Covert M.D.

by Jessica Andersen

  Rathe stood, uncoiling slowly from the chair as though afraid she might bolt.

  But bolting was the last thing on her mind as she identified the heady, racing sensation that had pounded through her during the fight. Excitement. This was the adventure she craved, the thrill she’d been seeking.

  The adrenaline poured through her body. She wanted to run. She wanted to dance, to sing, to tip her head back and scream.

  She grinned at Rathe.

  His eyes narrowing, he advanced on her and leaned down so they were face-to-face. “This is not a joke, Nia. Don’t you get it? You could’ve been killed,” he said, then placed a palm flat against the door, effectively trapping her.

  “Well, I wasn’t, thanks to you. That’s why the doctors here work in teams, remember? So we can watch each other’s backs.” She shoved at his chest with both hands, but he was immovable. “Damn it, let me go!”

  She saw the change in his eyes. Her body answered the call and he bent close and whispered, “I can’t.”

  Then he kissed her, and all that restless energy redirected itself to the places where their bodies merged.

  Dear Harlequin Intrigue Reader,

  Spring is in the air and we have a month of fabulous books for you to curl up with as the March winds howl outside:

  • Familiar is back on the prowl, in Caroline Burnes’s Familiar Texas. And Rocky Mountain Maneuvers marks the conclusion of Cassie Miles’s COLORADO CRIME CONSULTANTS trilogy.

  • Jessica Andersen brings us an exciting medical thriller, Covert M.D.

  • Don’t miss the next ECLIPSE title, Lisa Childs’s The Substitute Sister.

  • Definitely check out our April lineup. Debra Webb is starting THE ENFORCERS, an exciting new miniseries you won’t want to miss. Also look for a special 3-in-1 story from Rebecca York, Ann Voss Peterson and Patricia Rosemoor called Desert Sons.

  Each month, Harlequin Intrigue brings you a variety of heart-stopping romantic suspense and chilling mystery. Don’t miss a single book!

  Sincerely,

  Denise O’Sullivan

  Senior Editor

  Harlequin Intrigue

  COVERT M.D.

  JESSICA ANDERSEN

  To my friends in the New England Chapter

  of Romance Writers of America.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Though she’s tried out professions ranging from cleaning sea lion cages to cloning glaucoma genes, from patent law to training horses—Jessica is happiest when she’s combining all these interests with her first love: writing romances. These days she’s delighted to be writing full-time on a farm in rural Connecticut that she shares with a small menagerie and a hero named Brian. She hopes you’ll visit her at www.JessicaAndersen.com for info on upcoming books, contests and to say “hi”!

  Books by Jessica Andersen

  HARLEQUIN INTRIGUE

  734—DR. BODYGUARD

  762—SECRET WITNESS

  793—INTENSIVE CARE

  817—BODY SEARCH

  833—COVERT M.D.

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Dr. Nia French—Nia and her first lover are partnered in a deadly hospital investigation of failed transplants. Will she learn to forgive him before it’s too late?

  Dr. Rathe McKay—The guarded doctor-adventurer has two equally difficult tasks: to protect Nia from a vicious killer and to avoid the chemistry between them.

  Cadaver Man—The tall, gray man sees through Nia and Rathe’s covers quickly. Too quickly.

  Tony French—Nia’s father drove Rathe off years ago. After his death, will Tony’s memory separate the onetime lovers or bring them closer together as danger escalates?

  Dr. Logan Hart—The young transplant specialist wants to assist in the investigation of unexpected patient deaths. Or so he says.

  Marissa Doyle—The nurse has overseen many of the dead patients and has hidden secrets.

  Dr. Michael Talbot—The head of the transplant department, Talbot is a giant within the field. So why is a killer stalking his patients?

  Short Whiny Guy—Cadaver Man’s partner has seen too much.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter One

  The damp subbasement of Boston General Hospital smelled faintly of death and fabric softener. Corridors folded back on each other without apparent reason, which was both a blessing and a curse for Nia French.

  A blessing because she was able to stay out of sight. A curse because she had to follow close or risk losing Cadaver Man, Short Whiny Guy and the rattling laundry cart.

  “You got the keys?”

  Nia froze. The voice was near. Too near.

  Heart pounding, she breathed through her mouth and eased closer to the off-green cinder block wall, wishing for some cover. Wishing the fluorescent lights weren’t so relentlessly bright.

  Wishing she knew for sure she’d followed the right guys.

  “Yeah, I got the keys. Why, you think I lost them already?” The second speaker was Short Whiny Guy, who had complained incessantly during the trip down from the sixth floor. There was a metallic jingle, and the sound of a door being unlocked.

  “Just shut up and let’s get this thing loaded,” Cadaver Man ordered. She called him that because of the grayish skin and shadowed eyes she’d glimpsed when the elevators had shut on the men, leaving her wondering why they were changing the linens at two in the morning.

  And why none of the beds in the Transplant Department were stripped.

  Nia had followed them because this was her first assignment in HFH’s Investigations Division, and she was determined to prove herself.

  Her previous assignments for Hospitals for Humanity had sent her to outbreaks and disaster areas worldwide, where her medical degree made her useful and her guts were taken for granted. It was good work, but it wasn’t where her heart lay. More than anything, she wanted to be an investigator—and now, finally, she’d been given the opportunity to work a case.

  Hearing a metal door slide open and the men’s voices move away, Nia crouched down and eased around the corner, forcing her hands not to tremble from a mixture of nerves and excitement.

  In contrast to the rest of the hospital, the loading bay was dark. The smell here was stronger, both of decay and of fabric softener, though the wide garage door let in a thin breath of Chinatown funk.

  The men were gone. The big laundry hamper they had wheeled down from the sixth floor sat on the loading dock.

  “Transplants failing for no good reason,” the dossier on this assignment read. “Supplies and pharmaceuticals disappearing from the Transplant Unit.”

  Though the assignment didn’t officially begin until the next day, when she’d meet her new partner and they would be briefed on the full scope of the problem, Nia had sneaked into the hospital at midnight. She’d been hoping to discover something useful. Hoping to get a head start on impressing the senior investigator HFH had assigned to train her.

  And here was her chance.

  Stepping quietly on her soft-soled sneakers, she eased around the corner and crept toward the hamper. She had no concrete reason to suspect there was anything inside but laundry. But her left eyelid had twitched a warning, and the shift schedule indicated the linens in the Transplant Department were changed at seven in the morning, not two. Holding her breath, she stood on her tiptoes and peered inside the tall hamper.

  It
was full of laundry.

  “Damn it,” she muttered under her breath, “why can’t they make these things shorter?” Twenty-eight-year-old Nia had topped out at five-two. Usually she could mask her short stature with determination, but the hamper didn’t care how tough she was, it still came up past her breasts. She had two choices—dive in and hope for the best or hang back and wait.

  The sound of an engine and the rhythmic beep of a truck backing into the loading dock told her that “wait” was the better option. Darting behind a half-open door, she pressed her eye to the crack by the hinge and congratulated herself on a fine hiding spot.

  She’d be a good investigator. No matter what certain people thought, she was going to make it. It had been her dream for nearly ten years now, ever since she’d first heard the stories about a swashbuckling HFH doctor saving the world.

  “Come on, let’s get it loaded and get out of here. This stuff gives me the creeps.” Short Whiny Guy’s voice preceded him onto the loading dock. Cadaver Man, looking grayer in the half-light, unlatched the back of the laundry truck and ran up the door. Nia froze.

  That was no laundry truck.

  An empty gurney was secured to one side. Equipment sprouted from every flat surface and dangled from the ceiling. A faint white mist wafted out, as though the air-conditioning had been turned from “chill” to “preserve.”

  “Ay-uh. We wouldn’t want to keep him waiting for his things, would we?” Cadaver Man, who hadn’t spoken up to this point, gave a ghastly grin that was at odds with his down-home Maine accent.

  Nia’s pulse raced. Her first night on the job and she already had a huge break. If she got on that van and figured out where it was headed, what it was doing, then she could solve the case in a single night.

  Score one for Nia French.

  Short Whiny Guy pushed the laundry hamper across a narrow ramp and into the cleared center of the cargo area. The cart’s dirty canvas and worn wheels looked in congruous amidst so much stainless-steel and high-tech equipment.

  “Come on, guys, give me a break here,” Nia whispered, her burst of optimism draining when Short Whiny Guy climbed into the back with the laundry hamper, as though it was his job to watch over the dirty linens. Cadaver Man shut the door and latched it securely.

  Damn. Now what was she going to do? Her car was parked in the main garage on the other side of the hospital, so there was no way she could follow the men. Unless…

  Her eyes narrowed on the back bumper of the van, which was fitted with a hydraulic cargo lift. The lift was wide and flat, with plenty of hand holds. She could jump right on.

  She touched her back pocket and was reassured by the shape of her miniature tool kit. Given the chance, she might even be able to get the van open.

  Cadaver Man reached up and pulled the loading dock’s garage door down, but the vehicle was still visible through a smaller opening nearby.

  Nia’s heart pounded as the van’s engine started up. She rubbed her sweaty palms against her dark jeans and slipped out from the hiding spot.

  “I can do this,” she said, reaching for the latch of the outer door as Cadaver Man ground the gears, searching for first. “I can do this. I can—”

  “Oh, no you don’t!” Rough hands grabbed Nia, spun her and shoved her up against the wall, into the deep shadows. She panicked and screeched in terror.

  Her assailant was taller than she, though only by seven or eight inches, and his rangy body jostled against hers as they struggled. She shoved against him. “Let me go!”

  Oh, God, had she missed a third man? Panic spurted through her veins, and she shot an elbow at her attacker’s chin in a one-two move that her self-defense instructor had assured her should be followed by a knee to the groin.

  Her captor blocked the elbow, but his grip slackened. “Nadia?”

  She knew his voice instantly, but it was too late to stop the “two” of her one-two attack. She kneed him right where it hurt. Hard.

  Rathe McKay, the most famous of HFH’s investigators—and Nia’s first lover—went pale, sank to the floor and wheezed.

  Outside, the van revved and pulled away, its occupants unaware of the scuffle behind them on the loading dock.

  Nia stood, stunned, as emotions battled within her. Guilt that she’d hurt him. Confusion as to why he’d sneaked up on her and why he was even in the hospital. And above all else, excitement at seeing him again after all this time.

  Although his desertion had nearly destroyed her before, he still had the ability to leave her breathless. Because, damn it, even curled up on the floor, swearing, Rathe McKay looked good to her. Real good.

  His close-cropped hair was lighter than she remembered, prematurely silver, though he was only thirty-eight. The seven years since she’d last seen him had added new lines to his angular face, making him look older than his calendar age even as they added to his appeal. His wide shoulders and chest spoke of coiled energy, and his arms and legs still boasted the leashed power she remembered, the grace that could carry him soundlessly through rainforests or dance him elegantly through the classiest ballroom.

  And his eyes, when he opened them, still stared through her as though he could see into her soul.

  “Rathe, I’m so sorry—” Horrified guilt swamped the shock. She offered a hand, but paused when a terrible possibility occurred. She withdrew her hand. “What are you doing here?”

  He scowled, though something else moved in his eyes. Surprise, maybe, or wariness. Then those abstract emotions were gone, blanked out by the familiar stoniness. “I should’ve known something was wrong when Wainwright wouldn’t tell me who I’d be training.”

  Rathe was her mentor? No. Impossible. Her stomach roiled, though there could be no other explanation for his presence at Boston General in the wee hours of the morning. But how had their boss, Jack Wainwright, managed it? Everyone knew Rathe McKay only took exotic assignments overseas. And more important, everyone knew he didn’t work with women.

  Nia was one of the few who knew why.

  Dismay pounded in her temples. She couldn’t work with Rathe. He would ruin everything.

  “No,” she whispered. “This can’t be happening.”

  “My thoughts exactly.” Rathe cursed in Russian, his voice dark and rich like the language. “Was that kick for—” he sucked in a pained breath and straightened slowly “—self-defense, or for what happened before?”

  The question jabbed right beneath her heart. She wasn’t prepared for this. Wasn’t prepared for him.

  “Before?” Though guilt stung—she wouldn’t have kicked him if he’d identified himself as friend rather than foe—she wasn’t willing to apologize again. Wasn’t willing to be vulnerable to him again. She crossed her arms and stared at the ceiling to buy a steadying moment. For all the times she’d thought about seeing Rathe again, this scenario didn’t even come close to what she’d imagined. “Let me see. Would that be before when you took my virginity, kicked me out of your hotel room and disappeared without a word…or before when my father, your best friend, begged you to come visit him on his deathbed and you never showed?”

  Eyes dark, Rathe advanced on her, walking gingerly. She stood her ground and lifted her chin so she could glare scalpels at him, though her stomach knotted with nerves and a flare of traitorous warmth. They stared at each other for a heartbeat. Two.

  Finally he turned away, muttering, “This is why women shouldn’t be allowed in Investigations—they can’t separate their personal lives from their professional ones.”

  And there it was. Rathe McKay’s motto: Women Don’t Belong in the Field. Period.

  Denial howled in Nia’s head, in her heart, but she held the emotions in check because, damn it, he was right. This wasn’t the time or place to bring up the past. She had a job to do.

  And part of that job was proving to her HFH mentor that she was a capable investigator, fully ready to work in the field.

  So she found a frosty smile that hopefully showed nothing of her tum
ultuous emotions. “You’re right. I apologize for being unprofessional. What’s done is done. Jack Wainwright said he was pairing me with an older, more experienced investigator, so I suppose I should be honored he chose you. You’re as old and experienced as they get.”

  It was a low blow, aimed at what her father had laughingly called Rathe’s Methuselah complex. Though only ten years her senior, the HFH superoperative had always acted twice that.

  He narrowed his eyes and scowled. “There won’t be an investigation. I’m calling Wainwright in the morning and having you reassigned. This is no place for…” He gestured as though the words were unnecessary.

  “This is no place for a woman?” Nia clenched her fists at her sides. Though the HFH Head Office didn’t discriminate, there were a few old warhorses who did. Rathe, who’d been in the field more than fifteen years already, considered himself one of them.

  “This is no place for Tony’s daughter!” He grabbed her by the arms and shook her as though she was eighteen years old again and he’d caught her prying into his field notes. “For God’s sake, Nadia. You know this isn’t what your father wanted for you. What would he say?”

  Righteous anger speared through her. “He’s dead. The last thing he said on this earth was, ‘Where’s Rathe?’” And for that she had hated them both.

  Emotion darkened his eyes, though she wasn’t sure that it was remorse. He spread his hands. “Nadia, for what it’s worth, I’m—”

  “Don’t,” she interrupted, not willing to hear the apology, not willing to let him think that a betrayal of such magnitude could be scrubbed away with a few words. “Don’t bother. You’re right, this isn’t the time or the place for personal conversations. We have a job to do.”

  She turned and stalked toward the freight elevators at the far end of the subbasement.