Jessica Andersen - Intensive Care

“He worries me,” Ripley said to Tansy, thinking that the chemotherapy and radiation treatments were hurting Milo more than they were hurting the cancer. The boy was simply tired, and his family’s continued absence wasn’t helping Ripley keep his spirits up. If she had a precious child like that…

“You should be more worried about your A55 right now, Dr. Davis.” The dark voice was a shock, but it was the touch of his hand on her shoulder that had Ripley jolting and spinning around.

“Cage!” She’d been so caught up in watching Milo slump toward sick, exhausted sleep that she’d missed both Tansy’s escape and the RSO’s entrance. That was why her heart was racing, she told herself, not because the imprint of his hand burned her shoulder like fire. Then she processed his words and the heat of surprise shifted quickly to anger, both at his disregard for the child and for his implication. “And why should I worry about the accelerator? You checked it yourself this morning. It’s fine.”

“A patient that you irradiated is dead, Dr. Davis, and her corpse is contaminated. I think you should worry a great deal.”

He shouldn’t be so appealing, Ripley thought as her eyes glanced over his stubble-shadowed jaw, when he was threatening her. But for some reason, his antagonism was compelling. Perhaps it was the taint of grief at the back of his eyes. She wondered, not for the first time, what had happened to him. Why did he work in a hospital and hate doctors? Who had he lost, and how had it scarred him so?

Why, thought Ripley to herself with a mental shake, are you trying to romanticize him when he’s being a jerk?

Aloud, she replied, “Of course I’m worried about Ida Mae’s contamination.” He had no idea how worried she was, just as he had no idea that Ida Mae shouldn’t have died. “But I can’t see how the linear accelerator could be involved.”

“It’s killed before.”

The flat pronouncement startled her, as did the menace behind the words. The glimmer of an idea formed in the back of her mind, prompted by the tendril of grief she sensed within him. “True,” she said cautiously, “but the last of those lawsuits was settled years ago. The technology’s improved and the linear accelerator doesn’t leave a source behind. Can you honestly think of a way this machine could cause the sort of Geiger counter reading Whistler was getting off Ida Mae today?”

She had to give him credit. He actually thought about it for a minute before his shoulders relaxed a fraction. “No. I can’t.”

Ripley blew out a breath. “Which means she wasn’t contaminated by her treatment.” It was only a minor relief, because that still left two questions. What had killed her, and what had contaminated her?

“Well, in that case,” Cage began, “if we agree for the moment that the A55 isn’t capable of leaving a radioactive source behind, we have to assume that Mrs. Harris was either fed, injected or washed with something contaminated.”

The list was chilling. Ripley suppressed a shiver. “I guess we’ll know more tomorrow, once your lab has done some preliminary tests.” She switched gears. “You are going to allow us to autopsy, right? I mean, the radioactivity didn’t kill her, so we need to find out what did.”

Cage looked at her sideways. “Worried now? Starting to hear the M-word in the back of your mind?”

It took her a moment before she realized what he was talking about. Malpractice. She bristled. “Contrary to what you think, Cage, not every doctor focuses on covering his or her ass. Some of us are focused on doing the best we can for our patients.” She fisted her hands at her hips. “Yes, I’m worried. Damn worried. But radiation poisoning is a slow process, and Ida Mae didn’t show any symptoms. The radiation didn’t kill her.”

Cage made a sound that could have been a growl, could have been a curse, and he spun to pace across the outer office. “So it’s no big deal that she was contaminated? Since she didn’t die from it, we don’t need to be upset?”

“That’s not what I’m saying at all. Don’t put words in my mouth!” Now Ripley was angry, pure and simple. “Do you see me trying to sweep this under the rug? Am I pretending nothing is wrong? No. I care what happened to Ida Mae, and I’m going to figure it out if it kills me.”

“Forgive me if I find that hard to believe,” he growled, but he wasn’t looking at her. He was glaring toward the outer office doors, where the R-ONC label could be read backward through the glass. “You’re all the same. Money first, acclaim second, righteousness third and patients somewhere down around tenth or so.”

Ripley drew breath to blast him into next week, but something about his profile stopped her. His throat worked once, twice, and his hands balled into fists as though he wanted to lash out, yet the grief etched on his face was that of someone who’s been lost for a long, long time.

All of a sudden, he reminded her of Milo.

She crossed the room and touched his shoulder. “Whatever happened to you, Cage, I’m sorry. Maybe you have good reason for thinking this way, but it’s not fair. I’m a good doctor. I’m not in it for the money or the fame. I’m here to help people. You shouldn’t try to blame me for that or twist my motives. You don’t have the right.”

He lifted his hand and it hovered for a moment above hers, until she thought he might return her touch. But then he let his hand fall and stepped away from her.

“I apologize, Dr. Davis.” He was talking to the glass door, and she saw the muscles in his jaw bunch and flex as he swallowed hard and straightened to his full height. “That was unprofessional of me, and you’re right. We need to work together to figure out what happened with Ida Mae Harris.”

“That wasn’t quite what I had—”

He interrupted, “If you’ll get me a copy of her workup for the radiation treatment, I’ll study it tonight.”

Ripley wasn’t sure what to say. For a moment, she’d thought she’d seen something sad and lonely beneath the fierce brows and black eyes. But it could have been her imagination. The man standing before her looked as though he’d never had a weak moment in his life.

In fact, at that moment Cage reminded Ripley quite strongly of her father—the most angry, domineering, perpetually correct individual on the planet. The comparison quickly killed her moment of pity.

She ground her teeth. “I’ll get the paperwork.” And then you can get out of here.

When he was gone, she sat at her desk for a good five minutes, waiting for her system to level. She imagined steam coming out of her ears, and the mental picture was satisfying. But as anger slowly drained, she was left feeling empty and alone.

The sore spots from Harris’s fingers ached down to the bone, and the outer office echoed strangely when footsteps walked past in the hallway. Ripley shivered and heard a muted tinkle from the pocket of her lab coat when the broken glass stem chimed against a pair of pens.

The sound seemed unnaturally loud. Even the vents were shut down.

“I shouldn’t have sent Cage away,” she said into the quiet. “Being aggravated is better than this.” Her words didn’t even echo. They seemed to fall dead the moment they left her lips, but there was a slide of answering motion out in the hallway.

“Hello?” Suddenly desperate for the sight of another human being, Ripley stood and walked across the outer office to poke her head into the hallway. “Hello, is there someone out there?”

The corridor was deserted, but the door to the broom closet was ajar.

“Hello?” she called, walking to the closet. “Mr. Frank, are you in there?” The maintenance crew generally worked the late evening shift, but perhaps the janitor was starting early today. Ripley was so thoroughly freaked out by the bad vibes in her office that even the dour old man’s company would be a relief.