The Doctor And The Don

A Dangerous Type

I called my best friend Priya the second I got home, because that is exactly what a person does after stitching up what appeared to be a Mafia boss.

“Say that again,” she said. “Slower.”

“I got recruited to Miami General for a trauma fellowship. Then someone from a private household calls the hospital and specifically asks for me, by name, and I end up treating a gunshot wound in a mansion that has more security than the actual hospital.”

“And he is hot.”

“That is not the important part, Priya.”

“It is a little bit the important part.”

I flopped onto my couch, still mostly surrounded by unpacked boxes, and stared at the ceiling. “The important part is that someone specifically requested me. Not any trauma doctor. Me. Three weeks into a new city, and somehow this man already knew my name.”

“Maybe he googled the new doctor in town.”

“People who need to google new doctors do not usually have six armed men standing guard outside their bedroom.”

Priya’s voice softened, the way it always did when she switched from teasing to actual concern. “Does something about this feel wrong to you?”

I thought about the guards. The way nobody had explained anything. The way Cynthia had said the name Moreno like it was supposed to mean something to me.

“Everything about it feels wrong,” I admitted. “And also, for one embarrassing second, when he smiled at me, nothing felt wrong at all.”

“Andrea Hayes.”

“Do not.”

“You have a type, and your type is apparently criminal.”

“My type is competent men who do not argue with my medical advice. He failed that test in under five minutes.”

“Uh huh,” Priya said, in the tone of a woman who did not believe a single word of that, and if I was being honest with myself, neither did I.