Page 15 of The Bad Brother
I’m trying, Tank.
I’m really fucking trying.
“HEY, SLOANE—DR. RAGNAR WANTS TOsee you.”
When I hear it, I feel my gut clench and my spine stiffen in response, even though I knew it was coming. Sooner or later, I was going to have to answer for what happened and with Ragnar, you can always pretty much count on it being sooner. “Okay.” I give the second-year resident who played messenger a brief head bob and a bland smile without looking up from the chart I’m staring at. “Thanks for letting me know.”
Making a final notation in the chart, I wait for the resident to walk away before I flip it closed and hand it back to the nurse waiting on my orders. “Everything looks good.” I give Rita—the most seasoned RN we have—a satisfied nod. “You can start her transfer paperwork,. Are her parents here?”
Heris a seventeen-year-old unaccompanied minor whowas traveling from Dallas to Shreveport to spend a long weekend with her father when the bus crash shattered her femur in three places. I had to put in steel rods to replace the bone and do a complete knee replacement. She was a cheerleader and captain of her high school’s varsity volleyball team. She’ll be lucky if she re-learns how to walk by next year’s graduation. It’s been a week since the crash and now that she’s stable, I’ve made arrangements for her to be transported to our sister hospital in Dallas.
“Her mother’s here,” Ruth confirms while taking the chart. “She’s going to ride in the ambulance with her.”
“Perfect.” Backing away from the nurses’ station, I jam my hands into the pocket of my lab coat. “Let me know when the paperwork is ready—I’d like to be the one to deliver the good news.”
“Will do.” Ruth gives me a small nod. “Anything else?” “No, that’s it.” Giving her the same bland smile I gave Ragnar’s messenger, I turn away from the nursing station to make my way to the elevator, catching more than a few stares and whispers along the way. Everyone knows what happened and everyone is talking about it behind my back. Unfortunately, that’s not all they’re talking about.
I heard her fiancé dumped her for the best friend.
One of the orderlies said she’s been sleeping in her car and showering here. No wonder she’s been pulling back-to-back shifts.
Her parents are so rich. I don’t know why she doesn’t just move back in with them.
The last one is easy.
Because I’ve been avoiding my mother ever since Amy and Ethan sent me that disgusting video and I can’teffectively do that if I show up on her doorstep with my suitcase in hand, begging for a bed to sleep in.
She knows. I’m sure she knows. By this time, everyone in ClearwaterandBarrett knows that Ethan called off the wedding—and in true Celeste Barclay fashion, she’s decided that what happened is entirely my fault.
What did you expect, Sloane? A man can only take so much neglect before he starts to stray. If you spent as much time tending to his needs as you do at that ridiculous hospital, it never would’ve happened.
That was the gist of the last voicemail she left me. My cellphone’s voicemail is full of them. So full that she can’t leave me anymore.
Stepping off the elevator, I move down the hall of the administration floor, on my way to my mystery ass-chewing, reveling in the calm before the storm. Dr. Ragnar is our chief of staff and rules with an iron fist. She wouldn’t waste her time or mine, calling me into her office, for anything less.
Stopping in front of her closed door, I take a moment to get myself together before I knock. On the other side, I can hear the murmur of voices—female—the tone of one, in particular, sending my heart rocketing into my throat.
Oh god.
Can this week get any shittier?
Reaching into my coat pocket, I dig out a preemptive Atomic Warhead, unwrapping it and popping it into my mouth, before squaring my shoulders and knocking on the door in front of me.
“Come in.”
Stay calm, Sloane—you got this.
Grabbing the knob, I give it a turn, pushing the door open on a sight that nearly leads me to swallowing the sour candy in my mouth.
Dr. Ragnar, my mentor, boss, and omnipotent god of the trauma surgery department, is waiting for me.
With my mother.
“See?” My mother lifts a hand and jabs it at me as if my mere existence proves her point in some unknown argument. “Just look at what working here has done to her. She might as well?—”
“Mother.” The word comes out harder than I intend and out of the corner of my eye, I see Dr. Ragnar’s eyebrows shoot into her hairline. “What are you doing here?”
My mother opens her mouth but before she can start in, Dr. Ragnar answers for her. “Mrs. Barclay has been downstairs, in the hospital’s lobby, demanding to see you for the last forty-five minutes, while alluding to the fact that we’ve been holding you here against your will.” Lifting a hand from her desk, she flips it at my mother. “She even called the Sheriff.”
