by Jade Kerrion
“What about a personal coach? I know just the man for the job.”
“I…uh…” She averted her gaze.
“What the hell?” Brandon shook his head. “You’ve initiated the sexual contact both times, but when I allude to a longer-term relationship, you act like a skittish school girl—which I know you’re not, at least not in bed.”
She flushed. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
“Not if you don’t tell me what it is. Look, Shannon. I’m interested in you, and I hope you’ve figured it out. I understand that you don’t think I’m the right long-term guy for you, and I also understand that you don’t think you have time for a relationship right now, but yesterday, I thought we agreed to take this a day at a time.”
“Yes, you’re right. I’m sorry. I…uh…instincts?”
“Or habit?”
She winced. “Perhaps a bit of both. You’re not like Jerry.”
“And that’s a good thing, right?’
“An excellent thing.” She wrung her fingers together. “I don’t know how to say this, but Jerry made me feel…weird.”
“Weird? About what?”
“Wanting different things…in bed.” Shannon looked away, her cheeks stained with embarrassment. “Things like…you know…”
“Showing off your body? Wanting to be held down? What exactly is wrong with that?”
“He said it wasn’t natural. Not for someone like me.”
“Which is what exactly?”
“You know…professional working woman. A doctor. Solidly middle class. Protestant family. Goes to church every Sunday kind of girl.”
“He said that? What the hell is wrong with him?”
Shannon’s head jerked up. “You don’t think…”
“You experiment with almost everything else, Shannon. Look at your crazy art collection downstairs. Why would sex be any different?”
“Because some things can’t be experimented with, in the same way that drugs and alcohol are, or used to be, off-limits for me. I know I experiment, but I also know there are limits, and I’m afraid of crossing those lines.”
“Sweetheart, I’ve seen kink, and trust me, if sexual fetishes were a big Gordian knot, you’re a tiny thread in that big messy ball. You’re dabbling on the edges of it; your little toe isn’t even really wet.”
“It just didn’t seem like something that would be right in a long-term relationship, you know?”
“So you decided to seduce me, play out your wildest dreams, and then dismiss me as a one-night stand?” His eyes narrowed. “Nice try. Didn’t work.”
“I’m starting to realize that.”
He grinned wickedly. “Your little flash of kink turns me on.”
She turned bright red. “I never meant—”
“Doesn’t matter what you intended. The point is it did, together with everything else about you. Promise me, Shannon. A day at a time. If I’m not right for you, I’ll walk away, but I swear, I won’t make you feel bad about who you are, because you’re adorable.”
She bit her lower lip. “Adorable isn’t really the look I’m working toward.”
“No, it doesn’t suit the middle-class-doctor-who-goes-to-church-every-Sunday look you’re striving for, but you are adorable, especially when that dimple digs into your cheek.”
“Okay.” She nodded and inhaled deeply, shuddering as she exhaled. “And now, I have to go get ready.”
“Right.” He pushed up from the bed, wishing that it were as easy pushing away his doubts. “Any chance of seeing you next weekend?”
The refusal was on her lips. He could see it in the hesitation in her eyes. “Never mind. Why don’t you call me when you think you’re ready for tomorrow, whenever that might be?”
She bit her lower lip. “I only have to work a half day at the clinic. I’ll be home by 2 p.m. If you’d like to hang out here, we could have a late lunch and perhaps spend the rest of the weekend together?”
The tightness in Brandon’s chest eased, and he leaned in to kiss her lips. “Sounds perfect.”
Brandon had the house to himself after Shannon raced off to work. Frowning, he settled down at the dining table and opened his briefcase. Jerry was an asshole. What right did he have to make Shannon feel wretched about who she was just because she didn’t match his image of what he wanted in someone he could take to a dinner party? At least he now knew what Shannon’s problem was. He had something tangible to work on, a way to direct his focus and energy.
He set his laptop to the side and reached for the folder Henry Hammerstein had given him. The big malpractice case—his chance to redeem himself and set himself back on the partner track. He opened the folder and his gaze raced across the page before focusing on the named defendant.
Northridge Urgent Care Clinic, Westchester, N.Y.
Shannon’s half-day at the clinic could not pass quickly enough. Odd how a five-minute conversation with Brandon over an omelet could begin unraveling that horrible knot of shame and uncertainty in her chest. She knew it would be a while before she could fully dismiss the memory of Jerry’s cold and studied disapproval, but the cloud of doubt was no longer as dark or as ominous as it had been.
Her step was a great deal lighter when she arrived back at her townhouse, shortly after 2 p.m. The first thing that struck her was the absence of the delicious scent of herbs and spices. With a jolt, she realized she had been expecting a home-cooked meal. Wow, presumptuous much? When had she gone from uncertainty over a possible relationship with Brandon to dismay over the lack of home-cooked meals? “Brandon?” she called out.
After a moment, he responded. “Here.” His voice snapped with irritation.
She walked into the dining room in time to see him shove a laptop and a folder into his briefcase. He looked up at her, and she froze, stunned by his narrow-eyed glare. “Brandon, are you all right?”
He raked his fingers through his hair. “I—” He shook his head. “—was working.”
“Okay.” She bit her lip. “I’m back now, and I’m done with work for the rest of the weekend. Did you want to go out and get some lunch?”
“Sure. Something fast, simple.”
“There’s a deli around the corner—soup, salad, sandwiches, that kind of thing.”
“Sounds great.”
She turned to the door. “Brandon, are you sure you’re all right? You’re incredibly…tense.”
He shook his head sharply. “It’s just work. I got distracted. Lost track of time.”
She chuckled, trying to infuse lightness and humor into the situation. “It happens to me, too. Like today, at the clinic, someone came in and—”
He placed his hand on her arms. “Let’s not talk about the clinic.”
She gaped at him. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. I just don’t want to discuss the clinic right now.”
“Then what do you want to talk about?”
“Something else. Anything else.” The tone of his voice whipped out like a lash.
She jerked her hand out of his. “If you’re having a bad day, don’t take it out on me.”
“I’m not…I just…” He ground his teeth. “I should go. There’s a lot of work I need to do.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “All right. Fine. Go.”
He grabbed his jacket and strode to the door. “I’m sorry, Shannon.”
“Nothing to be sorry for,” she lied even though her heart ached and her head throbbed as if it was about to burst. What’s going on? she wanted to ask, but she could not get the words out past her trembling lips. The last time a man had been as brusque and abrupt with her was moments before Jerry had told her that she was not meeting his needs and had walked out on her forever.
She wasn’t ready to hear those words from Brandon’s lips.
“Goodbye, Shannon.” He walked out of her townhouse and got into his car. The engine roared, and his car vanished behind a trail of exhaust. It was out of sight before Shannon
realized one horrifying fact.
Brandon had said nothing about seeing her again.
Chapter 9
The weekend dragged but eventually rolled into Monday morning. Back at work, Brandon schooled his expression into cool professionalism before knocking on the open door of Henry Hammerstein’s office.
Hammerstein looked up from his perusal of the newspaper and waved Brandon in. “What can I do for you?”
“I wanted to talk to you about this malpractice case.” Brandon set the file on the desk between them before sitting down in the chair across from Hammerstein. “I reviewed it this weekend.”
“What do you think?”
“It’s not a strong case.”
“No, it’s not.” Hammerstein leaned back in his leather seat and laced his fingers across his chest. “That’s why I gave it to you. We need our sharpest talent on it. There’s a lot of money riding on it.”
“Is there? The defendant is a small urgent care center in Westchester. At best, it’s a going concern, but I doubt it’s rolling in cash.”
“The clinic itself probably won’t be paying out, but it will have malpractice insurance. The doctors will, too. If you can prove deliberate negligence on their part, the payouts could be massive.”
“The doctors’ insurance rates will jump.”
“Inevitably.”
“And the bad press will shut down the clinic.”
“More than likely.”
Brandon shook his head. “And what will that accomplish? A few people will collect a small financial payout, but Westchester will be short an urgent care center, one that has anchored the community for more than forty years—”
Hammerstein’s eyes narrowed. “Where are you going with this, Brandon?”
“Is the case worth it?”
“What are you suggesting? I’m sure the plaintiffs will be happy to settle outside of court, as long as they get paid, and as long as we do, too.”
“No, what I meant was whether the case is worth pursuing at all. The cost-benefit ratio doesn’t make sense.”
“Well, it’s your job to maximize the benefit, isn’t it?”
Brandon gritted his teeth. “It’s not—”
Hammerstein leaned forward to rest his elbows on his desk. “I don’t understand. Are you saying that we should turn down this case?”
“We could convince them to drop it. They don’t have much ground to stand on, and whether they win or lose, it could mean the end of the clinic. I don’t think that’s what they want.”
“The plaintiffs know what they want, Brandon. They want to hold someone responsible for what they consider negligence, however weak their case may be. If it means the closure of the clinic—” Hammerstein shrugged. “—then so be it.”
“I think—”
“We’re taking the case; it’s not up for discussion. I know some of those plaintiffs personally. They’re not going to drop the case, and if we don’t take it, another firm will, and they’ll profit from it.” Hammerstein shook his head, a frown on his lips. “What’s the problem, Brandon? I thought the challenge would appeal to you. It’s exactly the kind of case to prove that you haven’t lost your edge after…what happened last year.”
Brandon’s breath escaped as a soft sigh.
“This case is important to the firm, and to you, personally,” Hammerstein continued. His tone hardened subtly, and Brandon took it for what it was—a warning. “It’s your route to partner. I argued hard to give this case to you instead of to Travis. Don’t let the firm down. Don’t let me down.”
Shannon scribbled the prescription on a piece of paper and handed it to the young Latina. “This is for your pre-natal vitamins,” Shannon said in badly mangled Spanish. “You can find them at the grocery store. Make sure you take them every day, and then come back and see me in a month.”
The woman accepted the piece of paper with a trembling hand. “No tengo dinero. No tengo de seguros.”
No money. No insurance.
Shannon patted the woman’s hand gently. “Don’t worry.” She smiled. “Just come back here. I’ll see you.”
The woman mumbled her thanks and shuffled from the consultation room. Shannon followed her out, and Andrea met her in the corridor. “There are two more patients in the waiting room, but Curtis will see them if you want to grab a half hour for lunch.”
“I think I will.”
Andrea continued down the corridor but paused before opening the door that led back to the reception area. “How did your date with Brandon go?”
Shannon frowned. “I…don’t know.”
“What do you mean?”
“We had a great dinner and a great…after. The next morning, we kind of agreed that he would stay for lunch.”
“Kind of?”
“All right. I confess I was a bit half-hearted about it, but I realized he was right. I was over-planning, saying ‘no’ now when what I really meant was ‘no’ sometime in the distant future, if at all. But then, I guess he changed his mind in the time it took me to make up mine.”
“What do you mean he changed his mind?”
“He’d all but talked me into giving us a chance, but when I got back that afternoon, he was distant. Snappy, and not in a funny way.”
“Did you try to talk to him?”
“I was about to, but he cut me off. He said he didn’t want to hear about the clinic.”
“Really?” Andrea frowned. “It doesn’t sound like the man you’ve been telling me about.”
“It’s not. He did the Jekyll-Hyde thing on me. Just like Jerry used to do. Charming when he wanted something from me. Cold when he didn’t get his way.”
“That’s a shame. Sounded like he was just the guy for you.”
Shannon’s eyebrows drew together. “Really?”
“Something in you lit when you talked about him. It’s been a while since you’ve been this excited about a guy.”
“Excited? Me?” She did not think of herself as the excitable type, but she supposed she had been reliving the moments in his company—the conversations, the sex, heck, even the quiet moments spent together, each of them pursuing his or her own interest. Ironically, his bluntness put her at ease; she did not have to second-guess what he said. His career-focus alleviated her obscure guilt over focusing on her career.
Right guy. Right time. Right place.
Except that he doesn’t seem to want me anymore.
Well, she had been blowing hot and cold. How could she blame him for doing the same? Perhaps it was her turn to close the distance. She could send him a bottle of wine—she wouldn’t know what to pick but surely a halfway intelligently designed website would have recommendations. She strode into her office and flipped up the cover of her laptop to browse wine connoisseur sites. As a description of red wines appeared on her screen, she reached for the pile of mail on her desk.
The first envelope was registered and addressed to the clinic. Curious, she slit it open and pulled out the contents. She read through the two-page letter once, and then, suddenly cold, again. Words leaped out at her. Class action lawsuit. Plaintiffs. Defendants. Deliberate negligence resulting in physical harm.
She—the clinic—was being sued for millions of dollars!
Her mind skittered like a panicked squirrel. She reached for her smartphone and called Brandon’s cell phone number. Surely, he could help explain the document and advise her on what to do next.
He did not answer his cell phone, and she hung up without leaving a message. Hands trembling, she called his office number. Within moments, a woman’s voice came over the phone. “Hammerstein and Lewis. How may I direct your call?”
“I’d like to speak to Brandon Smith, please.”
“Please hold. I’ll transfer your call.”
As the phone rang, she picked up the letter again and held it at arm’s length, trying to distance her emotional reaction from the mental focus needed to deal with the problem. Her gaze fell on the letterhead.
Ham
merstein and Lewis.
Her heart jackhammered in her chest.
Brandon’s law firm was representing the people suing her—
The phone clicked. “This is Brandon Smith,” his familiar voice spoke in her ear.
Her heart cracking, bleeding, she hung up without a word.
Brandon pulled his ear away from the phone and frowned at the receiver. The caller had hung up without speaking. He reached into his briefcase for his smartphone, which he had set to silent mode. The screen displayed a single missed call from Shannon just moments earlier.
She had probably called his office, too.
Damn it!
Fighting the instinct to call her back, he set the phone down on the desk and slid it away from him. He stared at it—willing the screen to light up, the phone to start vibrating. Call me, Shannon, so that I can—
Can what?
Apologize? Explain? What on earth could he possibly say to justify what he was doing to her? He would win—because he always did, because his partnership was riding on it—and his victory would cost her insurance millions of dollars, and it would cost her the clinic in which she had invested all her savings. He would wipe her out, financially, and make it nearly impossible to start over, except as an employee in a hospital, forcing her back into the life she had escaped.
The case was not strong, but with the little she had told him about the clinic, he could strengthen it significantly. He knew where to dig deeper, where to find the circumstantial evidence that would convince a judge to rule in favor of the plaintiffs.
He could win the case.
He could make partner.
What else was there to discuss?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Except for the fact that he had fallen—hard—for her. Right girl. Wrong time. Wrong place. Brandon stared at his hands, clenched into fists, on his desk. What the hell do I do?
Chapter 10
Shannon did not arrive back at her townhouse until late that evening. After the clinic closed, she had spent hours researching law firms in the area and making appointments to meet with lawyers. The sooner she received trustworthy advice, the better off she would be.
