"Hello? Mrs. Mildrew?"
He shook her gently by the shoulders and she opened her eyes. Moving her parched lips to grumble something incoherent, she turned her head toward me.
"The surgery was a success," I smiled although she wouldn't have seen it through the surgical mask.
"Thank you doctor," she said, her voice dried out from the oxygen.
I watched as the nurse wheeled her away before I let the smile drop. It had been a long day but thankfully, Mildrew was my last surgery. Pulling off my mask, gown and gloves, I let them drop into the bin before heading out to the coffee machine. Harold was already out there, his forehead resting against the wall as he waited for his cup to be filled with caffeinated foam.
"How's it going’?" I gave him a slap on the back.
Harold was a frighteningly thin man who protruded bones from every part of his body. My hand came away feeling as though it had high-fived a bag of rocks.
"Yeah, alright," he mumbled and dragged his hands down his face. "I need a vacation."
"You and me both," I said and handed him his coffee before I pressed the cappuccino button.
"Hey, you got time for breakfast?" he asked.
"Sure. I can never get to sleep straight after a nightshift anyway."
Down in the canteen, we both looked at our shriveled pancakes with the miniscule side order of syrup.
"Would it actually hurt them to make decent food here?" I moaned as I pressed my knife into the pancake and felt its rubbery texture.
"Budget cuts," Harold shrugged.
I chewed on my food and looked out the window where a group of patients were huddled in the smoking area. All of them were in their gowns and one had even dragged their IV drip outside along with the stand.
"I don’t buy that," I said. "If they can afford crap like that," I pointed my fork outside. "Then they can afford better food."
Harold looked out the window and nodded.
"Hey, if it weren't for smokers we'd lose almost half our business."
I laughed and drained the last of my coffee, crushing the paper cup in my hand before letting it drop onto my tray. There was a curious look in Harold's eyes like he was bursting to tell me something.
"What's up?"
"Nothing," he said with a little too much enthusiasm.
"No, tell me."
He set his knife and fork down neatly on his plate and rubbed at his tired eyes that were set into deep, chiseled sockets.
"Okay. I'll be honest. I'm having a bit of a fan boy moment right now.”
I looked at him as though I didn’t know what he meant but it wasn’t the first time I’d had people feel this way.
“Fan boy?”
He actually blushed and pushed his tongue into the inside of his cheek as though he was trying to stifle a girlish squeal.
“Yeah… I mean, you’re not only the chief surgeon in residence but you’re the creator of the Cardiospan!”
He grinned to reveal his yellowing teeth.
“It’s amazing you’re actually still here,” he continued. “Most people would have cashed in on their invention and said goodbye to their day job.”
“What can I say? I love being a surgeon. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have this hospital to return to every day.”
It almost sounded corny as I listened to it come out my mouth but I really meant it. This hospital made me who I am and in turn, I saved lives and loved every second of it.
“Really?” Harold asked. “You never think of giving it up and living it up somewhere tropical?”
“Nah,” I shook my head. “I think I’d miss the blood too much.”
He laughed but I didn’t.
~
Back in my office, I switched on the news and sat back in my chair with a scotch. My secretary had already lay out the newspaper across my desk and I scanned the headlines. It was the usual doom and gloom and after flicking through it, I closed it over, folded it neatly, and slid it into the trash.
The scotch went down nicely and I sucked on an ice cube as I waited for my laptop to load up. Logging into my emails, I saw a long list of new messages, mostly from people wanting some sort of donation. That was the problem when you had money, people assumed they could ask you for some of it. However, one email caught my eye and I clicked it open as I crunched the ice.
A startup tech company was holding a launch night where they could showcase their invention to potential investors. The Gigarhyrthmia, the email explained, could detect an irregular heartbeat through a breathalyzer. It seemed almost too good to be true but that’s what the critics said about the Cardiospan when I created it.
I fired off a quick reply to say I was looking forward to attending then I slammed the laptop closed. That was enough screen time for one day. Now it was time to head home and get some sleep before the charity gala tonight. Not that I could remember what it was for. I was invited to so many and the same people were invited to them time and time again. I felt exhausted at the prospect of going to another where I’d have to smile and shake hands with people, listen to their small talk and laugh at their terrible jokes as though I actually liked them. Which of course I didn’t. Most people only ventured into the world of medicine under the pretense of wanting to save lives when really they were just pressured into it by their families or liked the idea of a six figure income.
But I wasn’t like that. I had my own reasons for pursuing cardiac surgery.
I was eight years old when my mother died. She’d been a heavy smoker most of her life and boasted that during her teenage years she smoked up to sixty cigarettes a day. There was always a cloud of smoke that enshrouded her like a miserable gray aura. My strongest memory of her was the way she smelled like non-filter woodbine cigarettes.
When she smiled her teeth lined up across her gums like a row of condemned houses and her fingers were always yellow. Despite this, I thought of my mother as an angel and when she had her first heart attack, I almost died of fright right there beside her.
Of course, she said she’d quit the cigarettes for good but only two days after leaving hospital, I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of footsteps on the porch. Looking out the window, I saw her sat in the rocking chair, a long trail of smoke drifting up toward the stars. I don’t think she ever did want to give up.
After her second heart attack, the doctor said it was a miracle she was alive. The next time she wouldn’t be so lucky. She was placed on the heart transplant list and told to give up the cigarettes or risk not living long enough to find a donor. Two weeks later she died.
At first the grief consumed me. I refused to go to school, speak, eat or sleep. I just stared out the window at her favorite chair on the porch. One night, as I lay staring up at the ceiling, I was sure I heard her steps walking by my window but as I looked outside, I saw nothing but the chair rocking back and forth in the breeze.
Cardiology, then, had become an area of intense interest. Excelling in science, especially biology, I obsessed myself with all there was to learn about the human anatomy. Yet it wasn’t until I was sixteen that I officially told my family my plans of becoming a doctor. We were poor and my father, a bus driver, made it clear there was no way he could afford to pay for a college education.
Not put off by his defeatist attitude, I worked four jobs as I sailed through my exams. When I obtained a place at Teague Medical School he cried and hugged me tight.
Ten years later I was the youngest heart surgeon at Normont Memorial. Two years after that, I had designed the prototype for the Cardiospan, a robotic heart that can keep a dead one pumping long enough for the patient to find a donor. Greenspan, of course, was my mother’s maiden name.
I yawned as I pulled on my coat. It would seem the night had taken a toll on me without me realizing. Walking past the reception desk, Bertha gave me a smile and wiggled her fingers at me.
“Are you going home now Dr. Bosworth? The traffic is really choked up on the highway.”
The thought of sitting in traffic exhausted me but I was desperate to get home.
“Yeah, if I don’t leave now someone’ll ask me to fill in somewhere and I haven’t got the time today.”
She smiled and stood up to open the door for me.
“Well I’ll see you on Monday,” she beamed.
“You have a good day, Bertha.”
Down in the basement, the light was flickering again. It drove me nuts that some equipment in the hospital cost more than the average person’s house but the basics like food and lighting often went neglected.
I always parked my car near the back corner, tucked away from where everyone else did. Bumping into people and pretending to be interested in their lives seemed like such a chore. Climbing into my black BMW, I ran my hands over the steering wheel and yawned. Looking at my reflection in the rearview mirror, I saw the dark circles beneath my eyes and how a few faint lines presented themselves around the corners of my mouth. I needed to get home, grab a green juice and head to bed. No doubt I’d wake up this afternoon looking like the usual handsome man I saw in the mirror.
Driving out onto the highway, I enjoyed the smooth ride and the way the car glided seamlessly between all the others. It was a modest car, one that blended in stylishly. Yes, it was a rather expensive model and yes, it was plush and luxurious on the inside but no, it wasn’t a Lamborghini and no, it wasn’t flashy. People often wondered why I drove something so unassuming but my answer was always the same.
“I’m a doctor first and a billionaire second.”
Up ahead, I noticed a commotion at a stop light where the road met a turnoff for the city center.
“Ah shit…”
I craned my neck to see better and noticed the compacted car at the side of the road and the crumpled fender. There was the distant sound of someone screaming. People were braking hard behind as the traffic tailed back. In front, people were climbing out their cars to do whatever they could to help.
On instinct, I jumped out leaving the engine running and ran up the center of the road. As I approached, I saw the smoking remains of two cars, the side of the second one having been shredded by the first.
“Call an ambulance!” a woman shouted.
She was reaching into the driver’s seat of the white sedan where a woman was slumped over the steering wheel. Blood was spattered across the smashed glass of the windshield and there was a trail of oil dripping down onto the tarmac.
“I’m a doctor!” I rushed forward.
The woman leaped out of the way and I leaned in through the crumpled remains of the door.
“Hello? Can you hear me?”
I touched my fingers to the woman’s neck and felt that her pulse was still strong although the cut to her head would need immediate attention.
“Okay, don’t worry, the ambulance is on its way,” I said as I rested her head back down on the inflated airbag.
She groaned and tried to open her eyes but drifted into unconsciousness. Grabbing my phone, I opened the torch application and brushed the hair from her eyes. Shining the light into her pupils, I saw they were reacting to stimulus.
“She’ll be fine,” I said to the woman beside me who was in a state of shock.
“I saw it all,” she said, her eyes turning to the other car. “He just came outta nowhere. Wasn’t paying attention I guess.”
I looked into the front seat for the driver but didn’t see one. Then I followed the woman’s gaze across the road. A body lay twisted against the embankment. I did a double take and it was then that I noticed the hole in the other car’s windshield from where the driver had been sent flying out over the sedan. I could see from where I stood that they were dead already.
“He should have worn a seatbelt,” I said. “The amount of people who don’t and end up on my operating table…”
I trailed off as I noticed the woman wasn’t listening. She was standing slack-jawed amidst the chaos as the sirens approached.
“Look, you should probably go back to your car and wait,” I said.
She nodded and, like an automaton, drifted back to her SUV.
Looking back at the girl in front of me, I reached into the car and held her hand.
“Stay with me,” I urged. “The ambulance will be here any moment now.”
I touched my hand to her forehead and felt her temperature was rising.
“Can you hear me?”
Again, she groaned and tried to open her eyes. There was something so familiar about her but in the moment it wasn’t my priority to identify it. I squeezed her hand tight and checked her pulse again.
“You’re doing great. Just try and breathe for me.”
The ambulance screeched to a halt halfway across the junction and it was my turn to take a step back. As the EMTs got to work, I walked over the road to where the other body lay. A group of people were rubbernecking from a distance while a teenager took photos. I couldn’t blame them. I wanted to be angry but it was human nature to take pleasure in the ghoulish spectacle of death. We did it every day when we watched death on television or dressed up for Halloween. We even do it when we eat meat. Death is part of life and to deny death, I often thought, is to deny your very existence.
The crowd eyed me warily as I knelt down beside the body. The boy couldn’t have been older than twenty. Thin and in baggy jeans, he wore a fake gold watch on one wrist and a festival wristband on the other. The front of his head had caved in on impact while his torso lay shattered and twisted amongst the sludge of his organs.
From the side of his body, I could just about make out what used to be his lungs and just above it, the lower portion of his heart with his aortic valves protruding out like tendrils. If only I had the Cardiospan with me right now, I thought. Then we’d have this guy up and moving in no time.
Chapter Three
Franklin
I looked at the picture on my phone then up at the girl in front of me.
"You look exactly like your profile," I said. "That almost never happens."
I was stunned by how lucky I was. When I sent a message to BunnyGirl1990 I thought her photo was too good to be true. With platinum blonde hair and an hourglass figure, she was every bit as beautiful as I hoped she would be.
"Seriously, the last time I met someone off Dater the woman was two hundred pounds heavier than she said and ten years older."
The girl giggled and bounced over to me before topping up her glass of wine and sliding in beside me on the armchair.
I felt myself grow hard as her body pressed against mine and I wrapped an arm around her.
"So tell me. What's a girl like you doing hooking up with a guy like me anyway? I could be your father."
"I thought you were only thirty five," she gasped. "You'd be a very young father."
I laughed and took a sip of wine.
"I suppose you’re right but I do wanna know. A girl like you could have anyone. I bet you’re a model."
She giggled again and licked her lips.
"I've had a couple shoots," she said. "Nothing big time though. But you wanna know a secret?"
She slid her hand over my thigh and leaned in close to my ear until I could feel her moist breath.
"I've always wanted to fuck a cop."
Growing harder by the second, I reached down my pants to adjust myself and took a deep breath.
"Woah... you move fast."
Her hand moved up, then further up still until she was cupping me firmly, her lips kissing me gently. Taking the glass from my hand, she placed it out of reach before moving to sit on my lap. Her breasts were large and full and as she pulled down her crop top, her nipples brushed against my lips. I sucked hungrily on them and she groaned quietly, biting down on her lower lip as she pushed my head into her.
"Hmmm...."
I looked up between her breasts and saw a smile on her face as she closed her eyes.
"That's nice," she purred with her creamy voice. "You wanna kiss me somewhere else?"
&nb
sp; "Wow... I was gonna take you out for dinner and try to impress you but I guess-"
"Shhhh."
She silenced me with a kiss as she pushed me down the chair until I was horizontal and looking up between her legs as she pulled her panties to the side.
"Where's your badge?" she asked as she lowered herself.
I fumbled in my inside pocket and pulled it out. She squealed when she saw it and took it in her hands as she sat on my open mouth.
"Oh fuck," she cried as I sucked on her, tumbling forward until the badge fell from her hands and slid across the floor.
She came hard and fast, screaming as she shuddered. When she stopped quivering, she climbed off me and wriggled her skirt down.
"That was nice," she said.
"Hey, I'm not finished."
"But I am," she replied as she picked my badge off the floor.
She tossed it to me and picked up her purse and coat.
"Thanks, you were great," she said and made for the door.
"What? That's it?"
The click of the door closing gave her response.
Shocked, I stood for a moment just staring at the closed door with my erection still raging in my pants.
"Bitch."
That was the last time I used a dating app. They were nothing but trouble and never gave me anything but lies and false hopes. As the disappointment set in, my arousal dissipated. Now, I was left with nothing but an empty feeling. All week I'd looked forward to the prospect of a date with a nice girl. I wanted to take her out, have a meaningful conversation and a laugh.
More than anything I missed Helena. I used to have all those things with her before I fucked everything up. Walking over to the framed photo of us beside the TV, I looked into the eyes of my younger self and wish I knew how lucky I was. Beside me, Helena looked like a princess in her wedding dress and I remembered seeing her for the first time as she walked up the aisle. I'd felt so proud I was ready to burst.
Of course, she never wanted to speak to me again, not after what I did to her. Or rather, what I did to her best friend.
I turned the photo around to face the wall, unable to look at it anymore. My brother always laughed at me for keeping it, said I was a soppy loser for clinging onto memories, but even though I helped pack all her things, I could never throw it out.
Jewels And Panties: (Book 1-15) Billionaire Romance Series Page 2