Necessary Medicine by M.K. York

Author:M.K. York
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2017-05-20T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

Fall rolled around a lot faster than he was expecting. The department secretary stuck her head into the dictation cubicles. “Neil?”

He leaned out so she could see him. “Yeah?”

“I’m making the arrangements for the trip to ACS.”

“That’s fancy, last year I had to figure it out myself.”

“Yeah, well, last year you were going about twenty feet.”

“What do you need?”

“Just wondering if there’s anybody you don’t want to sit next to on the plane. I’m making the final adjustments, we got a deal on a block of tickets.”

He paused, briefly electrified. He could ask—no. Better not to.

“Nah,” he said, “anybody’s fine.” He’d just put on his headphones and try to sleep.

“Do you have your hotel booking yet?”

“No, should I?”

“Neil.” She was exasperated. “You should have done that weeks ago. You’re going early, right? For the skills workshops?”

“Yeah, damn. Do you know if anybody’s looking for a roomie?”

“I’ll check the list. Damn it, Neil.”

Half an hour later he got an email. Hey, Neil, I checked the list. The only person I know for sure is still looking for a roommate is Dr. Newcombe. His roommate had to cancel. I’m letting him know you’ll be rooming with him.

He stopped dictating the note to gently bang his head into the desk a couple of times. He did it quietly, so no one would hear.

* * *

He was flying out the night before the conference. It was going to be about four and a half hours, not too awful, nonstop. He was leaving after almost a full shift on, which sucked, but there wasn’t much to be done about it.

When he got through security and found the terminal—he hadn’t cut it too fine—he saw a familiar flash of silver hair and groaned internally. He walked up and dropped into the seat next to Eli.

“Hey.” His voice came out rougher than he’d intended. It had been a long day, and he hadn’t gotten much sleep.

Eli’s head jerked up, startled. He had a book in his hands—of course he would—and as he registered that it was Neil, he relaxed again.

“Hey, yourself.” Eli set the book down, tucking the dust jacket in to mark his place. “Ready for the conference?”

“I’ve got my thumb drive around my neck.” He held out the chain it was dangling on. “And it’s uploaded to the cloud and emailed to myself, and basically, unless there’s an act of God, I’m not losing my slides for this talk.”

Eli laughed. “Better not tempt fate.”

“Got any plans to be a tourist while you’re out there, or have you been to Chicago so many times you’re bored?”

Eli shook his head. “I’ve done most of the tourist stuff. Have you been out there before?”

“Just when I was interviewing for residencies.”

“Well—” and Eli looked him right in the eye as he smiled “—I think we got the better end of that deal.”

Christ. Eli could just say things like that, and not mean anything by it, and smile at him like it was nothing. It killed him.

He slumped back into his seat, sighing.

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