The Wilders: Falling for the M.D.. Teresa Southwick

wanting to get caught up in another confrontation with Bethany, Peter replied, “Can’t argue with that.”

      “Oh, I’m sure you can,” she countered with a smile he couldn’t begin to fathom.

      Damn, but he wished she’d stop wearing that perfume. It wasn’t overpowering. It was very light, actually, but it left behind just enough scent to stealthily slip into his senses, blurring things for him.

      He had opened his mouth to respond when the sound of a cell phone playing a shrill samba reverberated through the room. The next second, Wallace’s wide hand covered his jacket breast pocket.

      “Sorry,” he apologized with a sheepish expression. “Forgot to turn off my phone.” But when he took it out to shut off, he looked at the number on the tiny screen. His expression turned to one of curiosity. He held up his hand as if to beg an indulgence. “I need to take this. Why don’t we just take a break for a few minutes?” he suggested. Not waiting for the members to agree, he quickly left the room.

      Everyone around them rose from their chairs, taking the opportunity to stretch their legs. Bethany watched the man at her left for a cue. Now that she had him in her sights, she intended to follow his lead in order to finally be able to say more than a handful of words to him regarding the takeover.

      Peter remained seated. So did she.

      “You didn’t go home last night, did you?” Bethany asked quietly.

      The question caught him off guard. But then, he thought, it really shouldn’t have, given the fact that she had been popping up all over since Monday. “Are you stalking me, Ms. Holloway?”

      She maintained a mild expression, as if tracking him down had never even crossed her mind. “No, I just noticed where you were parked when I left last night.” She didn’t add that she’d waited a quarter of an hour, hoping he would appear, since it was already after-hours. But sitting in her car on a cold January evening was her limit. “It snowed last night.”

      Where was she going with this, he wondered. And why did she have to look so damn attractive going there? “So I hear.”

      “You car had snow all around it this morning—as if it hadn’t been moved,” she said, explaining how she’d come to her conclusion.

      “Very observant.” Peter looked at her for a long moment, wondering whether to be amused or annoyed.

      She smiled and something definitely responded within him. He vaguely recognized what was going on. This wasn’t good, he thought.

      “Look, Dr. Wilder, let’s talk openly. What will it take to get you to listen to arguments for the other side?”

      All around the table, people had begun to return to their seats, drawn in by the verbal duel.

      He tried to make it as clear to her as he could. “You can’t possibly tell me anything about NHC’s motives that I don’t already know.”

      Oh yes she could, Bethany thought. She had access to the latest studies, something she highly doubted this throwback bothered with. “There are statistics, Dr. Wilder.”

      He waved her words away with an impatient hand. “I deal in patients, Ms. Holloway, not statistics.”

      “Patients make up the statistics, Doctor,” she insisted, and felt color rising in her cheeks. “Where do you think they come from?”

      He banked down his impatience. The woman probably didn’t know any better. Wiser people than she had been led astray by the hocus-pocus of numbers if they were juggled just right.

      “Ms. Holloway,” he began in a patient, quiet voice, “statistics are very flexible. In the hands of someone clever, they can be bent to support almost anything. The good done by a bloated, fat-cat conglomerate, for instance.”

      Her eyes blazed, reminding him, he suddenly realized, of Lisa. Of the woman he’d once thought—no, knew—he’d been in love with. The one he’d made plans to spend the rest of his life with. The one who’d left him in his senior year for a medical student who was “a better prospect” because once Steven graduated, he was slated to join his father’s lucrative Manhattan practice.

      A chill worked its way down his spine as the realization took root. Bethany Holloway had the same coloring, the same full lips, the same slender figure.

      And the same take-no-prisoners ambition, he thought.

      “Everyone I know at the hospital thinks that you’re this kind, gentle, understanding man,” she retorted. “So far, I’m not convinced they’re right.”

      At that moment, the silence in the room was almost deafening.

      And then Peter said quietly and with no emotion, “I have no desire to convince you about anything that has to do with me, Ms. Holloway.”

      But he knew it was a lie. What people thought of him did matter to him. He didn’t like being thought of in a bad light. It bothered him.

      Bothered him, too, that the sensual fragrance she always wore was really filling up his head, undermining his senses. It gave her an unfair advantage because it made him think of her during the course of the day when his mind was supposed to be on other things. And then his mind would wander. Wander in directions he was determined not to take. Not with her.

      Where was all this coming from? Peter silently demanded. He was arguing to preserve the hospital, not fantasizing about his opponent. He wanted to save the place that had been a second home to James Wilder. Walnut River General was his father’s legacy. And if NHC came into the picture, that legacy would be changed, if not eradicated entirely.

      And Peter needed to do everything he could to keep that from happening.

      “Sorry, sorry,” Wallace announced, coming back into the room. He made a show of turning off his phone. “I hope you all got to stretch your legs for a moment, before we launch into part two of our agenda this morning.” He chuckled at some joke he thought he’d made, then paused, waiting for the stragglers to be seated. Moments later, he began again. “First up, I’m told that the radiology department desperately needs a new MRI machine. The old one, according to Mrs. Fitzpatrick, the department’s head technician, has been down more than it’s been up in the last few months. Any ideas?” he asked, looking around the table as he threw open the matter for discussion.

      He no sooner asked the question than Bethany’s hand went up. The chairman nodded toward her. “Yes, Ms. Holloway?”

      “If we take NHC up on their offer when they formally present it, we won’t have to worry about how to pay for the new MRI machine. The money—” she slanted a look in Peter’s direction “—would come from them.”

      “Yes, but at what price?” Peter countered, struggling to keep his temper in check. This should have been a no-brainer, if not for her, because of lack of experience, then for everyone else seated at this table. They all knew what HMOs, no matter what they called themselves, were like.

      Obviously trying to keep the peace, Wallace asked him, “What do you mean?”

      Was the man playing dumb for Bethany’s sake? Heaven help him—maybe it was the lack of sleep talking—but he had no patience with that. “You know what I mean, Wallace. We’ve all heard horror stories about HMOs—”

      “Yes, but those are all from the nineties and earlier,” Bethany cut in. “Things have changed since then.”

      “Have they?” Peter challenged. “Instead of sitting around, waiting for NHC to come sniffing around, why don’t we investigate some of the other hospitals that have become part of their conglomerate in, oh, say the last five years or so? See what they’ve become in comparison to the way they were.”

      Wallace cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Our resources are limited, Peter,” he protested. “We can’t afford to do that.”

      Didn’t the man understand? If he was going to