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“Whatever it is can wait,” Bennett growls, annoyed by the interruption.
“I thought we weren’t allowed to have app notifications going,” Cricket gripes, and she’s right. We’re not. We’re not supposed to get notifications from things like social media, weather, or any other non-essential apps. They’re distracting in the OR. Clearly.
Except suddenly, I think I know what that buzzing is. I think it’s my continuous glucose monitor giving me a warning. Because I’m sweating and my heart is pounding in my chest. I’ve got a headache, my muscles are shaky, and my stomach is still feeling like that sponge.
Shit. My blood sugar is low. Just how low I don’t know—low enough to trigger the alert—but I don’t want to check it in a room full of other doctors, Bennett, and most of all, Cricket.
Only as things continue, it becomes harder and harder to ignore. I can feel that it’s low. Seriously low. And when my vision starts to tilt from side to side, I take a wobbly step back.
“Dr. Barrows?” Bennett questions, only his voice sounds distant. Tinny. And my vision isn’t just swaying now, it’s almost cartoonishly wrong. I need to get out of here. I need some orange juice or one of the glucose tabs I keep in my bag, but I put that back in my locker when I got the page.
“I…” Oh God. “I’m sorry, Dr. Lawson. I’ll be right back.”
I have no idea if he can understand me or if that comes out clear at all. It doesn’t matter. I start to head for the door, willing myself to make it. Only I’m not sure I can.
“Katy?!” his voice calls urgently just as the room crackles and my vision is fuzzy. “Someone help her!” he cries out, but it’s too late, and I feel myself start to fall just as everything goes black.
Chapter Twenty
I’m going out of my mind. The patient on my table is bleeding as fast as we can give him new blood. His surgery is more than just a little complicated and requires my complete attention. But Katy is unconscious on the goddamn OR floor.
Adrenaline shakes me and shortens my breath. I need to get to my girl.
“Dr. Lawson, you’re sterile and your patient is bleeding,” the nurse on my right reminds me as I instinctively go for her. Fuck!
“What’s going on?” I bark, my body and mind screaming at me to run to her and pick her up, but I fucking can’t or my patient will die. “Someone check her vitals. What’s her blood sugar?”
“We’re on it, Dr. Lawson,” one of the circulating nurses tells me as she and an intern are all over Katy, checking her blood pressure and her glucose. I can see from here on the vitals cart screen that her heart rate is one-thirty-eight and her blood pressure is shit at 86/52. No wonder she passed out. She’s been sick with food poisoning, and I should have made her stay home again last night. She was adamant and promised to keep the IV site in her arm in case she needed fluids.
Which she likely did but didn’t take the time to get them.
Goddammit! Why didn’t I make her stay home with me where I could take care of her? Hell, why did I let them page her, and why the fuck did I let her scrub in when she was already on all night? I’m her boss. Her… her… fuck, what am I to her? Not her boyfriend or even her lover. I’m not casual, and I’m not a friend with benefits either. I’m simply the guy she’s living with who is trying to knock her up.
But… she’s more than that to me. So much more.
She always has been and seeing her like this… “I need an update,” rips from my throat.
“Blood sugar is forty-one,” the nurse announces with a grim expression. “We’re going to move her down to the emergency department.”
I nod, even as I grit my teeth behind my mask and clench the instrument in my hand a little too tight. Forty-one?! How long was she feeling that before she tried to step away? Dammit, Katy!
We were going to take another test tonight after dinner with her uncle and stepmother. I haven’t met them yet, and knowing how close they are with Katy, I’ve been nervous about it. I invited them over and offered to cook, but Katy suggested we all go out to Stella’s to make it more casual.
Her uncle is going to kill me for not taking better care of her and I won’t blame him.
“Okay. Take her down and notify them that you’re on your way. Thanks.” I don’t mean it. I’m ready to burn down the world to go with her. “Start some D10 saline. She already has a line in her left arm. She had food poisoning the other day and required some fluids for it.”
One of the nurses gives me an acknowledging wave, and then they transfer a pale and unconscious Katy onto a gurney, lift the side rails up, and wheel her out. Her uncle is working down in the emergency department today. He’ll take care of her. Even if I can’t.
Frustration slams through me, and it’s taking everything I have not to call in another attending to take over so I can go be with Katy and hold her goddamn hand and help fix her.
Except I can’t.
No one knows anything about us or what we’ve been doing, and not only would it ruin my career, but it could be devastating to hers. She wants this fellowship—and she’s earned it—and that could all be ripped away from her in the blink of an eye if I do or say the wrong thing.
Fuck!
I can’t do this anymore. How can I keep her a secret? I want this baby with her, but now… I also want her. I told myself if it took a few months for us to get pregnant, I could fuck her out of my system. But that’s a joke. So laughable I’m almost embarrassed I believed something so ludicrous.
