Page 40 of Twin Surprise for the Italian Doc
And the silence was unnerving.
There was no time to waste on friendly introductions to a junior crew she didn’t recognise. Georgia slipped her arms from the backpackwith all her gear and dropped to a crouch, realising belatedly that the size of her belly made this impractical so she ended up on her knees beside her patient.
‘Fill me in,’ she directed quietly, her fingers already on the boy’s neck, feeling for a pulse.
‘This is Toby,’ one of the paramedics told her. She was holding the boy’s shoulders. Preventing him from being moved? ‘He’s eleven yearsold. He’s come off his bike at speed, going downhill.’
A head injury? Georgia glanced at the helmet the boy was still wearing. She couldn’t see any evidence of damage.
The pulse she could feel beneath her fingers was light and rapid. A little uneven, which was a concern.
Was he bleeding out from a severed artery?
Another searching glance didn’t show her any signs of blood loss and surely eventhe most junior crew would have external bleeding well under control by now.
‘He hit this tree. And...’
The tiny hesitation in the paramedic’s voice came at the same instant that Georgia saw what the problem was.
It had looked as if the small branch that had snapped from the tree was just a part of the organic debris of this crash scene.
But only one end of the branch was visible.
The otherend was hidden beneath a fold in the material of this young boy’s shirt. Very gently, Georgia moved the material and her heart sank.
Just how far had this stick penetrated? Were the irregular beats she had noticed due to its proximity to Toby’s heart?
This was beyond serious. It was critical.
The people all looking to her for guidance were probably reassured by how calmly she spoke. It wasa skill honed over a long career of facing difficult situations. She might be on the verge of panicking but nobody would ever guess.
‘Can you get on the radio to Comms, please,’ she said to the first paramedic. ‘Request urgent helicopter backup and then organise a place for it to land.’ She turned to the second crew member. ‘I need padding so that we can stabilise this branch. Then I’ll needmy IV roll out of my pack and I want you to get some ECG electrodes in place. Very carefully.’ She looked up at the bystanders. ‘Can I get someone to come and hold Toby’s shoulders, please? And someone else to keep a hand on his legs? We have to make sure we don’t move him yet, even an inch.’
By the time she heard the approach of the helicopter, Toby had IV fluids running, oxygen on, and a monitorthat was recording his heart rhythm and blood pressure. Georgia had her hands on the doughnut-shaped padding that was around the base of the stick. She didn’t know how close it was to this boy’s heart but she could feel the movement of its beating and knew that even a small movement of the impaled object could prove fatal.
She was so focussed on what she was doing, she didn’t even look up untila flash of red filled her peripheral vision. The legs of one of the critical care paramedics from the helicopter crew. Her glance flicked up swiftly and—despite that skill of keeping a personal reaction hidden in the face of a difficult situation—it was a miracle that her hands remained rock steady when she saw the face beneath the helmet.
Matteo?
The flicker on his face told her that her shockedthought must have escaped in an audible gasp but he wasn’t about to waste a split second on any explanation.
‘Vital signs?’
‘Blood pressure and oxygen saturation have dropped in the last five minutes and the blood pressure’s widened. Respiratory rate increasing. He’s in sinus rhythm but I’m worried about an increasing number of ectopic beats. I’m querying a cardiac tamponade?’
Matteo was unhookinga stethoscope from around his neck.
‘I’m going to check his breathing and heart sounds. I’ll work around you. Don’t move.’
Of course she wasn’t going to move. Even if the ‘fight or flight’ part of Georgia’s brain had activated itself and was urging her to flee.
To get away from Matteo.
A man who had offered to marry her and help raise what he believed to be another man’s child.
She’d knownthat Italian men had the reputation of being passionate and impulsive but that had been the craziest thing she’d ever heard. That the offer had actually been as alluring as it was appalling was what had made it so dangerous. Fear had prompted the rush of words she had finally found to respond to him. To tell him that she didn’t want him, oranyman, in her life. He’d finally got out of her carand left—as silently as he had that night after he’d left her bed. And that, she had been quite confident, was the end of it all.
But here he was.
