by Brill Harper
“My fault,” Christopher says. “She told me she had to go, and I was doing my best to distract her.” He pats my back. “Have fun.”
“I’ll be in the car,” Megan says.
As soon as the door closes, I turn to him. “I’m telling her the truth.”
“I wish you wouldn’t.”
“You patted my back like I’m your buddy or something. Christopher, nobody is going to believe this, and I look twice as pathetic every day I carry it on. It’s like exponential humiliation math.”
“I’m not big on public displays of affection. I’d be the same if we were really dating.”
“Let’s just let this go. It will be better for both of us. I’ll ...use your damn plain paperclips and black pens, and I’ll stay out of your way until Dr. Anderson comes back. It’s obvious that I’m not your type and—” I stop because he’s grabbed my shoulders in his big hands and squeezes gently. “What are you doing?”
“I’m about to kiss you. Senseless. Can you shut up for thirty seconds?”
“No.”
He chuckles, his dimple making a quick show, and then he’s kissing me. And I don’t know what it means. Nobody is in the room. We’re not impressing anyone. But he tastes like Altoids and he smells like spices and lemon hand soap. I’m trying so hard to not fall too far into it, but the lure of his mouth is undeniable. He pulls back. “Don’t break up with me until after the wedding. Please. We can do this.”
I nod in a daze. My sister honks the horn. “I have to go.”
When I get inside her car, she’s smiling. The way the Grinch does when he gets a horrible, wonderful idea. “You should marry him.”
The lightning bolt spears right through my heart this time. Only it’s cold. So cold. “Goddess, Megan. We’re barely just dating. I don’t think it’s going to last through the summer.”
“He’s totally into you.”
I shake my head. “We’re all wrong for each other.”
“He’s good for you.”
“He’s too set in his ways. He likes calm. He likes—”
“He likes you, idiot.”
Well, she’s right about one thing.
I’m an idiot.
Chapter Fourteen
Christopher
Tuesday is nearly over, thankfully. I can’t figure out what the hell I’m trying to do. I don’t want to be Stella’s fake boyfriend. Yet every time I think she’s going to end the charade, this man I don’t know inside me, I’m calling him Mr. Hyde, freaks out and starts kissing my receptionist.
This day has been an interminably long one. I had to visit the home of a cat hoarder with law enforcement today and make some very tough decisions. Stella is working overtime trying to line up homes for a litter of kittens that I’m not sure are going to make it. We’re both emotionally drained, which has made pretending to be in love even more difficult because it hasn’t felt like pretending. Working together felt right today. Leaning on her for support when we came across the remains of seven cats and facing the overwhelming sadness and anguish from the owner when we removed all her animals...I don’t know that I could have handled it without Stella at my side.
I’m hoping a good night of sleep will fix some of this angst. I’m making notes for tomorrow when a sparkle on the paper catches my eye. I twist the paper in the light. The ink is blue, but glittery. I toss the pen, grab another. Same thing.
On the corner of my desk is the basket of colored gel pens collected from all around the office. She’d contritely brought them in earlier claiming she’d done just as I asked and replaced all the pens in the office with black and blue. Just like I ordered. I can only assume that every black and blue pen in this clinic is now a glitter pen of some kind. But the blue and black I asked for.
She doesn’t care about my blood pressure at all. She really doesn’t.
My phone vibrates. A notification from eMatch. I don’t know why I hesitate to open it. Stella is not really my girlfriend. We are not exclusive. We are not real. It’s not cheating.
I skim the message from Melissa, a woman I’ve talked to before. She’s attractive. Works in finance. Runs in marathons. And wants to get a drink the weekend after this one.
The weekend after Megan’s wedding.
I’ll be free by then. Free to date. Free of the farce.
I compose a message. Delete it. Start another. Truth is, I can’t muster enough enthusiasm to commit to a drink with an attractive, reasonable woman who is looking for the same things in life that I am. And that’s all Stella’s fault.
“Doctor!” Stella yells from the reception area.
My muscles stiffen, hyper-focused on the distress in her voice. Don’t panic. But it’s too late. Cold sweat seems to open all my pores at once and I vault across my desk.
The idea of her in danger, suffering anything at all, has amped up my adrenaline to eleven. Please, be okay.
When I get out to reception, Stella is fine, but Rusty, a golden retriever, and his family are not. Rusty has been hit by a car. The driver and dog owner, Mr. Briggs, is white as a ghost. His wife has a baby in one arm and her inconsolable daughter clutched to her other hip. Stella is ushering them to the comfortable couch and doing what she does so well so I can take over.
I have to hide the fact that I have the shakes. That I’m on high alert. That somehow, I’ve become so mindful of Stella that the mere suggestion that she needs me turns my fight-or-flight response into fight, fight, fight.
A now cold sweat coats my back, but my doctor instincts rise back to the surface so I can assess the situation coolly. Rusty is still conscious and not losing any blood externally. I take him to the back to stabilize him. Set his leg. Tell him he’s a lucky bastard the driver had been backing out of their driveway slowly.
“Good boy,” I tell him.
When I look into the dog’s eyes, I know I’m doing what I am meant to do.
I’m practical and methodical about medicine. My patients get the benefit of my training and my full concentrated effort. But for all my practical and reasonable ideas and manners, inside me is a boy who just really loves dogs. I care for all animals, of course. I couldn’t do what I do very well if I didn’t because they know. All animals just know.
But dogs. There is something about them that reaches me on a level most humans don’t. They always make me want to be a better man.
Yeah, I’m doing the job I was meant to do.
As I leave Rusty resting comfortably, I find the reception area is a different scene now. Calm, relaxed. Stella’s got the once inconsolable girl in her lap on the floor, and they are coloring with the confiscated gel pens from my desk. The girl giggles at something Stella tells her. I’m struck by how easy it seems for her to deal with our patients’ people. My bedside manner there needs work. Humans are not my strong suit.
Stella does so well with them. She’s...well, she’s amazing. She’ll be a good mom. She’s open-hearted and fun and look at her on the floor with that little girl. Even though I’ve thought a lot about having kids lately, I don’t have that knack she does. Kids don’t climb into my lap, don’t come to me for fun or consolation. Yeah, I can provide well for a family...but I need to learn how to be more like Stella.
Something neither of us would ever believe I would have thought.
When they notice me, everyone stops what they are doing and stares at me. The little girl’s eyes are shining. The mom is holding a sleeping baby. It’s the dad that looks most vulnerable, though. You can see that all he wants is to take care of this family, and knowing he ran over his own dog is ripping his heart to shreds. Quietly. Stealthily.
“Rusty is going to be fine,” I say quickly.
The girl squeeze-hugs Stella and everyone starts talking at once, chaos running the show once again. But it’s manageable with Stella there directing it into something organized. We make arrangements to get Rusty home with care instructions, and when I get back to my office, the box of colorful pens is back on my desk. And a picture sig
ned by Misty Briggs is taped to my monitor.
Chapter Fifteen
Stella
I find Christopher in his office, twirling a pen idly in his fingers and looking thoughtfully at the picture Misty drew for him.
“That’s you,” I tell him, pointing to the man in the picture with really big hands standing next to a red dog. “Misty wanted to make you something to thank you for working on Rusty. It helped keep her mind off things.”
“You’re good with kids,” Christopher says. He pins the picture to the bulletin board behind his desk. “They like you.”
“They recognize a fellow child.”
He shakes his head. “You’re good with them because you care. You have a big heart, Stella. You take care of everyone around you.”
I’m not sure what to do with that. “Thanks.”
He hears the catch in my throat, the way I raise my voice so that it comes out more like a question.
He stretches. “Long day.”
The longest. If he were really my boyfriend, I’d rub his shoulders right now. I’d hold his face in my hands and kiss the tight line of his lips until he relaxed them soft again. I’d take him home and draw a bath and we could sink into the hot water and let our bones melt. We’d pull back the covers of my bed and slide in, naked and weak, wanting nothing but slumber. I’d curl around him, my hand on his heart so I could protect it while he slept.
I shake my head at the elaborate fantasy I’ve constructed of the two of us sleeping. It seems too intimate, too precious. Our relationship isn’t like that. It’s jagged and sharp, the difference between sea glass and a broken beer bottle.
He’s pondering the expression on my face, so I paste over my sudden disappointment that I’ll never have the soothing warm intimate nap with him. We are either high boil or freezer burn.
“Stella, I really appreciate everything you have done today. I don’t think I’ve ever had a harder, more heartbreaking day in my career. I’m glad Rusty is okay, but this afternoon... I’ve had to put animals down before. I know what’s humane...but...the way she screamed when we...” He closes his eyes, the memory probably playing across his mind on a vicious reel.
“You did everything you could for those cats and for Mrs. Bain. You did good work today, Christopher.”
He takes off his glasses and pinches the bridge of his nose. “I’ve never heard a woman wail like that.”
“She’s sick. She needs help. She loved those cats, but she can’t take care of them. It wouldn’t be humane to leave them there. And the ones that were suffering...Christopher, I was so proud to be by your side today.”
His eyes fly open. “Proud?”
“Yeah, proud. You really stepped up in a tough situation. You helped keep the rest of us on task and calm.”
“Because I’m cold and detached.”
“No...no. Nobody thinks that. You were attentive and thorough and calm.”
He shakes his head and traces the outline of his super big hands on the drawing Misty made of him. “I couldn’t have been any of those things without you today. You seemed to know what I needed before I knew I needed it.” He looks at me with the emotion he couldn’t show when we were in that house. “I needed you today, and you came through. Thank you.”
I don’t know what it cost him to say he needed anything, much less me. So, I nod like it’s no big thing. “Hey, I know we talked about making a public appearance at Ironwing tonight, but it’s late,” I say.
He looks beat, and I know I am. The adrenaline rush from the emergency on top of the horrible, no-good day at Mrs. Bain’s house has turned time into molasses.
“Yeah, the pub is out for me, too. I just want to go home, put my feet up, and eat salad straight from the jar.” Wow, did he just make a joke? I’m still chuckling when he adds, “Wanna come?”
It’s possible I didn’t hear that correctly. “You want me to go home with you? No one will see us together.” It won’t be part of our ruse.
“I know neither of us wants a real relationship, Stella. But I’d like us to be friends. And friends have dinner together sometimes.”
He hasn’t brought up if any benefits come with this friendship, but it’s probably best that they don’t. My fantasy of intimate sleeping be damned.
“Salad it is.”
Leann Anderson lives in the house behind the office, so we zombie shamble over after we close up. He pours wine while I dish us up—we will not eat directly from the jar, thank you very much. We sit on the couch in front of the television, and we both stare at the remote. Because now what?
Chances are pretty good that we will find nothing to agree on no matter how many channels Dr. Anderson subscribes to.
“What’s your favorite movie, Dr. Doolittle?” I ask him, kicking off my shoes and using the armrest of the couch against my back. He pulls my feet into his lap before leaning back with his dinner.
Well, okay then.
“If I’m trying to impress someone, my favorite movie is Shawshank Redemption.”
“And when you’re being real?”
“Toy Story.”
I feel like a fifty-pound weight gets lifted off my heart when we both laugh. Nodding to the remote, I say, “See if you can find it.”
We watch the movie as we eat dinner. When it’s over, he queues up the original Top Gun while I run the dishes to the sink. Top Gun because he didn’t believe me when I told him Leann Anderson was an extra in the bar when they sing that song to Kelly McGillis. When I get back to the couch, he’s got a blanket out and he spreads it over our laps when I sit next to him.
Devon and I never did this. We didn’t hang out. We went clubbing or drinking. But we never spent time with each other to be with each other. That’s what friends are for. And Devon was never my friend. I watch movies with Perry, usually. But this, just letting go of a shared long day and laughing and relaxing next to Christopher is...well, nice. I’m sure there are better words for it. But nice feels really good to me.
I barely make it through the volleyball scene before my eyelids get heavy. I don’t know how much time has passed when I open them again. The movie is over. The home screen is on the TV. I’m using Christopher’s shoulder as a pillow and he’s lightly snoring. Which is good because it gives me a chance to wipe off the drool collecting on my chin.
I’m debating my next move when Christopher wakes up. He’s got his arm around me and he squeezes, kissing my hair. Moving so I can see his face, I try to figure this guy out.
He looks relaxed and at peace, and his fingers are combing through my hair gently.
Is he awake or is he sleep-combing? “Christopher?”
“I’m glad you’re here.”
I warm all the way through. “You are?”
His hand moves to my jaw, cupping it while he carefully considers my face. There’s a tenderness I’m not used to in his eyes. A glowing ember instead of a shooting spark. “I really am.”
Slowly, like I’m afraid it might be the wrong move, I turn my face into his palm and press a kiss there. He swallows hard, calmly takes off his glasses, and flings them onto the coffee table so he can get his other hand on my face and bring me to a kiss.
I’m still sleep warmed and groggy. Maybe I’m the one who is dreaming. He would never throw his glasses, would he? Not Dr. Retentive.
He tilts my head to get a better angle. How can every kiss we share be so different from the last? This one...it’s sexy and deep and slow with a reverence that squeezes my heart. For once, he’s not frustrated with me. Nobody is trying to prove a point or convince bystanders we’re a couple. It’s just the two of us being...us. He coaxes me up and onto his lap without ever stopping his drugging assault on my mouth. His strong hands clutch me like I’m precious and I sink into him, groaning as I rub against the hardness of his erection.
“What you do to me, Stella,” he tells me between kisses.
I want to know. I want to hear. But now is not a time for conversation and everything inside me light
s up being in this man’s arms. Desperate to be closer, I start tearing off my clothes, but his strong arms band around me. “Wait. Just wait. Slow. I want to show you.”
“I want to see whatever you’re showing, believe me. Just do it faster.”
He laughs. And then he’s feeding me kisses and pulling me into his hard body until I feel that sweet high that usually only happens after coming. He lays me down on the couch and removes my clothes carefully, kissing my skin as it’s exposed, until I’m in my panties and he’s still dressed.
“I didn’t take my time with you on Sunday. That was a mistake.”
“The mistake is you’re still wearing clothes.”
“I’m going to enjoy every minute of torturing you, Stella. Every inch of you is mine.” He licks my neck below my ear. “This taunts me every day.” He sucks hard and my hips jerk up reflexively.
He growls as his hands pin my arms down and he moves his roving mouth lower, sucking my nipples into his hot, wet mouth. I strain against him, but he’s pinned me to the couch, his strong body turning me on even more as he overpowers me.
He stays on my breasts a long time, groaning into my skin. “So good, baby.”
Did he just call me baby? He doesn’t seem to be the kind of guy who uses endearments easily. But I could be reading too much into it. Maybe because I want it to mean something. I want this to mean something, even if it’s not forever.
Nothing wrong with making a moment count.
I’ve never had a problem with sex for sex’s sake. But I’m having a hard time keeping my heart out of this. His earthy scent, his words, the time he’s taking, the way he dominates my senses...it’s pushing me further and further underwater. I don’t want air. I don’t need air. I just need him.
“I want your skin, doc. Take off these clothes.”
He gives a slow, masculine smile, and I feel bits of my heart chip off like stardust. “So take what you want, Stella.”
He rolls us over so I am on top.
