Page 69 of Hearts on the Table
“But our organization also values team players, Ms. Carmichael. Your actions this week will tell us a lot about what we can expect from you in the future,” Sturmond butted in.
“DoctorCarmichael.” Lainey, her mother, and I corrected him all at once. He smirked without apologizing.
“What you can expect of me in the future is my full dedication to evidence-based, cardiothoracic surgery. Nothing more, nothing less.” Lainey held his gaze. The half-smile on his face didn’t budge.
???
“Holy shit.” The door to Caplan’s office closed behind me. I stared at the cheerful painting of daffodils in the hall and tried to wrap my head around what the fuck was happening. “Lainey, are you—”
She had already taken off, marching down the hall towards the elevators.
“Lainey, wait.”
“I can’t, Sam. If I slow down, I’ll get mauled by a news anchor or something. I have to check my post-op patients, including Mrs. Singh, and start rounds with the residents before my eight back-to-back interviews that start in”—she glanced at her smartwatch—“forty-five minutes.”
“Take a breath. It’ll be alright.”
“Ha! Easy for you to say. You’re not the face of heart surgery for the next week,” she growled, stabbing her finger at the elevator call button.
“It’s just a few day—”
“That schedule had me booked for an interview in New York on Thursday. This is not just a few days. They’re going to keep me out of the hospital for as long as media interest is there. And I’m going to miss out on OR time and get behind on my cases, just in time for these freaking attending interviews to really ramp up.”
I held my tongue as we stepped into the elevator. I’d worked with her long enough to know anything I said right now would fall on deaf ears. But I wasn’t just her colleague anymore. I reached for her the second the elevators closed.
“Sweetheart—”
“Cameras,” she whispered, jerking out of my grasp. An ocean of industrial carpet opened up between us.
“Fuck the cameras, I need to know you’re alright.” But I stayed on my side of the elevator.
Teeth dug into her bottom lip. The same one I’d sunk my teeth into just two days ago. What the hell had happened? “I’m fine. I just need to ride this out and get to the other side. I can make it work.” Her head bobbed. “We just can’t be seen together like this.”
“In an elevator?”
My weak attempt at a joke fell flat. “People saw us at dinner together on Saturday. What happens when they put two and two together?”
“We’ve worked with each other for years. No one will think twice if—”
“I can’t risk it. Not right now. God, I want to puke. Just…just let me get through this, Sam.”
The elevator doors opened, and she slid out. I stuck around long enough to hear Jones make a snide remark about how “well-timed” the video was, and then gloat about snagging her quad-bypass now that she was otherwise engaged with interviews.
As I made my way to the lockers to change (slowly, still interrupted every few steps by enthusiastic colleagues), I couldn’t help but replay her last words, over and over.
“Just let me get through this, Sam.”
I couldn’t help but think that she meant something closer to,“Just let me get through this without you, Sam.”
Chapter 26
Sam
“So, fame isn’t all it’s cracked up to be?”
I glared at Blake, taking a longer-than-necessary pull of my beer. Two days after the clusterfuck of a PR meeting and people were still cramming their phones in my face. I was a quiet guy. Private. I didn’t love having someone stop me every two steps and yelling lyrics to“Come and Get Your Love”at me from across the street.
I assumed it was so much worse for Lainey, but I couldn’t be sure. I hadn’t seen her since she left me in the elevator. Our text messages and after-work phone calls were nonexistent.
