He lifted the waitress’s wrist, finding the familiar metal oval under her shirt cuffs.
“She has a med alert bracelet,” he said, rolling up the waitress’s sleeve to get a better look. “And I am a doctor, a qualified one. I’ll explain later.”
He read the medical alert bracelet and sighed. “Peanut allergy. Quick. Ask the staff in the back if she has an EpiPen somewhere.”
Glancing around the room, he made eye contact with one of the young mothers. “Can you call an ambulance, please?”
He bent his ear to the waitress’s mouth to hear her breathing. Nothing now. Why would you work in hospitality if you had a severe food allergy? Rolling her onto her back, he began CPR.
The chef ran towards them, almost slipping in the beans. “Anika! What is…? What happened?”
Jess moved him aside. “She’s having an allergic reaction.”
She knelt beside the waitress, held Anika’s thigh tightly in one hand and pressed the EpiPen against it with the other. Nate heard the click of the pen and said a silent prayer. They’d just bought her fifteen minutes. He hoped it would be enough.
“How close is the ambulance to here? Does this town even have one?” he asked Jess, hoping not to upset the chef, who was now crying and repeating: “We don’t even have peanuts!”
As if hearing his question, the young mother calling the ambulance handed Jess the phone. “They’re two minutes away, but he’s asking questions I don’t know.”
Taking the phone, Jess filled in the details. “Yes, anaphylaxis – needs adrenaline. One EpiPen administered. Just now. We have a doctor here who has started CPR.”
“They’re here!” one of the mothers called out.
The door opened and two ambulance officers arrived, joining Nate and Jess on the floor. Jess quickly repeated the details of the EpiPen while Nate stopped CPR and checked again for a pulse and breathing.
“Weak pulse, but she’s breathing again.”
The ambulance crew prepared Anika for transport, and Nate helped them lift her onto the bed. Jess, Nate, and the chef followed them out to the waiting ambulance.
“Thank you both. We’ve got her from here. Is someone calling her family?”
“I can,” the chef said, immediately scrolling through his phone.
Nate helped them close the ambulance doors and then stepped back next to Jess on the footpath to watch them leave.
“Good work finding the EpiPen,” he said, still staring at the departing ambulance.
“You’re a doctor. A real doctor?” Jess looked up at him, her beautiful face full of confusion.
So much for keeping it a secret. Now he’d have to decide how much to reveal. Why he left everything, his prestigious medical career, his whole life, to run away literally to the other side of the world to pretend to be a doctor on a T.V. show. A whole can of beans he didn’t want spilt.
Too late now. She was waiting for an answer, and he could see the struggle in her face, trying to rearrange this new information about him into what she thought she knew.
He’d promised himself he’d make an effort this morning if he saw her. He needed to figure out a way to work with her nearby without his emotions taking charge. Getting to know each other better was already helping him separate Samantha and Jess in his mind. He knew logically Jess had been a safe target for his anger—the feeling he hadn’t yet expressed to Samantha—but as much as he wanted the cottage and wasn’t about to give it up, his intense anger was misplaced. As far as he could tell, Jess was good at her job, compassionate and kind.And from their conversation over dinner last night, pretty fun. It wasn’t her fault she reminded him of his ex.
“Let’s head back in. Your meal will be getting cold.” He led her back to the cafe, holding the door for her. Inside, the previously relaxed atmosphere had gone. All eyes turned their way as he and Jess entered, but he let his own drop to the floor, where Anika had collapsed.
“I assume those beans all over the floor are mine,” he said, recognising the metaphor—the spilt beans of his real life—and also hoping to change the subject.
“I would say so,” Jess agreed. “You know what? You can share mine. We’ve already shared a bed. Might as well carry on the theme.”
To his surprise, Jess didn’t bring up the whole doctor thing while they ate. Perhaps she’d picked up his reluctance to share? He could tell the dynamic had shifted, though. She was less hostile. He didn’t want to assume anything, but he could almost feel a kind of new respect coming from her. Or at least not the undisguised disdain she’d had before. He’d always prided himself on getting along with his work colleagues, and even though he hated that his secret was out, he couldn’t help feeling relieved by the change.
It wasn’t until they walked back to their cars that Jess mentioned the doctor topic again.
“A real doctor playing a fake one. That’s something new.”
Nate cleared his throat. Here we go. He prepared himself for an onslaught of questions. From what he’d learnt about Jess so far, she was not one to step lightly around issues. More likely to run a bulldozer through the middle of them.
