Chapter 6

“Hey, Lara?”

Lara looked up from her clipboard to see one of the newer RNs approaching, looking as if she had just faced a monster and barely escaped with her life.

“Dr. Teresa Lima has requested to see you,” the nurse said.

~That explains the look, then.~ Lara smiled and thanked her before putting the patient’s chart away and letting her station know she needed to step away.

Dr. Lima tended to scare most of the nurses shitless—all the hospital staff, really. And the patients. And the hospital’s board of directors. Any and everyone, actually.

Except for Lara.

Lara quite liked her, even though they hadn’t worked together yet. Dr. Lima’s reputation preceded her. She was a highly renowned general surgeon who was virtually incomparable in her craft—truly a cut above the rest.

She primarily worked out of Riverside Health, which was way across town, but she would sometimes lend her talents to other hospitals when required. Certain surgeons—mainly Dr. Baumgartner—found this presumptuous and unnecessary, but Lara found it admirable.

Dr. Lima didn’t make patients come to her; she didn’t inconvenience them or risk their health for the sake of their treatment, which she always provided to the best of her ability.

The opinions of her so-called peers be damned.

It was that no-nonsense, I-know-what-I’m-doing—and-I’m-not-going-to-compromise-to-soothe-your-ego sort of attitude that had solidified Lara’s high opinion of Dr. Lima, no matter how scary she may have been.

Lara knocked on Dr. Lima’s office door and poked her head in to see that the doctor was already expectantly waiting for her.

She waved Lara in, tutting when Lara didn’t move quickly enough to satisfy her. “Come, come, come,” she urged. “I need you to scrub in.” She began sifting through the file on her desk, barely sparing Lara another glance.

“Scrub in?” Lara asked.

Dr. Lima looked up and raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow. “To surgery, Hendry. I trust you remember how,” she said dryly.

“Oh, yes, of course, Doctor—”

“My scrub nurse had to go home. Something about projectile vomiting and horrible food poisoning. Weak constitution is more like it,” Dr. Lima grumbled as she dug around in search of something. “Ah, here.” She yanked a chart from the mess on her desk and held it out.

Lara grabbed it.

“All the op details,” Dr. Lima continued. “You’re familiar with this patient, so I trust you’ll do well. I’ll see you in thirty minutes.”

“Yes, Dr. Lima,” Lara said before turning to leave, immediately diving into the record.

Lara did recognize the patient; she had scrubbed for Dr. Baumgartner on his case. She also remembered the tension in that operating room. The surgery had been a success, but it hadn’t been without complications.

The man had come in as a trauma patient, and while the procedure had addressed the immediate concerns, there had been underlying issues with his kidneys.

Kidney, singular, now.

The patient was down to one, and he was about to go in for a partial nephrectomy to remove a tumor.

Lara’s head nurse was quick to arrange her coverage, and Lara had the room fully prepped five minutes before the patient was brought in.

Dr. Lima came in shortly after, acknowledging Lara with the slightest of nods before washing up from hand to elbow. Once finished, her sharp gaze zeroed in on Lara, scrutinizing her as she dried Dr. Lima’s hands and pulled gloves over them. “Are you ready, Nurse Hendry?”

“Yes, Doctor,” Lara said, meeting her eyes with as much confidence as she could muster.

“Good. Let’s get in there.”

Trying her best to be efficient and intuitive, Lara was hyper-focused during the operation.

She kept a keen eye on Dr. Lima for physical cues of what she might need, observed the surgery for what might come next, and monitored the patient’s vitals, keeping everyone aware of any fluctuations or adjustments that needed to be made throughout the procedure.

When all was said and done, Lara was in awe of Dr. Lima’s incredible work, and Dr. Lima seemed to think similarly of Lara’s.

Once they were back in her office, Dr. Lima said, “Good work, Hendry. I’ll be back at KGH next Wednesday for a laparotomy.” When Lara didn’t respond, Dr. Lima fixed her with the same raised brow, as if Lara had missed her cue to speak. “That means you will, too, Hendry.”

“Oh, right, yes,” Lara agreed hastily. “Of course, Dr. Lima, not a problem.”

Dr. Lima nodded curtly and tilted her head back down to the paperwork on her desk, which Lara took as her cue to leave.

***

As a treat to herself for a job well done, Lara splurged on dinner.

She walked the two blocks to the swanky sushi spot Delia had taken her to on her last birthday and ordered all her favorites to go. She even picked up a bottle of wine as a bonus treat for not only doing a great job but doing it in front of one of her idols.

Nothing could ruin her evening.

Lara was practically skipping through the lobby when she saw him at the security desk, signing for a package—Zavien Crane, once again threatening to spoil her mood by simply existing.

However, judging by the way he kept turning his head to look around while accepting his package, she had a distinct feeling that ~his~ day was about to get worse. Even from a distance, the distinct and unseemly shape of the package was easily visible atop the security desk.

That brought a smile to her lips.

Still, she gave him a wide berth, scurrying as surreptitiously as possible to the elevators to avoid detection.

Which she did.

Clutching her sushi and wine, she hammered her finger on the button to close the doors. As they slid shut, securing her swift escape, she released the breath she was holding.

But right before the two sides came together, a hand slithered between them and forced them open, revealing her least-favorite neighbor.

“Ah, Miss Hendry,” he said pleasantly enough.

Lara hummed in response, keeping her eyes locked on the floor counter above the doors.

“A curious thing just happened,” he continued, seemingly unbothered by her refusal to look at him. “A package for me was delivered to the front desk.”

“Well, the thing about that is, for most people, that’s actually the way mail is supposed to work,” Lara explained slowly. “You put your own address in the delivery field, and then the things come in your name, to your address.”

“Is that so?” He edged closer to her.

~Why is it taking so long to get thirty-two floors up?~

When Lara didn’t respond, Zavien continued, “Should I open it, then?”

With a huff, Lara turned her face toward his masked one. “It’s your package. Do whatever you want with it.”

He pulled it out from where he had tucked it at his side.

The black plastic wrapping did nothing to hide its distinctly phallic shape, and Lara had to bite her cheek to keep from laughing.

“Bit much, don’t you think?” His eyebrows quirked upward while his eyes roamed freely over her face.

Lara shrugged. “I don’t kink shame,” she said with a snide smile as the doors swished open and set her free.

She all but sprinted to her apartment, where she could revel in her little victory without admitting guilt and childishness. Delia would have been so disappointed in her, but she simply hadn’t been able to resist.

Nothing could have wiped the grin off her face—not even a steel wool brush; she was that pleased.

Her sushi tasted richer and her wine sweeter than they ever had before as she reflected on the paranoid way Zavien had glanced over his shoulder while accepting the package.

Lara wished she could have seen his face when he opened it, but playing innocent had felt even better. She felt high off refusing him a reaction.

As she cleaned up after dinner, she was still giggling to herself when a quiet knock sounded at her door. When she opened it, though, no one was there.

Only another small paper bag with a note scribbled on it that read: This is just the tip.

Lara laughed, loudly and in earnest, at the piece of chocolate awaiting her in the bag—the chopped-off tip of a girthy, impressively realistic choco-cock.

Zavien Crane was an annoying son of a bitch, so why was she smiling not in spite of him but despite herself?

Also, why was there a part of her, buried deep inside, that dared to hope Zavien would retaliate?