Page 88 of The Holiday Gift

He pushed away the memory of that completely inappropriate dream and did his best not to notice her faded T-shirt or the yoga pants she wore that stretched over every curve, to focus instead on the issue at hand.

“It’s fine. I’m here now. Let’s see what we have going on.”

The dog was clearly in distress, his respiratory rate fast and his breathing labored. His gums and lips were blue and Ben quickly pulled out his emergency oxygen mask and fit it over the dog’s mouth and nose.

“It’s gotten worse, just in the few minutes since I called you. I don’t know what to do.”

He ran his hand over the dog’s chest and knew instantly what the problem was. He could hear the rattle of air inside the chest cavity with each ragged breath. He bit out an oath.

“What is it?”

“Traumatic pneumothorax. He has air trapped in his chest cavity. We’re going to have to get it out. I have a couple of options here. I can take him into the clinic and do an X-ray first, or I can go with my instincts. I can feel the problem. I can try to extract the air with a needle and syringe, which will help his breathing. It’s your choice.”

She paused for just a moment, then nodded. “I trust you. If you think you can do it here, go ahead.”

Her faith in him was humbling, especially given the cold way he had treated her the day before. He fished in his bag for the supplies he would need, then knelt down beside the dog again.

“What can I do?” she asked.

“Try to calm him as best you can and keep him still.”

The next few moments were a blur. He was aware of her speaking softly, of her strong, capable hands at his side as she held the dog as firmly as possible. For the most part, he entered that peculiar zone he found whenever he was in the middle of a complicated procedure. He listened with his stethoscope until he could isolate the pneumothorax. The rest was quick and efficient: cleaning the area, inserting the needle in just the right spot, extracting the air with a gurgle, then listening again with the stethoscope to the dog’s breath sounds.

This was one of those treatments that was almost instantly effective. Miraculous, even. One moment the dog was frantically struggling to breathe, the next his airway was free and clear and his respiratory rate slowed, his wild trembling with it.

In just moments, he was moving air just as he should through his lungs and had calmed considerably. Satisfied, Ben took the emergency oxygen mask off Luke and returned the syringe to its packaging to be discarded back at the clinic.

“That’s it?” Caidy’s eyes looked stunned.

“Should be. We’re still going to want to watch him closely. If you’d like, I can take him back for another night at the clinic just to be safe.”

“No. I... That wasamazing!”

She was gazing at him as if he had just hung the moon and stars and Jupiter too. He had a funny little ache in his chest, and another inappropriate bit of that crazy dream flashed through his head.

“Thank you. Thank you so much. I was worried sick.”

“I’m glad I was close enough to help.”

“I’m sorry I had to wake you, though.”

So was he. Or he told himself he was anyway. If she hadn’t, he probably would have a great deal more of his unruly subconscious to be embarrassed about. “No problem. It was worth it.”

“Is there anything else I need to be concerned about?”

“I don’t think so. We cleared his lungs. If he has any more breathing trouble, we’re going to want to x-ray to see if something else is going on. If you don’t mind, I’d like to stick around a little longer to make sure he remains stable.”

“Can I get you something? Coffee probably isn’t a good idea at three-thirty in the morning if you want to catch a few hours of sleep when we’re done here, but we have tea or hot cocoa.”

“Cocoa would be good.”

He didn’t want to think about how comfortable, almost intimate, it was to sit here in this quiet kitchen while the snow fluttered softly against the window and the big log house creaked and settled around them. Only a few moments later, she returned with a couple of mugs of hot chocolate.

“It’s from a mix. I thought that would be faster.”

“Mix is fine,” he answered. “It’s all I’m used to anyway.”

He took a sip and almost sighed with delight at the rich mix of chocolate and raspberry. “That’s not any old mix.”

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