Two Doctors and A Baby. Brenda Harlen

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      Avery Wallace rolled her shoulders, attempting to loosen the tight muscles that ached and burned. She was an obstetrician, not an ER doctor—and not scheduled to work tonight in any event. But she’d been on her way to a party with friends when she got the call from her answering service about a patient who was in labor and on her way to Mercy. She knew the doctor on call could handle the birth, but the expectant mother—a military wife whose family lived on the West Coast and whose husband was currently out of the country—was on her own and incredibly nervous about the birth of her first child.

      Avery hadn’t hesitated to make the detour to the hospital. After texting a quick apology to Amy Seabrook—the friend and colleague who had invited her to the party—she’d exchanged her dress and heels for well-worn scrubs and running shoes.

      After Michelle was settled with her new baby, Avery headed back to the locker room with the vague thought of salvaging her plans for the evening. She didn’t make it far before she was nabbed to assist Dr. Romeo—aka Justin Garrett—with a resuscitative thoracotomy in the ER.

      While she might disapprove of his blatant flirtations with members of the female staff, she couldn’t deny that he was an exceptional doctor—or that her own heart always beat just a little bit faster whenever he was around. He stood about six feet two inches with a lean but strong build, short dark blond hair and deep green eyes. But it was more than his physical appearance that drew women to him. He was charming and confident, and not just a doctor but also a Garrett—a name with a certain inherent status in Charisma, North Carolina, where Garrett Furniture had been one of the town’s major employers for more than fifty years.

      After more than three years of working beside him at the hospital, she would have expected to become inured to his presence. The truth was exactly the opposite—the more time she spent with him, the more appealing she found him. She respected his ability to take control in a crisis situation as much as she admired the compassion he showed to his patients and, as a result, she’d developed a pretty major crush on him—not that she had any intention of letting Dr. Romeo know it.

      When the patient had been resuscitated and moved to surgery, he’d simply and sincerely thanked Avery for her help. That was another thing she liked about him—he might be in command of the ER, but he never overlooked the contributions of the rest of the staff.

      She’d barely discarded her gown and gloves from that procedure when she was steered to the surgical wing to help Dr. Bristow with a femoral shaft fracture. She passed through the ER again on her way out, and that was when she saw Dr. Garrett hunkered down in conversation with a little boy. The child’s face was streaked with dirt and tears, but it was the abject grief in his eyes that tugged at her heart and had her slipping into the room after the ER physician had gone. She chatted with him and played Go Fish until Victoria Danes arrived. Once she was confident that he was comfortable in the psychologist’s company, she headed back toward the locker room. And ran straight into the one person she always tried to avoid.

      “Good—you’re still here.”

      Her heart bumped against her ribs as she looked up at Justin, but she kept her tone cool, casual. “Actually, I’m just on my way home.”

      “We’ve got two ambulances coming in from an MVA—one carrying an expectant mother.”

      “Dr. Terrence can handle it.”

      “He can, but Callie asked me to find you.”

      “Why?” she wondered.

      “The pregnant woman is her sister.”