I step to the side to get a better view and Josie’s attention snaps back to me.
“Wait! You’re not the guy who picked Bailey up last night.”
I smile. “No. That was Cooper, my brother.”
“But…” She shakes her head. “No, that can’t be right, because I recognize you…” She tilts her head to the side, studying me intently before she gasps and her eyes widen with recognition. “You’re Dr. Russell! The hot doctor!”
Bailey leaps forward and grabs the edge of the front door. “Ooookay then. Well, Dr. Russell has to go now. Josie, move your foot. I’m trying to close to door. No, no, he has to leave, stop bl”—she shoves her sister out of the way—“ocking it!”
With an oomph, Bailey regains control and pushes the door closed all but one last inch. One of her bright brown eyes stares up at me from inside. I can only see a sliver of her mouth—the mouth that was just pressed against mine minutes ago.
“Well, thanks again,” she says, all fake smiles and pretend geniality. “I’ll, um—”
“BAILEY YOU WERE MAKING OUT WITH THE HOT DOCTOR!” Josie shouts behind her.
Bailey’s eye goes wide and her cheek burns bright red. “Hookay then, ignore her. See you at work! Goodbye now!”
Then the door slams and Bailey yells at her sister to stop shouting and I’m left outside in the cold with a big-ass smile on my face.
My last thought before I force myself to turn back to the street is that I wish I could spend the rest of the day with them. It would be the most entertaining Sunday I’ve had in a while.
Chapter 18
BAILEY
To say this weekend was a rollercoaster of emotion is like saying the sun is kind of hot. On Friday, I spilled instruments, delayed surgery, and cried at work. Matt drove me home and told me to grow up. I was 99% sure I was going to quit. On Saturday, I unknowingly attended a wedding with his brother but ended up going home with him and sleeping in his bed. On Sunday, I made out with him hardcore. I was slobbering all over him, making a real fool of myself. My hands were in his hair. My vocal cords were producing the most ridiculous, slutty moans. He probably thought I’d never been kissed before. Now it’s Monday and I’m expected to just walk into the OR like Hey everyone! Everything is hunky dory!
EXCEPT EVERYTHING IS NOT HUNKY DORY.
Can’t a girl have a minute to process these developments? My body has run through fight or flight so many times it’s not quite sure what we’re doing. Staying? Crying? Declaring our love? Fending off his advances? ARE WE IN LOVE OR WAR?
When I press my finger to my pulse, my brain comes back with an error message: too fast to compute.
Even though Matt isn’t technically my boss (the board of NEMC is), he is my superior and a surgeon and slightly intimidating. Getting involved with him sounds like a recipe for disaster. I’ve watched enough Grey’s Anatomy to know I have to handle this situation delicately. I won’t let this turn me into a nervous wreck. There can be no whispers in the halls or steamy sex eyes over the operating table. I will not be gossiped about. If this gets out (and it will) then it’s going to be on my terms.
Which is why I’m sitting outside the HR office on Monday morning. It’s ungodly early. The office is dark, but that’s okay; I’ll be the first person Linda sees when she arrives. She’s the sole human resources officer for the entire hospital. I rarely see her around the building, and when I do, she’s usually flustered, walking at a brisk pace and murmuring angrily under her breath. There’s often a stain on her shirt. I’ve only ever seen her hair look wild and unkempt. With the number of employees this place has, I think she has her hands full. They really ought to hire someone to assist her. I’ll be sure to tell her that when I see her, just so I’m on her good side.
There’s movement to my right and I glance up to see her making her way down the hall. Her head is down, focused on her phone as she approaches.
I jump to my feet and paste on a big, cheesy smile.
“Linda! Hi, good morning.”
She jumps out of her skin then glares up at me. “What? What is it?”
Not exactly a warm welcome, but I don’t let that deter me. “Oh, well, I know it’s early, but I was hoping to get a few minutes of your time to talk about something?”
I’ve never seen someone’s heart break before my eyes.
“You’re serious? It’s Monday. The sun’s not even up.”
Then she shakes her head and brushes past me to unlock her office door. She flips the light on and—wow. I thought Matt’s office was messy, but hers takes the cake. There are files and papers everywhere. Her desk is barely visible.
She plops her purse and her coffee down onto a side table then continues over to a tall filing cabinet in the corner.
“Who does the offense pertain to?”
“Offense? No. Well, the situation is between Dr. Russell and myself.”
“All right. What form do you need?” She tugs the top drawer open. “Sexual harassment? Hostile work environment?”
“Form?”
She pulls out a slew of them: orange, green, blue, red, purple—one for any and every offense under the sun. Oh god.
I leap forward and hold up my hands. “It’s not like that.”
She’s skeptical.
“Did he force himself onto you or put you in a situation where you weren’t comfortable?”
Well, that Prius console was digging into my ribs while we were making out yesterday.
“No. NO.” I shake my head vehemently. “Nothing like that. It was completely consensual—enjoyable, even.”
She drops the forms onto her desk and arches a brow, clearly confused by my presence in her office.
I decide to explain what happened over the weekend, albeit giving an abridged version. Though I’d rather not, I even reluctantly mention the make-out session in his car, though I keep it PG.
When I’m done, her eyes narrow and I notice the heavy bags, the disheveled hair. Maybe I shouldn’t have come.
“So…you’re just here to let me know you two consensually kissed and it was ‘enjoyable’?” She speaks slowly, as if talking to a toddler.
I sigh. Good. She gets it. “Exactly. Just in case it’s against the company guidelines, or some kind of rule outlined in the employee handbook, that sort of thing.”
“It’s not.”
Oh.
Huh.
She stuffs the forms back into the filing cabinet and slams it shut.
Oddly enough, I’m disappointed that she’s not going to forbid the relationship. “Is there any way you could double-check for me?”
Her eyes cut to the mountain of paperwork on her desk. Her computer pings with three new incoming emails. A woman skids to a stop in her doorway, breathing heavily, and announces that two nurses are at each other’s throats on floor three.
She groans and moves to round her desk so she can take care of the situation.
I try to block her from passing by me. “So there’s nothing you can give me? No angry orange form? No warning on my employee chart?” I chuckle like, Ha ha, help a sister out here. But no. She leaves and I’m left to stand in that HR office contemplating the twisting feeling in my gut.
I’m only now realizing I wanted our relationship to be against the rules. I couldn’t sleep last night because I kept reliving Matt’s kiss, every excruciatingly perfect detail of it, and that’s not okay. I liked my life before the kiss. I only had to worry about being good at my job and taking care of Josie. I don’t like these feelings stirring inside of me, the queasy sensation, the fear of what could happen if we get too carried away. I don’t have the luxury of a quick fling. My life is complicated enough as is.
Dammit.
I need one of those forms. Talk about a perfect buffer, a clean break. I could have given Matt a beautifully eloquent speech about valuing my position here too much to break the rules, but this HR lady gave me nothing. Not even a stern talking to.
I decide I have to take matters into my own hands.
Matt is in his office when I go searching for him. We have a case in a few hours and he’s probably about to round with his resident, but this shouldn’t take too long.
“Wait! You’re not the guy who picked Bailey up last night.”
I smile. “No. That was Cooper, my brother.”
“But…” She shakes her head. “No, that can’t be right, because I recognize you…” She tilts her head to the side, studying me intently before she gasps and her eyes widen with recognition. “You’re Dr. Russell! The hot doctor!”
Bailey leaps forward and grabs the edge of the front door. “Ooookay then. Well, Dr. Russell has to go now. Josie, move your foot. I’m trying to close to door. No, no, he has to leave, stop bl”—she shoves her sister out of the way—“ocking it!”
With an oomph, Bailey regains control and pushes the door closed all but one last inch. One of her bright brown eyes stares up at me from inside. I can only see a sliver of her mouth—the mouth that was just pressed against mine minutes ago.
“Well, thanks again,” she says, all fake smiles and pretend geniality. “I’ll, um—”
“BAILEY YOU WERE MAKING OUT WITH THE HOT DOCTOR!” Josie shouts behind her.
Bailey’s eye goes wide and her cheek burns bright red. “Hookay then, ignore her. See you at work! Goodbye now!”
Then the door slams and Bailey yells at her sister to stop shouting and I’m left outside in the cold with a big-ass smile on my face.
My last thought before I force myself to turn back to the street is that I wish I could spend the rest of the day with them. It would be the most entertaining Sunday I’ve had in a while.
Chapter 18
BAILEY
To say this weekend was a rollercoaster of emotion is like saying the sun is kind of hot. On Friday, I spilled instruments, delayed surgery, and cried at work. Matt drove me home and told me to grow up. I was 99% sure I was going to quit. On Saturday, I unknowingly attended a wedding with his brother but ended up going home with him and sleeping in his bed. On Sunday, I made out with him hardcore. I was slobbering all over him, making a real fool of myself. My hands were in his hair. My vocal cords were producing the most ridiculous, slutty moans. He probably thought I’d never been kissed before. Now it’s Monday and I’m expected to just walk into the OR like Hey everyone! Everything is hunky dory!
EXCEPT EVERYTHING IS NOT HUNKY DORY.
Can’t a girl have a minute to process these developments? My body has run through fight or flight so many times it’s not quite sure what we’re doing. Staying? Crying? Declaring our love? Fending off his advances? ARE WE IN LOVE OR WAR?
When I press my finger to my pulse, my brain comes back with an error message: too fast to compute.
Even though Matt isn’t technically my boss (the board of NEMC is), he is my superior and a surgeon and slightly intimidating. Getting involved with him sounds like a recipe for disaster. I’ve watched enough Grey’s Anatomy to know I have to handle this situation delicately. I won’t let this turn me into a nervous wreck. There can be no whispers in the halls or steamy sex eyes over the operating table. I will not be gossiped about. If this gets out (and it will) then it’s going to be on my terms.
Which is why I’m sitting outside the HR office on Monday morning. It’s ungodly early. The office is dark, but that’s okay; I’ll be the first person Linda sees when she arrives. She’s the sole human resources officer for the entire hospital. I rarely see her around the building, and when I do, she’s usually flustered, walking at a brisk pace and murmuring angrily under her breath. There’s often a stain on her shirt. I’ve only ever seen her hair look wild and unkempt. With the number of employees this place has, I think she has her hands full. They really ought to hire someone to assist her. I’ll be sure to tell her that when I see her, just so I’m on her good side.
There’s movement to my right and I glance up to see her making her way down the hall. Her head is down, focused on her phone as she approaches.
I jump to my feet and paste on a big, cheesy smile.
“Linda! Hi, good morning.”
She jumps out of her skin then glares up at me. “What? What is it?”
Not exactly a warm welcome, but I don’t let that deter me. “Oh, well, I know it’s early, but I was hoping to get a few minutes of your time to talk about something?”
I’ve never seen someone’s heart break before my eyes.
“You’re serious? It’s Monday. The sun’s not even up.”
Then she shakes her head and brushes past me to unlock her office door. She flips the light on and—wow. I thought Matt’s office was messy, but hers takes the cake. There are files and papers everywhere. Her desk is barely visible.
She plops her purse and her coffee down onto a side table then continues over to a tall filing cabinet in the corner.
“Who does the offense pertain to?”
“Offense? No. Well, the situation is between Dr. Russell and myself.”
“All right. What form do you need?” She tugs the top drawer open. “Sexual harassment? Hostile work environment?”
“Form?”
She pulls out a slew of them: orange, green, blue, red, purple—one for any and every offense under the sun. Oh god.
I leap forward and hold up my hands. “It’s not like that.”
She’s skeptical.
“Did he force himself onto you or put you in a situation where you weren’t comfortable?”
Well, that Prius console was digging into my ribs while we were making out yesterday.
“No. NO.” I shake my head vehemently. “Nothing like that. It was completely consensual—enjoyable, even.”
She drops the forms onto her desk and arches a brow, clearly confused by my presence in her office.
I decide to explain what happened over the weekend, albeit giving an abridged version. Though I’d rather not, I even reluctantly mention the make-out session in his car, though I keep it PG.
When I’m done, her eyes narrow and I notice the heavy bags, the disheveled hair. Maybe I shouldn’t have come.
“So…you’re just here to let me know you two consensually kissed and it was ‘enjoyable’?” She speaks slowly, as if talking to a toddler.
I sigh. Good. She gets it. “Exactly. Just in case it’s against the company guidelines, or some kind of rule outlined in the employee handbook, that sort of thing.”
“It’s not.”
Oh.
Huh.
She stuffs the forms back into the filing cabinet and slams it shut.
Oddly enough, I’m disappointed that she’s not going to forbid the relationship. “Is there any way you could double-check for me?”
Her eyes cut to the mountain of paperwork on her desk. Her computer pings with three new incoming emails. A woman skids to a stop in her doorway, breathing heavily, and announces that two nurses are at each other’s throats on floor three.
She groans and moves to round her desk so she can take care of the situation.
I try to block her from passing by me. “So there’s nothing you can give me? No angry orange form? No warning on my employee chart?” I chuckle like, Ha ha, help a sister out here. But no. She leaves and I’m left to stand in that HR office contemplating the twisting feeling in my gut.
I’m only now realizing I wanted our relationship to be against the rules. I couldn’t sleep last night because I kept reliving Matt’s kiss, every excruciatingly perfect detail of it, and that’s not okay. I liked my life before the kiss. I only had to worry about being good at my job and taking care of Josie. I don’t like these feelings stirring inside of me, the queasy sensation, the fear of what could happen if we get too carried away. I don’t have the luxury of a quick fling. My life is complicated enough as is.
Dammit.
I need one of those forms. Talk about a perfect buffer, a clean break. I could have given Matt a beautifully eloquent speech about valuing my position here too much to break the rules, but this HR lady gave me nothing. Not even a stern talking to.
I decide I have to take matters into my own hands.
Matt is in his office when I go searching for him. We have a case in a few hours and he’s probably about to round with his resident, but this shouldn’t take too long.
