Christmas with Her Bodyguard

Could he ever be worthy of a woman like her? She was incredible, blending in seamlessly, with no trace of the socialite he’d thought he’d known. She was like a different version of herself out here. A better version. Freer. More comfortable in her skin. The real Rae, he realised abruptly.

A woman he could easily fall for.

The thought was like a lasso around his chest. Tight. Constricting. That could never happen. Because even if Rae wasn’t the woman he’d believed her to be, he was still the man he knew himself to be.

Lost. Anchorless. Valueless.

He had nothing to offer a woman like Rae. He was damaged, and not just physically. He’d lost his body and he’d lost his career, but more than that he’d lost his reputation. His only worth now was in the work he could do in places like this. Here he felt so much more. Here he felt whole.

He didn’t belong back in regular civilian life—coming out here had proved that much to him. There was no place for him back there. There was no place for him in Rae’s world.

It should have made him want to back away from her all the more. Instead, it made him want to grab hold of the woman he had, enjoy her for the here and now. She’d be gone, moving on from his life, soon enough. The thought terrified him.

Gripping her wrists, he pushed her away from him.

‘Confession over,’ he bit out as coldly, as icily, as he could. ‘We’re expected back in camp and you’re due on shift in a couple of hours. You don’t want to let them down, and start living up to your old reputation, do you?’

And as she flinched he told himself the shattering in his chest was triumph.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

‘YOU’RE GOING TO need to sterilise her if you perform a Caesarean section on her,’ Janine, the senior consultant, murmured. ‘If it’s her third C-section, her uterus will be severely weakened.’

‘I know, but I don’t see another option for her,’ Rae concluded dully, glancing across the room at the patient in question. As if things couldn’t get any worse, the girl was on oxygen, still not even stable, and although they’d succeeded in bringing her blood pressure down significantly, it was still elevated. ‘Not if we’re to save her baby.’

There were times when Rae could feel her limitations pressing in on her, constricting and cruel, but the truth of it, Rae realised with something close to contentment, was that there was absolutely nowhere else she would rather be. She might not have known it three and a half weeks ago when she’d first driven into the camp, but this was where she was meant to be in her life. In places like this, helping women who might otherwise have had nothing.

Perhaps not for ever, but certainly for the foreseeable future. As much as she’d loved her job in her New York practice, it simply didn’t compare to how proud, how fulfilled, and, yes, how permanently exhausted she felt out here.

It almost made up for the way things had taken a sour turn with Myles. She’d thought that Myles opening up to her would be a turning point, bringing them closer together, maybe even allowing them to take their physical relationship to another level. One where they could possibly consider actually calling it something of a relationship.

She couldn’t have been more wrong. Unfamiliar bitterness trickled down her spine.

It was as though talking to her the way he had that night, opening himself up to her and showing her his vulnerabilities, had actually made him push her away all the harder. They’d barely spoken since that day, even before he’d volunteered to return to the forward camp for forty-eight-hour shifts, on two more occasions since.

Folding her arms over her chest and straightening her spine, Rae told herself that she didn’t care. Hadn’t she told herself years ago that the only person she could rely on to make her happy was herself? Not her family, not her friends, not a man.

And certainly no other man would do for her now that she’d been with Myles. He’d ruined her for life; she knew it for a fact. No one else would ever, could ever, come close.

But she had medicine, her career, and that was going to be enough.

More than enough, she chanted brightly, turning her attention back to her immediate patient.

The twenty-seven-year-old woman had come in with such severe pre-eclampsia that her skin had split in some areas and was at high risk of infection. They had battled to reduce her blood pressure, and stabilise her baby’s condition and, for a while, it had seemed to work. But now the baby’s health was beginning to deteriorate again. They had to get it out.

A third C-section meant a third scar, leaving the girl’s uterus too vulnerable to risk further pregnancies, which meant sterilisation was going to be the safest course of action. It wasn’t going across well with the young woman, or her family, who were beginning to turn on the interpreter.

‘I’d better get in there and support him.’ Rae started across the room. ‘This was my other patient I’ve been keeping an eye on. She came in pregnant with twins and fully dilated. She’s with the midwives but she’s been pushing for quite some time now, and I think we might need to help things along by delivering the first baby with a vacuum.’

‘I’m on it.’ Janine nodded. ‘You just go and deal with your pre-eclampsia patient.’

‘Thanks,’ called Rae, already hurrying across the room to where the husband was standing apart from the family, his face etched more with concern than with anger.

Instinctively, Rae summoned the interpreter over, a young man by the name of Lulwar. Her voice was low until she could be sure her suspicions were correct.

‘Can you ask the husband what he’s thinking?’

The two men spoke briefly, quietly, the family too emotional to notice.