Robert Timkin, the Crilex CEO, had spun to Jack and everyone else involved that Avery would be there just to observe the trial for her own education. But the company knew she had concerns about the new device and had really hired her to evaluate the data, giving her the power to stop the rollout of the next trials if she thought it necessary.
Jack had worked on designing the new device and organizing the trial for over a year, and he’d doubtless flip out if the data forced her to shut it down.
“Working together.” His warm smile faded and his brows lowered in a frown. “I guess you’re right. That is a problem.”
“It is.” She drew a calming breath. “Listen. This afternoon was wonderful. A lovely day in a wonderful city between two strangers. But now we’re not strangers. And I have to be an objective observer as I gather data on the trial. From now on, we’re just working colleagues, nothing more.”
He stared at her silently for a moment, his expression serious, before he nodded. “You’re right. Business and pleasure never mix well.”
“No. They don’t.” Not to mention that she’d sworn off cardiologists for good.
He stepped forward and pulled her close, pressing his lips to hers in a soft, sweet kiss. Despite her words and thoughts and conviction, she found herself melting into him.
“That was from Jack to Avery. Thank you for an unforgettable day,” he whispered against her lips before he stepped back. “Dr. Dunbar will be meeting Dr. Girard tomorrow in the cath lab as we both concentrate on why we came to Paris. Okay?”
“Okay.”
He dropped one more lingering kiss on her mouth before he picked up her coat and draped it over her arm. She stepped out to the hall and the door clicked quietly behind her. She lifted her fingers to her lips, knowing with certainty this had been the only one-time fling she’d ever have. That she’d savor the memory, and pray that over the next thirty days it didn’t come back to sting her in more ways than one.
AVERY STOOD BEHIND a wall of glass to one side of the operating table in the hospital’s cath lab, watching the procedure on the X-ray fluoroscopy viewing monitor. She’d gowned and masked like everyone else in the room, but unlike anyone else, she held a tablet in her hand to record the notes she’d be taking.
“The prosthetic valve is made from cow tissue,” Jack said to the nurses and doctors assisting or observing the procedure, as he and Jessica Bowman, the nurse he’d brought with him from the States, readied the patient. “This version doesn’t require a balloon to open it as the previous one did.”
He continued to explain, as he had last night during his presentation, how a transcatheter aortic valve implantation, TAVI, worked. The details of how the catheter was designed, and why the stent and valve were in an umbrella shape, designed to push the diseased valve aside before the umbrella opened, seating the new valve in its place. With the procedure not yet started, Avery had a moment to watch him instead.
Today, he was all business, his dark eyes serious above his mask, his voice professional and to the point. In stark contrast to yesterday’s amusing and witty companion. As they’d laughed and walked through Paris, his eyes had been perpetually filled with interest and humor, his mouth curved in a smile, his attention on her as much as it had been on the landmarks she’d shown him.
A very dangerous combination, this Dr. Jack Dunbar. So dangerous she’d thrown caution off the top of the Eiffel Tower. Thank heavens they’d agreed that no more hot, knee-melting kisses or spontaneous sex could be allowed.
Though just thinking about those kisses and their all-too-delicious lovemaking made her mouth water for more.
She gave herself a little mental smack. Date a cardiologist? Been there, done that. Twice. Fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice, shame on me again. Fool me three times? Well, her genius status would clearly be in question.
Then there was the other sticky issue. Obviously, the best-case scenario would be for the device to work fabulously, for the trial to be a success and for it to be further rolled out to other countries and hospitals. After all, in the U.S. alone over one hundred thousand people each year were diagnosed with aortic stenosis, and a solid third of them were high risk who might not do well with traditional open-heart surgery or weren’t candidates at all.
But, from studying this stent and catheter, she worried that it didn’t fully address the significant problem of postoperative valve leakage and subsequent pulmonary edema, which her own design had not solved and was something she was trying to fix in her new prototypes.
“I’m going to establish a central venous line through the right internal jugular,” Jack said as he made an incision in the patient’s neck. “Then insert a temporary balloon-tip pacemaker. Both groin areas of the patient have been prepped, and I’ll next insert an introducer sheath into the femoral artery.”
Avery watched as his steady hands worked. After completing the first steps, he made another incision in the patient’s groin, moving the guide wire inside the artery. “Contrast dye, please, and monitor the heparin drip,” he said as he watched his maneuvering of the wires on the overhead screen. “You’ll see that it’s important to puncture the artery with a high degree of angulation to minimize the distance from the artery to the skin.”
The man was an incredibly skilled interventional cardiologist, that was obvious. She quickly focused on the careful notes she was taking to squash thoughts of the man’s many skills he’d thoroughly demonstrated to her yesterday. Why, oh, why, would she have to be around him every day when the whole reason she’d given in to temptation had been because she’d thought she’d never see him again?
Finally, he finished stitching the access sites and the patient had been moved to Recovery. Jack shook hands with all those in the room congratulating him.
“Thank you, but I’m just one cog in this wheel that will hopefully change valve transplantation forever,” Jack said. “One important cog is right here with us. The designer of the first catheter-inserted replacement valve, Dr. Avery Girard.”
Taken off guard, she felt herself blush as Jack turned, gesturing to her with his hand, then actually began to clap, a big smile on his face, as the others in the room joined him. She’d been keeping a low profile, and most of the hospital had just assumed she was a Crilex representative. Most cardiologists she knew—most definitely both of her old boyfriends—loved to play the big shot and preen at any and all accolades. Neither one of them would have shared the glory unless they had to.
“I appreciate your nice words, Dr. Dunbar,” she said, feeling a silly little glow in her chest, despite herself. “I have every hope that the new design you’ve helped develop will be the one that works. Congratulations on your first procedure going smoothly.”
“Thank you.” His warm eyes met hers, reminding her of the way he’d looked at her yesterday, until the doctors observing converged on him to ask questions and he turned his attention to them.
Avery took off her gown, mask and hat, and caught herself watching Jack speak to everyone. Listening to his deep voice and the earnest enthusiasm there. She wanted to stay, to listen longer, but forced herself to move quietly from the room to go through her notes. Limiting her interactions with him to the bare minimum had to be the goal, and since there was just one surgery scheduled today, there was no reason to hang around.
Satisfied that her notes were all readable, in order and entered correctly into her database, Avery walked toward the hotel, feeling oddly restless. She’d planned to work in her room, but a peculiar sense of aloneness came over her. Since when had that ever happened?
Still, the feeling nagged at her, and she stopped to work for a bit at a little café, which seemed like a more appealing choice. After a few hours she headed to her room and settled into a comfy chair with her laptop. Projects on her computer included