Chapter Eighteen

Ryan

It's never good news when a Human Resource manager is sitting across from you with a clipboard and a finger tapping on said clipboard. So as I sat down in Marcus's office next to Lauren, I waited for the hammer to fall.

"I've asked Maria from HR to join us for this conversation," Marcus began and I resisted the urge to glance over at Lauren.

I could see her knee bouncing and her fingers white from trying to stop it. I nodded with a weak smile at the older woman seated across from me, but she did not return the smile.

"I've received information that there may be something more than a professional, working relationship between the two of you," Marcus said, clearly choosing his words carefully. "Is that true?"

I kept silent, giving Lauren a chance to say what she wanted to say first. I'd take her lead, I told myself. Really I was childishly hoping that if we just stayed silent the issue might magically disappear and we'd get to leave.

"Who passed on this 'information'?" Lauren asked finally, her tone dark.

"That's confidential," Maria, the human resources' manager answered automatically as if she'd already anticipated the question. "And beside the point."

"I know it was Samuel," Lauren said, sitting closer to the edge of her seat and gripping Marcus's desk. "He recently wanted to reconnect and I turned him down and now he's on a witch hunt. You know him, Marcus. You know what he is like."

Marcus rubbed his temples and sighed. "Regardless," he said, sounding tired and defeated. "I need to know the nature of the relationship between you and Dr. Castle."

Lauren sat back and crossed her arms.

"And if there was something romantic between the two of us?" she asked. "I don't see why HR is here for the personal lives of two employees of the hospital. What business is it of yours what happens outside of these halls?"

I'm sure to anyone else Lauren sounded confident and sure of herself, but I knew differently. I could hear the fear. They could hear the slightest of quivers in her voice. I could see her fingers tugging at a stray hem as if it were her last lifeline.

I knew what this job meant to her. She'd built her reputation up over the years and I knew that wasn't easy, especially being a woman. She cared about her patients and her staff and I knew how devastating it would be for her to lose it all.

Marcus motioned over to Maria and we both turned to her.

"While we wouldn't be thrilled to hear of a relationship between an attending surgeon and her senior resident, even one who has not technically been formally offered that position," Maria started with reference to her terrifying clipboard, "you are correct in the sense that we would have little to say about it outside of these halls, as you put it. However, inside of these halls is a different matter entirely."

Someone needed to look into the A/C because I felt a sudden chill descend on the office. Lauren shifted uncomfortably next to me. She must have felt it grow colder, too.

"Again I cannot disclose the name of the party," Maria said in her robotic tone, "but we were informed that inappropriate behavior between the two of you was occurring on Graton's Gift grounds. Such behavior, Dr. Decker, is fireable."

The word was like a whip.

"We were told sexual relations took place here in the hospital, if I am to speak bluntly," Maria added.

"And you're just going to take this 'informant's' word as gospel truth?" Lauren asked.

Maria lifted her hand at the anger that was clearly slipping into Lauren's words.

"Of course not, Dr. Decker. We know you've worked here for a very long time with a nearly spotless record and--"

"Nearly?" Lauren interrupted.

Maria consulted her clipboard again and tapped her pen.

"Well, there was the one incident a year ago with your now ex-husband, Samuel Decker"

"Yeah, I know of him," Lauren said sarcastically. "What the fuck does he have to do with me?"

"Dr. Decker, please," Maria said, as even toned as before. "Let's keep it professional. We just noted that this isn't the first time your personal life has bled into your professional one."

Lauren laughed and leaned back in her chair, clearly not believing the words she was hearing. Frankly, I couldn't either.

"Marcus," Lauren said, "can we just get to the point of this fun little meeting of ours? I've got actual work to do."

She sent a pointed glance toward Maria. Marcus opened a folder on his desk and I strained my neck to see what was inside.

"What happened with the simulation this afternoon, Dr. Castle?"

He looked at me and I swallowed, feeling like a kid in the principal's office.

"I, um, I had a disagreement with Dr. Decker on how to proceed with the patient's surgery. It got more heated than I intended."

Marcus nodded. "Lauren?"

"I encourage my residents to challenge each other. Dr. Castle is eager to innovate and lost his place for a moment. That's it."

I glanced over at Lauren. Her knee was still bouncing furiously.

"I want to believe that was what it was, I really do," Marcus said.

I noticed another piece of paper he was fiddling with under the record of the simulation. I couldn't see what it was.

"The reason we do not encourage workplace relationships is for that very reason. This was just a dummy. But if it were a real patient?" Marcus shook his head. "Unacceptable."

"Exactly," Maria said. "So for the safety of our patients, we've been investigating the possibility of any wrongdoing from the two of you since receiving the disturbing information."

Shit.

"You've been investigating us?" Lauren asked.

"And from our investigation we've heard of some disturbing insubordination on the part of Dr. Castle. That added with the hostile and unsuccessful simulation earlier today is damning enough," Maria said. "But we found this as well."

I held my breath as Maria unclipped a piece of paper and slid it across the desk toward Lauren and I. I tried not to let my shoulders visibly sag when I saw it was a note I'd written to Lauren and slipped into a patient's report for her to find.

I remember writing it as if the ink wasn't even yet dried. It was when Lauren and I were falling for each other deeper and deeper and we couldn't stop touching each other or looking at each other or biting, licking, tasting each other. Anything we could take, we took. We were greedy. We were greedy and we were sloppy.

Clearly, my note was found. It just wasn't found by Lauren.

"Is that your handwriting, Dr. Castle?" Maria asked and I wouldn't have been surprised if it was the second or third time she'd had to repeat it.

My ears were stuffed with cotton as I stared at the torn piece of scrap paper with the unerasable black ink.

"Yes," I said, unsure if I'd even uttered the word aloud or if it was just echoing around in my mind. "Yes, I wrote it."

"And you wrote it to Dr. Decker?"

I nodded.

"And could you read it for me?"

I brought the note closer to me and cleared my throat.

"Dr. Castle, please."

I nodded and pushed my hair back from my forehead.

"It says: I had a dream last night you were naked on your desk wearing just your medical coat."

I winced even while reading the words aloud. It was damning alright. We'd never actually have sex at work. It was just a fantasy. But I doubted explaining that to the HR manager would do much for my cause.

"And you did write that to Dr. Decker?" Marcus asked again.

"Yes."

I heard Marcus sigh. “Dr. Castle, you obviously know how interested the hospital is to see you take on a permanent chief resident position with us. And Lauren, you know I think the world of you, personally and professionally. But we can’t have—”

I didn’t bother waiting to hear what he had to say next. All I knew is that Lauren’s professional reputation was taking a beating because of me. Because of how immature I’d been acting since she broke up with me. All along, she’d wanted to keep things professional between us. To protect her career. And I’d done the last thing I’d wanted to do. Hurt her.

Hurt the woman I loved.

Fuck, that’s why her breaking up with me had sent me into a tailspin.

I loved Dr. Lauren Decker.

"Dr. Decker rejected me," I blurted out before I'd even had time to consider the implications of them.

Marcus looked over at me in confusion and Maria turned to me with a jerky head movement befitting of the HR robot she was, but I only had eyes for Lauren who brushed her dark hair behind her ear and shook her head minutely.

"Dr. Castle?" Marcus asked.

My mind raced and I wiped my palms against my slacks. "I—I, um, I developed a crush I didn't expect on Dr. Decker and I asked her out, but she rejected me.”

"Ryan, you--"

"No, no," I said, spurned back into speech at Lauren's words. "I appreciate it, Dr. Decker. But this is all me."

I looked up at Marcus and Maria. "Dr. Decker doesn't want me to take the fall, but this is all on me. I took the rejection poorly, thus my recent bout of insubordination. I acted immaturely, because I wanted to be with her and she refused on the grounds of her professionalism. I was out of line and out of control. Dr. Decker refused my every advance."

Maria looked at Lauren."Dr. Decker, is this true?”

"Yes," I said for Lauren, but Maria held up a hand to silence me. "Dr. Decker?"

Lauren hesitated when the attention of the room fell to her. She looked to me and I saw the conflict written plainly across her face: take the fall with me or save her career, her reputation, her job.

Despite how things had ended with her, I wanted the best for her. I wanted only good things for her life. I wanted her to be happy.

I smiled at her and said softly, "It's okay."

I saw the pain in her eyes before she turned back to Maria. Ten seconds ticked by. Twenty. She opened her mouth to speak, but then Lauren’s cell phone rang even as it buzzed with an incoming text.

She checked the phone.

And instantly paled.

Eyes wide, she stood. “Oh God. It’s Samuel. He’s had a heart attack.”