by Force, Marie
“Maybe if you think about that stuff when the anger hits, you’ll be able to reconcile it a little better.”
“Maybe so.”
“After I got back to the boat last night, I was thinking about you losing your husband the way you did and how awful that must’ve been.”
“It’s the worst thing that’s ever happened to me, by far.”
“I was wondering—and don’t tell me if it’s too hard to talk about—but how did you hear about it when it happened?”
Touched by his interest in knowing the details, Mallory shifted her gaze to the water rushing by the boat as she thought back to that long-ago day that had changed everything. “I was in the NICU with a set of micro-preemie twins, thinking the very worst thing that could happen to me that day would be losing one of them. It was a really complicated case, and my attending had put me in charge of their care, and nothing else, for my entire shift. I’ll never forget what he said when he left me to do rounds. ‘Don’t take your eyes off them for a second, not even to pee or eat or anything until I get back.’”
“Sounds like a real prince among doctors.”
“He was actually the best. I learned so much from him, but he was exacting, to say the least, and I never wanted him to be unhappy with me. So I did exactly what he told me to and watched over them like a hawk.”
She took a deep breath before she continued. “One of the NICU nurses came in to tell me I’d received an urgent call from the surgical ward, asking me to come down there immediately. I had no idea why they’d want me there. What’s funny is that it never occurred to me for one second that it was something to do with Ryan. I took my eyes off my babies to look at her, and the expression on her face told me whatever was going on, it was bad. She said my attending was on his way to take over for me, which scared me even more than I already was. By then I was certain I was about to get fired, although I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why. The attending came rushing in a few minutes later and told me to go. Just go, he said. The nurse was a friend, and she went with me down to the surgical ward, where I was met by what seemed like the entire medical staff. One of them, Ryan’s closest friend at work, put his arm around me and took me off to the side to tell me he’d collapsed in surgery.
“At first I thought, oh, good, he only fainted. We can work with that. But then I asked which room he was in, and his friend started crying. Even then, I still wasn’t prepared for him to say that Ryan had basically dropped dead.”
“Who would ever be prepared for that?” Quinn said softly. He turned the boat and switched to her side of the cockpit, nudging Brutus to move to the other side so he could sit closer to her. He raised his arm, and Mallory slid closer to him, loving the way his arm felt around her shoulders.
“I don’t remember much after that. I have big blank spots in my memory.”
“I don’t remember much of anything for two weeks after I was injured. I swear that’s the brain’s way of protecting you from things you’re better off not knowing.”
“Probably. That day marked the start of a long downward spiral for me. I went from being a married doctor to widowed and, a couple of months later, unemployed when I couldn’t work up the fortitude to return to a job I’d loved. I never stepped foot in that hospital again.”
“Can’t say I blame you.”
“I lasted about six months in San Fran before I packed up our place and went home to my mother in Providence. The drinking got pretty bad after that, until my mom got my best friend, Trish, involved, and the two of them wrestled me into rehab. They saved my life, but you couldn’t tell me that then.”
“It started with pain meds for me after I was injured. I know what it’s like to not want help that others are forcing on you.”
“Mom and Trish did the right thing, but it was a long, hard-fought battle that was finally won the second time I went to rehab.”
“What did the trick that time?”
“A counselor helped me see I was using alcohol to numb the pain of my loss rather than confronting the pain head on. So I confronted the pain head on, and that was tons of fun. But I was better afterward. Something clicked that time, and when I got out, I had no desire to go back to the way I’d been living before. That’s when I started taking steps to become an RN and pick up the pieces of my professional life, such as it was.”
“Why’d you decide to become a nurse rather than finishing your medical training?”
“I wanted to be more involved with patient care than I’d been as a resident. I used to envy the nurses who had a real rapport with the patients that we often didn’t have the time to establish.”
“I can understand that. As a trauma surgeon, I had very little contact with the patients under my care. I pieced them back together and handed them off to the clinical staff. The nurses did most of the heavy lifting.”
“It won’t be like that here, you know. You’ll be very involved with all of them—and their families.”
“Believe it or not, I’m actually looking forward to that. Hey, are you hungry?”
“I could eat something. Oh, and I brought some snacks that are in my bag.”
“Take the wheel and keep it right where it is.”
“Wait, you want me to drive the boat?”
“I want you to take the helm. If you’re going to be a sailor, you need to learn the lingo. Come here. I’ll show you how before I leave you in charge for a minute.”
Mallory stood and took a second to get her sea legs under her before she joined him at the helm.
“Put your hands right here.” He maneuvered them so she stood in front of him. Reaching around her, he placed his hands on top of hers and helped her gain a feel for how the wheel controlled the boat. “See?”
“Uh-huh.” She wasn’t sure how she was supposed to learn anything with him wrapped around her. Then he dropped his hands from the wheel, put his arms around her and kissed her neck.
“You’re doing great,” he said, his breath warm against her sensitive skin.
“I’m going to crash if you keep that up.”
“No, you won’t. I won’t let you.”
Mallory wanted to lean back against him, to let him hold her up when the load became too heavy to carry on her own. For someone who prided herself on fierce independence, that thought alone should’ve made her think twice. But with him pressed against her, she couldn’t be bothered with anything as boring as thinking.
“You got it?” he asked.
“I hope so.”
“I’ll be quick.”
Because it felt so good to be held by him, she wanted to ask him not to let go. But she didn’t say that or anything when he left her in charge of the boat and went down to the cabin. Mallory had things under control until the sail caught a gust and the boat began to list to the side. “Quinn! What’s it doing?”
“Heeling. Totally normal. Steer the boat into the wind if it becomes too much for you.”
She did as he directed and marveled at how that slight adjustment righted the boat, but it also made the sails flap uselessly.
“Too much,” he said. “Fall off a little bit the other way.”
She made that adjustment and smiled when the sails filled, propelling them forward once again.
“You’re a natural,” he said when he came up with a tray of sandwiches, chips, fruit, cookies and bottled water.
“Sure, I am,” she said with a laugh. “What do I do when we run out of water over there?” She nodded to the beach that was getting closer by the second.
“We tack, which is the sailing term for turning. Let me show you how.”
He walked her through the steps from releasing the main sheet—which he said was another word for rope—and turning the boat, and how to always watch out for her head when the boom came across the cockpit. “It’s too high to hit you on this boat, but that’s not the case on all boats. You haven’t lived until you’ve taken a boom to the skull.”
“Sounds pleasant.”
/> “It’s not. Trust me on that. You want me to take over?”
“Not yet. I think I might be figuring it out.”
He handed her half a turkey sandwich wrapped up in a napkin.
“Thank you. You’re going to spoil me if you keep feeding me.”
“I can live with that.”
Brutus lay with his head on his paws, staring at Quinn, begging without making a scene. Quinn rewarded the dog’s patience with a big piece of sandwich and a handful of chips.
“Something tells me that dog is frightfully spoiled.”
“Ridiculously so,” he conceded. “And I make no apologies for it.”
“Nor should you. He’s a good boy.”
“He really saved me when I was at my lowest point after rehab when I was trying to figure out my next move. One of the nurses at the rehab facility suggested I get a dog when I was ready to. She said having a pet would force me out of my pity party and get me out for the daily walk I refused to take on my own. She was right about both those things.”
“Nurses are wise, wise people.”
“You don’t have to tell me that.”
“I had a question after last night, too,” she said tentatively.
“What’s that?”
“Your family wasn’t notified when you were injured?”
“They were, or I should say Jared was. He was listed as my family contact when I was on active duty. They knew I’d been injured. I just never told them the full extent of it.”
“I’m still trying to understand why you’d choose to go through such an ordeal by yourself.”
“I didn’t intentionally choose to go through it alone. It just sort of happened that way. At first it was about trying to save my leg, and then… After…” He sighed. “I felt like such a failure.”
“Why? You couldn’t help that you got an infection.”
“No, but I still felt a profound sense of failure afterward. All my medical training, and I couldn’t save my own leg. I’m not saying it was rational. It’s just how I felt, and I didn’t want anyone around me then.”
“You were grieving.”
“I guess. I’d also been away from home a long time by then—almost twenty years. I was used to doing things for myself.” He stood to take a closer look at where they were. “We’re going to need to come about again. You got this, salty dog?”
“Yep.” Mallory pointed to the entrance to the Salt Pond, where the Coast Guard Station was located. “Can we go out there?”
“It might be a little sporty outside the pond. You up for that?”
“Define ‘sporty.’”
“Windier, rougher, a little wilder.” He waggled his brows to punctuate the statement, and the double meaning wasn’t lost on her. Was exiting the pond a metaphor for walking on the wild side with him, too? And what exactly would that entail?
Mallory decided she wanted to find out. “Let’s do it.”
He talked her through the steps of navigating the boat through the narrow channel that took them out into open ocean, where the water was, indeed, sportier than it had been in the pond. Off in the distance, they could see a huge gathering of sailboats that Quinn told her was part of Race Week.
“Let’s head over that way,” he said, pointing toward the northern tip of Long Island. “Out of the way of the racing.”
It took all of Mallory’s concentration to keep the boat on course as they coasted over two-foot “rollers,” as Quinn called them. To her, they were waves. The wind and the sun and the salt air made for an exhilarating experience, not to mention the sexy man who was taking such pleasure in watching her sail the boat.
“You really are a natural,” he said.
“I don’t know about that, but it sure is fun.”
“I’ve created a monster. I’ll never get my helm back.”
“I’m totally hogging it. You want a turn?”
“Nope. It’s much more fun watching you do it.”
Mallory wasn’t sure what got into her when she said, “I’m not sure I’m doing it right, though. You might need to come over here and check my work.” As her not so subtle message registered with him, she took great pleasure in watching his brows rise above his aviators. It was all she could do to refrain from giggling.
After standing and taking a second to make sure he was steady on his feet, he moved like a stealthy cat, circling the helm until he was behind her. Resting his chin on her shoulder, he said, “From what I can see, you’re right on course.”
In for a penny… “I’m not so sure. You should probably take a closer look.”
“Come to think of it, you might need a few adjustments. Here, let me help.” Pressing his body to the back of hers, he reached for her hands on the big chrome wheel.
“That’s so much better,” Mallory said.
His lips nuzzled her neck, setting off a chain reaction throughout her body. “You were doing fine by yourself, but this is definitely better.”
And wasn’t that the truth? Being with him made her feel lighthearted and unburdened, two emotions that had been in short supply since her mother died and her life changed in ways she couldn’t have predicted. After being further upended by the loss of her job, the last thing she ought to be feeling was euphoric the way she did right now, with a hot guy wrapped around her as she steered a boat through choppy seas. She’d been doing okay on her own. But this… This was so much better.
When she turned to tell him so, he kissed her, using his hand on her face to keep her there. She opened her mouth to his tongue and completely forgot that she was supposed to be steering the boat. The sails fluttered in the breeze as the boat foundered. Mallory couldn’t be bothered with righting it, and apparently, neither could he. She turned completely so she faced him, resting her hands on his hips as his arms encircled her.
The boat bouncing in the waves jolted them apart and tested their balance.
Instinctively, Mallory held on tighter to him so he wouldn’t fall.
He laughed when he assessed their predicament.
“Don’t quit your day job to give sailing lessons, Doc,” she said, smiling up at him as he reached around her for the wheel.
“No plans for that. Don’t worry.”
“I was doing great until my teacher distracted me.”
He kept one arm around her while he got them back on course. “In my defense, I was enticed by my sexy student.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Sure, you don’t. What do you say we head for calmer water and drop the anchor for a while?”
“That sounds good to me.”
He took control of the wheel but kept his arms around her as they sailed to the west side of Gansett and ducked into a little cove. “Be right back,” he said when he went to drop the sails and the anchor.
Knowing now what she did about his ordeal with his leg, she marveled at the way he maneuvered on the boat. He moved carefully but didn’t let his disability hold him back. There was much to admire in that, she thought, watching him as he returned to the cockpit, where Brutus was still sound asleep and Mallory waited eagerly for whatever came next.
Chapter 13
“How’s this?” Quinn asked of the scenic little cove.
“It’s beautiful.” The sun was warm, and the view of the rugged Gansett coastline exceptional.
“I found this place a couple of weeks ago and have come here a couple of times.”
“You do all this by yourself?”
“Brutus is with me.”
“You know what I mean. Do you ever worry about being out on the boat alone?”
“No.”
Mallory immediately regretted the question. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
He held out his hand to encourage her to join him on the seat. “You didn’t.”
She took his hand and sat next to him.
“I’m quite determined to do everything I did before as well as I did it then, and I’m getting there. The one thing
I refuse to do is be afraid to do things because they might be hard, you know?”
“Yeah, I do, and that’s a good way to be.”
“So no, I’m not afraid to be out here by myself, but it’s a lot more fun with you along for the ride.” He tucked a stray hair that had escaped from her ponytail behind her ear. Keeping his eyes open and his gaze fixed on her face, he leaned in slowly to kiss her again.
Mallory reached for him and ended up reclined on the seat with him warm and heavy—and hard—on top of her as he kissed her with desperate thrusts of his tongue. She responded in kind, her tongue caressing his, and buried her fingers in the fine silk of his hair.
“Is this okay?” he asked, keeping his lips on hers.
As she nodded, she knew he meant the position as much as the desperate nature of their kisses. “It’s okay.”
“Good answer.”
He tipped his head for a better angle and went back for more.
They kissed until her lips were numb and the rest of her body on fire for him. She worked her hands under his T-shirt and explored his muscular back, making him tremble from her touch. Good God, the man could kiss, and he made excellent use of the rest of his body by moving against her suggestively.
In the back of her mind, she thought perhaps she should put a stop to this or at least slow it down, but she couldn’t find one good reason to do either of those things when it felt so damned good to be held and kissed by him. She’d forgotten how fun it could be to start something new and exciting with a guy, especially one as sexy and interesting as Quinn.
He withdrew slowly, continuing to tease her with his tongue and the slick movement of his lips over hers. “What’re you doing to me?”
“Same thing you’re doing to me.”
“You want to take this somewhere more comfortable?”
“Like where?”
“Have you ever made out in a V-berth before?” As he spoke, he covered her face and neck with kisses before returning to her lips.
“Can’t say that I have.”
“You’ve been missing out.”