Connor blinked. “But you said—”
“I said I would give you a chance to fix the staffing issues your way,” Harlow interrupted, her spine flawlessly straight against the back of her desk chair. “That was a business decision. You presented a sound idea and solid planning. I wouldn’t have supported it otherwise. As for my phone conversation just now”—her frown said she wasn’t going to let go of the fact that he’d blatantly eavesdropped any time soon—“of course I told my father I stand by the decision. It’s the one you and I agreed on, and presenting a united front is good business.”
“Is that seriously all this is to you?” Connor asked, his frustration rising. “All those people out there who need their jobs? Everyone who relies on the clinic when they’re sick or hurt? They’re just business?”
Harlow’s stare glinted in the lamplight spilling over her desk, so quickly that Connor wouldn’t stake his life over the fact that he’d even seen the brief burst of emotion in her eyes. Especially when she said, “They’re people, and caring for them starts with business. You think good will prevail if we put care first, but it won’t. Good will only prevail if we make a plan for it. Without that, there is no care. The sooner you get that, the sooner we’ll be able to make real progress here.”
Connor’s jaw clenched. Damn it, he’d been a fool to think her belief had been in him. All Harlow cared about was furthering her family business. The clinic was just another contract she wanted for her win column. Business as usual.
But he’d been burned by that mindset before. He wasn’t going to let it happen again.
And he sure as hell wasn’t going to let her put business ahead of caring for anyone. So he squared his shoulders and said, “I guess we’re at an impasse, then. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do.”
11
Harlow knew a great many things. Among them was that there was an inventory budget in front of her, and she should be eyeball-deep in analyzing the thing before moving on to the host of other tasks lining her evening agenda.
So, of course, it made perfect sense that all she could think of was Connor’s mouth.
Whipping her chin to attention, she darted a gaze over the empty office before chiding herself. She hadn’t been thinking of Connor’s mouth so much as what had come out of it this morning; namely, the way he’d dismissively brushed off her entire hard-earned work philosophy in favor of his own. So, she was business-minded. That didn’t make her some sort of cruel bitch who thought people weren’t as important as business. For pity’s sake, she wasn’t lacking a soul. She didn’t like making staffing cuts. But if Connor thought for one second that they were going to get anywhere by impulsively putting people ahead of business when the clinic was a business and needed to be treated as such?
He was out of his mind. He could be at an impasse all he wanted. She was here to make this place run successfully.
Even if she had to run over him to do it.
Harlow’s heart beat faster, anger buzzing under her skin like a current, but she tamped it down. Good business was born of strategy, not emotion, and her father had taught her better than to let something as powerful as anger get the best of her. Connor wasn’t the first—or even fifteenth—man she’d ever worked with who had challenged her methods, and as tempted as she was to let it piss her off, he wouldn’t be the last.
But he doesn’t just make you mad, does he? He also fires you up…
A rush of heat expanded in her belly, quickly moving lower despite her efforts to snuff it out. Okay, fine. So the way Connor had looked at her this morning when he’d asked if she really stood by him had made her feel the polar opposite of angry, and the stormy, smoldering stare he’d given up the other night when she’d been on her way home? That had done things to her she hadn’t even thought were physically possible. But come on! It wasn’t as if she could let either of those emotions show.
Even if there were parts of him that ignited her curiosity right along with her untended (and fucking treasonous) lady bits—like the way he looked out for Natalie’s health and Tess’s baby, or sprang for pizza for his friends. Or how he spoke so patiently to Macie and Dana and the other staff members, even when they asked a thousand and one questions about the new triage procedures or needed help treating the occasional patient with nastier injuries than most.
It was as if there was this whole other side of Connor that he let everyone but Harlow see, kind and funny and quick with that smile that did all sorts of things to her insides and threw her off her game. He even read freaking romance novels, of all things.
At least there was one thing they had in common, Harlow thought, letting her gaze travel over the pair of books on the corner of his desk closest to hers. She’d always loved the escape of a really good read, and far too much time had passed since she’d let herself get lost in a nice, juicy novel.
Harlow sent a furtive gaze over her surroundings, which were—yep—as still and quiet as they had been two minutes ago, and two minutes before that. The staff had to be closing things up for the night by now, and Connor was surely out on the clinic floor, supervising them.
One peek wouldn’t hurt, right?
Reaching out, she impulsively picked up the book on top of the pile, tracing a finger over the tall, dark, and dangerous-looking man on the cover. Like Connor, the model had tattoos decorating both arms, and her thoughts shifted under the weight of even more curiosity. She wondered how far Connor’s ink extended. Did his tattoos stop at the broad bulk of his shoulders? Or did those bold splashes of color continue over the hard plane of his chest? His abs?
Lower?
Sweet Jesus, why was it so hot in here?
“You’re welcome to it, you know.”
Connor’s voice jolted her back to the office like a bucket of ice water directly to the face, and she swung toward him sharply. “E-excuse me?”
He leaned against the doorframe, the edges of his mouth hooking up into a smile just dark enough to make her shiver. “The book. You can borrow it, if you want.”
Oh, God, the places her mind had gone.
You’re welcome to it, you know…
On second thought, that really hadn’t been her mind, and yeah, she needed to get it together. Immediately.
“Right. The book.” Squaring her shoulders, Harlow placed the novel calmly and carefully back in the spot from which she’d swiped it. “I apologize. I didn’t mean to go snooping through your things.”
“Call it even for the eavesdropping this morning?” Connor asked, sending a twist through her belly. As if she needed the reminder of that conversation.
She nodded in the hope that a truce would kill the conversation and send him on his merry way. She really needed to get rid of all these emotions that had been knotting her up all day, and the task would be a hell of a lot easier if she didn’t have to do it with Connor’s storm-cloud stare on her skin.
But, of course, her luck was for shit, because the big oaf didn’t budge.
“I didn’t take you for a romance reader,” he said, his smile still in place and still unnervingly sexy, and Harlow dug deep for her composure.
“I’m sure there are a lot of things about me that would surprise you.”
He made a sound she couldn’t decipher. “Oh, yeah? Try me.”
Damn. She’d waltzed right into that one, now hadn’t she? She thought for a minute, trying to come up with something really good, something he’d never be able to guess on his own—something that might shut him up, or at the very least, make him stop looking at her like he could see right through her—and ah! “My favorite color is yellow.”
Connor’s laugh was warm and rich, and Harlow couldn’t tell if she was more turned on or pissed off. “Is that the best you’ve got?”
She went with pissed off. It was easier to navigate. “I suppose you think you can do better.”
“I’m afraid of thunderstorms.”
Under any other circumstances, Harlow would’ve been irked that he ha
d—once again—one-upped her. But as it stood, she was too busy dragging her jaw off the office carpet. “You are?”
“Big time,” Connor confirmed. “No rational reason why. I never got stuck in one as a kid or anything like that. But all that noise and rain and wind, with the ground shaking and stuff?” He paused to shudder. “Ugh, no thanks.”
“Oh, my God. I never would have guessed that,” Harlow admitted.
His smirk sailed directly into her solar plexus, lodging deep. “Now that is the way to surprise someone.”
Was. It. Ever.
“You want to give it another go?” Connor asked, lifting his chin in encouragement. “We can keep the topic so you don’t even have to get creative about it. You can just tell me something you’re afraid of.”
The answer formed in an instant, and God help her, Harlow nearly let it burst out. Her heart pounded at the thought, at the fact that she’d nearly loosened it, and she heard the echo of it in her head as she stuffed it back under the cover of her composure, where it belonged.
I’m scared to be alone.
“I’m not really afraid of anything,” she said smoothly, fixing him with the cool smile she’d been trying to scrape together since he’d appeared in the doorframe. “Other than the fact that this inventory budget is pretty much a dumpster fire.”
For one excruciatingly long heartbeat, Harlow thought he’d push. But then he straightened his frame to its full height and held up a manila folder.
“Speaking of which. These are the printouts of all the medical supply orders from the last three months, along with the complete inventories of the main supply closet, the lab, and all the exam rooms and curtain areas.”
“Oh, good. Those should help.” Harlow took the folder he handed over and flipped through the first few pages. 60 cc syringes, IV needle catheters, sterile lap pads, culture test tubes… “We’re going to need to set up a time to go over these together,” she said.
“Sounds scintillating,” Connor quipped, and seriously, she had less than zero patience for this right now.
“It’s necessary. Unless you want me to decide how many suture kits we really need per month?”
Well, that got him. “I didn’t say I wouldn’t do it.” He paused to rub a hand over the back of his neck. “When were you thinking?”
Harlow eyed the very unbalanced numbers in front of her on her laptop screen. “As soon as you’re able would be ideal.”
“We could do it now,” he said. “The staff is already gone for the night. Unless you’re headed out, too?”
“No. Right now is fine.”
Her brain sent up a warning that this was a bad idea. She was already tired (okay, fine. She’d been ready for mattress worship like two hours ago) and on-edge and a thousand other things she probably shouldn’t be when cooped up after hours with Connor. But she really couldn’t navigate the supply budget without his expertise, and since she didn’t know when he’d be both willing and able to go over the thing again, she couldn’t exactly be picky.
“Great.” He moved to his desk, fitting himself into his chair and reclaiming the folder full of inventory sheets. Harlow’s entire body seemed out to get her, because her stomach chose the near-silent moment to sound off in a mortifying rumble.
Connor’s auburn brows lifted. “Did you eat dinner?”
“Yes,” Harlow said, although ehhhhhh, now that she thought about it, that container of microwaveable tomato soup had probably fallen under the umbrella of lunch.
“Are you sure?” His skepticism belonged on a billboard, and God, she was so sick of everyone doubting her.
“Yes, I’m sure. I know this may come as a shock to you, but I am actually quite capable of taking care of myself.”
The edges of his mouth turned sharply downward. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Really? What did you mean, then?” How else could he have intended the question?
“I…” Connor’s eyes flashed, but the emotion didn’t last long enough for her to identify it. “You know what, forget it. Never mind. Where did you want to start with these?”
Harlow looked at the papers now spread on the desk between them, but funny, the work didn’t calm her like usual. “Unfortunately, it looks as if this budget has been grossly exceeded every month we’ve been open. We’re going to have to go through these line by line to determine where we can scale back.”
“Scaling back on medical supplies is a spectacularly bad idea,” Connor said, crossing his arms over his massive chest and sending a buzz of frustration through her veins.
“I understand that we can’t scale back on all of them. But there’s no way we can keep spending—”
“Do you know what happens when a patient’s airway is compromised and we can’t intubate them because we don’t have enough kits, or the right size blade for the laryngoscope?”
Harlow thought of the three times she’d witnessed her mother being intubated, and crossed her arms back so her shaking hands wouldn’t show. Don’t think about it. Don’t. “I’m sure that if a patient were having that much trouble breathing, they’d go directly to the ED.”
Connor shook his head and leaned in closer. “It doesn’t always work that way. A patient’s condition can deteriorate in a matter of seconds if they’re sick or hurt badly enough, and without intubation, they can’t breathe. Without IV kits, we can’t get certain antibiotics on board to treat nasty infections—”
“And without a balanced budget, we can’t do anything,” Harlow interjected, because she was certain he’d been about to go through their entire inventory, and the last thing she needed right now was a course in Medical Supplies For Dummies. “Look, I know it’s not going to be easy. But I gave you latitude to do the staffing your way. Now I need you to work with me on this budget.”
“You can’t run a clinic that way,” Connor said. “It’s not a negotiation.”
Harlow’s feet found the floor so quickly that she barely felt them touch down, her pulse snapping through her like a wild, untamable thing as all the emotion she’d kept bottled up flew swiftly past her lips.
“It is absolutely a negotiation! We are supposed to be working together. Me, and you”—she poked a finger at the immovable expanse of his chest, and she vaguely realized he’d stood, too—“but you don’t want to compromise. All you do is fight me at every turn!”
“I’m not trying to fight you,” he said, but oh, she was too far gone for reason now.
“That’s not stopping you from doing it.”
His eyes did the storm cloud thing. “Yeah, well, you’re fighting back.”
Harlow’s belly did the backflip thing. Not that it stopped her from upping the ante. “I don’t have any other choice when all you do is make me…”
All of a sudden, she was aware of how little space there was between them. How she could feel the heat of Connor’s body rolling off of him in waves. See the deep auburn sweep of his lashes as he dropped his stare to her mouth and watched her whisper, “Crazy.”
“You make me crazy, too,” he whispered back.
Harlow’s heartbeat accelerated even faster, the fizz of anger in her veins turning into a different sensation altogether. She needed to step away. She needed to take a breath. She needed to collect herself so she could fix this problem rationally, once and for all.
Instead, she slammed her mouth over his.
12
Harlow knew immediately that she was in the deepest sort of trouble, because the second her lips made contact with Connor’s, all she could think was more.
Then he let out a moan from the very back of his throat, and screw that. She was done thinking.
Her arms flew around his shoulders, which were even more sculpted and heavenly than they looked. Connor hauled her against his body in return, his hands moving low to wrap around the back of her rib cage. In her heels, she didn’t have to press up very far to keep her mouth fused to his, and the evenness that lent to the playing field sent a wicked thrill throu
gh Harlow’s blood.
The kiss hadn’t been gentle to begin with. But when Connor swept his tongue over her bottom lip in a demand for entry, Harlow demanded right back. She parted her mouth to give him access—she wasn’t stupid. But as soon as he went exploring, she met him with a bold stroke of her tongue. The push/pull of the kiss was exactly like their relationship, hot and demanding and so fucking intense, and Harlow arched against him even though they were already pressed together from shoulders to hips.
Connor made a noise she couldn’t describe, and oh, it did things to her. Using the forward momentum she’d just created, she kept moving, giving him no choice but to go back a step, then another, until finally, his shoulder blades met the wall with a thump. Harlow smiled against his mouth, her heart pounding faster from the thrill of the kiss, the contact—God, all of him.
The thrill became pure, uncut arousal when Connor tightened his hands to fists over the back of her dress and swung her around with a swift yank so that she was pressed against the wall, and he was pressed against her.
“Ah.” The moan that drifted out of her was shameless. She didn’t care—she felt too lit up for that.
But Connor must have cared a lot, because he got even bolder. Pushing deeper into her mouth, he kissed her as if he’d been starving for her, his tongue thrusting, his teeth clicking against hers. Harlow kissed him back equally, desperate need building in her belly like an out-of-control wildfire. He slid a hand over her rib cage as the other one framed her face, and her breath caught in some crazy sound she didn’t even know she’d been capable of when his fingers moved up to knot in her hair. Connor’s body was hot and hard—Oh, God, seriously hard—on hers. Harlow tipped her hips up toward the erection pressed tight to her lower belly.
His hand traveled higher in response, cupping her breast over her dress. There were no pleasantries here, and Harlow didn’t want any. Connor closed his fingers over her, pinching her nipple with just enough pressure to be provocative and not painful. She gasped into his mouth when he did it again, his big masterful fingers making her desperate. Making her crazy.
Between Me & You: An Enemies to Lovers Workplace Romance (Remington Medical Book 3) Page 11
