by Carly Keene
Contents
CHAPTER ONE Emergency of the Heart
CHAPTER TWO He Asked Me Out!
CHAPTER THREE PTO Program
CHAPTER FOUR Kalinda's Fantasy
CHAPTER FIVE A Night Out
CHAPTER SIX Fantasies Fulfilled
CHAPTER SEVEN Emergency at Home
CHAPTER EIGHT Regrets
CHAPTER NINE The Best Thing That Could Happen
CHAPTER TEN Epilogue
CHAPTER ONE
Emergency of the Heart
Noah
I finish up with the hip fracture in Room 6 and finish the paperwork to admit her, hoping her elderly husband or harried middle-aged daughter or somebody will be able to take care of her at home while she recuperates. I’ll never know, of course; I only see patients when they come into the emergency department.
They come in with appendicitis, with strokes, with heart attacks, with stomach cramps that turn out to be labor pains. They come in with broken ankles, smashed noses, cracked ribs. They come in with cuts and contusions, hernias and hematomas, nosebleeds and narcotic comas. Sometimes they come in with weird stuff—last week we had a guy in here with a lightbulb up his rectum—and sometimes they come in with sad stuff, like the babies who went to sleep and didn’t wake up. Too many times they come in drunk, high, suicidal, or victims of nasty accidents. Far too many times, they come in with injuries that would turn your stomach inside out. Sometimes they come in already dead.
Like my wife.
My late wife, Abby. She’s been gone four years now.
I saw her body, after the accident. James was not quite two years old, and he kicked up a fuss when we left him with Abby’s parents to go skiing at Canaan Valley to celebrate our 10-year anniversary. It wasn’t much of a fuss, though, because Abby’s mom offered him a cookie, and he stopped crying obscenely fast. In the car, Abby was so excited she was practically bouncing in her seat. She’d been a soccer star and all-around athlete at Northwestern when we were dating, but she’d been so busy putting me through med school and then my residency, and then so busy with James, that she hadn’t had the opportunity to ski since our honeymoon.
I’d warned her: there was enough snow to ski on, but not enough that it would cover objects in the landscape that might become obstacles. I’d warned her to wear her helmet. “Don’t be silly,” she’d said. “I’ll stay on the run. You go on and hit the intermediate without me; you know I like the bunny slope.”
We never knew, afterward, how she’d gotten off it. Or how the tip of her ski had caught a tree root just under the snow surface, or how that jar to her momentum might have catapulted her through the air and into a tree trunk. Her head injury didn’t even look all that serious.
She was just dead.
For a little while after that, I might as well have been, too.
Rachel got me out of that, though. She drove south in a snowstorm and came charging as only a tall girl can through the front door of my house (mine and Abby’s, the house we’d planned to fill with children) to literally shake me out of it. She’s been pretty much looking after me and James ever since. She moved in with me and turned the room over the garage that was supposed to have become my man-cave into her sculptor’s studio, and now she runs my life.
It could be worse. I’ve got James, who is the cutest human tornado ever, and who looks at me with his mother’s doe-brown eyes when he wants another cookie. Besides, I know my sister loves us.
And I’ve got my work, fixing people. We take our magic fix-it tape and superglue and stitches and potions, and we fix what we can, and most days, that helps.
Some days, it’s not enough. But tonight, it’s good. We had four patients from an MVA in here earlier (one mild concussion, one broken arm, a lacerated liver that went straight up to the surgical ward, and one catch-and-release with no medical issues). There was a drunk-and-domestic twofer, and a Code Brown (severe diarrhea). Plus my Little Old Lady with her hip fracture. Nobody died tonight, and that’s a good shift in the ER.
I recheck the x-ray films for my LOL’s fracture, just to make sure I didn’t miss something, and then I see the signature of the particular radiology technologist who took these images, and my night gets a little bit better, because the lovely Kalinda White is working my shift. My mind’s made up now: I’ll run down to Radiology and ask her about the films. I don’t need to do that, because she knows what she’s doing and the films are clear as day—but I need an excuse.
I start walking briskly down the hall, reminding myself that I really shouldn’t be doing this. The hospital doesn’t have an anti-fraternization policy, and there always seems to be plenty of dating action going on among my colleagues, but Kalinda’s so much younger than I am. She seems so sweet and bubbly, always friendly.
And then there is that astonishing ass of hers. It looks like an upside-down heart, all round and bouncy. It keeps beckoning my hands to touch it.
I don’t, of course. I don’t want to be a creepy creepster, much less a workplace harasser.
But holy fucking hell, do I think about touching that ass.
With those thoughts on my mind and my scrubs a little tight in the groin, it’s just a bit embarrassing when I round the corner leading to Radiology and see Kalinda herself coming out. “Oh hey,” I say, and flap the x-ray films at her. “Kalinda. Got a minute?”
She stops walking, and her cheeks go pink. “Hi, Dr. Bonner. Is there a problem?”
“No, no,” I assure her. “Just—I had a couple of questions about these, maybe you can clarify. How’s your night going?”
“It’s going,” she says gamely. “Did I do something wrong, Dr. Bonner?”
“Not at all. And call me Noah.”
She looks down and tucks a loose piece of her pretty strawberry-blonde hair behind her ear. When she looks up, her blue eyes are direct above those pink cheeks. “What did you need to know? Um, Noah.” And she blushes again.
“Well . . . I’m seeing some bone thinning here,” and I point to my LOL’s films. “Places other than the break. You see that?”
She blinks at me and bites her lower lip. “You know I’m just a technologist, right? This is kind of above my pay grade.”
She’s completely right. My excuse to come down here is pretty transparent. God, how embarrassing.
I nod. “Can we forward these to Mrs. Weissman’s primary care physician?”
“Sure. You just order it sent to her PCP. I’m sure you know—”
“Ah. Right, right.” I’m a fucking idiot.
I’m a fucking horny idiot. Except that it’s not all women that get to me. It’s not even women who remind me of Abby, because Kalinda looks nothing like her. It’s not even “sexy women,” because Dr. McLean, who’s our resident orthopedist and possesses an unbelievably splendid bosom, does nothing for me sexually.
It’s just Kalinda.
Damn. Might as well go all-out with this fucking nonsense.
“Listen, Kalinda—would you like to maybe grab a meal with me some time?”
She’s looking at me with wide eyes, beautiful mouth open. “I’d . . . um, I’d like that.” She looks down again, biting that luscious lower lip again. I have an actual hard-on now. “But my mom . . . my family . . .”
It’s probably embarrassing her that I’m easily fifteen years older. This is fucking humiliating. “Yeah, I get it. I’m too old for you.” She looks up, mouth open to say something, but I forestall her. “Look, never mind
. I won’t bug you, okay? We can still work together.”
“Doc—I mean Noah,” she says, holding out a placating hand. “It’s not that. It’s—see, my mom is . . .” She hesitates again.
Then my pager goes off: another MVA coming in. “Gotta go,” I say, and I escape.
CHAPTER TWO
He Asked Me Out!
Kalinda
I swing myself off the bus and walk up to the apartment. When I open the door, Kollin is in the kitchen busy scooping eggs out of the frying pan onto plates. When he sees me, his eyes go from panicky to calmer. “Oh good,” he says. “Can you make sure Kandace has her hair done? Because I don’t mind cooking breakfast, but I draw the line at braiding hair. Also, I have a test in AP Government today, and I really wanted time to look over my notes again.”
Our brother Korey, who’s ten, comes into the kitchen. “Yum, scrambled eggs. Where’s Mom?”
This is of course the million-dollar question. It’s also the reason I was leery of taking a position as x-ray tech at the hospital, instead of some nice specialist’s clinic in downtown Richmond, with 9-to-5 shifts and an hour for lunch. As it turns out, though, there aren’t a lot of clinics with their own radiology department, so it was the hospital or nothing. Newbies don’t get to pick their shifts; techs with seniority can ask for the day shifts.
Kollin makes a face while he’s grabbing a fork. “Asleep.” He catches my raised eyebrows. “Hey, at least she’s home. And on her own.”
“At least there’s that,” I mutter.
There were so many times when I was a kid that she didn’t come home at night. There was always some man, or some bar, or some party. She’d roll in the next morning, saying she’d just gotten up to get us a container of milk or herself some smokes, but we knew. My first-grade teacher noticed that I kept coming to school in the same clothes, and somebody called CPS.
There followed a string of foster homes, some good, some bad, interspersed with periods of time at home with mom, in between her boyfriends and new babies and/or jail sentences for possession. I spent a good few years running around like a wild child myself, hoping to get her attention, but it never happened. I was never as interesting to her as the next guy, or the next bottle of Wild Turkey.
By the time I was in high school, I’d begun planning for the future. I planned to take my education seriously and get me and my siblings out of this hellhole. I quit messing around with boys and pot. I got my grades up. And it took a while, because I was working retail and fast-food jobs at the same time, but I finished my associate’s degree and started working as an xray tech last year. Mom’s been out of the halfway house for two years now, and we’re all waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Kollin will graduate in the spring. The babies are ten and eight years old, and they will always have me, since none of us can count on our mother.
Kandace comes to the table in jeans and a purple sweater, hair in a clumsy ponytail. “Hi, baby,” I tell her. “Want me to do your hair?”
“Can I have cereal?”
“Yes, but eat some fruit too,” I tell her. I get my brush out of my backpack purse and slip the elastic out of her long brown hair. “Here, let me just get this little piece smoothed back. There, you look pretty.”
“Is Mommy coming to school tonight?” she asks, picking up the spoon Kollin sets in front of her and starting to chomp Cheerios.
“Why would she come to school?” I ask. Shit, I’m tired. These twelve-hour shifts can wipe me out.
Kandace glares at me. “It’s PTO tonight. Korey and me are in it.”
“There’s a program at school,” Korey explains. He’s finished his eggs, and now he’s shoving stuff in his backpack. “The first and second graders are singing, and then my class is doing a history skit.”
“Sounds good. A skit about what?”
He gives me an incredulous look. “’Bout history. Duh.”
“You’d better not be rude like that at school,” I say, but he’s already down the hall, brushing his teeth.
Quietly, because Mom is asleep. Waking her up when she’s been out partying is like waking a dragon: to be avoided at all costs.
I walk over and check the calendar on the wall, where I’ve written my work schedule. Mom is supposed to be writing hers down too, but half the time Waffle House won’t give her her schedule ahead of time, and the other half she forgets to do it. This week, though? She’s written it down.
And she’s supposed to be working a 4 p.m.-to-midnight shift. No way she’s going to make a PTO meeting. Well, just hell. I’m going to have to go, instead of trying to get some sleep before the next time I work a twelve-hour night shift.
And honestly? I’m not sure how I’m going to get some sleep anyway, seeing that Doctor Noah Bonner asked me out this morning.
Dr. Bonner! Asked me! Out! Me!
The one guy I’ve had a crush on at the hospital. Because he’s gorgeous, and because he’s so nice. He always looks right in my eyes and speaks to me politely. A lot of doctors are really arrogant, but not him. It’s pretty sexy to see him order around a roomful of medical professionals, in the process of saving somebody’s life, but after things have calmed down, he’s such a gentleman.
Also, the man is fucking ripped. He will sometimes go for a run at the end of his shift, before he takes a shower in the locker room and goes home, and sometimes he runs without a shirt. Lord help me, the first time I saw his chiseled abs and the way his stomach muscles taper down into a V above his hips, I seriously had to talk myself out of just grabbing his running shorts, yanking them down, and sucking on his lollipop.
Shit. Just thinking about him running shirtless, I’m instantly hot and damp between the legs.
I shake myself and finish packing the lunches: four PBJs on wheat bread, two for Kollin because he’s hungry all the time. One each of those baby oranges, and three snack baggies full of store-brand pretzels, and that’ll have to do because it’s time for the bus. I kiss everybody goodbye—Korey’s round damp cheek still smelling minty from toothpaste, Kandace’s rounder cheek suspiciously not smelling like mint, and Kollin’s lean brown cheek where he is sporting a few dark hairs.
And then I can collapse into a kitchen chair and think about Dr. Bonner—Noah—again. His dark wavy hair, his dark brown eyes crinkled in a smile, his beautiful lips. That lean runner’s torso, those strong legs. That V leading down into his shorts.
And he asked me out!
I’ve been flirting with him, in a restrained sort of way, for months. I can’t help it. Why, why didn’t I say yes?
I could kick myself. But the truth is, the man deserves to date somebody better than me. Smarter, prettier, more experienced, better educated. There are a million girls he could be with, girls who didn’t have three siblings and a substance-abusing parent to look after. If I didn’t care about him, or if I was still the indiscriminate teenage dater I used to be, I could have just said yes to a night out and what might be the best fuck of my entire life.
But Noah Bonner could break my heart, just by walking away.
I sigh, and remind myself that if he was serious, he’ll ask again.
Damn. Now all I have to do is wait and see.
CHAPTER THREE
PTO Program
Noah
When I get home from my night shift, worn out, Rachel is preparing to drive James to school, rattling her keys. “Thank God you’re home,” she says. “James, ask your dad.”
James does not look up from where he’s tying his shoes with intense concentration until the last loop is pulled tight. “There,” he says, satisfied, and runs smack into my legs, making me adjust my stance to keep upright. He’s a very solid little boy. “Daddy. You come to the parent meeting at school tonight, please.”
I reach down and pick him up, grunting slightly with the effort. He’s getting so big. “Is it special?”
“Uh-huh. I’m gonna sing.”
“Oh? Just you?”
“No, my class an’ ot
her classes. Can you come?”
Rachel breaks in. “Noah, I had promised to go to Shelby’s gallery opening tonight. It’s on the calendar—both the one on the wall and the family app.”
I shift James around so I can check my phone. “Oh, right.” What with all the usual ER mayhem, and Kalinda White’s distractingly sexy self, I had forgotten to even look. “Yeah. Yeah, I can be there.”
“Good,” Rachel says. “C’mon there, Chief, give Daddy another hug and let’s get on the road.”
James’s small arms are warm and fierce around my neck, then I set him down. “Rach, you ever think about just letting the kid ride the school bus?”
She scoffs. “This school district’s pretty mixed in terms of demographics, bro. Do you really want him riding the bus with foul-mouthed teenagers?”
My face probably shows my distaste at the idea. He’s too young now to learn all the four-letter words that he’ll certainly learn by the time he’s a teenager himself.
Rachel laughs, and opens the door. “I didn’t think so. Bye!”
“Bye!” James echoes, and then they’re gone.
I’m so tired, all I want is a shower and my bed. Out of habit, I make the shower a quick one, five minutes tops, and collapse onto my bed after a cursory towel-drying. I close my eyes, preparing for sleep, but as usual, my brain decides to make a tour of last night’s shift. It spins through blood and torn muscles and x-ray films, stops briefly on Kalinda White, spins again through the tiled floors and the bright lights, and stops again on Kalinda.
Her aquamarine eyes. Strawberry-blonde curls, pink cheeks, wide smile. That upside-down-heart ass.
I’m instantly hard. Without planning it, I slide my hand down to grip my cock and give it a squeeze.
Kalinda.
What would it be like, having her hands on my cock instead of my own . . . What would it be like to have her under me, moaning in pleasure, as I plunge inside her again and again . . . Hot, sweet, wet, tight . . .
