She remembered him after their breakup—how angry he had been, how devastated. She was a simple night’s mistake compared to Kate, whose loss had almost destroyed him.
Six weeks later …
CHLOE STOOD FROM her chair and felt a familiar wave of nausea and dizziness encompass her. She steadied herself before considering moving again. If she had thought things couldn’t get worse, she had been wrong. Her relationship with Tate remained unchanged. She had made attempts to talk to him but it was clear he was avoiding her. The hope that every day she would feel better, less rejected, was long since gone and every day she felt worse.
She needed to finish with her last patient and go home. The symptoms which she had originally attributed to heartbreak had become unremitting, and it was getting harder and harder to function. Ironically, the last patient of the evening emergency shift was feeling the same. An “LOL” in distress: a “little old lady” presenting with feelings of weakness and dizziness.
These patients were always complex, taking a lot of time and attention to detail in order to rule out conditions that could cause the patient serious harm, and most commonly nothing was found. In this case Chloe had managed to work out a cause and had reduced her blood pressure medications. If only her own case was that simple.
“Are you okay?”
A voice cut through her thoughts. She turned too quickly and immediately regretted the action, feeling her heart beat overtime to maintain her balance and remain standing on her feet.
Her attending physician, Dr. Ryan Callum, was staring at her intently and Chloe was grateful that it was him. He was seven years older than her and had completed a decorated military career as a trauma specialist before starting practice at Boston General. He was very attractive, with an athletic frame, a rare combination of brown hair and blue eyes, and a collection of scars and military tattoos that completed the package and led to him being sought after by the entire nursing staff. To Chloe, he was a trusted friend and mentor.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re lying.” He wasn’t angry, but he was making it clear he did not believe her.
“Yes, but you are a good enough friend not to push the issue.”
He reluctantly nodded his agreement and Chloe relaxed. She didn’t have the energy to pretend right now as she rubbed her aching shoulders.
“You would tell me if you needed something, right?”
She looked at her friend and a little bit of her misery and pity lifted. She might not have love, but she had amazing friends who would do anything for her. If only she knew how she could be fixed.
“Yes, I would.”
“Okay, then, go home. You look like hell.”
“Thanks, I will.”
Chloe discharged her patient and made her way to the women’s locker room, located within the emergency department. Her head throbbed, and pushing open the door took the last effort she had inside her. Between the rows of lockers was a bench and she’d stepped toward it, planning to rest, when a sharp pain in the right lower quadrant of her abdomen overtook her. The pain was so severe that she didn’t feel the impact as her body hit the floor. She tried to call for help but didn’t get the words out before curtains of black entered her vision.
Someone was screaming, but it wasn’t her. Everything was muted as she struggled to see and hear what was going on around her. She felt herself being picked up and carried by a pair of strong arms.
“Tate,” she whimpered as the pain gripped her again.
“No, Chloe, it’s Ryan.”
Disappointment filled her before she lost consciousness again.
Tate scanned the operating room slate for the night’s booked cases. The locked doors to the secure unit opened and a porter entered, carrying a sealed box from the blood bank. The unit clerk who had been assisting him shifted her attention from him. “Is that the blood for Theater Seven?”
“Yes, it’s the second four units of packed cells and two units of fresh frozen plasma matched for a Chloe Darcy—D-A-R-C-Y. Date of birth: March twentieth, 1983. Blood bank number: 4089213.”
“Perfect. You can leave it there and I’ll take it back to the room.”
Tate’s body had frozen at the sound of her name and his eyes landed on the box, confirming everything he had heard. The box was labeled just as the porter had read—for Chloe. He replayed the exchange. This was the second four units, which meant Chloe was in serious trouble.
“I’m already changed. I’ll take it in,” he told the unit clerk as he picked up the box and made his way toward Theater Seven without waiting for her response. It was ironic that for the first time in the operating room he felt fear. Never had he felt that when working, but right now he was helpless. It was a novel and terrifying feeling all at once.
He fastened a mask across his face and paused at the window in the door. There were two anesthetists at the head of the bed and the patient was surrounded, but he couldn’t tell by whom. On the operating room floor a collection of bloody sponges lay soaked through and counted off. He could see the suction canisters that were filled with over two liters of blood. Was it Chloe’s blood? It looked like a scene from a trauma case, and he couldn’t comprehend that Chloe lay in the center of it.
He walked into the room, his confusion growing as he identified members of the gynecology team as the operating surgeons. At the same time his eyes glimpsed the trademark red hair that flowed from the top of the operating table. It was definitely her.
He handed the box to the circulating nurse. “Do you need help?” He directed the question toward the team, needing to do something.
“You need to leave, Dr. Reed.”
The voice came from the gowned surgeon in the hibiscus-blue cloth scrub hat. He narrowed his focus on her and through the confusion surrounding the case was able to identify Erin Madden, chief gynecology resident. Her voice and hat identified her without her needing to look away from the operative field. He had known Erin casually for years, and more so in the past two through her friendship with Kate and Chloe, but even so he wasn’t in the mood to be told what to do. He normally encouraged resident autonomy, but not today—not when it involved Chloe.
“Dr. Thomas?” He addressed the staff surgeon whose back was to him.
“Dr. Madden is right. This is not a vascular case, Tate. We are going to have to ask you to leave.”
He looked around the room once more, noticing the discomfort of the nursing and other teams. It felt like a betrayal from the people he worked with day in and day out, but on the other hand he knew enough to know that he had become a distraction—one that Chloe couldn’t afford.
“Okay.” And he left, going as far away from her as he could handle being, which was right outside the operating theater doors.
His mind raced with possibilities? What the hell had happened to Chloe? How did a healthy young woman end up in a critical condition without warning? And why the hell was gynecology in there?
A previously unimaginable explanation filled and settled into his mind. He watched, his eyes oscillating between the anesthesia monitors tracking Chloe’s vitals and the actions of the surgical team.
“Tate.” He heard Kate’s familiar voice and felt a hand