LITMIR.BIZ

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She waved the printout as if that explained everything and walked away before she went into total embarrassed meltdown. Later, when alone with her thoughts, she’d try to figure out why Jared had acted so oddly. If it was because he thought she was going to make his work environment unpleasant by mooning over him, she’d set him straight.

      She’d gotten quite good at keeping her emotions hidden.

      Chelsea gave the printout to Hannah for her to look over while she saw another patient. When she’d finished, she returned to Hannah’s exam room, but the girl was gone.

      “Betty?” She went in search of the nurse. Spotting the pretty, slightly overweight forty-year-old, she asked, “Is Hannah in the restroom?”

      Blowing a stray short, dyed-platinum strand of hair out of her eye, Betty gave Chelsea a confused look. “She left.”

      “Left?”

      Betty nodded. “Right after you came out of the exam room, she took off. I thought you’d finished.”

      Glancing into the room, Chelsea saw the counter and trash bin were both empty. Well, at least Hannah had taken the brochures.

      CHAPTER THREE

      WHAT had he agreed to?

      Nothing. He hadn’t agreed, and no way was he going to dinner with Chelsea. Not even with his partners there as buffers. He’d been right to avoid her and should stick with that plan as much as current circumstances allowed.

      But for the rest of the day Jared’s mind kept drifting back to how his skin had tingled when they’d touched, how her smile gave glimpses of lightheartedness, how his body perked up at her nearness.

      But he shouldn’t do anything to encourage thoughts that there could ever be anything between them. There couldn’t. Attraction between him and Chelsea was the last thing he needed. His life in Madison was good, exactly what he wanted. It had taken him a long time to find happiness after Laura’s death and he wouldn’t risk losing that hard-won inner peace.

      Not peace, really, he had too much guilt for that, would always have too much guilt over what had happened to Laura, but he’d come to terms of a sort with what had happened.

      He’d done the right thing, focused on his relationship with Laura when she’d told him she was pregnant the week after she’d returned from Greece. The week after he’d met Chelsea.

      Laura had known something had changed, that he hadn’t been the same after spring break. She’d pushed, she’d prodded, she’d begged him to tell her if he wanted her to have an abortion. He hadn’t, but neither had he been able to admit that he’d fallen for a seventeen-year-old girl. He’d pushed thoughts of Chelsea aside, had asked Laura to marry him, and had committed himself to being a good husband and father.

      She’d been ecstatic, until she’d overheard a conversation not meant for her ears. A conversation when his buddies Larry and Tom had ragged him about Chelsea and the way she hero-worshipped him. Jared had snapped, telling them to shut up, but it had been too late. Laura had seen the truth on his face, and they’d argued.

      Although not in the way she’d wanted, he had loved Laura and would have done everything in his power to make her happy, would have been a good husband and father.

      He’d never gotten the opportunity.

      That night, she’d swerved off the rode, hit a tree, and lost their baby and her life.

      Guilt had held him captive ever since.

      Guilt that said he didn’t deserve happiness, particularly not with Chelsea.

      “Dr Jared?” interrupted his nurse, Kayla Welker. He’d hired Kayla the month he’d started at the clinic and he’d never had cause to regret his decision.

      He blinked, clearing the past from his mind. For the moment, at least. “Yes?”

      “Sorry to bother you, but I just put Anthony Rogle in room two. He’s wheezing. Do you want me to give him a breathing treatment, or would you like to check him first?”

      “I’ll see Tony first. Go ahead and set up the nebulizer, though. No doubt, he’ll need it.” Jared followed Kayla to the exam room where the pale twenty-one-year-old struggled to catch his breath, wheezing audibly. A beautiful girl sat next to him, holding his hand and whispering assurances.

      “Thank goodness, Dr Jared.” The young woman sighed her relief. “Tony is having another attack.”

      “Hey, Emily.” Jared motioned for Kayla to start the machine as soon as she got the apparatus set up. He listened to Tony’s heaving chest. “Any triggering factors this time?”

      Emily shook her head. “We were at work, and his chest started heaving. He used his inhaler, but his breathing didn’t get better so I drove him here. Doc, why has he started having these attacks? They scare the devil out of me!”

      “Quit…talking…about me…like I’m not here,” the thin, pale young man ordered, giving his girlfriend an irritated look as he panted for air.

      Kayla handed Tony the breathing apparatus, and he began inhaling the albuterol solution via the nebulizer. The noise of the machine droned through the otherwise silent room. When Tony gave the thumbs-up sign that his wheezing was starting to ease, Jared turned to Emily and Kayla.

      “Keep an eye on him. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

      Two months ago Tony had suffered his first asthma attack. He’d had no prior history of problems. His episodes occurred mostly at work, but he’d had a few at home and one at his girlfriend’s family home.

      His hand-held inhalers helped on occasion, but more and more Tony’s attacks weren’t eased without a trip into the office or the emergency room. More often than not, getting his attack under control required a steroid injection along with the nebulizer treatment. Jared tried to avoid the steroid shot if possible because of the potential side effects. Hopefully as Tony could already feel some relief, using the nebulizer, no injection would be needed today.

      What was causing the young man’s attacks?

      Developing asthma at twenty-one wasn’t a common phenomenon. They’d gone through Tony’s risk factors, and although he worked in the paint shop of a boat factory he always wore proper ventilation masks. There had been no new products or changes in the home and he didn’t have a pet. There were no recent illnesses and once the attack passed, Tony felt fine except for being tired, a frequent symptom following an asthma attack.

      Jared saw his next patient, a schoolteacher needing a refill on her anxiety medication. When he’d finished, he knocked on Tony’s door. The nebulizer no longer hummed, meaning the treatment had finished.

      “How’s the breathing?”

      “Much better, Doc,” Tony answered, talking without sounding winded. Emily still sat, squeezing his hand and watching him nervously, like she expected his chest to heave again any moment. All that Jared had expected to see. What he hadn’t expected to see was Chelsea smiling at his patients, chatting with them while she packed up the nebulizer. What was she doing and where was Kayla?

      Chelsea’s golden brown gaze met his and for a moment he felt as if she searched his soul, seeking answers to questions he couldn’t acknowledge. But then she slid on a professional façade, picked up the machine, and gave a tight smile.

      “Kayla had some business to take care of, and I was between patients,” she said by way of explanation. Without glancing his way again, she pushed past him in the small room. Her shoulder brushed against his, making his nerve endings pulse to life. Her scent filled his nostrils, making him feel as if he was struggling for his next breath every bit as much as Tony had prior to his treatment.

      When she closed the door behind her, he sucked in air, hoping to ease his oxygen-deprived brain cells, or whatever was making him feel so dizzy.

      He turned to Tony and Emily. “What happened?”

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