The Adept Book 2 The Lodge Of The Lynx (37 page)

“Well, the news is basically good, Doctor,” she said, dark eyes meeting his in the mirror as she scrubbed. “No apparent fractures to the skull, though I do want to admit you overnight.”

Adam sighed resignedly. “I’m not surprised, under the circumstances. I suppose that if I were you, I’d admit me too.”

“I’m glad you’re not going to fight me on the point,” she said. A ghost of a smile softened her look of severity. “You’re lucky on the shoulder too. Unless you’ve injured it in the past, you do have what appears to be a hairline fracture of the clavicle, but it’s nothing serious—other than seriously uncomfortable, of course. Ditto the cracked ribs. We’ll put you in a sling, mainly to remind you not to over-use it, and I’ll write you orders for mefenamic acid to knock down the inflammation and some of the pain. Other than that, I’m afraid you’re just going to have to tough it out.”

“Just keep reminding me how lucky I am,” he said with a strained smile. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the bloody swabs piling up on Sykes’ table, and grimaced as the orderly took up a razor-blade to shave deftly around the laceration that went into his hair.

“Careful with that razor, Mr. Sykes,” he said. “I pay my barber £25 a time to cut my hair exactly the way I like it. I’ll give you the same to leave as little evidence of your work as possible.”

“Just don’t you worry, Dr. Sinclair,” Sykes said, with a flash of white teeth. “You’ll hardly even know I’ve been here. And Dr. Lockhart sews the neatest little stitches you’ve ever seen.”

As Adam scowled up at him, trying to decide how serious he was, Dr. Lockhart came over, now gloved as well, to inspect Sykes’ work. Beside her, a male nurse had come in to fold back the top layers of green surgical toweling that housed a suture kit, exposing the gleam of scissors and hemostats and needle-holders to the light of the big operating lamp that he now switched on overhead and brought to aim on Adam’s head. In the glare of the light, Adam could just make out Dr. Lockhart as she snapped the top off a glass ampoule and began filling a syringe.

“I expect you’ve heard this before, Doctor, but in just a few seconds you’re going to feel a little pinch,” she said, setting the empty ampoule aside. “I assume you have no problem with one percent lignocaine?”

“None that I know of,” Adam replied.

She was good. She came in from above his head, so that he never saw the needle—only her other hand, partially blocking his vision, just before she set to work. It was more a tingling than a pinch, after the initial needle-prick, but she infiltrated the edges of the first laceration without a wasted motion, finished almost before he realized she had begun. The one in his scalp took more doing, for the skin was tougher, but that one, too, quickly yielded to her skill. He could feel pressure, but no pain, as she started the actual suturing, and he closed his eyes against the glare of the overhead light.

“You needn’t worry that I’ll fall asleep on you, Doctor,” he said, seeing the after-image of the light against his closed lids as she set the first suture. “I’m aware that I ought to stay awake for a few hours, until we’re sure my brain wasn’t bruised by all that banging around. Your light is brutal, though. Besides, you don’t need me to supervise.”

“I appreciate the vote of confidence,” she said archly, continuing to work. “Talk to me, if you want. Tell me about your accident. “

“Not much to tell,” Adam said. “I blew a tire at speed, just north of the Forth Road Bridge. Fortunately, I was driving a Range Rover—totalled the car, but here I am.”

“Happy Christmas,” she said lightly. “Is your practice here in Edinburgh?”

“Aye, over at Jordanburn—or Royal Edinburgh Hospital, to your generation, I suppose. Jordanburn would be before your time.”

She chuckled. “I’m not
that
young, Doctor,” she said. “Besides that, I’m fond of ancient history. What’s your specialty?”

He cracked an eye up at her again, venturing a faint smile. The efficient Dr. Lockhart had a tart sense of humor, besides being very attractive.

“Would you be put off if I told you I’m a psychiatrist?” he asked.

“Not at all. It beats the hours of
this
job.
Are
you a psychiatrist?”

Closing his eyes again, Adam controlled a chuckle. “I am. How about you? Surgical resident?”

“No, ER specialist. I’m here on a two-year contract to help set up trauma centers in the Edinburgh area. It’s a notion that’s just catching on, this side of the pond—and about time, too.”

“Well, especially this morning, I have to agree,” Adam said. “May I ask where you did your training?”

“Stanford and USC,” she replied. “California’s really on the cutting edge of this kind of technology. I started out in reconstructive surgery, after I finished my general surgical residency—which means you shouldn’t have much scarring to show for this morning’s misadventure. I found I missed working in the ER, though, so I switched to trauma management. There’s a special exhilaration about working with patients who come in messed up and you fix them. Every day is different. And you can’t beat it for people-watching.”

Adam grimaced slightly as a stitch pulled, though it didn’t really hurt; a part of him just thought it should.

“I prefer my people-watching under slightly less chaotic conditions,” he said. “What does the ‘X’ stand for?”

She chuckled. “I was wondering how long it would take you to ask. Everyone does. Care to guess?”

“If I guess it in three, will you allow me to take you to dinner some evening?” he countered, cracking an eye open and squinting against the light. “Assuming, of course, that I survive this.”

“Oh, you’ll survive,” she said blandly. “But that’s hardly a fair wager—unless Mr. Sykes told you, of course. Did you, Tony?”

The orderly’s rich chuckle rumbled from Adam’s other side.

“No, ma’am, I did not. But maybe Dr. Sinclair would let
you
pick the restaurant, if he doesn’t guess.”

She laughed as she set another suture. “That sounds fair to me. Dr. Sinclair, what do you think?”

Adam closed his eyes and smiled. “Is it Xenia?”

“No.”

“Xanthe?”

“No, you’re not even warm.”

“How about Xanthippe, the wife of Socrates?”

“Sorry, you owe me dinner. It’s Ximena.”

“Ah, the wife of EI Cid,” Adam replied.

She laughed delightedly. “Very good. That’s precisely where my mother got the name. The film had just come out, a few months before I was born. It’s actually spelled Chimene on my birth certificate, but I changed it to the ‘X’ spelling when I was an undergraduate—my gesture toward rebellion, I suppose. I liked the spelling even after I’d grown past that, though, so I’ve kept it. And it’s a great conversation starter, as you’ve just aptly illustrated.”

“I can’t argue with that,” Adam murmured, looking up at her again. “That makes your initials
X.L.
And you do, don’t you?”

She was setting a last suture and cocked him a droll look.

“Why, Doctor, how kind of you to say so. I’ll assume that you
may
still be in shock, but that’s one of the nicer things a patient has ever said to me.”

Adam smiled. “I’m trying to live down the old adage that physicians are notoriously poor patients.”

“Well, you’re bidding fair to prove the adage wrong,” she said, tossing her instruments onto the tray. “That’s it, you’re done. Mr. Sykes, let’s get a dressing on that.”

As Adam tentatively opened his eyes, squinting against the light, Dr. Lockhart was stripping off her gloves, tossing them inside-out on the instrument tray. She switched off the light, then retrieved Adam’s chart and began writing up her notes.

“You’re about to ask, so I’ll tell you anyway,” she said, not looking up. “You have eight sutures in the first laceration and six in the scalp wound, in case you lost track of the count. I could’ve done it in less, but you didn’t need a scar on your noble brow. Give it a few months, and you’ll never know you were cut.”

“Thank you very much,” Adam said with a grin, suffering Sykes to apply a sterile pad smeared with antiseptic goo, which he then taped in place with strips of adhesive.

When that was accomplished, Sykes helped him sit up so that Dr. Lockhart could fit a sling to his right arm—an ungainly contraption of canvas and nylon straps. As he lay back, exhausted with the effort’ that sitting had cost him, a lab technician stuck his head into the room, glass tubes rattling in the wire rack he carried.

“Is this the patient for admission, Dr. Lockhart?” he asked.

“Yes, it is,” she said. “Dr. Sinclair is being very cooperative—for a doctor—so I’m sure he won’t object while you ply your vampire trade for a minute or two.”

The prospect of blood being drawn made Adam flash on the clandestine visit someone had made to Gillian Talbot’s bedside at Jordanburn.

“Actually, I
will
object,” he said uneasily. “I don’t think we need to run up additional expense for National Health with needless blood work. I’m only going to be here overnight.”

“But those are hospital rules,” the technician began.

“And I’m telling you it isn’t necessary,” Adam said, glancing at Dr. Lockhart. “I hope I don’t have to threaten to walk out of here, to save the tax-payers unnecessary expense.”

Chuckling, she waved the technician off. “Let him be, David. It isn’t worth a fight. He’s a psychiatrist. I don’t think they like needles. And speaking of needles, Dr. Sinclair,” she went on, making another notation on his chart, “what’s the status on your tetanus immunization? When was the last time you had a booster?”

“I keep horses, Dr. Lockhart,” he said, smiling. “I get a routine tetanus booster in January of years divisible by five. You’ve stuck me with as many needles as I intend to put up with for one day.”

“Have it your way,” she said with a shrug, though she smiled. “Mr. Sykes, you might as well take Dr. Sinclair up to his room.”

As Sykes wheeled him out, Dr. Lockhart following as far as the charge desk, Adam failed to notice another staff consultant in scrub greens keenly watching his progress. It had not been part of Preston Wemyss’ plan to get drafted for an emergency appendectomy this morning—not when he had already pulled so many strings to be on ER call to deal with this particular patient.

It was probably the fastest appendectomy Wemyss had ever performed—and done at no appreciably greater risk for the patient, who now was stable in recovery, but it had not been fast enough to get back down to Emergency before Angela brought in the injured Adam Sinclair. Also contrary to plan, Sinclair’s injuries had been slight, and their nature such that the talented Dr. Lockhart had been a natural to take the case, especially since the patient was an eminent fellow physician; and once she had sent the patient off for X-rays, it was too late to try to intervene without arousing suspicion—which meant that Wemyss would have to resort to other means to accomplish his task.

Watching until the orderly had disappeared into the lift with Sinclair’s gurney, Wemyss waited for Dr. Lockhart to disappear into the physicians’ lounge, then casually walked over toward the treatment room that Sinclair had just vacated. When he was sure no one was watching, he ducked inside.

As he had hoped, Sykes had not lingered to tidy the room before taking Sinclair upstairs. Beside where the gurney had been, suturing debris still covered one of the stainless-steel tables, Sinclair’s blood staining discarded gauze sponges and the surgeon’s gloves. Smiling, Wemyss glided over to the table and stuffed several of the bloodier sponges into one of the inside-out gloves, which he then slipped into one of the pockets of his scrub pants. As he came out, he accosted one of the student nurses, directing her attention to the room.

“We need an orderly to prep this room right away, Miss Harper,” he said. “Treatment rooms in the ER must always be cleared immediately a patient has left, so they’ll be ready for the next emergency. See to it, please.”

So saying, he headed off to his office to inspect his find. Foiled in his original intentions, he would explore alternative options for neutralizing the resilient Sinclair, or at least lowering his resistance to more esoteric attack; but one way or another, he was determined that Sinclair should not survive the night.

Adam, meanwhile, had settled into his cheerless room and was gazing at the ceiling. It was a double room, but he had no roommate. He was free to sit up if he wished, but his ribs and shoulder hurt less if he stayed nearly flat, and his head was starting to throb as the local anesthetic wore off, both from the lacerations and the thump he had taken. A nurse had brought him his initial dose of the medication prescribed by Dr. Lockhart, but the two yellow capsules were only beginning to take the edge off his discomfort. He knew he would be given something stronger if he asked, but he also knew that anything much stronger was likely to dull his edge for defending himself while he lay in these unprotected surroundings. Erecting the necessary wards around the room took far more effort than it should have done, for his head pounded when he tried to concentrate, but by the time McLeod stuck his head in the door, grinning as he saw the face he was looking for, the inspector could sense the potency of what Adam had wrought.

“You’ve been a busy lad, haven’t you?” McLeod said, as he came in and dragged a metal chair nearer the head of the bed. “How’re you doing? You look like something the cat dragged in.”

“I feel
like something the cat didn’t want anymore,” Adam replied with a grimace, pressing his slung arm against his chest to brace himself as he operated the mechanism that raised the head of his bed slightly. “Did you make those calls?”

“I did. Your mother was appalled, of course, but realized immediately that she must stay where she is to protect Gillian. I persuaded young Lovat that he was needed there for the same reason. And the others have also been informed. They’ll all be working to send you healing energy over the next few days.”

Adam allowed himself a relieved sigh. “You’re a good man, Noel, and an indispensable Second. God, this was rotten timing! I didn’t need to be laid up just now.”