The Best Of The Year - Medical Romance

Mira skied faster, taking a group of moguls in her stride as she stayed the course.

She glanced at her watch, keeping track of time as she knew oxygen deprivation caused by suffocation was a very real concern for avalanche victims, although the cold was one thing in their favor in that respect.

Two minutes. One more off-piste and she’d be there.

She took a deep breath as she ventured off the groomed slopes and onto the rugged terrain that separated her from her patients. This was one of the most challenging off-piste sections on the resort, and she’d only attempted it a couple of times. It was also one of the reasons she’d insisted that Jack not follow her across. She couldn’t concentrate on getting to where she needed to be if she had to rescue Jack from a bad spill or crash.

She bypassed one tree, only to whizz past another so close that a branch caught at the sleeve of her jacket. She had to jerk her arm free to avoid being dragged sideways and off her feet. The sound of ripping fabric told her it had worked.

A few more yards of bumps and swerves as she made her way across, and then she came out of it, sailing onto the much smoother section to her left. The slope was steep and slick and it still took most of her concentration to navigate around unstable clumps of snow. Keeping her gaze focused on where she’d seen the small group of people go down, she sliced to a halt when her skis bogged down in a thicker drift. A few skiers had made it back up and were out of their skis, poking their poles into the snow. One person was digging about ten yards away.

“Found someone here,” said the man closest to her.

Mira clicked out of her skis and slogged several yards in snow up to her thighs before dropping to her knees beside the man.

“Try to uncover the face first,” she directed.

She immediately joined in scooping snow, hitting a jacket a few inches down. A black zipper ran down the middle of it. Thank God the person wasn’t face down. They quickly worked their way up and found a young woman. Mira leaned down to feel her pulse and listen for signs of breathing.

There! A gasped breath and the flicker of eyelids.

“Can you stay here and uncover her as much as possible? Don’t move her at all, though. I’m going to see if I can help some of the others.”

Robert and Jack arrived within seconds of each other, and while Robert sent the other man an angry glare he didn’t question his right to be there. He’d probably already heard that Jack was a doctor. And judging from the snide comment he’d lobbed at him on the way down the slope, her ex had overheard her and Ellory’s conversation in the bar and knew about that stupid resolution of hers.

No time to worry about any of that right now. They had to get these people out of the snow. And fast. “Robert, I saw at least two others go down about twenty yards to your left.”

“Right.” Her ex headed toward to the spot.

“Help!” yelled someone to her right. “I found someone, but he’s not breathing.”

Suffocation and crush injuries were their biggest worries right now, although the last person she’d found had been closer to the surface than she’d expected.

Jack motioned to her. “I’ll get it, you keep looking.”

Waiting to make sure he successfully navigated to the location, she paused and her cellphone went off. She mashed the button. “Can’t talk now.”

“Anson’s five minutes out.” Chuck’s voice came through.

“Got it.”

She dumped her phone back into her jacket pocket while she fought her way through snow that was now almost hip deep as she joined in the search. No one that she’d seen had been much higher up on the slope than she was now, and even if they had been they’d have been knocked downhill some way from the force of the snow.

“Any idea how many are missing?” she yelled into the general melee. She’d counted seven, but it had been hard to tell how many had actually gone down.

“I don’t know, but my brother is in here somewhere,” a woman called back to her from ten yards down the hill.

Thank God this was a more advanced slope. She’d seen no children on it when that thing had come thundering down the mountain.

She pushed toward the woman, whose black tracks of mascara bore witness to her distress. “Where was he when you last saw him?”

“Right here.” The woman pointed her pole in an arc.

“Okay, let’s start there and work our way down, okay?” She came alongside the distraught woman. “Side by side.” Glancing again at her watch, she saw that five minutes had now passed. Time was running out.

She turned her ski pole upside down so she didn’t hurt whoever was down there.

Chop, chop, chop. She pushed the metal end into the ground repeatedly, hoping to hit something that was obviously not snow.

Chop, chop, chop.

In the background, she heard others as they shouted that they’d also found someone, but she couldn’t worry about that right now. All of her father’s ski instructors were certified in CPR, and they knew the drill about not moving anyone. Her biggest worry right now was finding everyone who was missing before they suffocated.

Chop, chop, thunk. There!

About two feet beneath the white surface, she’d hit something soft. “Here!”

The woman beside her immediately joined her in digging as fast as they could.

They uncovered a hand. Pale and still.

Move up. Hurry, Mira!

The angle of the arm told her the victim was pointed down the slope, but the snow had buoyed the back part of him up, so that his head was buried deeper than the rest of him. It seemed like forever before they’d dug down far enough to reach him. Hair. Hell. He was face down. Mira frantically scooped deeper, digging around his face, until she could reach beneath him.

No breath. She felt the side of his neck. No pulse.

She swore under her breath.

“We need to turn him over.” And pray he didn’t have a fracture along his spine or neck. If they couldn’t get him breathing, that wasn’t going to matter, though. He’d die.

It took an additional fifteen seconds before they’d uncovered enough of his body to try to shift him. He was a big guy. And heavy.

“Get on this side with me.”

They both tried to lift him to turn him over, but there was so much snow packed tightly around him. Tears of frustration came to her eyes. Then Jack was there beside them.

She threw him a look of utter gratitude.

Getting between her and the victim’s sister, he said, “Grab hold of whatever you can on his far side. We need to pull him up sideways first, in order to flip him. There’s not enough room to turn him where he is. On three.”

“One, two...three!” They all pulled as hard as they could. The man budged, started to turn, and then Mira slipped, losing her grip on the man’s jacket. She swore, louder this time.

“Again,” she said.

Robert evidently saw their struggles, because he came up beside her. “Anson’s just gotten here. Let me help.”

He urged the man’s sister to move so he could take her place.

Jack didn’t even spare her ex a glance. “On three.”

This time, when he hit three, they pulled and the victim flipped onto his side as the trio used the momentum to haul him up out of the hole.

Mira glanced over the surface of the snow long enough to see that Anson and his dog were indeed on the scene, the rescue animal already with his nose to the snow.

Jack did what she’d done a moment ago and checked for a pulse. “Nothing. You start chest compressions.”

In the background, the man’s sister started crying.

“Robert.”

That was all she needed to say. Her ex moved toward the woman to keep her back, while she and Jack worked. She ripped open the guy’s jacket, no longer worried about hypothermia or anything that didn’t relate to his heart or lungs.

Quickly finding the sweet spot on his chest, she lapped one hand over the other, her palms thrusting downward in quick bursts as she counted aloud. His body sank in the snow a few inches from the force of her compressions, but the weight helped pack it down to form a solid enough surface to do some good. “One, two, three...”

No liquid came out of the man’s lungs as she continued compressions, so his airway wasn’t blocked by melted snow. Jack had evidently known to wait a few seconds to make sure of that fact, because by the fifth beat he’d tilted the man’s head back and leaned over him to give mouth-to-mouth between her measured pulses. He lifted his head long enough to say, “Tell me when you need me to spell you.”

She couldn’t think about that or anything else right now, except what she was doing. With each push of her joined palms she chanted, “Breathe, breathe, breathe,” willing the victim to fight. To live.

About a minute later she heard the most beautiful sound in the world. A gasp. Then a cough. Mira stopped what she was doing and reached for his neck, only to find that Jack’s fingers were already there. Icy cold without his gloves, but real and alive. Just like their victim, whose eyes now moved beneath his eyelids.

Mira glanced at Jack. Without his quick thinking they might still have been trying to figure out how to turn the man in that hole. A few minutes longer and this scene might have ended very differently.

Jack’s gaze met hers, and he gave a quick nod of triumph. She couldn’t hold back her smile or her mouthed, “Thank you.”

Her fingers were still over his, and he turned his hand and captured them, giving a quick squeeze. The backs of her eyelids prickled, before she forced herself to pull back. Robert still stood over them, his arm around the victim’s sister.

“Thanks,” she said to her ex. “Can you go find out who else needs help? Check with Anson and see what he wants us to do.”

Robert’s jaw tightened, and he eyed her for a second before giving a stiff nod and moving away.

Motioning to the woman, who was staring down, both hands over her mouth, Mira said, “He’s breathing. Why don’t you sit next to him and talk to him while we check him for other injuries?”

The woman dropped to her knees, her hands reaching into the depression in the snow and cupping her brother’s cheeks. “Marty, I’m right here.”

The man’s eyes finally opened, focusing on the woman. He tried to say something but his sister stopped him, tears streaming down her face. “Let them make sure you’re okay.”

Mira worked on one side of the victim while Jack stayed on the other. No obvious broken bones, and by the way the man’s limbs were starting to move around, his spinal cord was intact. Thank God, after the way they’d had to haul him up. They still had to be careful, though. Just because he could move it didn’t mean he was out of the woods.

“Your other resus? Did you get him breathing?”

“Yes.” He glanced at her. “They’ve accounted for everyone we know of. All doing okay.”

Mira lifted her head so she could look over the snow. The woman she’d dug up at the beginning was now on her feet, someone braced beneath one arm as they watched the rest of the rescues. Anson and his dog were further to the right, far away from the rest of them. Could someone have been carried that far away?

It was as if Jack had heard her thoughts. “It reminds me of an undertow. It just drags you down and carries you with it.”

She nodded. She’d never been around the ocean very much but she could see how the two might be similar in nature. Whether you suffocated in the snow or drowned, it was the same death. The same terror.

The man beneath them began struggling in earnest. “You need to lie still. You might have injuries we can’t see.”

His sister shushed him and gave him a fierce frown. Whether he was just exhausted or had realized what he was doing, he did as they asked.

“Can you zip his jacket back up?” Mira asked. “I don’t want him to get any colder than he already is.”

EMS arrived on the scene—several squads of men from the looks of it—swarming toward them, stretchers either in tow or folded into packs that were strapped to their backs. It was slow going, though, because this section of the ski resort boasted steep inclines geared toward the most experienced of their guests. But the rescue workers were prepared, the snow cleats attached to their boots grabbing at the surface, whether snowy or slick, with each step they took.

Jack climbed to his feet and made his way over to one of the workers, probably giving him an abbreviated version of what had happened.

A moment later a megaphone sounded through the group. “If you’re with an avalanche victim, please raise your hand, and one of us will make our way to you.”

Seven hands went up in all, including hers. Everyone was alive, from what she could tell.

Mira glanced anxiously at Anson to see if they were having any luck. She’d assumed there were only seven victims. Had she missed one somehow?

One of the emergency workers reached her. She recognized him. “Hi, Mike. Thanks.”

“No problem. What’ve you got?”

She quickly went through the rescue and then helped get a fresh set of vitals and stabilize the patient’s neck. Mike took the pack off his back and unfolded it into a kind of stretcher-sled combo that could be eased down the hill.

Jack helped with another victim, while a handful of ski instructors helped with some of the others.

From around a hundred yards away Anson’s dog gave a quick set of plaintive barks that sent a shiver through her. He’d found someone. She glanced down at her watch then closed her eyes and said a short prayer. Twenty minutes.

It had seemed like no time at all, they’d all been working so hard, and yet for whoever was buried it had been an eternity.

Jack reached Anson first and they went to work, shoveling snow. Mira cleared her current patient and got to her feet, giving the victim’s sister a quick smile of encouragement to hide her own anxious heart. She made her way toward the pair, who’d now stopped digging. They’d located whoever it was.

Jack hopped down into the depression in the snow and did some quick maneuvering before his head disappeared as he knelt. In less than a minute he climbed back out again. Even from there she could see his tight jaw. The way he shook his head at Anson.

Oh, no!

She stopped where she was, her eyes shutting for a second or two. Then she wrenched her lids apart. There was still time. The snow could slow body processes down for a while. Jack knew nothing about the mountains, he could assume things that weren’t necessarily true.

Surely Anson wouldn’t give up that easily. Anger unfurled within her and she moved quicker, her boots slipping a time or two as she tried to run through the drifts.

They were wasting time!

When she reached the pair, she snarled at them, “Help me get the victim up.”

“It’s too late.” Jack grabbed her arm.

“It’s not. The snow sometimes lowers the body temperature so that...” She glanced down at the victim and her words caught in her throat.

Snow-clouded eyes stared up at them from about three feet beneath the surface. And his neck...

She swallowed. Jack was right. There was nothing they could do.

The dog whined a time or two and pawed at the snow as if he didn’t understand what they were waiting for. Anson dropped a hand onto the animal’s head and gave him a quick scratch behind the ears, although when his eyes met hers they were grim. How often had the rescuer gone in search of a live person and come back with a body instead?

“Damn.” She scrubbed her palms over her cheeks, surprised to find them moist and cold. “Let’s get the others out first.” She lowered her voice. “No one has mentioned not finding someone, and by now everyone at the resort must know about the avalanche. He’s either here alone or someone’s waiting back in one of the guest rooms. We’ll need to see if he has some ID.”

Jack came over to stand beside her. “Even if we’d found him sooner, it wouldn’t have changed anything. You know that, right?” He put an arm around her and squeezed her shoulders. “There wasn’t enough time to clear the slopes before it hit, even if we’d started across right after you noticed the first movement.”

“I know.” She couldn’t stop herself from leaning a little closer, and then glanced over at Anson. “Thank you for coming.”

“Any possibility that anyone else could be under here?”

“I tried to keep count as the avalanche came down. I thought there were only seven people buried, but...” she motioned toward the victim “...this makes eight.”

Anson nodded. “I’ll go ask at the lobby to see if anyone is missing and then do one more sweep of the area.” He paused. “I don’t want to leave until we’re sure everyone is out.”

“Agreed,” Mira said. “While you’re at it, can you ask Security to start contacting the guests to make sure everyone is accounted for? My dad should be back by now.”

“No problem.”

“Thanks again.”

As she watched Anson and his dog head down the slope, a shudder swept through her body. She was freezing cold, even with all her gear on.

Jack pulled her closer and eased her several yards to the right, away from the poor avalanche victim. Most of the other patients had either been transported or were in the process of being loaded onto stretchers. “You need to get back to the lodge.”

“Not before everyone is out. It’s part of my job—and it’s the right thing to do.” She straightened. “But you go ahead. Thanks. You’re not having much of a vacation, are you?”

“That’s okay. Wasn’t my idea to take a vacation in the first place.”

He’d mentioned that before. Who came to a ski resort against their will?

A horrible thought came to her. “Are you married?”

He pulled back, dropping his arm from her shoulders and meeting her eyes with a frown. “Are you serious? Have you forgotten that sleigh ride?”

She swallowed. No. Not for a second. “That doesn’t always mean anything.” Who knew that better than she did? Her dad hadn’t respected his vows, and neither had her ex. She and Robert might not have been married but they’d been heading that way.

“It might not mean anything up here, but it does where I come from.”

“Meaning?”

“Evidently people up here on the slopes play loose and easy with their marriage vows.”

And how did he know...? Oh! Mrs. Botox.

“Those kinds of people live all over the world. Even in Texas.”

“Well, I’m not one of them.” His eyes, dark with some intense emotion, stared right through her for a second before he took a deep breath. “Sorry. That was uncalled for.”

Yes, it had been. But she could see how he might have taken her words. “It’s okay.” Another shiver went through her. Her hands went into her pocket to find her gloves, only to remember that she’d ripped them off to do chest compressions earlier. They were still over on the other side of the slope.

She turned, thinking she was going to retrieve them, when Jack pulled his out of his pocket. “Put these on.”

“Oh, but—”

“Do it.” He touched his fingers to hers. “I’m not as cold as you are.”

It was true. His hands weren’t warm, by any stretch of the imagination, but next to her stiff fingers his were like a tropical paradise.

One she didn’t dare think about right now.

“Okay.” She slipped her hands into the thickly lined fingers, smiling when Jack pulled her hat further down over her ears. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” He smiled back at her. “Lady, I have to tell you, you have a strange idea of a date.”

“I wouldn’t exactly call this a date.” It may have started out that way, but it certainly hadn’t ended the way she’d envisioned.

“Neither would I.” His thumb slid along her cheek. “It’s one thing after another when you’re around.”

“Believe me, I’d rather there were no such things as avalanches.” Her eyes went to the shovel sticking up out of the snow near the last victim. The whole lodge would mourn the man as if he were one of their own. These guests, even though they knew the risks of winter sports, never expected it to happen to them. And as careful as her father was, Mother Nature could—and sometimes did—trample right over the resort’s precautions. “I hate that this happened.”

“I know.” His arm went back around her.

It felt good. Comforting. She was used to being the only doctor around this place. It was nice to have someone to share this particular burden with. And she honestly wasn’t sure she could have handled this on her own. The worst thing she’d encountered other than the odd ski injury had been a norovirus outbreak that had swept through the ski resort three years ago, making a third of the guests and staff sick before they’d finally been able to contain it.

“Thank you for your help.”

“I’m glad I was here.”

“Even if being here wasn’t your idea?” She couldn’t help tossing his earlier words back at him.

He was tugging her further away from the site when two rescue workers arrived with a basket and some more digging equipment.

Now that most of the patients had been cleared from the area, the other skiers had also headed down, no doubt urged by the ski instructors to clear this part of the mountain until further notice.

Anson came by and gave her a half-wave and said her dad and some others were working on contacting the rest of the guests. He was fairly confident no one else was under the snow, so he was headed back to the station to check in and fill out a report.

As soon as he was gone, Jack turned to her. “It might not have been my idea to come but I’m beginning to think my coach might have known what he was talking about.”

“And what was that?”

He hesitated, then finally said, “Long story.”

“Fair enough.” He didn’t owe her any explanations. He was simply man number five. It was better if she didn’t know anything about him—well, except for the marriage thing. She’d have to remind herself to verify the marital status of any other man she went out with. She’d looked for the obvious thing, like a ring, but hadn’t bothered doing that with anyone else.

Then again, she hadn’t expected to go out multiple times with the same man.

She frowned. Now was probably as good a time as any to make her escape and move forward, otherwise she would just end up in the same old rut. Attracted to a man who wasn’t what she needed him to be. He’d said it himself. He hadn’t wanted to come. Preferred the surf to the snow.

Definitely not compatible. If she hadn’t been able to make it work with a man—make that three men—who were from the Silver Pass area, why would she even think about getting attached to someone who not only wasn’t from here but had no interest in sticking around?

Before she could say anything, though, he reached over and gripped her hand. “Walk you down?”

“Thanks. I’d like that.”

Okay, so she could put off this whole separation process until she got back to her room. She wasn’t even going to worry about dinner. Then, with their date officially over, she could sleep knowing this little bump in the road had been successfully navigated. She could tell Ellory she was moving on.

Life would continue, and Jack—no matter how tempting it might be to linger for a while and let him throw that rare smile her way—would be in her rear-view mirror, his reflection growing smaller and smaller with each day that passed. Until, finally, he was gone. Back to his home team. Back to his life with his coach and his friends.

And out of her life, forever.

CHAPTER EIGHT

MIRA HAD DESERTED HIM.

With dinner behind them and the night closing in fast, Jack sat at the bar, wondering exactly how he’d gotten here. After the shock of the avalanche and subsequent rescue efforts had worn off, it would have been easy to just cancel their plans to eat at the restaurant and go back to their rooms. Alone.

And yet once they’d come off that slope and stood in the arched doorway of the lodge, the words had come out of his mouth of their own volition. “Are we still on for dinner?”