Page 36 of Auctioned to Dr. Daddy

I hurry over to join them, and they shift about slightly, making more room for me.

Carter makes a face. “Soup?”

“It’s cold out,” I protest, not wanting to let on that I’m under the weather. If the storm is going to be as bad as Selma implied, then the hospital can’t afford to have people going home with stomachaches. My mother would have toughed it out. I bet that Nathan has toughed out worse than this too.

Josie eyes up the coke. Her brows raise, but she keeps her thoughts to herself.

Carter doesn’t, but he’s at least not interested in discussing my obvious ‘sick person’ meal choice. Instead, he uses his plastic spork to jab up toward the ceiling. “You can’t hear it through the roof, but it’s coming down like cats and dogs out there. I was just on the ground floor, and it’s a mess.”

“Really?” I ask, surprised. “My friend’s in the next city up. She says that the weather’s gotten seriously bad out there.”

“I feel like it’s going to get seriously bad here too,” says Josie, with a sigh. “I hate storm season. Nothing good ever happens this time of year.”

I would argue with that, but only because I’ve just met Nathan. Storm season has done me alright. Though the auction and the two don’t connect too much, I suppose.

“I agree with you,” says Carter. “Do you remember when Lori got in that accident?”

“That would be Kurt’s wife?” I ask, hesitantly.

Carter nods. “Yeah. It was pretty nasty. I don’t think that we’ve had one of our own on the table since then.”

“Knock on wood,” says Josie, quickly rapping her knuckles against the wood. She’s pretty superstitious, so she’s always doing things like that. “You can’t just say something like that when we’re in the middle of a rager like this, Carter. You’re going to get—”

The lights flash. It’s only for half a second, but it was unexpected. Yelping, the can of Coke slips from my hand and spills out onto the table. I jump to my feet and knock the chair that I’m sitting in over. All around me, the rest of the cafeteria breaks out into the same chaos.

It’s one thing to lose power at home but in public? That’s always terrifying, even more so when it’s somewhere like this—hospitals shouldn’t have power issues.

“Got it,” says Josie, slamming a handful of napkins on the table.

“Holy shit,” breathes Carter. He’s staring up at the ceiling. “Did the power just flicker?”

“I am so sorry.” I reach out and help clean the mess up. “Oh my God, I’m jumpier than a rabbit.”

Josie laughs. “Jumpier than a rabbit. I like that one.”

She tosses the wad of soaked napkins into the nearby trash bin. “Take a breath, girl. We’re fine. The hospital has the best emergency generator on this side of the county. If the power’s out for more than five seconds, the backups kick in. That way, doctors aren’t stuck in the operating room without any power.”

“That would be a disaster,” I say, with a shake of my head. “I guess they were right about the storm being ultra nasty. I’ve never been in the hospital when something like that happened.”

All around us, visiting family members are starting to hurry from the room. They’re either rushing back to the rooms with their loved ones, to make sure that everything’s alright, or leaving the hospital in an attempt to get home before the storm gets worse.

“That’s got to be seriously scary for them,” I say.

Josie agrees. “The nurses are going to have their hands full with both patients and visitors.”

Carter’s pager goes off. He’s in general surgery, which means that he’s twice as busy as the specialists. General surgery is a surgical specialty that includes pretty much everything, from alimentary canal and abdominal contents to diseases involving the skin. And trauma, of course.

“Speaking of people with their hands full,” says Carter, abandoning his lunch and standing up. “I’ve got to run. I wouldn’t be surprised if you two needed to head out pretty fast, too.”

Josie tosses a hand over one shoulder, waving him off, and starts gathering her stuff. “I’m pretty sure that my break’s going to be over early. The moment that we start getting calls in, I’ll have to hit the road and get out of here.”

She’s the best EMT we’ve got in the hospital. Most of her time is spent in the back of an ambulance, but the career she really wants is that of an oncologist. She’s been studying to go back to medical school for a while—and saving, too. EMTs aren’t paid very well, and she’s got a lot that needs to be juggled around.

“Stay safe, Demi. And I hope you feel better,” says Josie, with a nod toward my mostly cold soup. It doesn’t matter, because the nausea is long gone.

I wave her off and wish her good luck too, then start gathering up my own supplies. I’ve got great luck, because I’ve barely started out of the cafeteria when my buzzer goes off, and I’m summoned up to the cardiac floor.

Nathan meets me right outside of the elevator with a bundle of files in hand. I fall right into step beside him, the two of us a sight as we hurry through the hallway, toward our destination. “We’ve got a myocardial contusion being prepped for surgery as we speak.”

---