Page 86 of The Doctor's Truth

But he doesn’t seem to notice her. Instead, he leans in and continues. “It is, essentially, the final test, so needless to say, the interviews have to go well.”

“Understood.”

“This segment could bring in big investors,” my father continues. “We could build out the hospital. Update our equipment. So it’s important that we make a good impression. As a united front.”

“What does this have to do with me?” I ask, even though I already feel the inkling, a trickle of dread sliding down the back of my ear.

My father comes out and says it: “I need you two to pretend to be married for the interviews.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I scoff. “We’re divorced.”

“It’s for the camera,” my father continues.

“No,” I say. “Absolutely not.”

“It’s important that we show a—”

“United front. Yeah. You said that.”

My father is—as always—a stone. Impenetrable. Calm. Meanwhile, I’ve always been the uncontrollable one. The temper. My anger rises like a storm.

“Did you agree to this?” I ask Nadine. Even I can hear the snap in my tone, like a rubber band pulled too far.

She says it like it’s nothing: “Celebrities do it all the time. Brad and Angelina. Tom and Nicole.”

She doesn’t even avert her eyes from her phone when she talks to me. It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

“This?” I motion to her and her phone. “This is the kind of shit that drove me crazy. Can you look at me when you talk to me?”

Her dark eyes flicker to me and narrow. Like my father, she has no inflection when she says, “Are you angry with me, or are you angry with the situation?”

“Try all of the above.”

“It’s just TV, Jason,” she says. “It’s not personal.”

They’re cyborgs—emotionless, cut from the same cloth. They draw clear lines between business transactions and real life. They don’t mind peddling lies to get what they want.

How can they both sit there so calmly while I feel like a ripped sail flapping in the wind?

“Our marriage,” I growl. “Was that not personal, too? Just for show?”

“Nadine.” My father’s deep voice cuts through the heated conversation smoothly. “I think I should talk to Jason alone for a moment, if you don’t mind.”

Nadine’s gaze fixes on me, but she rises from her chair obediently. “Calm down,” she murmurs to me on her way out.

Calm down. My two least favorite words in the English language. I curl my fingers tightly around the arms of my chair and try to remember to breathe.

I am Jason King. Top surgeon at Hannsett Island. I am enough.

The door softly clicks closed behind her.

We’re alone, and there’s a little more space in the office. My rage has room to stretch, and my jaw unclenches.

“I know your relationship with her is complicated,” my father says smoothly.

“It’s not complicated,” I tell him. “We’re divorced. It’s simple. And it’s over.”

“All I’m asking is for you to wear your ring and stand next to her and smile. For one night. Surely you have the capacity to think outside yourself for one night.”

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