by Renee, DC
What a drastic change, huh?
I wasn’t complaining…at all.
And if I dare say so, Noah was more confident, more happy, more…everything. Except for our first couple of interactions, he was nothing short of nice. But if you paid close attention, you could see there were shadows in his eyes, dark circles under them, and a black cloud hanging over his head. Guilt. That was what it was. His guilt for not saving his wife, his guilt for living while she couldn’t.
He might not ever truly get over that, but it was holding him back. Now, he was here, present, no darkness following him. I’d like to think I had a hand in it.
The final step? Him winning the contest.
I was going to step back. I had to.
And it was days like this that made me realize he was one hundred percent worth it. As Bella had put it in her email, at the end of the day, I wanted to come home to Noah, not my job. But thank God, my job wasn’t going anywhere. I only had to step back from this contest.
One last thing, though. Noah had made it to the finals.
“Why me?” he’d asked. “I’m just a guy doing my job, and half the time, I’m hoping for a miracle.”
“That’s exactly why. If you were just some guy doing your job, you wouldn’t care enough to hope for a miracle. You’re not God, Noah, and no one expects you to be. But people want their heroes to try their best. Can you honestly tell me you’re not doing that? Can you sit here and say you just give some of yourself when you are with your patients?”
“No,” he mumbled.
“A hero isn’t what he does. It’s what he tries to do. You try to save lives every single day. You give it your all. No, you’re not going to save them all. Again, I repeat, you’re not God. Look in the mirror one of these days and allow yourself to see what all these people who are voting for you see.”
I think my little speech worked, at least a little. With each round he made it through, he dropped a tiny bit of his armor.
A giant ass chunk was still left, but if he won, I knew it would come crashing to the ground.
He didn’t know I had to pull out, though. Oh man, that sounded dirty. Could you blame me? Naked Noah was still sitting next to me. Did you see his body? You saw the picture he took for me, right? So yeah, my mind always veered a little toward the gutter around him.
What I meant was that he didn’t know I had to step away from the contest, which I technically had yet to do. I had one final piece of business with him first. I knew he’d need to hear this from me.
I sat up a little, purposely pushing my boobs closer to his face, hoping for a bit of a distraction as I revealed this little tidbit. “So about the final round of the contest…”
“What about it?” he asked, his eyes zeroing in on my nipples, which were starting to pebble under his hungry stare.
“We sort of need to have you interviewed and followed around,” I said, spitting the words out quickly as if it was one long word instead of a sentence.
“Wait, what?”
“Every finalist is doing it. If they don’t live nearby, we’re sending someone to visit them. You happen to be here, so it’s easier, of course. But nevertheless, someone is going to interview you, then follow you as you do your ‘hero work,’” I said with air quotes.
“And I’m out,” he responded, his eyes leaving my breasts and looking at my face.
“Nope, no, not happening,” I told him. “You’ve come this far. You’re not backing out now. You’ve done interviews, and you’ve done pictures. This is just more of the same.”
“It feels like I’m on display,” he said.
“Hate to break it to you, Noah. But you, Dr. Hottie, are constantly on display. You think I don’t see the stares you get when we’re out?”
He blushed, and I wanted to lick the red right off him. “Not the same.”
“No, but you started this thing, and you’re going to finish it. Besides, this is my baby. You can’t do that to me,” I said with a pout.
“Oh, fuck it, fine,” he said and then promptly captured my nipple with his mouth.
“Is that a yes?” I asked as he sucked.
“Yes,” he said with his lips around me. “Now let me have my prize for agreeing to this bullshit.”
“I’m you’re prize?” I asked.
He stopped what he was doing, looked up into my eyes, and with the utmost sincerity, he said, “You’re my prize every fucking day.”
My mouth opened to form an O, but no words came out. Speechless. Noah Shields had rendered me speechless. “You might want to close your mouth before I find a use for that perfect O it’s forming,” he said with a wink.
“Keep saying sweet things about me being your prize, and I might just—” I was cut off by the reminder on my phone chiming. “Hold that thought,” I said as I grabbed my phone to silence the reminder.
“What was that?” he asked.
“I set a reminder on my phone to remember to change my alarm.”
“Why?” he asked, genuinely curious.
“I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow morning. Need to wake up thirty minutes earlier to make it there.”
“Doctor? What doctor? Why? What’s going on?” His face became serious, all thoughts of sex out the window.
“Nothing’s going on,” I brushed him off. “People tend to see their doctors so that nothing goes wrong. It’s just an appointment, Noah. Nothing to freak out about.”
He eyed me skeptically for a minute before nodding. “In that case, where were we?”
“I believe I was going to put my mouth to good use,” I said with a raised eyebrow.
“Oh, yes, please do.” So I did, and then he did, and then he put his dick to good use too.
Noah
I CHECKED MY phone for the tenth time that day. It wasn’t like Hadley not to respond. I guess she was busy, but even when she was in the middle of doing something, she’d text me back when she was done. So far, it had been literally all day and not a word.
Not that I texted her anything important. Just a simple, Have a good day.
But she always responded back, ranging from a witty comment like, If I can figure out how to walk straight after last night’s pounding, I will to a simple, You too. Yes, she had actually responded with the former the first time I sent a text similar to Have a good day. I might have literally spit out my coffee when I read that. Luckily, I was still home when that happened—no witnesses to my embarrassment.
Nothing today, though. I knew the final contest round was going to be taking up time, so I chalked it up to that.
Didn’t stop me from worrying. I picked up the phone on several occasions to call her just to see if everything was okay, but then I reminded myself that she was at work, and I didn’t want to bother her if she truly was busy. Hell, there were days I forgot I even had a phone, let alone had the time to respond to a text. Just because she had been good about it before didn’t mean she didn’t have the right to be all in with her work every now and then.
The thing is, I wasn’t sure what our plans were that night. We hadn’t discussed them. Was I going to her place? Was she coming to mine? Did she feel like going out to dinner? Unfortunately, today was going to be a later workday for me, so no big date tonight. When I had something special planned, I would text or call her, tell her what time I was picking her up, and per her request, what kind of clothes she should wear.
“What? Why?” I’d asked her after she requested that.
“Okay, imagine me in a tight red mini dress, the hem so short if I bend too much, you can see my ass peeking from underneath, my matching red lace thong just barely visible, the low cut back so low that it almost touches said short hemline. Oh, and of course, no bra because it would be visible from the back, oh, and did I mention from the front because plunging neckline, showcasing my cleavage.” Oh, imagine I did. So much so, I was getting hard and had to remind myself that I couldn’t very well do that at work. “Now imagine you picked me up as I was wearing t
hat, and bam, the date is a fucking hike. Then what?”
“Let’s back up for a sec. Do you own that dress?” I asked.
“Maybe,” she responded teasingly.
“Change of fucking plans. We’re staying in. And you’re wearing that dress.” She laughed. I didn’t. “I’m dead serious, Hadley. Tonight, I’ll be at your place at seven, wear the fucking dress. But no lace thong. I want to be able to pull up your dress and fuck you against the door the minute I walk in with it bunched around your waist.”
“Holy shit, Dr. Hottie. I think I might have to go rub one out in the bathroom from that image.”
“Don’t you dare,” I told her. “If I have to walk around my patients with a semi, you have to be wet and ready for me.”
“Always am,” she whispered. And if you think for one second that didn’t happen, think again.
I digress. The point was, we didn’t have solid plans for the night. Was it presumptuous of me to assume we would automatically hang out? Maybe, but we had been spending every night together for over a week now, and we hang out quite a bit before then too.
When it was approaching evening, and I knew she should be done working for the day, and I had still not heard from her, I caved.
“Hey,” she said as she picked up the phone.
“Hey, yourself,” I answered.
“Sorry, I didn’t respond to your text,” she started right away. “Busy day.” I knew it. I’d been worried for no reason.
“I get it,” I said, not telling her I’d gone a tad bit crazy. “You sound tired. Is everything alright?”
“Yeah, like I said, busy day.” She didn’t sound like herself, and that got me worried. What can I say? I was a doctor, after all.
“Why don’t you go to my place, take a nice hot bath, and when I get home, I’ll give you a massage?”
“Mmm,” she said, sort of sounding like a half-moan. “Sounds divine, but I promised some of my girlfriends that we’d get together for drinks tonight.”
“Oh,” I said, not even bothering to try to hide my disappointment. She had friends. Of course, she did. I did too. I just didn’t see them that often. I knew her best friend was overseas, and she missed her, but it somehow didn’t dawn on me that she had other friends she wanted to make time for too. “Okay, well, then how about you come over after? I should be home by then, and I can have a bath ready for you. If you’re lucky, I might even join you.”
“As amazing as that sounds, can’t,” she responded. “My friends are not known for doing the customary two-to-three-hour dinner and drinks thing. I’ll be lucky if I’m home by two. I have a feeling I’ll be coming in late to work again tomorrow. Better send my boss an email,” she mused out loud. “And I know you have to be up early tomorrow,” she added, her voice apologetic.
It was on the tip of my tongue to tell her I didn’t care and wanted her to sneak into my bed instead of hers at the end of the night, but a guy could only voice so much desperation out loud. Did I want her in my bed, regardless of what hour it was, regardless if she woke me up, regardless if it made me cranky at work tomorrow? Yes, one hundred percent. Did it make me a pussy to admit it? Then so be it. Was I about to tell her that? Nope, I had a feeling today was not the day for it.
Maybe she just needed to drink with her friends and unwind. She did, after all, sound like she had a shit day. I knew, from being around my sister, that sometimes girlfriends just gave you an extra boost. Don’t ask me why or how. All I knew was that when she was in a shitty mood, she’d call her friends, they’d gather and do some girly shit like hair and makeup, and bam, she was magically in a better mood.
If hanging out with her friends meant she’d feel better from whatever had gotten her down, then I could suck it up and not see her for one night.
“Alright. Have fun, be safe. But if at any point you need me, don’t hesitate to call.”
“And you think you’re not a hero,” she said, and for the first time in the entire conversation, I could hear her smile.
“Oh, I’ll show you hero. Tomorrow?”
“Yeah, Dr. Hottie, tomorrow.”
Okay, one day I could do.
Hadley
“HOLY FUCKING SHIT,” Bella said after I’d picked up the phone.
“What in the world are you doing awake?” I asked.
“Fuck sleep,” she said. “Who the fuck can sleep right now?”
“That’s a lot of fucks in a very short time.”
“God, I wish. I miss fucking,” she said wistfully. “I also miss sleep,” she added with even more longing. I knew she was working hard and kicking butt, which was why we barely talked while she was away and didn’t Skype really. If she did this well, she was basically guaranteed an executive position when she came back here. Which one, though, we weren’t sure, but she didn’t care, as long as she was leading in some capacity. “But, wait, back the fuck up.”
“I’m at Noah’s,” I interjected, looking over at him, seeing a smile playing on his lips.
We’d gone to dinner, nothing fancy, but it was nice to be out. He’d asked me about my “tiring” day the day before. There wasn’t much to tell, but I could tell he was worried about me. He asked about dinner and my friends. I gave him as much information as I could. He didn’t seem jealous, but I couldn’t tell. I didn’t want him to be. But I could tell that he wasn’t one hundred percent happy with my answers. But, like I said, not jealousy. It was more like concern.
After dinner, we’d made it to his place. We didn’t fall into bed right away. Despite what you think, it wasn’t all about sex with us. He made us some popcorn in the microwave, and we cuddled together on the couch to watch a movie. I didn’t know if either one of us was truly watching the movie. I had a lot of thoughts swirling in my head, but mostly, I was enjoying the feel of him, surrounding me, as if he could keep me safe forever. If I had to guess, he was enjoying having me near him. Like he was trying to make up for the lack of contact the day before. Or the lack of my normally sunshine personality.
“Who the hell is that?” I asked when my phone suddenly rang in the middle of the movie. When I saw it was an international number, my first thought was, “Damn telemarketer. No, I don’t want to win a brand-new car but first sent you ten thousand dollars to ensure it is sent overseas properly.” Noah chuckled. “Oh, shit, wait, I think this might be Spain,” I said after another second.
“Bella?” I asked as I picked up. Glad I did because it was her, rattling off a string of fucks apparently.
“Tell Dr. Hottie I say hi,” she said.
Noah heard my friend loud and clear. I had a feeling he heard her loud and clear the entire short conversation. “She calls me Dr. Hottie too?” he asked.
“She’s my bestie. I tell her everything.”
“Everything?” he asked.
“Oh yeah,” Bella said through the phone. “Everything,” she said, stretching out the word. Noah blushed. “Nice abs too,” she added. The funny part was she wasn’t even on speaker, and I knew he heard her as if she was right in his ear. There was a reason I was friends with her. Like me, she was loud, unfiltered, and a tad naughty.
“I might have snapped a picture of your picture and shared with her,” I told him sheepishly.
“She bragged, Dr. Hottie. No, more like flaunted that shit, knowing I don’t have time for sex. Lucky bitch. When I’m back, you’re setting me up with another Dr. Hottie, got it, bud?”
Noah laughed. “I can see why you’re friends.”
“Okay, I guess I’ll try to call you later,” Bella said after a minute.
“No, no, if you need me, it’s okay. I can talk now.”
She was silent for a minute before saying, “Then let’s talk.”
“Okay, give me a few minutes, then call me back, yeah?” I asked.
“Yeah, babe, you got it. Talk to you in a few.” She hung up, and I turned to Noah.
“I’m so sorry,” I told him.
“You need privacy? You need me to leave?�
�� he asked.
“Yes, and no. This is your place. I’m not kicking you out of your own home. I just…Bella and I need to talk, and I don’t know how long it’ll be. I should better head home.”
“You can go into the bedroom, close the door, take however long you need.”
“Her voice is like a megaphone without her even trying to. Imagine if she gets emotional. I’m sure your neighbors will hear her.”
“Can’t say I’m not disappointed, but I understand. At least text me when you’re home safe, yeah?”
“Yeah,” I said with a nod, giving him a quick kiss.
“Nope, not enough,” he said, pulling me back, his kiss much deeper, much stronger. Just much more period. I moaned. I couldn’t help it. Each time I kissed Noah was magical.
“I better go before this leads to more, and the next thing you know, she’ll be calling back and listening to us having sex.”
“You’d pick up?” he asked.
“So not the point,” I said with an eye roll.
“Fine, fine, go while you still can,” he said with a wink. I laughed, said goodbye, and headed out.
Noah
“I’M SORRY, NOAH,” Hadley told me over the phone. “My mom guilted me that they haven’t seen me in a while,” she explained. I felt like a world-class asshole for being upset. It was her family for crying out loud. I should have been doing the same—going back home to see mine. I’d said I’d take a few days off and do that for a while now.
I needed to; I really did.
I missed my family, and I knew they missed me. And my sister was about to give birth. Any day now, really. Guess it would make more sense to go once my niece was born. Okay, that made me feel a little better for not going yet. Save my time to meet the latest addition to the family.
