Laura Iding – Marrying the Playboy Doctor (страница 1)
‘Kylie, there’s a sizzling attraction between us. Why are you pretending it doesn’t exist?’
She sucked in a harsh breath and tugged against Seth’s hand. ‘Don’t,’ she said softly. ‘Don’t do this.’
‘Do what?’
‘Make me fall for you.’
The seriousness of her tone made him drop her arm and take a step back. ‘Okay, that’s fine. Neither one of us is looking for a longterm relationship. Does that mean we can’t have any fun?’
Dear Reader
Welcome to Cedar Bluff Hospital, located in a small Wisconsin town overlooking the beautiful rocky shores of Lake Michigan. MARRYING THE PLAYBOY DOCTOR is the first book in my new mini-series, and I really hope you enjoy reading about Seth and Kylie as much as I enjoyed writing about them.
Working as an emergency department physician, Seth Taylor sees first-hand how life is too short. Anything can happen, at any time, so his motto is to live life to the fullest. He likes fast cars and playing the field with women. Settling down in a serious relationship isn’t a part of his plan—until he meets paramedic and single mum Kylie Germaine and her six-year-old son Ben.
Kylie has been burned by Ben’s father, who refused to stick around to help raise their son, so learning to trust Seth isn’t easy. But soon she’s forced to accept Seth’s help with Ben. Can Kylie convince Seth that life isn’t worth living without love?
I hope you enjoy MARRYING THE PLAYBOY DOCTOR, and look for the next two books in my Cedar Bluff Hospital series, coming out in November and December.
Happy Reading!
Laura Iding loved reading as a child, and when she ran out of books she readily made up her own, completing a little detective mini-series when she was twelve. But, despite her aspirations for being an author, her parents insisted she look into a ‘real’ career. So the summer after she turned thirteen she volunteered as a Candy Striper, and fell in love with nursing. Now, after twenty years of experience in trauma/critical care, she’s thrilled to combine her career and her hobby into one—writing Medical™ Romances for Mills & Boon. Laura lives in the northern part of the United States, and spends all her spare time with her two teenage kids (help!)—a daughter and a son—and her husband. Enjoy!
Recent titles by the same author:
EMERGENCY: SINGLE DAD, MOTHER NEEDED
THE SURGEON’S SECRET BABY WISH
THE FIREFIGHTER AND THE SINGLE MUM
BABY: FOUND AT CHRISTMAS
MARRYING THE PLAYBOY DOCTOR
BY
LAURA IDING
I’d like to dedicate this book
to the Milwaukee area WisRWA group.
Thanks for all your kind support and encouragement!
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
LIFE was too short.
Dr. Seth Taylor grimly watched the patient being rolled into trauma bay number two. From the paramedic report, he saw the woman on the gurney was only fiftyseven—the same age his mother had been when she’d unexpectedly died six months ago.
Ignoring the knot in his stomach, he stepped forward to take charge of the resuscitation.
“Hold CPR. What’s her underlying rhythm?”
“Still PEA,” a honey-blond female paramedic said as she climbed off the gurney from her position doing CPR. PEA was the acronym for pulseless electrical activity, which basically meant the electrical system of the heart was working, but the heart wasn’t actually pumping any blood.
“Get a set of labs, stat, continue CPR and give me a history.” Seth scowled, hoping this wasn’t another cerebral aneurysm like his mother had suffered. “We need to find the source of her PEA.”
“Labs are in process,” one of the nurses said. “Her pulse ox is low at eighty-two percent, despite being on one hundred percent oxygen.”
“Double-check the tube placement,” Seth ordered. “Did she have surgery recently? Is there a reason she might have thrown a pulmonary embolus or a tension pneumothorax?”
“No surgery, according to the husband, and no other reason to have a blood clot or tension pneumo that we’re aware of.” The female paramedic responded without hesitation. “Her history is fairly benign. The only complaint she had prior to passing out was nausea, lasting from the night before, and some vague complaint about neck pain, so our working assumption was that she’d suffered a myocardial infarction.”
Since women experiencing a heart attack generally didn’t present with the same symptoms of crushing chest pain, shortness of breath and dizziness as most men did, Seth was forced to consider the paramedic might have nailed it right. The honey-blonde looked young, with her hair tied back in a bouncy ponytail, but she obviously knew her stuff. A myocardial infarction would explain the patient’s lack of oxygenation.
“Should I get a cardiology consult?” asked Alyssa, the brunette trauma nurse beside him.
Cedar Bluff Hospital, located in the less populated rural area off the shores of Lake Michigan, only had two cardiologists on staff, and if their patient needed something complicated like open heart surgery they’d end up transporting her to Milwaukee.
“Yeah, tell them they need to get down here ASAP. Make sure a troponin level and cardiac enzymes are being run on the blood sample, too.”
Alyssa hurried off, and he continued running their resuscitation efforts. “Let’s give a dose of epinephrine and get a chest X-ray. Have we verified tube placement?”
“I did when I placed the tube.”