LITMIR.BIZ

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      He stalked out and Charlie drew in a deep, slightly shaky breath of relief. She’d thought for a minute that Trent would have to physically take the guy out, and realized she’d completely trusted him to do exactly that. Then she pulled up short at the thought. She was in charge of this place and she couldn’t rely on anyone else to deal with tough situations.

      “Thanks, but you didn’t need to do that. I had it handled.”

      Trent looked down at her with raised brows. “Did you, boss lady?”

      “Yeah, I did.”

      He reached out, his long-fingered hand swiping across her shoulder, and she jerked, quickly looking down. “What, is there a bug on me?”

      “No—a real big chip. I was wondering what put it there.” His lips tipped up as his eyes met hers.

      What? Ridiculous. “I don’t have a chip on my shoulder. I’m just doing my job.”

      “Accepting help is part of being head honcho, you know.” Those infuriatingly amused eyes lingered on her before he turned to the nurse. “Have you administered any anesthesia yet?”

      “No, doctor.”

      “Good.” He rolled a stool to the gurney and sat, that full smile now charmingly back on his face as he drew the sheet further down the child’s hips. “So, buddy, where’s it hurt?”

      He pointed, and Trent gently pressed the top of the boy’s stomach, slowly moving his hand downward to the right lower quadrant.

      “Ow.” The boy grimaced and Trent quit pressing his flesh to give the child’s skinny chest a gentle pat.

      “Okay. We’re going to fix you up so it doesn’t hurt any more. What’s your name?”

      “Lionel.” The child, looking more relaxed than when Charlie had first come into the room, studied Trent. With his small index finger, Lionel pushed his bulging, droopy eyelid upward so he could see. “My belly will be all better? For true?”

      “For true.” Trent’s smile deepened, his eyes crinkled at the corners as his gaze touched Charlie’s for a moment before turning back to the child. “Inside your body, your appendix is about the size of your pinky finger. It’s got a little sick and swollen, and that’s what’s making your belly hurt. I’m going to fix it all up while you sleep, and when you wake up it won’t hurt any more. Okay?”

      “Okay.” Lionel nodded and smiled, showing a missing front tooth.

      “But, before we take care of your sore belly, I want to talk about your eye.” Trent gently moved the boy’s hand before his own fingers carefully touched all around the protrusion on and above the eyelid. “Can you tell me how long it’s been like this?”

      Lionel shrugged. “I’nt know.”

      “I bet it’s hard to see, huh?”

      “Uh-huh. I can’t see the football very well when we’re kicking around. Sometimes Mommy has tape, though, and when she sticks it on there to hold it up that helps some.”

      “I’m sure you look tough that way. Scare your opponents.” Trent grinned, and Lionel grinned back. “But I bet you could show how tough a player you are even more if you could see better.”

      Charlie marveled at the trusting expression on the child’s face, how unquestioning he seemed as he nodded and smiled. She shifted her attention to Trent and saw that his demeanor wasn’t just good bedside manner. The man truly liked kids, and that realization ratcheted the man’s appeal even higher. And Lord knew he didn’t need that appeal ratcheted up even a millimeter.

      “Is your mother around? Or someone I can talk to about fixing it at the same time we fix your belly?”

      “My mommy brought me. But I don’t know where she is right now.”

      As his expression began to get anxious again, Trent leaned in close with a smile that would have reassured even the most nervous child. “Hey, we’ll find her. Don’t worry.”

      He stood and took a few steps away with a nod to Charlie. When they were out of hearing distance, he spoke in an undertone. “I want to take care of his hemangioma and we might as well do it while he’s under for the appendix. There’ll be a lot of bleeding to control, and I’ll get him started on antibiotics first. After I remove the tumor, I’ll decide if it’s necessary to graft skin from his thigh to make it look good. In the States, you wouldn’t do a clean surgery and an appendix at the same time, but I can do it with no problems.”

      “If it wouldn’t be done in the States, we’re not doing it here.” Didn’t he get that this was why she’d thrown Smith out?

      “If you think mission doctors don’t do things we wouldn’t do in the U.S., you have a lot to learn.” No longer amused, a hint of steel lurked within the blue of his eyes. “Here, I can follow my gut and do what’s best for the patient, and only what’s best for the patient. I don’t have to worry about what an insurance company wants, or cover my ass with stupid protocol. You can either trust me to know I’m doing what’s best for Lionel, or not. Your call.”

      Charlie glanced at the boy and knew better than anyone that they were talking about a tremendously skilled procedure, one that would require the kind of detailed work and suturing a general surgeon wouldn’t be capable of. “I’m in the process of getting a plastic surgery center together. That’s what the new wing of the hospital is for. How about we suggest to his mommy that she bring him back when it’s operational?”

      He shook his head. “First, there’s a good chance they live far away and it won’t be easy to get back here. Second, he’s probably had this a long time. The longer we wait, the more likely the possibility of permanent blindness. Even if it is fixed later, if his brain gets used to not receiving signals from the eye that part of his brain will die, and that’ll be it for his vision. Not to mention that in West Africa a person is more susceptible to getting river blindness or some other parasitic infection in the eye. What if that happened and he ended up blind in both eyes? Not worth the risk.”

      “But can you do it? Without him still looking...bad? The plastic surgery center will be open soon. And a plastic surgeon would know how to do stuff like this better than you would.”

      “You don’t know who you’re dealing with here.” His eyes held a mocking laugh. “He’ll look great, I promise.”

      She stared at him, at his ultra-confident expression, the lazy smile. Would she be making a mistake to let him fix the hemangioma when in just a few weeks she was supposed to have a plastics specialist on board?

      She looked back at Lionel, his finger still poked into the disfiguring vascular tumor so he could see out of that eye as he watched them talk. She looked at the trusting and hopeful expression on his small face. A face marred by a horrible problem Trent promised he could fix.

      “Okay. You’ve convinced me. Do it.”

      CHAPTER THREE

      HOURS PASSED WHILE Trent worked on Lionel. Worry over whether or not she’d made the right decision made it difficult for Charlie to sit in her office and do paperwork, but she had to try. With creditors demanding a big payment in three weeks, getting that funding check in her pocket for the new wing from the Gilchrist Foundation was critical.

      She made herself shuffle through everything one more time. It seemed the only things that had to happen to get the money were a final inspection from a Gilchrist Foundation representative and proof she had a plastic surgeon on board. Both of which would happen any day now, thank heavens.

      So how, in the midst of this important stuff, could she let her attention wander? She was thinking instead about the moment five days ago when Trent had strolled into this office. Thinking about how she’d stared, open-mouthed, like a schoolgirl.

      Tall and lean, with slightly long, nearly black hair starkly contrasting

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