“Ford?” Griffin’s voice tightens. “Is your father Bradley Ford?”
My stomach drops, and I freeze. “Yeah,” I answer. “You know my father?”
“I’ve met him.” Griffin leans on the side of the gurney next to his wife. “Cormac, you’ve known her father forever.”
“Yeah. And he’s the…dean here,” Cormac admits.
Ava snorts, but the laugh is edged in pain.
I feel my cheeks heat up. But the text from Mercy steals my focus. “Dr. Fredricks is prepping the OR at Mercy. He wants a pelvic ultrasound.”
“Copy that,” Cormac says to me and resets the machine.
“Shedoes the pelvic,” Griffin says, pointing to me. “Not you.”
Cormac is family… But when it comes to sticking a wand up a mob wife’s nether regions… They’d rather a female do it, even if she’s a stranger.
Cormac leaves the room to give Ava privacy. Prepping for the test, I catch the way the two of them look at each other. More so, the way the husband obviously adores his wife. My throat bobs. If this was a mafia-arranged marriage, it’s possible they didn’t know each other or even like each other at first.
Now look at them!
That will be Cormac in a few months. Married, spoken for. Unavailable. For some reason, I feel like breaking down.
I suck it up and focus, prepping the ultrasound wand and telling Ava what’s going to happen to relax her before I start the exam. I’ve done this test before during hospital rotations, and I call on my memory.
“Clear. The amniotic sac hasn’t ruptured,” I announce.
Griffin dips his head against his wife’s chest. “Thank God.”
With the good news, I decide to expand the ultrasound to look around and take additional measurements. Why not? More experience can never hurt.
“How far along are you?” I ask Ava.
“I’m thinking three months,” she answers.
Sounds like the pregnancy wasn’t planned. The way they can’t seem to keep their hands off each other, I imagine they’ve been boning like rabbits. And whoops, she’s preggers.
I angle the probe, adjusting slightly until the monitor flickers, then steadies on a second heartbeat.
I side-eye Ava. She said she hadn’t been to a doctor, so she doesn’t know she’s pregnant with twins. Am I authorized to tell her?
I pull the wand out, cover her, and snap off my gloves. “Excuse me.”
I head out into the hall to find Cormac, who’s talkingto a man of at least six-five, with curly auburn hair and wearing a suit.
Approaching them slowly, I say, “Dr. O’Rourke. I need you.”
His eyes fly my way, and I notice the tall guy’s eyes do, too. Then he nudges Cormac in my direction.
“She needs you, doctor,” he says smoothly with a sexy brogue.
“Go… Enforce your empire,” Cormac says and pushes him away.
Family. They’re family.
Mob.
God.