Page 9

THREE

ANATOMY LESSONS

ISAAK

“ I can assure you, Dean Reynolds, your daughter is in extremely capable hands.”

“She better be,” he grunts down the line. “If anything happens to her while she’s interning in that hell hole, I’m coming for you. You and that entire goddamn institute.”

Then he hangs up.

If I thought Carter Blackhurst and Donovan Ridgeway were intimidating, Byron Reynolds is downright scary.

Oddly enough, I don’t get the impression that he’s worried about his daughter’s safety, but that he’s more concerned about his own agenda.

What that is, I don’t know, nor do I particularly give a shit, but I have to answer to all three of those men now, and that’s going to make my job that much harder.

A job that was already doomed to fail before I even set foot inside the institution.

Scrubbing a hand over my face, I sigh and lean back in my chair.

Why am I doing this?

Because, like some idiot with a death wish, I have busted my ass the last twenty years so I could end up exactly where I’m sitting right now.

My own big corner office with an incredible view, full of soft leather and rich wood furniture, decorated in calm, inviting browns and creams. Shelves lined with medical books and journals, the majority on human behavior and mental health, including a few I’m featured in.

An entire staff of guards and nurses to oversee, the only other doctor on the ward is a colleague, an equal who single-handedly orchestrated my transfer because she believes in the same thing I do.

Dolly Ridgeway-Blackhurst—an omega who didn’t just fall into her pack name in order to maintain her own identity in a sea of domineering assholes—is exactly why I’m here.

She’s been here since before she mated Carter, working this very ward as soon as she finished at the university, and while she has fought tooth and nail to make mental health the true focal point of this institution and not the almighty dollar like it has been for so long, her own sanity is starting to take a hit.

Dolly is trying to retire, hoping she’ll be able to finally get out from under her alpha’s thumb and breathe a little, but she’s trying to make sure her ducks are in a row before she does.

I’m the first duck.

Once she’s confident, and hires a second psychiatrist with the same views she and I share, Dolly will be stepping away from everything here at Blackhurst Ridge except for her position on the board. And she’ll be leaving this entire floor to me.

The way she explained it when she first contacted me, it seemed like she was hoping to leave the stress behind and enjoy her grown children as they settled down, well before she thought she’d be too old to do either.

Dolly isn’t even fifty.

As a matter of fact, she’s just barely ten years older than me, and when I found that out, it felt like somewhat of a red flag.

Either this job is way more difficult than I anticipated and is far more taxing than I realized, or there was something she wasn’t telling me during our many video chats. Then we met in person, and I discovered it was a little of both.

This position, this career at such a renowned psychiatric facility is demanding and extremely challenging, something I knew going in, and Dolly didn’t make any bones about that. But it wasn’t why she’s ready to cash in on early retirement.

Sure, she does have two grown children, one of whom is supposedly going to be mating his omega by the end of the school year while the other is all but impossible to convince she needs to settle down, but I didn’t get the impression they were reason enough to leave this place behind.

Not when it’s literally in Dolly Ridgeway-Blackhurst’s blood.

No, the nationally famous psychiatrist who proudly paved the way for people like me is ready to get the hell out of here for two very real, very loud and controlling reasons, and nothing more.

Carter Blackhurst and Byron Reynolds.

After the conversations I’ve had this morning, I can understand why, and I have no idea how that woman has been married to the former for the last thirty years.

But now I know why I’m replacing her.

Dolly is staying on long enough to help me acclimate, to make sure I’m comfortable with everything that is Blackhurst Ridge, and to hire someone else who’ll help me make this ward’s mission an unbreakable one because without sharing genetics with one of the holy trinity of Raevenwood, chances of survival drop significantly.

Not to mention, the doctor she was hoping would be the one to do that, Dolly busted giving her alpha a blowjob the morning of the transfer. It’s why neither of them were present when I arrived, or when the new patients—residents—were escorted onto the ward.

Needless to say, we’re already in a compromised position, now fighting the battle for an extremely unorthodox and dangerous type of treatment with a huge hole in our ranks, but I know Dolly is doing what she can to fix that. She even left this morning to get a head start.

If her brother wasn’t in charge of the other floors here, and sitting in for her while she’s away, I might have begged Dolly to take me with her.

Donovan Ridgeway might be intimidating as fuck, but he’s a good man and a great doctor, and I know I have him in my corner whether his sister is here or not.

It’s just incredibly unfortunate that my start at the institution hasn’t been nearly as smooth as I was hoping it would be, and it seems as though the gods of old insane asylums are throwing damn near every challenge imaginable at me already.

And I’ve only been here four days.

With another sigh, I push my glasses up and rub my eyes, then attempt to pull myself together and check the time.

8:57am.

Which is the exact moment there’s a light knock on my door.

Sitting up, I tug on the front of my vest, straighten out my shirt and tie before I push my fingers back through my hair a few times then momentarily panic over whether or not I should put on my suit coat, white coat, or a goddamn straight jacket.

I hate that this is my response to the knock at the door.

More specifically, my reaction to the person who’s knocking.

The woman who has to knock again because I’m too goddamn busy preening like a fucking peacock all alone in here to actually grant her entry.

“Come in,” I blurt as I spin and lose my balance, grabbing for the lever on my chair by mistake and nearly launching myself onto the desk. “It’s open.”

In an attempt to refrain from making an ass out of myself, I press my palms against my desktop calendar, my fingers splayed and arms spread wide as my spine goes ramrod straight.

I try to regulate my breathing, slowing it down to a less I almost fell out of my chair and died rate while I blink rapidly behind my glasses, and the exact moment my intern enters my office and looks at me, I know I have failed miserably at looking like anything but a jackass.

“Are you okay, Dr. Lowe?” Magnolia asks with a frown as she closes the door.

I nod but, like an idiot, don’t change the way I’m sitting. “Fine, thank you. How are you this morning?”

“Fine,” she says slowly as she sets her messenger bag on the couch.

“Good. Great. Glad to hear it.”

One perfectly shaped, dark eyebrow raises as Magnolia stands in front of my desk, but thank god, she doesn’t call me on my bullshit.

Not that I think she would, not in this sort of setting, it’s just abundantly clear that I am not fine this morning and saying something about it wouldn’t be entirely uncalled for.

Between the conversation with her father, and the way I get incredibly stupid when she’s around, I’m anything but fine, and judging by the look on her face, this woman knows it.

God, she’s so pretty.

Raven colored hair that’s somehow both thick, and fine, cut into full layers that frame her face and compliment her features perfectly.

Features that are next to perfect on their own.

Fair skin and freckles. Large, piercing blue eyes, the kind that look right through all the bullshit and directly into your soul.

A slender, slightly pointed nose with a thin hoop through each nostril, and full, pink, Cupid’s bow lips, the lower one currently pulled between her teeth.

Fighting a confused smile by the look of it.

Most likely because I’m still sitting like I have a steel pipe up my ass while I gawk at her like a moron.

Unfortunately for me, this is not the first time this has happened so I’m sure by now, Magnolia just assumes there’s something drastically wrong with me, but I can’t seem to help it.

From the moment I first saw her, I haven’t been able to react any differently.

She is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.

This tiny, petite little thing with a presence that is so powerful it’s nearly suffocating.

When she walked into my office after the new residents were settled, I was so struck by her I could hardly speak.

I didn’t, actually, much like now, only I'm almost positive I was drooling by the time I finally said anything.

It didn’t help that I was already flustered when we first met.

The morning of the transfer was complete chaos, and I had to handle it all on my own, so I didn’t get to see the new residents before they walked onto the ward like I’d planned, nor did I get to meet them once we were all accounted for.

Part of the chaos? The guards fucking lost Ivan Sokolov.

They somehow managed to misplace one of the biggest, scariest, deadliest alphas I have ever come across, and it took far too long to find him once they realized it.

Thankfully, and weirdly enough, Ivan found his way onto the second floor staff patio after swiping a pack of cigarettes from one of the guards who lost him, and the serial killer was simply having a smoke before heading to his new home .