She hadn’t bothered to remove her gown and her hands wereresting in her lap, the garment liberally smeared with blood. It had never struck her as gruesome before, but it did now. That had been a person on that table, not a patient. A person who had put his trust in her and his life in her hands.
The tears turned to sobs. What was she doing? She wasn’t cut out for this. Sara had been right. She should be making jewelry and selling incense sticks in a kitschy store on the boardwalk, not pretending to be a doctor.
“Josie.”
Damn it. Houston.She ducked her head and swiped at her eyes, choking back a sob. “Just give me a minute, please.” Her voice was shaky and high-pitched.
If he had been decent, the least teeny bit considerate of her feelings, he would have hung back until she said it was okay. Or he would have just left her alone. Instead, Houston sat down on the bench next to her, brushing her arm with his, and setting her frazzled and tangled emotions nearly skidding over the edge.
Having to deal with him and his confident, seductive looks would be downright impossible right now. She turned away from him in irritation. “Do you mind?”
“Yes, I do.” He paused. “You did a good job in there.”
Astonished, she gaped at him. “Are you crazy? I almost killed him!”
She wanted to take the words back immediately. They revealed far too much of her fears, and Houston did not want to listen to her whining and pouting.
“No.” Houston shook his head. “That’s not true and you know it. You saved that man in there. You can’t beat yourself up over something that you had no control over.”
Really, she appreciated the attempt on his part to make her feel better, but right now she just wanted to be alone. Houston Hayes knew nothing about how it felt to not be up to the job, how to always scrape and fight and try and never be the best at anything. To always doubt and to wonder and to second guess.
“I was too slow. If I had been faster, he wouldn’t have arrested.”
“I’ll say it again. You saved him, Josie. I’m sure he arrested because of an undiagnosed deep thrombosis in his calf. It traveled up his bloodstream and caused a pulmonary embolism. It was a ticking time bomb. We just happened to be there when it went off.”
It made sense as an explanation for what had happened. If there was a thrombosis, the man could have arrested for any surgeon. It wasn’t her fault.
But somehow that didn’t make her feel any better. Josie wiped her damp cheeks and sat there hunched over, her heart sick.
“Patients die. That’s a fact of medicine. You do your best and that’s all anybody can expect.”
But that was the problem. That was where the doubt lay. She couldn’t stop herself from whispering, “What if my best isn’t good enough?”
Houston shrugged. “Sometimes it won’t be.”
His matter-of-fact manner appalled her. “I can’t believe you can just sit there and act like it doesn’t matter that someone dies!”
His jaw clenched, but he took her hand with his left and gave a gentle squeeze. “Of course it matters. But I’m a surgeon. My job is to fix the disease, the illness, or the injury. That’s it. Sometimes I’m not going to be able to do that. I’m not a miracle worker. I can’t fix what isn’t fixable.”
Despite trying darn hard to ignore it, Josie was finding comfort in his strong hand over hers, the familiar scent of him as he sat close to her, body touching hers. Houston had all the poise and self-confidence that she lacked. And when he was like this... warm and caring and personable, she found herself unable to resist him.
This was the Houston she had come to care about, admire, and respect. One who gave his very best and cared about each and every one of his patients, whether he wanted to admit it or not.This was the Houston she was fast developing feelings for that reached far beyond admiration and attraction.
“Surgery is impersonal, Josie. Not because the surgeon is cold-hearted, but because it has to be. When you’re in that OR, it’s about fixing the problem. Doing your job and doing it correctly. Like with Mrs. Frenske. You do a great job, but you hesitate.” He smiled a little, nudging her with his knee. “I told you before and I’ll say it again. You need to display a little arrogance like most surgeons and just do it. Own it.” There probably wasn’t an arrogant bone in her body. Maybe he had her share.
“That’s easy for you to say. Just do it. Well, it’s not like that for me. I have to look in the mirror every day, and I don’t see a professional, intelligent surgeon staring back at me. I have to work harder to earn respect, I have to force people to take me seriously.”
Agitated, she stood up, wanting to get away from him and his perfection. “You can’t understand that. You’ve probably never doubted yourself a day in your life. Lately, that’s all I have.”
God, she was going to cry. Tears were hovering, threatening, embarrassing little bastards, ready to show him just how inadequate she was. He, who was always in control, watching her spin way, way out of it.
“Josie.” Houston stood, and he was going to touch her and she wanted to hide, crawl inside her own skin and get away from him.
“Don’t, please. Just leave me alone. I’m an emotional wreck and you’re embarrassing me.”
But he didn’t leave her alone. Instead he took her hands in his, spun her around until she was facing the full-length mirror between the rows of lockers.
Josie winced as she saw herself, the blood-stained gown emphasizing her roundness, making her look like Frankenstein’s goony sidekick. She had dark circles under her eyes, mussed hair from the cap, and she wanted to ignore it all, to pretend that she was gorgeous and confident and could waltz into a surgery and take charge.But she couldn’t.