by Elicia Hyder
For a flash, I considered giving her the “when you assume, you make an ASS out of U and ME” speech but I didn’t. Instead, I forced a smile. “I’ll get started on it today as soon as I run last week’s online activity report.”
“Thank you. I’d like updated marketing plans no later than Friday. Before, if at all possible. Please keep me abreast of your progress.”
I stood from the chair.
“And Lily?” She stuck her finger out at me. “Keep this in mind for the future. I’d like to avoid embarrassing mistakes like this for the duration of your tenure at this firm.”
Anger threatened to boil over inside me, but I bit down on the inside of my lips and scurried out to the hallway. I stalked to my office, opened the door, then almost slammed it behind me. At the last second, I twisted around and caught it to prevent the bang that would echo back to Audrey, and smashed my fingers in the doorjamb instead.
I swore through clenched teeth, the worst of all cuss words, as blinding tears pooled in my eyes. Then I danced around my office, hugging my wounded hand to my chest and chanting profanities. My fingers were bright red, and a perfect line was etched across my knuckles.
“Lucy?”
I spun toward my door which had bounced open off my fingers.
West Adler was standing in my doorway.
*
Pain, confusion, anger—they all swirled around inside my head, rendering me catatonic in front of the flaky Adonis who’d invited himself into my office. At least I’d stopped hopping around the room like a drunken jackrabbit.
“Are you OK?” West asked twice before I finally shook my head.
Still unable to speak, I held up my throbbing fingers, my thoughts caught somewhere between “I need to go to the hospital” and “What the hell are you doing here?” It also crossed my mind that I should just be holding up my middle finger. Good thing for Mr. Says-He’ll-Call-But-Doesn’t, my fingers were frozen in a claw, maybe in the early stages of rigor mortis.
West gently held my palm. “What did you do?”
“Door,” was all I could creak out.
“Is there ice in your break room?” he asked, carefully turning my hand over to look at both sides. The underside of the finger he deserved was streaked with purple at the middle bend.
I nodded.
“Come on.” He took hold of my elbow and ushered me down the hall directly to the office break room. Of course he knew where it was. Then he searched all the cabinets around the sink until he found a glass bowl that he carried to the refrigerator.
My knees felt a little wobbly, so I sank down at the table while he filled a bowl, first with ice and then with water. Then he sat down beside me, gingerly took my hand, and eased it into the freezing water. Tears finally ruptured from the edges of my eyes and trickled down my cheeks.
West’s free arm curled around my shoulders and pulled me close to him.
It was a moment of weakness, for sure. I should’ve turned the ice water over onto his lap. But he was so very kind. His touch was nerve tingling and gentle. And he was disarmingly beautiful. Like his face had been put together for the sole purpose of making women question their judgment.
My face rested at the bend of his neck, where fresh cologne and pheromones provided the ultimate analgesic. I sniffed and wiped my nose on the back of my good hand. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, pulling back and drying my eyes with my sleeve.
He smiled that earth-shattering smile of his. “Are you kidding? I get to save my favorite damsel in distress a second time before breakfast.”
My laugh bubbled out more like a whimper. “What are you doing here?”
“I came by to apologize in person for never calling you.”
My head snapped back. “Really? It’s been weeks.”
“I know, I suck,” he said.
Couldn’t argue there. It was a good thing he was so pretty.
He tucked a sweaty strand of my hair behind my ear. “I’ve had a lot going on. I promise it’s not you.”
It’s funny how that’s the one statement in the English language that can truly make a person feel exactly the opposite. I hadn’t realized my face fell until West ducked his head in front of me to meet my eyes. “Are you free right now though? Maybe for a set of X-rays?”
Damn that charm.
My face broke into a smile, and I nodded. “OK.”
West bundled some ice in a wad of paper towels and gently laid it across my knuckles. Then he tore a few more sheets from the roll and folded them into makeshift bandages which he secured around my hand. He dumped the bowl in the sink.
“Where’d you learn to do that?” I asked, admiring his handiwork with the substitute first-aid supplies.
“I’ve seen lots of injuries on job sites. You learn to work with what you have.”
We stopped at my office, and West picked up my purse and keys where I’d dropped them on the floor, then we walked down the hall toward the front. “Why are you limping?” he asked.
Shit.
“Uh, new shoes.” It wasn’t a complete lie. The shoes were pretty new. They just weren’t the cause of the blisters.
“Girls,” he said with a sigh.
I paused at Audrey’s door which was still open. West knocked on it.
Audrey looked up from her desk and pulled off her glasses when she noticed the paper towel cast. “Lily, what’s going on?”
West looked at me. “Lily?”
I ignored him. “I accidentally slammed my hand in my office door, and I may have broken some fingers.”
“I’m going to drive her to the emergency room,” West added.
Concern and fear flashed across her face, probably fear that I might sue for workman’s comp. “Oh, OK. Let me know what they say.”
“I will,” I said.
West held the door to the receptionist area open for me. “I thought your name was Lucy? Your door even says Lucy Cooper.”
I sighed. “It is. Don’t get me started.”
Claire signed me out on our way through the lobby, and West escorted me to his truck that was parked at the curb. “I see you got a new bumper,” I said as he opened the passenger-side door for me.
“Yeah, but I kept the old one as a keepsake.” He held the small of my back as I climbed inside and waited until I fastened my seat belt. “I’m thinking about mounting it over my fireplace.”
“Very manly,” I said.
Smiling, he closed my door and walked around to the driver’s side. “You gonna be all right?” he asked, pulling out onto the street.
The first answer that sprang to mind with the memory of my shoulder was “I’ve recently been worse.” I didn’t say that, of course. I wasn’t ready to tell the world about my adventures in roller derby, especially immediately after proving I couldn’t enter a room without incurring serious bodily injury.
I managed a smile. “I think I’ll live.”
“That’s good to hear.”
God, he was gorgeous.
“How have you been?” he asked.
“Great, actually. Busy with work and hanging out with friends.” I hadn’t spent a lot of time with people my own age since before Mom got sick, and it felt good. Really good. “How about you?”
“The same. We’ve got a new residential high-rise going up in The Gulch. We’ll actually get close enough to see it here in a minute. We’re hoping to finish it before Thanksgiving, and then, hopefully, business will slow down some in the winter.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you built the Summit Tower?”
He grinned. “Been asking around about me, huh?”
Nope. Internet stalking.
“Would it have mattered?” he asked.
“Yes.”
He shot me a questioning glance.
“I wouldn’t have had to give you directions the day you took me to work.”
He laughed.
We drove past the Johnny Cash Museum, which already had a line of tourists forming at the door. Then he tur
ned left onto Broadway, the main drag of downtown’s honky-tonk scene. Even before nine in the morning, the neon signs were glittery and glowing. Most everything was still closed, so the sidewalks were quiet, but the traffic—which was becoming legendary in Music City—was bumper to bumper as far as my eyes could see.
“You know what? I have a better idea,” West said, looking over his shoulder to check his blind spot. He cut into the left lane, then into the turning lane, and turned down a side street. “There’s an urgent care on the other side of the river. That would be going away from traffic and would probably have less of a wait time.”
“They do X-rays?”
“Yep.”
I nodded. “That’s a good plan. I really don’t want to waste any more of your morning than I already have.”
“Don’t worry about my morning, Lucy. There’s no other way I’d rather spend today.”
I frowned and raised my bandaged hand into the air. “Really? You can’t think of anything better?”
He laughed as he stopped at a red light. “You know what I mean.”
“Now that I think about it, half the times I’ve seen you, you’ve tried to take me to the hospital.”
He shrugged. “Busted. I commissioned the wasp that attacked you in the car, and I filed the door edges in your office extra sharp. All so I could rush in and save the day.”
“You did build the tower, after all.”
“You’ve got me all figured out.” He flashed a smile across the cab. “Maybe next time I’ll try a tactic a little less hazardous to your health. Like dinner, perhaps.”
“Dinner is preferable to the emergency room,” I said, barely able to sit still in my seat.
“Are you free on Friday?”
Fireworks exploded in my mind. “As long as my injuries aren’t fatal, I think I am.”
The light turned green, and he grinned and stepped on the gas. “By all means then, let’s waste no time getting you the best medical care possible.”
*
There was no wait at the urgent-care clinic since we walked in just as the receptionist unlocked the front door. She was eyeing him with a pinched expression, clearly trying to figure out why she recognized him. I had a feeling this would be a common thing if we ended up spending any amount of time together. And, oh, I hoped we did as I watched him sign me in at the checkin desk because my writing hand was out of commission. Our babies would be beautiful, certain to make Bryan with a y and Little Miss Botox jealous.
“Just fill these out, and we’ll get you right in to see the doctor.” The woman handed West a clipboard filled with papers.
West looked down at the top sheet, then smiled up at me. “Oh, this is going to be fun.” We sat down in the waiting room, and he began to fill out the form. “First name, Lucille. Last name, Cooper. Middle name?”
“Louise.”
His eyes widened. “Shut up. Your name is Lucy Lou?”
I snapped my good fingers in front of his face. “Focus, please.”
“Birthdate?”
“April twenty-fourth, nineteen-none-of-your-beeswax.”
He smirked. “You’re what? Thirty-eight?”
Had one hand not already been potentially broken, I might have punched him.
“What’s your address?”
“534 Echelon Way, Nashville 37211,” I answered.
“Echelon Apartments?”
“Don’t tell me you built them.”
He chuckled and shook his head. “No, I didn’t build them, but I do know where they are. Phone number?”
“You have my phone number,” I reminded him.
“Not memorized. I’m not Rain Man.”
I spouted off my phone number.
“Email address?”
I gave him my work one. Somehow my lulabean424 address felt too personal. Then I told him my insurance and work information.
He flipped to the second page. “Now we get to the good stuff. Reason for visit. Accident prone.” He cut his eyes over at me, daring me to argue. I didn’t. “Do you smoke?”
“No.”
“Does anyone in your home smoke?”
“No.”
“Do you drink alcohol?”
“Occasionally.”
“How many per week?”
“Two a month, maybe.”
He looked up. “It’s a fill-in-the-blank question. Think I should divide?”
I grinned. “Sure.”
“OK. A half a drink per week. Do you have any of the following medical conditions?” He stopped and put his pen down. “Maybe this is too personal for a first date.”
A FIRST DATE?!?!
He said it, not me.
I almost had to fan my face to keep from passing out. Be cool, Lucy. Be cool.
“It’s fine. Go ahead,” I said, trying to keep my voice even and not doing a very good job of it.
He read through a long list of medical conditions to which I answered no. Then he froze—and blushed. “Do you have any STDs?”
I wanted to crawl under my chair and die. “No.”
He breathed a dramatic sigh of relief. “Well, I’m glad we’ve got that over with.” He leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Me either, by the way.”
I doubled over and buried my red face in my arms on my lap. “Oh my god.”
He was laughing, and he nudged me with his elbow. “Come on, we’ve got to finish this. Do you have any family history of the following: heart disease?”
“No.”
“Diabetes?”
“No.”
“Stroke?”
“No.”
“Cancer?”
Ugh.
“Yes.”
He stared at me like he was waiting for me to elaborate. I didn’t. With a slight nod, he checked the “Yes” box. “Do you have any allergies?”
“Bees,” I answered.
His face wilted into a mix of sympathy and endearment. “Really?”
“Yep.”
“Aww, I almost feel bad for teasing you about the accident.” He smiled. “Almost.”
“Lucy Cooper?” a woman in purple scrubs said from the door.
I stood, and West looked up at me. “Want me to come or wait out here?”
It wasn’t like I was getting a Pap smear. “You can come if you want to.”
He got up and nodded toward the door. “After you, my lady.”
The nurse took the clipboard and led us back to a small cubicle with half-walls. She took my blood pressure and temperature. Both were normal. “Step up on the scales so I can get your weight,” she said.
My eyes shot to West.
He laughed and crossed his tanned and chiseled arms over his chest. “Seriously? I can hear about your sexual disease history but can’t see how much you weigh?”
My heart was pounding in my chest. “No. Turn around.”
His eye roll seemed to be the pivot on which his whole body turned. The nurse was trying not to smile. I kicked off my charcoal ankle boots—because every ounce helps—and stepped up on the scale. She wrote down the number, and I quickly stepped off. “You can turn around now,” I said to West as I slipped on my shoes again.
He sighed and shook his head. “Girls are so weird.”
“Follow me,” the nurse said, walking down the hallway.
When we reached the tiny exam room, there weren’t any chairs. West helped me up onto the exam table, and then stood beside me.
“So what happened?” the nurse asked.
“Yeah,” West echoed. “What exactly happened?”
I frowned. “Jana Carter.”
They both exchanged a puzzled glance.
“I was a little mad at my boss, so I slammed the door in my office. Then I thought better of it and tried to catch it.” I held up my bandaged hand. “At least the sound was muffled.”
The nurse unwound the paper towels around my hand. Almost all the ice had melted, and the towels were soaked. She dropped them in the trash and examined my hand. My
fingers were frostbite red, but the pain had eased, and there didn’t seem to be any swelling. Slowly, I curled my fingers into a fist. It hurt and my joints were stiff from the cold, but my fingers bent without hindrance.
“No! No! Don’t bend them. Let’s get an X-ray first,” she said. She stood and picked up her notes. “Let’s go take the pictures. Then the doctor will be in.”
She took me down the hall and took two quick X-rays of my hand while West waited in the exam room. When the nurse returned me to him and left us alone, I carefully looked over my hand. “They aren’t broken,” I said, wiggling my fingers again.
“What about your purple middle finger?” he asked.
I looked at it more closely. “It could be a busted blood vessel under the skin.”
“I don’t know. It looks broken to me,” he said.
I shook my head. “It’s not. I’m sure.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Want to put a wager on it?”
I laughed. “Absolutely. What did you have in mind?”
He thought for a moment, and I was thankful for the excuse to stare at him.
“I’ve got it,” he finally said. He gripped the front corners of the exam table on either side of my legs and leaned on his arms toward me. “If it’s broken, you go out with me on Friday, and we do anything I want.”
The temperature in the clinic jumped about a thousand degrees.
I swallowed. “Anything?”
He leaned closer. “Anything.” His tone was dark and dangerous.
The butterflies in my stomach were about to rattle me off the table.
Suddenly, West burst out laughing. “I wish you could see your face right now.”
I hid behind my hands.
He took my wrists and gently pulled them away. “I’m kidding, Lucy. I promise I won’t go all Fifty Shades on you.”
That only made me blush harder.
“Not yet, anyway,” he added with a wink. Then he pointed at my face. “But if I want to eat cereal in my underwear and watch the latest Avengers movie on Netflix, you’re not allowed to judge me.”
I laughed. “OK. What if I win?”
He straightened and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “The same terms. On my dime.”
“Really?” I asked.
He nodded. “Yep. No limits. No budget. We do anything you want.”
I stuck out my good hand and he shook it. “West Adler, you have a deal.”
