One Kiss in Tokyo... (9 page)

‘What are you doing? Are you crazy? We need to cross before the lights change.'

Katsuko's head was darting from side to side. Time was running out.

But not for Avery.

He caught her head between both his hands. Her hair shone in the neon lights and her eyes sparkled. ‘This is what I'm doing,' he said as he bent down and caught her perfect strawberry lips in his.

He felt her breath catch. But she was only rigid for the tiniest moment. One second later her body relaxed against his. Her lips were soft, pliable and seemed like they were moulded just for his.

His hands moved from her cheeks and tangled through her silky-soft hair. He could smell her. He could smell the perfume she was wearing, the shampoo from her hair and the strawberry from her lip gloss. He'd be happy if he could just stay here all night, inhaling her essence.

Her hands moved up to his shoulders, her fingers brushing against the skin at the side of his neck.

Reactions. That was just what he needed. Right in the middle of the busiest crossing in the world.

But somehow he knew Katsuko could cause this reaction in him anywhere.

There was a shout near them. She jumped back, pulling her lips from his.

The crowd had virtually disappeared around them, the last few stragglers reaching the far sidewalk. ‘Come on!' she shouted with a flash of panic.

For a second he wanted to object. To tell the world that his only priority right now was to get his lips back on hers.

But any second now they would resemble two squashed bugs.

He grabbed her hand and ran, sprinting as fast as they could towards the further sidewalk. He was laughing now. He couldn't help it. The whole thing was so ridiculous. It had flashed into his head in the restaurant, an overwhelming urge to have their first kiss in the middle of the monumental crossing.

People parted around them, amused expressions on their faces.

Avery and Katsuko bent over, both gasping for breath. She was laughing now too. ‘What on earth were you thinking? Are you completely crazy?'

He shook his head as he caught his breath. There was something else in her eyes now. A sparkle that hadn't been there before. The sadness that had been there in the restaurant had vanished and he didn't ever want to see it again.

For a few minutes he pushed away his doubts about whether he could give her what she needed. This was all about the here and now.

He was still laughing. He straightened up and grabbed hold of her wrist again, pulling her over to the side of the street and into a doorway. ‘I must be completely crazy.' He couldn't wipe the smile from his face. ‘Because I'm going to do this again.'

And he did.

CHAPTER FIVE

H
ER
SKIN
FELT
ITCHY
, as if it prickled when she walked down the corridor at work.

She'd never felt self-conscious at work before. She could see her colleagues standing at one of the desks, talking in low voices. Were they talking about her? Did they know?

Then she saw who was standing among them. He was telling them some kind of story and his arms were waving around just like he did when he was excited.

A little shiver ran down her spine. She knew. She knew what he did when he was excited. Was that a good shiver or a bad shiver?

He leaned back and laughed and caught her eye. No.
That
was a shiver. One that sent electric pulses around her body.

She fixed her eyes on the floor and kept walking towards the treatment room. Her cheeks were warm and she wasn't normally the kind of girl who blushed. She wasn't normally the type of girl to lose sleep after a few kisses. Her lips had tingled for most of the night and when she'd taken her jacket off she'd caught a whiff of his aftershave. Just how close had they got?

She'd pulled back, laughing again, after the second kiss. Her stomach was doing backward flips and, with a mixture of alarm bells going off in her head and imaginary white unicorns charging around before her eyes, she wasn't quite sure what to think.

He'd looked thoughtful when she'd stepped back and hadn't pressed things any further. He'd slipped his hand into hers and they'd taken the subway back to the base.

Her skin had trembled as he'd walked her to the door of her house. She had felt like a teenager again, waiting for Don to throw the front door open and demand an introduction. But Avery was much cooler than she'd expected, he'd squeezed her hand and dropped a kiss on her head before walking away.

Don had been engrossed in his computer but had stood up when she'd appeared. ‘Coffee?' he asked as he walked to the kitchen. ‘I think I've missed dinner.'

No explanations were asked for. She was an adult. He didn't generally ask for a list of her activities. But once he realised she might be seeing a colleague she was quite sure Avery's file would fall across his desk.

Lily, one of the other nurses, looked up as she walked in. ‘Katsuko—great. Can you check some diamorph with me? I've got a patient with a fractured femur and the Entonox gas is wearing off fast.'

Katsuko nodded, pleased to have something—anything—to do that would distract her. Checking controlled medicines was an everyday part of the job. She counted the vials, drew up the prescribed amount and locked up the cupboard. The patient in cubicle three was wincing as he moved. They double-checked his name and date of birth before administering the injection. ‘Who are you on shift with today?' asked Lily.

Katsuko shook her head. ‘Not sure. Haven't had the handover yet.'

They rounded the corner. Lily beamed. ‘Oh, lucky you. It's our very own superhero, Avery. I kind of like him. He's fitting in well.'

The words were easy for Lily and she threw them out without a second thought. She was happily married, with her first baby on the way, and was currently seeing the world through a pink or blue hazy glow.

She'd been put onto night shift for the last part of her pregnancy as she hadn't been sleeping well and the night shifts were generally a little quieter.

Katsuko kept her gaze somewhere else. ‘Yeah, he seems fine.'

Lily gave her a nudge. ‘More than fine.'

‘What's that supposed to mean?' It must have come out sharper than she'd meant because Lily looked surprised.

‘Nothing.' She picked up her bag and stretched her back. ‘Time for me to go. Keep an eye on my patient, will you? They'll be here to collect him soon for Theatre.'

Katsuko nodded and headed over to the desk for the handover report. It was swift. Twelve patients in the department. One for theatre, three kids with minor ailments, four elderly patients with a variety of chest conditions, one guy with an anaphylactic reaction to something and three other adults with minor ailments. The staff shared the patients out between them and got to work.

She was trying her absolute best to be cool. She was always calm and collected at work—nothing usually fazed her. So why did she feel like a bumbling wreck?

She messed up a sterile trolley while doing a simple dressing, then tripped over her own feet while walking to the treatment room.

The whole time she was working she was constantly looking over her shoulder, wondering where Avery was, and if anyone would notice something between them.

It was a couple of hours before he finally spoke to her. ‘Katsuko, there's an ambulance bringing in one of the servicemen's teenagers. Can you give me a hand?'

Her response was automatic. She walked over to the sink to wash her hands. Avery walked up behind her, his hand brushing against her bum.

‘Don't!' she snapped.

They were at work. She was a professional. She wasn't the kind of girl to be caught in a compromising position in the treatment room or in the store.

At least that was the excuse she was letting bump around in her head.

It was nothing to do with the fact his kiss had driven her crazy. It was nothing to do with the things she'd shared with him—things she would never normally tell people. She'd worked with some of the people here for years and had never really shared about her grandmother. She could almost feel herself retreating a little. Trying to take back some of what she'd said.

Avery raised his eyebrows at her but didn't say a single word. He gave her a little hip-bump and washed his hands at the sink too. Katsuko grabbed an apron and some gloves and walked out to the receiving door. ‘Do you know what's wrong?'

He frowned. ‘Not clear. No accident. Sleepy and agitated.'

Katsuko joined in his frown. It wasn't exactly anything to go on. ‘Age?' she asked. It could be anything. Alcohol, drugs, infection—the list was endless.

The ambulance appeared in the distance with the siren blaring. ‘Nineteen.'

As it pulled up, Avery moved quickly to open the doors and pull the trolley towards him. The wheels automatically snapped down and allowed them to pull the trolley straight inside. The ambulance technician was talking rapidly in Japanese.

Katsuko walked alongside, translating as best she could. ‘This is Jay Lim. He's nineteen. Came home last night and told his mother he wasn't feeling too well and went to bed. When she tried to wake him for breakfast this morning she realised something was wrong and called an ambulance.'

‘Let's take him into Resus.'

She wasn't surprised at those words. Although the report seemed bland—the condition of the patient wasn't. The technician shot out another round of words.

‘Respirations high, forty, heart rate one-forty, and blood pressure one hundred over fifty-five. He's been aggressive and extremely tired. They haven't understood all of what he's saying.'

As soon as they hit the resus room Katsuko started hooking up the monitors for Jay. She turned to the technician and asked a quick question.

Her eyes met Avery's as she glanced at the oxygen saturation. ‘No history of asthma so we can put him on oxygen.'

Frank Kelly hurried into the room. ‘What do you need?'

‘I need bloods—lots of them—and set up an IV.'

Avery turned back to Katsuko. ‘Can they give us anything else?'

She looked over at the technician, asking swiftly in Japanese. A few seconds later she turned back to Avery. ‘He's a keen windsurfer and was away for the last two nights at a competition.'

‘Any chance he used drugs or alcohol?'

‘The technician said they've had no report of that.'

He was the ultimate professional. She was starting to cringe at snapping at him a few minutes ago. A quiet word was all it would have taken. It was hard enough to fit in. The last thing she wanted was to give her colleagues anything to talk about.

Avery moved around the teenager quickly, pulling out his stethoscope and listening to his chest. He lifted his hand. ‘Ask the technician to hang around for another few minutes.'

He carefully examined Jay's head and checked his pupils as Jay tried to bat him away. Then he checked his ears, which nearly earned him a punch.

‘No chance he could have an undiagnosed head injury from the surfing?'

She asked again. ‘Nothing reported.'

This was baffling her just as much as Avery.

He looked up. ‘What's his temperature?'

She lifted a tympanic thermometer as she asked the technician. It was unusual he hadn't mentioned it in the handover. The technician shook his head. ‘They couldn't get near his ears to get a temperature. He does feel warm to touch.'

Avery nodded to the technician to come back over and help hold Jay. ‘Jay, we're just checking your temperature. Can you tell me how you're feeling?'

Katsuko was quick. The tympanic thermometer only took five seconds to register. Thank goodness. Because by six seconds, Jay was thrashing around again. He made a loud noise and then retched. Katsuko grabbed a nearby sick bowl, but it seemed that Jay didn't have much to bring up.

‘Thirty-nine point five,' she said swiftly to Avery.

She could almost see his brain calculating everything. He watched as Frank nodded to another colleague who held Jay's arm firmly in place. Frank inserted a cannula and withdrew blood quickly, filling five different tubes.

Jay started to try and thrash again. ‘It'll be enough,' said Avery. He walked over to the medicine cupboard in Resus. ‘With a temperature like that there's likely to be an infection somewhere. His chest sounds clear, but call for an X-ray. The agitation is the thing that's worrying me most.'

Katsuko was watching him closely. Jay had been in the room around two minutes and she could already tell Avery was close to making a decision. At work he was decisive and trusted his instincts. She was learning to trust them too.

He caught her gaze. ‘Can you ask the technician what the sleeping arrangements were for the surfing competition?'

She frowned. It was an odd question, but easily asked. She listened to the technician and turned back. ‘It was university-style dorms.'

Avery nodded. ‘I'm going down the meningitis route. There's no visible rash but we all know that seeing the rash is bad news. In an ideal world we'd do a lumbar puncture and get some CSF. But he's just too agitated right now. I'm going to have to make an executive decision. Let's start with some IV penicillin.' He looked around the room. ‘Is there a relative? Can we ask about allergies?'

Katsuko held up the technician's paperwork. ‘Mum was following the ambulance in the car. She told the technician Jay had no allergies. Do you want me to find her and double-check?'

Avery shook his head. ‘If it's already recorded that's good enough for me. Let's not waste another second for this kid.' He mixed up the preparation and drew it up into a syringe. ‘Frank, can you hold his arm while I administer this?'

Frank nodded and held Jay's arm firmly. Avery slotted the syringe into the cannula. IV antibiotics had to be administered over a few minutes and Avery watched the clock while he completed the process.

He met her gaze again. ‘I'll talk to his mother as soon as she arrives. Jay needs one-to-one nursing care. Fifteen-minute obs. IV fluids. I'd love to monitor fluid intake and output but I'm not sure that inserting a catheter is feasible right now. I want his breathing watched carefully and also his oxygen saturation. I'll write up some other meds for temperature control, nausea and agitation if required, along with the rest of his IV antibiotics. We need to watch this boy carefully.' He gave a little shake of his head. ‘I'd still prefer to have got some CSF.'

She could see the worry lines on his forehead. Meningitis could be a killer. If this was the correct diagnosis they had to hope they'd administered antibiotics quickly enough to have an impact and halt the progression of the disease. Frank disappeared with the blood bottles and forms and she walked over next to Avery. She knew that testing cerebrospinal fluid could be a crucial part of the diagnosis. But the procedure for a lumbar puncture meant the patient had to lie very still in a certain position. Jay just wasn't able to do that right now.

‘You okay?'

She watched as he licked his lips and took a few seconds to answer. He looked up. All she could see was the pale green of his eyes. She was closer than she meant to be. But it was natural for her. The skin on their arms was touching and it felt like that was meant to happen.

It was the first time she'd actually seen Avery look a little vulnerable. Something inside her squeezed tight. She reached up and touched the side of his face. ‘You've got this, Avery.'

Her voice was low and his head inched a little closer to hers. Their noses almost touched. ‘Do you need to tell me something?'

He shook his head. ‘I'm just not good with waiting games. I want to know right now if meningitis is the correct diagnosis. The penicillin won't do any harm. But I want to know right now if it's doing any good.'

She gave a little smile. ‘Avery Flynn, do you have no patience?'

He smiled too. ‘Not a single bit.'

She licked her lips. ‘Then let's get logical.' She tilted her head to one side. ‘Tell me why meningitis.'

Avery nodded. ‘Teenage boy, quick onset, he's probably immunised against some strains of meningitis but not every type. Neisseria meningitis is most common in teenagers, particularly if they've been in a communal environment. It could be serotype C, Y or W.'

She put her hand on his arm. ‘And you could have just saved his life.'

It was the oddest feeling. But since her palm was in contact with his warm skin she didn't feel the urge at all to pull it away. It was pathetic. Look at how she'd acted when he'd brushed against her behind. Why did this feel like exactly what she should be doing?