The transplant didn't save her. It accelerated the countdown. Dr. Julian Mercer thought he had survived the worst night of his career. But inside Surgical ICU Bed 4, twenty-four-year-old Natalie Ward is suffocating from the inside out. The experimental preservation wash-Batch 90-TX-has fractured under body heat, turning her pulmonary capillaries into a jagged web of insoluble polymer that is shredding her blood cells and starving her brain. She has hours before total brainstem infarction. And St. Jude Specialty Hospital is locking down. To protect a multi-million-dollar venture capital filing in Delaware, the hospital's corporate shadow desk initiates Phase-Two: local server logs are purged, master credentials are revoked, and Dr. Maurice Keller prepares a clinical scapegoat to bury the evidence forever. Julian is stripped of his license, hunted by security, and crippled by the terrifying realization that his own failing hands were deliberately poisoned through months of chemical titration. His only ally is Rachel Ward-an investigative reporter holding a stolen lab file, an unindexed patent for a Swiss rescue solvent called Compound RH-7, and an unyielding demand for justice. With the hospital surrounded, a Level-One mass casualty event overwhelming the emergency bays, and a surgical airway crisis that will force Julian into a public arena of blood and cameras, the clock strikes zero. To save the sister of the boy he broke ten years ago, a disgraced surgeon with a dead right hand must break every law of medicine-or watch St. Jude's darkest secret claim its final victim. A breathless, high-stakes medical thriller full of authentic surgical suspense, perfect for fans of Michael Crichton, Robin Cook, and Tess Gerritsen. ***PLEASE NOTE: Hypoxia is Book Two of the 4-book Aseptic Field medical thriller series and concludes on an intense, pulse-pounding cliffhanger. Book Three is coming soon!
