The Boss's Proposal by Kristin Hardy Read Free Book Online Page A

desk here.”
    â€œWe already have an information desk. You’ll see it if you look between all those red lines you just added.”
    â€œNot big enough.” He didn’t look up. “We need drama.”
    â€œWe need treatment space,” Max countered.
    â€œWe’ll have it. Besides, if people want information before someone cuts them open, it needs to be clear where they go.” He started sketching new lines on the drawing with confident strokes.
    Even infuriated as she was, Max found herself temporarily fascinated watching the swift, graceful movements of his hand, the speed with which the ideas flowed from his mind to the paper. “If we cut the balcony garden outside the infusion center and move the supply room downstairs, we can still keep the recovery area on two,” he continued. “What’s this over here?” He pointed to an area at the back of the third floor.
    â€œThe family suites,” Max told him. It had taken her two months of working on Jeremy, but she’d finally managed to convince him that it was the very latest standard of care for medical facilities and he was a genius to add them.
    â€œFamily suites? For families that get sick together?”
    â€œIn a way, yes. The new wing includes a pediatric oncology unit. When there’s a kid in for an eight-hour brain surgery or stuck in intensive care for a few days, the family needs a place to stay.”
    â€œYeah, it’s called a motel.”
    She straightened, and all her careful strategy went right out the window. “You want to tell a six-year-old kid who wakes up crying that Mommy and Daddy are going to have to drive over from the Bide-A-Wee down the street to see him?”
    â€œNo, I want to tell the patient who needs surgery that they can get it today instead of waiting two weeks for a bed to open up because we didn’t put in enough rooms. The board wants this place to be a center of excellence and that means having a certain capacity.” He came up to face her. “The family suite thing is a nice idea but we can’t afford it.”
    â€œBut we can afford to waste all that second-floor square footage to make a hospital wing look like a shopping mall?” Max retorted. “Health care is about more than just medicine, it’s about emotional support. Treat the patient.”
    â€œListen to your client.”
    She took two steps toward him. “The patient is our client.”
    â€œNo, the client is the group whose signature is on the check,” he shot back. “If you don’t make them happy, we don’t get the contract and your patientswon’t get their family suites, anyway. We can’t do it all—but we can do what it takes to win.”
    â€œThe family suites and the infusion center gardens were the main concepts in the proposal that got us short listed. You want to take a chance on taking that out?”
    â€œI want to make a proposal that’s going to give the client what they want.”
    â€œAnd how do you know that, from overhearing a few speeches at the gala?” she demanded. “You haven’t even been to the site. You haven’t seen the medical center. You haven’t talked to the staff.” Her voice rose. “You don’t know the first—”
    â€œHow’s it going in here?” Hal stuck his head in the door.
    Max snapped her mouth closed. Dylan tossed the pen on the worktable and jammed his hands into his pockets. “Just brainstorming.”
    â€œI kind of like to hear architects arguing about a design,” Hal said mildly, walking over to the table as if he intended to look at the drawings but mostly studying the two of them. “It tells me they’re invested in what they’re doing.”
    â€œWe’re only talking over some changes to the floor plans everyone okayed at the last design review,” Max said, watching Hal scan the floor plans.
    He nodded.