Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Gaines
“I thought you ran off and moved to some tropical island.” Evan’s hand meets the middle of my back as he steps in place beside me. “But here you are without a tan and with that same ‘don’t-fuck-with-me’ look on your face.”
I glance at him. “What?”
He huffs out a laugh. “It’s been what, two or three weeks now since I’ve seen your handsome mug around here.”
Shaking my head, I shrug. “I’ve passed you in the hall at least twice this week. You’ve had your eyes pinned to your phone. I’m not the bastard ignoring you.”
“Are you saying I’m a bastard?” The smile on his face gives away the intention of the question. I admire him and consider him a friend. I know that feeling is mutual.
“I am.” I nod, shooting him a grin. “I’ve been around, Dr. Scott. You haven’t taken time to notice me.”
He pats my back again. “I guess we’ve both been busy.”
That’s an understatement.
I’ve been buried under work for days, hell, it feels like weeks, but I know it’s not.
I’ve been faced with a host of appointments and consultations over the past week and a half, culminating in the heart attack I just attended to down the hall in the ED.
“How did that kid make out?” he questions, genuine concern in his expression. “The one you found on the floor in Atlas 22 a couple of weeks back.”
I glance at him again because that’s typical Evan. He remembers people and the challenges they face. He’s been known to stop by the rooms of the patients of his colleagues to check in on them. The man can be an ass, but he has a heart of gold.
“I discharged him early last week,” I say. “I reached out twice via phone. So far, so good. I’ll see him again tomorrow for a follow-up.”
“His little sister is a hoot.” Evan laughs. “I met her in the cafeteria after her brother’s procedure. She was there with her mom, having a donut.”
Without a word, I hold out my hand for him to shake.
He goes for it, and as we both raise our hands to complete the Saylor Robinson signature handshake, we laugh.
“You need to have kids.” He glances to his left to where another vascular surgeon seems to be waiting for him at the end of the corridor we’re standing in. “You’d make a great dad.”
“I’ll leave the superior parenting to you.” I smack his shoulder. “Get back to work. I’ll see you around.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for you, Dr. Morgan.” He points at me. “I don’t know how the hell I missed saying hello to that handsome face, but I won’t make that mistake again.”
“I haven’t seen you in scrubs in years.” Berk goes in for a hug as I approach him.
I reciprocate because my cousin is the closest thing to a brother I have. “It’s a good look, no?”
He huffs out a laugh as he directs me to sit across from him in this bustling coffee shop on the Upper East Side. “You look good, Gaines, although you could use a shave.”
I could use that, a decent meal and a fuck, but cardiologists can’t be picky. I take what I get, and today, that is fifteen minutes with my cousin, and what looks like a day old croissant and a lukewarm coffee.
“I’ve been here for a while.” He slides off his suit jacket, placing it over the back of his chair. “Sorry if the pastry is dry and the coffee cold.”
I take a bite of the croissant and wash it down with a mouthful of the bitter coffee.
He watches me chew, his gaze falling to the front of my scrubs, where my name is stamped across the left side of my chest.
“It’s good,” I tell him before I go in for another bite. “How are you? Astrid? Stevie?”
“We’re all fine.” He sips from the cup in front of him. “I’d ask how you are, but you’re living a doctor’s life, so underpaid and overworked?”
I’m both. Our grandfather left me enough money when he died that I could drop the career and adopt a new, much less stressful one, but medicine is it for me.
It’s always been.
A slice of the inheritance funded my education. Dutch, our grandfather, would be proud.
I knew I wanted to be a doctor decades ago. That desire intensified as I got older until I made the announcement that I was heading to medical school.
My mother cried. My dad did the same.
Making them proud has been the icing on the cake for me.
“I’ve been swamped,” I admit before I finish the croissant. “How’s work for you?”
Berk owns a publishing company. He’s made the dreams of a host of people come true. In his way, he’s changing lives, too.
“It’s been great,” he admits. “I’ve got a few projects on the go. They’re big, but nothing I can talk about yet.”
“Not even to me?”
He laughs. “If I tell you, you’ll have to tell me what was wrong with Eloise’s friend. What was the guy’s name? Daxton?”
Hearing her name sits me up straighter. “You know about Daxton?”
I ask that question to keep from blurting out the one I really want to ask. I haven’t seen Eloise in ten days, but that hasn’t stopped my mind from focusing on her.
“Eloise mentioned him when she stopped by for dinner last weekend.”
I want to ask where the fuck my invitation was, but I stop myself.
I’ve kept my encounter in the club with Eloise to myself for two goddamn years.
Now that I know she was the beauty I brought to orgasm, I need to keep that secret forever, especially since she has no idea I’m the masked man who took her into that room.
“Daxton was the guy who collapsed in Atlas 22,” I explain because I have no idea what Eloise told him. “He’s doing well now.”
“Good.” He nods.
The door is open for me to ask how Eloise is, but I slam it shut because it’s none of my damn business.
“I wanted to meet up to ask a favor.” He shakes his head. “If you don’t have time for this, tell me, Gaines. We’ll go in another direction.”
Curiosity piqued, I smile. “Lay it on me.”
“I thought my daughter might look to me or Astrid for help with this, but you’re her first choice, so…”
“So?” I interrupt. “If it’s for Stevie, I’m in.”
“She needs to do a report on someone she admires.” His voice wavers slightly. “She said you save lives, so you’re it. She needs an hour, two tops, to interview you.”
Touched that Stevie views me in that light, I nod. “I’ll make the time. Tell her to text me.”
He laughs. “I’ll give her phone back to her so she can do that.”
Finishing the final swallow of my coffee, I chuckle. “Uh, oh. What did little Miss Morgan do?”
“She accidentally called 911 from math class.” He closes his eyes briefly. “She felt horrible, but she was on her phone in class, so it stays with one of us while she’s at school now.”
I smile. “Live and learn, right?”
“Right.” He nods. “She’ll be in touch in the next day or so. If you’ve got time this weekend, we can do another family dinner before the interview. I’ll get Keats, Maren, Sinclair, and Jameson to come, too.”
Eloise’s name sits on the tip of my tongue. I want to suggest he extend an invitation to her, but I don’t.
“I’ll see if Eloise is free,” he adds, as if he can read my mind, before he veers off in a direction I’d never venture to. “I’ll get her to drag her boyfriend with her.”
“Sure. Why not?” I bite out with a forced smile.
Oblivious to the bitterness in my tone, he drops his gaze to his phone when it starts to ring. “I need to take this.”
That’s my cue to head back to work, so with a quick goodbye, I do just that.