by Ruby Scott
Regardless, he needed to stop thinking about her ability to wear pants and start saving her life.
After administering the antivenom, Dr. Andrew cleaned his equipment and put it away hurriedly. He had a certain cowboy to discuss matters with before his unexpected patient woke up.
###
Megan came to slowly. She couldn’t remember where she was or what the pounding pain in her leg was from, and most of all, she didn’t recognize the voice that was speaking in a low tone just off to her left.
She tried to open her eyes, but they seemed to be super-glued shut. Was it possible that someone thought that she was dead and had sewn her eyes shut? She remembered her father telling her something about how they sewed peoples’ eyes shut to keep them that way for a public viewing one time.
One of the many reasons she had been eager to escape that life.
The voice was still talking, and Megan could tell that it was male and a deep tenor, but she couldn’t discern any words. Her heart was pounding in her ears like never ending waves. Megan squeezed her eyes shut and tried to make the noise go away, to no avail.
What the hell had she been doing before she ended up in a strange place; hard wood digging into her shoulder blades and her leg pounding as if it had been chopped up with a machete? Her memory was blurry. She remembered getting off of the plane and grabbing her bags from the conveyer belt; remembered calling a taxi and checking into her hotel.
She remembered seeing the handsome cowboy with the sweet-as-sugar western drawl that was endearing enough to convince her to go on a horse ride with him. He had driven her to the stables that she had seen upon entering the quaint little town that still held traces of the “old west” and let her pick out her own horse. Megan also remembered getting off of the appaloosa to look at the view over a deep valley. It had been a deep red that wasn’t quite the shade of blood and interspersed with scrubby little plants that were too short and sparse to be called trees. She remembered leaning over the edge to look at the water more closely, the cowboy—whose name she couldn’t remember for the life of her at the moment—shouting at her to step back and then… nothing. A black stretch of nothingness in her memory.
Where was her, and who was talking?
Cool hands brushed her forehead and Megan couldn’t quite find the energy to flinch at the foreign touch. “Are you able to hear me?”
Blind. She was blind. The light was blindingly bright, like the sun. She should look away. Megan blinked a few times before she realized that her eyes were open and she was having something painfully bright shone into her eyes.
“Pupil response is normal. She should be coming around in a few moments, Michael. Then we can hear her side of the story.”
Michael; that was his name. Megan laughed at herself. It was such a simple name, and not one she should have forgotten. Her first boyfriend’s name had been Michael. They had broken up after two weeks and one lousy kiss; but everyone remembered their first “real” date, horribleness aside.
Wait, had his words just made sense? The pounding sound was gone and Megan could hear the tick of a clock and the whirr of a fan. The second thing she noticed was the physical sensations all around her. It was unbearably hot. She should have paid attention to her mother’s advice and brought shorts instead of jeans.
Megan blinked a bit deliriously and everything swam into focus. There was a man standing over her, quite possibly the polar opposite of her cowboy. He had hair the color of corn silk and startling blue eyes that seemed to glow from the sheer intensity that they emitted. She blinked at his very undeniably handsome face a few more times and then remembered how to speak.
“Where am I?” she asked. The words blurred together as if she had drunk too much.
“A doctor’s office,” the man said, the frown line between his brows leaving after a moment. He leaned back, looking over towards the other side of the room. “You’re lucky that this man brought you here as quickly as he did. Rattlesnake bites can be fatal, you know.” His voice had the same slow, western accent, but his words were pronounced with efficiency and effectively clipped off when they needed to be. A doctor’s voice. The combination was startling, but not altogether unpleasant. She could get used to that voice rather quickly.
Snapping herself out of the daze she was still half in, Megan focused on the doctor’s actual words. “Rattlesnake bite?”
“This idiot,” the doctor said sardonically, shooting a none-too-friendly look at Michael, “decided that it would be a good idea to take you on a ride. You got bit by a rattler and he was lucky enough that I happened to be unoccupied at the moment.”
“You’re never occupied, Andrew,” Michael said. His deeper voice still managed to send shivers down Megan’s spine. She wanted to turn and look at the cowboy, to see his face and possibly that incredibly sexy smirk that did things to her nether regions, but she couldn’t move a muscle. She felt her arms twitch in preparation to lift her up, but they didn’t do a damn thing besides that.
The doctor—Andrew—scoffed and slid his arms out of his jacket. Damn, Megan thought. If only they made doctors like that where I come from. From the way his shirt was sticking to his body in the heat, she could tell that he worked out—hard and well. How had he even been able to wear that hot doctor’s jacket in the first place? And why would he want to with a body like that?
Megan attempted to sit up and let out a gasp of pain as the wound on her leg—had she seriously been bitten by a goddamn rattlesnake on her first day away from the city life that she was so eager to get away from?—twanged in sympathy.
Andrew was instantly by her side, hovering over her, that frown line that was admittedly adorable present once more between his eyebrows. “Don’t move quite yet, darlin’,” he said. “You’ll upset the process of the antivenom.” Megan’s mind got tripped up on the ‘darlin’’ for a few long and heart stopping moments before she remembered that this was the wild old west where everyone called everyone else ‘darlin’’ like a second name and said, ‘howdy’ as an actual way of greeting each other.
“O-okay,” she stuttered as he checked her leg once more, pinching the linen cloth of her trousers in his thumb and forefinger. He glanced down at the wound and his frown deepened.
“You shouldn’t move until the swelling has gone down a bit,” he added, looking back up at her. He dropped her pant leg and stood, all business. “While we wait, I need to get your information.”
“Information?”
“Full name, address, blood type, birth date, social—all of the information that goes on the official report. Oh, and whether you want to pay with cash or credit.”
There was a snort on the other side of the room, and Megan finally found the strength in her neck to crane her head back and glance at the cowboy occupying most of the space alongside the furthest wall away from her table bed. He stood, arms crossed over his chest. His flannel had been loosened as to allow him to roll the sleeves up over his muscular arms and his cowboy hat was perched on the desk beside where he was leaning. He looked even better after she had snake venom in her system, she had to admit. “Already asking her about payment,” he said and tsked. “Andrew was never a gentleman,” he said, turning that half-quirked grin on Megan. She found her lips twitching up in response.
Before she could reply, Andrew had made a disgusted noise of his own and pressed Megan’s shoulders into the table so that she would have to look away from Michael. “I said rest,” he instructed firmly but not unkindly. He grinned back at Michael. “And you were always too much the gentleman.”
“There’s no such thing,” Michael said dryly.
Listening to the two men bicker like an old married couple was doing wonders for relieving the stress that had coiled tight in every muscle in Megan’s body and she found herself relaxing into the wooden table slowly. Even if she had no clue where she was or what she would do after she got done with whatever paperwork they threw at her, she finally felt as if she belonged.
That
was something that had never happened in her family. Doctors, lawyers and entrepreneurs were what her family was made up of. They were all analytical, cold and distant; never around much for anything and never—God forbid—showing any type of emotion. As an artist and free spirit, Megan had always been the black sheep of the family. She had no taste for the things that they did, and they had no way to understand her. They had tried to make her conform, tried to get her into Stanford and Harvard, but she had run away from the place she was meant to call home from the very moment it was legal to do so and not looked back.
It was hard, pretending as if one’s family didn’t exist. They still existed everywhere, and running into an estranged mother occasionally was something uncomfortable but all too familiar for Megan.
After last week’s disastrous run-in with her sister-in-law, she had wanted to get away from it all. Thus, the random and completely unplanned trip to the west. It had been the most affordable region furthest from New York and the sterile home Megan had grown up in. She didn’t particularly care for horses or the heat, but if it was away from home then it would be the best place in the world for her.
“Megan?” She was shocked out of her reverie by the voice of the doctor—Andrew. The tone suggested that this wasn’t the first time he had spoken her name, and she blinked up at him blearily. “You can move now.”
She nodded and tried to lift herself up. He was there in a second, fingers wrapping around the fleshy part of her upper arm. It sent a zing of something up her body, something that reminded her of little sparks and firecrackers. She jerked her arm out of his grasp out of reflex, sitting up on her own with a renewed vigor. The blood rushed to her head, and her vision went black around the edges for several moments before she was able to blink it away and look around the small office.
It was well worn but up kept very well. It was obvious Dr. Andrew cared for his equipment; it was shiny and for the most part, new-looking in the mess of woodwork that was probably as old as the town and the cobwebbed ceiling rafters. There was a desk cluttered with various objects and papers just outside of the partially open door. She squinted back up at Andrew, who had taken a few steps back to allow her the space she had non-verbally requested, yet still hovering close enough to catch her if she fell.
It was rather endearing; like a high school shy boy who was trying to decide whether or not he should approach his crush, and she felt a bit bad for wrenching her arm out of his grip. He was just so… electric. She needed to stay away from him if he was going to affect her like that every single time he touched her. It did funny things to her brain and other parts of her anatomy.
“Any lightheadedness?” Andrew asked Megan after a few moments when she simply sat there and attempted to tell her brain to stop taking such dirty paths into the gutter.
“It’s passing,” she said. It was, truthfully. She finally felt as if her head belonged on her shoulders and the blackness had receded, leaving her with ultra-clear vision that she had been lacking a few moments ago. Ah, there, everything was back to normal. Megan clenched her fist in her lap to test her brain’s reaction times and was satisfied with an immediate response.
Her father had been a doctor. She knew how to take care of herself. Andrew didn’t need to know that. “Good,” Andrew said, going over to the desk and picking up a clipboard. “Can you read the poster over the window?” he asked.
Megan turned from watching him, realizing that she was once again admiring the way his muscles shifted underneath the cotton of his button-down blue shirt that did wonders for making his eyes look nearly violet and squinted at the sign over the wall.
“If you can read this, you’re too sick to be in my office. Lovely decorations, Dr. I’m sure that they keep all of the patients coming back for more,” she said dryly. Andrew turned to her, a smile quirking up half of his generous lips. Damn, that smile nearly rivalled Michael’s. She glanced over at the cowboy and saw that he was looking out the window. She studied his profile for a few good heartbeats before he glanced over and caught her staring, letting her know just what he thought of her visual administrations with a cocky grin.
Damn, but if Megan didn’t like her men cocky.
“It tends to get them out and ‘better’ faster,” Andrew said, interrupting her stream of thought once more. He came into her line of vision once more and extended the clipboard. “Here, you can fill out as much as you want tonight. If your vision starts blurring or you feel as if your eyelids are drooping, just holler and we can continue this tomorrow whenever you’re feeling better.”
“Thanks, doc,” Megan said, flashing him a quick smile. Was it just her, or did he pause, giving her a very thorough once-over before escaping the room rather quickly?
She grinned at him, though he wasn’t even in the room to receive it. Perhaps he wasn’t all that immune to women, as she had originally thought upon hearing his business-like tone and the way his frank gaze refused to travel down her body unless he was assessing something.
Michael moved to her side and sat down on the edge of the table. He glanced over at her, for once his face completely serious. “I apologize for having gotten you into this mess,” he said. She could almost hear the way it bent his pride to stoop the level of apologizing to anyone.
“Oh, no it’s my own fault,” Megan said instantly, waving a hand in the air and wincing as her bite marks twanged. She saw the way his shoulders instantly relaxed, as if a huge weight had been lifted off of them at the words, even though they were only partially true.
“Once the swelling has gone down,” Michael continued, running a hand alongside her leg until his fingers hovered directly beside the bite marks that decorated the outer side of her calf, “we can put some antiseptic on that and get it bound up. It should help with the pain, just a bit. We can also get you some pain killer if you need it.”
“For not being a doctor, you sure do know a lot about medicine,” Megan commented.
“I suppose I picked up on Andrew’s lingo,” Michael said and shrugged in the easy way that had the eloquence of it being very easy to talk about Andrew and his relationship with him.
“You’ve been friends for how long?” Megan asked, elevating her foot above her heart as her father had taught her.
Michael laughed. “We’re not friends,” he said. “Something more like friendly rivals. That’s how it’s always been between Andrew and me. We’ve always had this competition thing going where we try to always outsmart and out-brawl the other.”
“You act like friends,” Megan commented after a few moments of taking this in. She supposed that could be the case, but the two seemed to genuinely like each other underneath all of the irritation.
“Don’t let Andrew hear you say that,” Michael said, and Megan wasn’t sure if he was joking or not.
“Don’t let Andrew hear you say what?” the said doctor asked as he reentered the room with a glass of water and blankets. He shot Michael a frown. “I hope you weren’t touching her bite.”
“Of course not, doc,” Michael said. “You should know that I don’t touch when the items are damaged.”
Andrew scoffed and didn’t reply. Instead, he handed the glass of water to Megan. She only then realized that her tongue felt like cotton in her mouth; dry, oversized and utterly disgusting. As he draped the blanket over her shoulders and shooed Michael away so that she could lay back down if she so pleased, he finally said, “You never change, do you?”
“Never,” Michael agreed. “I’ll go get us some dinner,” he added, putting his cowboy hat back on and nodding to Megan. “You rest up, honey. I expect you to go on another ride with me.”
Megan let out a sigh, but made sure to include a smile so that the cowboy knew that she was joking. “If you insist.”
Michael shot her that captivating and utterly undeniably handsome grin. “I do insist, darlin’.”
Megan couldn’t help the blush that flamed across her entire face in the splotchy manner that it so loved to do as she realiz
ed that he hadn’t included the word ‘horse’ in his ‘ride.’ Coupled with that smile, she was sure that he had implied it sexually and that she had been too out of it to notice.
Not just out of it; out of practice as well. Megan hadn’t been the recipient or giver of flirtation for years, now. She would need to brush up her skills quickly if she was to keep up with this alluring, beautiful man; and she found that she wanted to. She hadn’t bothered to make the effort for quite a long time because the long line of men that she had gone through had all been the same type of asshole breed that she didn’t want to expend the energy on to attempt to improve.
This day had certainly turned out very interesting. Megan moved herself over to a chair with Andrew supporting her and began filling out the paperwork. She would think about the stressful things tomorrow, but right now, she just needed to fill out the basics. Things she could handle. Her name, date of birth, social security number, medicare provider… it was soothing, almost; as if she could remind herself of who she was simply by proving it on paper.
Luckily, she started to feel sleepy before she got to the payment part. That would be part of tomorrow, when she could deal with it. Yes, tomorrow…
###
Megan hardly noticed when Andrew slid the clipboard from her lax fingers and draped the blanket over her. She was already out cold. Andrew was envious of her ability to sleep, but then he was always jealous of anyone’s ability to sleep.
He pulled out a medical textbook he had been meaning to read for the past few weeks and settled into the chair across from the sleeping woman and waited for Michael to return with their food.
