Rocky Mountain Reunion. Tina Radcliffe
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“Anne, ambulances are en route.”
Anne Matson looked up from the tidy pile of paperwork on her desk. “Was that plural?”
Marta Howard, RN, stood in the doorway of Anne’s office. She reached up to tuck a strand of short gray hair behind her ear. “Afraid so. Accident at Paradise Lake. At the construction site.”
Anne straightened the bud vase on her desk that held a fragrant pink rose bloom from her garden and put away her files.
“How far out are they?” She stood and grabbed her stethoscope before slipping a pen into the pocket of her navy scrubs.
“Seven minutes.” Marta winked, her severe countenance warming. “And you thought it was going to be a slow day.”
“I should have kept my mouth closed.” Anne hit the light switch as she followed Marta into the emergency department hall. “What’s the extent of the injuries?”
“The first is a male—thirty-two, in serious condition with broken ribs, upper quadrant and lower extremity lacerations, abrasions and possible internal injuries.
“Second patient is also a male, thirty-one, possible ankle fracture with minor abrasions and a head laceration. I’ve already paged Dr. Nelson. He’s on his way.”
“Surgeon on call?”
“Daniels.”
“Notify him. Call Life Flight and give them a heads-up, in case we need transport.”
“Got it.”
As head of the Paradise ER nursing team, Anne was proud of her department, but she fully understood the limitations of the facility’s trauma unit. The majority of the center’s patients were the tourists that flooded the San de Cristo Mountain area and the close-knit mountain town of Paradise, Colorado, in search of seasonal recreation. Anything outside the scope of the small hospital’s care would be transferred straight to Alamosa and often to Denver.
“What’s going on with the patient in five?” Anne called out as Marta moved quickly to the unit secretary’s reception desk.
“Discharged. I called Dr. Rogers.”
“Sara?”
“No. Ben. He said he’d stop by tomorrow with his mobile unit and check the patient’s incision.”
Anne nodded and smiled. “That’s why I like working in Paradise. All the efficiency of big-city medicine with the personal touch of rural medicine thrown in.”
In the distance a siren could be heard. The familiar wail grew louder as the entire fleet of the Paradise Valley ambulance company approached the glass doors of the emergency department.
An instant later paramedics slammed through the ER doors. The late July heat met the hospital air-conditioning as a paramedic called out the first patient’s stats while he steered the moving gurney.
Anne slid her hands into disposable gloves. “Get this one to triage,” she directed. “The other can go to exam room two.”
Marta and two orderlies followed alongside the gurney that sped into the curtained triage area while Anne grabbed the hospital copy of the paramedic’s worksheet and shoved the papers into a metal chart.
“Move him over,” Marta called. “On my count. One. Two. Three.” The first patient was smoothly transferred to a hospital stretcher.
Anne noted the dwindling contents of the IV and hung a new bag as the medics left and Dr. Luke Nelson entered the room. Everything ran smoothly when Nelson was on the schedule. Though he was new to Paradise, he was their most qualified ER physician.
“What do we have?” he asked, already assessing the patient.
“Scaffold accident.” Anne read the chart. “Probable cracked ribs. Left abdominal-penetrating laceration, along with several minor lacerations to the scalp and face. BP is eighty-eight over fifty. Pulse, one hundred. Oxygen at three liters. Pulse ox, ninety percent.”
He began a head-to-toe physical examination as an orderly sliced through the man’s bloody shirt then wrapped an electronic blood pressure cuff around the patient’s arm.
“Any relevant history?” Nelson asked as he peeled back the crimson-soaked abdominal dressing. He nodded to Marta and she applied a clean gauze pad.
“None noted,” Anne said.
Nelson leaned over the patient. “Mr. Seville, I’m Dr. Nelson. We’re going to take good care of you.”
Seville? The name tripped a distant memory Anne couldn’t quite grasp. Frowning, she dismissed the thought.
The dark-haired man, whose upper half of his face was obscured by dirt and blood and the lower part by an oxygen mask, gave a weak shake of his head.
“Open up that IV,” Nelson continued. “I need a CBC and chem panel. And type and cross for four units. Get X-ray down here stat.”
“We’ve got another patient in exam room two,” Anne said. She tossed her gloves and scrubbed her hands at a stainless-steel sink before leading the way down the hall.
“Are you going to the fund-raising dinner?” Luke Nelson asked, his steps in sync with hers.
“Apparently it’s expected.”
“You don’t sound too enthusiastic.”
“Don’t I?”
He chuckled. “Politics, Anne. You have to play the game if you want to move up the career ladder. And since the money goes to expanding the emergency department, you should be excited.”
Anne shook her head. Hospital social events were low on her list of things to be excited about. But Nelson was right. She’d have to try to be social for her career, because that was what she wanted, right? A career move; maybe even an administrative position.
Or maybe not. Lately she’d been restless for something that a promotion couldn’t satisfy.
“Why don’t we go together?” Luke finally asked.
She gave him a sidelong glance. “I have a rule about dating people I work with.”
“Not a date.” He shrugged. “Just going together.”
“You’re new to Paradise. Let me warn you that the grapevine moves fast here. That’s why I also make it a rule never to let the line between my job and my personal life blur. It’s best to fly under the radar in this town.”
“Sounds like you have a lot of rules.”
Anne paused at his remark. Maybe she did. But the guidelines she’d set for herself had served her well as an unmarried woman living in a small town, and she didn’t plan to detour anytime soon.
They reached the open exam room and she stopped short and handed the chart to him.
Luke flipped it open, scanned the contents and then handed the chart back to her as he moved into the small room. “Mr. Clark?” he asked.
“Matt. You can call me Matt.”
“I’m Dr. Nelson and this is Ms. Matson.”
Anne’s head jerked back at the sound of Matthew Clark’s voice and the chart in her hands tumbled to the floor. Her gaze snapped toward the clear blue eyes of the man she had married nearly eleven years ago.
“Anne?” His eyes widened in turn as he stared at her.
Matthew Clark sat on the edge of the exam table in a bloodstained, torn and once-white polo shirt and jeans. His shirt bore the logo of First Construction Company on the left chest area.
The ice pack he held to his head