Page 105 of Devil's Riches

21

Nate

When I reachedthe hospital at Blackthorne, I raced inside and pushed past a group of doctors gossiping over coffee in the massive front lobby. A trio of receptionists sat at a large desk on the left side of the room, concentrating on their computer screens.

I went for the one on the far left. Young, blonde, pretty. The exact type of girl who’d fall for anything I said. According to the little silver badge affixed to her white shirt, her name was Clara.

“Hi, Clara,” I said, approaching her side of the desk with a genial smile. “I need to see Dr. Paxton.”

She looked me up and down. I could see a hint of attraction behind her coolly assessing gaze. “Sorry, sir. He’s unavailable at the moment.”

“I have an appointment with him.”

“That’s not possible, sir,” she said, raising a brow in a disbelieving expression. “Like I said, he’s unavailable.”

She wasn’t going to be an easy nut to crack after all. I’d have to try another angle.

I narrowed my eyes and leaned forward, placing my hands on the desk in front of her. “Do you know who I am, Clara?” I said.

Her eyes narrowed to match mine. “No, sir. I don’t,” she replied in a frosty tone.

I pulled my wallet out of my pocket and slapped my license down on the desk in front of her. “Maybe this’ll help you figure it out.”

It was moments like this that my heritage came in handy. Everyone on Avalon Island recognized the Lockwood name and the power and influence it held.

Clara’s eyes wavered slightly as she read my license, and she dropped the chilly attitude. “Sorry, sir. I didn’t know who you were,” she said hurriedly. “But Dr. Paxton still can’t see you. He’s overseeing a surgery this morning, so he’s going to be busy for several hours.”

I let out a short snort of annoyance and waved at her computer. “Look me up,” I said. “I was in here a few weeks ago after some asshole stabbed me. Dr. Paxton took over my case as a favor to my family after I got out of surgery.”

Clara’s fingers flew over the keyboard as I spoke.

“He told me to come back in for a follow-up appointment,” I went on. “There should be something in there about that.”

She nodded. “Oh, I see. He added a note to your file.”

“My follow-up appointment is today. I arranged it with him in person at his party last night.”

“His party?” she said, brows puckering.

“It was his birthday yesterday. He had a party.”

She clicked something on her computer and raised her brows. “Oh, you’re right, it was his birthday. But there must be some sort of mix-up,” she said, eyes flickering between me and the screen. “He’s definitely not available this morning.”

I frowned. “He mentioned last night that he had a surgery this morning and something else this afternoon, so he told me to come in first thing before the surgery. It’s just a quick consultation for some scar reduction stuff. Shouldn’t take longer than fifteen minutes.”

Clara bit her bottom lip as she thought about it. Then she nodded slowly. “He probably has a small window of time before the surgery starts. But you’ll need to hurry.”

I breathed a silent sigh of relief. “Can you tell me where he is?”

“In the secure wing.”

“The what?”

“It’s a closed-off wing of the hospital. It’s where the most high-profile people on the island go to get their treatments done so they don’t have to see or be seen by anyone apart from the doctors,” she said, eyes flashing with a smidgen of resentment. “Do you need me to tell you how to get there?”

“Yes.”

She pointed somewhere over my shoulder. “Take the elevator to the top floor. When you get out, go straight to the end of the hall. Take a right there, and go to the end again. You’ll see a glass sliding door. It’s always locked, so unless you have the code or a keycard with clearance, you’ll have to wait for someone to let you in.”

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