Twenty Times Tempted: A Sexy Contemporary Romance Collection

by Petrova, Em

  “I would definitely be interested in meeting with you to discuss it.” He hoped that was enough to diffuse Patrick’s excitement so he could get to the real matter at hand. “Actually Patrick, I telephoned for a different reason. I’m hoping you could help me out.”

  “I’ll do what I can,” he answered.

  “My...” he paused for a moment. Exactly what were he and Josselyn? Their relationship was a bit indefinable at the moment. She wasn’t his girlfriend, and he certainly couldn’t come out and say, the woman with whom I’m contesting a will against over my father’s house, but I’m wildly attracted to.

  “Excuse me, Ben? I didn’t hear you.”

  He quickly recovered. “Josselyn took a nasty fall down our front steps earlier this evening.”

  “I’m so sorry to hear that,” said Patrick.

  “She landed hard on her shoulder, but what I’m most concerned with is she has broken her neck in the past, and she’s told me she has metal caging and plating. After her fall, she couldn’t feel her left leg for a while. The emergency room doctor didn’t seem at all competent, and I remembered Evan telling me that you’re actually trained as a neurosurgeon, so...”

  “Actually, I’m a neurologist. My specialty is rehabilitation after head and spinal injuries. My dad is the neurosurgeon. I know enough. Do you need me to come over?”

  Patrick was actually willing to have his evening interrupted. He was a nice guy.

  “Josselyn is asleep, and I don’t want to interrupt your evening anymore than I already have. I was hoping you could give me some advice for pain medication. The ER doctor gave her a prescription for some super-aspirin. It doesn’t seem enough to control her pain.”

  “You’d be hard pressed to find a pharmacy open this hour. I could swing by with morphine. I would be happy to do it.”

  “Oh, I have morphine in my bag.”

  “Well, go ahead and give that to her every four hours through the night. Don’t hesitate to call back if you need me. I’ll stop by and examine her in the morning. By then, I should be able to access her x-rays on the hospital’s system. If anything even remotely looks wrong, I’ll give my dad a call and get his advice.”

  He sighed with relief. “That would be great. I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “No thanks necessary. Just think about coming on board with me. If things work out, we could talk about making it permanent.”

  Ben didn’t know if he could ever walk into the practice once belonging to his father and feel comfortable. He grew up around that practice, always wanting to be a doctor, and to someday assume his father’s place. The practice was gone from the family with the divorce, and if he did decide to join, he would not settle for anything less than becoming a full partner.

  Once he told Patrick about the fiasco where he nearly lost his license, Patrick probably wouldn’t want him anywhere near his patients. Now wasn’t the time to worry about it. He needed to get back upstairs to Josselyn.

  “Well, that’s certainly worth thinking about. Thank you again, Patrick. I’ll look forward to meeting you in person tomorrow.”

  Chapter Six

  “Josselyn.”

  From somewhere in the distance she could hear a voice calling out her name. A deliciously, sexy male voice.

  I must be dreaming.

  “Wake up, Sleeping Beauty. It’s time for your medication.”

  Everything came crashing back. The fall down the front steps of the house, the ambulance, the hospital. When she opened her eyes, Ben’s face shimmered above hers.

  “How are you?” he asked as he caressed her cheek with his fingertips.

  Please, don’t stop touching me, is what she wanted to say. “I’m fine,” she whispered.

  “I just want to tell you I spoke with a top-notch neurologist who just happens to live in Unity. He’s going to come here in the morning and examine you. In the meantime, he recommends I give you an injection of morphine to keep you pain free.”

  “Oh...okay.” She sat up and swallowed a scream as an intense pain crashed down upon her shoulder.

  “Easy, easy, baby,” he cooed, his hand stroked her unbruised shoulder.

  He was so gentle and so handsome...so perfect.

  Why couldn’t they have met under better circumstances, like when Morgan was alive? In a perfect world, father and son would have gotten along, and Morgan would have introduced her to his son. They were both single, maybe something magical would have happened between them.

  Yet it wasn’t a perfect world.

  “So, where is this morphine you speak of?”

  He held up his black leather doctor’s bag. “Tonight I’m your magic man,” he grinned.

  He rummaged through the bag and removed a small glass vial full of clear liquid and a syringe and prepared the injection.

  While she clutched the sheet to cover her bare breasts, Ben uncovered her leg and swabbed her thigh with an alcohol soaked wipe.

  “Are you ready?” He raised a blond eyebrow.

  “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

  Uncapping the syringe, he aimed for her thigh. She felt a burning sting, but it was quick to subside.

  “I’m sorry if I hurt you. I’m afraid I’m a bit out of practice.” He pressed a square of gauze to her thigh.

  “I’m a big girl; I can take it.”

  He recapped the syringe and tossed it into a nearby trash can. “Be thankful you don’t need any blood drawn. I’m absolutely useless.”

  “A hematologist who is lousy at taking blood? Your patients must cringe when they see you coming at them with a needle.”

  “Nah, my patients love me. I have a very skilled phlebotomist who does all of the blood drawing for me.”

  Josselyn gazed at his handsome face. His patients probably did love him—especially the females.

  “That morphine should work fast.” He patted her pillow into shape. “Lie back and let it do its magic.” He engulfed her in his strong arms and lowered her gently to the pillow.

  For a long moment, their eyes connected, and his lips were only mere inches from hers. At the last second he shifted his face and pressed a lingering kiss against her forehead. “I’ll check on you in a little while.”

  Josselyn closed her eyes, not feeling any relief, and willed sleep to overtake her. When she had been hospitalized all of those years ago after her first fall, she was given so much morphine just to be able to tolerate the pain. Maybe she’d built a resistant to the drug.

  Then the magic he promised hit her. Her whole body became weightless. Her head was heavy on the pillow yet felt as light as air. Nothing really mattered, not the fall, not the battle for the house, and not even the growing attraction for Ben Parnell she fought.

  Sometime later she awoke to darkness. She knew she was safe in her bed, but something was different—wonderfully different. Someone kissed her cheek.

  Everything was so foggy. Was this some wonderful dream or the side effects of the medication causing her to hallucinate? To her surprise, she felt no fear, only deep, aching desire.

  “Ben, is that you?” she managed to ask. Her heart thumped erratically and her breath quickened.

  To her dismay, he pulled away from her. At the last second she reached for him, but found herself only clutching air. “Please don’t leave.”

  “I must. Josselyn will be back soon. She mustn’t know anything about this.”

  His voice was low and smooth, pulling her in even further. She listened, bewildered and struggled to understand.

  “But I am Josselyn,” she insisted.

  “No, Josselyn is away, deep in her sleep.”

  “Then who are you?”

  “No one, my angel,” he whispered. “We exist only in this dream.”

  If this was just a dream or a terrific hallucination, it was the most erotic, mind-boggling figment of her imagination she ever experienced.

  ***

  When she awoke again, light streamed through the slats of the window blinds, and Ben s
tood in the doorway of her bedroom. She modestly pulled the sheet up to her neck.

  “How do you feel?” He lazily leaned against the door frame wearing jeans and red t-shirt she hadn’t seen him in before. He held a coffee mug in his right hand.

  “Better. Good morning, Ben.” She met his gaze, but her head felt stuffed full of cotton.

  “I brought your coffee.”

  Her eyes followed him as he walked to the bed.

  “Are you all right? You seem rather—perplexed.” He placed the mug into her left hand.

  “Are there ghosts in this house?”

  “Ghosts?” A blond eyebrow rose in amusement. “I don’t know, maybe. A lot of people have lived in this house over the years.”

  At least he didn’t make fun of her. “I had the strangest dream a few hours ago—or a very vivid hallucination. It seemed so real.” Unconsciously she touched a fingertip to her cheek. “But I guess it wasn’t real at all.”

  “I’m not really surprised. I gave you a big slug of morphine last night. It must have given you some wild dreams.”

  “I suppose so.” She was still not completely convinced her visitor had only been a dream.

  “I’m going to attempt to cook you breakfast. I also wanted to remind you Patrick Leighton will be stopping by sometime this morning to have a look at your neck and shoulder.”

  “I remember.”

  “Is there anything else I can get you or do for you?” he asked.

  Her gaze remained on his face. “I’m fine, thank you. I don’t need anything else.” That wasn’t completely true. If this kind, caring compassionate side of Ben was his true identity, she needed someone like him in her life.

  When she heard his footsteps reach the stairs, she set the coffee mug aside and began to inch her way out of bed. Her shoulder was sore and hot and her neck and arm stiff. She made it to the edge of the bed. Her bare feet grazed the floor beneath them.

  She stood and reached for the yellow terry cloth robe draped over the back of a wing chair. She desperately tried to get the robe over her injured shoulder and close it with the big white buttons before Ben came back and saw her naked except for a pair of pink silk panties. Of course he was a doctor. He had seen plenty of nearly naked bodies over the years. One more surely wouldn’t faze him.

  As she walked slowly down the hall, her mind recounted her encounter with her ghost with intense clarity. Even though he only kissed her cheek. She swore she could still feel him, still smell his skin.

  Her mind teased her with thoughts of her ghost being Ben in reality. He was only checking on her to make sure she was still breathing, and the morphine caused her to imagine it was something more.

  Whatever the truth, she yearned for her ghost to return to her bed and this time, make love to her. Once again she felt the ache of desire deep inside her belly. She knew if he ever came back, she would willingly give herself over to him both body and soul.

  ***

  Later that morning, Ben carefully opened the front door to Dr. Patrick Leighton. Dark haired with big blue eyes, Patrick was tall and willowy. Under his left arm he carried a computer.

  “It’s so nice to finally meet you. Please be careful on those steps,” he warned.

  “No problem. How is your girl this morning?”

  Ben didn’t know about Josselyn being ‘his girl.’ “She’s been out of bed on her own. I’m not sure if that’s such a good thing. She’s a nurse, so I don’t think she’d do anything to injure herself further. I don’t know what happened to me last night—it seems like everything I know about medicine went right out of my head.”

  “Usually the patient, especially a trained nurse, is the best judge of what they’re ready to do. It’s the people who love them who fear for their safety the most. Sometimes I think my Autumn is happy to have me leave the house. With her so far into her pregnancy, I smother her with attention. She’s bigger and more beautiful every day.”

  Love. If he met Josselyn under different circumstances he might very well have fallen in love with her. He treated her so harshly those early days it would take a woman with the understanding of an angel to forgive him.

  “Are the twins your first children?”

  “Yes! I never thought two years ago I could be so happy. I was thirty-eight years old when Autumn walked into my life. Now I’m forty, and I’m finally going to be a dad—and with twins—a boy and a girl. I’m getting my whole family at once.”

  They were the same age. An arrow of jealousy hit Ben square in his heart, though he couldn’t begrudge good Dr. Leighton his share of happiness. “Congratulations.” Ben hoped it didn’t sound half-hearted, or that a rapid change of subject was too obvious. “Just let me run upstairs and tell Joss you’re here.”

  Ben hurried up the stairs and made the turn into Josselyn’s bedroom. She sat with her back turned to him, attempting to brush her hair.

  “Joss, Patrick is here to examine you.”

  “Give me a minute to try to run this hairbrush through my hair.”

  “Let me do that for you.” He took the hairbrush from her. The bristles passed through her long raven tresses, reminding him of liquid silk. He wanted to bury his face in her hair and lose himself.

  He never intimately a woman with Josselyn’s hair color. Everyone in his family was blond. His former fiancée was blond. All of their friends remarked what beautiful blond haired, blue eyed children they would have someday. That never come to be, but at least he had found out before he married her how unworthy of either his trust or commitment she was.

  “What’s he like?”

  He snapped back to reality. “Pardon?”

  “Patrick. What is he like?”

  “He’s nice,” he said lamely. “He’s tall and sort of pale and quirky. He’s got huge blue eyes. He kind of reminds me of one of those kids with the great big eyes on those tacky velvet paintings. Be warned though—he’ll talk your ears off about his pregnant wife and how happy he is.”

  “Ah, that’s sweet. Listen, Ben, will you stay in the room while he examines me?”

  “Of course, but he’s harmless.”

  “I’m sure he is. I would feel more comfortable if you were here.”

  She wanted a chaperone. Why was she so distrustful? “I’ll stay. Don’t worry.”

  Ben stood in the doorway of the bedroom while Patrick took some general health information from Josselyn. Although she was friendly and personable, her answers were measured and short. She gave him just enough information without elaborating.

  When he asked how she broke her neck, her reply was a simple, ‘I fell.’ No explanation and no details. Ben suspected a lot more story to her broken neck existed than she was telling.

  Patrick pricked a path up and down both of Josselyn legs with a short needle.

  “Josselyn, I want to have a look at your spine and have a quick feel around your neck and shoulder. Afterward, with your permission, I’d like to dial into the hospital’s patient records system and have a look at your x-rays,” Patrick said.

  “Okay,” she agreed easily, and held her hand out to Ben.

  He went to her, and took both of her hands into his while Patrick examined her back. He couldn’t help seeing the look in her dark of eyes of something resembling fear. No matter how gentle Patrick was, she was extremely uncomfortable with his touch.

  “It’s all good, Joss,” Ben mouthed the words to her, and tried for a reassuring smile.

  Finally, Patrick patted her back. “Everything’s fine. I’m going to leave you with some painkillers so you can get some sleep.”

  “No morphine,” she protested. “It made me all loopy last night. I was seeing ghosts.”

  “All right, no morphine. Now let me have a quick look at your x-rays, and I’ll send Ben back up to you.”

  Ben followed Patrick back down the stairs. “Is she okay?”

  “She’s going to be sore and stiff for a while, but I believe she is fine. I’ll be able to tell you something more definit
e after I see her x-rays.”

  “I’m sorry, but we’re not set up for the Internet yet.”

  “No worries.” Patrick produced a portable broadband stick from his pocket.

  For several minutes, Patrick stared in silence at the films of Josselyn’s neck, spine, and shoulder. Surprisingly, there were even x-rays of her ribs and arm.

  “Your girl is accident prone, eh?” Patrick asked.

  Ben had no answer for him. He knew practically nothing about Josselyn’s past medical history. As a matter of fact, he knew practically nothing about her past, period.

  “She’s got a lot of old fractures...well, everywhere,” Patrick stated.

  Ben stepped closer to the computer screen. Josselyn had multiple healed rib fractures. Her collar bone was broken at some time in her life and both arms. The most disturbing was the sheer amount of metal in her neck. Josselyn was either a very accident prone girl, or her bones were a road map of abuse. Patrick probably realized the same, but was too polite to say.

  Once again he remembered the afternoon in the bathroom. He wished he would have taken the time to ask her questions about her past, and what her tormenters did to her.

  “The caging and plating in her neck is exceptional work. No need to worry about your girl. She’s perfect. When she fell, she probably stunned a nerve, and that’s the reason for the temporary loss of sensation in her leg. Afterward, I’m guessing fear ignited panic.”

  Ben relaxed at Patrick’s diagnosis, but it didn’t soothe his dismay at seeing the history of fractures in those x-rays. He was determined to find out exactly what happened in her past.

  He thanked Patrick as he walked him to his car.

  “I’m happy to help,” said Patrick. “Listen, Ben, Evan mentioned wanting to throw a little party to welcome you and Josselyn to Unity. I’m hoping you and I could get together to talk about you helping me out at the practice, and Josselyn as well, when she’s up to it. If she’s interested, I need a really good nurse too.”