Page 26 of The Doctors Will See You Now

After overhearing whispered conversation after conversation about The Doctor Is In star, my curiosity had reached an all-time peak. The episodes may have been weekly, but the office chatter was endless. I couldn’t stop myself from tuning in and finding out what all the fuss was about with my own eyes.

The first episode had felt weird. The Will I knew and the Will that was schmoozing and charming his way across my TV were two different men. On camera, he was a force to be reckoned with—flashing flirty winks at nurses, chatting to patients with a sexy smirk permanently across his full lips.

Off camera, he was professional and had a fantastic bedside manner. He was equal parts caring and concerned, while managing to get straight to the important tasks at hand. Sure, he had tried to shake my hand after pulling his own hand out of a vagina, and he did have a flirtier smile than some, but who was I to judge? Six hours into my first day, I’d reenacted Girls Gone Wild.

I’d only known Will for a short period of time, but my impression of him didn’t at all match the man nicknamed Dr. OBscene.

But even I couldn’t deny I was a bit addicted to the show. Sure, I was nowhere near Marlene’s level of excitement, but I definitely had the sucker set to DVR every Tuesday night. Which was interesting in itself. I’d really never been one to watch TV, especially reality shows. I’d much rather spend my time browsing eBay for weird, abstract art or curling up behind a good book. Television had never really done it for me.

Until now.

Until Will.

I wasn’t sure if it was because I enjoyed the show itself or if I just enjoyed the man on the show—or at least, my version of him—an enigma of sexy and brilliant and adorably awkward.

My version?

Well, shit.

Two weeks in, and I’d already done something enormously stupid.

Why the hell do I have to like the guy?

My cell phone rang in the pocket of my coat as I headed for the cafeteria in the hospital. I was inducing two women today and rounding on the bedrest of a third. I’d expected to go into the office for appointments first thing this morning, have my coffee, and get things moving before I headed over here, but one of the babies didn’t like my plan.

Sarah Jeffries was in active labor; she’d come in about three hours ago, and I’d just gone in and broken her water to try to keep her dilation progressing. She’d stalled out around five centimeters, and even though she’d had an epidural, she still wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea of being in labor for all of eternity.

I checked the screen quickly and saw that it was the number of the office.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Dr. Cummings. Load-y just called in to say she’s running five minutes late. Something about the subway and a banana. I don’t know. She never makes much sense to me.”

I shook my head at Melissa’s theatrics. “Fine. Just send her over to the hospital when she gets in. We’ve got one in active labor and another induction in two hours.”

“Okay. Will do.”

“Great. Thanks.”

This would be Melody’s first day at the hospital with me, but I’d done some searching—cough, research—once I’d met her, about her past experience.

That’s not creepy, right?

I guess it wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t done it for more personal reasons than professional. I couldn’t help it, though. I couldn’t get the picture of her out of my head. But at least half the time, she was clothed. That’s something, right?

Anyway, she’d been working as a night shift labor and delivery nurse for the last five years, so I had no doubts she could handle being thrown right into the hospital fire.

Hell, she was probably dying for a little excitement after being confined to the office with Melissa and Marlene for three weeks.

The cafeteria was already bustling with the breakfast crowd when I stepped inside, but I had only one thing in sight. Coffee shone like a beacon on the far wall, radiating its energizing brilliance as though a Columbian with a donkey stood beside it, so I kept my head down and avoided eye contact to ease my passage.

The last thing I needed was to have some kind of interaction or discussion about me or the show or any-fucking-thing before I guzzled about a gallon.

Victory sounded inside my head as I made it there without incident and yanked a cup from the stack. Glorious heat spread through my palm as my cup filled with the hot liquid, and the smell of full brain function and better decisions made me smile.

I was just reaching for the jug of milk when I made the mistake of looking up and across the room.

Damn. Spotted.