Tina Beckett - Hot Docs On Call - New York City Nights

What the…?

The doors closed, and it started moving up—with him and Tessa as its only occupants. She turned toward him. “What is going on? I just got a call from Marcos that you’ve decided to take part in the capoeira exhibition after all.”

He tried to wrap his head around her words and failed. He’d only just come out of Lloyd’s office. Surely word couldn’t have gotten back to her or Marcos this fast.

“Did you already know about this?”

The doors on the next floor opened and, when no one got on the car, closed again. The elevator continued on its course.

“Know about what? That you were going to go to the administrator and ask him to put you into the exhibition?”

“No. That would have been you.”

“Me?” Her eyes widened. “Why would you think…? Hardly. I thought you said you didn’t want to do it.”

“I don’t.”

“Then who…?”

“Marcos.” They both said the name at the same time. Clay’s muscles relaxed and he leaned back against the wall of the car. Lloyd had said it was Marcos, but he’d only half believed the man.

The elevator stopped again, the doors opened and then closed once more. He could have gotten off and walked up the two remaining flights of stairs to his floor, but he didn’t. “So what are we going to do about it?”

“What can we do? Between Marcos and Peter Lloyd they’ve got us right where they want us.”

He laughed. “And where is that?”

“Putting on a show for anyone who wants to watch.”

For some reason a lurid image came to mind, of Tessa again sprawled across his chest. But this time, instead of leaping to her feet, he stopped her, his hand sliding into her hair and angling her head within reach of his mouth.

He swallowed hard, trying to banish the mental picture. It didn’t work. So he trickled a bit of gasoline on the spark to make her aware that she was treading on dangerous ground. “Then we’d better make that show worth their while, don’t you think?”

This time her face tipped up to look at him. Seeing what was written there, her lips parted and she blinked. “That could be awkward, Clay. Very awkward.”

“Could it?”

Clay remembered playing these games with her many times in the past. Suddenly all thoughts of his mother getting her hopes up fled as those memories crept closer to summer madness. “They have a poster already made up. The one taken at my batizado .”

“The one where I… And afterward we went to your place and…”

“That’s the one.”

Two more floors came and went. After the next one they’d be heading back down the way they had come. The doors opened and this time a nurse got into the elevator. He nodded a greeting at the newcomer, who turned to stare at the readout, her head craning to the side, probably wondering why so many floors were lit up.

Tessa’s cheeks turned a shade of pink he recognized all too well.

She was the one who’d pressed all those buttons. And he realized he’d squandered his chance to act on their time alone. Except that little camera in the corner—which he hadn’t noticed until just now—would have caught them in the act. Good thing someone had interrupted or the poster the administrator hung on the walls might be even more suggestive.

Not the kind of staff behavior Mr. Lloyd would approve of.

There was silence for two floors, then the nurse got off, leaving Tessa and Clay alone once again. Despite the danger, he couldn’t resist pressing just a bit harder. “So we’ll have to practice,” he murmured.

“More than likely.” She flushed even more.

Hell, he’d love nothing more than to crowd her against that wall and mash his lips to hers. Instead, he crossed his arms over his chest. Time to cool things down a little. “What day were you planning on going over to the studio?”

The elevator stopped again, and this time Tessa pushed the button to hold the doors open. “This is my floor. But I’ll be over there Tuesday at five.”

“I’ll see you there, then.” Three days from now. “To practice.”

She stepped off in a hurry, saying nothing more. Soon the doors slid back together and cut her off from view.

What the hell had he just gotten himself into?

This was crazy. Except the anticipation flooding his veins and infiltrating his thoughts said something completely different. That the only crazy thing was thinking about what would happen when the exhibition was over and done.

And when he and Tessa finally went their separate ways. Once and for all.

TESSA’S ATTENDING WAVED to her as he walked past the desk where she was reading through some of the newer protocols on melanoma. It seemed research was showing that the depth of the tumor wasn’t always the best predictor of whether or not it would metastasize, rather it depended on the type of melanoma itself. So even very thin tumors could be deadly.

“Do you want to check on your patient this morning?” he called.

“Mr. Phillips?” The elderly gentleman was still recovering from surgery on his broken leg. “Have you gotten the results back on his scan?”

Brian backtracked until he stood in front of her. “I was just going to check the computer to see. We can stop by my office on the way.”

“Sounds good.”

She followed him down the corridor to where some of the staff offices were. Once there, he sat behind his desk and she slid into one of the chairs in front of it. Tapping the keys on his computer, he soon pulled up the file and turned the monitor so they could both look.

Flipping through the different slides, he soon got to one that made Tessa lean forward. “Oh, no.”

Mr. Phillips’s liver had a couple of hot spots on it, as did his lungs. “I see them. We’ll need to talk to the patient and then assemble a treatment team.”

Tessa’s heart contracted. The leg break was now suspect, as well—although it could be coincidental, due to his age. They wouldn’t know for sure without a bone scan. And at almost eighty she wasn’t sure what kind of intervention his body could handle. If they’d caught the cancer earlier…

Memories of her mom’s fight came winging back. It had been a similar case, only her tumor had been deep-seated, roots extending down to the lower levels of the dermis before it had been caught. By then it had been too late. It had spread everywhere.

None of that helped them right now, though. All they could do was come up with a plan.

Brian looked up. “Thoughts? He’s officially your patient.”

And this was where the weight of responsibility became heavy. It was one thing when you worked under someone and they made the final decisions. Tessa was rapidly coming to a time in her career where she would make those choices. As much as she might wish it were different, to have it any other way would be a cop-out. Brian was basically handing this case to her. She should be ecstatic. Instead, she was swamped by indecision. But she’d better snap out of it or she may as well hang up her scrubs right now. So she stiffened her spine.

“I concur with what you just said. His daughter flew in to see him pretty soon after surgery, and she’s got medical power of attorney in the event that anything happens, if I understood her correctly.”

The daughter whose name was Tessa. The memories of Mr. Phillips protecting his modesty seemed bittersweet now.

“Good,” Brian said. “DNR order?”

The tightness in her chest grew. DNR… Do Not Resuscitate. “I don’t know. I was hoping the section was all he’d need.”

“I’ll need you to check on that. Talk to the daughter.”

She knew that Brian didn’t mean to sound brusque. It was part of remaining objective enough to do what was best for the patient. And she should be grateful that he was guiding her through the necessary steps, because right now her head was spinning. She’d lost other patients, especially when she’d done her trauma rotation. But there was something about this one…