“Do you ever get sick of that?” she asked, turning to me.
“I don’t even notice it anymore.”
She leaned back in her seat. “God, you guys are like the royal family. So what are you gonna do about all that? Derek’s gone, so you’re sort of ‘The One’ now, right? You have to, like, kiss babies and christen pediatric wings?”
I squeezed my eyes shut. “I hate this so much.” I looked over at her. “You know the Star Tribune called me yesterday? They wanted to know what my plans were for the hundred-and-twenty-five-year anniversary now that the ‘torch has been passed on to the new generation.’” I put my fingers into quotes. “Apparently I am now delivering the keynote speech at the quasquicentennial gala in September.”
She made a face. “Damn. Can you just not do it? Say no?”
I shrugged. “Sure. And then the hospital will lose a million dollars for cancer research, the Montgomery scholarship program will cease to exist, half the initiatives for low-income families will be defunded, construction on the new transplant center will grind to a halt, and I’ll become the shame of the Montgomery legacy.”
“Wow. No pressure.”
“Seriously. Mom made sure to remind me that the international donors won’t fly in for the galas unless a Montgomery is in attendance. So I will be expected to be at every fund-raiser to schmooze the elite from this day forward.”
“Derek loves to schmooze the elite.”
“Well, right now Derek is loving something else far more important.” I sighed. “I love what we do, I just hate the pageantry of it. It’s like this unrivaled, bottomless tool for good and I’m the last one that can wield it, and I just wish it wasn’t me.”
“With great power comes great responsibility.”
I smirked, but she wasn’t wrong.
“That’s kind of cool though. You can save lives just by showing up in a cocktail dress. Hey, remember when Forbes called you guys the last great American dynasty and then Taylor Swift used that as the title of a song?”
“STOP.”
“What?! It was hilarious. You’re fancy. I’m proud of you. Also, can you autograph a few Post-its for me? I sell them to the first-year residents. I have student loans.”
I flicked a pen at her, and we cracked up.
Then Neil rounded the corner.
The second we saw him, our humor ground to an abrupt halt.
He made his way to the nurses’ station in his sky-blue scrubs.
At forty-seven, Neil had a full head of silver hair, a strong square jaw, and a chin dimple. He was annoyingly good-looking, and what was more annoying was that he knew it.
I saw him almost every day that I worked. He was the chief of surgery so I was constantly handing patients off to him. But we didn’t have any today, so this was probably a personal call. Yay.
Bri crossed her arms as he approached. “Dr. Rasmussen. What can we do for you?” she asked dryly.
He ignored her and looked at me. “Alexis, I’d like to speak to you.”
“You can say anything you need to say to her in front of me, Wreck-It Ralph,” Bri said. “She’s gonna tell me everything anyway. Saves her from having to do the sleazebag accent.”
I saw the flicker of annoyance on his face, but he pushed it down.
I crossed my arms too. “What do you want, Neil?”
He glanced at Bri and then back at me. “It would be better if we talked in private.”
“Better for who?” Bri said. “You?”
His jaw ticked. “We need to discuss the house.”
The house. Actually, we did need to discuss it.
We hadn’t been married, but we had bought the house together five years ago. We were both on the title. He’d paid his portion of the mortgage the last two months, but it wasn’t fair to expect him to keep doing it given that he wasn’t living there—even though in my opinion it was the least he could do.
“I’d like to buy out your stake in it,” he said.
My arms dropped. “What?”
“I’d like to buy you out. I want the house.”
I stared at him, incredulous. “I’m not selling you my house.”
“It’s not your house. It’s our house. My friends are there, it’s close to work when I’m on call, it has the running trails I like—”
Bri pressed her lips into a line. “Uh-huh. Well, guess you should have thought of that before you boned what’s-her-face over there.” She gestured vaguely to the exit.