many times do I have to insist you call me Lionel?”
Thomas cocked his eyebrows. Never in the thirty-odd years he’d known Lord Twinsbury personally and the five years he had been the man’s surgeon had he been permitted to call him Lionel.
And Lord Twinsbury was one of his godfathers.
“Lionel, then.” Geraldine smiled. “What seems to be the matter?”
Lord Twinsbury craned his neck and looked at Thomas. “Young fellow, they paged you as well. That’s good.”
“I would certainly hope that they would page me as well, my lord, or perhaps you’ll allow me to call you Lionel, as well?”
Lord Twinsbury fixed him with a stare, much like his own dear departed father used to do. “I think not. You’re not an attractive lady, like Geraldine is.”
The stern smile softened as he looked over at Geraldine, who was taking Lord Twinsbury’s blood pressure and frowning.
“Look at this, Mr. Ashwood,” she said. Thomas leaned over to look at the reading and grimaced.
“Well? What’s wrong? I can tell by your faces that my blood pressure isn’t good.”
“No, it’s not, my lord.” Thomas pulled out his stethoscope. “Do you mind if I have a listen?”
Geraldine helped Lord Twinsbury sit up as Thomas listened to the erratic sound of Lord Twinsbury’s heart trying to pump blood through his clogged arteries. He had been warning Lord Twinsbury for years that his clogged arteries would only get worse. They had done several angioplasties at different times, but Thomas knew and had told him that one day it would come to open heart surgery.
It looked like that day had come.
“I can tell by your face, Thomas, that you’re going to tell me something I really don’t want to hear,” Lord Twinsbury said.
“You can call me by my given name but I can’t call you Lionel?”
“Your father would have a thousand fits knowing you’re being so informal with me,” Lord Twinsbury warned.
Thomas rolled his eyes. “My lord, you know what has to happen. I’ve told you this day would come. You need a coronary artery bypass graft and you need one today. Now. Or the next time you’re speaking in the House of Lords you’re liable to drop dead.”
Geraldine gasped. “You have a terrible bedside manner, Mr. Ashwood.”
Lord Twinsbury chuckled and patted Geraldine’s hand. “Nonsense. I’m used to his behavior. I like his frank talk, my dear. It keeps me on my toes.”
Geraldine frowned and Thomas winked at her.
“I’ll have you admitted, Lord Twinsbury, and then we’ll get you ready to go up to the operating theater today.”
Lord Twinsbury nodded and then turned to Geraldine. “I do hope you’ll stay, my dear. Your father has been treating my heart for so many years and I want to make sure I have someone I can trust in there.”
Thomas groaned and walked out of the room.
Lord Twinsbury was an eccentric character. He was also pompous and arrogant. Never took his advice. Probably because he still saw Thomas as that little boy who’d destroyed his Tudor hedge maze during Royal Ascot when he was ten.
“Mr. Ashwood, can I speak with you a moment?”
Good. Lord.
His day had been going so well. He’d done a great LVAD surgery to extend the life of a patient and was planning on returning to his office to get some charting done. He had not planned to deal with Charles Collins’s daughter today.
He turned around. “How can I help you, Dr. Collins?”
“Do you treat all our patients in such a manner?”
“I do, as a matter of fact, because most of them I’ve known for quite some time. I haven’t had any complaints yet.”
“Do you think that he warrants a coronary artery bypass graft? Wouldn’t another angioplasty or perhaps an endocardectomy work in this case? Is surgery really the answer for a seventy-three-year-old man in poor health?”
This was a little too much.
“Have I missed something, Dr. Collins? Are you or are you not a surgeon?”
Red tinged her cheeks and he’d hit a tender spot on her hardened walls. A chink in the armor, as it were. So perhaps there was a weakness, a crack in her icy facade. “I am a cardiologist so, no, I am not a surgeon.”
“Then do not question my surgical opinion.”
“Lord Twinsbury is as much my patient as yours.”
“Your father would never question my surgical decisions,” Thomas snapped.
“Perhaps he should.”
Thomas took a step closer to her. “How long have you been treating Lord Twinsbury, Dr. Collins? A few hours, perhaps. I have been treating him for five years and over that five years I’ve done numerous angioplasties and made a failed attempt at a carotid endocardectomy, which almost killed him. I have informed my patient that he would need a coronary artery bypass graft. I have tried to keep the procedures as minimally invasive as possible for the sake of my patient, who has been in congestive heart failure for a long time, but there is no other option, so unless you’re able to perform in the operating theater and have discovered a new, minimally invasive way of doing a coronary artery bypass graft, I would suggest you head back to our surgery in Harley Street and leave the surgical procedures to the qualified individuals.”
He turned on his heel and left her, hating himself for taking her down like that in the hallway, in front of the A and E department and other physicians. Physicians she’d be working with.
He hated himself for making her feel that way.
If it had been anyone else, he wouldn’t feel as bad as he did now. He’d given dressing-downs like that before and they had never eaten away at his conscience, but this was different.
He didn’t know why, but it was and he didn’t like it one bit.
I SHOULD LEAVE.
Geri bit her lip as she paced the viewing gallery of the operating theater where Thomas Ashwood was currently performing a coronary artery bypass graft on Lord Twinsbury. How she wished she could be in there, assisting. She’d read so many papers Mr. Ashwood had written. A few hours ago she would have given anything to learn from him.
Now she knew that would be a mistake. Just like Frederick had been a colossal mistake. She was here to start afresh. To prove herself. There was no way she was going to become entangled in a dalliance at work because the last time it had cost her her surgical career.
