Page 31 of Toxic Temptation
“Dr. Fairfax, wait! The board is in session— You can’t just?—”
Lynn scrambles from behind her desk in a desperate attempt to stop me, her chair squeaking as it spins behind her.
But I’m already pushing through the heavy oak doors of the meeting room, and Jeremy’s voice cuts off mid-sentence like I’ve yanked the plug from a speaker.
Twelve faces turn toward me, but I only see two that matter: Jeremy’s arctic blue eyes and Shana’s rat-like sneer. The rest might as well be mannequins for all the backbone they possess.
“Gentlemen. Shana.” I pause in the doorway. “Sorry to interrupt your… What do we call this? Creative accounting? Devil worshipping circle?”
Jeremy’s laugh is painfully forced. “Dr. Fairfax, this is highly inappropriate. We’re in the middle of?—”
“Oh, man, I would really love to hear how you finish that sentence,” I interrupt with a forced laugh of my own. “If you asked me, I’d say you’re in the middle of weighing the costs ofsaving kids’ lives against all the yachts you could buy if those dollars went into your own pockets instead. And the poor kiddos are coming up just ateensy, weensybit short.”
Any remnant of a fake smile on Jeremy’s face withers and dies. The rest of the room is silent, too. Dr. Weatherly strokes his mustache nervously, while Dr. Kaplan suddenly finds the surface of the mahogany table fascinating.
“That’s quite an accusation,” Shana purrs. “Perhaps you’d care to elaborate?”
“I nearly lost an eight-year-old boy today.” My voice doesn’t shake, even though my hands want to. “Do you know why I almost lost him?”
Jeremy adjusts his tie and fidgets, feigning indifference. “Equipment malfunction happens, Doctor. It’s regrettable, but?—”
“What you call ‘regrettable,’ I tend to call ‘willful, homicidal negligence.’” I pivot toward the other board members, these spineless men who used to respect my father, who used to respect this profession. Who used to give a fuck about children.
“Dr. Weatherly, how many times have I stood in this exact spot, begging for updated anesthesia equipment? Five? Ten? Fifteen? Twenty?” His mustache twitches, but he won’t meet my eyes. “Dr. Kaplan, do you remember my presentation on cardiac monitors? I told you what would most likely happen, and then, whaddaya know, a preteen girl coded out on my table,the exact way I said she would.”
Silence.
Always fucking silence from these cowards.
“Today, that equipment you’ve been ignoring nearly killed another child. A child who came to us for help. Who trusted us.” My voice cracks on the last word, and I hate myself for it, though not enough to stop. “But I guess dead kids don’t affect quarterly bonuses, do they?”
Jeremy clears his throat. The sound has a menacing edge to it. “Dr. Fairfax, this emotional outburst is beneath you. I think perhaps you need some time off. Extended leave, maybe. To… process.”
“I don’t need to process a goddamn thing. I know what I’m saying. I mean every word.”
“Your father’s legacy seems to have given you certain expectations about how this hospital operates.” He smiles again. It’s smarmy enough to make me want to vomit right in his lap. “But nepotism died with Thomas Fairfax, I’m afraid.”
The room spins for a second.He did not just?—
“My father earned his place here through decades of service,” I snarl between clenched teeth. “I’ve done the same.”
“Have you?” Shana chimes in. “Because last week, you abandoned your shift without following protocol. Left early, if memory serves. Almost like you knew something was going to happen.”
My mouth opens, then closes.
“And now, you’re making wild accusations about equipment that you claim is faulty,” Jeremy continues, circling closer and closer to me like a shark. “Equipment that works perfectly fine for every other doctor in this hospital. Makes one wonder if the problem isn’t the machines, but the operator.”
“Are you questioning my competence?”
“I’m questioning your stability.” He’s close enough now that I can smell him, like rotten meat doused in a cloying, old man aftershave that makes me sick to my stomach. “Your judgment. Your continued ability to function in a high-stakes professional environment such as this revered institution.”
His words are a velvety croon, and to my horror, they seem to be having the intended effect on his audience. Every mindless lemming in this room is now looking at me likeI’mthe problem. LikeI’mthe one slowly killing this place from the inside.
“If you’d followed proper requisition procedures,” Jeremy is saying, “new equipment would have been ordered immediately. We’re not monsters, Dr. Fairfax. We want the same thing you do: to save lives. But we can’t help you if you won’t help yourself.”
And there it is. The masterstroke. He’s made me look like an incompetent, unstable legacy hire who blames everyone but herself for her failures.
Weatherly nods. Kaplan mumbles.
