18. Marcus
18
MARCUS
“E mma,” I called after her as I saw her walk with determination through the atrium and toward the front entry.
She didn’t hear me at first and kept walking, head up, shoulders back. It was clear that she was leaving. I quickened my pace and called to her again. She slowed momentarily as I jogged to catch up.
“Are you leaving? Did I do something? Is everything all right?”
“Yeah, I’ve got to go,” she said, gesturing back toward the party area where people were still happily dancing. “I just… I can’t be in there with him.”
“That guy was a bit of a jerk. Let me walk you home,” I offered.
“That’s not really necessary. I live nearby.”
“Let me. The guy’s got you shaken up.”
“Maybe… Sure.” She shrugged.
“He was being a jerk,” I said. “After all, a gentleman doesn’t cut in when the lady says no.”
“Sorry he ruined our dance. He’s more than a jerk,” she admitted. “He’s my ex-boyfriend. He wanted to make sure that I knew he’s now on one of the oversight boards here. Basically, he now has a position that he’s lording over me.”
“But he doesn’t work at Manhattan Memorial, does he? I don’t recognize him.”
“He used to, but not anymore. He’s got friends in powerful places in the administration here, and they’re bringing him along for the ride.”
I raised my eyebrows. “He’s on the review board as an outside third party?”
"Exactly. Outside eyeballs, as it were.”
“Gotcha,” I said, nodding. He was the “expert opinion”. I hated guys like that and the boards and committees they sat on. They could sway popular opinion because they positioned themselves to know better than anyone else there.
Emma looked nervous and uncomfortable, and I wasn’t one hundred percent certain that it wasn’t my presence causing her unease. Maybe she was still reacting to her interaction with that asshole. She walked next to me a few steps away and she rubbed the backs of her arms like she was chilled. I shrugged out of my jacket and draped it over her shoulders.
She gave me a soft smile. “Thank you. I guess I let him get inside my head.”
“What was his business with you?” I asked. “You said he’s your ex. How recent?”
“It’s been a while. A couple of years. Sometimes, it just seems like a long time ago, and other times, not nearly enough.”
“I think he would have just ignored you, right?” I would have liked to think I would have done that. But it had been far too long since I had an ex-girlfriend. I don’t know how I would have reacted. If a woman like Emma had been my ex, maybe I wouldn’t have been able to play it cool and just watch her dance with other men.
She shrugged. “He wants to be somebody to watch out for.”
“Somebody to watch out for? What do you mean?”
“He’s on a power trip.”
“I get it, he wants to be somebody for you to have to watch out for. Someone you have to appease or he’ll make things difficult for you?”
“Sounds about right. Are you sure you haven’t met him before?” She shrugged again. “He’s nothing but ego.”
“Is he somebody I need to watch out for?” I asked.
She stopped and raised her eyebrows at me. “For us?”
“Yes, us,” I said. “We still do need to come up with that protocol plan, and I assume he’s going to sit in on that review.”
“Oh, right.” She nodded nervously. “The second he finds out my name is attached to that project, he’ll make sure to sit in on that meeting.”
“Do you really think he’d mess with our intake protocols?” I asked.
“Yeah. He’ll probably cause some problems for that.” She nodded, then started shaking her head. “I hope not. He might, simply because it’s me.”
“If he poses a conflict of interest…” I started.
“He’s not going to bring it up. He won’t be the one to point out that he’s had intimate relationships with multiple people they are overseeing. And if I do, well, most people are going to ignore those facts and just kind of brush it under the table, as it were. Instead of pointing out the obvious conflict of interest, they would spin it to make it sound like I was being unreasonable. They could even bring up the relationship I had with him as some form of professional misconduct.”
“Is it that bad?” I asked. “Manhattan Memorial does not have an anti-fraternization policy. How could your past relationship be professional misconduct?”
“Kevin is tricky,” she admitted. “He’d find a way if he really wanted to.”
“Would he cause problems for us?”
This time, when I paused and looked at her, I think she realized I was asking about us. What was happening between Emma and me, not that I was fully aware of what was happening. We had sex in the hospital, in a break room, while on duty. Technically, what we did had been professional misconduct. It was one of the reasons it absolutely had to stay a secret. Even if a proper relationship developed between us, that little indiscretion was never to be revealed.
She took a long, slow inhale through her nose and then let out a heavy sigh. “He can be jealous and bitter,” she said, “but I don’t think he would. He’s probably only interested in messing with my job.”
She paused and shook her head, clearly thinking about the situation. She looked up at me, making eye contact. “He’s out of my life for a reason,” she said. “I don’t want there to be any excuse for him to think he can come back.”
We continued walking in silence for a while. We had stopped walking at some point, but stood there, and the conversation picked back up. We continued talking about inconsequential things. I wanted nothing more than to pull her to me. She was so beautiful, and I wanted to spend the rest of the night dancing with her. But if she couldn’t be back at the gala because this Kevin jerk was there, then I would be where she was.
“Well, this is me,” she finally said, pointing to the building we had stopped in front of. I wanted her to invite me upstairs, but that was going to be something she needed to do on her own, not because I pushed it.
“You do live close to the hospital,” I said. “I guess I didn’t quite realize just how close you were when you said you lived close to the hospital.”
“It’s a good apartment. Nothing as fancy as your brownstone, but it has everything I need, and it’s not one of those super-sized closets that pass as an apartment in New York,” she said. “I have a real living room and a separate bedroom. And it’s convenient.”
“Has Kevin been causing you problems in other parts of your life?” I asked.
“Are you asking if he stalks me?” She chuckled.
I nodded. It wasn’t information that I exactly needed to know, and I certainly didn’t need to know it right then. But I admitted I wasn’t ready for my time with her to be over this evening, and I was asking simply for an excuse to stand next to her and gaze at her. She was stunning in her gown, and there was something that felt like she belonged to me seeing her wrapped in my tux jacket. What I would give to see her in one of my button-down shirts and nothing else. I pushed down the lustful thought. It wasn’t welcome in this particular conversation.
“No, no,” she said. “He hasn’t done anything like that yet. But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t expect it of him at any point in time. For now, he leaves me alone.”
“Good, good.” I nodded. I was running out of excuses and reasons to be this close to her.
“Well, if he ever does anything, you let me know, okay?” I said.
“And what?” She chuckled. “You’ll have a little chat with him? Trust me, the power he holds over me at my job is going to be the same he has with you at the hospital.”
“I wouldn’t be talking,” I admitted. “And I know how to invoke an ethics committee and a review board. He won’t get away with playing those kinds of games with me.”
“Did you know, Dr. Walker, that you can be very intimidating when you want to be?”
She stepped in close, and I gulped, not expecting my overreaction to elicit this response from her.
“If I knew that you liked to be intimidated,” I said, licking my lips, “maybe I should have…”
I growled a little louder.
Her laugh cut straight to my balls. Whatever I had just attempted—whether that was being sexy or intimidating or what—I did not know, but it had clearly failed epically. That had not been the reaction I had wanted.
“I do like you, Marcus,” she said. “You’re fun.”
“I like you too, Emma,” I said. “And I don’t like the idea that this man is causing problems for you.”
“He’s not. He just likes to think he is. But I appreciate your concern. I really do.”
I closed the gap between us and wrapped my arms around her, placing my lips firmly against hers.
“Good night, Emma,” I said, realizing that tonight was not going to be the night she invited me upstairs.