Caro Carson - Doctor, Soldier, Daddy

Sam objected, but Jamie concentrated as he would with any patient. He kept palpating despite Sam’s whines and wiggles—and then he felt the roof of the mouth give. The palate wasn’t formed correctly toward the back of the throat. It looked normal because the membrane covering the roof of the mouth had grown over it, but there was a definite cleft, hidden.

Miss Harrison had noticed a symptom that Sam’s pediatricians and Jamie himself had missed. Sam had a cleft palate. A very slight, easily overlooked, but definitely malformed palate. One that hindered his swallowing.

Guilt.

If any parent should have figured that out, he should have. He was an M.D., but this was his first child, the first baby he’d ever given a bottle to, and it hadn’t occurred to him that the amount of formula that came back up was greater than normal.

Like the doctor he was, his brain kept working despite the guilt. After the diagnosis, treatment options needed to be reviewed. As medical problems went, this one was simple. Sammy would have to go under the knife one more time, but it was fixable.

“Me,” Sammy whined, reaching toward the empty bottle. “Me!”

“This is what you want, little buddy?”

Jeez, his kid was probably hungry, ready to eat more, now that he could get it down and keep it down, thanks to Miss Harrison figuring out the best position.

“Me.”

“Got it. Coming right up.” Jamie carried Sam into the kitchen, tossing the balled-up dirty blanket into the laundry room as he went, then started the process of opening the can of formula.

Jamie owed Miss Harrison more than a simple thank-you. He could write her a commendation, although the possibility for a raise or a promotion was slim when the hospital was under a strict budget.

“Me.” Sammy grabbed for the freshly filled bottle.

Jamie chuckled to himself. “Yes, this is yours. Trust me, I don’t want it.”

At least his son did well communicating. He was advanced for his age when it came to expressing his needs verbally, as he was doing now. “Me” was an effective way for the baby to say he wanted something. He’d used it earlier today, when Jamie had come to pick him up at the hospital day-care center. Sam had wanted—

Jamie stopped in the middle of the living room.

Sam had wanted Miss Harrison.

Chapter Four

Jamie MacDowell, emergency room physician and war veteran, very nearly chickened out.

Last night’s revelation that Sam was attached to Miss Harrison warranted further investigation at his first opportunity, but when Jamie spotted her sitting alone in the hospital cafeteria, he felt like a boy in sixth grade, ready to turn tail and run rather than sit next to a girl.

The cashier charged the lunch to Jamie’s account. Instead of looking toward Miss Harrison’s table, Jamie made eye contact with the cartoonish scarecrow that was taped to the cash register for the fall. In four weeks, Jamie would be reporting to his reserve unit for two days of military training.

For the next six months, he’d report once a month, train for two days and come back home. Unless, of course, the medical unit was activated and deployed to Afghanistan, or any other corner of the world where they were needed. Jamie would go, and Sam would be left behind.

Sam needed a mother.

With a brief nod at the cashier and a fresh sense of determination, Jamie picked up the plastic cafeteria tray in one hand and turned toward Miss Harrison’s corner of the cafeteria. Sam’s favorite caregiver sat, alone, at one of the smaller tables. She was concentrating on her meal, so Jamie studied her face as he approached. He’d thought of her as plain, but she wasn’t homely. If they shared a house, it wouldn’t be a punishment to look at her across a dinner table. She had even features. Her mouth was compressed into a bit of a frown right now, but her lips were pink and not too full, not too thin.

Not that it matters. Mothers were always beautiful to their children, and this woman might make a good mother. He was here to find out.

“Is this seat taken?”

She looked up at him and froze for a moment, her spoon halfway to her mouth, before she glanced toward the entrance to the physician-only dining room.

“I’m not required to eat in the physicians’ lounge.” He smiled at her and stood there like an idiot, holding his tray. Middle school had never been this uncomfortable. “May I join you?”

She nodded, so he sat.

“Thanks,” he said. “I thought you’d like to know how your dialysis patient was doing today.”

“You mean Myrna?”

Jamie silently awarded her a point in her favor. She knew each child in her care by name. The patients were more to her than their pathologies.

“Was the incision site infected only near the surface, or had it spread outward from her kidney?” she asked.

“It appears to be localized at the incision site. Her kidneys are clear.” Jamie was glad she understood the pathology, however, because his son had his share of medical issues. The kids whose parents were the best informed tended to be the kids who did well. Another point in her favor. “It was caught early, thanks to you.”

“I’m glad to hear it, Dr. MacDowell.”

“Call me Jamie.”

For a split second, she looked at him like he’d just suggested they go somewhere and get naked. Dropping titles could indicate that kind of intimacy in a hospital setting, he knew. The next second, she turned her head and sneezed. Loudly.

Her nose seemed to be perpetually runny, although it was a nice enough nose, besides being red most of the time. She turned away from the table and blew her nose rather unbecomingly. With purpose. Force. Her bangs fell over her face, got tangled with the napkin she was using to mop up.

Jamie pushed aside his mashed potatoes and congealed gravy.

“Excuse me,” she said, when she was done with a second napkin.

“No problem.” Physical attraction to her would make their co-parenting awkward, anyway.

She was having soup and crackers. Lots of crackers. She had a tower of those little oyster cracker packets on her tray. He tried to see through them to the photo ID that hung on the lanyard around her neck, hoping to catch a glimpse of her first name. It seemed awkward to have to ask a woman her first name when she already knew his child as well as he did. Better than he did, in some ways. Her name tag stayed wrong way out.

“Have you worked here long, Miss Harrison?”

She turned away and sneezed again. At least it flipped her name tag around.

Kendry. Kendry Harrison. Jamie waited for a feeling of great portent to settle over him. Waited for a thunderbolt to strike, for a feeling of destiny, for something.

“Amina. Amina Sadat.” She’d laughed, and in a voice that blended foreign tones with British enunciation, she’d said, “At least, that’s the Westernized version of my name.” She’d then recited a sentence-long string of syllables, her true Afghani name, one he would later learn included her father, her grandfather and nearly her whole family tree. Every syllable had sounded like exotic music...

Jamie cleared his throat. “Kendry? That’s an unusual name. What country is it from?”

She dabbed at her nose with her crumpled napkin, an apologetic motion. “I think my parents made it up. They’re kind of free-spirited like that.”

Free-spirited parents? Not the kind of people he expected, somehow, to produce the plain, serious person in front of him.

“But to answer your first question, I’ve been working here for nearly six months.”

Another point for her. She wasn’t distracted easily. Which reminded him that he needed to keep his head in the game. He was here to gauge their compatibility. “Do you enjoy working in the hospital?”