Secrets of a Career Girl

‘I’m just going to lean you forward, John,’ Penny said, and listened again to her patient’s chest. The oxygen saturation machine was bleeping its alarm. Vanessa, another nurse, returned with John’s blood-gas results and it was confirmed to Penny that things were really grim. She had already paged the medics to come down urgently and was now considering putting out a crash call, because even though he hadn’t gone into cardiac arrest he was very close.

‘Give him another forty milligrams,’ Penny called out to Jasmine, though she wasn’t cross when Jasmine hesitated. ‘He’s a renal patient,’ Penny explained, ‘so he’ll need massive doses of diuretics.’

Still, Penny was concerned about the amount of medication she was having to give and was carefully checking the drug guide, wishing the medics would hurry up and get there. She had just decided to put out a crash call when Ethan approached.

‘Problem?’ Ethan asked, and Penny quickly brought him up to speed.

‘He’s not responding,’ Penny said. ‘And neither are the medics to their fast page. I’m going to call the crash team.’

‘Hold off for just a moment.’ Ethan scanned the drug sheet to see what had been given. He had just come from working a rotation in the major renal unit in a city hospital, so he was familiar with the drug doses required in a case like this and he quickly examined the patient. ‘He needs a large bolus.’

Ethan saw Penny’s face go bright red as he took over the patient’s care. ‘Penny, where I worked before …’ He didn’t really have time to explain things and he wasn’t about to compromise patient care by pandering to Penny’s fragile ego—she was spitting with rage, Ethan could see it. In fact, he was tempted to lick his finger and put it onto her flaming cheek just so that he could hear the hiss.

‘Go ahead,’ came Penny’s curt response, and she thrust the patient notes into his hands and walked off quickly.

‘Have we ordered a portable chest X-ray?’ he asked Jasmine.

‘It’s supposed to be on its way,’ Jasmine answered.

‘You’re going to be okay, sir.’ Ethan listened to his chest and considered calling the crash team himself.

He could see Jasmine was blushing too at her sister’s little outburst and was sorely tempted to ask Jasmine just what the hell her sister’s problem was, though of course Ethan knew. Well, he wasn’t just going to stand back, and if Penny didn’t like it, she’d better start getting used to it. Penny Masters was an absolute … Ethan kept the word in his head as he saw the fluid start to gush into the catheter bag. The patient’s oxygen saturations started to rise slowly. He was just ordering some more morphine when the radiographer arrived for the chest X-ray, along with a much calmer-looking Penny.

‘Thanks for that,’ she said, completely unable to look him in the eye. She had fled to her office, which had a small sink in it, and splashed her face with cold water and run her wrists under the tap. Penny would never have left the patient had Ethan not been there, but she had never had a hot flash so severe. She knew that Ethan was less than impressed, especially when, without a further word, he stalked off.

‘Are you okay?’ Jasmine checked as they waited outside while the patient was being X-rayed, Vanessa staying in with him.

‘Of course I’m not.’ Rarely for Penny, she was close to tears. ‘He thought I was cross at him for making suggestions and that I just walked off in a temper.’

He’d thought exactly that, Jasmine knew. She had seen the roll of his tongue in his cheek and the less than impressed rise of Ethan’s brows. ‘Penny, if people just knew—’

‘What?’ Penny interrupted. ‘Do you really think that I’m going to explain to him that I just had a hot flash?’

Penny was mortified—absolutely and completely mortified. The down-regulation medication to stop her own cycle was in full effect, and she had a splitting headache as well, another of the side effects. The headache she could deal with, but for a woman who was usually so able to keep things in check, the rip of heat that had seared through her face and the rapid flutter of her heart in her chest had felt appalling. She had hardly been able to breathe in there but she had absolutely no intention of telling Ethan Lewis why. ‘Do you really think that Neanderthal would be understanding?’

‘Neanderthal?’ Jasmine grinned in delight at her sister’s choice of word.

‘Just leave it,’ Penny snapped.

Ethan didn’t leave it, though.

Before heading for home, he passed her office, where Penny sat busily writing up her notes. She was sitting very straight, like some schoolmarm, Ethan thought as he knocked a couple of times on her open door.

In fact, it was rather like walking into the headmistress’s office as those cold blue eyes lifted to his and gave him a very stern stare.

‘What time are you on till?’ Ethan asked.

‘Midnight,’ Penny answered—she knew that he hadn’t just popped in for a chat.

‘How is Mr Douglas doing now?’

‘He’s a lot better, but the medics are still stabilising him and then he’ll be transferred so he can have his dialysis.’ She wished he would just leave; she really didn’t want to discuss what had taken place. ‘Thank you for your help with him.’

‘It didn’t feel very welcome.’ Ethan waited a moment, but Penny said nothing, just turned her attention back to her notes and, no, he would not just leave it. ‘What the hell happened back there, Penny?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘I think that you do,’ came Ethan’s swift retort. ‘If there is an issue then it’s time that we discussed it.’

‘There is no issue.’

Ethan begged to differ. She was the most difficult woman that he had ever met and he’d met a lot of women! Yes, she was a fantastic doctor. Ethan had no qualms there, and in fact he was quietly surprised, having seen her work, that she hadn’t been given the consultant’s position. He could well understand how angry she must be, but somehow they had to work together and if she was going to storm off every time he stepped in on a consultation, something had to be said. ‘We have to work together, Penny.’

‘I’m aware of that.’

‘Which means that at times we’ll disagree.’

‘I’m aware of that too.’ Her face was starting to burn again, but from embarrassment this time. ‘Look, thank you for stepping in with Mr Douglas, it was much appreciated. I’m not as familiar as I would like to be with renal patients so I’m very pleased that you were there. We do seem to have our wires crossed, though.’ She gave tight smile. ‘I wasn’t cross or upset.’ She saw his incredulous look.

‘You walked off.’

Penny said nothing, just stared at this huge, very masculine man. She didn’t know how to tell him and she didn’t really want to try, except her silence invited him to continue speaking.

‘I wasn’t trying to take over. You seem to have formed an opinion that I’m—’

‘Formed an opinion?’ Penny stopped him right there. ‘I’m actually a bit busy in my life right now. I haven’t had time to think, let alone form an opinion of you.’

His lips twitched almost into a smile at her not-too-subtle putdown. ‘Oh, but I think that you have,’ Ethan said, and there and then he took the gloves off. He’d tried niceness, he’d tried politeness, he’d accepted that the situation might be a little difficult for her, but at the end of the day Penny needed to get over it and accept that he had been given the job. ‘Do you know what, Penny? I’m starting to form an opinion of you, and your behaviour this afternoon is leading me to think it might be the right one.’

‘Whatever!’ Penny hadn’t got this far in her career on charm. To do her job you needed to be tough and she certainly wasn’t there to make friends. ‘You carry right on forming your opinion of me and, while you do, I’ll get back to my patients.’ Penny stood. ‘Or is there anything else you want to discuss?’

‘Nothing that won’t keep.’

She brushed past him and he was terribly tempted to catch her as she walked past, to turn her round and just have the row that was so clearly needed. Perhaps it was wiser to just let it go, Ethan thought, letting out a rare angry breath as he heard her heels clip down the corridor, but he turned at the sound of Lisa’s voice. ‘There he is.’

‘Kate?’ Ethan smiled when he saw that Lisa was with his sister, wondered, albeit briefly, what on earth she was doing at his workplace, and then properly read her face. ‘One of the kids …’

‘The kids are fine, Ethan.’ She took a breath and he knew what was coming. ‘It’s Phil—we need to get to the hospital.’ And still his brain tried to process things kindly. He waited for her to smile, to hold up crossed fingers and to say ‘this is it,’ that a heart had been found for their cousin, but she just looked at him. ‘Carl’s watching the kids. We need to hurry and get there.’

No, it would seem that Phil wasn’t going to get that heart.

Ethan was glad that Kate hadn’t told him by phone, realised that had he not stopped to talk to Penny he could have been sitting in his car, stuck on the packed Beach Road and finding out that Phil was about to die.

‘I’ll meet you there.’ He was already heading to his office to grab his car keys but Kate shook her head. She knew how close Ethan and Phil were.

‘I’ll drive.’

It was just as well that she did, because the rush-hour traffic didn’t care that there was somewhere they needed to be. Ethan could feel his temper building as they inched towards the hospital, could sense the mounting urgency, especially when his mother called to see how far away they were.

‘A couple of minutes,’ Ethan said.

‘Get here,’ came his mother’s response.

They were pulling into Melbourne Central and again Ethan was very glad that Kate had been driving. He was grateful that there was no competition in the grief stakes between him and his twin—she knew that he and Phil were like brothers. Kate dropped him off at the main entrance and then went to find a place to park the car as Ethan ran through the hospital building, desperate to get to his cousin in time, still holding a small flame of hope that something could yet be done.

It was extinguished even before he got to Phil’s room.

Because standing outside was Phil’s ex-wife, Gina, and unless he was dying she’d never be there otherwise. She’d be sitting outside in the canteen as she usually did when she brought Justin in to visit. It had been a wretched divorce and Phil’s parents hadn’t exactly been kind in their summing up of Gina—and not just behind her back. There had been some terrible arguments too.

‘Gina,’ he said, but she just flashed him a look that said he was a part of the Lewis family and could he please just stay back.

‘I’m here for Justin,’ Gina said, and Ethan nodded and went in the room. His eyes didn’t first go to Phil but to Justin. Ethan could see the bewilderment and fear on the little boy’s face as Vera and Jack, Phil’s parents, told him to be brave. Ethan felt his head tighten, wanted to tell them to stop, but then his eyes moved to the bed and to his cousin and there wasn’t even time to say to Phil all he wanted to.

It was all over by the time Kate arrived.

CHAPTER THREE

PENNY PARKED HER car and took a couple of moments to sort out her make-up and hair. She wondered, not for the first time, how she was going to get through this. It was eight a.m. and she had just come from having a blood test and vaginal ultrasound. If the results were as expected, she would be starting her injections this evening.

She collected her handbag and the little cool bag holding the medication and told herself that lots of women worked while they went through this.

And she told herself something else, something she had decided last night—at the very first opportunity she would apologise properly to Ethan. Penny had come up with a plan. She wouldn’t tell him everything, just explain to him that she was on some medication and that yesterday she hadn’t felt very well. If he probed, she might hint that it was a feminine issue.

Her lips twitched into a smile as she pictured Ethan’s reaction—that would soon silence him.

Walking towards Emergency, Penny saw a dark blue car pull up in the entrance bay, where the ambulances did, and she watched as a security guard walked towards it to warn the occupants that they couldn’t park there.

Except the woman wasn’t parking her car.

Instead, she was dropping Ethan Lewis off.

Penny tried not to look as they shared a brief embrace and then a thoroughly seedy-looking Ethan climbed out. He was unshaven and unkempt, dressed in yesterday’s rumpled scrubs. She tried to turn her attention away from him, but her gaze went straight to the car he had just come from. And it was then that Penny felt it—the red-hot poker that jabbed into her stomach as she glanced at the woman, a red-hot poker that temporarily nudged aside her loudly ticking biological clock. And at six minutes past eight and a few months later than most women at Peninsula Hospital, Penny realised that Ethan Lewis really was an incredibly sexy man and it wasn’t a hot flash that was causing her to blush as they walked into the department together.

‘Ethan.’ She tried to keep to the script she had planned. ‘I was wondering if I could speak to you about yesterday. I realise that I—’

‘Just leave it.’ He completely dismissed her, so much so that he strode ahead of her and into the male changing rooms.

Charming!

Ethan ignored her all day and Penny decided that she wasn’t about to try apologising again.

She took her lunch break in her office, waiting for the IVF nurse to ring, which she did right on time. Penny took a deep breath as she found out that, as expected, she was to start her injections that evening, which meant she needed to call Jasmine.

‘I’m on till six,’ Penny said. ‘I don’t think I’ll be able to get away early.’

‘Penny, when do you ever get away early? It’s not a problem, I’ll come and give it to you at work, but Jed won’t be home so I’ll have to bring Simon in.’

Penny grimaced. She did not want to make a fool of herself in front of her nephew as it would terrify him. Simon, like his mother, was very sensitive. Still, there was no choice.

There really wasn’t time to worry about her upcoming jab. The department was busy enough to keep her mind off it and she smiled when she saw her next patient, an eight-week-old named Daniel.

‘He’s had a bit of a cold,’ Laura, the mother, explained. ‘I took him to my doctor yesterday and he said that he didn’t have a temperature and his chest sounded fine. I’ve been putting drops up his nose to help with feeding,’ Laura continued. ‘But this afternoon I came in from putting out the washing and went to check on him and he was pale, really pale, and he’d been sick. I know he’s fine now …’

He seemed fine and Penny examined Daniel thoroughly, but apart from a cold and a low-grade temperature there was nothing remarkable to find.

‘Has he been coughing?’

‘A bit,’ Laura said, as Penny listened carefully to his chest, but apart from a couple of crackles it was clear.

Still, Penny was concerned and it did sound as if he might have had an apnoeic episode so she decided to ring the paediatricians, who were very busy on the ward.

‘They’re going to be a while,’ Penny explained to the mum. ‘I’m going to take some bloods and do some swabs, so hopefully we’ll have some results back by the time they get down here. And I’ll order a chest X-ray.’

To show that she wasn’t, in fact, too up herself to value Ethan’s opinion, late in the afternoon when she was concerned about the baby and the paediatricians weren’t anywhere around, instead of speaking with Mr Dean, Penny decided that she would ask Ethan.

He barely looked up from the form he was filling out when Penny asked if she could have a word.

‘Sure.’

‘I’ve got an eight-week-old I’m concerned about.’ He glanced up. ‘Mum found him very pale in his cot after his nap and he’d vomited, but he picked up well. He’s had a cold, struggling to feed, he’s a bit sniffly, just …’ She moved her hand to show she was wavering. ‘His chest is clear, and he’s got a small cough, which is unremarkable. I’ve done some swabs and some bloods.’

‘What did paeds say?’ Ethan asked.

‘They’ll come down when they can, but they’re busy and they’re going to be ages,’ Penny said. ‘Mum just wants to take him home now that he’s had the tests and wait to get the results, but I’m not sure.’

Ethan came and though he had been scowling at Penny, he was lovely with the mum. He carefully checked the infant, who was bright and alert and just hungry. Penny put some saline drops in his nose and they watched as the baby latched on and started to feed happily, but just as Ethan was about to go, Daniel spluttered and broke into a coughing fit. As he came off the breast Ethan took him and held him and Penny watched, the diagnosis becoming more and more evident as he broke into a prolonged paroxysmal cough and then struggled to inhale and then cough again. Ethan was holding him up and tapping his back as Penny turned on the suction, but thankfully it wasn’t needed.

‘He wasn’t doing that.’ Laura was beside herself, watching her son. ‘He’s just had a little cough.’

‘That might have been what happened this afternoon,’ Penny said, ‘when you found him in his cot.’ She had to explain to the mother that it would seem her baby had whooping cough.

‘He’s not making any noises, though.’

‘People, especially babies, don’t always, but he’s struggling to get air in during the coughing attack,’ Penny explained. ‘It’s not evident straight away but he’s moved into the coughing stage now.’ She looked at the baby Ethan was holding—he had stopped coughing and was again desperate to be fed. ‘I’m going to call the paediatricians …’

‘Can I feed him?’

‘I’ll watch him feed while you go and call Paeds,’ Ethan said to Penny, handing the crying baby back to his mum. ‘Wait one moment before you feed him.’ He stepped out with Penny. ‘He’s to be transferred. I know he seems fine at the moment but, given his age, he needs to be somewhere with PICU.’

‘I know.’ Penny nodded.

‘Can you get Lisa to come in and watch him feed? I’ll stay in for now.’

Penny nodded. The coughing episodes were scary at best and someone calm and experienced needed to be in with the mum to help deal with them. ‘I’ve never actually seen whooping cough,’ Penny said to Lisa.

‘I’ve had it,’ Lisa said. ‘Hundred-day cough they call it and I know why. Poor baby and poor mum having to watch him. I’ll go and relieve Ethan.’

Penny spoke again to the paediatrician and started the baby on antibiotics, but really there was no treatment that could stop the coughing attacks and, as Ethan had said, given his tender age, he really did need to be somewhere with paediatric intensive care facilities in case he suddenly deteriorated.

‘They’re going to come down and see him just as soon as they can,’ Penny said when Ethan came out. ‘I’ll go and let mum know.’

‘She’s in for a tough time,’ Ethan said. ‘Are you immunised?’

‘All up to date,’ Penny said, because though she was terrified of injections, before embarking on IVF she had made herself get all her immunisations up to date and poor Jasmine had been the one who’d had to do them. Still, it was worth it, Penny realised, for days such as this.

‘Right.’ Ethan glanced at his watch. ‘I’m going home.’

‘See you tomorrow,’ Penny said, but Ethan shook his head.

‘I’m on days off now.’

‘Enjoy them.’

He didn’t answer. In fact, since her attempt to apologise, unless it was about a patient, Ethan had said nothing at all to her and she felt like poking her tongue out at his back as he and his bad mood walked off together.

Maybe it was just as well he was on days off. Hopefully by the time he was back they could put yesterday’s incident behind them and start again.

And she’d hopefully be finished with the hot flashes by then.

As predicted, there wasn’t a hope of her getting away at six, but when it neared, Penny told Lisa she was taking a short break and, seeing Jasmine walking down the corridor with Simon in his stroller, the moment she had been silently dreading all day was finally here.

‘I don’t want Simon seeing me upset.’ Penny was starting to panic. ‘It could make him as terrified of needles as I am.’

‘There’ll be someone in the staffroom who can watch him for five minutes,’ Jasmine said. ‘You go on and get everything ready and I’ll come in.’ They both knew it wasn’t a question of Penny being brave because her nephew was there—it was the one thing, apart from her fertility, that Penny couldn’t control, and her response to injections was varied and unpredictable.

‘Vanessa’s watching him,’ Jasmine said when she came into the office a few minutes later.

‘I don’t know if I can do this again,’ Penny said. Her hand was shaking as she checked the doses the IVF nurse had given her.

‘In a couple of moments you’ll be one evening down.’

‘With God knows how many more to go,’ Penny said. She took a deep breath and undid her skirt. ‘Just do it.’

She closed her eyes but could not stop shaking as Jasmine walked over. She had hoped so much that things would be different this time, but she was crying again, just as she had that morning at her blood test, and she was very glad that Simon wasn’t there to see his aunt make an absolute fool of herself.

‘It’s done.’ Jasmine massaged in the medication. ‘You’re done for the day.’

‘It’s ridiculous,’ Penny whimpered. ‘I’ve given so many injections today, I’ve taken blood from an eight-week-old …’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Jasmine said. ‘You’re actually better than you used to be.’

‘Really?’

‘A bit,’ Jasmine lied. ‘How are the hot flashes?’

‘Only two today.’

‘How’s Ethan been?’ Jasmine asked as Penny tucked herself in.

‘Horrible,’ Penny said. ‘He’s still sulking about yesterday. I tried to apologise but he wasn’t having any of it. There’s not much more that I can do.’

But even if she shrugged it off to her sister, Penny was rattled because, yes, she had wanted to put it behind them, had wanted to start again, and, no, she didn’t want to but she felt the tiniest bit attracted to him.

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