Father By Choice. M.J. Rodgers

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СКАЧАТЬ Was she still dreaming? Slowly, her vision cleared and his features came into focus. Thick, dark hair. Straight eyebrows. A face full of strong bones and clean lines. And eyes the color of polished pewter. Wow. No, he couldn’t be. Could he?

      Pulling herself into a sitting position, she looked around. She was in an E.R. examining room, all right. Fully clothed, thankfully, except for her shoes. A blood-pressure cuff circled her left arm. A nurse was pumping it up.

      “What happened?” Emily asked.

      “You lost consciousness,” Brad said. “The paramedics brought you in.”

      The nurse released the pressure on her arm and took off the cuff. “One ten over seventy.”

      “How do you feel?” Brad asked.

      “Fine.” Physically, she was. But mentally and emotionally, she was still reeling from the shock of awakening to find him.

      “Do you know where you are?” he asked.

      “I’m in the Courage Bay E.R.”

      “And why are you here?”

      “You just told me it was because I lost consciousness.”

      “Lucid and responsive to verbal stimuli,” he said to the nurse who nodded and made a note on the sheet attached to the clipboard she held.

      “What’s the last thing you remember?” Brad asked.

      “Walking into the greenhouse,” Emily said.

      He shone a small flashlight in her eye. She blinked.

      “Are you in pain anywhere?”

      “No.”

      “Do you have any medical conditions?”

      “No.”

      He switched the light to her other eye. “Are you on any medication?”

      “No.”

      “Have you had any alcohol today?”

      “Of course not.”

      “Drugs?”

      She understood these questions probably had to be asked. But she was beginning to resent them. “Half a cup of coffee this morning,” she said. “But I’m trying to get clean.”

      Not even a twitch to his lip. So much for his purported sense of humor.

      “Have you had any operations?” he asked.

      “No,” she responded.

      He turned off the light. “How many fingers do you see?”

      “One.”

      And a strong-looking hand, well formed. At least the physical part of him appeared to be as advertised. When he positioned the listening end of the stethoscope in his ears, she knew what was coming. Even so, she gave a small start when he slipped the circular disk beneath the V-neck of her blouse.

      Brad showed no sign that he noticed, but the nurse smiled at her in sympathy. “Cold, isn’t it?”

      Thankful her response had been misinterpreted, Emily gratefully returned her smile. Before Brad could ask her to take a deep breath and hold it, she had done so.

      After listening to what was going on inside her from several different spots, he checked the reflexes in her elbows and knees all the while continuing to ask questions about her medical history.

      Emily was proud of her calm and cognizant answers. Especially when she considered how incredible it was meeting him this way. Or meeting him any way for that matter.

      Another nurse interrupted the examination when she poked her head into the room. “Two victims of a construction accident en route. Scaffolding collapsed from beneath them when they were two stories up. They’re both critical. ETA is four minutes.”

      “I’ll join you when I’m finished here,” Brad called over his shoulder before addressing the nurse beside him. “Why don’t you go help her prep. I’ll handle this.”

      The nurse nodded and followed the other one out.

      Brad’s hands circled to the back of Emily’s neck and felt their way into her scalp, his probing fingers firm but gentle.

      “Do you feel any tenderness here?”

      His expression was one of total concentration as he gazed at a blank wall to the right.

      She realized she was staring at the slight cleft in his chin and averted her eyes. “Uh…no.”

      “What about here?”

      “No. I’m fine. Really.”

      He ceased the exploration of her scalp, placed a finger on her pulse. His eyes focused on his wristwatch.

      “People who are fine don’t suddenly lose consciousness for nearly thirty minutes. Have you had anything to eat or drink today?”

      “Breakfast was light. Normally I have a full lunch at noon, but I had to attend to some business about that time. How did I get here?”

      Brad glanced at the clipboard that the nurse had left lying on the bed table. “A Josh Smithson called the paramedics. Identified himself as your assistant.”

      “Poor Josh. I must have scared him to death.”

      “What is your business?”

      “I take care of plants.”

      “Have you been using any new pesticides or fertilizers in your duties?”

      “No.”

      He released her hand. “Your pulse is a little fast.”

      With him taking it, she wasn’t surprised.

      He picked up the chart to make a note. “Any chance you’re pregnant?”

      Thank God he’d taken her pulse before asking that question. “No chance about it. I’m eight weeks pregnant.”

      His eyes shot to hers. “Why didn’t you tell me that when I asked if you had any medical conditions?”

      She sat up a bit straighter, annoyed at the insinuated censure of his question. “A medical condition implies something’s wrong. Nothing’s wrong with being pregnant. That’s why I fainted, isn’t it?”

      “Fainting during early and middle pregnancy is a common experience. The hormone, progesterone, is at an all-time high, relaxing the walls of the blood vessels, making the blood pool in your hands and feet and away from your head. The medical term for it is postural hypotension.”

      “So, it’s perfectly normal.”

      “Remaining СКАЧАТЬ