LITMIR.BIZ

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hadn’t been any man’s favorite in a long time.

      If ever.

      “Beautiful and good at her job, too,” Mr Duke mused. “She’s a keeper.”

      “Definitely.” Oz raked his gaze over her. When their eyes met something dark flashed in the blue depths.

      Blair stepped back, shaken by the intensity of his stare. He loved to tease her, seemed to live to do so, which was why she avoided him as much as possible. But for that brief moment he’d looked serious. Almost dangerous.

      “Good thing I’m a catch-and-release kind of guy or I’d be in trouble.”

      Relieved at his normal cocky tone, she let out the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

      Without another glance her way, Oz turned back to the equipment. He warned his patient about the ensuing hot flush and possibly the sensation that he’d need to urinate. When finished, he double-checked Mr Duke’s identification bracelet. Satisfied he had the right patient and wasn’t missing any allergies, Oz administered the dye.

      “Nice.” He watched the image on the screen and closely observed his patient’s reaction to the medication.

      “Is she single?”

      Blair blinked. Had Mr Duke really just asked that?

      “Yeah—” a tiny tic twitched at Oz’s jaw “—but I thought you were married?”

      “My son just moved back to Madison. He graduated from business school in December. Yale,” the man added proudly. “A real bright boy. Handsome, like his father.” He chuckled. “I’d love for him to meet a nice local girl—” he gave Blair a meaningful look, his gaze going to her gloved left hand “—and settle down and get married.”

      Settle down? Marriage? Ick. Blair almost broke out in hives at the thought. She didn’t have time to date, much less get married. She didn’t even want to. Her life was full with her five-year-old daughter, Addy, her younger sister, Reesee, and Dr Talbot. There wasn’t room for catering to a man’s ego and she didn’t want to make room. She liked her life as it was—with the exception of Dr Talbot’s illness and Oz’s annoying presence.

      “You should tell your son about the fund-raiser we’re doing to help with Dr Talbot’s medical expenses,” she suggested, tired of being talked about as if she weren’t there. “We’re hosting a silent auction for donated items, but the main attraction is a bachelor/bachelorette auction.”

      “That dye wasn’t as bad as I feared,” Mr Duke admitted. “Bachelor/bachelorette auction?”

      “Actually, I should talk to your son about volunteering to be auctioned. A handsome businessman would raise a lot for a good cause.”

      “You’re still short on bachelors?” A frown creased Oz’s forehead, but he didn’t glance away from his patient. “Even after I contacted Will Majors about volunteering? Stephanie told me he called.”

      Although Oz had offered to help in any way he could, surprisingly, he had refused to be auctioned. Not when Blair asked, nor when her co-coordinator Stephanie had asked. Blair still couldn’t believe Oz hadn’t wanted to be auctioned. She’d have thought women fighting over him publicly would be right up his alley.

      “We still need two more bachelors to even the numbers out.”

      “Two bachelors,” he mused.

      Oz might be talking with her, but his real focus was on what he was doing. He guided the instrument into the patient’s femoral artery and up into the heart.

      Even during routine procedures, Blair breathed a little shallowly until her patient was resting comfortably post-procedure. She’d never developed the tough skin needed to see the person lying there as just another patient.

      Perhaps because her mother had died during a hysterectomy for uterine fibroids when Blair had only been nineteen.

      “Ah, problem number one is right there,” Oz murmured, causing Blair’s and Mr Duke’s heavy-lidded gaze to shift to the computerized screen. “There’s a tiny blockage of the right bundle branch. Nothing a stent won’t fix.”

      Mr Duke had closed his eyes, probably in sleep. Blair kept a vigilant eye on the man’s vitals. Oz positioned the device to where the artery was significantly narrowed, impeding blood flow and cutting off oxygen to Mr Duke’s heart tissue. With single-minded purpose Oz opened the blockage.

      The blood flow immediately resumed through the artery.

      Oz had a magic touch when it came to healing hearts.

      Blair had learned so much from working with Dr Talbot, but she’d told Mr Duke the truth. There wasn’t a cardiologist she’d trust more than Oz Manning. He was that good, that talented.

      Which seemed at odds with the man who was always teasing, always flirting, always out with one woman after another. Only this visit, with caring for Dr Talbot his primary focus, Oz had curtailed his revolving-door dating.

      Before finishing Mr Duke’s arteriogram, Oz placed two more stents in diseased arteries. While he worked he explained what he was doing to his patient. He made conversation with the heavy-lidded man as if they were watching a football game on television rather than Oz’s life-saving measures inside the man’s heart.

      Although a big teddy bear outside of work, Dr Talbot was a grizzly during procedures. Blair had grown accustomed to his intensity, to his drill sergeant ways in the cardiac cath lab. Oz’s easygoing attitude disoriented her to say the least.

      The man disoriented her, period.

      Even now, she could smell his musky scent, was keenly aware of his broad shoulders, thick chest and narrow hips. Not to mention that her fingers perpetually itched to trace over the cleft in his strong chin.

      Okay, so Oz was attractive. Big deal. She wasn’t blind. No matter how attractive he was, she’d never allow a man like him to get close. Never again. Some lessons were learned the hard way and left lasting impressions an entire lifetime wouldn’t erase.

      Blair swallowed, forcing her mind back to her patient and not his sexy surgeon.

      “Unfortunately, I can’t repair your mitral valve through the catheter,” Oz said, although he’d explain again when his patient was free of the twilight medication. “The damage to the valve is too extensive to seal the leak as we’d hoped.”

      Although having taken leave from his clinical position in Minnesota, Oz continued researching a valve repair device that didn’t require opening the patient’s chest. He opted to use the innovative procedure at Madison when patients met the study criteria.

      When Oz decreased the anesthetic medication and removed the catheter from the man’s femoral artery, Blair placed a weighted device on her patient’s groin, keeping pressure on the bleed.

      Mr Duke’s face had grown pale, but not from blood loss. “Does this mean I have to have open-heart surgery?”

      “There isn’t a way around it.” Oz sat straighter on the wheeled stool. “If you’re agreeable, we’ll get you on the schedule for tomorrow. Regardless, I recommend doing the surgery within the next few weeks.”

      The medicine starting to wear off, Mr Duke shook his head. “I can’t have surgery that soon. I didn’t come prepared to stay. I’ll be out of commission for weeks. There are things at home, at the bank, that need doing before I’m incapacitated that long.”

      “Who’s going to do those things when you die from heart disease? Who’s going to take care of your family?”

      Blair couldn’t drag her gaze away from Oz. His lips had thinned. The cleft in his chin seemed deeper, craggier. But his eyes were what held her mesmerized.

      In that moment, she glimpsed an unguarded vulnerability she hadn’t known he possessed. Somewhere along the line he’d known heartache.

      Blair

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