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“So, we can let this go?” he holds his hand out to me.
I shake his hand and nod.
“What you did last night was incredible. The nurses told me that Director Presley’s heart stopped three times during the surgery but you refused to give up. He was clinically dead for two minutes and now he’s stable. Truly, truly amazing, man. He and his daughter are lucky that you were here. I honestly don’t know if I could have done it,” Smith tells me.
“Do me a favor. Don’t tell Skylar about any of that. As far as she knows, the surgery was textbook. She’s already a wreck about her father. She never needs to know how close this was.”
“Really? Are you sure about that? Did you even stop to consider the number of brownie points you could get in your relationship if she knew? That’s like having a get-out-of-jail-free card for your screw-ups,” Smith goads me.
“I don’t need a get-out-of-jail-free card. I don’t plan on screwing up,” I tell him.
“If you say so. I seem to screw up with women all the time. Anyway, if there’s anything that I can do for you two, just name it,” he offers.
“There’s something that you can do for me right now, actually,” I reply.
“Name it, man.”
“Take my rounds so that I can have an extended lunch with Skylar.”
He agrees and as he leaves, I get lost in thoughts about Presley’s surgery. For the first time in my career, the idea of losing a patient hit me on both a personal and professional level. When his heart stopped beating, I didn’t just think about saving my patient. I grew frantic because I refused to fail at saving Skylar’s father.
I would do anything to keep her safe, and I was not going to have to tell her that her father died on my watch. I’m glad that I followed my judgment and kept her out of the operating room. If she was there and panicked when his heart stopped, I may not have been able to keep my wits about me and bring him back.
I don’t ever want her to know what happened in there. I don’t want her to worry that it might happen again and, more important for me, I don’t want her feelings for me to be clouded by some misguided hero syndrome.
So, as far as she’s concerned, this was a routine operation and I plan to keep it that way.
13
A PROPOSAL
SCOTT
Itap on the door to her father’s room and she waves me inside.
“How is he doing?” I ask her.
“Good, I think. He was awake for a while but went back to sleep after the nurse changed his IV bag.”
“Are you ready to go to lunch?”
“Sure. Cafeteria?”
“No, we’re going out,” I say and lead her out to the car.
She watches out the window as I drive through town, past all of the regular lunch spots for the hospital staff. “Where are we going?”
“Carnival food and a walk on the pier,” I respond, squeezing her thigh.
“How long are you planning to be gone?” she asks, knowing that this lunch date won’t be wrapped up in an hour.
“Except for checking in on your father, I’m done for the day,” I smile.
“How did you manage that?”
“Smith came by my office to apologize and I convinced him to take my rounds.”
She appears frightened and asks, “You spoke with him and everything was okay?”
