LITMIR.BIZ

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closing.

      It sounded straightforward. It seemed the hardest surgery he’d ever undertaken. Why? Because the huge unknown was how much damage had already been done. Had they been fast enough? Had the pressure already caused irreparable harm?

      He fixed the drainage tube, dressed the wound and finally stood back from the table.

      He’d done all he could do.

      Carla was his friend and he felt ill.

      What would have happened if Anna hadn’t been here? Would he have had to administer the anaesthetic himself? Have Maria do it?

      Or wait for evacuation?

      He was under no illusion as to what waiting would have meant. Even now, as Anna reversed the anaesthetic, he was aware that they might have been too late. Cerebral haemorrhage was the most frightening of medical emergencies.

      ‘We’ve done everything we can,’ he said wearily. ‘A neurosurgeon will need to take over. We’ve put in a call for evacuation but that’s still hours away. Meanwhile, we just have to hope.’

      Anna had finished reversing the anaesthetic. She’d removed the intubation tube. Carla was breathing for herself again, but would she wake up? And if she did, what damage had been done?

      ‘You went in as fast as you could,’ she said, maybe sensing just how close to the edge he was. ‘She has the best chance you could possibly have given her.’

      ‘Partly thanks to you.’ Then, almost huskily, ‘Thank you.’

      ‘Don’t thank me.’

      He nodded, dumbly, as the imperatives of surgery faded and the fear for his friend flooded back. What if the damage from pressure was irreversible? What if Carla didn’t open her eyes again, or, if she did, what life would she be facing?

      Surely they’d moved fast enough.

      With this level of bleeding, with the speed with which things had overtaken Carla, there was no way of knowing.

      There was nothing more he could do but wait. The pain he was feeling was fathoms deep.

      ‘The Italian neurosurgeons will take over,’ he said roughly. ‘We don’t have the facilities to do more.’ While there’d been medical need, he’d been able to put distress aside, but now there was little to do for Carla but wait, that distress was impossible to hide. ‘I need to speak to her son. Our receptionist will have contacted him already and he may well be on his way. But enough. Anna, you need to go home.’

      ‘Leaving you alone.’

      ‘Bruno will be back later today. He’s one of our nurse-practitioners but his six-year-old fell out of a tree last week. Comminuted fracture of his femur. He needed specialist orthopaedic care.’

      ‘So he was evacuated, too?’

      ‘Yes, but Bruno should be back.’

      ‘But he’s not a doctor.’

      ‘He’s good. Anna, you need to leave. I’ll take over here.’

      ‘And leave you to worry about Glasgow scores on your own.’

      ‘You’re a patient, Anna,’ he said, reminding himself as well as her. ‘Your place isn’t here.’

      He saw her wince, but there was nothing he could do about it. He had room for nothing but distress for his friend.

      And she seemed to accept it. She looked at him for a long moment and then nodded.

      ‘Okay. But you will call me if Carla needs me. If you need me.’

      ‘I will.’ He hesitated. ‘But the castle won’t necessarily put my calls through.’

      ‘What the…? Of course they will.’

      ‘Try and see,’ he said wearily. ‘The outside world isn’t permitted to intrude on the castle and its occupants.’

      ‘That might have been then,’ she said briskly. ‘This is now. If there’s any problem, I have my own phone and it’s on international roaming. I’ll leave my number at the desk. Call me. Promise?’

      And he looked at her, a long look where questions were being asked that he didn’t understand and maybe she couldn’t respond to.

      ‘I promise,’ he said at last. ‘Not that I think it’ll happen, but I promise. Thank you, Anna, but you need to remember you’ve been injured yourself. It’s time for you to leave.’

       CHAPTER FOUR

      TO SAY VICTOIR was annoyed was an understatement. He’d come to collect her in one of the castle’s limousines. He’d been left kicking his heels for hours.

      When she finally joined him he was leaning on the beautiful auto, glowering, looking almost startlingly out of place. The entrance to the hospital was serviceable but that was all that could be said about it. It was a narrow driveway, crammed with people coming and going, mothers and babies, the elderly in wheelchairs or Zimmer frames, people visiting with bunches of flowers or bags of washing.

      The ambulance that had transported Anna to hospital the day before had backed into the entrance parking bay, in front of the limo. The limo was practically taking up the entire bay. Paramedics were trying to manoeuvre an elderly lady on a stretcher around Victoir. Victoir, in his immaculate dark suit and crisp white linen, with his hair sleeked back, a man in his forties in charge of his world, wasn’t about to move for anyone, not even a patient on a stretcher.

      The sight made Anna wince. Not for the first time she thought helplessly about the terms of the castle Trust. Yes, she’d inherited but she had no power. Once upon a time one of her ancestors had mistrusted his heir and made the entailment bulletproof. It would be twenty years before she had any control over funds. She owned it all and yet she didn’t own it.

      Her cousin hadn’t survived his inheritance for the twenty years needed to break the Trust. Her uncle and her grandfather…clearly by the time their twenty years had been up they hadn’t bothered. After all, why should they? All their needs were being met.

      Men like Victoir had no doubt been lining their own pockets, but to find out how, to explore the complexities of things she probably could do nothing about…

      ‘Leave it and come home,’ Martin had suggested. ‘A decent legal team can look after your interests from over here. If in twenty years you wish to do something more, you can think about options then.’

      It made sense. She knew little about this place except that she now—sort of—owned it. And it was poverty-stricken. And Leo was here and he was struggling.

      Victoir was opening the car door for her. ‘You should have asked the nurses to carry your gear. That’s what they’re here for.’

      Really? It was a small holdall. To ask one of the overworked medical staff to abandon their work to carry it…

      ‘I can’t believe they let you just walk out with it,’ he continued. ‘If they think they can treat a Castlavaran like—’

      ‘They treated me well.’

      ‘They asked you to work! When you’re ill yourself?’

      ‘I’m not ill and I asked to work.’

      ‘They’ve even demanded to come to the castle. A final check, the nurse said. As if we can’t take care of you.’

      An offer of a follow-up visit by a district nurse was entirely reasonable, Anna thought. She’d have organised the same for a patient of hers. She didn’t need it, though. She was okay.

      Except that she was angry.

      Usually she was unflappable. She prided herself on her calm in the face of crises.

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