Page 48 of Remembering You
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Chris Foster walked into GoGo’s and all the breath was robbed of Marty’s lungs. Even after a late surgery and morning rounds, he looked breathtakingly handsome. Still in scrubs, they brought out the vibrant honey brown of his eyes and contrasted the stark dark hair with only a bit of silvery gray at the temples.
But even with as sexy as he looked, his eyes were red and tired. Being on call was no joke. Some nights, you didn’t get any sleep during your long shifts at the hospital. Other nights, you were lucky enough to squeeze in a nap here and there.
It looked like last night had been a no-nap kind of night.
And here I am, about to put him through the ringer.“Hi,” he said softly and slid into the chair opposite of Marty. “Thanks for meeting me.”
She chuckled. “I should be thanking you for making time for me after you were on call and in surgery all night. Are you sure you don’t want to hold off on lunch and have a nap instead?”
He laughed, running his hand through his hair in an endearingly boyish way. “I look that rough, huh?”
Marty shrugged and nudged the cup of coffee toward him that she’d taken the liberty of pre-ordering for him. “Just… tired.”
“Believe it or not, I had a couple hours of sleep in the on-call room. More than I can say for some shifts, you know?”
Chris blew on the top of his coffee before taking a sip. He looked startled as he swallowed, glancing up at Marty in surprise. “This has a pump of peppermint in it.”
Marty shrugged. “Americano with peppermint and half and half. Your favorite coffee to order after surgery.” She paused. “You’re not the only one who’s observant.”
“I guess not.” He chuckled and set the coffee down. “So… what do you want to hear first? The cradle-robbing explanation? Or the going to the Chief to discuss our date explanation?”
Marty bit her lips, circling her finger over the top of her own coffee mug. “You mentioned that your wife had cheated on you?”
He nodded. “With my brother.”
Her gaze shot up to meet his, wide and shocked. “What?”
He nodded. “Yep. Pretty screwed up, huh?”
“Oh, my God, Chris. That’s terrible.”
“Yep. Not just one betrayal from someone I loved… but two. Two marriages down the drain. Granted, ours was already circling that drain for a while…” He shrugged, but his frown countered the nonchalance of the movement. “But my brother… no one even knew he and his wife were struggling. He seemed to have the picturesque marriage. The one the community used as the example of how to be. If I had a nickel for every time my wife saidIf you could just be more like your brother…” He exhaled a deep breath with a roll of his eyes. “It had a whole new meaning once I figured out they were sleeping together.”
“I’m so sorry, Chris. That must have been horrible.”
He nodded, glancing quickly at Marty before dipping his gaze back to his coffee cup. “It was.”
Marty took a deep breath. “So, walk me through it. She cheated on you. Your marriage ended. How did that result in you having a relationship with your intern?”
He sighed and Marty noticed his grip on the coffee mug tensed. “It just… happened.”
“I need more than that. Did you two meet before you were her attending? Like one of those cheesy nighttime soap operas where they walk into the hospital and surprise! The one-night stand you had is actually your intern.”
Chris chuckled, but shook his head. “I wish I could say that’s what happened. The truth is, I was really messed up when my marriage ended. Brittany, my intern—”
“Her name was notBrittany.” Marty laughed and covered her smile with the back of her hand. “I’m sorry, but that’s such a college girl’s name. Like Trish or Sierra.”
“Okay, okay,” he laughed and waved his hands. “Anyway, Brittany was always kind of flirty. One night I was on call. It was a quiet night and I went to the bar around the corner thinking I would just have one beer. Well, I had more than one. I wasn’t fall down wasted, but I should not have been that drunk while on call. So when I got paged in for an appendectomy on a 24-week pregnant woman, there was no way I could perform that surgery. Brittany immediately saw my condition, stepped in and did the surgery under my supervision. She saved my ass. After surgery, we ended up in the supply closet. I was tipsy. And stupid. And completely blinded by the fact that my own wife had left me for my brother.”
“It was only that one time?”
Chris nodded. “Just that once. I told my chief immediately and he took her off my team, moved her to another specialty and said that as long as no one else found out, I could keep my job.”
Marty winced. “I take it, someone found out?”
He inhaled and let the breath go on a sigh. “Yep. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that she told a couple people. It only takes one person to spread it around. Then again, I think it was for the best. My chief and I are still good friends. He gave me a great referral and I landed here. I think I needed the change of pace, you know? I messed up… I know that. I was really lucky that my career didn’t end because of it.”
