Lynne Marshall - Nyc Angels & Gold Coast Angels Collection

‘Could I have a word with you?’

‘Sure.’

‘I’m worried.’ She gave him a tight smile. ‘Which is nothing new. I always am … but tonight I’m really worried.’

‘Go on.’

‘I’ve just spent another couple of hours talking to Mike and I’ve just been in again to Tommy and I just don’t think that Mike’s responsible for the bruising.’ She looked at him. ‘Have you read the notes?’

‘I’ve just started.’

‘Have you read my notes?’

‘Not yet.’ Part of Jack’s frustration was that he never actually got a chance to sit down and do that. He was always relying on handovers, catching up. He had read Lorna’s findings and wasn’t quite happy with the detail of her notes, would have preferred to have thoroughly examined Tommy himself rather than rely on a locum registrar’s findings. He looked at Nina, saw the tension in her face and her genuine concern. ‘Tell me what you know.’

She actually exhaled in relief before she started talking.

‘I’ve been working with the family for six months, since the mother’s death,’ Nina explained. ‘Prior to Kathy’s death, the marriage was in trouble—they had major financial issues and Mike was away all week working, and when he came home at weekends Kathy often went to her mother’s, so he hardly saw Tommy. Six months ago, Mike left for a trip after a huge argument with Kathy. He didn’t ring her that day, but the next day, when he did, she didn’t answer her phone and he figured she still wasn’t talking to him.

‘When she still didn’t pick up the next day, Mike had a neighbour go and check on her. She was dead and Tommy was with her, hungry and dehydrated …’

Jack wasn’t shocked, he had heard many stories like this before, but he saw tears well up in her eyes and her involvement in the case unnerved him, challenged him even. ‘Given the row and the circumstances, there was suspicion as to Mike’s involvement in the death. While Tommy was admitted here, the father was flying back to face police questioning, and Child Protection was naturally called in. That’s the reason for my involvement.’

‘Okay.’ His expression was deadpan, but his mind filtered the information, and, Nina noted, he really was listening.

‘Tommy had shut down from the trauma of being with his mother’s body, but apart from that there were issues with bonding with his father.’

‘Explain.’

She smiled. He didn’t waste words, but gave her a chance to speak.

‘When I first met Tommy and his father, Tommy took all his direction from me. He had more connection with me than with his own father. As you know, a child is normally unsure around strangers, but not in this case. Mike had had very few dealings with Tommy and that’s what we’ve been working on, whereas the psychologist has been dealing more with the issues of losing his mother. They’ve come on in leaps and bounds—despite enormous financial stress, Tommy and Mike are a real unit. He looks to his father now for prompts, he’s asking to see him right now …’

‘The father clearly has a temper problem. I saw the way he was with you.’

‘Yes,’ Nina said. ‘But never with Tommy.’

‘Never?’

‘He was cross this morning about the wet bed, but that was out of frustration and fear. He doesn’t understand the bruises and the cut. Mike told me that he was terrified that we’d take him away, what we’d think, that’s why he didn’t bring him in—which, yes, was a terrible call …’

Jack nodded. It had been a terrible call but one he had seen many parents make.

‘I remember one child that was referred to us for unexplained bruising had leukaemia …’

‘He’s had blood work.’ Jack shook his head. ‘He hasn’t got that and leukaemia wouldn’t account for two fractured ribs and an infected cut that actually looks as if it’s combined with a burn—and that he’s resumed bedwetting.’

‘Fine,’ Nina said, and Jack frowned.

‘What does that mean?’

‘You’ve already made up your mind.’ She walked out of his office and to the nurses’ station and set up her computer to input her notes—God, she was an angry thing, Jack thought. He felt like walking over and tapping her on the shoulder, telling her that, no, he hadn’t made up his mind, that he was still trying to catch up on the notes, and that he didn’t jump in with assumptions. He looked at all the facts and then he made up his mind.

So he started to.

He read the psychologist’s notes though they dealt more with the issues surrounding the mother, and then he read Nina’s.

They were incredibly detailed and her observations were astute, outlining how Tommy had first responded to her, that he had been precocious almost, sitting on her knee, playing with her lanyard, taking no direction from the father he knew, but in later visits he had turned more and more to his father, so much so that Nina had been about to close the case.

So what had gone wrong these last weeks?

Jack looked up and saw Nina tapping away on her laptop, then she stopped and yawned and gave her head a little shake. He watched as she stood and headed for the water cooler and then came back to the computer, frowning as she read through her notes. Then she must have hit ‘send’, because an update appeared in the notes Jack was reading.

And he read Nina’s account of today.

She was a brilliant report writer. He had expected more passion, a little dig at the medial staff perhaps, but instead she had detailed all that had happened, and her conclusion that, given the injuries and the lack of any explanation, she had obtained an urgent court order that allowed supervised access only for the next seventy-two hours.

And Jack sat and racked his brains.

He shut out all chatter.

He was head of paeds for more reasons than his financial pull.

No one argument swayed him, no tearful plea prompted his signature on anything that he didn’t believe in.

Jack walked over to the bedside where Nina now stood stroking Tommy’s dark curls as he slept. ‘Do you always get this involved?’

‘Always.’ She didn’t look up. ‘Right now my department is all this little guy’s got.’

‘As well as the medical staff.’

‘I’m talking about family.’ She looked up. ‘He wants his father and I’ve been to court to stop that contact; it’s not a decision that can be taken lightly. I have a worker booked for nine a.m. and she will supervise a visit, but really Tommy needs his father tonight.’

‘I’ve been reading through the notes,’ Jack said, only he didn’t get to finish as he was interrupted by a sudden wail from a sleeping Tommy. Nina looked down, moved to comfort him as his eyes opened and he sat up, clearly terrified.

‘It’s okay, Tommy,’ Nina said, sure the little boy was having a nightmare, but instead Jack told her to step out, already pressing the bell for assistance. He knew long before Nina did what was happening, because Tommy hadn’t woken up. He was experiencing an aura, a sudden panic before a seizure, and Tommy nearly bolted from the bed as Jack firmly held him, then laid him back down as his body gave way to spasms …

Nina felt sick. There was no question now that she should go home and she headed to the office, watching as the nurses ran with the trolley, IVs were put up and drugs were given.

Yet nothing seemed to be working.

She heard the call go out for the anaesthetist and then she saw through a chink in the curtains that after only brief respite young Tommy’s body was starting to seize again.

A grim-faced Jack came into the office a while later.

‘He’s anaesthetised and we’re taking him down for an urgent head CT,’ Jack told her. ‘You need to let his father know.’