Ishq Factors

by Suleikha Snyder

  This wasn’t actually happening. At any moment, her alarm was going to go off, and she was going to realize she’d never left the bed in the on-call room. Anu pinched her thigh, hard, through the material of her jeans. But aside from the stinging sensation, she remained where she was: in the back of a taxi with Vince. Vince, who was no longer just Vince in her head, because he’d asked her to call him by his given name. The car was zipping uptown, the eastern European driver weaving through the light traffic like an expert, and she had no idea where they were going. On both a literal and metaphorical level.

  Vince was watching her carefully, studiously, with those keen dark eyes, and asking her questions about her life that she could pretty much answer on autopilot: She’d grown up in Philly, she liked Thai food, and Adele, and her favorite author was Tolkien. All the while, she was aware of him sitting just a few inches away. He wasn’t a big man, but he seemed to fill the entire cab with his aura, sprawling confidently in the seat, one arm slung across the back. His dark blue silk shirt and designer slacks practically screamed money and power. He’d lived all over the world, he told her with more than one note of pride. He liked French cuisine and the Beatles and doing the New York Times crossword puzzle.

  “I like puzzles in general, and you, Anushka, are a puzzle.”

  A shiver went up her spine, even though she was warm—overheated, sweating, burning—not cold. She’d said he could call her Anu, never mentioning what it was short for. “I’m not that complicated,” she shrugged, hoping her voice didn’t betray her internal chaos. “You, however, have completely bucked the expected pathology. Being seen leaving the bar with me is going to have everyone reworking their Vince McHenry hypotheses.”

  “Good.” He smiled, too wide and too wolfish. “You don’t stay at the top by being predictable. You have to take informed, educated risks.”

  “What’s educated about this?” she demanded. “What’s Dr. Vince McHenry going to gain?”

  He cocked his head, mouth twitching in what was either amusement or disdain. Or an allergic reaction to shellfish. “I don’t know, Anushka. Why don’t you tell me? Since you have me so pegged. Is there anything to gain here?”

  “No.” She had to stop looking at him. Before it scrambled her wits like the tasteless eggs they served in the caff every morning. He was too handsome, too confident, too…too out of her league. She forced her gaze out the window. “There’s everything to lose.”

  For about a quarter mile, he let that pronouncement hang there, left her blissfully alone to war with her self-control. Then, he put his hand on her knee. It wasn’t a sexual touch, it was just meant to get her attention, but it still set her every nerve aflame. “Why all the hostility, Dr. Gupta?” It was a question that was too kind, too gentle by half. Like he was probing her for symptoms of some larger condition. “Did I do something to you to make you hate me?”

  No, but I really wish you would. So I could stop wanting you so much.

  It wasn’t until she heard his sharp intake of breath, felt his grip on her knee flex and tighten, that she realized her blunder. Her stomach lurched, and she whipped her head around, meeting his gaze. His smug, sexy, dangerous gaze.

  “Yes,” he chuckled. “You said that out loud.”

  Anu wondered just how much trauma she would sustain if she threw herself out of a moving vehicle. She swallowed hard. Maybe dying of sheer mortification was a better idea. Then there was option three: brazening it out. Every resident worth their salt had to learn the art of backing up their claims even if they were total bullshit. This wasn’t any different. “So?” She feigned a lack of shame, shrugging and pretending to check the display on her phone. “Big deal. Everybody wants you. It’s like wanting George Clooney. You can’t possibly be surprised.”

  “Can’t I? I don’t think I’ve ever been put in the same company as George Clooney before. That’s very flattering.” He was laughing at her, and she deserved every bit of it. “I thought showing someone you cared by putting gum in their hair went out of style in elementary school. What are they teaching you at Penn State these days?”

  “I wouldn’t know. I graduated.” Anu scowled, more mad at herself for the slip of tongue than at the mockery it inspired. Fortunately, she was spared further inquiry when the cab stopped in front of a posh high-rise. The Grand. He’d brought her to his place, she realized, almost tripping in her haste to get out of the car. She didn’t think twice about letting him take care of the fare. Vince made more money in a year than most people saw in a lifetime. When the taxi was speeding away, and they were both standing in front of the uniformed doormen, Anu fixed him with the most baleful look she could manage. “What do you want from me? Another member of the Vincibles?”

  “No.” He took her hand, like he had at the Subtle Knife, but this time he didn’t pull. This time, he stroked his thumb over her knuckles. He caressed the inside of her wrist. He counted the beats of her pulse and probably guessed that, right now, they were all for him. “I want honesty, Dr. Gupta. It seems to be your specialty.”

  He couldn’t be more wrong. Anu wasn’t honest. She was deluded. As she walked with him into the hotel—breathless, dizzy, exhilarated, and delirious—she told herself the world’s biggest lie: that anything that happened between them tonight wouldn’t mean a thing.

  ***

  She hadn’t looked directly at him for what seemed like an eternity, and he felt the loss of it acutely. She admired the art deco lobby, murmured compliments about the old-fashioned mirrors in the elevator, and made a point of focusing those amazing eyes everywhere but on him. She was still a little embarrassed, a little angry, and now that he knew precisely why, he couldn’t fault her the emotions.

  While he wasn’t in the same class as George Clooney, Vince did know what it was like to be wanted, to be considered a catch. It wasn’t a matter of ego but of truth. He was accomplished, intelligent, and good-looking, and he’d never known anyone to work so unbelievably hard at denying it. Anu Gupta had put up a wall, brick by brick, just to mask that she was attracted to him. Now he could see it in the tight line of her mouth, in the tension of her body, and hear it in the crisp, staccato way she spoke. He could feel it in the way she didn’t look, didn’t touch, and barely breathed when he reached for her. It was taking everything she had not to fall.

  “Is the prospect of wanting someone really that terrible? Or is it just the prospect of wanting me that’s so repugnant?”

  “I didn’t go to medical school to turn into a TV cliché.” She was watching the lights across the top of the doors as they sailed up toward the penthouse, once again clutching her purse like it was going to save her from drowning. “I’m not here for an MRS degree. I’m not here to be a notch on some hotshot’s bedpost.”

  Then why are you coming upstairs with me right now? he wanted to ask. But, instead, he gave her a soft shove out the opening doors and spoke to the proud line of her neck. “How do I know I’m not the notch, Anushka? I’m not Dr. McDreamy, I’m more Dr. Evil, and yet women seem to take an inordinate amount of pleasure in saying they’ve slept with me. Even if it isn’t true.”

  “It isn’t true?” she scoffed, holding herself stiff as he aligned himself with her back. She was the perfect height to fit against him, the top of her head just grazing his chin, and when he leaned down to whisper in her ear, he felt her shiver like it was his own.

  “I fucked—” He used the word deliberately, relishing the harshness, the shock of it, and how it made her move into him instead of away. “Two women at Mercy H. My ex-girlfriend—who I was with for four years—and a top surgical nurse. I don’t know who any of the Vincibles are, and I wish them all luck with their vivid sexual fantasies.”

  “I don’t believe you, Dr. McHenry.”

  “Vince,” he reminded. “It’s Vince.”

  She was determined to deny herself and him, because she didn’t say his name. Instead she stared at the two doors—one on either end of the carpeted hallway—clearly trying to ascert
ain which lion’s den he’d be leading her into. “Both,” he told her, closing his hands around her upper arms and guiding her to the left. “The entire floor is mine.”

  “Of course it is.” She laughed, the pitch just shy of high. “But shouldn’t you live in a swanky mansion in the suburbs? Maybe a refurbished brownstone? You’re filthy rich.”

  “I’m filthy rich, because I work nonstop,” he pointed out, “and I don’t have time to commute to a swanky mansion or to devote to the maintenance of a brownstone. Living here, I have all the space and privacy I want, and the hotel staff caters to my every need. It’s practical, Anushka, nothing more, nothing less.”

  When they were over the threshold, standing in the dimly lit entryway, she finally turned to look at him. Finally. “Is this practical?”

  God, she was beautiful and fiery and utterly breathtaking, all without putting any effort into it. She wore simplicity like other women wore diamonds. “No,” he said, roughly. “This isn’t practical at all.”

  He wasn’t sure who made the move. Him. Her. It didn’t matter, because within a fraction of a second they were in each other’s arms. Anu kissed like she talked, combative and defensive and completely committed to her argument. They crashed into the wall, a tangle of bodies, of hands exploring and mouths battling for dominance. Vince tasted heat, mint, and fury and he wanted more. He wanted everything.

  He grabbed her wrists, pinning them above her head. She wedged her knee between his legs, rubbing her denim-clad thigh against the rise of his fly. For every move he made, she matched him and then upped the ante. So he pressed the only advantage he could: he swept her up in his arms and carried her into the depths of his suite. But even then, she didn’t surrender. She locked her legs around his hips, kissing his mouth, his cheek, his throat. Every bit of him that was available to her. Like he was something to be devoured. He’d been wrong that day in front of room 206. He wasn’t the Big Bad Wolf. She was going to eat him alive.

  “Anushka,” he gasped, nudging aside the strap of her tank top and baring the soft, honeyed skin of her breasts. “Anushka, tell me you want this. Tell me how much you want this.”

  She didn’t. As they made their way into his bedroom, flinging clothes and second thoughts every which way, she showed him.

  ***

  There were no pagers. No alarms. No dangers of waking from another unfulfilled dream. Anu was in this for real. Vince was spread beneath her, a willing victim. The flesh was more stunning than any fantasy. He was all muscles and sinew, lightly haired arms and chest, the dark whorls of his hair growing thicker the further south they traveled. She almost wanted to pinch herself again, to double-check that this wasn’t her imagination, but instead she closed her teeth around the tender skin of his throat and marked him as her own. Let him be the one begging for mercy.

  Vince swore, hips bucking off the king-sized mattress, and palmed the back of her head. He worked the tie on her hair, snapping the band and letting it all loose. It spilled around her like a curtain as she bracketed him between her thighs and continued her attack. If this was her chance, she was going to take it. To the hilt.

  “Anu,” he called her, the unspoken demand in the sharp syllable. He wanted her to lay herself bare in more than just the expanse of her skin. But she couldn’t give him the words. She had to hold something back or she’d lose it all.

  As if he could read her mind—which wasn’t outside the realm of possibility, given his multitude of talents—he rolled them so he was the one on top, and he took the lead.

  Oh, God. Had she really thought she could master the great Dr. Vince McHenry? She’d only succeeded because he let her. Now, he was the one calling the shots, with his powerful grip, his consuming kisses, and his deft fingers scissoring inside her heat, touching places she didn’t know existed, and making her want to give up all of her secrets. He didn’t leave bruises; he didn’t need to. She would remember every place he pressed his mouth to, every hollow and angle he caressed.

  “Vince.” His name tore from her throat in a desperate plea. “Vince, Vince, Vince.” As he grabbed a condom from the nightstand, covered himself, and buried himself in her in one sure stroke, she gave him the only truth she could allow: the prayer that was his name.

  ***

  Four days later, Vince could still hear the echo of Anu’s throaty cries. They haunted both his sleeping and waking moments. Her voice was his surgery music. VinceVinceVince. His name had turned into a keening wail as he drove her to the edge and they fell over it together, and he wasn’t sure he could ever hear it spoken again without remembering how, just for an instant, Anushka had let him in. They’d clung to each other, no barriers, no illusions. Just a man and a woman sharing the most sacred thing in the world next to holding someone’s life in your hands.

  Then, she’d climbed out of his bed, gathered her clothes, and fled.

  It was easy to play the avoidance game when you worked in different departments. She threw herself into what was, doubtless, an insane cardio rotation schedule. He had multiple procedures, a clinical trial to check in on, and a talk for the first year residents. He saw her name on the surgical board for an assist on a bypass, but he couldn’t track her down and demand to know what happened. There just wasn’t time, not for anything but the replay.

  On the fifth day, after a four-hour nap in one of the on-call rooms that was riddled with lurid fantasies that made him feel like a twelve-year-old coming in his shorts, Vince knew avoidance was no longer an option. He had to see her. He had to get to the bottom of this. And I have to have her again.

  “I’m sorry, Vince. I had her here for a full forty-eight. She clocked out for the day.” Theresa Lincoln, the best damn CT surgeon in the city, was enough of a professional that she didn’t bat an eye when he cornered her in one of the observation rooms. There was no recrimination in her voice. She spared as little consideration for stray emotion as she did for her hair, which she kept tamed in a severe bun. “Is there something I should be concerned about? Is Dr. Gupta’s work in question?”

  “No. Never!” he was swift to assure. A doctor’s career could end merely on the suspicion of sub-par care. “It’s nothing, Teri. I just wanted to follow up on a consult from last week.”

  Dr. Lincoln didn’t buy that, of course. A Johns Hopkins grad with a PhD, she hadn’t been born yesterday. But all she did was nod, dismissively. “If she’s not at that bar down the street, you’ll find her at the Barracks on 7th Street. I believe she, and a few other residents, have apartments there.”

  The Barracks was slang for an old apartment building called The Baron, built in the 1950s. Stark, almost military in its efficiency, it was perfect housing for anyone who did nothing in its rooms but sleep and maybe heat up a can of soup. Vince knew of it even though he’d never been there. It was an easy, fifteen-minute walk. Easy in every way except mentally.

  What did one say to a woman who ran from their bed after a bout of phenomenal sex? Vince had never, ever been in this position before. He’d never had to be the pursuer, tracking someone down for answers and pleading for a second chance. Even when he and Debra had broken up, he’d just accepted it and closed the case file rather than dwelling on all the maudlin might-have-beens. Anushka was uncharted territory, territory that he’d mapped to the best of his ability in the darkness of his bedroom, memorizing the taste of her and exploring the wild terrain of her body.

  Are you insane, or just so used to getting your own way that you don’t give a damn what anyone thinks?

  Both. Most definitely both. Because he stalked through her apartment building with purpose, recognizing and then ignoring a few interns along the way. When he came to her door, he didn’t bother with a pleasant tap or a gentle ring of the doorbell. No, he pounded on it, until he heard the fumbling of locks and the knob on the other side, and it was swinging open to reveal one very exhausted and cranky-looking future cardiologist.

  Wearing flannel pajama pants and a faded Penn State T-shirt, without a trac
e of makeup on, and looking ready to kill him, Anu was still one of the most compelling things he’d ever laid eyes upon. “What?” she demanded. “What do you want?”

  “What do you think I want?” He shouldered past her, into the small apartment, which could easily fit, in its entirety, in his living room. “To check your bedpost for a fresh notch.”

  “That’s not fair. I don’t deserve that from you.” She flinched, shutting the door behind him and flattening herself against it. Like she needed it to hold her up.

  He would’ve held her until sunrise. Gladly. “I don’t know what you deserve, Anu. I don’t know anything about you, because you didn’t stick around long enough for me to discover it.”

  “As if you’re not used to that?” She came away from the door then, skirting past him and keeping a battered plaid couch between them like a force field. “What would’ve been the point, Dr. McHenry? You’re you, and I’m me. We have no long-term potential whatsoever, so why not file it away as what it was: a good time that doesn’t need to be repeated.”

  He wanted to kneel and look for his jaw where it had hit the floor. “Jesus. Is that what you think? Do you really think I’m not capable of a deeper commitment?” It certainly wouldn’t be the first time he’d been accused of it, but he usually deserved the suspicion. This…this was something else. “Is it just how you’re determined to live: for nothing but the work and the occasional recreational sex? Because I have to tell you, we don’t do that by choice, Dr. Gupta. It’s not a goal. It’s not a life. Not for a top surgeon, not for anyone.”

  Her face was ghostly pale, and she’d wrapped her arms tight around herself like a tourniquet. “No, what I really think is that I was obsessed with you before, and now that I’ve actually been with you, I will never, ever get you out of my blood. So, for the sake of my sanity, for the sake of my career, I need to stay as far away from you as possible.” She gave him a brittle, beautiful smile with that confession. “And, yes, I know I said all of that out loud.”