The Nurse's Not-So-Secret Scandal

by Wendy S. Marcus

  “I’m sure it does.”

  She looked at him askance. “She doesn’t work. Hasn’t worked since I got my first job at sixteen. Her health is deteriorating. What would happen to her if I left?”

  She’d become a ward of the state, and they’d have to deal with her. But Roxie was too good a daughter to let that happen. “She’s lucky to have you.”

  “Yeah. Yeah.” Roxie downplayed her worth, stood and replaced her drawer in her dresser. Fig replaced the one beside it.

  “So what happens now?” Fig asked.

  Roxie held up a pair of glasses. “Now I go to the hospital to check on Mami and give her her glasses.”

  “I mean what are you going to do about the house and the mess outside? Oh, and I forgot to mention, the fire marshal said upon inspection this morning, the house is structurally sound. You can’t return to live here, but you can come and go between the hours of nine and five as long as you don’t use any electricity.”

  At least that was something.

  “Where will you stay?” Fig asked. “Where will your mom stay when she’s released from the hospital?”

  “I’ll work it out.” She stood. Everything always worked out. Somehow. “No need to worry about me.”

  “You’re welcome to stay at my place. I’ll take the couch.” But he’d rather not.

  “What fun would that be?”

  Thank you! “Or I could make myself available for stress relief after a long, hard day.”

  “Or at the start of one.” She smiled back.

  “Anytime,” Fig clarified and meant it.

  “What about right now? What if I were to say ‘I want you now. Hard and fast and I’m in charge.’ What then?”

  Fig stood up, walked to the door, closed and locked it. It’d be unrealistic to expect to control a woman with Roxie’s passion every time. Part of focusing on the woman involved knowing when she needed to take the lead.

  “Just like that?” Roxie asked. “I say I want sex, you drop your pants and we go at it?”

  If that’s what she needed. “I know how you feel, Roxie.”

  She laughed. “How could you possibly know how I’m feeling?”

  “Because I’ve been there.”

  “Where exactly is there?”

  “Living with a mother who cared more about herself and her needs than she did mine. Living the life she’d created for me rather than my own life. Feeling let down and angry and betrayed by my family. Feeling my life was going nowhere but too tired to fight for what I wanted.”

  After a few moments of silence, she said, “Which hits home the fact you know a lot more about me than I know about you. I want three questions, and you have to answer honestly.”

  “I’d rather you use me for sex.”

  She smiled playfully. “We can make them strip questions, you know, since the door’s already locked.”

  All he’d have to do was answer three simple questions to get her naked. “Your bra and panties count as undergarments. That’s one item of clothing.”

  “Fine. When we first met and I asked you out to dinner, why did you say you were dying of cancer?”

  “Because my medical history usually freaks people out. But you looked like you could handle it. So I made a joke to see how you’d react.”

  “For the record, jokes are supposed to be funny. That wasn’t. You’d do better with a different approach.”

  “You handled it just fine.”

  “Well, I’m not your typical woman, am I?”

  No, she wasn’t. “Is that your second question?” He smiled. “Because you need to take off your shirt before I’ll answer another one.”

  “No, that’s not my second question,” she grumbled as she lifted her shirt over her head to expose her well-endowed, zebra-print-bra-covered breasts.

  “Is your medical history the reason you’re so pale and have no hair?”

  “Childhood leukemia. In and out of remission. Radiation therapy. Chemotherapy. Bone-marrow transplantation resulting in permanent remission but accompanied by permanent alopecia—but I’d like to point out, freak that I am, I somehow retained my eyebrows and eyelashes.” Both of which he bleached to a pale blond or they looked odd on his pigment-challenged face. “I’m pale because I grew up the boy in the proverbial bubble. I rarely went outside except to go to the doctor or the hospital. I developed indoor interests that I continue to enjoy as an adult.”

  Roxie looked sad. This time for him.

  “None of that, sweetheart,” he said, hating pity. “Now give up your pants.”

  She smiled as she stood. “Pushy, pushy.” She shimmied out of her cargo pants. Lord help him, she had a beautiful body. Tall and slender yet rounded in all the right spots. A body he dreamed about and would no doubt continue to dream about long after he returned home.

  He reached for her.

  “Nuh, uh, uh.” She wagged a finger between them. “I have one more question.”

  “Well, spit it out. You expect too much if you think me capable of sitting politely when you are looking so good and so naked and all I have to do is extend my arm this much to touch you.” He poked her on the shoulder.

  She reached behind her back, undid her bra and flung it at him. “To sweeten the pot.”

  “This last one must be a doozy.” He eyed her breasts, imagined each one filling his palm. “Go ahead. I’m ready.”

  “Why wouldn’t you take off your shirt for me this morning?”

  Fig let out a breath and tried to think of a way to get out of answering. But the determined look on Roxie’s face left no doubt if he didn’t answer they would not be having sex. If he wanted Roxie, and, oh, did he want Roxie, he’d have to explain. Or he could simply go ahead and show her. Roxie was different. Maybe the sight of his torso wouldn’t appall her like it had the few women he’d shared it with.

  He reached for the bottom hem of his tee.

  * * *

  Roxie could not believe her eyes and, yes, could not stop her mouth from dropping open in surprise. “You’re…” The words wouldn’t come.

  Fig stood there, staring back at her, looking vulnerable and so uncomfortable under her perusal.

  “I have scars and…I’ll put my shirt back on.”

  Roxie ripped it from his hands and tossed it over her shoulder. “From now on,” she said, stepping close enough to touch him, “when we’re together, I want you shirtless.” She traced some of the outlines with her finger. “You are a thing of beauty, a colorful canvas to be ogled and appreciated, not hidden.”

  Brilliantly colored, professionally crafted tattoos, interwoven with scrolls on which motivational proverbs were expertly written, covered his chest and shoulders to the point they obliterated his pallor. Yet no hint of this amazing profusion of color extended past the short sleeves or neckline of his T-shirt. Which made her wonder, “Your legs?”

  He nodded. “I needed some color.”

  Roxie dropped her hands to the button of his pants. “I am a huge fan of color.” She had his pants down to his ankles in a matter of seconds. A realistic-looking python, surrounded by various shades of brilliant-green foliage, circled his left thigh. The tail of a fire-breathing red dragon, set against a mountain of rock, circled his right. Both tattoos ended just above his knee. “Why do you hide them?”

  Fig shrugged. “Tattoo art is not an acceptable form of expression among my business associates, friends and family.”

  “Then you need to find some new people to hang around with.” He was…beautiful and so different than he appeared at first sight.

  “There’s one more,” Fig said, sounding hesitant. “On my back.”

  “Let me see. Let me see.” Roxie rubbed her hands in anticipation.

&nb
sp; He took his sweet time showing her. But when he did… Roxie sucked in a breath. Absolutely magnificent.

  “It’s a phoenix,” Fig explained.

  A beautifully drawn, intricately detailed phoenix rising up from flames. Reborn. The image filled Fig’s back, the mythical bird’s plumage inked in vibrant reds, oranges and golds. Its wings extended, spanning his shoulders.

  “You’re awful quiet.” He turned his head to try to look at her. “I chose a phoenix because each time the doctors had thought I wouldn’t make it, I pulled through, came back from the dead in a sense.”

  Roxie set her palms to his skin and caressed the bird. Felt something up by its beak. Stopped.

  “I was in a car accident,” Fig said. “I received over a hundred and seventeen stiches.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” He turned to face her. “It’s how I met Kyle. In rehab.” He lifted her hand to his left upper chest. Another scar. “This one’s from the portacath the doctors inserted for my chemo.”

  Roxie kissed it.

  Her phone rang.

  Not now. She dropped her forehead to his chest. He kissed the top of her head. “You’d better answer that,” he said.

  Most men would have told her not to answer it. But Fig understood. “I know. But I don’t want to.” They’d each shared a part of themselves. Things she hadn’t shared with another person. And Roxie got the impression Fig didn’t share his tattoos with many people, either. Yet he’d shared them with her. She felt so close to him right now and didn’t want it to end. But the call could be from Mami. Roxie picked up the phone and checked the voice mail. Mami asked, “Where are you? What’s taking so long? I can’t see the TV up close without my glasses.”

  “I have to go,” Roxie told Fig.

  “I know,” Fig answered, pulling up his pants.

  “Tonight?” Roxie asked. She’d make this interruption up to him then.

  “Most definitely.”

  After helping Roxie pack a small duffel and bag up some clothes to wash, Roxie let Fig drive her to the hospital. Yes, she could have driven herself. But then he wouldn’t be holding her hand and she wouldn’t be feeling so…happily content.

  “If your mom wasn’t in the picture,” Fig said, “where would you be living? What would you be doing?”

  “I stopped wishing for a different life years ago.” She never understood people who wasted their time pining for a life they couldn’t have. Better to accept the life you did have and make the best of it.

  He squeezed her hand. “Humor me.”

  Okay. “Tightrope walker traveling with the circus. Roller Derby queen. Llama farmer.”

  “Come on, Roxie.”

  “All right. I’d still be a nurse because I love it. But I wouldn’t live anywhere near Madrin Falls. This town holds very few happy memories for me.” She looked over at him. “Although today increased the count by two.”

  He smiled. “I’m glad.”

  “I think I’d like to live someplace warm. In a condo by the beach. Where I could parade around in skimpy bathing suits and sip iced drinks beside a pool every day if I felt like it.”

  “I’d risk blistering sunburns to come and watch you parade around in those skimpy bathing suits.”

  “Well, I’d rub you from head to toe with SPF 50—” just like in her dream “—to protect your beautiful skin. And I’d invest in a huge beach umbrella.” Wouldn’t that be fun. The two of them. Hot days at the beach. Hotter nights. Together. Naked.

  “Honey, you’d better let me apply my own sunscreen or we’ll be spending more time indoors than out.”

  Fig veered onto the hospital drive and reality slammed back into the forefront. There was no condo, no beach and no iced drinks by the pool in Roxie’s immediate future.

  At the block of elevators in the lobby, Roxie pushed three for the CCU. Fig pushed five. Roxie looked up at him.

  “I have an appointment,” he said. “Do you want me to meet you over in CCU when I’m done? Or should I wait in the lobby?”

  Who could he possibly have an appointment with on the fifth floor? Victoria? She studied him, but he gave nothing away. Was there some meeting—that she apparently was not privy to—where her future at Madrin Memorial was to be decided? And if that were the case, why hadn’t Fig told her?

  “It’s nothing important.” He pulled her close and kissed the top of her head. “I’ll miss you,” he whispered.

  Although it was hard to fathom, she felt a pang of loss at their separation, too.

  “Hola, Mami.” Roxie channeled good cheer as she entered the single-bedded room, noting the wires emerging from beneath her mother’s hospital gown winding up to the cardiac monitor flashing on the wall. Heart rate eighty-two. Normal sinus rhythm. Good.

  “I have no privacy here,” Mami complained, motioning to the glass half of the wall overlooking the nurses’ station. “I want to go home.”

  “According to your nurse, the doctor wants to keep you for at least another day so you can have a few more respiratory treatments.” Which gave Roxie one more day to figure out what to do with Mami after discharge.

  “I don’t want to stay.” She sat up, slid her legs over the side of the bed and started to push off. “Stop,” Roxie said, rushing to the other side of the bed and holding Mami by the shoulders. “At the moment, our home is uninhabitable.” The fire marshal had his scrawling signature on an official paper saying so.

  “What does that mean?” Mami suddenly looked very old and weak in that big hospital bed.

  “Lie back down.” Roxie got her propped up on her pillows and tucked the covers around her. “It means we can’t live in the house until we clean it enough that the fire marshal says it’s not a safety hazard for you to live there.” And until Roxie settled with the insurance company—who had deemed two fires in two weeks suspicious—so she could replace the kitchen.

  “It’s my house.”

  Technically it was Roxie’s house since Mami signed it over to her when she’d turned eighteen—to keep her creditors from going after it.

  “Where will we go?” Mami clutched her chest. Roxie detected an arrhythmic change in the blip of the cardiac monitor. “Ay Dios mio. What will happen to us? To all our things?”

  “Calm down,” Roxie said, caressing her thinning gray hair. “We are going to be fine. I’ll take care of everything.” Like she always did.

  “It’s already taken care of.” Fig entered the room. “Victoria’s offered to have your mom stay at her house.”

  What? “That’s where you went? To talk to Victoria?”

  Fig nodded.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Because you would have told me not to.”

  He was right. Roxie didn’t like imposing on her friends.

  “Who are you?” Mami asked Fig.

  “The name’s Fig.” He held out his hand. She took it. Hesitantly. “I’m a friend of Roxie’s.”

  “You’re so pale.”

  “Mami!”

  “You need to eat some meat. I want to cook you a steak.”

  The woman in the bed looked like her mother, but that last comment had Roxie questioning her true identity. “You haven’t cooked a steak in over ten years.” Hadn’t cooked much of anything besides macaroni and cheese, grilled cheese and canned soup.

  “Because I haven’t had a man around to cook for.” So the daughter who took care of her day after day didn’t rate a delicious steak dinner. Good to know.

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t eat meat, Mrs. Morano.”

  Come to think of it, she hadn’t seen him eat much of anything.

  “Which is why you’re so pale,” Mami said.

  No, he wasn’t.
Not really. He was bright and colorful and she loved that he kept it secret from the world, yet shared it with her. “We were talking about Victoria.”

  “Is that the nice young lady who visited me this morning? A tiny thing with black hair?”

  Roxie couldn’t believe she remembered. “That’s her.”

  “We can both stay there?”

  “No,” Fig answered. “I’m afraid she only has space for one. But you’ll have your own room and television and there’s a full bath just down the hall.”

  “I couldn’t…” Mami started. “I want to stay with Roxie. Where will you be?” she asked.

  Fig raised one of his bleached brows.

  “With a friend,” Roxie said, avoiding eye contact. Mami still preached the importance of Roxie remaining chaste for her future husband. Like any man in this town would marry her after the life she’d lived to date—and with her hoarding mother in tow. “She has a small place. Only one bedroom.” At least that last part was true.

  “She’s very nice to take you into such cramped quarters,” Fig commented with a smirk.

  “More like desperate for company,” Roxie said. “She’s kind of an oddball. I actually feel a little sorry for her.”

  “You’d really be helping Victoria,” Fig said, ignoring her last comment. “School’s out and she could use some help keeping an eye on her son until summer camp starts, and if you’re there long enough, maybe after camp.”

  Mami’s face lit up. “How old is the boy?”

  “Nine,” Roxie answered. “But I don’t think…” She wasn’t well, mentally or physically.

  “That’s the same age as Angelo.” One of the many grandchildren they’d seen only in Christmas card photos. “I’ll do it,” Mami said, looking happier than Roxie had seen her in years.

  But still. “You’re not up to babysitting.” She could barely take care of herself.

  “May I speak with you in private?” Fig asked.

  What was he up to? Roxie followed him out into the hallway.

  “Victoria wants to do this,” he said, taking her hand. “She said when she visited your mother this morning she’d perked up at the mention of Jake—” Victoria’s son “—and she thought if we could convince your mom she’ll be helping out with Jake, it may sway her decision. Victoria assured me she will make sure both your mom and Jake are well supervised and safe.”