Chapter Six

      One hour into their trauma center visit the next day, Mitch guessed Lauren regretted saying that.

      She took her chances coming in, all right.

      A bus of summer-camp teens overturned shortly after Mitch and Lauren arrived, which filled the center with victims.

      “Eighteen and counting,” Ian informed Mitch. “No way to divert.” Ian referred to the fact that the center was diverting low-risk patients to other hospitals until Mitch and Ian secured a second trauma team. Today that wasn’t possible.

      Kate handed him a chart. “Want me to call help in?”

      Mitch nodded then faced Ian. “I need to get on the ball putting together another full-time trauma crew.”

      “Yeah. You’ve been tied up at Lem’s, though.”

      “Not enough hours in a day to get everything accomplished that needs to be, this summer.”

      “Let me know how I can help.”

      “I will.” Yet he knew Ian was already strapped for time with his divorce, court hearings, housing and custody stuff.

      “Where’s Lauren?” Mitch asked Kate, passing by with an armload of ice packs.

      “Your new director assumed Lauren came to help. She assigned her to triage to treat non-emergent wounds which, thankfully, she did graciously. She’s doing awesome, Mitch.”

      Still, he’d better go check. Mitch found Lauren and assessed her for signs of panic. None whatsoever, but he should ask anyway. “Are you okay?”

      “Are you absurd?” She looked down the hall of writhing, wailing, wall-to-wall youth and laughed. “I’m not about to abandon you to the fate of all this teen angst. I’m the last person you should be worried about right now, Mitch. Your director, however, is having a total freak-out.”

      “So I heard. She’s not used to trauma care.”

      Lauren made the funniest face. “Uh, hello? Neither am I.”

      Yet he didn’t see her screeching down halls and complaining in front of patients and their families, as he’d received reports of the director doing. His mistake. Some applicants looked good on paper, yet they had no people skills.

      “Point well taken, Lauren. I trust you. Unequivocally. I just wanted to make sure you weren’t feeling overwhelmed.”

      “I doubt there’s a staff member here who doesn’t feel overwhelmed. Twenty patients hit the floor in two hours’ time.”

      He grinned, loving the fire in her eyes. “You’re made for this. You are.”

      “What I am is annoyed at the prospect of being babysat over a busload of mostly bumps and bruises. Now shoo!” But she smiled when she said it.

      Satisfied she was okay for now, Mitch viewed X-rays. Then casted an ankle, miraculously the only bus-wreck fracture.

      Between patients, he went to check on Lauren again.

      She waved him toward another incoming gurney. “I’m fine. Check on that one. He looks kind of critical.” She smirked then righted herself before anyone but Mitch could catch it.

      When Mitch found nothing but a nosebleed on Gurney Guy, he realized two things: One, Lauren had a gift at triage. Two, she knew when it was okay to use humor to cope. Something he felt crucial to anyone in trauma care. Otherwise stress and burnout would run off the best ones.

      After earnestly convincing Gurney Guy he wasn’t bleeding to death, Mitch held an ice pack to the kid’s nose and issued fatherly hugs. Like Lem used to whenever Mitch had some kind of accident.

      “Ever had a nosebleed this bad?” Gurney Guy asked him.

      “Actually, yes.” He nodded at Lauren, bandaging a wound nearby. “I nearly broke my nose crashing a new bike her grandpa got me. Refuge Community Church had pitched in on it.”

      “That’s cool,” the kid said.

      “Not really.” Mitch laughed. “Considering I’m probably the only kid in Southern Illinois to have an entire congregation present to cheer me on when I learned to wreck and ride it.”

      “You still go there?” The young man looked up to Mitch.

      “Yep. That church has prayed me through med school and safely home from two wars. I have to say, though, that we didn’t have the distinct pleasure of experiencing a bus crash.”

      That evoked the youth’s laughter and erased tension from his features. Mitch pivoted and caught Lauren, within hearing range, watching them with an adoring expression.

      “She your girlfriend?” the kid asked.

      Mitch caught himself before he reacted sharply. “Nope. She’s my nurse.” But he could hope.

      “She could also be your girlfriend. Maybe even your wife.”

      He could hope that, too. If he was hungry for more heartache. No, thanks. Still, the kid’s words circled around his head, stalked his brain and mocked his steely resolve.

      If Mitch were smart, he’d refuse to entertain the innocent suggestion at all. Instead he dwelled on how to get Lauren to join Refuge Community Church this summer, as Lem had requested of him. Refuge lived up to its name and was where Mitch met the PJs who had become his friends.

      After releasing the now-calm nosebleed fellow to his mom’s care, Mitch checked on other patients then the rest of his crew, including Lauren. Or maybe he just liked watching her work.

      Her efficient yet calm body language revealed she’d picked up on the fact that the bus driver and chaperones had blown this wreck way out of proportion. Yet Mitch didn’t blame them for being scared. He was thankful it wasn’t worse.

      It could well have been because they’d had to call Refuge’s pararescue team to help firemen extract teens who were in reality more frozen with fear and panic than physically trapped. Still, God had evidently had His hand over the kids and the bus. Thank You, God.

      The bus patrons had non-life-threatening injuries, but Mitch wanted everyone assessed nonetheless. That, along with parental worry and teen drama, made for a long, interesting day. By the time they had finished, dusk’s velvet-purple evening winked at them through the trauma center’s windows.

      Lauren approached. “Mitch, some off-duty PJs are here.”

      “Probably checking the status of bus teens they helped rescue.”

      “They also offered to man the center overnight so your current crew can make like platelets and regroup.”

      Mitch