A Match Made in Texas- By Arlene James Page 0,37
of day,” Leland said with a wink, one arm draped casually about Kaylie’s shoulders.
“You wish,” Philem smirked, as Kaylie, to Stephen’s disgruntlement, laughed and reached out to slide her free arm around the young surgeon’s waist so that the three of them stood linked.
Both shorter and thicker than Leland, with receding sandy brown hair, the orthopedist was, nevertheless, an attractive man. His eyes alone commanded attention, being a bright, intense blue. Stephen glumly supposed that some women might find those dimples adorable, too.
Kaylie said something clever and chummy, no doubt, but Stephen tuned it out, wondering sourly if she was on hugging terms with every doctor in the hospital. Targeting the two physicians, he decided that it was past time to get down to business.
“If you two are through pawing my nurse, I’d like to get out of here.”
“Great!” Philem exclaimed. “How does tomorrow morning sound?”
“Right now sounds better.”
“Not happening, champ,” Leland said, strolling forward and lifting his stethoscope from around his neck. “Maybe if this was the first or only broken bone we had to worry about…As it is, though, I have to agree with Dr. Philem.” Waving Stephen into silence, he popped in the earpieces of his stethoscope and slipped the bell beneath Stephen’s T-shirt. After several seconds, he motioned Stephen forward, shifted and listened to his back. “Lungs are clear,” he finally announced.
Philem stepped up, lifted the bedcovers and checked the color of Stephen’s toes. “How’s your pain level?”
“Eh,” Stephen said with an unconcerned shrug of one shoulder.
Philem chuckled and glanced at Kaylie. “These hockey players are tough cookies. But seriously, is the leg bothering you?”
“Only when I move it,” Stephen said.
“It’ll get worse as the nerve block wears off,” Philem warned. “But we’ll do our best to get on top of it and stay there. Isn’t that so, Kaylie?”
“Yes, sir. I just have one concern,” she said, smiling at Stephen. “He’s been having nightmares.”
“Kaylie!” Stephen snapped, appalled.
“That’s why this happened,” she went on, ignoring him. “He broke the leg again when he fell out of the bed.” She shifted her gaze to Brooks, adding, “I suspect that’s what led to his rib injuries the other night, too.”
“Kaylie!” Stephen barked again.
“Is that right?” Leland asked him. Then, without waiting for an answer, he shook his head. “I should have picked up on that.”
“Those are some pretty violent nightmares,” Philem noted.
“What happened to my right to privacy?” Stephen demanded. To his surprise, Kaylie turned on him.
“What are you talking about? I haven’t breached any confidentiality. These are your doctors. They need to know how the drugs are affecting you.”
“The drugs?” Stephen echoed uncertainly.
“She’s right,” Leland agreed, consulting a PDA that he’d drawn from a pocket. He rattled off several familiar-sounding drug names. “In combination, any two of those can, in some cases, induce nightmares. In a small number of patients, one of them can even cause hallucinations.” He drew a prescription pad from a pocket, produced an ink pen and began to scribble. “Let’s change the anti-inflammatory and the oral analgesic.” After a few moments, he tore off the top sheet and handed it to Kaylie. “You can adjust the injections, too. May take a little tweaking, but I trust you to keep him comfortable without producing side effects.”
Kaylie slid the prescription into her own pocket and nodded at Stephen. “I’ll take care of him.”
“Lucky stiff,” Philem cracked. He launched into a series of instructions that Kaylie probably didn’t need to hear and Stephen ignored.
Instead, he watched her, the classical lines of her profile drawing him like a lodestone. He understood now what she’d meant yesterday when she had mentioned “taking care of” his nightmares. He understood, too, that she had become indispensable to his well-being. When he’d said earlier that he needed her, he hadn’t been exaggerating. Maybe he had been trying to schmooze her a bit, but the truth was that he didn’t see how he could do this without her now.
Truth be told, Philem was right. He was lucky to have found her, and every instinct he possessed dictated that he hold on to her, which was why he didn’t like watching these two white-coated mashers drool over her. Not that he was jealous or anything. It was just that, well, she was his nurse. That meant she was with him. Right? He was determined to make that clear to her at the first opportunity.
Her thoughtfulness and kindness touched and soothed him, and selfish as it might be, that was not something he meant to