I would have to face another slew of questions tomorrow, but I was being granted a reprieve for tonight. A cold beer sounded like a nice way to unwind while I tried to figure out how the hell I was going to answer her questions without lying or getting her hopes up.
Leaving her bedroom door open just a crack for the light from the hallway to filter in, I blew her another kiss before going to the kitchen. After grabbing my beer, I got settled on the couch and pulled out my phone to distract me.
The dangerous thought of texting Chris popped into my head, so I scrolled down to Luna’s number instead. It wasn’t that late, and I could really use some insight from my friend right about then.
While I waited for her to answer, I peeled the label off the bottle and looked out of my window at the lights of the building next door with a million thoughts racing through my head.
“Hey, April,” Cyrus said. I pulled the phone away from my ear to make sure I’d dialed Luna and not him, but I hadn’t made a mistake. “What’s up? Luna’s just gone to grab something from our study. Maybe you can help us settle this argument. She says it’s a waste to keep traveling back to places we’ve been. I think it’s better to go back and see all the things we missed the first time.”
“Are you planning another trip already?”
He laughed but I could practically hear the pout in his voice when he spoke again. “I don’t like having to share my wife with work. I’m trying to convince her we should take a sabbatical for a year and practice our baby-making skills instead of working.”
I rolled my eyes, but I couldn’t stop the smile that came at the same time. “Who needs work, am I right?”
“Exactly. Thank you. You and Adi should come with us. There’s no way Luna would refuse if you guys come.”
“Thanks, but no thanks. An entire year with you two on a baby-making mission sounds like the stuff nightmares are made of.”
“Your loss.” He chuckled. “I understand where you’re coming from, though. I wouldn’t have wanted to spend a year with the person I am now a few years ago either.”
“I was thinking something very similar earlier,” I said.
“Are you coming over to our side of the fence?” he asked, sounding way too excited. “Who’s the guy?”
“There is no guy,” I lied. “You get to keep your side of the fence all to yourself.”
“Boo. You deserve a good guy, April. He’d have to have balls the size of watermelons to keep up with you, but there has to be at least one guy in New York City who’s not a pussy. Want me to set you up with one of my friends?”
“Stop offering. We all know you don’t have any friends.”
He scoffed. “Whatever. Let me know when you’re ready. Here’s Luna.”
“What’s this about a guy with balls the size of watermelons?” She wasted no time when he handed the phone over to her. “Is it that doctor we were talking about the other day?”
“I have no idea how big his balls are.” Well, not literally. Metaphorically, though, they seemed to be decently sized. “Cyrus was just being Cyrus.”
“He’s not wrong about you deserving a good guy.”
“People keep telling me that today.”
She snorted in a way that only Luna could pull off without sounding disgusting. “Maybe you should see it as a sign from the universe that you really do deserve a guy who’s not a giant tool.”
“Or a sign that she deserves a guy with a giant tool,” Cyrus piped up in the background.
Luna broke out laughing, murmured something to him I didn’t want to hear, and then turned her attention back to me. “Sorry about that. He’s gone. What’s up?”
I tore the label into little pieces that scattered on my lap. “I went on a kind of, maybe, sort of date with Chris tonight.”
“What?” she squealed. “Why didn’t you call me earlier? We could’ve watched Adi for you.”
“He took both of us out actually.” I huffed out a breath. “I tried to warn him away, but he refused to listen. He just told me he’d pick us up at seven.”
“A guy who’s not going to be scared away by your tactics? Interesting. I like the confidence. It reminds me of Cyrus.”
The snort I let out was not at all as cute as hers had been. “Except Chris isn’t the cockiest dick on the planet.”
“Never let Cyrus hear you calling him that. You’ll give him enough ammunition for puns and jokes about his nether region to last for the rest of our natural lives.”
“Aye aye, Captain.” I smiled but it didn’t last very long. “Did Cyrus really leave?”
“Yep. Why?”
My teeth sank into my lower lip. I chewed on it for a beat while I thought. “Adi asked Chris if he was going to kiss me when he dropped us off tonight. He told her it wasn’t his choice, and I freaked out. I just pulled her inside and said good night.”
“Why’d you freak out? Wait. Let me rephrase that. You freaked out over a guy wanting to kiss you?”
“He didn’t say he wanted to kiss me, just that it wasn’t his choice to make. But yes, I freaked out over a guy. That’s why I wanted to talk to you. I think there’s something wrong with me. It’s like there’s been this fundamental shift in me since the accident.”
She didn’t hesitate for even a second. “Since the accident or since you met this doctor?”
“I met him ages ago. I work at the same hospital, remember?”
“You said you hadn’t really spoken to him before, though, so I’m counting the day he treated Adi as the day you met him. Either way, this fundamental shift happened once you started spending time with him. Why would that mean there’s something wrong with you?”
“Because I don’t get this way about men. I’m not the girl who dreams about the poofy white dress or the romance, but tonight after we got back, I wanted to read Adi a story like that.”
Instead of the excited shriek I expected from her, I got a quiet sigh. “There’s nothing wrong with you, April. You got burned before, and it’s made you cautious, which is completely understandable. But I think you should give this guy a chance. If you’re happy being single, that’s fine, but if you want to explore what other options there might be out there, that’s fine, too.”
“Other options, huh?” I chewed on my lips again.
“Yeah. I mean, why not? Giving him a chance doesn’t mean you have to marry the guy. As long as you’re clear about what you want from each other, you don’t even have to put a label on it. Spend some time together and see what happens.”
“I wouldn’t have minded spending the night alone with him. See how much he really knows about anatomy.”
“That’s not what I meant, but okay.” She giggled. “Look, if that’s what you want, go for it. Just remember that being friends with benefits sometimes ends with that poofy white dress and all the romance. Cyrus and I are the perfect example of that.”
“You really are.” That was half of the damn problem. I’d literally just watched this movie playing out before my very eyes and I hadn’t been able to believe how a series of such small events could’ve transformed Cyrus from ruthless, renowned bachelor to a pussy-whipped puppy dog.
To be fair to him, he was still ruthless in every other area of his life and I wouldn’t call him a pussy-whipped puppy dog to his face. But when he was with Luna, he was the sweetest, gentlest person imaginable and he didn’t give two fucks about who knew it.
The thought that I might be at the start of my own series of small events was downright terrifying. Cyrus had once told me that it had almost been like he’d had no choice in falling in love with Luna. She swept him right off his feet, and he hadn’t even noticed it until it was too late.
Their story was the stuff romance novels were made of. Real life didn’t work like that. On the other hand, I now knew what to watch out for going in.
Giving Chris a chance didn’t mean it had to end the same way for us as it had for them. I didn’t live in a romance novel like Luna did. Real life had a w
ay of jerking me back to reality as soon as my head hit the clouds.
So I’d be fine. The universe would keep my feet firmly planted on the ground. No sweeping would be happening here.
“You know what?” I said. “I’ll think about it. Thanks for talking me off the ledge.”
“Any time.” I heard the smile in her voice. “Have sweet dreams about all that anatomy he might know.”
“I will.” I snorted as I tried to hold back my laughter. “But you say Cyrus hasn’t corrupted you. Keep telling yourself that, girl. You’re just as dirty as he is now. Tell him I said congratulations.”
Chapter 15
CHRIS
“That’s it for us for the day,” Hunter said as the telltale ding of the tablet shutting off sounded. “No more appointments make Hunter a free boy. Mind if I take off early? I have to do some things for our new business.”
I laughed and scooped a basketball off the floor, making a perfect shot into the bucket we stored them in. “Yeah, sure. Go ahead. I’ll just finish tidying up here all by myself.”
He grinned. “Great. Thanks, boss.”
“No problem. It’s my turn anyway.” I grabbed the last ball and made another shot while Hunter walked to the door.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said and left before I could reply.
Wonder what he’s really getting up to this afternoon. Considering that we’d just recently concluded that we weren’t ready to leave the hospital just yet, I doubted he was really going to do something with opening our private practice.
It didn’t really matter what he was really going to do, though. On the odd occasion when our appointments ended early, we always left once the therapy room was restored to a more respectable state.
Our sessions could get out of hand, especially when we had a lot of kids coming in as patients. At the moment, we had a pretty even split, but there was still equipment everywhere.
As I finished stacking the mats, there was a soft knock at the door. I sighed, hoping to everything that might be holy it wasn’t the ER calling.
“Come in,” I yelled, already mentally preparing myself for whatever emergency I would have to attend to. There go my grand and glamorous plans of catching up on my paperwork this afternoon.
I turned to find not an ER nurse standing in the doorway, but April.
She smiled and gave me a wave. “Hey. Where is everyone?”
“Home, I assume. We finished our appointments early today. Come on in.”
Fuck, why did she have to look so good even in the drab uniform the hospital made her wear? The navy dress with red accents was plain, but the material strained across her breasts and made it look like the button was hanging on by only a few threads while the hem hit her about mid-thigh.
It shouldn’t be this sexy. Unfortunately, women weren’t the only ones who often had a thing for someone in uniform.
I, for one, had had my fair share of fantasies about women in certain uniforms. This particular uniform had never made the cut before, but I’d also never paid much attention to April in it.
I had a feeling said uniform would be making an appearance in my fantasies someday very soon. Clearing my throat as I tried not to indulge in those fantasies right then, I sat down on the mats to hide the bulge I felt growing in my scrubs.
“I just wanted to come by to thank you for last night,” April said, turning to close the door behind her. “We had a lot of fun. I’m pretty sure you made Adi’s year.”
“I still owe her an ice cream,” I said. “I enjoyed it, too. Thanks for agreeing to come out with me. We should do it again sometime. Start with the ice cream maybe.”
“Sure.” She stopped and ran her hand over her long ponytail, bringing it forward over her shoulder as she glanced around the room. “Are you really alone here? It’s so weird when there are no other people around.”
“Yeah, it’s not often this quiet in here. Are you done with your shift?”
She nodded. “I wanted to come up earlier, but we were slammed downstairs all day. I’m glad I caught you before you left.”
“You could’ve just texted me,” I suggested. “You didn’t have to come all the way up here.”
Something unfamiliar sparked in the green depths of her irises. Well, it wasn’t entirely unfamiliar. I just hadn’t seen it from her before. If I was right, it was heat radiating from her gaze as she dragged it down the length of my body.
My cock, still excited from the almost-fantasies of getting her out of the uniform, twitched when her eyes lingered on that area. When she brought them back to mine, there was a sassy smile playing on her lips. “What if I didn’t text you because I wanted to see you instead of just messaging you. Would that be a problem?”
“Definitely not.” My voice came out rougher than usual.
April must have noticed because she suddenly started walking slowly toward me with a little bit of a sway in her hips. “You mentioned the other day that some of your exercises are good for anyone. Care to show me some? I’ve been a little stiff lately. Maybe you’ve got something to help me unwind.”
“What did you have in mind?” I asked, watching her approach with my gaze roaming openly and unashamedly across all the places I hadn’t let it linger on before.
Even if this wasn’t going where I thought it might be, it was only fair. She sure wasn’t making a secret about checking me out.
Scrubs did nothing to hide a hard-on the size of the one I was growing. If she came much closer, she would see exactly what effect she was having on me but I couldn’t say I really cared.
I was attracted as fuck to this woman, and if she’d come up in here with any kind of intention of seducing me, which seemed to be the case, I wasn’t about to say no. Placing my palms on either side of my hips, I splayed my fingers on the plastic and dug my nails into it to keep from reaching for her when she came to a standstill inches away from me.
Eyes locked on mine, she shrugged and flicked her hand in a careless wave. “I didn’t really have anything in mind, but this seems like an opportunity too good to pass up. It’s never this empty around here, with not even Hunter being around.”
“Got it.” So she hadn’t come up here to seduce me. I couldn’t deny that I was a little disappointed about it, but I could live with making the most of the opportunities life handed us. “If I remember correctly, the exercises I mentioned before were stretching exercises.”
“Yeah, I think so.” Her voice, like mine, was definitely husky now. She swiped her tongue across her lips and my cock strained against my pants in response. “Care to show me which ones might help? I know you’re off the clock, so it’s fine if you’d rather I come back another time.”
“Nope.” I jumped off the mats and strode toward the door, calling to her over my shoulder. “Turn around. I’m just going to lock the door to make sure no one interrupts our private session. I don’t mind helping you out while I’m off the clock, but I’m not available to anyone else right now.”
It would kill the mood to sit her down and have a talk about what we both so clearly wanted to do, but I needed her to know that if this happened, I remembered her comments about not playing games and I wasn’t planning on sleeping with anyone else while we weren’t playing those games.
“I’m off the clock, too,” she said, and her voice was laden with enough meaning that I knew she’d caught my drift. “So I’m not available to anyone else either.”
“Good to know.” The sound of the lock clicking into place echoed in the room, but instead of it spurring me on to shoot into action, it slowed me down.
I didn’t have anywhere to be for the rest of the day and she wouldn’t have initiated this if she was in a hurry to get somewhere, so I wasn’t planning on rushing anything.
April had turned as I’d asked, and I took a second to check out her ass as I moved back to her. “Okay, so what you want to do is to reach up as high as you can with both hands.”
“Like this?” she asked as I watched the d
ress riding up until it was right below that ass.
I curled my fist into a ball and put it in my mouth to keep from making any of the sounds I wanted to. Once I was sure it was safe, I removed it but that didn’t mean my voice didn’t give me away anyway.
“Perfect,” I said with a gravelly undertone. “Now bend over and try to touch your toes.”
Again, she didn’t question me. Her fingertips brushed against her toes seemingly without any effort at all.
“Does this work?” she asked.
“Like a charm.” I walked up behind her until I was close enough that she’d be able to feel my erection if she rocked back even slightly. I wasn’t about to grind myself against her until I was one-hundred percent sure it was what she wanted.
Placing my palm on her lower back, I applied gentle pressure. “Extend your arms forward while straightening out your back. Imagine turning your arms and body into an ironing board.”
I was making up the biggest load of shit but I was pretty sure she knew. My plan worked, though. As she lengthened her back and extended her arms, she pressed her ass firmly against my erection.
The quietest moan slipped out of her but she didn’t move a muscle. Since I didn’t want to take any chances of scaring her away, I didn’t assume anything. There was still the possibility that she was turned on but didn’t want me to do anything about it.
“I’m going to touch you now,” I said. “That okay?”
“Yes,” she whispered, but it was more than loud enough for me to hear in the quiet room.
“Relax,” I replied. “Stand up straight but don’t turn around. We don’t want to make your muscles any stiffer than they have been.”
“You seem pretty stiff yourself.”
Her comment cut through the tension in the air and I let out a chuckle. “Yeah, it’s been a while since I’ve done any stretching myself.”
“Really?” She sounded surprised but then dropped her head back against my shoulder when I started running my fingers from her hips to her thighs. “Fuck, Chris.”
She was standing flush against me now. I turned my head to trace her earlobe with my tongue, one hand slowly lifting the dress while the other snaked around her waist. I was so hard it hurt but I was still intent on taking this slowly.
She’s Mine Now Page 10
