Rebel Rising: A Rebel Storm MC Romance Read online

  Rebel Rising

  A Rebel Storm MC Romance

  Tahlia Gold

  Contents

  1. Jess

  2. Dylan

  3. Jess

  4. Dylan

  5. Jess

  6. Dylan

  7. Jess

  8. Dylan

  9. Jess

  10. Dylan

  11. Jess

  12. Dylan

  13. Jess

  14. Dylan

  15. Jess

  16. Dylan

  17. Jess

  18. Dylan

  19. Jess

  20. Dylan

  21. Jess

  22. Dylan

  23. Jess

  24. Dylan

  25. Jess

  26. Dylan

  27. Jess

  28. Dylan

  29. Jess

  30. Dylan

  31. Jess

  32. Dylan

  33. Jess

  34. Dylan

  35. Jess

  Also By The Author

  Copyright © 2016 by Tahlia Gold

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced or distributed in any format without the permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations used for review. If you have not purchased this book from Amazon or received a copy from the author, you are reading a pirated book.

  1

  Jess

  “This is Mr. Thomas,” Madison says. “88-year-old man with a dislocated shoulder.” She slaps the x-ray up on the viewer.

  “Thanks, Madison,” I say.

  When she passes by, she pauses, whispers, “Drinks later?”

  “Maybe,” I say. “I have to study.”

  She rolls her eyes and leaves it alone for now.

  To the patient, I say, “Good morning, Mr. Thomas. How did you hurt your shoulder?”

  The old man sits up on his elbow in the hospital bed, frowns when he sees me. I know what he’s going to say before he says it. I’ve heard it a million times before.

  “I already saw a nurse,” he says. “I want to see the doctor. I’ve been here for five hours. What kind of hospital is this?”

  “Sir, I am the doctor. And this is a county hospital. We have a lot of sick people to take care of today.” The waiting area is full, there’s not an empty exam room and the new ER director is supposed to be starting today. I don’t have time for another patient who doesn’t think I’m a doctor.

  He squints at me, shakes his head, then sits up higher, trying to look over my shoulder. Maybe he hopes some rational person is going to come along and overhear what I’m saying. Overhear the young girl wearing a white coat, pretending to be a doctor, discover the fraud I’m committing. Some days I wonder myself if that will happen.

  “How old are you?” he says.

  I look at his chart. “Where are you from?” I say.

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Well,” I say, “where I’m from it’s impolite to ask a lady her age. Maybe they do things differently where you’re from?” I see Madison smirking out of the corner of my eye.

  “I guess it’s the same where I’m from,” he says.

  “How about we start again? I’m Dr. Bell. What brings you into the ER today?”

  After I finish examining his shoulder, I decide we’re going to have to sedate him. “Mr. Thomas, I’m going to give you something so that you won’t feel anything while I reduce your shoulder, okay?”

  To Madison I say, “160mg Ketamine, IV.”

  The anesthetic kicks in as expected, and within thirty seconds Mr. Thomas becomes a much happier if rather disoriented old man. “Are you two sisters?” he says. His eyelids droop heavily. “You’re the prettiest pair of nurses I ever saw.”

  Madison laughs. I start to put his shoulder back into socket while she holds his torso in place.

  “Have you met the new ER director?” Madison says.

  I shake my head. “Webber? No. Have you?”

  “Yeah, she stopped in yesterday.”

  I get the shoulder back in and the old man grunts, barely aware. “How is she?” I ask.

  “I don’t know… Maybe she was just having a bad day yesterday.”

  “That bad?”

  “She walked into the department and started re-arranging all the files without even saying who she was. Virginia, the girl that works the desk at night? Said she completely re-did everything and it makes no sense at all.”

  “That’s weird,” I say. “I heard she’s a good doc though. Maybe she’s just not used to being management.”

  “We’ll see. I think things are going to change around here. And not in a good way.” Her eyes dart towards the door and in a hushed voice Madison says, “Speak of the devil.”

  I turn around as a woman, about 40, with her hair pulled back in a bun walks in, trailed by two med students.

  Madison says, “Let me know if you need anything else, doctor,” before rushing out of the room.

  Thanks a lot, Madison.

  The woman is smiling. She puts her hand out. “Hi, I’m Delilah Webber, the new ER director.”

  She doesn’t seem so bad. I shake her hand. There’s sweat in my palm. I ignore it and try to match the firmness she’s gripping my hand with.

  “It’s nice to meet you Dr. Webber. I’m Jessica Bell.”

  “Please, call me Delilah. You are…” She holds up her index finger and places the point into the cleft of her chin and pauses, then says, “second-year resident, right?”

  “That’s right,” I say.

  “Great,” she says. “You’re going to have a lot more responsibility this year than you did as a first-year. I’m going to expect a lot out of you but in return I can promise that I will give my all to turn you into the best ER doc you can be. There’s a lot of sick people that will come through here. My first priority is that they get the best care we can offer and my second priority is teaching you residents how to do that. How does that sound?”

  “That sounds good to me,” I say.

  “Great. Now, what do we have here?” She nods at the old man who is starting to come back from the anesthesia.

  “88-year-old male, presented with a right anterior shoulder dislocation. I administered Ketamine and reduced the shoulder.”

  Webber frowns. “Why did you sedate him? Did you try Cunningham’s method?”

  “Um, no.”

  “Well, did you try scapular manipulation after local anesthetic?”

  “No, I didn’t try either of those methods because the patient is elderly and isn’t able to keep his back straight for the Cunningham method and would have trouble getting into position for scapular manipulation.”

  “Can you please describe for me the method of scapular manipulation? I understand that my predecessor ran things a bit… loosely. But, from now on residents will not administer anesthesia without an attending physician present. Is that clear?”

  I can feel my face heating up from embarrassment. “Yes, of course, Dr. Webber—I mean, Delilah.” This is not how I intended my first impression with the new director to be. I look at the med students and they look away.

  An announcement comes over the intercom. “Code yellow. Incoming trauma.”

  At least now Dr. Webber’s attention will be on something other than me.

  “Let’s go,” she says, motioning to the med students to follow her.

  I turn back towards my patient. He’s
starting to come back to reality. I envy the chemically induced unawareness he has.

  “Jessica,” Dr. Webber says.

  I turn to her. She’s standing in the doorway, the two med students at her heals.

  “Let’s go,” she says. “There’s a trauma.”

  I look from her then deliberately to my patient, about to say how I need to make sure he’s stable, but she interrupts as if she can read my mind. “Have a nurse monitor Mr. Thomas and come to the trauma. I want you to run it.”

  We’re standing at the ambulance bay waiting for the trauma to arrive. No one is saying anything. I consider telling her I’m just barely a second-year. Could it really be a good idea for me to run a trauma? Wouldn’t it be better if I assisted? But the words sound terrible in my head and I resign myself to my fate. Maybe it’s something easy. A superficial wound that looks worse than it is. Or even better, a DOA. God, am I really hoping that a person is dead so that I won’t mess up again in front of the ER director?

  Then the whine of the ambulance approaching stops all my internal bickering. There’s no time for any of that. We open the trauma bay doors as the ambulance pulls in. I’ve seen this countless times as a first year. I can do this.

  The paramedics open the back doors and start to pull the patient out. It’s a black male—probably not more than fifteen—squirming on the stretcher, moaning. There’s blood all over him.

  “What do you have?” I ask.

  “Black male, fourteen years old. Multiple gunshot wounds. One to the chest. One to the leg.”

  “Fuck!” the kid screams. “It hurts!”

  Dr. Webber stands to the side of the trauma bay, staring at me. Apparently she wasn’t joking about letting me run the entire trauma. The x-ray tech, nurses, med students and paramedics are all poised, looking at me for direction. Perfect.

  I take a deep, steadying inhale and force down the sensation of panic rising inside of me. I can do this. I let the breath out and start barking orders.

  “Ok, let’s get him onto the cart.”

  People seem to snap out of their momentary daze and leap into coordinated action. We get the kid onto the hospital bed, people are starting IVs and drawing blood, others are cutting off his clothes.

  Dr. Webber reminds me to be ‘methodical and loud’ while examining the patient.

  “A, B, C.” I shout. “A, airway. Patient is able to vocalize quite well. Airway is clear. B, breathing. Patient has diminished breath sounds on the right. His blood pressure is adequate and his trachea is midline. I don’t suspect tension pneumothorax. C, circulation. He has equal, strong pulses in all extremities.”

  The rest of the exam is a blur. We put paper clip markers on his entrance and exit wounds so we can see them on the x-rays. No bullets left inside. The two shots each went through and through. Minutes later we are back at the patient’s bedside after reviewing the x-rays. Dr. Webber is telling the med students that our young patient has a hemopneumothorax or blood and air around his right lung, collapsing it. She quizzes them on the treatment of this injury. One of them correctly answers ‘chest tube.’ Dr. Webber is gathering some supplies. She congratulates the med student on getting the question right and then turns to me and says “Well, the chest tube isn’t going to put itself in.”

  I start to panic. I’ve seen these placed and read about it but never done it myself.

  Dr. Webber is in the background telling the med students that this is a routine procedure for ER physicians and all residents should be comfortable performing it. Great, I guess there’s no backing out now.

  I get a sterile gown, gloves, cap and face mask. I’m under the trauma lights. I feel like they’re spotlighting my deficiency. I’m sweating now. I numb the skin and make a tentative incision with the scalpel. I’m opening the tissue down to the ribcage and thinking that the book diagram makes this look easy. My hand is lost in the tissue. I reach the ribcage and find the top edge of a rib.

  Dr. Webber is in the background reciting to the med students that the bottom edge of the rib has the neurovascular bundle in it. If you go through that, the patient bleeds excessively and usually ends up needing surgery instead of just the ‘simple tube’ procedure.

  I put the Kelly clamp through the muscle between the ribs. And then everything falls apart at once. There’s a rush of air, then a rush of blood and the patient screams in pain. I grab the chest tube but can’t find the tract I just made. My hand is there but fumbling. I can’t get the tube in the space between the ribs.

  Dr. Webber sees the fumble and shouts “Jessica, get that tube in.”

  Thanks for the pep talk, coach. What do you think I’m trying to do here? I try again to find the hole I just made and get the tube through it. I’m failing. There’s blood everywhere and I’m no closer to placing the tube.

  “Jessica, can you do this or not?” Webber says.

  “I can’t find the tract,” I finally admit.

  Webber’s face tenses. In twenty seconds she puts gown and gloves on and clamps the end of the chest tube. She motions for me to get out of the way and smoothly uses one hand to find the tract that I couldn’t. Her finger rotates in a circle. She thrusts the clamped tube into the chest and gets blood return, hooks up the tube to the drainage kit and ties the tube in place in two minutes.

  She has the med students dress the tube site with tape.

  Damn it. I feel like I don’t belong here.

  After she’s finished with the patient, Webber stands up on a stool, puts her hands to her mouth, and addresses the entire department. “Excuse me everyone!” Her voice is starting to grind on me. “Excuse me! Can everyone gather around for a minute? I promise this will just take a second. I know you all are very busy but I want to introduce myself.”

  A crowd forms around her. I back away to the edge, still running things through my head. There’s blood on my shoes from the kid.

  Someone elbows my side. It’s Madison. “Don’t worry about it,” she says. “You did fine.”

  I shrug. Whether or not I did fine is arguable. Actually, I would argue that I didn’t do fine. Messing up a routine chest tube and almost killing a patient is not within my definition of fine. Maybe you could say that I’m a second-year ER resident and running my first trauma and performing my first chest tube—and in that context I did “fine.” But I want to be better than fine. Fine is for everybody else. I want to be the best.

  Webber says, “Hello everyone. I think I’ve met most of you but for those who don’t know me yet, I’m Dr. Delilah Webber, the new ER director. I’m very happy to be here and I look forward to working closely with all of you. This is a teaching hospital and, while taking care of sick people will always be our first priority, teaching and training the next generation of doctors and nurses will be our very close second priority.

  “I understand that my predecessor had his way of doing things. My way is going to be different. I hope you can be patient with me as we make changes. I’ve already noticed that we can clean up our sloppy handling of traumas.”

  I look down at my shoes again. The kid’s blood is still there.

  “I will be correcting things as I notice them,” Webber continues. “For now, please be advised that all sedations need to be monitored by an attending physician. And to the residents, I look forward to seeing you all tomorrow in our study session. Dr. Jessica Bell will be giving a presentation on the top three non-sedative methods for reducing a shoulder. Thank you everyone.”

  As the crowd thins and people start getting back to work I do my best to avoid direct eye contact with anyone.

  Madison leans close to me and says in a low voice, “Don’t worry about it. She’s a bitch. I give her a week before she realizes things aren’t going to go like she thinks they will. Oakland County is not some textbook. We have real patients with real problems. And real good doctors.”

  “I guess so,” I say. Maybe she’s right, maybe she isn’t. But I still fucked up.

  “Listen,” she says. “I have som
ething that will cheer you up.”

  “What?”.

  “There’s an insanely hot guy in exam room four with his shirt off ready for you to come stitch up his chest laceration.”

  I smile.

  “I think he’s a biker,” she says. “He’s got a six pack like you wouldn’t believe. And tattoos… Oh my god. You have to see him to believe it. Come on.”

  2

  Dylan

  “Goddamn, where did that pretty little nurse go,” Road Dawg says. “I’m gonna give her the business.”

  “I don’t know,” I say, “but I’m ready to get the fuck out of here. I hate hospitals.”

  “Ain’t that the truth.” He’s leaning against the wall near the door, looking outside every few seconds. The VP might be the only person I know that’s more paranoid than I am.

  The nurse was cute; he’s right about that. Madison I think her name was? But this place reminds me of things I don’t care to think about. I shift my weight on the hospital bed.

  “Fuck this,” I say. “I don’t need stitches.” I hop off the bed. My heavy boots hit the floor hard.

  “Naw,” Road Dawg says. “Sit your happy ass back down. That’s an order. I’ve seen enough slashes in my day to know when it needs stitches. And that one,” he points to the blood-soaked bandage covering my pec, “definitely needs stitches.”

  I sigh. “Those fucking Soul Crushers. We’re going to hit them back, right?”

  “You bet your ass we are. Look alive, my nurse is coming back. Goddamn! And she’s got a hot friend with her.”

  The nurse walks back in. “Still alive?” she asks, then turns to the woman behind her and says, “This is Mr. Riley. 27-year-old male with a chest laceration he apparently got in a bar fight.”

  I do a double-take when I see who she’s talking to. “Jess?”

  “Dylan?” she says. “Is that really you? I can’t believe it.”

  “Wait,” the nurse says. “You two know each other?”

  Jess is looking me in the eye, smiling, then her gaze drifts down to the rest of me, and the smile leaves her face just as fast as it came. She’s looking at the tattoos that weren’t there when we last saw each other, my grease-stained jeans, my scuffed motorcycle boots.