Destroy (A Standalone Romance Novel) (16 page)

“Oh, good God!” he
muttered. “I’m so sorry…”

“Don’t be sorry, I’m a
doctor. Do you know why you fainted?”

“I’m afraid I do,” he
replied as I helped him to sit up. “I have hypoglycemia. And although it does
not happen to me often, I sometimes have these episodes.”

“Okay,” I said, “the
ambulance will be here in a minute…”

“Oh no, that won’t be
necessary. I’m fine now. I’ll just walk home. I live around the corner.”

“I don’t think that’s a
good idea. You don’t want to fall into a hypoglycemic coma, do you?”

He stared at me as if
such thing never occurred to him. “No, of course not. But it’s not that bad. I
just need to get a better diet, that’s all.”

“Maybe tomorrow, after
you’ve gone through a complete blood test.”

“The name is Frank
Trevor, by the way.” He wanted to change the topic of conversation, obviously.

“Dr. Heather Williams,
Mr. Trevor,” I said as the paramedics arrived.

Once I had explained what
was going on with Mr. Frank Trevor, I bid him good-bye and let the EMTs take
charge.

As I resumed my trotting
home, I noticed Tiffany coming down the path. I had to laugh. She was hooked. I
knew she would be.

“I wish you were a little
quieter when you talk to your mom and you know I’m sleeping,” she scolded, as
she fell in step with me.

“Why are you here then?
Why aren’t you asleep?”

“And miss all this?” she
said, laughing with me.

As we came around the
corner of the street, we saw Mrs. Camborne come down the sidewalk. She was up
bright and early, I thought, and wondered what she was carrying. As she came
closer, I noticed that her bags were full of clothes.

“Mrs. Camborne, good
morning,” Tiffany and I said in unison.

“Good morning, doctors.
Out early for your jog I see. Such a beautiful day.”

“It is, isn’t it?” I
replied, my eyes honing on the bags she was carrying. “What are you doing with
the clothes, Mrs. Camborne?”

“Oh, I do that every
year. I collect old clothes from the tenants to give to the charity at the
mall. So the poor people have warm coats for the winter. But this year, there
wasn’t many things people could give, unfortunately.”

An idea popped into my
head. “How about we organize a drive at the hospital and get a few more clothes
for you?”

“Do you really think you
could do that?”

“Oh yeah, Mrs. Camborne,”
Tiffany put in, “There are a lot of staff and patients who could give us some
clothes for the homeless. We’ll see what we can organize on Monday, okay?”

“That would be wonderful.
But if you can’t do it, it’s okay too. You’ve got enough to worry about beside
me and my silly charity drive.”

“Nothing silly about it,
Mrs. Camborne,” I told her. “Leave it with us and we’ll keep you in the loop.”

On Sunday, as usual,
Tiffany and I prepared a few meals for the week and got a big bowl of spaghetti
going. We made a cheese sauce with freshly cooked spinach, mushrooms and two fish
filets. That’s one of my favorite meals. Not everyone likes spinach, but with
the cheese and jalapeño peppers, it tastes great. We had bought some Italian
wine the day before, so we felt as if we were dining in the finest Trattoria in
town. We watched a couple of movies that night and dispensed with the studying
all together.

         
Monday arrived far too soon. But it was another beautiful,
crisp day. As we were jogging, I noticed Frank trotting on the path.

Since I had told Tiffany
what had happened on Saturday, we were both happy to see him on the track.

“Hey, Doc,” he said, the
three of us jogging on the spot, “Thanks for what you did on Saturday. Good
advice you gave me.”

“Don’t mention it, Mr.
Trevor. I hope they got you all fixed up at the hospital.”

“Oh they sure did. I got
a new diet and some pills to take. I feel much better.”

“Have a great day then,”
I said, as we resumed our jogging around the park.

“He’s a nice guy,”
Tiffany remarked. “Maybe a better catch than Dr.
Hottie
.”

“Are you kidding me?” I
retorted jocularly. “Mr. Trevor is nice, but besides being a bit old for me, I
think he’s probably married with three kids and a mini-van in the carport. I
don’t think he’s my type either.”

“And Dr.
Hottie
is your type, is he?”

“Not really. He’s a bit
too flashy or maybe ambitious. I don’t know…”

“But you melt in front of
him, don’t you?” She smiled and turned her head to me briefly.

“Okay, okay, I like him a
lot. He’s a gorgeous guy and I don’t know what I’m doing when I’m with him. I
admit it. But that doesn’t mean that we’re booking the church anytime soon, okay?”

“Alright, alright,”
Tiffany said, still laughing. “Let’s go home and get ready for another day of
the grind.”

“You got it–I’ll race
you!”

Tiffany tried, but she
couldn’t catch me. She was not a runner yet.

As we arrived at the
hospital, I felt something was wrong. I was afraid. Was there another major
accident in the offing or was I imagining things? Since Tiffany had phoned
everyone regarding the clothes drive for Mrs. Camborne, we found ten bags in
front of our lockers. They were all marked with a big sign: “Interns’ Charity
Drive–Do not remove”.

Tiffany and I were really
taken aback. That was a beautiful gesture on the part of our colleagues.

When we got to the café,
everyone was there already. Dr. Kerry was all smiles.

“Thank you for doing that,
Doctors. I think the administration should organize a drive like that in all of
the departments every year. Well done.” She looked around the table. “Okay,
today is the day; you’re going to be each assigned to a doctor. Depending on
your chosen career path, the board has assigned you to a physician or surgeon
that will work with you for the next few months. That is not to say that you’ll
still be working with the same physician at the end of your internship. You
each have chosen a specialty or a discipline that appeals to you. However, you
are here for us to determine whether or not you are suited for the discipline
in question. For example, Dr. Jensen”—Tiffany sat up—“is interested in working
in the ER. Maybe she’s cut out to do that sort of work, maybe not. It will be
up to the board to suggest she either stay with her chosen career path, or move
to another discipline. It will all depend on your performance and aptitude.”

“What if we don’t agree
with the board’s choice after they decide we don’t fit in with what we had
chosen in the first place?” I wasn’t surprised by Corey’s query. He was the
doctor who wanted to go overseas after his internship.

“It’s up to you, Doctor.
However, our recommendations are all based on your aptitude and abilities. If
you prefer to choose something else, you’re free to address your request to
another hospital.”

After a few more queries
and answers from almost everyone around the table, Dr. Kerry distributed our
assignment sheets, which mentioned the name of the doctor who was going to
assume our tutelage from now on.

My assignment sheet said
that I was to be working with Dr. Aldridge–3
^rd
Floor, West Wing.
That was the transplant department, all right. It couldn’t have been a better
choice. As for working with Dr. Aldridge–that was a bonus.

As I made my way to the
elevator, I had another one of those gut feelings that something was going to
go wrong somewhere.

I tried ignoring it.
Nevertheless, it was with butterflies in my stomach that I pushed the double
doors of the transplant center. As I approached the nurses’ station, a lady
came toward me. She was a doctor.

“Are you Dr. Williams?”
she asked.

“Yes, I am. I’m looking
for Dr. Aldridge,” I said, ignoring the nametag on her lab coat, which was
partly hidden by her stethoscope.

“I am Dr. Elisabeth Aldridge,
Jeff’s wife,” the woman said, extending a hand for me to shake. “Welcome
aboard.”

Shit…!

Chapter
17

Lunch couldn’t come soon
enough. Working with Jeff’s wife was an exercise in keeping my mouth shut,
which is not easy for me at any time, and keeping my wits about me. I couldn’t
imagine myself working with the woman for weeks on end. I would go absolutely
bonkers. Besides which, I wasn’t here to play “avoid the woman”, I was here to
learn and become the best surgeon in my field. I couldn’t allow myself to set
my goals and aspirations aside in favor of having a fling with a married man.
Don’t be an idiot, Heather,
I told
myself.
You’ve got a heck of a lot more
to lose than either of the Aldridge surgeons.

I was sitting down at a
table alone in the café, which had now closed its terrace doors for the winter,
and enjoying a crispy salad with some cheese and crackers. I didn’t notice when
he sat down. I was still thinking of how I was going to get out of this stupid
situation.

“Hey, how are you?” he
said, flashing a smile at me as I turned my head to him.

“Fine,” I replied dryly.
I certainly wasn’t in any mood for chitchat. I couldn’t understand how an
intelligent man like him would want to lie and cheat on his wife with one of
his own hospital’s interns. I was fuming. “I’ve met with my supervisor this
morning,” I went on.

“Oh, and who’s that?”

“As if you didn’t know!”

“No, Heather, I don’t”

“Dr. Williams to you,” I
spat at him.

“No, Dr. Williams, I
don’t know. I have no idea where the interns are assigned from one day to the
next. I have other things to do.”

“Well, let me inform you
then. Dr. Elizabeth Aldridge, your lovely wife, is now my supervisor!”

His mouth hung agape for
a fraction of a second. “I’m sorry…”

“Is that all you’ve got
to say, ‘I’m sorry’?” I glared at him.

“No, I was going to say,
I’m sorry for not saying anything earlier.”

“Oh yeah? I don’t think
you’re sorry about anything, Dr. Aldridge…” That’s all I had time to say. Dr.
E. Aldridge walked in. Thank goodness I saw her before I let my mouth do the
walking into an awkward situation.

I got up with my tray,
emptied it in the trash bin and walked out.

I had to calm down before
returning to my floor and face the woman again. I had to wonder what happened
between the two of them. Elizabeth Aldridge was, in fact, a lovely woman. She
was tall, elegant, with nice dark hair. She seemed very well educated and truly
gentle. I couldn’t figure out why Jeff would turn away from her. Yet, some guys
can’t keep it in their pants. They can’t apply the brakes before it’s too late.

In Jeff’s case, he was
openly flirting with me – at least he was trying to – and didn’t seem to mind
if anyone (including Elizabeth) noticed it. Even if they were separated or on
their way to a divorce, he should have told me what was going on so that I
would know where I stood with him. Thus far, all I knew was that I loved having
sex with the man. He was a fantastic lover, but after that, what was there to
keep me involved in this, this affair? Nothing; was the answer. He was an
accomplished surgeon; I was coming up the ranks, yes, but for now I was just an
intern learning the ropes.

The other question that
kept coming back to mind truly bothered me. Had Elizabeth Aldridge known all
along about her husband’s involvement with me? Was it one of the reasons I had
been assigned to her department. On the other hand, I didn’t think that was a
possibility, since the transplant department had been my choice all along. I
wanted to be there. Yet, there were more than one transplant surgeon working there,
so Dr. E. Aldridge may have asked for me to be assigned to her. So, there was a
fifty-fifty chance that the woman knew about her husband and me.

The mere thought of a
confrontation between the two of us ran shivers down my spine. The only
solution to the problem was to set it aside and work my butt off so that Dr.
Elizabeth Aldridge would not have anything to reproach me when it came time for
the Board to evaluate my performance. It was knuckle down time.

By this time, I had
reached the front of the hospital, crossed the street to the little park and
was sitting down on a bench. It wasn’t cold out yet, but it wasn’t warm either.
I crossed my arms over my chest to keep my body heat from escaping too fast.
Suddenly, I saw Tiffany come down the path, her arms laden with what looked
like bags of groceries. I was surprised. We had done our shopping for the week already,
and we usually drove her car to the mall to do it.

“What on earth are you
doing with all the groceries?” I asked, getting up from the bench.

“Oh, it’s just that the
ER’s fridge is empty–like bare, barren. There’s not even a can of pop or a
bottle of water in there. And if we want a drink, we have to go down to the
cafeteria–you know the one in the dungeon–or drink from the tap…” She looked up
and down at me as if she had suddenly realized that I was standing outside in
my lab coat, shivering actually.