Chapter Two
The shrill bleeping of her pager cut through Amanda’s concentration with an eardrum-piercing volume. Darn thing drove her bonkers. With a huff, she saved and closed the note she’d been working on and drew the pager from the pocket of her scrub pants.
She groaned as Dr. John Michaels’ number flashed on the screen. Amanda bit back a groan and picked up the phone. For the past five years, she’d worked closely with Dr. Michaels, who was the medical director of the intensive care unit, and about a year ago his interest in her changed from strictly professional to romantic. She’d had a crush on the handsome doctor since the first time she’d met him and jumped right into an exclusive relationship.
The first three months were great. John was charming, attentive, fun, and she’d really thought she’d found something that could go the distance. Things began to change over the next month, spawned by him witnessing another colleague, Mark, asking Amanda for a date. She’d declined with a polite smile and explanation that she was taken, but John wasn’t satisfied with that. He’d railed at her for hours about how her friendly nature could be misconstrued as flirting. What was she supposed to do? Give all her male coworkers the cold shoulder? It was the first red flag she’d ignored.
The second came a few days later when Mark’s tires were slashed in the parking lot of the hospital. There was never any proof that John had done it, and he’d even convinced Mark it wasn’t him, but Amanda’s gut told her otherwise. And she trusted her instincts.
From there, he seemed to grow more possessive by the day. He never crossed the line into abusive, but after just six months of dating, Amanda couldn’t take it anymore. He called or texted so many times throughout the day, it was making her crazy. She didn’t owe him any explanations about how she spent her time or who she associated with.
She’d broken things off and he’d reacted like a child, calling her a slew of insulting names and insinuating she’d slept her way through the hospital. In reality, she’d had a strict no dating coworkers policy until she met him. That and he was only the third man she’d ever been with. Not that he believed her. Sick of his nonsense, she’d made it clear a cordial working relationship was the only one they’d have moving forward.
In the month since then, she hadn’t regained her footing when working with him and she’d avoided him whenever possible.
But she was the lone physical therapist on call that weekend, which meant any consults would go to her. After two rings, the charge nurse in the ICU answered the phone. “Hi, Cindy, it’s Amanda with PT. I’m returning a page from Dr. Michaels.”
“Oh, hey, Amanda. He was here two seconds ago but got called away to answer some questions for a patient’s family. He asked me to see if you could come down here. There’s a patient in bed five he wants you to start working with tomorrow and I think he wanted to discuss some things with you first.”
“Be there in three minutes,” she said as she ended the call. Ugh. Now she’d have to go talk to him in person. “Might as well get it over with, girl,” she muttered to herself as she stood and headed toward the stairwell. With as many wards as she rotated through in a normal day, waiting for the elevator got old very fast. Plus, taking the stairs all day long helped keep her rear end from getting flabby. Or so she told herself on days she was too lazy to hit the gym.
Amanda waved her badge in front of the wall panel granting her access to the locked ICU and entered the quiet area that held the most critically ill patients. Not that they ever got cases that were overly intense. The hospital was a small community medical center. Any kind of major trauma was airlifted to one of the trauma centers over an hour away.
Dr. Michaels was nowhere to be seen, so she made her way to bed five. Might as well peek in on the new patient she’d be evaluating the following day. She popped her head into the room and was greeted by the familiar sounds of a ventilator breathing for the sedated man in the bed. She’d been at this for so many years now, it was easy to look at a patient with a clinical eye and leave her emotions out of the equation. Yet, as she trailed her focus up to his face, she couldn’t help the gasp that left her lips.
“Pretty shocking, isn’t it?” Dr. Michaels’ voice behind her made her jump.
“Um, yeah. It really is. Not what I was expecting.” For the moment, the awkwardness with the physician was forgotten as she took in the sight of the injured man before her. He had to have been beaten. One of the worst she’d ever seen, and she’d worked in a few trauma centers during her schooling.
His face was mottled with a grotesque palate of purple and green bruises, almost to the point that none of his white skin was visible. A tube ran from the front of his neck to the ventilator next to his bed. If she had to guess, without knowing anything about him, she’d say the facial swelling had blocked his airway making breathing through his mouth and nose impossible. A tracheostomy tube had been placed to bypass the normal breathing route and allow the patient to breath…and survive.
“What happened to him?” she asked.
John was indeed a handsome man, she had to give him that much. Sandy blond hair, green eyes, wide shoulders, movie star good looks. Not her typical type, but still very attractive.
Unfortunately, she tended to be drawn to darker guys, both in coloring and in temperament. Dark hair, dark eyes, and as her roommate liked to tease, dark pasts. But those men weren’t good for her, so she steered clear, making her dating history a sad and short story. John had been her shot at a stable relationship with a man who had it all together. And that had sure blown up in her face. Now what kind of man was she supposed to look for? The bad boys were off limits and it turned out the good ones could screw her over as well.
With a heavy sigh, John entered the room and stared at the telemetry monitor, keeping track of the patient’s status round the clock. “We’re not entirely sure. I mean, we know his injuries, but not how they came about. Hell, we don’t even know his name. He was found without any identification and no one has called or made any inquiries about a missing person.”
He bent over the patient and pressed his stethoscope against the man’s chest. John was interacting with her as though they had no messy history. As though she was nothing more than a respected coworker. Just as she’d demanded. Maybe this could work. Maybe they could maintain a professional relationship and she could stop avoiding him at all costs.
“Anyway,” he said as he straightened and faced her, “we’ve been weaning him off the vent and tomorrow we’re planning to discontinue it and stop the sedation. Now that most of the swelling in his airway has receded he’s been breathing surprisingly well. He has some facial fractures and three bullet wounds. One in the thigh that hit his femur. Another in his shoulder which luckily only did soft tissue damage and another in his right side. That’s the one that should have killed him. One inch over and it would have. A few of his ribs are broken and he has more bruised skin than not. He also had a brain bleed which required surgery but is now stable. He’ll be looking and feeling rough for quite a while, but he’s damn lucky to be alive.”
Geez. The man was a mess. Exactly the type of patient she loved to work with, but not one that was typically admitted to that hospital. Amanda only worked there on the occasional weekend, for extra cash. Her primary job was at a rehab hospital about forty-five minutes away. She was used to this level of injury, but this hospital wasn’t. “Shouldn’t he be at a trauma center?”
Dr. Michaels shot her a nasty look and she took a step back. It wasn’t a look she’d received from him before. Granted, it did sound like she was questioning his medical judgment, but, truth of the matter was, John Doe probably needed to be in the trauma center. They just had more experience with critically injured patients.
“Are you questioning my ability to properly care for this patient?” John asked, his voice cold.
Ugh, someone save her from the fragile male ego and its ability to bruise like a peach. “Of course not. I was just surprised to see him because we don’t typically admit patients with this level of injury here.” She chose her words carefully. If she played it right, she could end this conversation, finish her two notes and be out of the hospital within the next half hour. Very important because she had a date with her roommate, a bottle of wine, and some cookie dough ice cream to catch up on their favorite trashy television shows they’d missed during the week. Wild Saturday night. A long dramatic encounter with Dr. Michaels would only delay her fun.
He stared at her for a moment, through a narrowed gaze. Whatever he was looking for, he must have found, because he nodded and walked toward her. “You working tomorrow?” he asked when he was only a few inches away.
Amanda swallowed and fought to remain still. He was so close, his breath wafted across her face and a tingle of discomfort skirted up her spine. Whether it was an intimidation tactic or an excuse to just be near her, she couldn’t figure out. Either way, the invasion of her personal space was unwelcome, but she refused to back away like a scared kitten. “Yes, it’s my Sunday on. I’ll be the one to evaluate him.”
“Good. You’re the most qualified to work with this type of patient.”
The compliment was surprising given the strain of their past few interactions. Thank God she didn’t have to see him every day. Maybe the compliment was his manly way of issuing an apology. Which she’d accept. She’d never go out with him again socially, that was for darn sure, but they could have a successful professional working relationship.
“Thank you, Doctor. Have a good evening.” Even when they’d been dating, she’d never referred to him as John at the hospital.
He nodded and left the room, slipping right into the room next door. Tough job, being medical director of the ICU. Not one she envied, seeing as how she’d be out of there by five and John probably had hours to go before he could take off for the evening.
She lingered for a few more minutes, taking in the outrageous sight of the injured man. What kind of life did someone have to live to put themselves in the position to receive such a brutal beating and multiple gunshot wounds? Was it a random act of senseless violence, or did this man live a dangerous existence?
No matter. Those weren’t questions she needed to have answered in order to treat the man. Her gaze landed on his distorted face. What had he looked like before this tragedy? Was he an attractive man?
She shook off the uncharacteristic thoughts and wandered into the hallway. Just another patient in a long line of them. No one to become personally interested in, and his looks had nothing to do with her job. She’d be out of there in a few minutes and it was always wise to leave the patients’ sad stories at work. Burnout was just around the corner for those who brought each trying case home with them.
An hour later, Amanda opened the door to the lake house she shared with her best friend, Katherine. “Honey! I’m home!” she called out their usual joke as she locked the door.
“How was your day, dear?” Kat yelled from the kitchen.
Amanda snickered. They’d been friends since the first day of kindergarten and had moved in together about six months ago. The silly married couple routine had become their standard post-work greeting and never failed to amuse them both.
“It was fine.” Amanda toed off her shoes, stripped off her scrub top, and dropped it on the bottom step of the staircase leading to the three second-floor bedrooms. Clad in a tank top, her scrub pants, and socks, she padded to the kitchen.
“Any run-ins with Dr. Douche?” Kat had christened him with the moniker after hearing all about his outbursts.
Amanda laughed. “Actually, yes, and he was fairly nice if you can believe it. Even gave me a compliment.”
“Well, look at that. Maybe whatever large object was shoved up his ass these past few months finally came out.”
“Ha, let’s hope. What’s all this?” Amanda waved her hand over the piles of newspaper clippings, printed articles and file folders littering their kitchen table.
Kat’s hazel eyes sparkled with excitement. “This is it, Mandy. My big break. For real this time.”
Amanda had to glance away from Kat’s radiant face. Every six months or so, Kat discovered it, the big story that was going to catapult her from her obscenely early spot on a small-time local morning news show to world renowned investigative journalist. Each it lasted a few weeks, until Kat either realized she’d bitten off more than she could chew and the project was more dangerous than she’d realized, the story was broken by someone else, or it just fizzled out.
Whatever this new scheme was, it would undoubtedly end the same, but Amanda never voiced that opinion. Bringing Kat back to reality wasn’t her job as the best friend. Despite her skepticism, her role was to smile, ask for details, and encourage Kat in her dreams. Then be there with wine, chocolate, and tissues when it all blew up in her overly ambitious friend’s face. Kat had a few solid ideas recently, but really wanted to break a story that would shock people, so she tended to run with the more grandiose thoughts. “Let me get myself a glass of wine and you can tell me all about it.”
After she poured a healthy glass of merlot, she dropped to the one chair that wasn’t piled high with papers. “Okay, girl, lay it on me.”
Kat squealed and pulled a pen out of the giant messy bun piled high on her head. Her hair was a fiery auburn color that looked fantastic with her creamy complexion. If Kat had her choice, and enough money, she’d dye it a different color each week and branch into more exotic purples and blues, but being that she had a job in the public eye, she kept the changes to every few months and more mainstream hair colors.
“Outlaw motorcycle clubs,” Kat said holding up a newspaper from a town a few hours away with picture of some seriously tough looking dudes standing next to a line of motorcycles.
“Outlaw motorcycle clubs? What does that even mean? Are we talking Sons of Anarchy type of thing?” Amanda took a sip of her wine and leaned back in her chair. If she didn’t have to work tomorrow, she’d make it a few glasses and really unwind. But as it was, patient care with a hangover was not a fun experience.
Kat nodded. “Kinda, but not the romanticized made-for-TV version with hot sexy men and fake blood. I’m talking real-life gun smuggling, drug trafficking, prostitute pimping, woman abusing assholes who never manage to be brought to justice because they are slippery as eels and have half the police force taking bribes. I’m talking really bad men who—hey, don’t give me that look!”
“What look?”
Kat rose from the table and braced her hands on her hips, the newspaper she still held crinkling against her oversized T-shirt. “That disapproving parent look.”
Amanda couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing, earning a deep scowl from Kat. “I’m pretty sure I’m about as far from being a parent as one can get considering it doesn’t look like I have any chance of getting laid ever again.”
Kat snatched Amanda’s wineglass off the table and stole a giant sip. “Don’t be so damned dramatic. You’ll find another man. And do not change the subject, missy. I’m asking you to not look at me like you want to give me a scolding. Like you think I’m crazy.”
She was a little crazy, but Amanda would never admit it out loud. “I’m just concerned for you, Kat. What are you going to do? Take down some dangerous gang that the police can’t even control? Make all their illegal secrets public?”
“First off, it’s club, not gang. Apparently, they can be a bit sensitive about being called a gang.”
“Potato, pototo. Don’t play the semantics game with me and think I’m too stupid to realize you’re trying to distract me. This sounds like it could get really dangerous, Kat. What are you going to do? Dress as some biker chick and infiltrate a dangerous biker gang with your notebook and tape recorder?”
Kat scowled.
“Club, sorry, biker club.”
A sheepish smile crossed Kat’s face. That’s exactly what she’d been planning. Jesus. Amanda drained the last of her glass. Her ovaries may be drying up, but with Kat around, she did feel like a parent more often than not.
“Look, Mandy, I’m not stupid. I’m not just gonna waltz in there uninformed and vulnerable. I’m planning on doing extensive research and setting myself up for success as well as ensuring my safety. And, no, Mom, I don’t have it all planned out yet, but there’s no rush. Hell, if it takes me two years of preparation, I’m willing to put the time in.”
Amanda opened her mouth but Kat shook her head and held up a hand.
“I can’t do this forever, Mandy. How much longer can I work on a crappy, small-time news show that airs at four in the morning with approximately three viewers before I feel like a complete failure? I’ll wither away. Lose my fire. This isn’t what I want for my life.” Tears filled her eyes.
Oh, hell. After being through this so many times, Amanda had learned there was no talking Kat down from one of her wild hairs. She had to learn the hard way. Each and every time. Hopefully this wouldn’t be the time that broke her.
She had to admit, the idea had merit. Sons of Anarchy, while maybe a romanticized version, brought the idea of motorcycle clubs into the public. People most likely would be interested in a story about a real-life MC. She just hoped it wouldn’t come at the expense of Kat’s safety.
With a sigh, Amanda rose and hugged her friend. “Sorry, hon. I don’t mean to poop all over your idea. I just want you to be safe. You’re my soul sister. I’d be lost without you, girl.”
Kat sniffed and returned the embrace. “It will all work out, Mandy. You’ll see. I’ll make you proud, sister. Besides, how bad can they really be if the police and Feds can’t get a single thing to hold over their heads?”
With a final squeeze, Amanda drew back. Hopefully Kat never found out the answer to that question.