Page 3 of Hearts on the Table
???
I slept poorly. Even though I didn’t have to be at work until eight (practically afternoon, in the surgical world), I swung out of bed as soon as my alarm rang at five-thirty. I’d spent the nighttossing and turning, beating myself up, and was eager to pound something else into the ground. I yanked on a workout set from a pile of unfolded laundry in my closet before padding across the apartment to start water for tea. I’d lived in this unit for three years now, upgrading to the shiny new building as a reward to myself for bagging the Cedar fellowship.
The tall ceilings and fake-wood floors might have seemed homey, if I’d bothered to decorate. But I didn’t spend enough time here to invest much in hanging pictures, or whatever.
That could come after I was an attending, perhaps, and had some more time and money on my hands. For now, I had a gray Ikea couch and a few chairs if I needed a place to sit. A dining room table from Target I’d only used once. The most color in the place was in the corner where I’d set up my desk, which was covered in Post-it notes, index cards, and medical journals. When I wasn’t at the hospital, I was usually there, working on research.
While the kettle warmed, I brushed my teeth and flicked through emails. Jones had already sent over his thoughts on the case. The notes were thoughtful, his recommendations sound, despite the strong whiff of superiority practically oozing from my screen. Jones also didn’t recommend surgery.Frack.I flicked to my other emails, vowing to think on it later when I didn’t feel so crabby.
A night spent thinking about Reese and the case and the patient had given me some distance from the roaring anger I’d felt last night, but my ego still sported a dent. It would take me some more time to fully get over it.
I glossed over a few notes from a research partner at UCLA who was working with me on a paper, a note from my mother reminding me about the upcoming reception for a regional cardiology association, and…
I froze, toothpaste dripping down my chin, staring at the name I’d have sworn I’d never see in my inbox again.
From: [email protected]
Subject: DON’T DELETE - CHI JOB - PLEASE READ!!
Blood froze in my veins before blazing through my body. A thrumming sound filled my ears and my eyes narrowed, tunnel vision burning a laser beam into the email that I wanted to print out just so I could shred.
Seeing her name obliterated any semblance of calm I’d cultivated last night. The anger sprang back to life, hot and illogical.
I slammed the sink on, slurping water and flinging my toothbrush into its cup, nearly shattering the ceramic. My reflection in the mirror looked wild; normally unruly brown curls spiked in crazy disarray from my restless night. Freckles were stark against my usually tan skin, bleached now by outrage and something that felt uncomfortably close to fear. Beneath arched, disbelieving brows, my brown eyes were wide open.What did she think she was doing?
I swiped to delete Katie’s message without opening it and fled my apartment, water droplets still sluicing down my face. I needed to pound something sooner rather than later.
My building was conveniently located between Cedar’s new hospital and my gym. Work five minutes in one direction, workout fifteen minutes in the other. When embroiled in a tumultuous fury, the gym commute was closer to ten. Gravel spewed as I pulled into the parking lot behind the building.
R3had opened just last year and ticked all my boxes: It was new, clean, well-equipped, and it didn’t hurt that since I’d been coming here for the last few weeks, I’d struck up something of a flirtation with the gym’s hot owner, Will. His brother,Conner (also hot, but sporting a wedding band), ruled over the other half of the business, a high-tech physical therapy practice specializing in athletic recovery.
The prospect of working off some steam and getting a little shameless flirting in was appealing. Maybe Will would wear me out and charm me senseless so I could stop feeling like I wanted to strangle someone. I didn’t want to think about Katie and her email, so my brain helpfully supplied the next best person for me to imagine pounding into the gym mats.Reese. The oatmeal, himself.
Rija’s words bounced around my head.“He’s a good teacher.”He was, darn it, and the interns and residents universally favored him. All that boring translated into boundless patience, which meant he didn’t lose his crap when we messed up. It would also be just like him to send me to Jones to make me work on my collaboration with other doctors or whatever. Or to help me see for myself if I was making a wrong call, so that I could self-correct before he stepped in.
But that didn’t mean that for the next hour, I had to like him.“Be the better person,”Rija had said. Well, sure. I could do that. But only after I imagined my punching bag was his face for a while.
“There’s my favorite regular!” Despite my mood, I couldn’t help but return Will’s smile as I walked through the doors. He was standing at the reception desk, talking to a tall man while the rest of the class spread out by the mats. “Hey, I’m not sure if you’ve met my other brother, Sam? You’re usually a morning person and he’s mostly here at night.”
My smile froze.
“Dr. Reese?” I sounded out the syllables of his name through gritted teeth.
“Lainey.” He nodded at me. I was so caught off guard seeing him here, in my inner sanctum, I almost didn’t notice that he’dcalled me by my first name. Not Doctor, or Carmichael.Lainey. The familiarity grated.
“I didn’t know you worked out here.” Translation:What the frickity-frack are you doing at my gym?!
His head tilted ever-so-slightly towards Will. “Brother.”
Right. That made sense. Looking between the two of them now, I could kind of see the resemblance. Though Will was clean-shaven with brown hair, they had the same blue eyes. The same big, tall build and, if I thought about it, the same thoughtful, focused way of moving. Even Conner lumbered around like that. Reese gave the same patient encouragement to freaked out residents as Will did when people in class were almost ready to give up.
I felt stupid that I hadn’t seen these similarities before, or bothered to look up Will’s last name. It took some of the wind out of my sails. If it was Sam's brothers’ gym, this place had been his long before it had been mine. Maybe this washisinner sanctum? Though that didn’t quite compute.
Considering he was the most boring man alive, I hadn’t given any thought to Reese’s extracurricular activities. I just assumed he’d left work, driven his boring car to his boring house, and stared at the wall till it was time for work again. Like a surgical robot.
But now, suddenly, he was here inmygym, wearing something other than scrubs. Without an OR scrub cap, his dark blond hair was thick and wavy, like he’d run his fingers through it a few times. It matched a short beard that was a little more unkempt than I was used to seeing it. Clear blue eyes seemed sharper here than they did within the hospital walls.
The quick-dry fabric of his t-shirt clung to his muscles. I’d never seen those before. I knew he was tall, but all at once I realized he was jacked. Jacked like he worked out all the time.Jacked like his brother owned a gym. Like he wasn’t such a robot after all.
