Page 20 of Getting Off

Brooklyn’s shift was over, but not her nightmare.

It was twilight. She was sitting in her car in the parking lot, staring at her phone. There were voicemails and texts from Lucas and Dylan, but she hadn’t glanced at any of them. She couldn’t.

Late this afternoon, Dr. Harvey Gibson had summoned her back into his office.

No reason given. She’d been terrified that she was going to not only lose her chance at the promotion but lose her position at the hospital entirely.

Walking into his office for the second time that day had been one of the hardest things she’d faced in years.

This time it was as if she’d been caught in the Twilight Zone. Dr. Gibson was furious. She could tell by his eyes and the thin slash of his mouth. But what he’d said to her nearly floored her.

“Congratulations, Dr. Foster,” he’d told her in a voice so polite it was nearly cracking under the strain. “I’ll get right to the point. You will be the head neurologist and director running our new, fully funded traumatic brain injury center.”

She stared at him, certain she’d misheard him. Or that he was playing some kind of cruel trick on her.

“I’m sorry…what?”

“The board of directors just let me know their decision. I apologize for any earlier confusion. You are the candidate they have chosen.” His cold eyes told her that she definitely wasn’t the candidate he’d wanted, and his barely suppressed anger told her how much he resented it. And her.

“When did this happen? I thought—”

“You are far better at glad-handing than I suspected. Nicely done. I’m not too proud to admit I’ve been outmaneuvered. You have powerful friends.”

Her heart was in her throat, but her stomach felt as if it had plunged three floors down. “What do you mean?”

But she thought she knew exactly what he meant.

“I mean your apparently extremely close friendship with Lucas Fox. He has agreed to fund the trauma center construction in full. Provided you run the center.” Again came that icy smile. “How could the board of directors turn that down?”

“I see…” She felt like she was all broken glass inside. In a way, she felt even worse getting what she’d wanted than she’d felt when Gibson had denied her any chance at it.

Because she hadn’t earned it. Lucas had used his money to solve the problem. To toss her a bone. This was something she’d pursued all her career, a culmination of a dream, and she had to rely on a billionaire to hand it to her.

Thank you so much, Lucas Fox.

Her anger and her sorrow deepened. First, they’d somehow lured her into that crazy nighttime ride into the desert…

and what in God’s name had she been thinking?

It had been a complete lapse of sanity. Then she’d proven herself cognitively unsound by pretending she was a wild kid again and racing that big truck over the off-road track, only to have that bite her in the ass.

Thank you so much, Dylan Pierce.

So now she had zero desire to read a bunch of texts and calls from them, congratulating her on something she hadn’t earned. Listening to those calls or reading those texts might even make her break down in tears. She would be an emotional wreck.

Like the responsible person she truly was, she waited until her hands stopped shaking before starting the car and leaving the hospital. She turned on the radio but didn’t really hear any of the music. It was white noise. She was headed for Lucas Fox’s condo. They were going to have dinner tonight.

The doorman let her into Lucas’s luxury condo tower. The desk clerk signed her in. She stood there, letting them do their jobs, her mind a blank, but her emotions roiling inside her. They let her through. She walked through the fancy lobby to the fancy elevators and took one to the top floor.

This place was luxurious beyond belief, but she wasn’t really seeing that either. Her head was throbbing. She could feel her pulse in her temples.

Lucas’s door was unlocked. She didn’t knock. She opened it and stepped inside.

“Congratulations!” Dylan and Lucas both yelled. They knew she was coming. The desk attendant notified them.

They both looked ecstatic, happy beyond words to see her. They were standing beneath a banner that said the same thing: Congratulations . The word opened a wound in her.

It didn’t take long for either of them to see things were very wrong. There were no congratulations to be had.

“Brooklyn,” Lucas said, moving across the big luxury condo toward her. “Talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“You know exactly what’s wrong.”

The ice in her words brought him up short. “Gibson told you.”

“You’re damn right he told me.” But she didn’t shout the words or even say them loudly. No, her voice came out as little more than a whisper. “I asked you… I begged you not to get involved. And you did anyway.”

Dylan was frowning—a rare expression for his usually happy-go-lucky handsome face. “They were fucking you over, Brooklyn. What that guy was doing was bullshit—”

“So you both decided to fuck me over yourselves?” she said, still quietly.

“Everyone at the hospital will know I didn’t earn that position.

” She clenched her fists, glaring at them.

“First, you trick me into sleeping in the desert after putting my life at risk. Then…I made a mistake and drove that stupid truck, and it cost me my chance at my dream job.”

“That wasn’t a mistake,” Dylan said. “It wasn’t a trick, and your life was never at risk. You loved it. I know. I was there. I saw it. Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t retreat like this—”

“What do you want from me?” she snapped, her voice breaking. “I lost everything today!”

Lucas was watching her with hurt and sympathy in his eyes, and she hated that right now. She didn’t want or need his sympathy, damn him.

“I won’t stand by and watch them destroy you,” Lucas said. “I won’t apologize for standing up for you. Or for using my wealth to right the wrongs in the world. That’s what it’s there for. I won’t hesitate to protect the people I care about.”

She closed her eyes. A tear slipped down her cheek, and she turned her head away from them, hoping they wouldn’t see. She wanted to seem strong. She needed to be strong.

“I’m not one of your employees, Lucas,” she said. “I told you I wanted to handle it. You pulled strings with the board of directors and got them to choose me. I didn’t earn it. I didn’t beat out all the other candidates because I’m the best. No, you bought it for me.”

“ You are the most qualified person for that job—”

“How would you know that? Simple. You don’t. You stuck your wallet in because you were listening to your cock instead of listening to me. You wanted what you wanted and damn the consequences.”

His expression darkened. “That’s not fair, Brooklyn. Not at all.”

“What’s fair about any of this? Nothing.

I never cared about your money. But you threw money at my problems— my problems—as if I’m some investment you were trying to turn around and make a profit on.

You want to sweep in and throw your money around, then sit back and be labeled a hero.

Was that what you wanted tonight? For me to fawn all over you and thank you for your gift ? ”

There. She’d said it. She’d spat out the poisonous words that had been burning inside her like acid since that second meeting with Dr. Gibson. She was breathing so hard she was practically panting. The pressure of tears behind her eyes was almost too much to bear.

“Brooklyn,” Lucas said, taking a step toward her. “Listen, I—”

She stepped backward. “I’m done listening. I’m done screwing around. I’m done acting like a little girl who thinks she can have everything. No. I’m done.”

She turned and headed for the door. Dylan called her name, desperation in his voice.

She didn’t answer. She didn’t pause or wait for them to catch her. That wasn’t the kind of woman she was. There would be no more games.

As she’d told them, she was done.