“Are you sure?” he asked, descending on the donuts before she’d finished nodding. “You know, Dr. K, if you’re interested in a guy’s perspective, I’m always happy to trade advice for carbs.”
Natalie had to admit, getting a man’s insight on the whole friends-with-benefits thing might not be such a bad idea. Still, she and Jonah hadn’t really talked about whether or not they would go the full-disclosure route with their colleagues and co-workers, so she’d have to get creative with some of the details.
“I, um, slept with someone,” she said. Connor didn’t seem to find this news earth shattering, so she continued. “It was someone I know. A friend.” Funny, the word suddenly seemed so standard and insufficient when she applied it to Jonah. “We agreed ahead of time that it would be completely casual, and it was…it is…”
Connor looked up from the pair of jelly donuts he’d balanced over the napkin on his palm. “But?”
“But now they’re both into each other and neither one of them wants to admit it because they’re worried it’s going to fuck things up,” Tess said.
“We are not worried,” Natalie argued. Ugh, why hadn’t she just kept her mouth shut? “And we’re not into each other. Not like that. There is no ‘but’. We’re just two friends who like and respect one another, and we also happen to be having great sex for the short-term. That’s all.”
“Huh.” Connor took a bite of his donut, chewing thoughtfully for a minute. “Well, it’s about damned time you and Sheridan did the deed.”
Natalie’s jaw unhinged. “How did you know I was talking about Jonah?”
An ear-to-ear grin appeared amid the auburn stubble on Connor’s face. “Ha, I was bluffing, but awesome. It really is about time.”
“Connor,” she warned, and he took a deferent step back.
“Okay, okay. Don’t worry, I’m not going to tell anybody. So, what’s the big deal? You both agreed to keep it casual, right?”
“We did.”
“And is it?”
“Yes. Sort of. Yes,” Natalie said, and God, it was official. She was never opening her yap about her personal life again. “Of course things aren’t entirely casual. We’ve been best friends for years. You can’t have that without some sort of depth.”
Okay, so there was lots of depth between her and Jonah, along with respect and trust and a great, big boatload of sexual chemistry, but that wasn’t a hair she was going to split right now. They’d agreed on keeping things casual, and that was the safest way to ensure that their friendship remained intact. “Jonah and I want different things from different people in the long-term, but for right now, we’re on the same page, so yes. We’re sleeping together, and we’re friends, but it’s really not a big deal. We’re just enjoying it while it lasts.”
Charlie and Tess exchanged a glance so brief, Natalie couldn’t be certain she’d seen it. But then Charlie gave up a genuine smile. “As long as you’re both happy, that’s all that matters,” she said, and Tess agreed with a nod.
“Truth? I think it’s great,” Connor said, sliding his second donut to the table and reaching out to give Natalie’s shoulder a friendly squeeze. “I mean, it’s far better to sleep with a friend than an enemy, right?”
Before Natalie could tell him that only happened in romance novels—after all, she might be new to the game, but who really slept with someone they hated?—the door to the lounge opened again.
“Seriously, Don is fucking fired from guard duty,” Tess muttered under her breath. The words fell prey to a precise clack-clack-clack of designer footwear pretty much never found in the ED, making Natalie turn in complete confusion.
The woman belonging to the—yep—very expensive-looking four-inch heels and the immaculate dark gray sheath dress looked at Natalie without smiling. “Dr. Kendrick.”
“Ms. Davenport?” Natalie pushed up from the couch in surprise. What the hell was Harlow Davenport doing down here in the ED?
Harlow nodded with a single, brisk lift of her chin. She cleared her throat expectantly, and Natalie’s cheeks flushed in realization.
“Oh. I take it you haven’t met Doctors Becker and Michaelson,” she said, gesturing to Charlie and Tess, who stood closer to Harlow than Natalie and Connor. “This is Harlow Davenport. She was recently appointed to the hospital’s board, and obviously has a vested interest in the clinic.”
“Your name does precede you,” Tess said, and Harlow smiled, an entirely polite gesture that didn’t consider lasting any longer than it had to.
“It usually does. Doctors,” she said, shaking both of their hands, then turning back toward Natalie, who gestured to Connor.
“And this is Connor Bradshaw. He’s one of our very best nurses. We’re lucky enough to have him come down from the ICU and help us out in the ED from time to time.”
Harlow’s ice-blue eyes narrowed slightly as they traveled over Connor’s huge frame and brightly inked arms. “Bradshaw,” she said slowly, as if she were turning over some puzzle in her mind.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said stiffly. “That’s what my dog tags say.”
“Oh. I see.” Harlow blinked once, then shook her head and returned her attention to Natalie. “Well. Dr. Kendrick, I’ve been looking for you.”
“For me?” They’d only had that one exchange in the clinic a few weeks ago. What could they possibly have to discuss that couldn’t have been done via email?
“Yes. I’d like a word.” She paused. Looked at Tess, Charlie, and Connor pointedly. Then added, “In private.”
“I believe that’s our cue,” Connor said, although Natalie couldn’t help but notice he’d put a little un-Connorlike frost to the words to match Harlow’s all-business tone. Natalie said a quiet goodbye to her friends, who shuffled out of the lounge in various states of curiosity (and in Connor’s case, irritation), and Natalie had to admit, she was overflowing with the stuff, herself.
“How can I help you, Ms. Davenport?”
“We’re both intelligent women with very busy jobs, so I’m going to get right to the point. The clinic is failing. Badly. As a director for Davenport Industries and a member of this hospital’s board, I’ve recently taken over all of the clinic’s operations in an effort to change that. I need someone to run the facility on a permanent, hands-on basis, and I’d like for that person to be you.”
Natalie’s breath whooshed from her lungs. “I’m…sorry?”
“I realize this may seem abrupt,” Harlow said, and it took all of Natalie’s control not to blurt no shit, Sherlock in reply. “But after reviewing the business and management plans currently in place, it’s become very clear that we need someone in charge of the clinic who understands protocols as well as infrastructure. Your experience as a physician and your history of volunteering your time speak for themselves, and Dr. Langston highly recommends you. The board feels you’d be a strong asset.”
Dear Lord, the amount of jargon in that one sentence alone made Natalie’s head hurt. “Okay, can we just skip the formalities and speak plainly, here?”
A tiny smile, the real kind, twitched at the edges of Harlow’s mouth, but only for a blink before disappearing. “Fine. The person running the clinic right now is an idiot. You, Dr. Kendrick, are not an idiot. In fact, I think you’d be perfect for the job, and the clinic is losing an astronomical amount of money every day. I need a director in there who doesn’t have their head in their ass, and I need it right now.”
Natalie had to give the woman credit. She could speak plainly like a boss. “Okay, but I already have a job. I’m a surgeon. And I’ve never directed anything in my life.”
“You mentor interns and residents, and you’ve got an impeccable track record coordinating treatment plans with other doctors. In fact, Dr. Hoover was quite effusive with her praise for your dedication to the case you just worked on together.” Harlow lifted a perfectly penciled blond brow. “Annabelle Fletcher, was it?”
“Well, yes,” Natalie said. “But that was a team effort.”
/> “Precisely. You already know how to direct plenty. Plus, you and I would be working very closely to start, so whatever you don’t know, I can teach you.”
Natalie plucked the next question from the huge pile growing in her mind. “But my job is to help patients, not manage other medical professionals.”
At that, Harlow paused. “You’d still be able to treat patients, of course, although the parameters would change. But with a good management team in place, the clinic can treat thousands of patients who need care. With you as the director, you’d have a hand in all of their wellness and care. Also”—she slid a folder out of the slim, leather bag on her shoulder—“the salary and benefits are quite competitive. This would be a big advancement in your career.”
Natalie flipped to the top page, her heart climbing all the way up her windpipe. “Ah, okay,” she managed. Holy shit, that decimal point had to be in the wrong spot. “This is a really generous offer, but one I really wasn’t expecting, at all. I’m grateful for the consideration,” she added, because holy-shit factor aside, she really was. “But it would be a huge change. I’m going to need some time to go through the particulars, and to talk to Dr. Langston, in order to make a decision.”
Harlow didn’t look pleased, but she also didn’t look shocked. “Understood. I’ll need to know as soon as possible. We’d like to make an announcement before the end of the year.”
Natalie swallowed. “That’s less than two weeks away.”
“It is,” Harlow agreed. “But you’ll soon find that when I set my sights on something, I stop at damn little until I get it. This clinic will be running successfully six months from now. You can take that to the bank. In the meantime, let me know if you have any questions. I’d be happy to answer them.”
And then she walked out of the lounge, leaving Natalie to wonder what the hell had just happened to her career.
21
“And that was it? She just walked out of the lounge?”
“Yep,” Natalie said, leaning her head back against Jonah’s leg. They were sprawled out over the couch in his apartment, with him sitting at one end and her stretched out on the cushions, at his insistence. Her back had been killing her today, but, then again, three pediatric surgeries plus a whole raft of ED cases would do that to a girl. “That was it.”
The ten hours that had passed since Harlow had offered Natalie the director’s job at the clinic hadn’t made things any less whoa. The fact that Natalie had needed to wait this long to tell Jonah about it had only made her edgier, but they’d both been up to their eye teeth in patients all day. She hadn’t even seen him since they’d rolled out of bed this morning.
“Jesus, Nat.” Jonah looked down at her, his shock paving a path for his smile and his handsome face lit by the soft glow of the Christmas tree. “This is huge. Just think of all the things you’d be able to do as a director.”
“It is huge,” she agreed, biting her lip. “And it is possible that I’d be able to make a lot of strides for wellness and health care awareness, especially for kids, which is great.”
Jonah read her mind in less than a breath. “But?”
“But for all the things I could do, there’s one really big thing I’d have to give up.”
“Surgery,” Jonah said after a beat, and all the unease that had been pricking at Natalie’s belly came bubbling to the surface.
“What I do now is already a full-time job and a half. Add the day-to-day management of an entire urgent care clinic to the mix? There’s no way I’d still be able to perform surgeries, even if I limited my schedule. I just wouldn’t be able to give any of my patients the sort of one-on-one care they’d need and deserve. It would be a huge change.”
“And you’re not sure you want to make it,” Jonah said.
Natalie huffed out a sound that wanted to be a laugh, but fell just the tiniest bit short. “Am I that obvious?”
“That’s not a fair question.” Jonah traced his fingers through her hair, and although the contact was slight, still, it soothed her. “This is me we’re talking about.”
He had a point. He might be the only person in the world who knew that she kept any negative feelings she might have hidden from the rest of the world, and he was definitely the only person who knew why. But he did know that sometimes, her glass wasn’t half full. Natalie had trusted him with that. She could trust him to see her uncertainty now.
“It’s not that I don’t understand how huge this opportunity is, or that I don’t recognize that I could potentially have a lot of chances to make a difference in peoples’ health and wellness. But for as much influence as the position might carry, the work is nearly all administrative. I’d never get to personally treat the patients.”
She knew, because she’d asked Langston point-blank today when he’d performed his last surgery. He’d taken so long to come up with the answer that the fact that it had been months ago had been a given. “There are meetings and committees and more meetings, and I get that they’re necessary. We do need stronger plans and policies in place at the clinic in order to provide strong health care.”
“You’re just not sure you want to be the person in charge of facilitating that,” Jonah finished.
“I don’t know that I’m the right person to be in charge of facilitating that. I’m a surgeon. I want my name on the OR board, not a bunch of budget meeting agendas.” Natalie exhaled, her indecision riding out along with her breath. “Does that make me a horrible person? It does, doesn’t it? If those budgets are allocated properly, it could help a lot of people, too.” Ugh, she hated this!
But Jonah just laughed. “Sweetheart, I can think of a thousand words that accurately describe you. Horrible is not on the list.”
“I shouldn’t be putting what I want ahead of the needs of all the people the clinic could help if it were run more effectively,” she argued. “Yes, directing the clinic is a huge job, and yes, that’s probably a really huge understatement. But what sort of person would I be if I said no?”
“The kind, smart, caring sort who loves the career she’s already got,” Jonah replied, his fingers still moving gently through her hair, and God, all of her conversations about life-changing decisions should happen like this. “Look, I hear what you’re saying, and I’m not trying to downplay the fact that, yeah, you’d have a shitload of opportunities to make a difference in patient care if you took this job. But you already do that as a surgeon. Just look at Annabelle.”
The death grip Natalie’s lower back muscles had put around her spine eased a notch at the thought. “I guess that’s true.”
“You guess?” Jonah snorted, scooping her up and turning his body to bring them face to face. “Try again.”
This time, her laugh was more genuine. “Okay, okay. I do.”
“You do,” he agreed. “Every day. And while you’re obviously Harlow’s first choice for the director’s job, you’re also not the only person who could make those changes happen at the clinic. So, saying no, if that’s what you choose”—he paused to lift one hand—“wouldn’t necessarily deny anyone care.”
“Well, yeah, but with the wrong person as director, the clinic won’t help people, either,” Natalie hedged.
Jonah paused. “That’s true. But it’s still not selfish to choose a career that you love over one you know you won’t.”
“The trouble is, I don’t know that I won’t. Not for sure. If I took this job and was able to make strides…” She broke off, completely frustrated, her brain spinning like one of those pop-up carnival rides her mother always warned against. “I just don’t know.”
“You have time to think about it, right?” he asked, and at least here, she had the luxury of a yes. Even if it came with a caveat.
“A little. Harlow said she wants to make an announcement by the end of the year.”
A frown hinted at the edges of Jonah’s mouth. “She’s pretty intense, huh?”
It was his way of asking Natalie if she really wanted to work with the wom
an, she knew—a topic to which Natalie had given a whole lot of thought on her drive home. “She is really intense, and if I took this position, it’s something I’d have to get used to. But she’s clearly passionate about her job. Even if she has a super prickly way of showing it,” Natalie added. “But I can’t really fault her for wanting the clinic to be successful. I want it to be successful, too.”
“I guess if there’s going to be a shark in the water, it helps to have them on your side,” Jonah said, and Natalie knew it was true. Or, it would be true, if she and Harlow agreed on how to run the clinic. If not…
Natalie sat back against the couch cushions, lacing her fingers through his. “All of this is making my head spin. Tell me something good about your day.”
“My old man wants to take me fly fishing.”
Although he delivered them with enough seriousness for her to know he wasn’t kidding, the words still sent a smile over Jonah’s face.
Which sent one over Natalie’s by default. “For the record, I so want pictures of that.”
“Yeah, it’s not exactly in my wheelhouse,” Jonah agreed with a laugh. “But I guess it’s his thing now that he’s retired. He’s really into it, and he told me a couple of stories when we talked on the phone yesterday. I don’t mind giving it a go.”
Natalie’s heart squeezed at the thought. Now here was something to be glass-half-full over. “You two have talked a lot over the last week,” she ventured, and to her surprise, Jonah answered openly.
“We have. Well, a lot for us,” he amended with a tilt of his head. “But it’s good, you know? I tell him about work, and he tells me about fly fishing. He’s even made a couple of good friends who also live in the retirement community, and the staff there makes sure he’s got everything he needs. We don’t talk about…anything else.” Now came the pause Natalie had expected, and the squeeze in her heart along with it. “But we don’t really need to, I guess.”
Better Than Me (A Remington Medical Contemporary Romance) Page 21