Finishing the caution, the big, blond officer pushed Brendan towards his partner and then stepped closer to Kelly. Rather too close in Ari’s opinion. Any further and he would have been able to touch her ear with his lips but Ari could still hear what he said.
‘You called for us, Cowbell. So why don’t you just let us do our thing and look after you, okay?’
* * *
Oh, man...
How humiliating was this?
Kelly could actually feel the bright flash of colour that was heating her cheeks. She certainly couldn’t miss the way Ari’s jaw dropped as he heard that patronising tone and the dismissive nickname either. Or the expression in his eyes, even though his gaze only grazed hers for a heartbeat. He didn’t understand, did he? He’d seen her stand up to an aggressive, obnoxious drunk with no more than her voice and determination as weapons so why was she letting another bully take charge?
Kelly didn’t understand it herself. It was more than two years since her relationship with this man had ended. She should have been over it long ago. She had proved she was strong enough to keep herself completely safe from any other disastrous entanglement. Stupid nicknames should have lost any power long ago as well but, apparently, they could still sting.
Cowbell... Or maybe Kettlebell, because that’s all you are, sweetheart. A useless lump...
At least it was chaotic enough for anyone’s impressions or embarrassment to be so fleeting that they were unlikely to be remembered. Brendan was being dragged, shouting, from the room at the same moment that paramedics were coming in with a stretcher laden with more equipment. Vicky was crying and another alarm was sounding on the defibrillator. The focus needed on her patient was welcome. Kelly knew that treating a critically ill person was at the top of that list of things she was not useless at and she was going to use every one of those skills right now, for the sake of Vicky and her unborn baby.
Vicky’s heart rate was climbing. Her blood pressure, oxygen saturation and level of consciousness were dropping. They needed to increase the rate of fluid resuscitation with another IV line. They also needed to get this patient to hospital. Fast.
Only minutes later, Kelly was making sure that all her monitoring equipment for continuous measurements of blood pressure, oxygen saturation and heart rhythm were functioning. One of the back-up paramedics was going to drive her SUV back to the hospital so that she could stay in the ambulance with her patient.
Ari had gathered his own equipment while they’d got Vicky ready for transport. He appeared at the back of the ambulance just before the doors were slammed shut. The flashing lights had already been activated.
‘Where are you heading?’ he asked.
‘Kensington. It’s the nearest hospital set up for obstetric and neonatal emergencies.’
‘Great. I’m heading that way myself. I’ll be able to check up on Vicky later, then.’
Kelly could see him kicking his bike into life and starting to follow them before the ambulance reached the end of the street. She cleared her throat as she received acknowledgment from her radio handset that she’d been patched through to Kensington’s emergency department.
‘We’re coming to you with a thirty-seven-year-old woman—Vicky Tomkins,’ she told them. ‘Pregnant, almost thirty weeks gestation, sudden onset of acute abdominal pain and bleeding approximately ninety minutes ago. Suspected placental abruption. She’s on her second unit of saline but her blood pressure’s dropped to ninety over forty and her GCS has dropped from fifteen to twelve in the last ten minutes or so. Estimated blood loss of at least a litre. We’ll be with you in about six minutes...’
Another glance through the rear window showed Kelly that her rapid response SUV was right behind the ambulance. Just beyond the SUV was a large bike with a tall man in a dark leather jacket and a black helmet.
Ari Lawson—the astonishingly different midwife who had unexpectedly dropped into her life less than an hour ago—was riding shotgun.
For some inexplicable reason that she wasn’t going to allow any brain space to analyse, knowing he was close by was making Kelly feel safer. Protected, even.
And it was a good feeling.