Shoulder to Lean On

by Morgan Malone

  “Whoa! I’ve got you.” His deep voice caressed her ear as his strong hands clasped each forearm. Her gym bag dropped to the ground between them. They both bent at the same moment to grab for it and Ella fell into Levi again. She stiffened when her breasts were crushed against his chest and his hands once again steadied her. A hot blush stained her cheeks and her breath was fast and uneven as she stepped back out of his reach.

  He was staring at her, though she couldn’t tell for sure from the reflection in his black Ray Bans, but his lips were turned up in a definite smirk. Ella’s back straightened even more and her teeth clenched, fighting off the panic. Suppressing the tiny thrill in her stomach.

  “Sorry. I’m fine.” Her voice trailed off when she realized the bag was back on the ground in front of her. She started to bend toward it when his voice interrupted her movement. “Stop. Wait. I’ll get it for you. Unless you want another collision.” Levi scooped the bag up and draped it over her right shoulder. “Glad to see you’re following my instructions about not lifting anything heavy.” Her bag contained only her cellphone, a bottle of water, and a small towel.

  Eager to be away from the doctor’s disturbing presence, Ella mumbled her thanks and hurried into the building, leaving him standing alone in the parking lot, looking perplexed. She managed to catch her breath in the elevator so she entered the physical therapy center on the second floor appearing calm. Her insides were churning in a mixture of panic and passion. It was the first small, but recognizable feeling of arousal she felt since her surgery. Since her attack.

  ****

  Attacked. She’d been assaulted in Manhattan in early October of the previous year.

  Levi pulled up Ella’s complete history from NY-Ortho’s patient database and read what was not in the brief referral file given him for her follow-up appointment the day before. A purse-snatcher had made a grab for the bag hanging from her left shoulder. She held on and tried to use it as a weapon against him. The assailant, seemingly enraged that she did not simply let go of her possessions, had wrenched the pocketbook out of her grasp before he punched her in the face. The force of the blow knocked Ella to the ground where the assailant—asshole, as Levi was already calling him—delivered two kicks, one to her ribs and one to her left shoulder, before dashing across the street and disappearing. She was still unconscious when admitted to Mount Sinai, with two cracked ribs, a torn left rotator cuff, contusions and lacerations to her face, and a concussion.

  Her parents, cardiologist Dr. Marshall Levin and wife, Rose Levin, Esqire, arranged her transfer to Dr. Levin’s home hospital, Albany Medical Center, where she was operated on the next day by Levi’s colleague and partner, Dr. Michael Fein. Her hospital stay was four days. She was then discharged to Daughters of Sarah for three weeks of rehabilitation. The concussion was deemed mild, the two cracked ribs had not caused any damage to her lungs or other organs, and the contusions and lacerations healed without scarring. After a brief stay with her parents, Ella had returned to New York City. She had been seen in the NY-Ortho offices for three follow-up appointments, the last being on December 28, when she advised the office she was traveling to Florida for a brief stay. Hence, the referral to FL-Ortho’s office and Dr. Levi Gould.

  “Well, damn.” Levi blew out a pissed-off whistle as he closed out of her file and leaned back in his chair. Even the view of the Gulf from his office window could not calm the anger coursing through him on Ella’s behalf. No wonder she was skittish. No wonder she seemed frail and frightened. Anyone brutally assaulted in broad daylight would have residual fear. Yet, she’d loaded herself into a brand new muscle car and driven over a thousand miles alone to find…what? A refuge? A new beginning?

  This woman was a conundrum. And why am I spending so much damn time on a patient who has a ton of baggage and is not really my concern? And not really my type. Since his divorce, Levi had been mostly attracted to bold, buxom, compact women—not long drinks of cool water like Ella Anderson. Anderson? Where did that come from? Levi opened her chart again to review her marital status: divorced. More baggage. He closed the file again.

  Enough time spent on the enigmatic Ms. Anderson. He had learned what he needed as her doctor—she had suffered more trauma than her brief intake chart had revealed and he would adjust his care of her accordingly. He would be very careful about touching her during an examination without letting her know beforehand what he was about to do and why. He would simply put her out of his mind as anyone other than a patient. And he had plenty of other patients to treat.

  Like Tommy Sullivan. His newest patient from the Barefoot Bay Bucks. Levi opened his tablet and reviewed the notes he’d made earlier during his stop at the Stadium. Tommy Sullivan was a 25-year-old pitcher for a double-A minor league team who’d been sent down to the Bucks for assessment and rehab after he suffered a shoulder injury while pitching during a winter season game. The patient had run to first base to cover a play and been plowed into by the batter. Although the collision knocked him to the ground, he dusted himself off, assured the pitching coach he was fine, and gotten the next batter to hit a pop fly to end the inning. Only then did he admit to the coach that he was having difficulty lifting his left arm and he left the game. X-rays revealed no broken bones but an MRI later that day showed a slight tear in his rotator cuff. Now he was Levi’s patient.

  Levi entered his notes into the office system, directing his administrative assistant to schedule the patient for arthroscopic surgery as soon as possible to repair the tear in the rotator cuff. That morning in the Stadium’s training room, the young pitcher had been understandably concerned about the injury and its impact on his career.

  “Doc, I was on my way to the Bigs. What’s going to happen now? I have to be ready to play this season. Do I really need surgery?

  “Yeah, you really need surgery, Tom. It’s a small tear and we could treat it with shots and therapy but for athletes that is just a Band-Aid. You need it fixed if you want to be able to have full use of that arm. The surgery is arthroscopic and minimally invasive. With PT, you should be back in about three months.”

  “Three months! The regular season will have started by then! What if I don’t make the roster cut? Doc, my wife and I have a baby on the way.” Worry clouded the young man’s amber eyes as his right hand nervously scrubbed through his curly black hair.

  “Well, congrats on the baby. You just do what I tell you and work hard during your rehab and soon you’ll be able to pitch and hold that new baby.”

  Levi smiled over Tommy’s head when he saw the encouraging nods from the Buck’s general manager, Cutter Valentine. “You’ve got a great facility here, a great staff, and the best shoulder guy in Florida operating on you. We’ve got this.”

  Levi patted the pitcher’s good shoulder and packed up his bag. “My assistant will be in touch with a surgery date. In the meantime, come in later today to our lab for blood work. Cutter, can you have the team physician send over Tom’s medical charts and approval for surgery today?” After handshakes all around, Levi left his patient deep in conversation with his trainer.

  Cutter followed Levi out to his SUV. His face showed concern about the young pitcher’s prospects, concern he had concealed while in the training room.

  “Doc, give it to me straight. We need to know if the kid is going to be good to go this season.”

  “The injury is serious for a pitcher, I’m not going to lie, Cutter. But, it’s a small tear and he’s in great shape and motivated, too. Let me get in there in a couple of days and repair the tear. Then we’ll see. If he follows his doctor’s and his PT’s orders, he will probably be ready to return to the rotation around May first.” Levi tossed his bag into the Mercedes and turned back to Cutter. “Tell the owners that he has an excellent shot at coming back 100 percent. He’s got a family to consider now. Seems like a good kid.”

  Cutter told him Tommy had played briefly for the Bucks during the previous season and the owners had high hopes for him. How he would repair the
young pitcher’s injury was niggling at Levi’s brain until he pulled into the lot at work and ran into, literally, Ella. “Two more strays. That’s what Missy would tell me.” Levi muttered to his empty office. He glanced at his watch. Five minutes before his first patient today. Better get my head back in the game. He pulled on his white coat and went out to meet someone he hoped he could fix without complications. Without getting involved.

  Levi’s day passed quickly. Back in his office after his last patient, an eighty-year-old Romeo with a dark tan and a tennis elbow, accompanied by not just one, but two, simpering and sniping widows, he pulled off his white coat and his tie in one frustrated gesture. He’d not been at his best since his morning visit to the Buck’s Stadium. His concentration had been off, not that any of his patients had noticed. But Maureen remarked after he snapped at one of the receptionists about a late patient, that he might want to go out to his farm and knock something down before she had to do the same to him. “I get no respect from that woman,” Levi fumed as he rounded his desk and threw himself into his chair. Then, he had to laugh at himself because Maureen catered to him almost as much as she catered to Fitz. And he had been a jerk for most of the day. The cause of some of his disquiet was staring him in the face, he saw, as he looked down at Thomas Sullivan’s name on a memo from his own administrative assistant, Charlie.

  “Doc, we got the consent form and medical files from the Buck’s doctor for Thomas L. Sullivan. Check your schedule. I slipped him into your next surgical day at 7:00 a.m.” Checking his computer, Levi noted that Tommy’s surgery was set for two days from now. He scrolled through the younger man’s records. Thomas Leviticus Sullivan. Well, one of his parents had a sense of humor.

  After reviewing the rest of the patient file and making some notes for his surgical team, Levi heard the sounds of the office staff leaving. Glancing at his watch, he decided to call it a day. He might even have enough time for a walk on the beach with Hersch before it got too dark.

  Tooling up the shore road with an open window cleared most of the funk out of his head. He loved the island. A New York resident for most of his fifty years, he had taken to Mimosa Key from the moment he drove over the causeway from Naples. The turquoise water, pale pink beaches, and lush greenery had welcomed him home almost immediately. A home like he’d never known. Calmer, slower and with unending, ever-changing beauty. “Yeah, this is good. No worries tonight, old man,” he thought. Until he saw the red Mustang convertible parked at a haphazard angle along the beach road. Empty.

  Chapter Four

  Her body was one gigantic pain. Walking in the still-warm sand, Ella could feel the jolt of every step she was taking all the way up to her teeth. Not since the day she had been knocked to the sidewalk by her asshole assailant had she felt this broken and bruised. Today, Cory made her use muscles she had not used in three months. Gently but firmly lifting Ella’s arm up and up farther, Cory was encouraging but relentless. The memory made Ella cringe. She had cried. Like a baby. Silent tears slipping out of her eyes, down the side of her face to rest in the crease of her neck. Even the slow, measured breathing Cory talked her through did not lessen the pain of having her arm lifted over her head for the first time since her attack.

  Kicking the sand in her frustration for her weakened state, Ella was muttering low curses. Stop. Just stop, she scolded herself. You didn’t come for a stroll on the beach to feel sorry for yourself.

  After physical therapy, Ella had returned to her villa for a much-needed soak in the whirlpool in the master bathroom and a long nap. Hunger awoke her around noon and she did justice to the leftovers of her meal from Junonia the night before. The interesting take on Pad Thai and a vegetable spring roll had filled her up. She decided to sit on the patio and soak up some sun before Perky arrived to clean the villa. But, just as she settled onto the comfortable chaise lounge, her cell phone started ringing. Penny.

  “Hi, Penny. How’s the weather in New York?” God, I’m talking about the weather! I sound like I’ve lived in Florida for years!

  “It’s cold and windy and covered in slush. Don’t even tell me that it’s sunny with a balmy beach breeze or I’ll have to come down there and slap you.” Penny’s chuckle was a bit forced as if the humor in her statement was hiding the real meaning for her call.

  “What’s up?”

  “How are you feeling? Have you started therapy yet?” Ella was certain Penny was hedging about the real purpose for her call. Her agent’s answer had only served to heighten her suspicions.

  “You did not call me to check on my health. What’s going on? What’s the matter?”

  “I really do want to know how you are doing. But, well, I just got off the phone with Gotham City Press and Max is pushing for three more Bloody Murder books.” Gina’s voice was strained.

  “No!” Ella’s voice was a sharp rebuke. “I finished my contract with them. I told you all no more murder, no more crime.” Her voice broke.

  “I know, I know. Shhh. It’s okay, El. It’s okay. I told them you weren’t interested but as your agent, I’m obligated to present any offers to you that I receive. They are very anxious to continue the series and will pay double what they paid for the last three.” Penny sighed. “The hype for the newest movie is fueling interest in the books and they want to ride that wave. They also would like you to do some interviews….”

  “I’m in no condition for interviews, Penny. You know that. Hell, they know it too. I don’t even look like E.L. Levin anymore. I’m done. I fulfilled every term of my last contract with them. I’m still a lawyer and even without you and your crack legal team, I’d know if I owed them any more books or PR.”

  “No one is suggesting that you are in breach of contract, El. Gotham wants a new contract with you for three more books and they want it now. And they want it bad. The money they offered is astronomical and given how badly they want these books, we could probably negotiate….”

  Ella broke her off in mid-sentence. She had come to Florida to avoid the pressures of New York City and Gotham City Press and being E. L. Levin. She needed time to heal and to figure out what she was doing with the rest of her life. “Look, I know they don’t want the series to just end with the last book. I gave you the idea for the final book in the series and they rejected it. That’s all I have left in me of Bloody Murder.”

  A long-suffering sigh from her agent echoed over the phone. “I know, El. But you want to write a romance to end a series of psychological murder mysteries. They aren’t buying it, they think your readers won’t buy it either.”

  “What did Max say?” Max Klein was her editor at Gotham. He had been with her since the first Bloody Murder book years ago.

  “Max likes everything you pitch, you know that. But, even he had some doubts about ending the series with a love story. Can’t you tuck at least one criminal act in there to satisfy your fans and your publisher?”

  “My former publisher. Look, obviously for Barb and Joe to call it a day there has to be some resolution of the conflicts in their relationship. I’m choosing to resolve it in favor of them finally getting together after all the years of sexual tension and hurt feelings.” Ella felt herself wavering in her resolve to never write another crime scene. “I’ll do some revisions on the proposal, maybe a few chapters to see if I can come up with some criminal premise to throw them together. But, I’m not promising anything. Tell them that if they don’t want this final installment, I’ll just self-publish it and move on. This will be the last E. L. Levin book ever.”

  Ella ended the phone call with all the peace from her workout and nap totally destroyed. After a few hours bent over her laptop, trying to expand the proposal she had already submitted to Penny, she was so frustrated she hopped in the Mustang and headed out of the resort to the less populated part of the island. Driving along the northern coast of Mimosa Key, the inlets and tiny coastal islands intrigued her. When she was stronger, she decided, she would definitely try her hand at kayaking up here. As the road turn
ed south along the eastern side of the island, a break in the foliage revealed pristine beach and blue water. Pulling the Mustang off the road, Ella picked her way along an almost overgrown path to the beach.

  The isolated stretch of pink sand called to her. Slowly at first, she walked along the hard-packed damp sand at the shore’s edge, breathing in the salt tang of the air and reveling in the silence, broken only by the lapping of the waves and the cry of the gulls. Peace crept into her troubled heart. As though released from the bonds of pain and worry, she quickened her pace until she was almost jogging along the beach. Her lungs felt as though they were on fire and every muscle screamed at the now unfamiliar pull, but Ella felt alive for the first time in months. She turned and made her way back toward where she’d started her angry stroll, aching and cursing the pain but much less frustrated than when she’d started. Looking up from the sand, she glanced out at the water and noticed for the first time that the sky was darkening. I’ve been out here longer than I realized. I’d better find that path and get back to the car.

  Ella pivoted toward the foliage and was immediately brought up short by the hard body of an unmoving male. A small scream involuntarily tore from her throat. Her hands came up to break the hold of the stranger’s hands on her arms, but he stepped back, releasing her.

  “Whoa.” Levi said as he reached out to steady her again. At the sound of the familiar voice, Ella looked up from the impressive chest in front of her into the dark, concerned eyes of Dr. Hottie Rock Star. How was it that he was better looking each time she saw him? The waning rays of the sun caught the silver in his hair and made it glisten. His whiskey eyes looked golden in the fading light and his handsome features showed concern and mild irritation.