“Sorry,” he apologized. “I have this arrangement—”
“I see that. It’s far too large.”
“Yes, it is big.” The size was her problem, not Zach’s.
“We can’t accept something that size.”
Crap.Okay, now it was his problem. Zach sighed. After this, he’d need a decadent chocolate cupcake. Cornmeal was not going to cut it.
It took far too long to negotiate the giant arrangement controversy. Twenty minutes later, a relieved Zach wound his way back to the tunnel.
The emotions hammered at him.Pain. Grief. Fear.Overwhelming, powerful. Scattered with imagery strongly linked to the emotions. So many that he couldn’t discern where they came from. A child with a broken leg. Another with a disease far more serious. Grieving parents, spouses, and children. Many blurred images of desperate, worried people connected to machines. Someone, conscious but sedated, being wheeled into the operating room.
Even with his mental walls engaged, he couldn’t shut them out. His head pounded and his vision blurred. He’d be popping Ibuprofen for the next few hours.
It rarely helped much.
But it was all worth it, to have met Jessie.
Moonlight. Her eyes were the color of moonlight. Startling against her olive skin and curly hair—a striking shade of red and twisted into a knot high up on her head.
Striking. Direct. Herconfidencehad shone through in those eyes. No shrinking violet, that woman. And her mentalcalmamong all this chaos. He’d reached for it with a sense of desperation.
Her beauty had struck him speechless, at first. Then, miracle of miracles, they’d started to talk, and the conversation just flowed. Like they’d known each other all their lives.
Jessie had seemed interested enough to give him her number.
Zach sighed. She’d likely reconsider the entire thing. Flowers and chocolate might have set him up for an epic failure. But like his mother used to say: “You never know, unless you try.”
The instant he got into his truck, he pulled out his phone.
And looked up pulchritudinous.
He drove away with a ridiculous grin plastered on his face.
2
The good vibe, along with her resolution to appreciate the little details in life, lasted for the first three hours of Jessie’s shift.
Then it all slid downhill fast.
The ER was hopping tonight. Jessie never understood how these things happened in waves, but they always did. St. Boniface emergency received over one hundred patients a day on average. Most were noncritical. Tonight’s had been particularly demanding. Everyone seemed to be falling on swords. Or at least something pointy or sharp. And hearts were failing all over the place.
Must be the full moon.
At the end of her shift, Jessie stood in the hall as the swinging doors shut in her face. On the other side went her critical heart attack victim, on his way to the cardiac ward. He should make it, but he was a lucky man. St. B. had some of the best cardiac doctors in the province. They’d saved his life.
That guy deserved a monstrous flower arrangement too.
The thought brought Zach to mind and gave her a much needed boost. Dependable and versatile, his sign had said. Good qualities, those. She hoped he wouldn’t wait too long to call. Why on earth hadn’t she gotten his number in exchange?
She had his name and that of the courier. She supposed she could track him from there.
Sometimes her libido got the best of her. Once the muscles—and green eyes—departed into the great unknown, she usually downgraded her opinion. But in Zach’s case, it had gone in the other direction. Was he really as hot as she remembered? That butt. Those thighs. That voice. He’d been funny too.
The eyes. Couldn’t forget the eyes. The longer she’d looked, the greener they’d become.
A commotion in the hall drew her attention—a stretcher, surrounded by three of her fellow nurses, turned into the ER. She hurried after it.
