“Sorry, Becky.” Adam looked so smug she was fairly certain he wasn’t sorry at all. In fact, he might as well have admitted he planned the whole thing. “It’s something the board has wanted to do for a while. We just needed somebody with experience to be able to carry it off. Judging by the clips you showed me when I hired you, you’re the right person for the job.”
“Yes, but following a doctor around for a month?” She closed her eyes and groaned. “What can I learn in a month that I couldn’t learn in twenty-four hours, or in a series of interviews?”
He shrugged. “A month-long blog about your experiences with the doctor could be invaluable PR for the hospital, and I know you’ll do it right. Besides, what are you complaining about? You don’t even know who the doctor is yet.” He handed her another folder.
She opened it to find an eight-by-ten glossy portrait of Dr. John Grant. She stared at the handsome, stony face, then back at Adam. “This has got to be somebody’s idea of a joke.”
“Nope.” The shake of Adam’s head was final. “He’s just won some doctor of the year award or something, which makes it a perfect opportunity to implement the board’s plan. What’s the problem, anyway, Becky? You play your cards right, this is a byline in a real paper. Probably front page of the Lifestyle section. I’m betting the blog will get a hundred hits a day.”
Becky fought a brief but intense internal battle with herself. She didn’t like this idea, but she knew it would be useless and unprofessional to say so. Besides, she didn’t want to admit John Grant scared her. “I don’t have a problem. But are you sure Dr. Grant’s willing to go along with this? He doesn’t seem like the type to put up with something like this. What was it you said he’d won?”
“It’s in there.” He flipped the pages of the folder to a faxed press release.
“Emergency Medicine’s Best Patient Relations.” She raised her eyebrows. “That’s actually pretty impressive.”
“Exactly.” His voice was firm. “As for John, don’t worry about it. He likes you.”
Becky blushed and looked at the picture of John Grant to cover her embarrassment, though seeing the sculpted face didn’t really help.
As if he’d read her mind, Adam added, “And at least he’s good-looking, right?”
She slapped the folder closed. “Thanks, Adam. I’ll get started on the background research right away.”
“All righty then.” He stood, looking uncertain and relieved at the same moment. “I’ll leave you to your work.”
She nodded, smiled and waved at Adam, biting the inside of her lip. “See you.”
Becky turned her attention to John’s CV, trying desperately not to look at the photo observing her with a disconcerting, sardonic grin from the opposite half of the folder. John Grant attended medical school at Johns Hopkins and looked like someone who had a big dog, something like a Labrador. He’d been a member of the AMA since graduating Johns Hopkins, but dress shirts didn’t really suit him, she could picture him in jeans and t-shirts. He did his internship and residency in Philadelphia. She thought jeans would look really good on him...
With a disgusted sigh about her own inability to concentrate, Becky compiled a list of contact names from the information in the folder. She spent most of the rest of the afternoon on the phone requesting transcripts and board scores. Finally, she left a message with a reporter from Emergency Medicine and glanced at her watch. Four thirty. John was on second shift, which began at four PM. She decided to do a little pre-assignment sleuthing.
Emergency room doctors worked eight-hour shifts beginning at eight AM, four PM and midnight. The department would be crowded with extra people at shift change, so no one would likely notice one extra person. Becky decided it would do no harm to sneak into the emergency room and take a peek just to prepare herself. She wasn’t due to follow him until the next week when he started days, and she thought she knew a place where she could observe a large part of the department without being seen.
Becky got into the emergency room without a problem by signing in with the security guard and showing her badge. The radiology reading room was as packed as ever with radiologists, techs and doctors hurrying past. No one noticed when she slipped in and sat on a stool near the door. Eventually the shift change died down and the crowd thinned, but the reading room was still dark and busy with people going to and fro. Becky sat very still in the corner and the busy staff milled about her without taking notice.
She had a good view of a large portion of the emergency room and spotted John Grant quickly. Becky bit her lip and leaned forward a little. He flipped through a chart, discussing it with one of the nurses. He looked good in scrubs, more natural than in his picture. The inevitable white coat was a little threadbare, but Becky could imagine it spreading out like a cape behind him as he rushed around barking orders.
Smiling a little, she rolled her eyes at her own silly fantasy. This wasn’t a soap opera, after all. Even though he had won Best Patient Relations, he was just one of many ER docs on duty and he was hardly superhuman. Still, Becky watched him with fascination as he handed the clipboard to the nurse and started across the room. The nurse gave him an appreciative look before turning away, and Becky grinned to herself. It looked as if Adam was right about John’s effect on women.
At that moment, a radiologist passed her and stuck his head out the door. “Dr. Grant,” he called, causing Becky to shrink further back into the shadows. She was momentarily horrified to catch a glimpse of John heading directly toward her hiding place. He passed so close she caught a whiff of his aftershave as he moved to join the radiologist at the light box.
Overcoming her alarm, she watched with interest as they discussed the films the radiologist mounted on the box. A few interesting phrases–pleural effusion, atelectasis, fracture of the lateral first rib–caught her ear and she made a mental note to look them up in the library. She decided she liked watching John Grant in action. He was more attractive in person than she remembered.
Becky suddenly realized how long she’d been sitting in a cramped position on the stool. Glancing at her watch, she saw it was after six o’clock. She should get home. Not that anyone was waiting for her–Ellen probably wouldn’t be home for hours–but still.
She stood while the two doctors had their backs to her and turned, bumping into a technologist as she came in with an armload of films. They hit the floor with an enormous racket, and Becky’s hopes of getting out unnoticed evaporated as she bent to help the tech pick up the scattered X-rays, trying to keep her face hidden behind her hair as she did so.
“You lost?” The tech studied her curiously, speaking around a wad of chewing gum. “I don’t think I know you.”
Becky chanced a quick look at John and felt a shock course down her spine as his gaze met hers with a flash of recognition. Her face burned with embarrassment, and she shoved the films she’d picked up back at the tech. “No, I’m not lost,” she muttered. “I was just leaving.” She exited the reading room to illustrate her point.
She didn’t pause in her panicked flight until she was at the end of the hall at the elevator. After pressing the button and saying a silent prayer that she hadn’t attracted as much attention as she was afraid she had, she glanced over her shoulder, half expecting to see John following her. The security guard relaxed at his post and everything seemed normal.
Becky heaved a sigh of relief. Of course there was no way John could know she had spent the afternoon staring at his picture, and besides, she hadn’t really done anything wrong. A little research, that was all.
So why did she feel guilty, as if she’d been acting like a lovesick schoolgirl with a crush on the teacher?
* * * *
Just as Becky reached her car, her cellphone rang. The number was unfamiliar, but she answered it as