“Why don’t I do the crib sheets while you stay in your apartment with the baby?” Devlin suggested instead. “Don’t look so shocked. I mastered the use of washers and dryers years ago from sheer necessity.”
He could tell that she didn’t want to accept any help at all from him. Though she kept her face poker-straight, her eyes were expressive, revealing her internal struggle. Gillian needed his assistance, and she hated that she did. She desperately wanted to say no—but the baby had to have clean, dry crib sheets.
Her maternal instincts won out. “Okay, you can do the crib sheets,” Gillian said grudgingly.
“Thank you, gracious lady,” quipped Devlin. “Doing laundry for you is both a privilege and a dream come true.”
Gillian fought a smile because she knew he was trying to make her smile and she didn’t want to grant him even that small victory. “I’ll get you some quarters,” she said repressively.
Devlin told her not to bother, that he could afford to feed the machines with his own quarters, but Gillian was insistent. She did not want to be beholden to him in any way, not even for a few quarters.
Ninety minutes later Dev carried the seven freshly laundered crib sheets to Gillian’s apartment. Inside, he could hear the baby howling at the top of her lungs and when Gillian opened the door, she looked tired and frazzled and on the verge of tears herself She held the flush-faced, shrieking Ashley in her arms.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with her,” Gillian blurted, too desperate and worried to exert her usual control. “I know she’s getting a tooth—see, right here, her top left incisor—but she never had trouble when her four front teeth came in.”
“Incisors can be tough to cut.” Devlin recalled that fact from a long-ago child development class during his med school pediatric rotation. He rubbed his finger over the swollen bud in the baby’s mouth. Ashley tried to chomp down on his finger. “Have you tried rubbing ice on her gum?”
“Yes. My foster mother suggested whiskey, but I didn’t have any so I tried some of Carmen’s cold beer. Nothing’s given her any relief.”
Devlin frowned thoughtfully. “Why don’t I get my bag? I’d like to check her ears.”
“She hasn’t been tugging at her ears and her nose isn’t stuffy,” Gillian replied quickly. “And she doesn’t feel feverish.”
“Ear infections in babies can be tricky. Sometimes they don’t touch their ears or even seem congested. If Ashley has a fever, it’s only a slight one, a degree or two, but I’d still like to check...” He placed his hand on the baby’s head. Her dark curls were damp from perspiration. “I’ll go get my bag.”
He was back with his black medical bag before Gillian could protest. Not that she would have, not now. She wanted her child to be seen by a doctor, even if that doctor happened to be Devlin Brennan.
They sat together on the sofa, Ashley on Gillian’s lap, while Devlin checked the baby’s temperature with a thermometer that he slipped under her arm.
Gillian was trembling as she watched. “I didn’t think she was sick. I—I just thought she was fussy because of her tooth.” Tears stung her eyes. “Does she have a fever?”
“A low-grade one. One hundred point two.” Devlin. replaced the thermometer and took out an instrument to look in her ear. “I’m looking for bunny rabbits, Ashley,” he said as he turned on the light and cupped her head with his hand. “If I remember correctly, that’s standard pediatric lingo during ear exams,” he added dryly to Gillian.
“Her pediatrician says that same thing.” Gillian swallowed. “Except sometimes she’ll say puppy dogs.”
“Has Ashley had many ear infections?”
“A few.
Devlin nodded. “Okay. Let’s take a look at her ears.” He was Dr. Brennan now—“Any puppy dogs hiding in here, Ashley?” —resorting to standard pediatric lingo as he looked inside the baby’s ear.
Ashley screamed and wriggled and tried to get away “Oh. yeah.” Devlin took one more look as the baby continued to struggle. “The tympanic membrane is erythematous, all right.”
“What does that mean?” Gillian cried, horrified.
“Her ear is red,” Devlin translated, his smile slightly sheepish. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like an alarmist.”
“Poor Ashley! She’s sick and she’s been in pain and I...I—” Gillian broke off in a sob. “She seemed fine when I picked her up at the day care center this afternoon. She started crying after dinner and...and Mom said she was just exercising her lungs.”
Devlin smiled. “Those Doctor Moms have some interesting theories. Look, Gillian, you can’t blame yourself. Little kids get sick fast, and this isn’t serious yet I’ll write a prescription for amoxicillin—she doesn’t have a penicillin allergy, does she?”
“Not that I know of.”
“I’ll give her something for the fever and pain, too, so she can get some sleep. So you both can get some sleep,” he amended. “Make an appointment with your pediatrician for a follow-up visit, okay?”
Gillian redressed Ashley in her aqua footed pajamas. The baby clung to her, sniffling and casting an occasional glare at Devlin as he delved into his bag for his prescription pad.
“If looks could kill, I’d be on life support with the transplant team ready to claim my organs,” he remarked, catching one of Ashley’s particularly baleful glowers. “One of the main reasons why I hated my stint in pediatrics was that I didn’t like being universally loathed by all those sick little kids who screamed when they saw a white coat coming.”
Gillian paced the room with Ashley in her arms. “The medicine.” She caught her lower lip between her teeth. “I—I’ll have to take Ashley with me to pick it up at the drugstore.”
Devlin stood up. “I think that’s as close as you’ll come to asking me to go get it for you, isn’t it?”
She didn’t meet his eyes. He was right, of course. She couldn’t bring herself to ask him, though she wanted him, needed him, to do it.
Dev heaved an exasperated sigh. “Consider it done, Gillian.”
He strode from the apartment and was back within half an hour with a bag from the hospital pharmacy. Ashley did not like the bubblegum-thick liquid medicine and promptly spit it out when her mother gave it to her.
“Time for me to show off one of the little tricks a warhorse of a pediatric nurse once showed me. Try this.” Devlin held Ashley’s small jaws open and funneled the medicine down her throat. He was nimble and swift, and the startled baby swallowed the dose before she could erupt in a howl of protest.
“You’re really good at that.” Gillian was impressed by his dexterity.
“Ashley was co-operating, weren’t you, sugar?” He patted the baby’s belly. Ashley eyed him suspiciously, then turned to her mother for comfort. Devlin watched Gillian cuddle the child close. “If you think she hated the amoxicillin, just wait till we try to get the ear drops into her. No self-respecting kid likes drops of any kind.”
Ashley proved herself to be a self-respecting kid by attempting to ward off the ear drops, turning her head from side to side and flailing her arms and legs while shrieking her protests. But it was two adults against one small, albeit enraged baby, and her parents prevailed.
After another dose of liquid medicine