Forbidden Prescription: A Stepbrother Romance (2 page)

Isabella walked out into the hallway and fanned her face with her notebook.
Focus,
she thought to herself.
This is not the time or the place to get distracted.

T
he rest
of the morning was a blur for the new interns. They met the small army of medical staff and toured every nook and cranny of the hospital. Isabella tried to remember everything, but for the first time in her life, the information didn’t seem to stick in her brain.

The attending, James, was a great tour guide, showing the interns the basics and injecting his own commentary into the mix.

“Here is the orthopedics wing,” he said as they passed through glass double doors. “These guys are assholes, so feel fortunate that you chose general surgery,” he added, a little quieter.

The group sniggered. There was definitely rivalry between the different specialties. Each specialty had their own stereotypes. The guys in orthopedics were arrogant jocks, the brain and heart surgeons were nerds, pediatrics and neonatal surgery was dominated by women, and general surgeons primarily wanted to make a difference in their patients’ lives. That, or they weren’t smart enough to get into a different specialty.

Of course, these were just stereotypes. There were good doctors and bad doctors in every specialty. As a matter of fact, one could predict that half of the interns were in surgery for the money and the women, and the other half were committed to doing well with their skills and education.

“What do you think about the attending?” Jordan asked Isabella as they walked through another corridor.

“He seems like a good doctor,” she replied. “I hope he’s as good as Doctor Jensen says he is.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Jordan pressed. “What do you
think
about him?”

“If you’re aiming for subtlety, that’s not it,” Isabella said coolly.

“Ha, I could say the same for you.”

“What do you mean?”

“What did you say when you shook his hand? Something about being ‘under him’?”

“I was understandably nervous. I misspoke. Not a big deal.”

Jordan smirked. “It’s so obvious that you’re attracted to him.”

“You don’t find him attractive?”

“Of course I do,” Jordan replied. “He’s positively gorgeous. I just know when I have no place talking to a man like that, and this is definitely one of those instances.”

“Obviously,” Isabella said, getting annoyed. “You really think I’m the type to get involved with my superior? I got here on my own. I’m not about to screw my way to the top.”

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Jordan said, softer. “I’m just saying that I saw a spark between you and that it’s clear that you’re into him.”

“I know.” Isabella sighed. “It’s just that it’s probably the last thing I would want right now.”

“I admire your restraint. If I had the opportunity, I’d go for it.”

“Then go for it,” Isabella said halfheartedly. “I won’t stop you.”

“I don’t think I have a chance,” she said glumly. “I could probably manage a hookup with one of these fools,” she said, nodding at a couple of guys in their group. “There’s a couple of hot nurses here too,” she added. “Maybe those men would be down.”

Isabella chuckled. Getting tangled in a relationship was the last thing she wanted to worry about. There was so much to learn, and she was terrified that she wouldn’t be able to stay above the others. It wasn’t enough for her just to get through residency. She needed to be the best.

James led the group back to their little conference room.

“This concludes my tour of the hospital,” he announced. “We will pause for a short lunch of sandwiches and their accoutrements, generously provided to you by Central General Hospital.”

There was a quiet hiss of soft cheers from the crowd. James slowly shook his head and smirked.

“Sad,” he said. “You guys are starting your first day as surgical interns and you’re most excited about getting free food. Well, enjoy it while you can, because you’ll be eating the finest cafeteria slop for years to come.”

This lecture fell on deaf ears as the male interns rushed the buffet and greedily filled their plates. Isabella and Jordan, as the only female interns, felt like they had a sense of pride to maintain, and they hung back, waiting patiently.

“I have a feeling the two of you will be a formidable pair,” a soft voice said from behind them.

The girls whipped their heads around. It was James.

“I see it every year,” he continued. “The men always count out the women in their class. There’s this belief that the girls don’t try as hard because they’re more likely to get married and start a family and let their careers fall by the wayside.”

“Really?” Jordan asked naively.

“Sure. And it does happen from time to time. But, I have a feeling that the two of you will do well here. It’s such a male dominated profession that if you fight against the stereotype, you’ll crush them.”

“Is that what happened in your internship?” Isabella challenged.

He laughed. “Nah, I obliterated them. Not even a competition.”

“How modest,” Isabella said.

“You have to be a little full of yourself to get ahead. If I could give you one piece of advice, it’s to never let anyone get in your way.”

Jordan nodded eagerly, like she was being handed the secrets to the universe.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Isabella said dryly.

Their conversation was interrupted by several anxious interns with too many questions. James spoke patiently, but it was clear that he wasn’t thrilled with the task of babysitting a bunch of new interns.

Isabella picked at her turkey and cheddar on wheat while Jordan scarfed down a handful of chips.

“You’ve got to eat something,” Jordan said between bites.

Isabella humored her and nibbled on a baby carrot. “I just don’t have much of an appetite today.”

She didn’t want to admit it, but she just couldn’t shake her case of nerves. Maybe James thought he was motivating them with his little speech, but it just piled on more pressure. It did feel good to know that someone was rooting for her, but it also added one more person who would be let down if she failed.

“Okay, everyone,” James announced. “The hospital wants me to cover a few more points, so I’ll get this out of the way while you eat. Basically, don’t fuck things up. If you don’t know what you’re doing, please ask me or one of the nurses for assistance. Technically, you’re supposed to ask Doctor Jensen, but he’s probably not going to be available most of the time. So, I’m going to need you all to be on your best behavior. If some shit goes down, we’ll lawyer up, but we’d rather not do that. If you make a mistake, kill someone, and the family sues, the hospital loses money. The first budget they cut is the cafeteria, and if you cause Taco Tuesday to go away, there will be hell to pay.”

The interns didn’t know whether to laugh or not. James seemed pretty serious.

“That’s about it for orientation. Now, the real fun can start.”

An excited chatter filled the room.

“Settle down,” he mocked. “This is how it’s going to go: I will take you around to see various patients. I’ll ask you questions, and if you know the answers, you’ll get the pleasure of treating patients. If you don’t, you’d better study up because you’ll soon get left behind. Ready? Let’s start.”

The interns jumped out of their chairs and followed James out the door like ducklings. Isabella dug her fingernails into the inside of her palm. This was the moment she had been waiting for since she started medical school. This was the time to prove that her hard work was worth it.

As nervous as she was, Isabella was also incredibly excited. While she couldn’t practice medicine without close supervision, she was still a doctor. She had the ability to help the other doctors treat patients, and that was the first step toward achieving her dream. All she had to do was beat out six other interns.

“Are you ready for this?” James asked Isabella, grinning.

“You have no idea,” she replied.

“Good,” he said. “Things are about to get crazy.”

He raised his eyebrow at her, ever so slightly. He seemed like the type of man who was naturally flirty. He reeked of confidence and knowledge.

Isabella found him mildly infuriating but particularly fascinating.

D
espite her fears
, Isabella made it through the first few days of her internship with no issues. She had answered tough questions just as well as anyone else in her group and earned the prize of getting to work hands-on with patients. So far, she had only sutured and placed IV lines, but it was better than nothing.

By the end of her first week, she knew where everything was in the hospital and wasn’t mistaking supply closets for exam rooms anymore. The hospital was a chaotic place, but she felt a sense of calm working amongst the hustle.

Isabella was taking a rare moment of free time to chug a cup of coffee in the nurse’s station. Jordan approached her, massaging her right hand.

“I’m starting to think that they’re just rewarding us with the crappy jobs the other doctors and nurses don’t want to do,” she said in a hushed tone. “I’ve basically sewn a quilt’s worth of human skin today.”

“Better that than what Matthews was assigned today. He had to drain some old guy’s nasty abscess. I heard he still can’t get the smell out of his nose.”

They chuckled, knowing too well that they could be in his position at any time.

“Are you going out for drinks tonight?” Jordan asked. “The guys told me that we’re meeting up after we finish today.”

“No one invited me.”

“They probably forgot. Hell, I nearly forgot. Of course you’re invited.”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re going,” Jordan interrupted. “I’m not going without you.”

“I might just stay in and catch up on my reading. I heard a rumor that we’d be quizzed on metabolic disorders next week.”

“You can do that later. It’s healthy to socialize and to blow off some steam. Plus, what’s that saying about keeping your enemies close?”

Isabella thought for a moment. She wasn’t interested in socializing while there was work to be done, but perhaps Jordan was right. It would be good to have some insight into the minds of her competitors.

“Fine,” she submitted. “Just a few hours, though. Then I’m going to finally get a good night of sleep.”

“I knew you’d see reason.” Jordan smiled.

“Dr. Lopez, you’re needed in Room Two. Patient has a ten-inch laceration on their lower left leg,” a nurse said, handing a chart to Jordan.

“Are we closing it with staples?” she asked hopefully.

“The patient is an aspiring model with her stage mom in tow. They’re demanding the very best doctor to suture her. Everyone in Plastics is busy, so we’re just going to pretend that you’re the best fit for the job.”

Jordan rolled her eyes at Isabella. “Okay, let’s get this over with,” she said, following the nurse back to the exam room.

“Dr. Carter,” James said as he walked down the hall to the nurse’s station. “Are you busy?”

“I’m finishing up some paperwork,” Isabella said, writing notes on her chart. “What do you need me to do?”

“Come with me,” he said mysteriously.

She gave him a quizzical look and followed him down several corridors. They walked in silence until James gestured to a small room. It looked like a supply closet, but Isabella didn’t remember seeing it before.

“What is this?” she asked hesitantly.

“You’ll see,” he said with a grin.

The room was completely dark except for the blue-white glow of x-rays on the wall. They were in complete silence except for the soft hum of the light.

“Are those . . .?”

“Yep,” he answered for her. “We’re looking at a patient packed with balloons full of drugs.”

“That’s a pretty serious intestinal obstruction.” She marveled at the x-ray.

“Oh, most definitely. I guess he got greedy with the smuggling jobs and overdid it. Came in when he was unable to pass them.”

“That was smart. Well, as smart as someone can be when they’re filled with drug balloons,” she added.

“Yeah, he’ll be going to jail, but hopefully, we’ll get him there alive. If even one of those balloons bursts before we get them out, he will overdose.”

She stared at the image. Little white orbs dotted the colon like inner tubes on the river.

“Scrub in,” he said abruptly, breaking her from her trance.

“Wait, what?” she stuttered. “You’re letting me assist?”

He laughed. “I’m letting you observe. You might learn something.”

This was so much more exciting than sutures and picking debris from wounds. Even if she was just observing, she was still excited to scrub in on her first surgery as an intern.

James flicked off the lights from the x-ray. Isabella gasped at the sudden darkness. She was alone with her gorgeous mentor in a tiny, pitch-black room.

“Not afraid of the dark, are you?” he teased, turning the door handle. She was disappointed and relieved at the same time to be surrounded by people again.

“No,” she said. “I guess I’m a little on edge these days. Stress and all, you know?”

He smiled, and she followed him to the operating room. There, a nurse helped her into scrubs and she meticulously cleaned her hands. After two pairs of gloves, Isabella was ready to watch.

She watched in awe as James helped another surgeon carefully make incisions in the patient’s abdomen. He worked with perfect precision, like a robot programmed to understand every delicate feature of the human body.

His face was mostly covered by his mask, but his eyes showed great intensity and focus. It was evident that he lived for this—to go inside the human body and solve any problems that he may encounter. To him, surgery was no different than taking apart a computer and putting it back together to make it run more efficiently. The body was a machine that he had the skills to improve.

“There’s balloon number four,” James announced, plopping a rubbery mass in the tray. “One more to go. Dr. Carter, will you come forward, please?”

Isabella looked around like there was another Dr. Carter that he was referring to.

“Dr. Carter?” he asked again.

She stepped forward from where she was observing until she was within arm’s reach of the patient.

He looked her directly in the eyes. Their faces were so close that she could smell his hair product from underneath his scrub cap.

“I need you to reach into the bowel there and carefully grab that last balloon.”

“Really?”

“Would you rather I find another intern to do it?”

“No, no, I’ll do it.”

“Good. Careful, now. You don’t want to break it.”

Isabella inserted her hand into the patient’s open cavity. It was a rush. She had sliced cadavers to no end in med school, but being inside a real, living human was so exciting. She felt around until she found the foreign object and slowly pulled it out.

“Excellent work,” James said gently.

“You can take it from here, Dr. Johnson,” the other masked surgeon said, returning to the scrub room.

There were nurses and anesthetists around, but to Isabella, it felt like she and James were the only two people in the room.

“Now, all we have to do is close him up,” James said.

She watched him with great intensity as he closed the body with graceful precision.

“So, how was your first surgery?” he asked without looking up from his work.

“Amazing,” she gushed. “It was truly incredible.”

“I’m glad you had fun. The best surgeons still have that spark, even during the most routine procedures.”

He handed his instruments over to Isabella. “Want to finish up? I know this is about all you guys are allowed to do, but all the practice really helps.”

She took them in her gloved hands, expertly stitching the tissues back together. She had spent more free time than she would care to admit practicing.

“You’re a pro,” James noted. “Don’t let that go to your head,” he added quickly. “You still have much to learn.”

Isabella hid a shy smile under her mask. When she finished, she handed the instruments back over to James, brushing her hands against his. A jolt of electricity shot through her stomach.

“It’s about time for you interns to leave,” he said, looking up at the clock. “What do you have planned for your weekend?”

“The group is going to a bar tonight, and then I’m just going to study for the rest of the weekend.”

“Try not to have too much fun tonight,” he said.

“I’ll be in bed by midnight,” she said coyly.

On the drive home from this hospital, Isabella felt buzzed. Not only did she get to take part in a surgery, something that no other intern had done yet, but her attending complimented her on her work. Once home, she took a quick shower, applied a light coat of makeup, put on a blouse and skirt she never seemed to have an occasion to wear, and drove to the bar to meet her colleagues.

She found the group of them sitting around a table, two dripping pitchers of beer halfway gone.

One of the interns, Justin, slid an empty glass toward the vacant seat. She was oddly touched at the small gesture. She wasn’t very talkative at the hospital, so she was surprised that they were acting friendly toward her.

“I told you she would come,” Jordan boasted to the boys. Isabella poured herself a full glass of tasteless beer as she listened to everyone’s recap of their first week.

“My highlight of the week was getting hit on by a senile old lady,” Craig said.

“Did you take her up on her offer?” Justin teased.

“I sutured forty wounds,” Jordan added. “I think that’s a world record. What about you, Isabella?”

She scrambled to think of something mundane she did over the week, but her mind kept going back to surgery. She couldn’t tell them about that. It would make them all hate her, and things were actually going well.

“I think I made enemies with a nurse. He sent me to get fresh syringes, and I got distracted along the way and forgot.”

They nodded in approval. It was reassuring to hear that other people made mistakes.

“The next round is on me,” Isabella announced, trying to shift the attention away from her experiences that week.

She got up from the table and went to the bar, handing the bartender her credit card. She peeked back at the table—they were all smiling and laughing. It was nice to be part of a group, even if everyone was ready to stab each other in the back to get in on a surgery.

She returned with full pitchers to cheers from her peers. James was right—new doctors lived penniless for so long during school that the second they get anything for free, they lose their minds. The pitchers were drained in minutes.

Isabella was feeling giddy. In her rush to get to the bar, she had forgotten to eat supper. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last meal she’d had. She didn’t care, though. Surprisingly, she was having a great time.

As the interns were digging through their pockets to order more booze, three pitchers were delivered to their table.

“We didn’t order these,” Jordan said to the waitress as the other interns tried to hush her.

“That guy over at the bar bought them for you,” she said, taking the empty pitchers.

Isabella squinted toward the bar. James was sitting at the bar, alone, with a smirk on his face. One of the tipsy interns waved at him, prompting James to approach their table.

“Thanks for the drinks,” Jordan said.

“This gift comes with some strings attached,” he said. “Consider this my tip to you. Enjoy this free beer, and in return, you do whatever I say.”

They all nodded in agreement, refilling their glasses.

“Do you want to sit down?” Justin asked as they drained their glasses.

“No, we’ve got to keep some boundaries, don’t we?” he teased, winking at Isabella. She gave him a sleepy smile in return.

“I see you’re taking it easy tonight,” he said sarcastically to Isabella.

She giggled. “I’m always easy,” she slurred softly.

Luckily, everyone was too entrenched in their drinks to notice their short exchange.

“On that note, I will be leaving now,” he said, turning toward the door. He let out a long sigh as he left the bar, imperceptibly shaking his head.

After they finished their drinks, they left, splitting off into different directions. Isabella decided to walk home, giving her time to sober up before bed.

Once home, she stripped off just inside the door, brushed her teeth, and flopped down on her bed. She felt like she was floating—from the surgery, from her interaction with the dreamy doctor, and mostly, the alcohol. In the morning, she was certain she would regret it all, but for the time being, she basked in the high.