First-Time Valentine. Mary J. Forbes

happen.

      The water grew cool and she pulled herself lethargically out of the tub. Molly offered a squinty-eyed look from the mat by the sink.

      Ella laughed. “Yeah, I know. Nothing riveting.” No, Anna was the family beauty queen. Elegant, lovely and gifted. Oh, Anna. I miss you.

      With a sigh, Ella pulled the tub’s drain. Maybe one day they would be close again—as sisters should be.

      The phone rang. The nightstand clock read nine twenty-eight and caller ID indicated the hospital. Although she wasn’t on call, she became immediately alert, and lifted the receiver. “Dr. Wilder.”

      “It’s Lindsey, Doctor.”

      The night nurse.

      “Your patient, Mr. Sumner, is reacting to the Demerol, I believe. Heart’s pounding, sweats, woozy.”

      She climbed from the bed, reached for her clothes. The symptoms definitely sounded like a reaction. “Temp and BP?”

      “Fifty-two, and seventy over sixty. Feels as if he’s about to pass out.”

      Damn. His admission form hadn’t signified any allergies. “Get two liters of saline into him, flush it out. Now. And get Doctor Roycroft in to check his stats.” Roycroft was on night call. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

      She hung up, rushed into her jeans and a sweatshirt. She didn’t stop to think why she needed to race to his bedside. The nurses and on-call doctors were there.

      They’re competent, Ella. You’re not dealing with an alcoholic nurse who wouldn’t acknowledge her own problems.

      Still, she couldn’t take the chance. This time she was responsible, not a scrub nurse. She had prescribed the meds.

      In her car, she shivered, although the vents blasted hot air. At the hospital, she half-jogged up the stairs to the second floor.

      A male nurse inputting computer data sat behind the counter of the floor station. “Is Lindsey with Mr. Sumner?” she asked.

      The man glanced up from the screen. “No, but the patient is okay, Doctor. We got him settled. Changed his nightshirt and the sheets. Sponged down his skin.”

      Ella scanned Sumner’s chart. Heart and blood pressure back to normal. Saline doing its work. “Thank you. I’ll check on him while I’m here.” She headed down to the room.

      A nightlight glowed from the opposite wall, casting a dim hue across the bed and J.D.’s form under the blankets. His leg had been propped on several pillows. He was still awake.

      “Hey, Doc,” he said, voice deep and raspy. “You come all the way back just to see me?”

      Sick as he’d been, she heard the grin in the tone, pictured his grass-green eyes in the dark.

      “How are you feeling?” she asked, automatically checking the pulse along the arch of his elevated foot for circulation. Steady.

      “Wasn’t feeling so hot a while ago.”

      “You reacted to the Demerol. Were you aware about the symptoms before, by chance?”

      “No. Never bother with meds unless it’s aspirin or some such. Don’t like taking prescription meds. Don’t need ’em.”

      She wanted to ask about his jumper’s knee. He hadn’t gone without pain at some point in his life. But he was drowsy and he’d been through enough for one night. “You may need a medical alert bracelet for the Demerol.” Setting a palm against his forehead, she noted the coolness of his skin. He was okay.

      “Get some rest, Mr. Sumner.”

      “I wish…” His eyes drooped. “I wish you’d call me J.D.”

      She ignored the request. J.D. was far too personal. It gave him an edge she wasn’t prepared to relinquish. “Sleep, sir. It’s best for your injury. Let the saline and the

      medication do its job.”

      “They gave me Tylenol 3.”

      “It’ll help with the pain.” And the fever. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

      “What time?”

      “Around seven.”

      “I pressed the call button right away,” he said, as if reluctant to let her go. “Was surprised someone attended so fast.”

      “That’s how our hospital works. No calls go unnoticed or unattended. Here, patient care is first and foremost.”

      “Good.” His breathing slowed, his eyes drifted closed. “Wish you were on call. I hate…hospitals.”

      “Well,” she said softly, “I hope you won’t hate ours too much.”

      “’Ni’, Doc.”

      “Goodnight.”

      She left his room, returned to the nurses’ station and wrote her observations on his chart. Several minutes later she was heading home, hands gripping the steering wheel. Would she ever get past the horrifying repercussions of that surgery in Boston?

      One day at a time, the counselor had told her.

      God help her if something had gone wrong with J. D. Sumner.

      He’s already scared. The thought popped up like a weed.

      Oh, he had a cocky attitude, but an underlying current of apprehension rode his voice from the moment Mike O’Rourke, one of the hospital’s paramedics, brought him into the E.R. Which, she supposed, was understandable, but still…

      In her mind she backtracked the past two days. His constant questions, the hint of anxiety. His need for her at his side. And it was more than simple attraction. He saw her as his lifeline. Why?

      Why was J. D. Sumner, executive of one of the largest health care corporations, leery of hospitals?

      Or was it just her hospital?

      J.D. woke in a cold and drenching sweat.

      The hospital gown stuck to his clammy skin and for a moment his brain didn’t register his surroundings. And then his eyes focused.

      He lay in the hospital, a place he had not spent one night—never mind two—since his birth. The clock radio read 12:03 a.m. He’d been asleep less than two hours. His mouth tasted of dryer lint. He reached for the water, took a sip. The ice had long since melted.

      Someone had placed the call button within reach, tying it to the guardrail near his hand. He pressed the red glow light of the tiny plastic knob—one, two, three. Shudders rolled through his body.

      Within ten seconds, a soft tread came down the corridor. A woman entered his room.

      “Doc?” J.D. rasped, eyes blurry.

      “It’s Lindsey,” the woman said. “The night nurse. Are you okay, Mr. Sumner?”

      “I’m soaked.” His teeth rattled. He tried to focus, but she stood etched in the dim glow from the hallway. “Need the doc,” he slurred.

      At his bedside, the nurse ran gentle fingers down his arms, took his cold hands between her palms. “I’ll get you a clean gown and some extra blankets,” she said, then disappeared.

      J.D. shivered. He hadn’t been this cold since he’d been a kid and had to shovel his dad’s truck out of a ditch one bitter winter night when the old man hit an icy patch and plowed into the snowdrift along the shoulder of the road. I’m frozen, he’d told his dad.

      You’re not shoveling hard enough, Pops had retorted.

      Another shudder rushed through J.D.’s body.

      Lindsey returned with blankets in her arms, a fresh water bottle in her hand and the male nurse on her heels.

      “We’ll