As Salke was more her charge than his, she did get a bigger say in the discipline. They shared the paramedic, and it would be ridiculous to punish her more than the surgeon. “Fine. Give them another chance after he apologizes to her. I’ll find them after my ENT conference.”
“You do that.” Kandal wandered off in a different direction, so Roan headed over to prepare for the conference. In addition to the surgery teams, Crozier and a few of the residents would be attending for their education and possible future participation.
Roan entered the conference room to find the lights were off, so he flicked them on. “What’s going on here?” Paramedic Raine appeared to be strangling Dr. Salke on the long table.
Before he could act, Dr. Salke waved his hands and yelled, “Captain, stop! It's not what you think.”
Based on the fact that Dr. Salke had a bite mark on his neck and lipstick across his face, Roan determined Salke wasn’t in danger. “This is how you work things out?”
Raine released him and smirked, arms crossed over her chest. Salke pointed to two cups of coffee sitting on the table. “I bought her ‘I’m sorry’ coffee as a peace offering.”
“And you're buying me dinner. Again.” She stood up, nonchalantly walked past the table, and grabbed both coffees. “Bye, boyfriend. I win.”
Her boyfriend's lovelorn eyes followed the movement of her hips out the door. “Okay, suspend me as long as you want. Worth it.”
“I hope it was,” Roan growled at him. “You do realize that you’re not coming out on top in this? In the OR or getting her to respect your opinion.”
“Well, I still think the Cardiac Bypasses are going to win. Right now, she thinks I conceded the field.” Paramedic kisses must have resuscitated his backbone.
“Get out of my sight. I’ll discuss this with Kandal,” Roan seethed, and for the second time in an hour, Salke made tracks. “If she ever lets you back in the OR, you will NOT assign yourself to any surgery with Paramedic Raine in attendance.”
It should have been no surprise Kandal was waiting outside with the largest shit-eating grin and one of the coffees Raine had taken with her. “Guess they worked it out on their own.”
“Word travels at light-speed on this floor. The CIA doesn’t have this many sources,” he grumbled.
She took a swallow of the coffee. “Ah, I have two advantages you don’t. One, my nurses report everything back to me in almost real time. Second, make out sessions on that table is a surgery romance tradition.”
“Couldn’t you have warned me about the table or that the two of them were dating?” The sheer number of dalliances going on in the hospital was absurd. The Navy didn’t tolerate behavior like this.
Then again, they had a bit of an easier time, with a good eighty percent of the staff being male. Besides, he couldn’t exactly complain about hospital dating if he was dating Clarissa.
“Why? This is more fun. They aren't in the same department. Lucky them, they don't even have to fill out a form.” Kandal kept drinking the coffee unperturbed.
He hesitated, wondering if she had been one of the members of the physicians’ council that had approved his relationship with Clarissa. It was possible, but he’d have expected her to play that card already.
“I hate you,” he told her without venom.
“You love me. Unless the hospital is swallowed by the earth, the MetroGen gossip machine with have plenty of sneaky medical romance for all eternity to feed the beast.”
This woman was infuriatingly correct, since MetroGen could have been the physical manifestation of Dante’s second circle of hell for lust. An unrelenting whirlwind. There were more than enough relationships to keep the building airborne. Best he not add to that storm, especially if he was dating Clarissa and fake dating Willow, who already had a boyfriend.
Roan reached out a hand for her coffee. “Who do you think's going to win?”
“Paramedic Amber, duh.”
“I meant the game. I hear there’s a betting pool.” Roan did enjoy flipping it back on her as he tried the coffee. Not his level of black but potentially passable.
“Oh, the Cardiac Bypasses. Absolutely,” she answered without hesitation.
“Really. You’re that sure?” He wouldn’t be shocked if she had inside information he didn’t. It would probably be more useful to Drew Crozier, who had turned out to be a big basketball fan to the point that he was running a March-Madness-esque bracket.
“Yep. They’ve been holding back their secret weapon,” she confided and checked her watch. “He should be closing any minute.”
Roan skimmed the schedule and settled on the surgery she’d left. “Judah Weiss?”
He was a quieter, short, thoroughly Jewish third-year surgery resident who wore glasses. Not exactly a basketball dynamo, though.
“Possibly. You’re learning.” She took the coffee back and made no move to leave.
