by S. E. Rose
After a revitalizing shower, I set up a picnic in Ash’s room with the ravioli we picked up on the way home. We watch another movie until I hear a car pull up.
“Is that Brix?” Ash asks.
“I think so,” I answer.
I go and open my side door just in time to see Brix get out of his car. He smiles at me, and I melt a little on the inside. Is this what normal family life is like? Two parents, greeting each other after a long day? I quickly squash that idea because the mere thought of having a normal family life seems too out of reach for me. I can’t hope for such things.
“There’s ravioli in the oven for you,” I say as I step back to allow him to enter the house. He doesn’t give me the chance, though, as he swoops me into a hug and presses his lips to mine.
“What was that for?” I ask after a moment.
“For being you,” he says with a wide smile. “Now, where’s my patient?”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Brixton
“Tell me about it, what it was like for you as a child,” I urge her as I tuck her closer against me. We’ve tucked Ash in, and he’s fast asleep. We managed to make it to her bed, but we both fell asleep within minutes of lying down. I woke to her drawing little hearts on my chest. I lay there for way too long, pretending to still be asleep as I enjoyed her feather-like touch, her soft breath on my shoulder, and the heat of her bare skin against mine.
We are now curled up in her bed. Her head leans on my shoulder, and her finger is currently drawing patterns on the palm of my hand.
She doesn’t speak for a long moment. “I didn’t fully understand at first. The doctors tried to explain to me in terms that I would understand, but it still didn’t seem real until I was being poked and prodded. Then it sunk in. Mostly, I just felt bad, and I hated that I didn’t get to have a say in anything. I just had to do what I was told when I was told to do it. I suppose that’s when I became such a control freak. I felt safer when I was in control.”
“That’s understandable.”
“It was the smell that brought back the memories at first. Then . . . seeing Ash going through treatments. I . . . there were a few times I had to excuse myself. It was too hard to remember and to be there with him.”
I kiss the top of her head. “You are so strong, and you don’t even realize it.”
“I’m not that strong. If I was, I’d go there more, volunteer even.”
“No one expects that from you, you know that, right?”
“I know. But . . . I guess that I expect that from me.”
I tilt her head up toward me, and she looks into my eyes. “You are the most beautiful, bravest, kindest, most caring woman that I’ve ever met, Lanie. I think those things are innately you, no matter what you went through in your past. But I also see how you are so empathetic with the kids and so patient. You understand them in ways I will never be able to, and that is purely from those scary experiences that you try not to think about. They changed you and in some good ways.”
“I guess I don’t think about the good.”
“I know. It’s easier to focus on the bad. It’s like when I think about all the patients that I couldn’t save instead of thinking about the ones that I have saved.”
“That must be hard,” she says, softly running a hand over my jaw.
“It is. It’s the hardest part of my job, of my life, but I know that it’s just part of the whole.”
“The whole?”
“Your life is a whole unit, right? I think of it as a pie chart. There’s a good slice, a bad slice, a mediocre slice. You can’t have the whole pie without the different slices.”
She laughs. “That’s very mathematical of you.”
“I suppose.”
“That’s why you like cars, isn’t it?” she asks me. I had told her once that I liked to work on old cars with my grandfather. We liked to fix them up and sell them.
“Yes, you can fix them. No matter what, you can rebuild them. It was a hobby, but now it’s . . . therapeutic for me.”
“I get that. It’s like my organization. I know it sounds crazy, but it helps. I know that my pantry will always have my soups stacked in alphabetical order. I can depend on it. It’s a constant. No matter what the day brings, good or bad, I know where chicken soup is in the pantry.”
I laugh. “I suppose that is something.”
She shoves my chest. “Hey, it’s ‘my’ something.”
I lean down and press my lips to hers. “I like your something.”
She squirms against me.
“Careful, angel, or we might not get up today.”
“Ash can fend for himself,” she murmurs as she grinds against me.
I push her panties to the side and run my finger over her slit.
“Oh, Lanie, I have no self-control when it comes to you,” I curse myself as I pull my erection free and roll us over, slowly sinking into her.
Brixton
“Tell me about you,” Lanie asks as we sit on her porch swing sipping coffee. We finally emerged from the bed and grabbed a shower. Ash is still fast asleep.
She pulls her legs up under her and turns toward me, wrapping the blanket we brought out here more tightly around her.
“Not much to tell.”
“Your mom died in a house fire. And you grew up at your grandparents’ house. That much I know from Tabby.”
I nod. “That’s about it.”
“That must have been tough,” she states rhetorically.
“It was. I guess that’s why I wanted to get away. I went to college and then medical school and never looked back. I guess . . . I just kept running. With every new country and new adventure, I was trying to put more distance between all of that and my present.”
She studies me as I speak, and I feel like she sees me, really sees me. It’s slightly unnerving and also a bit comforting.
“And how did that work for you?”
“Do I need to pull up a sofa to lie on?”
She glares at me and rolls her eyes. “Why do boys have such issues with discussing their feelings?”
I turn to her. “I don’t. I just prefer to keep the past in the past.”
“I bared my soul to you,” she points out. I grimace because she’s right.
I lean back into the soft cushion of the swing, staring up at the wooden ceiling of the porch. I close my eyes and smell fire burning in a nearby chimney. It transports me back to that day.
“I was at school. School was my escape. After my mom had a car accident, she got hooked on the pain pills. She was too proud or too stupid or too addicted to care or ask for help. I felt guilty leaving Tabby behind every day, but I loved school. It was a Wednesday. I remember that because on Wednesdays we had gym and we had played soccer that day. I got to be a team captain, and I was so happy. The smoke is what I smelled first. Some neighbors were standing in front of the house. I saw Tabby, and she started to try to run back inside. I grabbed her and told her to stay. She kept screaming that Mom was inside. There were so many flames. I was going to try to go in myself, but the firefighters arrived. They took us to a police car and called my grandparents. They got my mom out, but they weren’t able to save her. I kept Tabby’s face pressed against my chest as they performed CPR on our mom. I didn’t want her to see that. That’s when I knew that I wanted to save lives when I grew up, that I wanted to be someone who could fix people.”
I feel Lanie’s hand tighten around mine, and she squeezes it. I open my eyes and see hers watching me, tears running down her cheeks. I run a thumb across her cheek, wiping away the tears.
“Don’t cry,” I whisper, my heart aching for causing her pain.
“I’m so sorry that happened to you.”
“It was a long time ago, angel. I’m a different person now. My grandparents provided us with a stable upbringing. We got to stay in one house, go to one school. They disciplined us and taught us. They aren’t perfect. They aren’t the most affectionate people on the planet, but they
gave us much more than my mom was capable of giving us. And for that, I’m grateful to them.”
The tears come faster down Lanie’s cheeks. “I’m so lucky,” she whispers.
I cock my head to one side.
Lanie blinks back a few tears. “I have such a good family. They were there for me through everything. They’ve been my rock my whole life. I . . .” She trails off as her eyes search mine.
“You are very lucky to have them,” I say to her.
She brings her hands to my face and cups it. “It’s not fair.”
I turn my face and kiss her palm. “Life isn’t fair, Lanie.”
“But why did these things happen to us? We were just kids.”
I stroke her face and pull her into me. She curls up on my lap, and I tuck her head under my chin, kissing the top of it. “Bad things happen to good people all the time. I’ve seen it again and again at work. It’s not fair; you are right. But I’ve seen amazingly good things happen, too.”
She sniffs against my chest, using the back of her hand to wipe her nose. “Like what?” she whispers.
“Like a donated pair of glasses that helped a little girl see clearly for the first time. Like a donated prosthetic leg and crutches that lets a little boy walk. Like a little boy that’s going to be cancer-free.”
Lanie pushes back from me and looks into my eyes. “You’re right. I should look on the good side of things. We survived. We’re here. We’re helping Ashton.”
I smile at her. “We found each other,” I add as I push a hair away from her eye.
She smiles back. “We have found each other.”
“You see, all good things.”
She leans back in, placing one leg on either side of me. I lock my feet on the ground to keep the swing from moving as she presses her forehead against mine.
“I love you, Brixton Crane.”
The breath leaves my lungs. I stare into her dark blue eyes.
“I love you too, Lane Moore.”
Before I can say another word, she presses her lips to mine. I grab her head and tilt it, deepening our kiss, wanting more of her. She moans against my lips.
“Seriously, Lanie Moore, I expect better behavior from you.” Mrs. Miller’s voice rings out from the street.
Lanie giggles as she continues kissing me.
“Sorry, Mrs. Miller,” I manage as she bites my lower lip.
I hear grumbling, and Lanie’s body shakes with laughter, but she doesn’t stop her attack. I pick her up and carry her into the house, deciding we don’t need an audience for what I want to do next.
“Shhh,” Lanie manages in between fits of giggles. “You’ll wake Ash!”
I kiss her to shut her up as I carry her monkey-style up the stairs and into her room. I manage to quietly shut the door with one hand while keeping my other hand under her ass. Our kiss goes from passionate to damn near all-consuming as we begin ripping our clothes off one another. I’m not even completely sure how we manage to get naked and on the bed, but we do it in a frenzy of kissing, stroking, and grinding that has me ready to take her the instant her legs fall open to me.
“Fuck, Lanie,” I groan as I slide inside of her.
Her inner walls clench around me, and I have to close my eyes and take a deep breath so that I don’t blow my load right then and there.
“Don’t stop,” she croons as her hands grip my arms. I slam into her again and revel in the wet warmth of her body.
She begins grinding against me as I thrust into her, and we build delicious friction that has lights bursting beneath my eyelids as my balls tighten.
“Not gonna last,” I breathe.
“Me either.” She grinds herself harder against me, and I feel it the second she releases. The added heat and wetness push me over the edge, and I have to clamp my mouth shut to stop me from yelling her name.
I collapse on her for a moment, and we breathe heavily.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
“What?”
“Condom.” I squeeze my eyes shut, pissed at myself for letting my lust get the better of me.
She shrugs. “I trust you . . . and . . .” She trails off, and I feel her entire body go from relaxed to tense in less than a second.
I prop myself up on my elbows and stare down at her. “What’s wrong?”
Her eyes glimmer in the early morning sunlight filling the room. She shakes her head. “I . . . the treatments when I was little . . .”
I close my eyes and curse. She can’t have kids. Damn it. I’m so stupid. I should have known this. We should have talked about this. It’s one of the worst complications from childhood cancer treatments: infertility.
I roll off her and wrap my arms around her, pulling her against me. “I’m sorry. I should have thought about that.”
Her body stiffens further. “I understand if you . . . most men would want a child,” she stammers as she tries to give me an out.
I pull back and look at her. “Listen, I don’t care if you can’t have a baby. I mean, shit, I’ve never even contemplated having kids.”
She looks up at me with such sadness in her eyes that it breaks my motherfucking heart. “But, someday, you might want them, Brix. You can. It would be selfish of me to expect otherwise.”
I take her face in my hands. “Lanie, all I want is you. OK? Kids, no kids, pets, whatever. As long as I’m with you, that is all that matters.”
“Don’t make a decision this big right now, Brix. Please. Take some time and think about it. I’m not perfect, and you need to know that,” she says as she pulls away from me. “I should go check on Ash.” She silently pulls on a robe and leaves the room.
Fuck. I run my hands through my hair. I’m a Goddamn doctor. I should have thought about this. I’ve been too obsessed with work, Ash, falling for this amazing woman. She ran away to protect herself, but now she’s doing it to protect me.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Lanie
Nothing, and I mean nothing, prepares me for what I find when I walk into my guest room. Condoms. There are blown-up condoms everywhere. I see an empty box on the floor and a very happy Ash trying to keep several condom balloons in the air.
Suddenly, I feel the hard muscle and heat of Brixton at my back. Please universe, kill me now. His chest is shaking, and I know he’s laughing.
“Whatcha doing there, champ?” Brix asks. I don’t need to turn around to know that this man is doing his very best not to laugh. I am also very aware that my face is the color of the toy fire truck on the floor.
Ash looks up at us. He looks from my face to Brix’s with a mix of confusion and guilt.
“Sorry . . . I . . . remember how Dr. Brix lets me make glove balloons at the hospital, and I found these, and they are just for one finger, but I thought maybe I could make them blow up like the glove ones. They don’t really work like that, though.” He looks sadly around at the condoms that are in various stages of being filled with air.
I raise a hand to my face, trying to cover both my grin at his adorable, oblivious joy and my intense mortification.
Brix, however, recovers much faster than I do. Without missing a beat, he gently places his hands on my arms and moves me to the side, so he can enter the room.
“Yeah, these aren’t so good. How about we go find some gloves downstairs and I show you how to make chicken balloons?” he says enthusiastically.
“Should I clean these up first?” Ash looks around.
“No, it’s fine. I got these,” I say to him, digging deep to find my composure as I begin to pick them up. Just when I think my mortification cannot reach a new level, a condom balloon releases in my hand and goes whizzing around the room.
“Cool!” Ash yells as he tries to jump on the bed to catch it. Brix grabs it and shoves it in his pocket.
“Come on, I have something cooler,” he says.
“Really?”
“Yep.” He lowers his back so that Ash can jump on, and the two of them head out of the room. I look around at
the ten or so condom balloons as I sit on the bed and contemplate when exactly my life made such a hard-left turn.
Brixton
It’s only been a few minutes since I escaped to the kitchen with Ash so that Lanie could clean up the condom balloons. I think Lanie might have a coronary. There is flour on nearly every surface of the kitchen. Eggs are on all the surfaces, some opened, some not. A bowl with a spoon in it sits on the island, and there is a pan on the stove. My mind immediately goes to the day my mom died. It was a fire that killed her because she wouldn’t get her drugged-up, lazy ass off the sofa to feed Tabby, so Tabby put a can of soup in the microwave which started a fire. I place the hot pan in the sink. The sizzle of it against the water is the only sound in the kitchen as Lanie slowly walks in and examines the chaos.
I turn back to Ashton, and his lower lip trembles. “I—I’m s-sorry,” he stammers before running upstairs.
I sigh and run a hand through my hair.
Lanie runs a finger through the flour on her cabinet door. “It’s impressive that he managed to get such distance with it,” she finally says. I look at her, and she’s grinning. It’s not until I feel the egg shatter against my arm that I realize she just threw it at me.
“Oh, you’re on,” I growl as I grab a handful of flour and throw it at her. It hits her smack in the chest. She throws some chocolate chips at me as she ducks under the island. She comes back up with a container of frosting, and a handful lands on my cheek.
I jump over the island and grab the frosting. We go tumbling to the floor, and I smear some on her cheek. I’m about to lick it off when we both turn to see Ash standing in the hallway, staring at us in shock.
Lanie grabs a handful of chocolate chips and tosses it at him. He giggles and tosses a few back. Before I know it, the three of us are covered in food. We are all laughing and sliding on flour and eggs. It’s a complete mess, but it’s also the most fun that I’ve had in a very, very long time.