The Doctor's Pregnant Bride? (12 page)

A five-minute window of opportunity opened up for Sara Beth.

Not enough time to debate what to do. Only time enough for one thing—action.

“A
re you sure?” Lisa asked Ted in a closed-door meeting in Derek’s office almost a week later. Chance leaned against a file cabinet. Paul paced. Lisa and Ted sat in visitor’s chairs across from Derek’s desk.

“Positive,” Ted said.

“You have proof?”

“In the report I just handed you are statistics confirming that the institute has had a three-year run of above-average numbers of multiple births, enough to be suspicious that too many embryos were implanted. However, we also found similar statistics twice before in the institute’s history, or at least in the past twenty years, which is as far back as we went for now. We
believe in each case that it was purely happenstance. No one breached protocols.”

“I told you,” Derek said smugly. “We can use this information to our benefit right now. Let it be known that our in vitro procedures have a higher-than-average success rate. Business will boom.”

Ted disliked Derek more each day, had come to resent the way he stopped by the lab almost daily, asking for a full accounting on the day’s work, as if Ted and Chance were shirking their duties. They had decided not to tell Derek about their trial study until preliminary results were in.

“Just don’t guarantee anything,” Chance cautioned Derek. “As Ted said, it’s happened before. Following that logic, it’s likely to ease off, too.”

Ted agreed. “What’s important for the moment is that we found incomplete reporting of critical statistics. Sara Beth has done a thorough job of compiling the information and updating it into the new computer system. You’ll be able to pull out any statistic you need, should anyone question the institute again.”

“I can’t tell you how grateful I am,” Lisa said, then looked at her chief-of-staff brother, Paul. “It was hard having that shadow hanging over us.”

“Yes, let me add my thanks,” Paul said, something Derek hadn’t bothered to do. “I think Lisa talked to you about writing a best-practices manual of lab protocols? It will be a required checklist that everyone will adhere to and enter into the computer. How long do you think that would take?”

“A week or so,” Ted said. When they were finished with it, Sara Beth would return to her regular duties. He wouldn’t get to turn his head and see her anytime he wanted. Couldn’t watch her stretch out the kinks after an hour in front of the computer.

Or watch her stare into space now and then, unfocused. Was she pregnant and hadn’t told him yet?

He thought back. She’d been distracted for almost a week—since the day they’d brought up the last boxes from the vault, actually. Their weekend at the shore hadn’t been as relaxing as it should’ve been, even though they’d had all the privacy they’d sought.

“We need to bring Ramona in on this,” Derek was saying. “Have her come up with a PR plan to let people know that the Armstrong Fertility Institute is seeing such great success. This is a good time for a push.”

Paul nodded in agreement. Ted had met Paul’s fiancée, Ramona, a few times and liked her. She had a good head on her shoulders and was an excellent strategist. Once a reporter, the institute had hired her as their public relations strategist.

“Let’s talk to her together,” Paul said finally, then glanced at his watch. “Thank you all again for your hard work to clear up this problem. I hope we can move forward now without distraction.”

Ted and Chance walked down the hall to the lab.

“I don’t suppose this means the end of Derek’s visits to the lab,” Chance muttered.

“I doubt it. He’s always seemed more interested in our research than the disproportionate number of births.
I don’t understand why he wasn’t worried about that. The institute stood to lose a lot of money if, in fact, we had been implanting too many embryos, thus exaggerating results.”

“I agree. The institute stands to pull in a hell of a lot of more money if our research yields results. And the sky’s the limit if we can get beyond elevating sperm count and motility.”

“He does seem interested more in dollars than reputation, doesn’t he?” Ted mused. “I guess you don’t become CFO without money being the main focus of your thinking.”

“Speaking of the main focus of your thinking,” Chase said. “You and nurse Sara Beth seem to have become…close.”

Ted had promised Sara Beth he wouldn’t talk to anyone about her, and he’d agreed. “I like her. It’s been nice having her around. Breaks up the tedium when you’re not there.”

“Breaks up the tedium? Right.” Chance laughed. “You’re not fooling anyone.”

Were they that obvious? Or had someone seen them together away from the office?

“You watch her with the same intensity as you conduct a tricky experiment. I think when you’ve finished writing the manual and she comes back to work with me, you should ask her out. I’m sure she would say yes.”

Ted relaxed. “Maybe.”

They went into the lab, finding it empty, except for a note from Sara Beth, telling him to call her when he
wanted to start working on the manual, which he did right away.

He and Chance had barely gotten their computers up and running when the door opened, but Lisa came in, not Sara Beth.

“We have a problem,” she said, handing them a sheet of paper bearing the Breyer Medical Center letterhead.

Before the door shut, Sara Beth arrived and said a happy good morning.

“Would you mind coming back in about fifteen minutes, please?” Lisa said to her.

“She can stay,” Ted said as Chance grabbed the letter and swore.

“What’s going on?” Sara Beth asked, coming closer, her gaze moving from person to person then staying on Ted.

“Our former employer is accusing us of unethical behavior regarding funding issues during our years there,” Ted explained.

“No way,” Sara Beth said. “No possible way.”

“I appreciate your faith, but the burden of proof will be ours,” Ted informed.

Sara Beth put a hand on Ted’s. “You are the most ethical man on the planet. There’s no way you’ve done anything wrong.”

Guilt took a bite out of Ted. By not telling Derek or Paul that he and Chance had entered into a trial study with one subject, they weren’t being forthcoming. And if a best-practices protocol manual had been in place a week ago, Ted couldn’t have justified the secretive project.

“Are we ever going to be allowed to just do our jobs?” Chance asked, frustration in his voice. He threw the paper onto the lab counter and walked away to look out the window at the parking lot. “Ted and I came here to get away from the bureaucracy that Breyer burdened us with, constantly tying our hands. We’ve already made progress here that would’ve taken us years had we stayed there.”

“What do they want?” Sara Beth asked.

“They say we recruited and used funds dishonestly,” Ted answered. “That we promised impossible results.”

“Can you think of anything they might have that they could use against you?” Lisa asked.

Ted shook his head as Chance almost shouted, “No. Nothing. We tried to do what we’d been hired to do. Even that was a daily uphill battle. We had to write our own grants, meet with potential investors, beat the drum. We were spending most of our time raising funds. It’s no wonder we couldn’t accomplish anything of value.”

“Then it sounds like sour grapes to me,” Lisa said. “When you left, their funds dried up.”

“Did you keep copies of all the funding we got there?” Chance asked Ted.

“It’s all on my home computer.”

“I can’t cancel my appointments today,” Chance said. “But let’s meet at your place tonight and go over it.”

“Okay. If Lisa’s right, and they’re just trying to ruin our reputation, then we need to fight fire with fire. Let’s ask Ramona to help, too. We could use a spin doctor’s opinion.”

Chance came back to the table. “If push comes to
shove, Ted and I know some things that Breyer wouldn’t want made public.”

Ted shifted uncomfortably. Yes, they knew secrets, which was one of the reasons why they’d left. They hadn’t agreed with Breyer’s methods all the time. “I hope it doesn’t come to that,” Ted said. “I don’t want to be associated with dragging Breyer’s name through the mud, either.”

“The last thing we need is a loss of funding,” Lisa said, her jaw tight. “I’ll talk to Paul and Ramona. Um, I’d like to keep Derek out of the loop for a couple of days. See what we can come up with first.” She looked at Chance, then Ted.

“No problem,” Ted said.

Chance raised a hand in agreement.

“All right. Give me a call at home tonight after you’ve taken a look at your records.” She walked out.

Chance swiped the accusatory letter from the counter, swearing as it drifted to the floor. “We left there to get away from chaos. Since then we’ve dealt with one problem after another. When will it end?”

He yanked open the door and left, angry and frustrated. Ted felt exactly the same. He just tended to internalize his emotions more.

“One scandal door closes and another one opens,” he said to Sara Beth.

“You’ll be cleared.”

“It may not matter. Tarnished reputations are hard to polish.” Like Chase, he was tired of the upheavals. “I’ve never been one to have secrets, Sara Beth.”

Her sympathetic expression became guarded. “Are you still talking about your work?”

He shook his head.

“You want to go public about us,” she said, not as a question, already knowing the answer.

“Not this second, but as soon as you stop working for me.”

“Why?”

“Because right now I’d really like to hold you, and I can’t do that. Anyone could walk by.”

“There’s always the supply closet.”

Her response was so quick and unexpected, he laughed, then he hauled her to the closet, shut them inside and held her, just held her, until his anger dispersed, replaced with need for her, the incredible Sara Beth O’Connell, one of the kindest, most beautiful women he’d ever met.

He didn’t want to keep her a secret anymore.

In the dark, he found her mouth with his, the taste of her familiar now, yet always arousing and exciting. They rarely spent a night apart, often talking into the late hours before falling asleep, her head on his shoulder, his arm around her, hers across his chest, then waking up in the morning with her wrapped in his arms.

One thing they’d avoided talking about was the possibility she could be pregnant. How long could they pretend not to notice?

“We’ll go public,” he said against her lips.

“We’ll talk about it.”

“Ted?” Derek’s voice reached them inside the closet.

They went utterly still. Sara Beth pressed her face to
Ted’s chest. Her shoulders shook. Laughing? Seriously? She was the one who was so worried about going public, and she was laughing?

“Where could he have gone?” Derek said, his voice fading, then silence.

After a few seconds, Ted turned the knob slowly and peeked out. The room was empty. “Hurry up,” he said, patting Sara Beth on the backside.

She laughed and scurried out just as Derek looked through the window and frowned. “Uh-oh,” she said when Derek opened the door.

“Where were you? I was just here.”

“Restroom,” Ted and Sara Beth said simultaneously. He didn’t dare look at her.

She headed to the door, not making eye contact, either. “I’ll arrange my schedule so that we can start on the manual tomorrow, Dr. Bonner,” she said.

“That’d be great, Ms. O’Connell, thanks.” He looked down for a second to smooth his expression, and spotted the letter from the Breyer Medical Center lying on the floor, face up. Had Derek seen it when he’d been in a few minutes earlier? Ted figured him for a good poker player. If he’d read it, he would probably wait to see how long Ted took to tell him.

He scooped it up, folded it and stuck it in his back pocket. “What can I do for you, Derek?”

He didn’t answer immediately. “I realized I hadn’t thanked you for the work you did on the stats. Good job.”

Ted figured Derek called it a good job because it had turned out well. If it hadn’t…

“All I did was compile and run the numbers. But I’m glad it’s over.” He grabbed his lab coat from the coat rack near Sara Beth’s desk. The room seemed empty without her. “Anything else?” Ted asked, waiting for the ax to fall.

“Just wanted an update.”

“Nothing’s changed since yesterday. When there’s something to report, I will.”

“I know you think I’m pushing too hard. But just word of the possibility we’re close to a treatment would sustain us for now.”

“Sustain us for now?” Ted repeated. “Is there a problem with keeping the research going?”

Derek shifted a little. “The program is expensive. Setting up the lab to your specifications was costly. Your salaries. So far, there haven’t been any returns.”

“That’s the burden of research.” What was going on? Was Derek saying the institute was having financial problems?

“I realize that. We just have to hope there are no more rumors or scandals. We had some close calls.”

Ted nodded. Lisa had asked him to keep quiet, so he would, for now—and because he didn’t trust Derek himself.

After Derek left, Sara Beth quietly slipped in.

He smiled. “The coast is clear.”
Except Derek may have read the letter
.

“So, everything is okay?”

“I wouldn’t go that far. But we’ll have to skip seeing each other tonight. Chance and I may pull an all-nighter trying to figure this out.”

“I’ll try to hook up with my mom, since she canceled on me last night.”

“Call me when you’re getting off the bus.”

She cocked her head. “How will you explain that to Chance?”

“I’ll figure out something. Have a nice time with your mom.”

“Thanks. I’ll miss you.”

He didn’t say anything in return. He probably should, because he would miss her, for sure, but his confusion over her unwillingness to let their relationship be public held him back. Maybe she saw what they had as temporary. “Talk to you later,” he said.

A little light went out of her eyes. He was sorry for that, but it was the best he could do for now.