Bad Boys Rule

by Naughty Aphrodite

  “Thank you for helping me out,” she said.

  “I’m noting a pattern of cowardice with you,” he replied. “You keep trying to run away from everything. You can’t pick a career and fight for it when things go downhill and neither can you a lover or even the truth. You were never this way back then or was your confidence all a facade?”

  “Perhaps it was,” she answered. “I’m not as strong as I thought I was.”

  He was quiet for a while and she knew that he was fuming.

  “I’m sorry about what happened today,” she said.

  “I don’t need your apology.”

  “I’ll take my leave then,” she said quietly, and his response stung. “Close the door on your way out.”

  Chapter 19

  Caleb was pissed at both himself and her as she exited the room. He hated the way the man had spoken to her, and even worse how she had accepted it all without a word of defense. Granted she had been at fault, but the Aisha he had known would never have allowed anyone to speak down to her.

  She was so very timid now, and filled with perhaps fear or shame... he could not tell, and he wanted to snap her out of it.

  His phone began to ring then and upon the ID of his closest friend, he picked up immediately and rose to his feet.

  “Have you found the nurse’s address?” he asked.

  “I'm sorry man, I wasn’t able to.”

  Caleb shut his eyes and fought to control his frustration. “Perhaps you should just let this go,” his friend said to him. “It’s been four years already and Aisha’s already gone. They altered all the records and hid it all away. Even I, as Chief of Neurology, have no access to it.”

  “That wasn’t the tune you sang to me a few days ago when I was in your home.”

  “I know, but then I know you. Once you latch on something you never let it go until it has been resolved. After searching and seeing just how much secrecy surrounds this entire case, I’m suddenly very worried and scared of your involvement. You’ve flown to three states in the last few days to speak to the staff that was present and testified against her, and so far no one has budged. Everyone seems overly cautious and I’m sure Aisha would have been the same if she were still here. She wouldn’t want you to get hurt.”

  “Thank you,” Caleb said to his friend.

  “You’re welcome, buddy. I’ll come over with the kids next month. We all could make proper use of the lake by your house.”

  “Sure,” Caleb said and hung up the phone.

  He stared out the window as he brooded over and over about the matter. All he had now were rough shards of what had happened, but not the whole thing. And he feared that if he gave up now, that it would be much too late in the future.

  Placing his phone in his pocket, he turned around and exited the office.

  He headed straight for the staff room and when he entered he saw her. She was sitting at a table and going through a thick textbook as she ate what appeared to be a cold slice of pizza.

  “You shouldn’t be eating that,” he said to her as he walked in, and shut the door behind him.

  Surprised to see him, she paused her nibble on the dough. “It’s fine,” she said. “Did you want something?”

  “You moved out the next morning,” he commented.

  “Hm,” she replied. “I thought it would be best.”

  “For whom?”

  She didn’t respond. He went forward to take a seat opposite her.

  “Aisha, tell me what happened four years ago. We need to get somewhere.”

  Her hand froze at the mention and it was a few moments later before she spoke again.

  “You’ve found me out,” she said. “That’s enough.”

  “Why do you want to live like this?” he asked. “Are you that scared?”

  “I am.”

  “What about me?” he asked. “What happens to us?”

  “I’ll leave,” she said and rose to her feet but before she could walk past him, he grabbed her hand.

  He could feel her pulse, the erratic beating of the small nub within her wrist.

  “Don’t you love me?” he asked without turning his gaze to hers, and at his words, he could feel her resistance lessen.

  “Let me go, Caleb. Remaining here was a bad idea.”

  “Then why did you stay?”

  “I have a debt to pay.”

  “Is that what you’re telling yourself? We were engaged to be married before you disappeared. That is the debt and promise of a lifetime which I am certain a few thousand dollars don’t compare to. But you still ran away. Say the truth… I don’t deserve this.”

  She didn’t say a word, so he eventually let go of her hand. He thought that she would leave and shut his eyes to contain the pain in his heart, but then suddenly, warm arms came around him as she buried her face in his shoulders.

  She just breathed him in, refusing to speak, but still refusing to let him go.

  “I wish I could just leave,” she muttered. “Forget you and everything that happened in the past. And I should, but… I just wanted to stay with you a little bit more. To remember what it felt like to have the world at my feet and your love within my reach.”

  He held her arms when she started to loosen it from around his neck. “Let’s fix this,” he said, but she shook her head, her voice croaked with tears.

  “We can’t. I’m a coward.”

  “I’m not!”

  “That’s the problem. You are not. I can’t lose you.”

  “Is my life threatened?”

  She shut her eyes in frustration and he knew that he had pushed her to say too much of the things she never wanted to utter. She turned around to leave but he placed his hand on the door and turned her around to face him. “Is my life in danger?” he repeated.

  “It is,” she said. “As long as I’m around… as long as I exist.”

  “Tell me,” he urged with gritted teeth. “It is Kate Hades and her father, isn’t it? Tell me the details so that I can find something to bring them down.”

  “And you think I haven’t tried? You think I would give you up that easily?”

  She placed her hand on his cheek, softly recalling and committing his features to heart. The tears fell from her eyes.

  “I had hoped you would forget me,” she said. “That you would move on. You’re a smart guy, Caleb, that is exactly what you should have done. But what is this? Why am I still buried so deeply within your heart?”

  He took her hand from his face and held it against his chest. “You are my heart,” he said. “The moment I chose to love you was the moment it ceased from being inside of my chest. It is with you, so when you left, you left me incomplete, and you’re about to do it again. Please don’t break me once again. I won’t survive it.”

  “Caleb stop!” she cried, and began to pull her hand from his grasp but he wouldn’t let her go.

  “I can’t lose you,” she said. “I’d rather be without you than risk losing you. You can’t win over ruthlessness.”

  “Yes, I can,” he exclaimed and the moment he said that, she froze. She looked into his eyes, and he knew that in that moment she believed him, and it scared her. There was a laughter behind the door and it brought them back to where they were.

  She instantly began to wipe the tears from her eyes, as the complaints came through the door at why it wouldn’t open. She hurried over to her seat and picked her pizza back up.

  “I need to kiss you,” he said and she stared at him.

  “I’ll come by your office.”

  “Promise?”

  She nodded.

  “Stop eating that trash,” he said. “I’ll get you a new box.”

  He stepped away from the door and it fell open, almost throwing a nurse inside. He walked away before she could regain her composure enough to see him.

  Chapter 20

  “Who was that?” the nurse asked, and Aisha cocked her head as if to
see past the door. She shrugged, so the nurse went out to check but Caleb was already gone.

  “It was Dr. Pace, wasn’t it?” she asked and Aisha nodded with a smile.

  The nurse’s eyes widened as she came over to sit with Aisha. “He wasn’t still scolding you for the child’s incident, was he? Oh my, I can see the tears in your eyes. Were you crying?”

  “He was really mean,” Aisha said, and the nurse shook her head in pity for her.

  “We call him Dr. Frost,” she said. “Pity you. Now you’re on his black list.”

  “He has a black list?”

  “He does,” the nurse said, “but he doesn’t know it. We’ve chucked it up to him being so brutally honest in every sense of the word. If he’s pissed off at you, he becomes a little colder or snappier. He can be dismissive one evening and the next morning he smiles at you again.”

  “Isn’t that based on his mood?”

  “To be honest, I don’t think he projects that onto us. He is only ever cold and snappy after he’s scolded us for something wrong, not just for any reason. He’s really good at hiding his feelings when it comes to himself. He’s a strange one, that Dr. Pace, but incredibly attractive.”

  Aisha smiled and returned to her textbook.

  “There’s word around the hospital though…” she began in a gossipy tone. “That you two are…”

  Aisha lifted her gaze, her face expressionless. “We’re what?”

  “You know…” the nurse teased and Aisha chuckled.

  “No, I do not know.”

  “He saved you in the ER, and just a few weeks later you’re working here.”

  “We were acquaintances,” she said. “We used to work in the same hospital so we can’t help but be a bit more familiar.”

  “Oh.”

  Aisha suspected that the nurse was going to keep prying so she shut her book and rose to her feet.

  "If a box of pizza comes, don’t you dare eat it all,” Aisha said to her and left the room. She got a call as she headed to Caleb's office, so changed her direction and hurried to the ER.

  As she arrived, she met a gathering of the residents and a few nurses in the Hybrid Room. A report was shared with her as she arrived.

  “Have you paged Dr. Pace?” she asked, and as if on cue, Caleb responded.

  “I’m here.”

  Aisha stepped aside, her stomach fluttering at the sight of him. He took the stethoscope from around his neck and examined the patient. Thereafter, the CT scans were brought to him.

  “I’ll take this surgery,” he said and turned around to leave, but was stopped.

  “Dr. Pace?” Jeremy Reed called. “Who’s going to be your first assistant?”

  Caleb looked at the eager faces. “Well, who’s interested?” All the residents and intern shot up their hands, including Aisha.

  “Dr. Graves will be the first assistant on this one,” he said. “We’ll discuss in time for the next.”

  The groans of complaint echoed across the room.

  “Why Aisha?”

  “Because she’s a General Surgery specialist,” he said, “or do you want to take this opportunity from her?”

  Aisha lowered her head as a blush spread across her face. Her specialist was not General Surgery since she was yet to choose one, and he knew that. “I’ll get ready,” she said and hurried from the room.

  When she arrived to wash her hands, she met Caleb dressed with his surgical cap on and a pair of blue scrubs.

  “Hey,” she said and he nodded.

  “Are you ready?”

  “I am.”

  She went to stand by him and said. “My specialty isn’t General Surgery.”

  “I’m aware,” he said. “I did it as a favor to you. So you better think long and hard about how you’re going to repay me. I doubt a simple kiss is going to cut it. Where’s your cap?”

  She touched her head to see that she’d forgotten it, and her eyes widened with surprise.

  He shook his head at her and began to rinse his hand.

  Aisha checked to confirm that no one was coming their way and went over to hug him from behind.

  “What is this for?” he asked as she revealed in his warmth.

  “Nothing,” she answered and listened to his sharp intake of breath as she slipped her hand inside his pants.

  “What are you doing?” he whispered.

  “Appreciating your nomination.”

  “You’re fucking heartless,” he breathed. “I’m about to go into surgery.”

  “We have a few minutes.”

  He chuckled, “I can’t be distracted.”

  “You’re Caleb Pace,” she said, her eyes burning his. “You can’t fuck me and then focus enough to save a life?”

  “No, I can’t,” he replied.

  With a pout, she grabbed a few paper towels from the rack behind her and quickly wiped his right hand clean.

  He was amused out of his mind. “What are you doing?”

  She led his hand into her own pants and then kissed him deeply as he cupped her hard. She gasped as he slipped two fingers inside her, and began to coax her wild.

  “You’ll pay for this later,” he said, and she nodded absentmindedly. He kissed her as her grip tightened against his biceps, however, just before she could reach her peak, he withdrew and slipped the two fingers into his mouth.

  “What are you doing?” She fisted his shirt, and he grinned in amusement. “See you in the OR and after. Don’t let me remind you to come to my office.”

  Upset, she pushed his chest and began to walk away to retrieve her cap.

  “Walk properly,” he said to her, just as he turned the tap on once again.

  Chapter 21

  The surgery was a success.

  The moment Caleb was done, he headed over to his office and sat down to wait for Aisha. However, when he found that he couldn’t sit still any longer, he went over to the door and leaned against the wall to wait. A few seconds later, there was a knock on the door, so he instantly pulled it open.

  “Aisha,” he called, but instead met the gaze of the Head Nurse.

  She cocked an eyebrow at him. “Aisha? Dr. Pace.”

  He cleared his throat and immediately turned around to head back to his seat. “How can I help you, Mrs. Kang?” he asked, and the older woman smiled at him.

  “Has she confirmed that she is the one?”

  “Not... officially,” Caleb said, “but she isn’t denying it any longer.”

  “What about her memories?”

  “It was all as I predicted. She was just faking it until she could find a way to leave.”

  The nurse’s face fell at the information. “And the reason why she’s running scared? Are you aware? And have you been able to come up with a way to fix it?”

  He sighed deeply. “No, I haven’t, but I plan to bring it all to an end very soon.”

  The nurse covered his hand with hers for reassurance and rose to her feet. “I need you for a thoracic consult. Dr. Reed sent me.”

  “Now?” Caleb asked, looking at the door.

  “Right this moment, Dr. Pace,” she said. “You can speak to your fiancé when your job is done.”

  With an inward groan, Caleb scribbled a note and wedged it on his table. Then he went with the nurse to one of the patient wards.

  Chapter 22

  Aisha knocked on Caleb’s door a few times without receiving any response.

  So she pulled the handle and upon finding that it wasn’t locked, went in and shut the door behind her.

  She turned around, and her heart almost fell out of her chest when she found his chair occupied by Kate Hades. She quickly regained her composure.

  “You scared me,” she said, a strained smile on her face. “Where has Dr. Pace gone?”

  Kate glared at her with a mix of disgust and anger. “His mother was right,” she said. “You truly are the one. You’ve even begun to work here. How da
re you try to fool us all?”

  Aisha gave her a puzzled smile. “What do you mean?” she asked.