Page 26 of Beneath Her Hands
“What are you doing here?” Jane snapped before she could reel in her emotions.
“Is this going to be a problem, Doctor Roberts?” Doctor Mars asked without preamble.
“I’m sorry,” Jane said, and her eyes dropped to the floor. “What do you mean?”
“I mean whatever’s going on with you and Doctor Maxwell,” she said and pressed her lips.
“Don’t worry, there’s nothing going on between the two of us,” Jane answered with a little more venom than she intended.
“You know as well as I do that this is only temporary,” Doctor Mars said, her voice softening with empathy.
“I’m sorry, Doctor Mars, I don’t think I understand what you’re telling me,” Jane said, starting to become annoyed with the woman in front of her.
“Doctor Maxwell won’t be here long. I had hoped it would be longer than this, but I knew as much as anyone that as soon as her father passed, she would be out the door again,” she said with a sigh. “But I need to know if you’ll still be here once she’s gone.”
“Well, she certainly doesn’t want me to come with her,” Jane said with a childish sniff.
“I wasn’t really worried about that,” Doctor Mars said and rolled her eyes.
“Then what do you mean?” Jane asked.
“Jane, it’s no secret that you want to get out, that you want to travel, but life has held you here,” Dr. Mars took a deep breath. “I knew that bringing in Doctor Maxwell would inspire you, at least in some way, and I just need to know, when you do, finding another trauma surgeon that can double as the ER director is going to be challenging to say the least.”
Jane blinked. The thought of leaving had not so much as crossed her mind—not in any realistic sense anyway. Sure, she always had it in the back of her mind as some sort of pipe dream, or wishful thinking, but there was no way that she’d really be able to just drop everything and go. Was there? Jane shook her head.
“Doctor Mars,” she began then shook her head again. “I’m sorry, but this is not a good time for this conversation. The job always comes first, but anything not immediately work-related is so far outside anything I can even wrap my mind around rightnow. Ask me again in a few weeks and I’ll have a better answer, but for now I have no immediate plans to stop working here.”
“Well, that makes me happy,” Doctor Mars said with a slight smile. “But what about you?”
“I don’t know what I want,” Jane said and sat down heavily behind her desk.
“Well, maybe figure it out. We will all be better off if you do,” Doctor Mars smiled a knowing smile, but Jane just furrowed her brows as the Chief of Medicine walked out the door and closed it behind her. Jane struggled to figure out what she meant by that, but it certainly felt like there was some sort of hidden meaning in the words. Jane highly doubted that Dr. Mars was really worried about hiring someone else for the hospital. Jane shook her head. She wasn’t going to figure it out right now anyway. She had bigger problems. Rosalind. What was she going to do about this situation?
The thought of running into her in the hospital was infuriating, but she knew it would happen eventually. Hell, Rosalind had all but forced her to take on her father as a patient, there was no way that she’d be able to just avoid her. She would just do her best to put it out of her mind. If Rosalind was going to be this cold toward her, then she would just be cold back, simple as that. There was no reason to think about it any further. She definitely wasn’t going to risk her career over it.
She got up and checked her make-up in the mirror, suddenly feeling like she could handle whatever was thrown at her. She would be fine, of course, nothing Rosalind could do would change that. Her phone pinged as though reading her thoughts. She closed her eyes, her shoulders drooping as she read the message, then headed out her door.
She walked quickly down the hallway, Rosalind and her mother were both in the room with Robert Maxwell, and a team of nurses flurried around him. Jane didn’t rush, Roberthad signed a Do Not Resuscitate order when he first came in, so there wasn’t much anyone could do regardless, but he certainly seemed agitated. Rosalind’s mother was crying again, and Rosalind was stone-faced as she held on to her mother’s shoulders.
Jane could hear the shouts coming from the room, but nothing coherent, apparently his mind had slipped away again. She quickly gave the order to give him a sedative as he thrashed and grunted at the team surrounding him. One of the nurses complied, pushing the drug through his IV, and he slowly settled onto the bed. His heart rate was sporadic at best, and his blood pressure was almost nonexistent; it was a wonder his heart was still beating at all.
“Mr. Maxwell? Can you hear me?” Jane asked as she shined a light into his eyes and gauged the reaction.
“What? Where am I?” Robert barked at her and Jane stepped back.
“You’re in the hospital, Dad,” Rosalind said as she stepped up beside Jane. Jane could feel the warmth emanating from her and forced herself not to think about it.
“Dad? Why are you calling me that, it’s strange, Lyla,” Robert said, and Jane could feel Rosalind’s muscles tense. Jane’s eyes narrowed, and she wondered who Lyla was.
“How do you feel, Robert?” Jane asked.
“I’m fine, Denise, what am I doing here? Why are you here?” he asked, then his eyes rolled back and he started snoring. Jane pressed her lips together and turned to Rosalind and her mother. “I’m sorry, with the DNR there’s not much we can do from here, it’s only a matter of time.”
“I understand,” Mrs. Maxwell said with tears in her eyes. She knew all the information, but Jane couldn’t imagine how hard this must be on her. Jane turned to Rosalind. She had no intention of saying anything other than what was professionallynecessary, but the expression on Rosalind’s face was unreadable. It was twisted in pain, but it seemed like something more than the situation at hand; there was something wrong, and Jane was compelled to find out what it was. She wondered if it had anything to do with the names Robert was throwing out.
Rosalind didn’t say anything, but she turned on her heel and headed for the door. Acting on what was likely a childish impulse, Jane followed her.
“What happened?” Jane asked when Rosalind finally came to a stop in the hallway.
