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‘Now the main pain,’ she continued. ‘Is it your back? Your shoulder? Your neck?’
It was all three, if he was going to be honest. The right side of his neck and shoulder were sore, and his head was beginning to pound, as though the pain was running from his back right up to the top of his skull.
Mainly because of the car crash, though he suspected it wasn’t helped by the need to fight this sudden, wholly inappropriate attraction to a woman who was not only his nurse now but who would be his colleague in a matter of weeks.
Nonetheless, his right hand and arm were beginning to stiffen up, and even his right leg was aching. His professional assessment was that he’d torn his trapezius muscle. He imagined it was her assessment, too.
‘Like I said,’ he ground out, ‘I’m fine.’
‘You’re clearly medically trained,’ she said archly, ‘so I think we both know what’s likely happened. And that you aren’t fine.’
‘Fine, I have a bit of whiplash, but there’s little that can be done but give it time to heal. Fortunately, I’m fit and healthy, so I should be okay.’
‘There’s downplaying it, and then there’s that,’ she commented. ‘But if that’s the way you want it, that’s up to you. Either way, I’m going to be sending you to CT to ensure there are no internal injuries.’
But there was something in her tone that got under his skin. A compassion that he knew he didn’t deserve.
What had happened to him had been luck rather than good judgement. He’d risked his life because that was his job. When, really, his main job these days should be his young son.
Because he got to go home to his son. How many of his former army buddies had lost that luxury when they’d lost their lives?
And what was it about today, the accident, this woman, that was all coming together to pry open a dark box inside him that needed to be kept locked? For ever.
‘Agreed,’ he ground out, standing up in a rush and taking some perverse pleasure at the shock on her face.
Let her wonder what had suddenly made him apparently take his health so seriously.
As far as he was concerned, he’d done so because she’d reminded him of the little boy who was at his grandparents’ home, and even now was waiting for Logan to come home so that the two of them could start their new life together. Jamie had already lost enough with a mother like Sophia, but what the hell would his boy have done if anything really had happened in that car accident?
He was here to make sure that nothing happened to him for his son’s sake. He was here because it was the responsible thing to do, to let this nurse check him over to ensure there were no internal injuries that the adrenaline was concealing. He was here because the quicker he let her assess him, the quicker he could get back to King Roberto’s room, and make sure that he hadn’t lost his employer—and friend—on the last day of his job.
He was most certainly not here because any part of him was intrigued by this Kat woman.
No part of him at all.
CHAPTER TWO
‘ANY SIGN OF my bloodwork back for my lady in three?’ Kat asked, as she finished handling a couple more IV bags for two of her other patients.
It was beginning to grate on her that, three hours after he’d left the hospital, she was still trying to get Logan Connors out of her head. Not listening to the medical advice to go home and rest, it had apparently taken someone from Logan’s party to order him home, which only added to her suspicion that he was a bodyguard.
A very fit, very on-his-game bodyguard.
‘No bloodwork back yet.’ Her colleague shook her head. ‘What’s the preliminary assessment on that lady?’
Chagrined, Kat shoved thoughts of Logan to the back of her mind and conjured up her patient.
‘She presented with lower quadrant abdominal pain, tender to palpation. She also complained of nausea, vomiting, fever, constipation and loss of appetite.’
‘Yeah, appendicitis sounds like a good call.’
‘Never mind the appendicitis.’ Elsie, one of the other nurses, came scurrying over. ‘I can’t believe you got the hottie hero. What was he like?’
Kat flashed her brightest smile and tried not to bare her teeth. She didn’t know Elsie all that well, but what she did know was that the woman loved a good gossip—the more scandalous the better.
Precisely the opposite of Kat.
‘Like a patient who has been in an MVA.’
