“No.” He laughed, putting up both hands in defeat.
“You know what? Here’s an idea. That woman wants to revise our budget? Maybe she should move her fancy self down here for a month—sit here where we actually do the job of taking care of the patients. I’d like to see what she thinks is fluff after that.”
Josh raised his eyebrows, picturing those black heels and that business suit down here among the scrubs and Crocs. Fish out of water didn’t even begin to describe it.
On one hand, he loved the idea of sending her a strong message—You want to cut our budget? Then come down here and see that budget at work. On the other hand, having that tight little body, long chestnut hair, and sharp-as-a-tack brain that close to him for days on end could be very, very dangerous.
He smiled.
Now this was an idea.
* * *
For the second time in two days, Delaney stepped off the elevator on the third floor. For the second time, she fought back the panicky feeling that came with the mixed scent of disinfectant and sick children. For the second time, she had to lean on the jungle-painted wall and focus on her breathing before she could make her feet walk down the hallway.
She massaged her temples, trying to quell the images that flew into her head when she saw the bright lights, the polished floors, the damn stripes.
Ten deep breaths later, she turned toward the nurses’ station, trying to make her stride purposeful but casual. She’d find Dr. Mackenzie, she’d make an attempt to get him to talk, and it if didn’t work, she’d leave. From now on, they’d meet elsewhere. She couldn’t survive another trip down this hallway without a panic attack.
Just as she went by the nurses’ station, a blond woman dressed in hot pink scrubs popped up from her computer and waved a hand.
“May I help you?”
Delaney scanned her quickly. This must be one of the legendary ward secretaries Megan was always talking about. Underpaid, overworked, and the holder of mucho power, they were reputedly a force to be reckoned with.
Delaney looked down the hallway toward Dr. Mackenzie’s office. His door was open, but from this angle, she couldn’t tell whether he was in there.
“I’m just here to see Dr. Mackenzie.”
Delaney turned to keep walking, but the woman cleared her throat purposefully. “And you are?”
“Delaney Blair. I need to follow up on a meeting we had yesterday. I’ll check his office to see if he’s there.” Delaney gave a quick smile and took two steps toward the office before she heard the woman clear her throat again.
She turned to see the woman holding out a yellow note-pad. “I’m Therese, and he’s busy. If you would be so kind as to leave your name, I’ll be happy to pass along the message that you were here.”
The words were delivered in a proper, syrupy way, and a tight smile accompanied them, but it definitely didn’t reach Therese’s eyes as she handed Delaney the pad and a pen.
Delaney looked around, taking in the bustle of the hallway. The place defined controlled chaos, but she didn’t see him anywhere. Whether that was because he was busy or because he was avoiding her, she didn’t know.
She matched Therese’s fake smile. “Do you know when he might be free?”
“He’s never free.” Therese shrugged. “And I’m not saying that to be difficult. It’s just the truth.”
Delaney reluctantly took the pen and pad, writing her name and office extension on it before handing it back over the counter.
“Thank you,” Therese said, again with the smile. “Have a good day, now.”
Delaney sighed as she turned back down the hallway. She had a niggling suspicion that piece of paper would hit the trash before she got to the elevators. If his staff had gotten wind that she was on the floor talking about budget cuts, she knew the reception would be decidedly chilly.
“Ms. Blair? Back so soon?”
Delaney’s head snapped up at the sound of Dr. Mackenzie’s voice. He was striding toward her, a grim smile on his face.
“Hi. Hello—hi.” Delaney cringed. She sounded like a thirteen-year-old with a nervous crush.
He stopped walking, putting his hand on her bicep to steer her out of the way of a rolling cart headed their way.
She hated how much her bicep liked it.
Today he had on a dark green Oxford shirt and a black tie under his white coat, and the way the color set off the unique mix of dark blue and green in his eyes was downright swoony. If she had to name a crayon after the color, she’d call it angry ocean.
Of course, maybe it was her that was bringing out the angry part.
Now that he was standing so close, she could report back to Megan that he was the perfect height. A head taller than her, with shoulders that spoke to a football history and a waist that spoke to a five-mile-a-day running habit.
“I assume you’re here to see me?” He raised his eyebrows.
“Yes. I am. Yes.” She fought to stop scanning his body. It was destroying her ability to actually put words together. His eyes were a mix of wary and amused, and the way they were looking at her made her swallow nervously.
He looked at his watch. “So what can I do for you?”
“I just wanted to—see if we might schedule a follow-up meeting … maybe take another shot at my list?”
“So yesterday’s meeting wasn’t just a bad dream, then?” His eyes were amused as he took her arm again, steering her out of the way of a stretcher this time. She was probably imagining it, but he didn’t seem to let go as quickly as he had the first time.
She pushed back her shoulders. “Bad dream for who?”
“Touché.” He smiled, and she got all foolishly melty inside. What was wrong with her? She could smell his spicy aftershave—just a hint of it—and hated that she wanted to step a little closer to get a better whiff.
He leaned against the wall, arms crossed. “So what happens after I convince you there’s nothing to cut here? Seems to me you’ve got quite a lot of skin in the game. If your job’s on the line, I’m a little mystified as to how you could possibly stay objective.”
Did she hear a note of sympathy in his voice? Or was she just wishing she did?
“It’s my job to stay objective, and I will make every effort to do so. That’s all I can promise.”
He sighed, looking over her shoulder and down the hallway. Then his eyes landed on hers. “Okay. Then in the spirit of cooperation, I’ll make every effort to give you the information you need, but I have to tell you, I won’t be party to making cuts that impact my patients.”
“Understood.”
It was really the best she could hope for at this juncture, even though she was starting to fear that there was the very real chance that any cut would impact his patients.
He pointed down the hallway. “Look around you, Delaney. Do you see anybody standing around? See anyone who doesn’t look busy?”
Against her will, she followed his hand with her eyes. She already knew what she would see: nurses in bright scrubs dodging in and out of rooms, therapists dodging nurses, and parents doing their best to dodge everyone as they prayed for miracles.
But she’d known this before she’d ever pressed the third-floor button—known it in a way Dr. Mackenzie would never, ever guess.
He raised his eyebrows. “So, should we find a time to discuss your list?”
“I’m ready when you are.”
He paused, studying her eyes for an uncomfortably long moment. Then he turned, motioning for her to follow.
“I have an idea. Come with me.”
“Where are we going?” Delaney stepped quickly to catch up with him as he headed down the hallway.
He turned back, a half smile on his face and challenge in his eyes.
“To your new office, Ms. Blair.”
Chapter 5
“What are you talking about?” Delaney’s voice sounded small as Josh led her to the empty office at the end of the hallway.
Office was actually a
kind word for the closet-sized space, but it had the necessities: a desk, two chairs, and—well, nothing else, really. He flipped on the light and motioned for her to look inside, trying not to notice the panicky waves practically wafting off her skin.
“Here. Sit.” Josh indicated the ancient desk chair, while he grabbed the even more rickety one squeezed into the corner.
She stepped in and looked down at the desk chair, like she wasn’t sure it would hold her.
“When’s the last time you guys got new furniture down here?”
“I don’t know. 1968?”
She sat gingerly, and he tried not to notice how her blouse gave a peekaboo view to a lacy purple camisole as she did so.
“Okay, I’m sitting. And I’m noticing that your furniture is decrepit. Is that the point you’re trying to make?”
“Actually, no. Side benefit, I guess.” He sat down in his chair, and it made an ominous creak. Her arms were crossed, defensive as hell, and he almost felt guilty for dragging her into this sorry excuse for an office.
Almost.
Yesterday she’d come down here in that prim little suit that had left a lot to the imagination. Today she had on a filmy blouse with the sexy shell thing underneath, a long skirt, and high-heeled boots that probably ended somewhere close to her knees. Her light brown hair was wavy against her face, and her eyes were the same smoky blue as her blouse—the same blue as his bedroom wall, actually.
For an insane moment, he imagined what her porcelain skin would look like after a long, hot kiss, then had to rip his eyes away before she noticed him—noticing.
“Listen, Delaney.” He shifted his weight in the chair, trying to corral his wandering thoughts. “I’m going to be really straight with you, because I don’t have time to be anything but straight.”
Her eyebrows went up, but she didn’t speak.
He leaned forward. “See, here’s the thing. I think it’s probably far too easy to get disconnected, sitting up on the sixth floor working on your computer all day long. Not your fault. It’s just the reality of it.”
“I’m perfectly well connected, doctor.”
He paused. “Are you ever going to call me by my first name?”
“Probably not.”
Fine. She was maintaining professional distance so it wouldn’t feel personal when she slashed his funding to shreds. He could see how the technique probably worked for her.
So why did he want so badly to hear his own name on her lips?
He shook his head. Focus, Mackenzie.
“I think, if you really are interested in pediatric programming—if you’re truly invested in making the right financial decisions for this department—then you need to be part of this department.”
“Meaning—what?”
“Meaning … I think you should relocate your office.”
“Relocate my—are you insane?”
“Only on Thursdays. Which it isn’t.” He looked at the ceiling. “I don’t think.”
“You are nuts. You really think I’m going to move my office down here?”
He laughed. He couldn’t help it. Her cheeks were reddening by the second, and her body was as tense as a jaguar in a cage. He couldn’t tell whether she was afraid, or just royally pissed off, but either way, he was definitely getting to her.
He put out a placating hand. “Temporarily.”
“How temporarily?”
“Until you get the information you need.”
She uncrossed her arms and leaned her elbows on the desk. He swallowed when he caught another glimpse of purple lace under her very proper blouse. Was she purposely trying to distract him?
“Has it occurred to you that maybe I already have the information I need? That maybe I’m just being polite by involving you at all?”
“You don’t. You aren’t.” He pushed his eyebrows upward. “You need me.”
He paused, the words feeling strangely enticing on his tongue. Her cheeks darkened. She’d heard them, too.
“You’re awfully confident, doctor.”
He leaned back, creaky chair be damned. “I am. But I’ll sweeten the pot. I will promise to answer your questions, give you access to whatever numbers you need, and be fully invested in this exercise.”
“If I live down here on your floor.”
“For two weeks.”
“Two—no.”
A flush crept up her neck as she looked out the window into the hallway. He watched her eyes skate back and forth, tracking on the bustling nurses, and when he slid his own eyes down her face, he caught on the pulse flipping madly just below her earlobe.
He saw her swallow hard, then reach down to adjust her boot. When she was upright again, he could swear her eyes were shiny, but she blinked quickly.
Uh-oh. He’d just hit a nerve.
She took a deep breath and turned back to him. “Fine. I will come down here. But I will do it for one week.”
He toyed with agreeing, but something made him push. “Two.”
“One.”
He smiled at her fierce pose. Fine. Let her win this one.
“One, then.” He stood up, opening the door for her. “But I bet you’ll be begging for a second week by the time you finish the first.”
She brushed past him into the hallway. “We’ll see.”
As she went by him, he caught her vanilla scent, and he caught himself leaning to catch another whiff before she was gone.
She headed down the hallway, then stopped and turned to face him.
“I hope you don’t regret this, doctor.”
* * *
“He wants you to move into a closet for two weeks? Because he thinks that will somehow convince you not to cut his budget?” Megan sat down in Delaney’s guest chair fifteen minutes later, sliding a salad across the desk, then opening her own.
“Something like that.”
“I can’t believe you agreed to it.”
“It didn’t feel like there were a lot of other choices, Megan. He’s convinced I’m just another clueless sixth-floor exec.”
“Which, of course, you are not.” Megan raised her eyebrows. “Right?”
“Of course I’m not.” Delaney looked out her window, taking in the lake view, and suddenly felt guilty. From her two brief forays downstairs, she now knew that most of the rooms on the pediatric floor looked out on the facades of parallel wings. All day long, her sixth-floor office was flooded with natural sunlight, while down on the third floor, the only view was … brick.
While she worked in her quiet office on a quiet, carpeted wing of a quiet, security-code-required floor, the floors below her buzzed like beehives, chronically understaffed and overpopulated with patients.
But did that really make her disconnected? It was her job to be up here on the sixth floor. She spent her days poring over budget sheets and projections and expenditures, working her hardest to make decisions that would have the best possible impact on patient care. Did people like Dr. Mackenzie not believe that? Did doctors and nurses really feel like the sixth floor was so isolated from the rest of the hospital that its residents had no idea how the medical facility really ran on a day-to-day basis?
She swallowed.
Could they be … right?
Megan propped a foot on Delaney’s desk. “Maybe he’s looking for an excuse to work more closely with you. Have you considered that?”
Delaney swallowed a snort. The man oozed sex appeal, and from what she’d seen downstairs, he was surrounded by young, perky, blond nurses who would probably love to have his babies. She, on the other hand, was a nerdy sixth-floor accountant.
Fat chance.
“No, Megan. Attraction—mutual or otherwise—is definitely not at play here.”
Megan’s eyes widened. “You just said mutual.”
Delaney rolled her eyes and shrugged. “He’s sex on a stick, for God’s sake. He’s like an underwear model mixed with a linebacker mixed with a television doctor. It’s a wonder we don’t have moms faking thei
r kids’ illnesses just to come in and be treated by him.”
“Not funny. That happens, you know.”
“I know.” She grimaced. “Bad word choice.”
Megan leaned forward. “So he’s just as hot up close? Better than his online profile?”
“To-die-for hotter.”
“Lucky.” Megan frowned and went back to eating her salad.
“Ha. Lucky would be me and Dr. Mackenzie getting assigned to some awesome project where we had to spend endless hours deciding how to spend oodles of money. Instead, I get to spend the next few weeks on a floor that gives me hives, slashing the heck out of a budget while pissing off the most gorgeous eligible bachelor in the entire hospital. Go, me.”
“Okay, so maybe not ideal.”
“You think?” Delaney put down her fork, her appetite dismal. “I don’t know, Meg. What if Dr. Mackenzie’s right? What if budget cuts really would do serious damage to pediatrics at this point?”
“Do you have the option of recommending that the current budget stand?”
“No. Gregory said the cuts have to happen across the board. You and I both know people try to build insulation into their budgets, but we’ve had three rounds of cuts in the past three years. I’m starting to wonder if there’s any insulation left.”
“I can’t believe he dared to mention firing you.”
Delaney shrugged again, exhausted. “Money has to come from somewhere, right? It’d be one less salary to pay. And in his defense, he included himself on the could-be-fired list.”
“You really think it could happen?”
“I really do. You’ve seen the numbers. It’s never been this bad. And now the board’s compressed us into a thirty-day window, so we don’t have time for the normal back and forth. I need Dr. Mackenzie to sit down with me, go over my proposed cuts, and come up with some sort of working compromise. Like, yesterday.”
“Okay. Sounds like a plan.” Megan put her fork down and pulled out her phone. “When are we doing this?”
Delaney felt her eyebrows rise. “We?”
“Yes, we. Aren’t I your humble, trusty assistant?”
Heart Like Mine Page 4
