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Damn the woman!
He should be relaxing and enjoying the soaps he'd taped earlier in the day and his bottle of scotch. Instead he kept hearing Cameron's last statement as she'd walked out the door. He knew she wasn't serious, dating more than one man at a time would definitely be against the Cameron code of ethics. So if he was so sure that she wasn't going to carry through with it why couldn't he take his mind off the subject?
He'd heard the nurses twittering all day over the handsome brothers. He told himself that it was because of all the gossip that he was irritated.
Yeah, even he wasn't buying that one.
No he was aggravated because not one, but four handsome eligible men had zeroed in on Allison Cameron. And he couldn't blame them. He could hate them for it, but he definitely understood where they were coming from. After all, her fresh scrubbed beauty was one of the reasons he'd hired her. After which he'd spent many a day ruing the temporary weakness.
Ok so the day she wore the red dress had been an exception. He wouldn't have missed that day for anything.
Damn the woman.
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When he arrived at the diagnostics department the next morning he was in a foul mood. Some of the grump was taken out of his sails by the absence of yesterday's floral explosion. However one look at Cameron and he was seething again. She was wearing the same outfit that had caused his libido to dance a jig all those weeks ago when they had played out the last bet they had made, and that little slit pocket in the vest was taunting him.
Which meant he couldn't resist getting a jibe in as he poured himself a cup of coffee. "So how is bachelor number 4 doing this morning?"
Cameron was reading through the mail and didn't even lift her head. "Improving nicely," she commented.
House just grunted and went into his office.
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James Wilson had pretty much given up on giving his friend any advice that would be listened to or taken seriously. But that didn't mean that he hadn't been watching the current dance that House and Cameron were engaged in. And he better than anyone was in a position to see that Cameron was slowly wearing House down. As much as he was rooting for Cameron, he knew that should she succeed, there would be one major obstacle to overcome. At lunch, he watched House watch Cameron and he came to a decision.
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Lisa Cuddy had been having a shitty day. No other way to describe it. Budget planning for the coming year was not going smoothly, and to top it off the assistant department head of cardiology had announced his intentions to retire in two months. That brought the total to three of the top staff that she would be losing in the coming months. So when James Wilson asked for a few moments of her time she could only hope that there wasn't another crisis looming. Five minutes into their conversation she was staring at him in disbelief.
"Are you sure?" she asked.
"That he's going to crack? No this is House we are talking about. But he's definitely leaning that direction, and I think it's a good thing," he commented.
"He's her boss. It can only lead to disaster," Cuddy predicted.
"Unless of course she was to transfer somewhere else, say to Immunology where you are losing Jenkins," Wilson suggested.
Cuddy mulled the suggestion. "She's not experienced enough to be a department head, but Spencer is ready to move up and that would leave the assistance department head position open," she mused out loud.
"And you know she already does all the paperwork for Diagnostics, so she could handle the workload," Wilson encouraged.
"Immunology has been short staffed for six months. They could really use someone of her caliber," Cuddy agreed. "And House could get along fine with just Chase and Foreman for a while as long as he had Cameron to consult. Wouldn't House be upset with her for jumping ship though? It could defeat the whole purpose."
"Not if it came from you and wasn't something she asked for. He wouldn't expect her to pass up a promotion like that," Wilson advised.
Cuddy was silent for a moment then smiled at Wilson. "Are you starting a pool? Because I want in."
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TBC