Page 7 of Healing Her

But Nina had also been open, generous, wore her heart on her sleeve, whereas Ashley was… well, Jen didn’t like to use thephraseuptight bitchgenerally speaking, but she really couldn’t think of a more accurate descriptor in this particular case. And that was everything Nina had never been.

And yet here she was, staring blankly out over a Los Angeles suburb, wondering how she could get Dr. Ashley Proctor tolikeher.

“All right. All right, enough,” she said aloud, spinning back around to face her desk. She had a full schedule ahead of her for the rest of the day, starting with a pre-surgical consult with Priya Majumdar on a laparoscopic ovarian tumor excision. It would be a delicate talk, she knew. This was a patient who’d been through some pretty intense chemotherapy, and now she’d had a reoccurrence of her cancer. Bringing up organ donation could make her think that the hospital thought her prognosis was terminal, when in reality her odds were excellent. It would be a slender needle for her to thread.

Jen checked her watch. Oops, she had to get a move on. Today’s surgical roster was a tight one. There was a nurse shortage due to some kind of over-allocation of vacation hours, some illnesses, and a lack of travel nurses able to come in so last minute. She didn’t have a second to spare between chats, and absolutely none of them could go sideways if they were to stay on schedule.

7

“What do you mean my OR staff isn’t available yet?” Ashley stared at the OR charge nurse, Sandra Ramsey, in disbelief. “This valve replacement is supposed to be happening right now. I have a patient who hasn’t eaten in over nine hours. Why do we even have a schedule if this is what happens?”

“Doctor Proctor, I apologize,” Sandra said, shaking her head. “Truly, I do. But you know that the best-laid schedules can go awry even on a perfectly staffed day. Which this is not.” Her face was sympathetic, but her body language was resolute, arms crossed over her chest, chin in the air. “We’ve rescheduled as many surgeries as we could. Surgeons are completing their surgeries in as reasonable a time as is safe, which I knowyouof all people appreciate.”

Ashley rolled her eyes. “Yes, of course.”

“I’m sorry Dr. Majumdar got started late, but if you can give us thirty more minutes, her patient should be in recovery, the room will be sterilized, and we’ll have nurses for you.” She tossed her long dark ponytail. “That’s going to have to be good enough for you, because it’s as good as I can get.”

“Fine.” Spinning on her heel, Ashley stalked off towards the room where Magnus Svensson and his wife Vita were waiting for her to update them on the status of his procedure. He was such a good and compliant patient, she hated to make him wait any longer.

Anger surged with every step she took down the hallway, with every squeak of her sneakers. Of course delays happened, but 98% of the time, theydidn’t. Not here, not with Sandra Ramsey in charge. Sandra was constantly being headhunted by other hospitals; she was that good at her job. Oakridge’s surgical department was a smoothly running machine because of her. And this wasn’t the first time they’d had people out sick or on vacation, but it was the first time it had ever been a problem to this degree.

That meant there was some kind of new variable causing today’s problems. Ashley stopped outside of Magnus’ room, her eyes narrowing as she thought about what that could be. Realization hit right at the same time that she heard footsteps behind her.

“Doctor Proctor, I’m so glad I’ve caught you. Is everything all right?” Doctor Jen Colton’s pleasant voice piping up from behind her was the last thing Ashley wanted to hear. Slowly, she turned to face the source of her irritation.

“No, Doctor Colton. Everything is not in fact all right.” She tried to take slow, deep breaths, willing herself to remain calm. “Would I be correct in thinking you’re the reason that Dr. Majumdar’s surgery began late today?”

The surgeon stepped back, eyebrows raising. “I see we’re off to a grand start today. Do you always get up on the wrong side of the bed?”

The breezy audacity of the joking inquiry made her see red. “Answer the question.”

Doctor Colton blinked and spread her hands wide. “Her patient had a lot of questions about corneal and tissue transplants. Our educational consultation did run a little long, but that’ll be an outlier, I’m sure. I got a little excited that she wanted to know so much about?—”

“My patient isstarving. He is waiting for a procedure I should have started twenty minutes ago!” Ashley pointed towards the room where the Svenssons waited. “For you to hold up anyone’s surgery while you recite the contents of a pamphlet at them is inexcusable.”

“Now, hang on,” Dr. Colton began, drawing herself up taller. “I’m very sorry?—”

“You’re always sorry! Yet you never stop being inconsiderate!” The words burst out of Ashley, and she immediately regretted them. What was it about this woman that just riled up the worst in her? She’d known her for two weeks, but it felt like she’d loathed her for years.

Doctor Colton’s mouth compressed into a nearly straight line, and Ashley could hear the sharp breath she drew in through her nose. “I am sorry for your patient. I will order him whatever he likes for his post-surgery meal and apologize to him myself. But I need you to grant me a little bit of grace here. Today is an unusual day. This will not happen again.”

“It never should have happened in the first place,” Ashley hissed, still horrified by herself but also still unable to stop. Two weeks of bottled-up irritation and unwanted attraction were just boiling out of her. “You knew today was an atypical staffing day. You’re an experienced surgeon. I don’t care howexcitedyou were about your little education initiative, you put patient care first,always.”

“Educationispatient care,” Dr. Colton snapped back. “Organ donation education is care for this patientandfor other, future patients. It’s a bigger picture.”

“On a day like today, you set the bigger picture aside.” Her voice was rising. “Immediate needs take precedence when we’re understaffed! It’s unconscionable for you to have delayed even one procedure, let alone two. Or more, really, since there’s inevitably going to be a ripple effect down the schedule. Your inconsideration didn’t only cause problems for me.”

“Well, you’re certainly acting like it did.” Dr. Colton’s eyes were flashing with anger. “Again, I apologize to you, I will apologize to your patient, I will provide him a meal, and this will not happen again. Now, are you done berating me in front of our colleagues and patients?”

To Ashley’s horror, when she looked around, she saw nurses, doctors, and even the Svenssons watching the goings-on with concern and curiosity on their faces. Her face flushed hot at how unprofessional she was acting, and she wished the tile floor would open up and swallow her whole. “I,” she began, and had to pause to gulp down her humiliation. “I am sorry, everyone.”

She didn’t know what else to say. What could make up for the scene she’d just caused? At least the Chief hadn’t witnessed it. But Elaine had, and that was more than Ashley could bear. With a whispered further apology to the Svenssons, she shoved past startled hospital personnel and walked briskly to the stairs.

Steps echoed behind her as she took the cement stairway down towards the basement. “Go away,” she hissed, not bothering to look behind her. She knew it was Elaine. “I’m fine.”

“Oh, no you’re not.” Her mentor caught up to her and grabbed her arm, forcing her to stop on a landing. “Absolutely you’re not. I’ve never seen you like this, Ashley. What’s going on?”

“There’s nothing going on, Elaine, I had a momentary lapse in sanity.”

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