“Glad she’s not mean to just me,” a dark voice said behind me.
I whirled around and glared. “What are you doing here?” I hissed.
He lifted his hand in the air, waving it around slightly.
“What…how…what…why…shit,” I said in horror. “What are you doing standing? Sit down!”
He moved to the room where I guessed he’d been originally and sat on the bed.
I snapped my fingers at Melissa. “I need the klutz’s chart.”
Melissa laughed and moved to the cart where we held all the charts, spinning it around idly until she found what she was looking for.
Once she had his chart, she pulled it and walked it to me, all the while with a smirk on her face that I wanted to scratch off.
Best friend or not, I was not above sharing her secrets. Fighting wouldn’t work. Not with her.
I’d have to do something drastic to knock that smile off her face, and I wasn’t ready to pull that card yet, so I’d wait until she really stuck her foot in it.
Snatching the chart from her extended hand, I turned to Bennett’s room and stalked inside.
“So… how’d that happen?” I asked without preamble.
He winced, holding up his hand.
“Well… the first part was when I was following a suspect over a fence. A barbed wire fence,” he said, pointing to a large, mangled gash in his hand about an inch long. Then he moved to the knife that was sticking out of the webbing of his fingers. “And this happened when that guy decided to throw a knife at my face. I pulled my hand up just in time for it to lodge there.”
Indeed he did.
Holy shit.
I moved around his side, studying the wounds.
“The doctor’s going to have to look at the knife wound. And pull it out. I can stitch it up if there are no nerves that have been hit,” I said, squatting down so I could see the other side.
“That’s some zit you have there…” Bennett said, eyeing my forehead.
I slapped my hand over my face and stood abruptly.
“I know it’s there. You don’t need to point it out!” I snapped, spinning quickly to go wash my hands, then left the room.
I found Dr. Stevens at his usual spot, pecking away at his charting.
“Dr. Stevens, I’ll need you to come take a look at his hand. I’m sure I won’t have any trouble, but I want a second opinion,” I asked pleasantly.
Dr. Stevens didn’t like me. Not even a little bit.
He didn’t like me because he thought I was ‘too young’ to be a PA, and that I should’ve never been hired. He liked to say that it was my father’s ‘handout’ that allowed me to be where I was.
Pretty much, he didn’t respect me and probably never would.
Which was fine with me. No skin off my nose if he didn’t like me. And I had no qualms calling him in for a second opinion.
“You can’t do something so miniscule yourself?” he asked, raising a surprised brow at my question.
“I never said that. I just think I’d like a doctor to look at it to make me feel better about my assessment. If you’re unable to do that since you’re so… busy… I can go get Dr. Milford,” I said sweetly.
He glowered at me.
He hated Dr. Milford more than he hated me.
And I kind of liked the way he glared at the mention of Dr. Milford.
Apparently, a few years ago, the two of them had fought over a woman, and Dr. Milford had won.
Which wasn’t really hard for me to see.
Dr. Milford was nicer, cuter, and younger. No wonder he’d won.
“Fine,” he sneered, standing up and walking to Bennett’s room.
I decided that the two of them were probably made for each other with their bad attitudes, so I didn’t go back in there until twenty minutes later when the knife was removed from Bennett’s hand.
“You can stitch him up, can’t you Ms. Jane?” Dr. Stevens asked with disdain.
I barely contained the urge to flip him off as I nodded. “Yes, I can do that.”
Bennett stayed quiet during the confrontation. However, I knew that he was aware of the tension between the two of us.
Finally, Dr. Stevens left, and I breathed a sigh of relief.
“What was that all about?” Bennett asked when he could stand it no more.
I grimaced. “Long story.”
He snorted. “I think I have time if you want to tell me. Maybe it’ll take my mind off the pain.”
My brows lowered. “You shouldn’t be feeling any pain.”
He grimaced. “I couldn’t take the pain meds. I have to go back to work after this. Then I have to make it to my daughter’s recital in less than four hours. Drugs will just make me miss it, and then I’ll never hear the end of it.”
My mouth opened.
“You really want me to do this to you without pain meds? Not even a local?” I asked in shock.
He shook his head. “No. So get on with it.”
Back snapping straight, I went to the tray where the still full vial of lidocaine sat, and then proceeded to numb him up. Without his permission.
“Hey!” he snapped indignantly.
“I’m sorry. I don’t perform stitches on men without at least some form of pain meds. I’ll be sure to call you a cab later, though,” I smiled.
He narrowed his eyes at me. “No. You’ll be taking me to the recital is what you’ll be doing.”
I shook my head. “Um, no. I won’t be. But you shouldn’t be going to work either. This needs time to heal; at least forty-eight hours. Only minor lifting if possible.”
Then I proceeded to put ten stitches into the gash on his hand, and six stitches into the knife wound on both sides.
Throughout the entire thing, he didn’t say a word.
Only stayed silent while I did my work.
“When you go home and take a shower, be sure to keep these dry for at least forty-eight hours. You’ll need to get them taken out in ten to fourteen days; but, if you want to come by my house, I’ll do it for you,” I said, snipping the last thread on the suture.
Why had I said that?
I shouldn’t be offering those services.
At all.
He was a patient. I was a PA.
He had kids… and was probably married!
Yet, I couldn’t help but say it.
When he didn’t reply, I looked up at him to see him staring at me. No expression whatsoever on his face.
“What?” I asked, tossing the scissors onto the tray and standing up.
He still didn’t say anything, and I was starting to get distinctly uncomfortable.
To hide my discomfort, I started to babble as I stripped off my gloves and washed my hands.
“When I was fourteen, I tried to climb a chain-link fence and fell before I was halfway over. I ripped open my thigh and hand, requiring eighteen stitches in one, and twelve in the other. It was an extremely painful experience. Then when I was fifteen, I was chasing my sister around the house when she turned sharply and threw a stone coaster at me. It bounced off my face and split my eye open, requiring four stitches. Then, when I was…”
“Lennox?” Bennett asked, interrupting my nervous chatter.
I blinked and turned to see him still sitting on the gurney, arm placed in his lap palm up.
“What?” I asked, ripping a few paper towels from the dispenser and turning to survey him.
He looked so good.
His brown hair was a little scragglier today, with the ends going every which way. His eyes were alight with humor at what I guessed was my annoying diatribe.
I really had a problem giving away too much information.
Like really.
“Nothing. I just wanted you to slow down so I could thank you and ask you what time and day would be good for me to come by,” he said laughingly.
I couldn’t help the grin that spread across m
y face.
“Since today is Tuesday, next Friday or Saturday would be good. Although, I’ll be at Truman Smith for their annual walk-a-thon on Saturday morning, so Friday would probably work better for me,” I rambled.
“Do you work there?” he asked, standing to his full height and walking next to me to stand by the sink.
When he started to put his hand under the water, I caught his wrist and stopped him from getting it wet. “What part of don’t get your hands wet did you not understand?”
He snorted. “The part where I have blood caked all over my hands, and I can’t very well get it without washing my hands.”
I narrowed my eyes up at his laughing ones and turned around to grab an alcohol pad. Then got to work removing the caked blood from his hand.
Jesus, the man had huge hands. I’m talking massive. He could probably engulf my entire face with his one hand!
I could feel his eyes on me while I held the one close to my breast and scrubbed carefully.
Once I had it as good as it was going to get, I grabbed his other hand and held it under the water where I quickly washed his hand clean with both of my own.
It was an intimate gesture, and just by touching him somewhere so simple, I was damn close to asking him to come home with me tonight, but I was saved.
By him and whoever chose to call his phone.
“’Scuse me while I get this,” he said, grabbing a paper towel and turning the faucet off before he reached into his pocket. With his bad hand.
Men.
Shaking my head, I started to clean up my mess while I pretended to be busy.
I wasn’t.
I was really just listening.
“Hello?” Bennett answered his phone.
“Hey,” I heard said rather loudly. It sounded like a woman’s voice, one that was all sultry and feminine. Something I was not.
“Hey, whatcha’ need?” he asked, drying his hands off as well as he could before tossing the towel into the trash.
Something was said between the two of them, and I threw the trash into the trashcan a little harder than I needed to.
“I’m free tonight if you want me to stop by. Do you want me to bring anything for dinner, Meg?” he asked.
Not wanting to hear any more about the man I was starting to have an irrational appreciation of, I walked out of the room and straight to Melissa.
“Okay,” I said as cheerfully as I could muster. “Mr. Alvarez is ready to go. He needs to have his stitches out in ten to fourteen days. No water on his hand for the first forty-eight hours. And he needs a prescription antibiotic as well as a pain med.”
I rambled off the exact dosage I wanted her to give, wrote out the prescription on my pad, and handed it all over to her. “I’ll be going to lunch now, okay?”
Melissa nodded. “Got it.”
With that, I left and felt Bennett’s eyes on me the entire way down the hall.
Chapter 4
Do you want to know what I got for Christmas? Fat. I got fat.
-T-shirt
Bennett
It was Friday, a week and a half after I’d gotten the stitches in my hand, and I was about to knock on Lennox’s front door.
I contemplated having my sister do it, knowing she had every capability to do so, but I sort of liked having the excuse to go see her.
Plus, my sister had just taken the ones out of my face. It was someone else’s turn.
She’d been on my mind a lot in the last week and a half, and I found that I sort of liked the idea of her being there.
She was cute, funny, and I liked that she didn’t lay down and roll over when it came to me.
I wanted… and needed, someone who could go toe to toe with me. I didn’t want some simpering woman who was intimidated by my size and personality.
Plus, they never made it past round two with my family.
We were all loud, obnoxious and found it more fun to laugh rather than cry.
Which made me think Lennox would fit in perfectly.
Knocking on her front door, I turned until I could see the street behind me.
The neighborhood was nice. Something I could never afford to live in on my salary.
I made plenty of money when I wasn’t having to shell out a whack to pay for a home loan, but I was afraid with one, I wouldn’t be able to buy that new truck I needed, or the fifty dollar pair of jeans Reagan was already insistent upon having.
My truck was the same one I had in high school, and since it was still running good, I had no reason to get a new one. Yet, it would be better to have a little nicer of a vehicle that I could rely on in the middle of winter.
“Oh, hey!” Lennox said, opening the door. “I thought you’d call!”
I raised my brow at her. “And how would I have called you?”
“Well… you called me the other day just fine… you know, to get your phone back?” she asked, opening the door wide to allow me in.
Her eyes were happy to see me, and I liked that.
Although I was afraid she was a little too blonde.
“You do realize, right, that I called my phone?” I asked.
Her mouth dropped open, and then she blushed from the roots of her hair all the way down her chest.
“Oh,” she breathed.
I snorted, then ruffled her hair. “You’ll do, Lennox. You’ll do.”
She gave me a sour face and then motioned me into her kitchen.
It wasn’t opulent, but it was pretty freakin’ awesome.
The countertops were stainless steel, as were all her appliances.
It was a man’s kitchen, with a woman’s flare.
She had Coca-Cola decorations all over the walls, and the windowsill was decorated in rich red fabric. She had a red bowl of fruit set up in the middle of the island that separated her kitchen from her dining room, and I wondered why she even bothered to put it there when the fruit itself was fake.
“I have a suture kit around here somewhere. Let me wash my hands real quick. Go ahead and sit at my table,” she said, gesturing to the table with her free hand.
It was piled high with… shit.
That’s all it was. Letters. Newspapers. Magazines. Change. You name it, it was on the table.
“Sorry for the mess, but I’m allergic to cleaning,” she laughed.
My eyes followed her movements as she walked to the kitchen sink and washed her hands. She had a massive glass with a stopper on it that held the soap, and she upended it, pouring a gargantuan amount of soap onto her hands before she washed all the way up to her elbows.
“This isn’t surgery,” I said once she turned the water off.
She smiled. “I know. I just had my hands in the soil outside, though. Soil’s a breeding ground for bacteria. I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
I silently agreed, eyes moving down to her paper, and immediately alighting on a stack that was directly on top.
My eyes scanned it and then widened at what I read.
“Why do you have a restraining order?” I asked in alarm.
She gave me an admonishing glance as she said, “You really shouldn’t be reading other people’s mail. Isn’t that illegal?”
I shook my head. “No, it’s illegal to open other people’s mail. It says nothing about reading it once it’s already opened.”
Walking back to me, she grabbed a package off the counter between the kitchen and dining room table and tossed it to the top before getting a pair of gloves out of a box on top of her table. Something I hadn’t seen because it’d been buried under a hefty pile of newspaper.
“To answer your question, I have a restraining order against one of my ex friends,” she explained. “We had a big falling out, and she started to get really ugly. I asked her to back off, and she started to send her friends around to terrorize me, as well as coming herself. Toilet papering my house, egging my car, forking my yard.”
My mouth opened and
closed. “Forking your yard…”
She smiled. “Yeah, they stab the plastic forks into the yard, and then break them off at the base so you can’t get them out.”
Ahh that made sense.
“And what did you do to deserve that behavior?” I asked her.
She grimaced. “When I was in college, we shared a room together. She said that I stole her boyfriend and her ‘stash.’ I didn’t know what stash she was accusing me of stealing, but I most definitely didn’t steal her boyfriend, nor her stash.”
I snorted. “Stash of drugs, probably. And has she come around lately?”
She shook her head as she started opening her box, revealing sterilized scissors and other stuff that I had no clue what it was.
“I haven’t seen her in a while. I moved about a year ago, and either she doesn’t know the new address, or she’s obeying the law,” she informed me.
“Mmmm,” I said. “It’s more likely that she doesn’t know where you live. Try to keep it that way.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “I try to do that. Yet some police detective I know looked me up in the system when I didn’t want him to.”
I smiled at her. “I’m not a detective. Only a lowly patrol and SWAT officer.”
She snorted and then snapped her gloves on before she started to cut the pieces of thread from my hand.
It pinched slightly but didn’t hurt anywhere near as bad as they had going in.
Once done with that, she started to pick them out with a small set of tweezers.
While she did this, I studied her hair. Her face. Her clothes.
Her hair was up today in a messy bun on top of her head, and her face was free of any makeup.
I found that I liked both sides of her, but this one had to be my favorite.
If she looked this beautiful in the first place, why in the hell did she wear makeup?
She was wearing a pair of black knit shorts that were extremely short, and the tank she was wearing barely covered her belly. However, I found that I liked the two in combination with the other. She looked freakin’ hot.
Her tan proved that she was outside a lot, and most likely in just about the same amount of clothes if the tan lines were anything to go by.
Ruff! Ruff!
My eyes went to the French doors on the other side of the table, and then down to see her dog, the massive white beast that looked like it’d grown in the week and a half that I’d seen it.
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