Heartburn: An Everyday Heroes World Novel (The Everyday Heroes World) by Tarrah Anders (100 best novels of all time TXT) 📕

walk into my house and Duke greets me at the door. I lean down and pet him behind the ears.

“Who’s a good boy?” I ask him.

He licks my face; I stand back and notice there is an aroma wafting in from my kitchen that I’m not expecting. I step further into my home and there stands Karin in the kitchen, who apparently has let herself into my house.

Did I give her a key?

I don’t remember doing so.

“Oh, hey honey,” she greets me.

“Hey, I didn’t know that we had plans tonight?” I say uncomfortably.

“Oh, we didn’t, but I thought that it would be a pleasant surprise. You know to let you know what you’re missing by us not living together.” She gives me a wink.

I roll my eyes. Luckily, she doesn’t notice.

“Well, okay then, what’s for dinner tonight?” I ask.

“I’m making shrimp scampi,” she answers.

I hide my reaction by undoing my tie and turning around.

I’m not a fan of shrimp and especially of seafood in my pasta. But I can’t blame her for not knowing that. But it’s also not like it’s been part of any conversation that we’ve ever really had. We’re a surface couple, as in we don’t delve too deep into our lives. I couldn’t tell you what her ambitions were, and she likely wouldn’t be able to tell a soul about what my normal day would look like aside from working too much.

I realized that this was the type of relationship that we had about a month into it. She never asked personal questions, she never offered up answers that were meaningful and so because of that—I gave up trying. The sex was decent, and I thought we agreed to keep it casual.

Should we end this relationship?

Of course we should.

But will we? Not soon enough.

6

Kindra

I step up to the front desk of the office.

“Hello, name please?” The receptionist asks.

“Oh, I don’t have an appointment,” I reply.

“Well, today we have little space for walk-ins. But I can get you into an appointment with Doctor Mason first thing in the morning.”

“Can you just go back there and give him a message for me?” I ask. “I’m pretty sure that he will relinquish a few minutes of his time.” I smile sweetly.

“Sure, I can try.”

“Can you please tell him that Kindra is here to see him?” I smile.

“Kindra. Okay.” She nods, not at all recognizing my name.

“He’ll know what that means.” I say.

She looks at me with a confused look but pushes her chair back and disappears behind a wall.

A moment later, my spine straightens as I feel the atmosphere change.

“Kindra.” A loud male voice says halting my movements of pacing the waiting room.

I turn around slowly.

“Father.” I reply.

I conquered one thing today. Seeing my father. And while that meeting didn’t go so well, I did it.

I know that I need to talk to Rogan for real, except when I get to the hospital, he is nowhere in sight. I’ve looked in each of the bays and I haven’t seen him since I arrived. I checked the schedule and saw that Dr. Quinn, was on tonight, but there was also another doctor listed as well.

“Have you seen Dr. Quinn?” I ask one resident on the floor.

“Oh, he’s on call tonight. He will only be in if Dr. Richardson is unavailable. Come on, let’s introduce you.” The resident waves me over.

I shake my head and politely decline. “I’ll introduce myself on my own, I want to get a feel for what we have going on in here and then prepare for the rest of my shift.”

The resident nods and takes a seat at the computer to continue typing up her notes.

I review what I need, then inhale deeply as I look around the space. It’s not too busy tonight, but in the emergency room, that can change in a moment’s notice.

I see the tall man in dark blue scrubs talking to a patient. That must be Dr. Richardson. The conversation looks to be a positive one as they both have smiles on their faces. Then suddenly the phones at the front triage desk begin to ring excessively. One after another and there’s not enough people to answer the phones. I start picking up the lines and jotting down the notes of what we should expect for an incoming.

“Why are these calls not coming through on the dispatch system?” I ask in between picking up the phones.

“No clue, but the machine has been on the fritz the past few days.” The intern answers, grabbing for the next phone.

“What is happening over here? Why did all the lines light up?” Dr. Richardson asks.

“The switchboard is down sir, they have routed all calls to the phone lines.” The intern beside me replies.

“There was a multi-car pile-up on the way into town. The calls are coming from the PD as an incoming. All buses are stocked and soon we will have a packed ER.” I tell him.

“Are there any fatalities?” he asks me.

“Negative, sir. PD says a few serious injuries, but a lot of patients are on their way.”

“And here I thought that tonight would be a peaceful night. I haven’t seen you around here before, have I? I’m Doctor Richardson and you are?” He holds out his hand.

“Nurse Mason, very nice to meet you sir.”

“Looks like we’ll get to break in our relationship the fast way.” He grins, then looks at the intern at my side. “I want to make sure that we’ve got all med lockers stocked. I don’t want to be scrounging around for things and would like to be prepared for anything that comes our way.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Nurse Mason, how versed are you in the ER?”

“Sir, I’ve spent my entire career at SF General. I specialized in emergency medicine, this is where I thrive,” I hold my head high.

“Why on earth would you leave the city and come here? If you thrive in the ER, wouldn’t you want to be where the action is?” he asks