much in common?
“Are You trying to tell me something here, Lord?” she asked softly. Is this my true calling, then? she went on in silence. Am I made to nurse fractious, unreasonable men? Or am I missing something?
She wanted to help. She truly did. She wanted to help her father, and she wanted to help Stephen Gallow.
“Show me, Lord,” she whispered. “Please show me what to do.”
Chapter Five
As much as he disliked her being away from his side, Stephen had to admit that Kaylie proved as good as her word. She arrived back at Chatam House just after noon and brought up his lunch. Despite his nap, however, she wisely judged him too weak to make the trek back into the sitting room. She was right. He felt like a limp dishcloth; much as it grated, he dined in bed after only a token argument.
Later, she helped him clean up somewhat and change into fresh clothing, but he simply did not have the energy to shave. She decided to forego wrapping his ribs for the time being. For one thing, he wasn’t likely to be doing much more moving around today. For another, his incisions were still sore to the touch. Eventually she dosed him with painkiller that he did not want but desperately needed. After disappearing into the bowels of the house with his lunch tray, she must have left again a short time later, for she was gone when he awakened in just over two hours.
Her aunts popped in and out during the afternoon, thankfully one at a time and sans tea tray. Stephen found them surprisingly entertaining.
Hypatia was the first. Graceful and slight, she put him in mind of the beloved queen of the Netherlands, Beatrix. She seemed to simply appear in the chamber, giving Stephen something of a start. He looked up from playing a game on his phone and there, without warning, she stood. Almost terrifyingly proper, she had him actually speaking in perfect syntax during their brief interview, as if he expected to be graded on his grammar. It didn’t take long for him to realize that Hypatia reigned as the undisputed authority at Chatam House.
He was bored enough to have picked up a book when Magnolia clumped in bearing two vases of flowers, one of which she left atop the dresser in his bedroom. The other stayed in the sitting room. Frumpy and a tad on the stocky side, she seemed more than a little suspicious, sniffing the air as if checking for gas leaks. When he politely asked about the flowers, however, she eagerly told him more than he’d ever wanted to know about the various blossoms. How could he not describe the incredible tulip fields of Holland and the massive international flower market in Amsterdam for her? Afterward, to his disgust, he drifted off to sleep again, despite becoming surprisingly but thoroughly engrossed in a mystery novel with a floral theme, of all things.
Odelia woke him when she brought up his dinner, a succulent baked chicken breast and yams, with asparagus and pickled beets. Kaylie sailed in while they were trying to get situated and took over, allowing Odelia to leave in a flutter of lace and daffodils. Stephen gobbled down everything, including the beets, relieved to find his appetite strong and ridiculously glad to see Kaylie with her sweet smile and her hair windblown, tendrils escaping her ponytail to waft about her face. She admired the flower arrangements and teased him about Magnolia taking a liking to him. Frightening thought.
She helped him take care of his personal needs then stayed to hold a small mirror while he used the electric razor that Aaron had supplied him at the hospital. She asked questions about the book he was reading and surprised him by saying that she would have to take a look at it herself once he had finished with it. Then she made him comfortable, administering his meds and straightening his bed with brisk, easy, efficient motions. Her placid smile remained fixed but somewhat impersonal.
That irked him for some reason, and the fact that he could not bully himself into staying awake long enough even to check the scores of the night’s hockey games did not help. As the drug and his own exhaustion pulled him under, he thought unhappily that he should be playing tonight and instead may have tanked his career. To add insult to injury, his pretty little nurse apparently did not like him. God clearly felt