Page 6 of Close Pursuit

For just a second, something incongruous—and totally non-geeky—flashed in his eyes. Amusement. Male appreciation. Desire.

Where did the geek go? And who was this guy?

She did a double-take, and his eyes were back to being as guarded and unaware as ever.

What. The. Hell?

* * *

Alex studied Katie—or at least the tip of her nose where it poked out of her mummy sleeping bag. She could be a serious problem. She’d had already shown decent intuition and was much smarter than he’d first thought. Not to mention, she was easy on the eye. The first thing he’d noticed about her was the lush, brunette hair falling in soft waves around her pretty face. And her bright blue eyes. And her attractive, athletic figure.

What really drew him, to her though, was her smile. It was warm and genuine and filled a room.

A rock clattered outside. He froze, every sense abruptly on full alert. Silently, he shed the sleeping bag he’d wrapped around his shoulders and eased into a dark shadow beside the front tarp where the stove’s light didn’t reach. With a flick of his hand, he released a razor-sharp knife from its wrist sheath and let it slide into his palm.

Voices whispered nervously on the other side of the canvas front of him.Femalevoices.

He slipped the knife back in its sheath and moved swiftly to Katie’s sleeping bag. To give her shoulder a sight shake. “Wake up.”

“Wha—” She mumbled pushing back the sleeping bag to peer blearily at him. Heavy sleeper. Must be nice to be so naïve. It had been a long time since he’d thought the world was safe enough to sleep like that.

“We have company.”

She tried to get out of her sleeping bag but the nylon bag got stuck in the zipper. She struggled inside the cocoon, flailing around like a cat in a burlap bag

“Ow!” she exclaimed as she banged her head against the granite side wall. She rolled away from the rock, and he dove forward to rescue the lit propane stove.

She stilled suddenly, appeared to roll over inside the tight confines of the sleeping bag, and crawled out the top of it on her hands and knees. Her hair was all over the place, and her sweatshirt and sweatpants were askew when she finally freed herself. Whether it was exertion or embarrassment staining her cheeks, he couldn’t tell.

He pulled back the tarp to reveal two women, swathed in black robes and head scarves, huddled together. A blast of cold air made him shiver. And to think, Katie’d said the tarps weren’t holding in any heat. Hah!

He gestured with his free hand for the local women to enter. The pair’s faces lit when they spied Katie, and the much older woman of the two spoke rapidly to Katie in the local dialect, explaining that the girl with her was her granddaughter, who was in the middle of having a baby.

Katie murmured soothingly that the granddaughter was in good hands.

Doctors Unlimited gave all its staff crash courses in the languages they would encounter where they were posted. Apparently, Katie had a knack for foreign tongues, for she’d understood the woman’s rapid Zagan and had replied credibly well in it.

“How old is your granddaughter?” he asked the grandmother.

“Fourteen. Her first baby.”

A first-time mom barely into her teens? This could get dicey. He sighed. He knew women were considered marriageable at age thirteen in the more backward corners of this country. Grandma put her arm around the girl’s shoulders and held her up as the contraction gripped her.

He told Katie, “I’m going down to the Land Rover to get a cot and more medical supplies. While I’m gone, get her out of her clothes and wrap her in my sleeping bag. We need to keep her warm.”

“Bring up the other heater, too,” she murmured as she moved to the girl’s side.

He said in English, “Break it to her that I’m going to be looking at and touching her lady parts, but she won’t get in trouble for letting a male doctor deliver her baby. I’ve done it before in this country.”

“Gee. Thanks for giving me the fun job,” Katie murmured.

“This is why you’re here. She’ll take the news better from a woman. Tell her you are here to chaperone me the same way her grandmother is here to chaperone her.”

Katie smirked at him as he ducked out of the tent into air so frigid his teeth felt like they might crack. This was his second season in the field, so he knew how to pack the Land Rover to have fast access to a variety of boxes, each labeled and pre-packed to handle a specific type of medical emergency. Grabbing a folded cot and the birthing box, he mentally thanked his last-week self for labeling the kits so clearly.

He trudged back up the hill and deposited his load inside the crowded space between the boulders. Katie helped him unfold the cot, taking up most all the remaining space. While she spread their foam sleeping pads and her sleeping bag on the cot, he dug out disinfectant gel and two pairs of sterile surgical gloves.

He ducked back outside. Squirting a big glob of the gel in his palm, he meticulously scrubbed his hands with it.

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