He rarely had to ask Callie for instruments during an operation, not unless an unforeseen complication occurred and he had to improvise on the spot.
Otherwise, she routinely remembered which one was used for what from previous operations, and when he was going to try something new, he would go over the procedure with her beforehand, taking her through it step by step. She filed away what he told her in her head, using the information to expertly assist him.
Trey admired her excellent memory and OR nursing skills as much as he did her unruffled calm under pressure. He had never worked so well with anyone before, never been so in sync with another person as he was with Callie Sheely during surgery. While in the OR, it was as if she were an extension of himself.
It was new to him, this kind of intuitive rapport. Certainly it had never existed in his personal life and still didnât. Yet here in the OR he and Callie were as one, working together in uncommon unity and intimacy.
He lifted his gaze to meet Callieâs again. She had the most beautiful, expressive eyes heâd ever seen, a dark liquid velvet glowing with warmth and intelligence, alert with liveliness andâ
âAny questions?â Trey deliberately interrupted his own reverie.
Lately, renegade thoughts about Callie Sheely seemed to strike him more and more frequently. Whether in the OR or alone in his apartment or chatting with colleagues anytime, anywhere, random images of Callie Sheely would suddenly pop into his head. He would find himself drifting off on a mental riff, mulling over her memory, her eyes, her humor.
Such thoughts had no place in a professional relationship, Trey reminded himself. And a professional relationship was the only type he and Callie Sheely had. The only kind of relationship they would ever have, and that was the way he wanted it, the way it had to be.
Still, his unexpected musings were beginning to bother him. After all, Trey Weldonâs finely honed mind did not drift into unfitting flights of fancy.
Except lately, when it did. And inevitably the disconcerting drift was Callie Sheely inspired.
âI repeat, any questions?â He heard the impatient edge in his tone.
Well, he was impatient, though not really with the students who remained silent, perhaps intimidated.
âSo I can assume that everybody perfectly understands everything there is to know about AVMs and this procedure?â It was a short step from impatience to sarcasm, and Trey couldnât resist taking it.
At last one of the med students dutifully piped up with a question. True, it was a stupid question, but then the kid was merely a student. Trey took pity on him and proceeded to answer in painstaking detail.
He determinedly put aside any more thoughts about Callie Sheelyâs eyes. He refused to think about her marvelous memory or her invaluable OR skills, either. He particularly refused to ponder their intuitive rapport and the way her sense of humor had somehow infected him.
She was not getting under his skin, Trey assured himself.
They were colleagues. They worked together, nothing more. They werenât even friends, because friends socialized outside the workplace, and he and Callie Sheely never saw each other except in the workplace.
And that was the way he liked it, the way he wanted it to be.
No, she was not getting under his skin.
Chief OR scrub nurse Callie Sheely listened to every word of Trey Weldonâs comprehensive explanation. As always the mellifluous timbre of his voice stirred her. Only Trey could sound seductive while discussing the complexities of AVMs and their variations, along with inventive ways to repair them.
Callie watched him work, anticipating what he would do next and what surgical instrument he would need, his voice keeping her focused even as it enthralled her. Excited her. Trey Weldon had the sexiest voice sheâd ever heard, deep and masculine, mesmerizing, with just the slightest hint of an upper-class Virginia drawl.
If only he sounded like Elmer Fudd, she lamented wistfully. As a diversion Callie tried to imagine Elmer pronouncing arteriovenous. She had to do something to decrease the sensual effect Treyâs voice had on her.
It just wasnât fair! Not only was her boss good-looking, brilliant and talented, but he had a voice that could net him a fortune doing romance-hero readings for books on tape. And she had to listen to it, to him, by the hour and was expected to remain completely immune to him and his powerful allure.
After all, Callie knew the rules. She was Treyâs coworker, his subordinate, actually, and she knew that was the only way Trey Weldon saw her. Would ever see her.
She viewed their situation as comparable to characters in the old Greek myths, which sheâd enjoyed reading as a child on her biweekly trips to the Carnegie library. In those myths, gods who dwelt high in Mount Olympus did not consort with ordinary mortals. Just as upper-class scions like Trey Weldon didnât socialize with working-class nurses from Pittsburgh. Like Callie Sheely.
Ancient and fanciful they might be, but those myths taught a necessary counterlesson to the fairy tales that Callie had also devoured as a child. In fairy tales, a scullery maid might land a prince, but not in real life.
Real life meant sticking with your own kind. Otherwise the result was culture clash, not romance.
Callie suppressed a sigh, wishing that Trey would lapse into silence so the music could be cranked up to full volume. The OR team took turns choosing what was to be played, and todayâs choice had been Quiana Turnerâs, the circulating nurse. That meant sassy girl singers, lively and loud and brimming with attitude, just what Callie needed to hear.
But Trey continued to explain what he was doing to the students, and Callie listened and watched as he skillfully wielded the tiny scalpel sheâd handed him.
His technique was flawless. As always she was awed by his incredible dexterity, his seemingly effortless expertise. To use such a tiny instrument so effectively in one of the most crucial parts of the brain was true genius. She never tired of watching him perform.
Nobody else did, either. To say that Dr. Trey Weldon, Tri-State Medical Centerâs extraordinarily gifted neurosurgeon, was respected by his peers, by his lesser colleagues, by the establishment powers that be and everybody else, was a pallid understatement.
Trey Weldon was a star, a âsurgical supernovaâ to quote a dazzled science reporter from the local Pittsburgh newspaper. The article exalted Treyâs operating prowess and his impressive credentials, also mentioning the determination of the medical centerâs administrators to recruit him eighteen months ago.
Callie had saved that article and read it from time to time, particularly when she felt herself in danger of forgetting just how far she wasâand would always beâfrom Trey Weldonâs world. Beginning, appropriately enough, with their origins.
The Weldon family descended from landed gentry in colonial Virginia, whose fortune had been made generations ago while Callieâs forebears were still trying to eke out a living as peasants in the old country. And though different backgrounds often didnât matter, Callie knew bloodlines meant a lot to the aristocratic Weldon family.
It would certainly matter to them that her blood was the wrong shade of blueâthat is, blue-collar blue. She just knew it would, from what sheâd gleaned from that newspaper article and some of the casual comments made by Trey himself.
The son of Winston and Laura Weldonâsheâd learned his parentsâ names from the article, tooâhad nothing socially in common with her, the daughter of Jack and Nancy Sheely, whose grandparents had left poverty in Ireland and Russia to live in poverty in Pittsburgh. Their brave move and hard work had eventually paid off for their children and grandchildren, but high society they werenât.
The Weldons were and had been Southern aristocracy for a couple of centuries.