whisper to another woman, “That doctor is way too fine. I just love watching him strut his stuff.”
Jaclyn thought the same thing. She liked seeing him strut his stuff as well, but that was something she wouldn’t dare share with anyone. She watched and listened as he went through the regular routine of asking how things were going and if anyone had had any challenges for the week to share with the others.
She knew that was her cue and she raised her hand. He glanced over in her direction. “Yes, Dr. Campbell?”
She spoke up and presented Mr. Aiken’s situation to everyone. Some fellow interns asked questions while jotting down notes. Several threw out possible diagnoses for her to consider and she wrote those down as well. It was nice getting feedback from her peers. More than once she glanced at Dr. De Winter and saw him watching and listening with interest. He was letting them work as a team. A few times it seemed after scanning the room his gaze would come to settle on her. And each time it did, her breath would get caught in her throat and she would swallow deeply to force the air down.
“So, Dr. Campbell, do you think you have enough possibilities to work with?” he asked, his eyes homing in on hers in a way that made blood rush through her veins.
She took a deep breath and then responded, “Yes, and I’m going to narrow it down to the best three.”
He nodded. “Time might not be on your side,” Dr. De Winter then said. “I understand Mr. Aiken’s fever spiked overnight.”
She wasn’t surprised that he was well aware of what was going on with each of the intern’s patients under his charge. How he kept up with it all she didn’t know. There were fifteen of them and each had been assigned five to seven patients.
“Yes, sir, but so far we’re keeping the temperature down.”
He nodded. “But what we want is to get rid of it all together.”
Jaclyn moistened her lips with her tongue thinking she could have taken his words as a put-down. Instead she took them as a challenge. A patient’s health was on the line and her job as a doctor was to not make him comfortable but to get him well. “Yes, sir.”
He straightened from the podium he’d been leaning against and then looked out over the group. “Good job, team. Now go out there and take care of your patients.”
Lucien remained behind in the empty meeting room. Things with Jaclyn Campbell were still not going well. Hooking up with a woman, getting to know her, developing a relationship both mentally and especially physically, was one of those simple pleasures in life that all men looked forward to experiencing.
He dated, although it had been a while since he’d dated anyone seriously. He always enjoyed a female’s company, but in most situations he tried avoiding dating women in his own profession. More often than not their conversations would center too much around the medical cases they were up against.
The last woman he’d dated had been in the education field and he enjoyed learning about her work and the challenges she faced. The only bad thing about Shawnee Powers was her inability to stop placing herself on some sort of pedestal. There was nothing wrong with someone believing in themselves, but for Shawnee it had begun getting downright ridiculous. He’d put up with it until he’d noticed her jealous streak. She had begun questioning him when he didn’t call or when he didn’t immediately text her back. It had been ten months since they’d broken up and at no time had he been tempted to call her. Ten months.
That had been when he’d seen Jaclyn for the first time. He would always remember that day. There had been twenty residents and now they were down to fifteen. One had gotten seriously sick and had to leave the program, three hadn’t been able to cope the first six months and one he’d had to terminate.
His mind shifted to Terrence Matthews, the one he’d had to terminate. The young man, although somewhat brash at times, had had a promising future. He had started off sharp as a whip, up on every assignment and possessed a bedside manner all the patients appreciated. Then Terrence began being late to group meetings, going MIA when he was supposed to be visiting patients and falling asleep during group discussions.
Lucien had mentioned Terrence’s behavior to Dr. Dudley who at first hadn’t wanted to rock the boat; after all the man was a Matthews. But Lucien had been making his own notes and observations when Jaclyn had come to him about Terrence’s drug use.
Without Terrence aware he was being observed, she had witnessed him stealing drugs from the hospital pharmacy. A replay of the pharmacy’s surveillance camera had backed up her claim, and a random drug test confirmed Terrence’s drug use.
Lucien shook his head when he recalled the day he had summoned Dr. Matthews to his office. The man didn’t deny the charges. Instead he said because he was a Matthews and his family had given so much to the hospital, he felt anything he did should and could be overlooked.
Even the offer that he take a temporary leave and go into drug rehab was laughed off with Terrence saying to do such a thing would be an admission of guilt. Lucien had ending up terminating Terrence’s association with the hospital that day.
Although he’d backed up Lucien’s actions, Dr. Dudley had predicted there would be a backlash from the Matthews family. The old man had been right.
Drawing in a deep breath Lucien walked to the window and glanced out at downtown Alexandria. Below, the brick-paved streets were lined with shops and boutiques of early eighteenth and nineteenth century architecture. And in the distance, across the Potomac, was the nation’s capital in all its glorious splendor. He enjoyed where he worked and loved living in Georgetown, far enough from the hospital on the D.C. side to appreciate the days he had off work.
He knew Jaclyn lived in Virginia, and the only times their paths had crossed after hours had been that Sunday when he’d decided to do his grocery shopping at a store in Alexandria.
He rubbed his hand down his face and turned away from the window. Although she had been sitting in the back of the room today, his gaze had sought her out anyway. He had looked for her. Found her. And had felt his attraction to her intensify. When she’d opened her mouth to speak, his pulse had accelerated and his ability to breathe had become affected.
What the hell was wrong with him?
It had taken all of his control to keep his features neutral, void of expression. Each and every time he was around her he risked the possibility of giving something away. The interns under his charge were bright, observant and astute. They would hang on to his every word, decipher his every action.
Jaclyn made it hard for him to think straight at times. Like today when she had been explaining Mr. Aiken’s condition to everyone. While she talked about the man’s fever, Lucien had begun imagining a fever of a different kind—the typed generated in the heat of passion between a man and a woman. Namely, him and her. He could envision her lush body, naked and hot, extremely hot, writhing beneath his while he thrust in and out of her making nonstop love to her.
Those thoughts had been the last thing that should have been flowing through his mind, but they weren’t. Even now those kinds of thoughts were uppermost in his mind and determined to get the best of him. It might be wise to consider placing as much distance between him and Jaclyn as possible, and the only way he could do that was to suggest she transfer to another hospital. He knew there was no way he could do that. It wouldn’t be fair to her to disrupt her position here just because he was the one with a libido problem.
As he
