Joss
A faint lemon smell greeted me when I opened the door to the room I’d commandeered as my new research hub. I closed my eyes and smiled. It was nice and clean. I’d had two dozen gourmet cupcakes delivered to Domestic Services along with my request that they fast-track the cleanup of this former storage room, and they’d come through.
I flipped on the light switch, and a bright glow filled the room. This was going to work out after all. I’d had my doubts when I first checked out the dusty space crammed full of outdated equipment, but it was perfect. Now I just needed to set things up for tomorrow.
When I stepped farther into the room, the lemon smell got stronger, and the warm, stuffy air made me wrinkle my nose. The place needed some air. I checked all four plain white walls for a thermostat but couldn’t find one.
Well hell. It didn’t matter how clean the room was if it felt like a jungle.
Stepping back into the doorway, I took a deep breath and collected my thoughts. My patients wouldn’t be here until ten tomorrow morning. Maybe a simple check of the air vents would fix this. I needed to page Mechanical Services.
OB was quiet tonight. We didn’t have anyone in labor, and that always created a more relaxed mood. And we tried to keep our floor quiet, anyway, because new moms and babies need their rest.
I sat down in front of a computer and typed out a message to Mechanical Services. Hopefully, whoever was on call could come right away. I wanted my first research meeting to go well tomorrow, and I didn’t want my patients fainting with the heat. Pregnant women were always hot, even under the best of circumstances.
Since I was sitting at the computer, I couldn’t resist the urge to check my email. Not surprisingly, there was nothing exciting there. A shipment notification for some shoes I’d ordered, several ads, and a reminder from my gynecologist that it was time for my annual pelvic exam.
I shook my head and blew out a breath. That was going to be the most action I’d had between my legs in quite a while. More than ten months, but who was counting? And even then, it’d been perfunctory sex with Dean, and I hadn’t even gotten off. It’d been well over a year since I’d had decent sex.
“Dr. Drake?”
The sound of a deep voice made me look up. Was the clenching of my lady parts due to my thoughts about sex or him?
Him, I decided as my gaze wandered from his dark, close-cropped hair to his chiseled cheekbones and dark eyes. He wore a gray button-down shirt with short sleeves that gave me a view of the lines of his biceps. On one pocket was a patch that said “TMC Mechanical Services.” And on the card hanging from his lanyard, I scanned the letters of his name: Carson Stephens. He wasn’t smiling in his hospital ID photo.
“I’m Dr. Drake,” I said, clearing my throat. “How can I help you?”
His brow furrowed. “I’m here to help you. You paged me? Something about a stuffy room?”
My cheeks warmed. “Right, sorry. I got wrapped up in something here, and . . . anyway, it’s this way.”
I led the way to my reclaimed storage room at the end of the hallway, where I’d left the lights on. Carson followed me in, glancing around wordlessly.
“It’s hot in here, don’t you think?” I said. “And no windows in here or anything. Could the thermostat be broken?”
He ignored me, instead getting on his knees to look under some chairs. When he stood, he pushed a filing cabinet aside as if it were full of feathers.
“Yeah, there’s no air return in here. I don’t see any vents, either. So there wouldn’t be a thermostat.”
“No return? So that’s bad?”
He shrugged and looked at me. “The air’s stagnant because the air-conditioning’s not reaching this room.”
Helplessness set in, morphing into panic within seconds. “But I have people coming tomorrow for interviews and tests.”
“Might need to find a different spot.” This guy was a man of few words.
“No, there is no other spot. This is my spot. Any other location in the hospital would require a request to administration, and I don’t have time for that.”
He wrapped a hand around the back of his neck. “Maybe if you leave the door open it’ll help.”
My lips parted as I looked at him. “I can’t leave the door open. I need quiet and privacy for my interviews. It can get loud out there when patients are in labor.”
Carson shrugged and looked down at the screen of a cell phone he’d pulled from his pocket.
“Look, I’ve gotta go,” he said. “Sorry I didn’t have better news for you.”
“No! No, no, no.” I crossed my arms and glared at him. “Can you maybe catch up on the text chat later and help me? This is very important.”
A flicker of aggravation passed over his face. “The text was from Radiology. They’ve got a bulb out, and I need to go change it.”
“A bulb?” My voice was high pitched with stress. “As in a light bulb? Can’t they change it themselves?”
He gave a single low note of laughter. “You’d think.”
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “All right,” I said, looking up at him. His eyes were the color of milk chocolate, framed by long, dark lashes. Under different circumstances, I might have been stumbling over my words right now. “I’m sorry for anything I said that wasn’t nice. Truly. I’m super stressed out. This research project means so much to me. And I know you’re busy, and I know it’s asking a lot, but is there anything you can do to help me?”
He knitted his brows together. “Uh . . .” He sighed. “Some vents and a return would need to be cut in. It can be done, but it doesn’t need to be done right this second, does it?”
“It kind of does. I’m interviewing fifteen patients in here starting at ten tomorrow morning. I need to be able to run a few tests on them, too.”
His eyes widened.
“It’s not possible,” I said, looking down. “Not all in one night, anyway. I understand.”
He sighed again, more deeply this time. “Yeah. I think I can do it. As long as I don’t get called away on an emergency.”
A warm, powerful wave of happiness flooded my chest. “You can? You can get this room air-conditioned?”
“As long as I find what I’m expecting to find,” he said, fixing his eyes on me seriously. “I think there’s a duct on the other side of that wall. I won’t know for sure till I get in there. If there is a duct, I can patch into it and bring some AC in here. If not, I can’t help you.”
“Of course,” I said. “If you’re willing to try, I’d be so . . . so grateful. Thank you, Carson.”
The praise didn’t seem to do anything for him. His brooding expression remained firmly in place. “I’m gonna go to Radiology and then to get some tools. I’ll be back.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?”
He shook his head and turned to go.
Friendly fellow, this Carson. But I didn’t care if he didn’t feel like talking. It didn’t matter. I didn’t need to make friends with him as long as he could fix my problem.
Carson
I rounded the corner into Radiology and scanned my access card. The door opened, and I caught a glance of the bushy graying hair of Donald, the one guy I was hoping I wouldn’t run into tonight. He was an asshole with megalomania tendencies, and I was in no mood.
“About time,” he said, grimacing with aggravation. “Time is money in Radiology, you know. We’re backed up waiting for that bulb to be changed.”
“Where’s the problem?” I asked.
He pointed to a set of double doors. “The technician will show you which bulb is out. And then I need you to recalibrate another machine for me.”
“Where is the new bulb?”
He scoffed and shook his head. “Do I look like I know where the extra bulbs are kept? That’s not exactly in my pay grade.”
I counted to three in my head before responding, which didn’t tame me much. “Yeah, it’s not in my pay grade, either, but who really gives a shit? You’re supposed to call Maintenance for this, not Mechanical Services, but I’m here.”
He huffed his aggravation. “Just get it done, all right?”
“If I can find a bulb, I’ll change it,” I said. “If I can’t, I’ll page Maintenance. And I’m not touching the machine that needs to be calibrated. You’ll have to call the manufacturer for that.”
“How hard can it be?” He glared at me over the rim of his glasses.
I shrugged. “I’m not doing it. It voids the warranty, and that’s expensive equipment. Plus, I’ve got another project that I need to work on.”
“Thanks for nothing,” he said.
“Anytime.”
It was all I could do not to flip the asshole off as I turned toward the double doors. When I got inside, a guy who looked about my age looked up from the screen of his smartphone.
“Hey,” he said in greeting, standing up. “Thanks for coming. I assume you’re here to help with the bulb?”
“Yeah.”
“Cool. I’m Andy.”
“Carson.”
He led me to the machine in question, and I took a mechanical screwdriver from my pocket to remove a panel.
“Don’t want to go hang out with Donald?” I asked.
His single note of laughter said it all. “Yeah, no. His wife left him not too long ago, and none of us can stand to be around him anymore.”
“Why would any woman leave such a charmer?”
“I know, right?”
I took the panel off and set it on the floor. “Can you hold these?” I passed him the screws.
“So you’re the famous Carson?”
I gave him a confused glance before reaching my arm inside the machine in search of the bulb.
“Uh, no,” I said. “You must be talking about another Carson.”
“I don’t think so. The female techs have been talking about what they could do to get the hot new Mechanical guy, Carson, up here.” He laughed. “They’re going to be mad when they hear you were up here tonight.”
I frowned and grunted dismissively. The last thing I wanted was to encourage that sort of thing.
After several turns, the bulb gave way, and I pulled it out.
Taking one look at it, Andy said, “We definitely don’t have a replacement for that here.”
“I’m gonna run down to Maintenance with this,” I said. “Be back in a minute.”
Andy nodded and returned to his chair to resume whatever it was he was doing on his phone.
I got lucky, both in locating a replacement bulb and in not running into Donald a second time when I returned to Radiology. The repair was done in two minutes. Andy thanked me, and I left to get the tools I’d need for the OB project.
It was unlikely I’d get back to the dilapidated old furnace tonight. I was a sucker for someone needing help, and the furnace could wait.