Back To You (A Remington Medical Contemporary Romance) Read online

  I was so in love with you that it hurt…it hurt…it hurt.

  Everything about that time had hurt.

  Charleston reached out for the bin of IV kits, desperate to give her hands a task other than shaking. “Work,” she whispered. Although the word shook, too, and after the third try at restocking the kits, she had to give up. Her chest was so full of emotion—anger and frustration and fear, churning around and snatching at her composure—that she could scarcely breathe. As recklessly as he’d proclaimed it, then just as recklessly married her as proof, Charleston had never doubted that Parker had loved her. But when she’d lost the pregnancy—damn it, there went her traitorous hands, trembling again—the only thing that had been able to keep her bone-numbing grief at bay had been work.

  Here, there was order. A set path to clear answers. A patient presented with symptoms, and she parsed through the facts, using her skill and her knowledge to fix the problem. Here, there was no gray area, no “spontaneous misacarriage of unknown cause”. Here, she’d been able to forget, if only for a few hours, that she’d lost a pregnancy she hadn’t expected, but then had grown so hopeful for, it had ached. She could forget how blindsided she’d been by the devastating loss. She could forget that—naively, stupidly—it had never even occurred to her that she might miscarry, especially at fifteen weeks, well after the higher-risk time period of the first trimester had passed.

  At the hospital, she’d been able to forget lots of things, like the kitchen counter where she’d been standing when she’d felt that twinge of something not-quite-right, low in her belly. When she’d been there, working, she’d been able to go to the bathroom and not be in the place where she’d discovered she’d been spotting, then started hemorrhaging outright, and she hadn’t had to fall asleep next to Parker, knowing what they’d never have. When she’d spent all that time at the hospital, she hadn’t been faced with looking into those big, beautiful, black-coffee eyes and seeing all that loss, feeling it travel to her bones to paralyze her.

  She hadn’t had to feel like it was her fault, that maybe there was something she could’ve done or not done that would’ve saved their baby.

  And so she’d worked. But she’d been so angry at his leaving with a note for a goodbye that she hadn’t realized that in closing out her grief, she might have closed Parker out, too.

  I was so in love with you that it hurt.

  Charleston’s heart raced fast enough to make her dizzy. Oh, God, oh, God, she had to work, right now. She had to find her composure and set her brain and hands and thoughts on something she could fix.

  Inhaling as deeply as she could (which, admittedly, wasn’t much), she straightened her doctor’s coat. Although it took a few failed attempts, she was nothing if not determined, and eventually, the IV kits—along with every other item on the shelf in front of her—were restocked and ready for anything short of a zombie apocalypse.

  But the task hadn’t even come close to taking a dent out of her unease, and finally, Charleston had to admit the truth. This supply closet business was for amateurs. What she needed was a good, long surgery—a colectomy, or, no! A liver transplant, to set her back to rights.

  Sure, she thought grudgingly. Because she’d done so many complex surgeries since returning to Remington. For God’s sake, she’d had to resort to routine appendectomies. Before last week, she hadn’t done one of those in years. A complex surgery like a transplant was about as likely to materialize in the ED as a bunch of circus animals, especially considering she had four minutes left in her shift. She was going to need a Plan B.

  That stiff drink/hot shower/good cry combo seemed like a decent enough backup. For tonight, anyway. First thing tomorrow morning, she could talk to Langston about the possibility of performing more surgeries in her downtime.

  Charleston firmed her shoulders and walked out of the supply closet. She measured her steps toward the nurses’ station, half afraid she’d see Parker and half afraid she wouldn’t. He was nowhere to be found, though, and the night shift staff had already started filtering in.

  She reviewed the few remaining charts in the queue, her heart twisting as she realized how thoroughly Parker had updated them, and then she signed everything over to the night shift attending. She took a minute to call upstairs to check on Tess, relief splashing through her when the head nurse told her both Tess and the baby were sound asleep. Aside from the obvious happiness that Tess was recovering well, Charleston knew that if Tess put eyes on her right now, it would take less than two seconds for her best friend to sense that something had rattled her. The last thing Charleston wanted to do right now was unpack her baggage all over the poor woman who had, oh, by the way, had a life-threatening health scare just a few hours ago.

  I was so in love with you that it hurt.

  “Okay,” Charleston blurted, even though the nurses’ station was empty. Unless she was going to gut, scour, and reorganize the supply closet (and a part of her had given the idea some very serious consideration before abandoning it as just a smidge over the top), then she needed to get out of here. Sticking around in a hospital where she couldn’t work was like a shopaholic going to a Black Friday sale with no funds.

  She headed to the attendings’ lounge, shucking her doctor’s coat and scrubs in favor of the jeans and long-sleeved blouse she’d thrown on this morning. Pulling her hair into a haphazard braid until she could get back to her sublet and give it a proper washing, she reached for her messenger bag. But before she could shoulder the thing and get out the door, Natalie came bustling into the lounge.

  “Oh, Charleston! Whew, I’m glad I caught you,” she said, her grin a telltale sign that there was no incoming trauma or other serious matter that needed attention.

  Much to Charleston’s dismay. “I was just heading out. What’s up?”

  “I saw Drake like, seven hours ago in radiology. He was bringing someone in for films and I had a kid with a broken humerus. Anyway”—she waved off the details, thankfully not noticing that a flush had prickled over Charleston’s face at the mention of Parker’s name—“he asked me to leave this for you, and I tucked it away upstairs, but I’ve had such a crazy day I didn’t get to bring it down until now.”

  Belatedly, Charleston noticed the brown paper bag from Sweetie Pies in Natalie’s hand, and her heart jumped. “He asked you to give this to me?”

  “Yeah.” Natalie nodded and handed over the bag containing the muffin that Charleston had declined this morning. “Said something about how you might change your mind, but he didn’t want to leave it in the lounge in the ED because he knew someone would swipe it. I feel really bad that it took me so long to get it to you, but I figured better late than never.”

  “No,” Charleston said, shaking her head slowly even though her thoughts were whipping around in circles at warp speed. But she kept coming back to the same one, over and over, and it just kept getting louder.

  I was so in love with you that it hurt.

  In that instant, her chin whipped up. “I mean, don’t worry about it,” she told a slightly confused-looking Natalie. But Charleston was far from confused. In fact, she was dead certain. “Your timing is actually perfect. You wouldn’t happen to have seen Drake recently, would you?”

  “As a matter of fact, I saw him fifteen minutes ago. He was headed to the locker room. Said something about hitting the gym in the PT facility now that they’re closed to patients for the day.”

  “Great. Thanks,” Charleston said, putting her messenger bag back in her locker and heading for the elevator.

  Natalie was right. Sometimes late was better than never.

  Even if it meant doing something she’d sworn on her heart she’d never do.

  Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump…

  Charleston got all the way over the threshold to the physical therapy facility before she realized she probably should’ve come up with a plan. The gym, which was tiny compared to commercial facilities even though the equipment was stare-of-the-art, had been closed to patients hours ago. Anyone with a hospital ID badge could still access the space, so Charleston had been able to slip past the door without a problem, even though half of the overhead lights were switched off.

  The other half were still very much on, though, as was the treadmill facing the far corner of the room, where Parker was currently running at top speed in nothing but a set of earbuds, a pair of basketball shorts, and a sheen of sweat that clung to his body as if it was the last lifeboat on the Titanic.

  Decorum dictated that Charleston let him know she was there, or—at the very least—stop eye guzzling the man. But between the draw of his muscles, flexing and releasing over his shoulders and back with each stride, and the raw, intense power practically emanating out of him as he ran, Charleston was hypnotized. He’d been fit when she’d met him seven years ago, gym-toned and lean, and she could still see traces of that former physique in his frame. There was a hardness about him now, though, the kind that came from work. Experience. His muscles were sharper—not bulky, but cut, as if he’d been shaped by a force of nature. He was mesmerizingly beautiful.

  Also, staring at her.

  “Oh!” Charleston resisted the urge to clap a hand over her mouth, but only just. “Sorry, I was just…” Right. No good answer there. She gestured to the treadmill that he’d slowed to a stop. “We’re technically not supposed to use these facilities for personal workouts.”

  Parker closed his eyes for an amount of time that was too long to be considered a blink, and ugh, she was graceless. “Do you have some kind of sonar or something that goes off in your head every time someone even thinks about breaking a rule around here? Or do you just reserve all of your ire for me in particular?”

  “I’m not…I didn’t come in here to give you a hard t
ime.”

  He paused. “Why did you come in here, then?”

  Charleston’s heart worked faster in her chest, but she countered it with the truth. “I came here to talk to you. About us.”

  A minute ticked by, then another, where the only sound between them was of his breathing. God, this had been a mistake. He’d said what he’d needed to in the supply closet, loosened six and a half years’ worth of anger and hurt that had been the flip side of her own. She should probably just leave it at that.

  “You know what, this was a bad—”

  “Okay.”

  Relief crashed into her, unexpected and oh so sweet. “Okay?”

  Parker nodded, grabbing his T-shirt from where he’d hung it over the treadmill’s display and gesturing toward the stack of exercise mats in the opposite corner of the room. “Might not be the most comfortable thing going, but I bet they’re not as bad as the futon in my old apartment.”

  Charleston’s relief became surprise. “You want to do this here?”

  A small, dark smile ghosted at one corner of his mouth, and in that moment, she realized exactly how low her immunity to him had grown. “It’s been six and a half years, Charlie. Do you really want to wait another minute to do this?”

  “No,” she admitted, following him over to the mats and dragging one off the top of the pile. “And for the record, that futon was awful.”

  Parker gave up a single-syllable laugh. “I was a med student. Give me a break.”

  He picked up a mat and placed it flush with the seam of the wall and the floor, over by the floor-to-ceiling mirror. Charleston put hers beside his, waiting for him to shoulder his way into his T-shirt before lowering herself to sit next to him, angling her back against the wall.

  “Parker, I’m so—”

  “Charlie, I—”

  Their words collided, making them both stop short. But she really didn’t want to wait another minute to have this conversation, so when he offered her a beat of quiet, she took it.

  “A lot happened between us the year we were interns. Some of it was really good…”

  “Some of it was great. Excluding my futon, of course,” Parker said with a tilt of his chin. The edge of mischief in his tone, coupled with the reminder that not all had been bad between them by half, released just enough of the tension in Charleston’s chest to allow her to continue with far more ease than she’d brought into the room.

  “Some of it was great. But when I miscarried, I felt this sadness that I didn’t understand, let alone know how to explain to anyone else or deal with. I mean, the pregnancy was unplanned, and us getting married was unplanned, but it had felt so right. And then, when I wanted it more than anything, all of a sudden it was gone.”

  Here, she paused. She’d never said any of this out loud to anyone other than the therapist she’d finally gone to see once she’d moved to Nashville, too far from Tess and too close at the same time to be able to talk about the double whammy of her miscarriage and divorce. She’d certainly never expected to say any of it to Parker. And yet, giving the words voice didn’t rip at her the way she’d thought it might.

  The look on Parker’s face, however? That, Charleston felt everywhere. “I wanted it, too,” he said quietly.

  “I know,” she whispered. “I just didn’t know how to cope with it then. My emotions were so strong, they crushed me. It was hard for me to be around you, knowing what we’d lost. I’d been impulsive and trusted my gut, and then my gut failed me so thoroughly, I just…I felt like the only thing I could count on was medicine.”

  Understanding lit Parker’s eyes, turning them wider in the soft shadows of the corner where they sat, elbow to elbow and hip to hip. “Facts. You wanted something you could quantify.”

  “I wanted something I could understand.” God, she’d been desperate for it. Something she could put into order. Something logical. “And the grief I was feeling, the way it made me so sad, even around you, especially around you…none of that made any sense. The only time I felt normal was when I was here. I didn’t realize how much it was hurting you in the process. Honestly, it took all I had just to get out of bed every day.”

  Charleston’s breath shook, so much that she was certain Parker could see the uneven rise and fall of her chest from where he sat beside her. Now, in hindsight, it was so obvious, so easy to see that she’d pushed him away. She’d meant to block out the blinding pain of her miscarriage, to make order out of chaos. She’d had no idea she’d block out everything else to the point of losing it.

  “So, that’s why you drowned yourself in work?” he asked, and she nodded.

  “It was the only way I knew how to cope at the time.” She tried, possibly for the first time, to process her actions from his point of view, but came up empty. “Why did you think I did it?”

  Parker’s exhale was soft and slow, and it sounded like regret. “To be anywhere other than with me.”

  Looked like hindsight wasn’t done throwing punches yet. But Charleston couldn’t deny that it made sense, especially when he added, “I knew you were sad, but I thought you were trying to move on, and that you wanted to do that without me. I thought you were pulling away, so I left. I wish I’d realized how much you were hurting.”

  “And I wish I’d been more open with you about what I was feeling before you left behind a career you loved.” Straightening, she turned to look at him. This was as important as the rest of the conversation, and it needed to be said. “I want you to know I did eventually work through those feelings of loss.” It had taken some therapy, and even more time, but she’d finally found a healthy way to cope with her sadness. “If I wasn’t emotionally prepared to treat patients—all patients—to the best of my abilities, I wouldn’t have continued my residency, and I definitely wouldn’t be here now.”

  “I’m glad,” Parker said, meeting her gaze in the soft light. “But I know it still must’ve been hard for you to treat Tess today.”

  There was no sense even trying to pretend she hadn’t been rattled. He’d seen her directly after she’d come down from telling Tess’s doctor to haul his ass into that OR, then repeating every last prayer she could think of until a nurse had come out to tell her that both Tess and Jackson were okay.

  Charleston nodded. “It was hard because she’s my best friend, and yes, I was scared. Not just for her health, but because I know what that sort of loss is like. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.” The thought of her best friend having been faced with it—even now, with the knowledge that all had turned out well—still made her heart squeeze. “But I meant what I said earlier. It is my job to take care of everyone who comes in to the ED, no matter who they are or what they’re suffering from.”

  She’d spent plenty of time in Nashville Gen’s emergency department as a surgical resident, and she’d treated more than a few patients suffering from miscarriages as a result. They’d been sad cases, of course. The ones involving loss always were. But Charleston had never thought twice about treating those women. They’d needed care, and she’d given it.

  “Wow. You really have worked through a lot,” Parker said, giving up a small, wistful smile.

  “I think a tiny part of me will always feel sad for what could’ve been and isn’t,” she said. “But there’s a big difference between where I am now and where I was six and a half years ago.”

  “Me, too.” Intensity flashed over Parker’s face, darkening his stare until it was nearly black. “I was mad, back then. Mad that we’d been dealt such a painful hand, mad at the loss. Then I was mad at you because I thought you’d checked out of our relationship. I didn’t want to be married to myself, so I let my anger lead me out the door, but I shouldn’t have left you just because things got hard.”

  “And I shouldn’t have shut you out.” Charleston swallowed, emotion gripping her throat and making her heart work faster in her chest. Still, she shook her head. It might’ve taken her six and a half years and a turn of events that had been outside of her control to realize it, but now that she did, she was unerringly certain of what she was about to say.