by Janice Lynn
“Pleasure plays a big role,” he admitted, his fingers tracing over her lower back. “What’s sex about to you, Emily?”
“Pleasure. Nothing more,” she immediately answered, refusing to give the question more thought. “Just pleasure.”
Which she was feeling with her body pressed up against his. When was the music going to change back to something upbeat?
“Yet you were having sex with a man who didn’t give you physical pleasure,” he pointed out.
Her feet stilled. “I never said Richard didn’t give me physical pleasure.”
Nor did she recall telling him she’d been having sex with Richard, although maybe she had.
“Did he?”
She frowned. “You don’t hear me asking about the women you’ve been with since our divorce, do you? You have no right to ask me about Richard or any other man.”
“Have there been others, Emily?” he asked, whether he had the right or not. His body had stiffened against hers, as if he were bracing himself for her answer.
She was tempted to lie, to say that there had been dozens, many men who shamed him as a lover. But she’d never been much on untruths.
“No.” She didn’t elaborate.
“I’m glad.”
Frustration ran up and down her spine. She pulled back to glare at him. “Really? You’re glad that in the past five years I’ve had one lover besides you? How absolutely selfish is that when I’ve no doubt you’ve had dozens of women.”
“There haven’t been dozens of women, Emily.” He closed his eyes, took a deep breath. “I’ll be the first to admit I have no right to feel jealous of any man touching you—I gave up that right—but, Emily, I do. The thought of you being with anyone other than me rips me up inside.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Why not?”
“Because we both know that whatever this is between us right now, it’s temporary, and I don’t intend to spend my life alone. There will be other men, Lucas. Someday. Maybe I’ll get lucky and meet someone who can give me all the things I want first thing after you, but, if not, then I’m okay with having a few hot affairs first.”
“No.”
“No?”
He let out an exasperated breath. “What is it you want from a man, Emily?”
“From you or from some other man?”
“Both.”
“From you, sex.”
He nodded as if he knew that was going to be her answer.
“From other men?” She shrugged. “Someday, I want to meet a man whom I can have a good life with, a couple of kids, go to parent-teacher meetings and soccer games, that kind of thing.”
Kids. Her heart squeezed. Would she ever have children? Did she even want to risk pregnancy again? What if she couldn’t carry a pregnancy to full-term?
“You deserve that.”
Oh, Lucas. If only...
“I know. I do,” she agreed, wondering if there was ever a way to repair the hurt once so much had piled up on a person.
“But not with me?”
Her breath caught. “What are you saying, Lucas? You don’t want those things. You don’t even want kids.”
He frowned. “I never said I didn’t want kids.”
“Sure you did,” she reminded him, her fingertips curling into her palms. “When I mentioned having a baby, you shut me down real fast.”
“We’d only been married a few months, Emily. You were just starting your nursing career. I was finishing up my fellowship. We were still figuring out married life. You were unhappy and I was stressed. The last thing we needed was a baby.”
“Then I guess it’s a good thing we didn’t have one.” She pulled away, unable to stand being in his arms another minute, unable to suppress the memories she never let rise to the surface. Memories she’d done her best to forget altogether.
Blindly, she made her way through the crowd on the dance floor toward the exit. She needed air.
When she stepped outside the club, she gulped in big breaths of air laced with the smell of hot dogs, pretzels and whatever else the street vendors had going.
Her heart pounded in her chest and her lungs couldn’t get enough air. Why hadn’t she just not answered his text? That would have been for the best. Instead, they’d gone down a conversation path she’d never wanted to take.
“Emily?”
Why had he followed her? She’d known he’d follow her. Of course he would. He’d come to the club because she was there.
She didn’t open her eyes.
“Emily?”
“Go away, Lucas.”
“No.”
She opened her eyes. “You told me you’d leave if I asked you to.”
“That was before.”
“Before?”
He paused, seeming to search for the right words. “What happened back there?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your skin went green, and if I didn’t know better, I’d have thought you were going to be ill. You told me you didn’t have anything but soda. That shouldn’t have made you sick. So tell me, what happened in there?”
“There are some things we just shouldn’t talk about.”
“So you were okay talking about our past lovers but not your perception that I didn’t want children? Your false perception, I might add.”
“No, I wasn’t okay with talking about our past lovers or my perceptions. I’m not okay with any of this.”
She pulled away and started walking down the street in the direction of her apartment. Her building wasn’t far.
“I don’t want to fight with you, Emily. I never wanted to fight with you,” Lucas said from beside her just outside her apartment door.
“Odd, that’s what we seem to do best.”
“That’s not what we do best.”
“Then too bad we can’t just stay naked all the time, eh?”
“Well, it’s a safe bet to say you’d win every argument if that were the case.”
She shook her head. “Don’t make light of this, Lucas.”
He touched her face, running his fingers along the edge of her hair, then cupping her nape. “I’m sorry, Emily. For whatever it was I said wrong inside the club, I am sorry. For every mistake I ever made where you are concerned, I’m sorry. Forgive me.”
She wasn’t sure she could if she wanted to, but that didn’t stop her body from melting against his when he pulled her inside her apartment and kissed her.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CASSIE BELLOWS REGAINED consciousness at some point during the night.
Apparently, Cassie’s nurse had called Lucas, because he was there and in Cassie’s room when Emily arrived at the hospital and took report from the night nurse.
“He’s in with her right now. Has been for a while. He’s such a great doctor. He’s going to be a great father someday.”
Emily’s heart squeezed so tight in her chest that she thought she might pass out. She didn’t respond to the nurse’s comment. There was no need. Amy was still going on and on about Dr. Cain’s many fabulous features.
“I bet you were ecstatic when he bought your TBI basket.”
“Ecstatic,” she agreed to keep Amy from digging deeper if she told the truth about how she’d felt about Lucas buying her basket. She liked Amy but wasn’t close enough to the woman to be sharing intimate details of her life. She still felt a little nervous that she’d told Meghan about who Lucas was. She didn’t want her friend’s pity should things go wrong.
“How a good-looking guy like him hasn’t been snapped up by some smart woman is beyond me.”
“Looks aren’t everything,” she mumbled under her breath, not really meaning for Amy to catch her words.
“Yeah, but that man is the to
tal package. Looks, intelligence, sense of humor, compassion and money. A girl could do a lot worse.”
Ugh. How did she end up in this conversation?
“I suppose.”
“Hey, all I’m saying is that if it were me he’d paid that much money to go to dinner with, I’d make sure he got his money’s worth.” Amy waggled her brows suggestively. “You should at least think about it. I heard you and the pharmacist broke up.”
Gossip sure spread fast.
“We’ve already gone on our dinner date.”
“And I definitely got my money’s worth.”
She hated how Lucas did that, walked up behind her and joined into conversations she was having. But she supposed if she was going to talk about him, he had a right to join in. Not that she’d wanted to talk about him, but it seemed she couldn’t escape doing so.
Amy blushed at being caught. “Hi, Dr. Cain. We were just talking about you.”
“I heard.” His smile reached his eyes. “All good things, I hope?”
“Absolutely.” Amy laughed a little flirtatiously. “Is there anything else to be said?”
His gaze met Emily’s, as if challenging her to speak up. She kept her mouth closed.
She might have lots of negative things to say, but since she’d been having mind-blowing sex with the man, she really didn’t think she had the right to point out any flaws.
“Did Amy tell you the good news?” His gaze searched Emily’s. “Cassie woke up during the night.”
“She mentioned that. She also mentioned you came to the hospital after she woke up and that you’ve been with her since.”
As in, she knew he’d come here when he’d left her place, and when had he slept? Because, as handsome as he was, Emily noted the fatigue around his eyes and it pulled at her heart.
“She’s going to be fine from the bleed.” He sounded genuinely happy about the news. “No lasting damage that I can tell from the increased intracranial pressure.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“I’ll be taking her back to the operating room soon to remove the tumor. Just as soon as she’s strong enough to withstand another surgery.”
Emily nodded.
“She’s going to feel like a new person when I’m finished.”
“No doubt.” She met his gaze. “Did you need for one of us to do something for you, Dr. Cain? Because Amy needs to finish giving me report so I can go check on my patients this morning.”
* * *
It didn’t surprise Emily when Lucas showed up again later that day. She was in Cassie’s room and had just finished helping her mother sponge bathe the little girl. They’d just settled her back into her clean hospital bed.
“Hi, Dr. Cain,” Cassie said, smiling at him despite the bandages around her head. “Are you...going...to take my blood?”
He shook his head. “You’re safe from me sticking you.”
“Good, because...I feel...a lot better.” She truly was doing better, but one only had to listen to her speech, watch her hand and arm movements, to know that there were still serious health issues.
“I see that.” He smiled back at the child. “Your color is a lot better than when I was here this morning.”
“Momma says...I can...go to the playroom...soon...if I keep...getting stronger.”
“Hopefully, you’ll be strong enough very soon.”
He ran through a check on Cassie’s cranial nerves, making her smile as he asked her to make the different facial expressions at him. He puffed his cheeks out, waggled his eyebrows, smiled, frowned, furrowed his brow and gritted his teeth back at her with each check, eliciting a giggle from his patient and a smile from Cassie’s mom.
He really was great with Cassie. Amy had been right. Lucas would be a great father. If only... No. Emily absolutely positively was not going to let her mind go there.
Even if her mind had been going there on and off since he’d first shown up at Children’s. How could it not have?
Still, some memories were best never resurrected.
Some parts of the past she just couldn’t deal with.
Not ever again.
Having lived through them the first time had almost killed her.
* * *
“Will you please go to dinner with me tonight?”
Emily bit the inside of her lip. She didn’t want to date Lucas. She wanted... She wasn’t sure what she wanted. Just that she was scared of going to dinner with him. She’d had fun with him at the club, dancing, but overall that experience had just left her feeling raw. Everything about being near him left her feeling vulnerable.
“I promise I won’t bite.”
Her gaze cut to his. “Yeah, I’ve heard that before.”
His lips twitched. “Promises not to bite when I’m in bed don’t count.”
“Says who?”
“Me?”
Despite her misgivings, she laughed. “You’re the final authority on biting?”
“I probably don’t have near enough experience to be the final authority, but if you want to volunteer for me to practice nibbling on, I’m all for upping my game.”
“I’m sure you are.”
“But I’d like to take you to dinner first.”
“Why?”
“I enjoy being with you and want to spend time with you.”
She enjoyed being with him, too. Naked, no problem. That was easy to categorize into just sex. But spending time with Lucas with her clothes on? That wasn’t so easy to justify away from work.
“I’d like to take you to this little French bistro off Broadway. They have this fresh-baked bread that just melts in your mouth.”
“And straight onto my hips.”
“Your hips are perfect, Emily.”
His compliment came out as sincere and not one meant to puff her up. She liked that. Liked that he sounded as if he truly believed what he said.
“But they won’t be if I indulge in fresh-baked bread,” she pointed out, trying not to get too elated that he’d said her hips were perfect. He made her feel perfect. When he looked at her, touched her, with such awe, how could she not?
He’d always done that in the beginning, made her feel good about herself, made her feel as if she was the only woman in the world and the center of his existence.
“I promise to make you burn every single carbohydrate before the sun comes up.”
She rolled her eyes. “I know what will be coming up before the sun.”
He grinned. “You know me so well.”
Yes, she did. And yet she didn’t. Not anymore. He’d changed in the years they’d been apart. He was more mature, more stable these days, more caring and aware of others around him. Then again, he was five years older, a man in his thirties. Of course he’d matured.
“Does that mean you’ll give me the privilege of taking you to a late dinner for two?”
She sighed, then nodded. It wasn’t as if she could say no. Even if she could, all she’d do was think about him and hope he showed at her apartment. What would be the point of saying no? “But only if you promise to make me enjoy every second of carb-burning.”
His grin was lethal. “Was there ever any doubt?”
No, that, Emily never doubted.
* * *
Emily’s menu hadn’t had prices, but she didn’t need dollar signs to know she was in a restaurant way out of her price ballpark. Part of her wanted to question Lucas about wasting so much money on taking her to eat at such a place when she’d have enjoyed grabbing a pretzel dog and walking around Times Square to people watch just as much.
Well, almost as much.
She had to admit the cozy candlelit booth with just the two of them was nice. Perhaps a bit too over-the-top romantic for a divorced
couple. Then again, most divorced couples weren’t having hot sex every night, either.
Or maybe they were. What did she know about such things other than that Lucas got to her physically as much as he ever did? The absence of the golden band he’d slipped onto her finger so long ago hadn’t changed that one bit.
Not really.
“You got quiet. Should I be worried?”
“I was thinking about when you put my wedding band on my finger.” Automatically, her thumb brushed across the empty spot. She’d never been much of a jewelry person, and these days she chose not to wear any rings unless it was a fun, chunky costume piece that complemented whatever she was wearing.
His expression tightened. “What about it?”
She shrugged. “Not really anything specific. I was just thinking about you doing so.”
“Do you still have your rings, Emily?”
Wondering if she should admit such craziness, she nodded. “I thought about selling them, but there just seemed something weird about doing so. I guess keeping them is just as weird.”
“I’ve still got mine, too.”
“You do?” Why did that surprise her? Why did some deep part of her rejoice that he’d held on to his wedding band? It didn’t mean anything that he’d kept the ring. The only thing that meant anything was the legal divorce document that had torn away any meaning the ring had once held.
He nodded. “Like you, I’ve thought about getting rid of it but never have.”
“We were too young,” she mused.
“That’s what everyone said.” His gaze met hers. “But the truth of the matter is that I was older than you are now.”
Her eyes widened a little. “You were, weren’t you?”
Not that she hadn’t known, just that she hadn’t thought about it. He’d seemed much younger at the time than she currently felt. Maybe because he’d still been working on his education and had still lived in his parents’ home.
“I’d led a pretty sheltered life up until I got to medical school,” he admitted, echoing her thoughts. “It was harder work than I’d anticipated.”
“You always made excellent grades.” She knew he had. She’d seen the academic awards he’d won throughout his college and pre-college years.