Hot Bodies Boxed Set: The Complete Vital Signs Erotic Romance Trilogy

by Hughes, Jill Elaine

  ****

  Maryam was at her supervisor’s desk on the main ward bright and early the next morning, catching up on paperwork. She was signing off on a stack of nurse timecards when Starla Berring bounded up to her.

  “Well, well, well,” Maryam clucked. “Don’t we work fast?”

  Starla gave her a blank look. “What are you talking about?”

  Maryam chuckled. “Don’t pretend you don’t know, hon. The whole damn hospital’s talkin’ about it.”

  “I still don’t know what you mean.”

  Maryam rolled her eyes. She glanced over both shoulders to make sure no one was listening, then lowered her voice. “I mean, you took care of Dr. Harlan Wilkinson already. Nice job. You musta wore him out, since they found him passed out and naked in his office. And I had to be the one to wake him up, dontchya know. I gotta say, thanks hon. I’ll never forget the site of his naked body for as long as I live.”

  Starla’s eyes widened and she went white as a sheet. “But I—we—didn’t do anything! I mean, I tried to, I came onto him just like you said I should! But it didn’t work. He just told me he was a married man and walked away.”

  Maryam blinked. She took several moments to process this information. “Well, that’s a horse of a different color,” she finally said. “And I’m afraid it’s just gonna make the whole situation worse.”

  “How so?”

  “Never you mind, hon,” Maryam snapped. “Now run along. You’re on duty in Geriatrics today. Bedpan duty. We’re short on staff over there, and long on patients.”

  “Geriatrics!” Starla protested. “I hate Geriatrics! And I’m an OR nurse! Why should I have to go clean up old peoples’ shit?”

  “Because I say you have to, hon,” Maryam shot back. “Beggars can’t be choosers.” Maryam handed her a stack of shift notes and motioned for her to get going.

  Starla tucked the file under her arm and headed off towards Geriatrics, her eyes smarting. Other nurses and hospital staff pointed and whispered about her as she walked by. She was obviously the laughingstock of the whole hospital—and through no fault of her own.

  Sure, Starla would be the first to admit that she was a little free and easy when it came to who she was willing to open her legs for. And yes, it was true she’d made a play for Dr. Harlan Wilkinson, even though she couldn’t stand the man. But she’d done it at Maryam Malone’s request, for the sake of patient safety and workplace harmony.

  And the whole thing had just blown up in her face. She’d stuck her neck out for Maryam—way out—and what did she get in return? She got to spend eight hours cleaning up old peoples’ shit.

  Starla laughed despite herself as an old saying of her mother’s reverberated through her brain. When life hands you shit, make mud pies.

  She could do that, all right. She could do that and more.

  Today marked the last time that the world fucked around with Starla Berring. From now on, it would be the other way around. She’d get back at everyone who had humiliated her if it was the last thing she ever did.

  And Maryam Malone was first on her list.

  ****

  Rebecca Marsh paced frantically up and down the narrow six-foot span of her dark and dusty office in Old Wards. The private investigator she’d hired to track down Billy Hartzell was supposed to have called over an hour ago, but so far, no dice. And the state inspectors were due to show up the day after tomorrow. She was running out of time, and in more ways than one.

  Rebecca Marsh was a workaholic who hadn’t been on a date in over two years. She hadn’t gotten laid in more than three. So it went without saying that she was damn horny, to the point that it interfered with her work, with her thinking—hell, just about everything she did. She needed sex, and she needed it now. And as far as she saw it, Billy Hartzell was the best place for her to get it.

  He was hot, for one. And he was desperate for work, for another. And rumor had it he was sweet on one of the pretty young nurses. Maybe, just maybe, Rebecca could dangle a promise of his job back in exchange for just one little discreet dalliance. She was sure that one night between the sheets with Billy Hartzell would be more than enough to make up for her three-year dry spell. One night of fun and passion, with no strings attached. What redblooded twenty-two-year-old man wouldn’t jump at the chance to sleep with an attractive older woman, no commitment required?

  Rebecca was a cougar, and if she had her way, Billy Hartzell would make her growl.

  Rebecca’s desk phone rang. She snatched it up on the first ring. “Hello?”

  “Rebecca, Philip Jones here. I’m finished with my investigation, and haven’t turned up a thing. Looks to me like this Billy Hartzell character has gone up in smoke.”

  Rebecca’s heart sank. “Are you sure?”

  “I’ve done all my usual investigations—credit cards, bank transactions, hotel stays. The only thing I turned up was that Billy made a large cash withdrawal from the Chase Bank branch in Statesville. After that, nada. If he’s doing anything—eating in restaurants, staying in hotels— he’s paying in cash, which is untraceable. I’ll let you know if anything else turns up, but as far as I’m concerned, this guy is long gone.”

  “I understand,” Rebecca said with a heavy sigh. “Thanks anyway for your time.”

  She hung up, cursing herself for being so forceful with Billy, running him out of town with a threat of criminal charges following the Geriatrics incident. What on earth had she been thinking? Why had she been so quick to take the hospital lawyers’ advice? She was a human-resources executive with more than fifteen years’ experience, and she knew by now that the lawyers weren’t always right about everything. The chaos of that fateful day in Geriatrics had really clouded her judgment.

  That, and the fact she hadn’t gotten laid in three years.

  Something had to give. Rebecca Marsh was a healthy, attractive forty-one-year-old woman at the absolute peak of her sexual appetites—and yet, she couldn’t get laid to save her life. That would be bad enough all by itself, but now her sexual problems were spilling over into her career. She desperately needed sex, somewhere, somehow—or her head was going to explode.

  Before she had any more time to think, her desk phone rang again.

  “Rebecca Marsh,” she said into the receiver, her voice clipped and tense.

  “Rebecca, we have a problem.” It was George McGill, and he did not sound happy.

  “What’s that?”

  McGill sighed. “Well, where should I start? Dana Johnson, the new nurse-anesthetist who assisted on one of the Geriatrics death cases—do you remember her?”

  “Of course I do. I hired her.”

  “Well, she just quit.”

  “Why’d she quit? I just hired her a month ago.”

  McGill sighed again. “Something about one of Dr. Marx’s psych experiments gone bad. There was an assault of some kind. We’re still looking into it.”

  “That Dr. Marx is a real loose cannon,” Rebecca mused. “I’ve been warning Administration about him for years.”

  “I know, I know,” McGill snapped. “But Marx brings in a lot of funding. And money talks.”

  “That’s the way of the world, isn’t it George?”

  “You bet. Speaking of which, what’s the story from that private investigator you hired? Was he able to track that Hartzell character down? The state inspectors are gonna be here day after tomorrow.”

  “The PI just called. Billy Hartzell is nowhere to be found. It’s like he’s dropped off the face of the earth.”

  McGill coughed. “As I recall, that’s exactly what you told him he should do.”

  “Well, I was wrong,” she snapped. “And with Dana Johnson gone, now that’s two people the state inspectors won’t get to interview.”

  “Rebecca, the way our staff keeps disappearing, it’s gonna look suspicious.”

  “I know, I know,” she groaned. Things were just getting worse and worse. “I’ll keep trying to track Billy down. And I have Dana John
son’s home address. I think I’ll go and have a little chat with her.”

  ****

  Harlan watched as Joanna began to stir in their big four-poster bed. It was well past midnight, and a violent thunderstorm raged outside. A heavy thunderclap rattled the huge house to its foundations, waking his wife out of her slumber.

  She sat upright slowly, rubbed her eyes, and stretched. She seemed oblivious to Harlan’s presence, and he did nothing to announce himself. She climbed out of bed and padded softly across the thick pile carpet in her bare feet towards the bathroom.

  Harlan heard a toilet flush, followed by running water. He waited until Joanna came back out into the bedroom before he flipped on the light.

  She was almost on top of him when the reading lamp by his easy chair flickered on as if by magic. She stopped short, and her eyes grew wide.

  “Hello, Joanna.”

  A little gasp of shock escaped Joanna’s lips, but she said nothing.

  “I suppose you’re wondering why I’m here,” Harlan said. “I was supposed to be on call tonight, but there’s been a change of plans.”

  Again, Joanna said nothing. She wouldn’t even meet his eyes.

  “Joanna, what’s wrong?”

  She scoffed. “What’s wrong?” she repeated, mocking him. “You can actually ask me that with a straight face? You’re even more of a scoundrel than I thought.”

  “Joanna—“

  “Don’t you Joanna me. You’ve got some serious explaining to do, Harlan Wilkinson. Whatever made you think you could sleep with that cheap tramp Starla Berring without me finding out about it? Whatever made you think you could get away with traipsing around your office naked? Honestly, Harlan, what is going through your head? What the hell do you take me for—an idiot?”

  “Joanna, let me explain—“

  “Explain? Explain? There’s nothing for you to explain. Why don’t I explain things to you?”

  Harlan blinked, but showed no emotion. “Go ahead.”

  “For one thing, Harlan, you are damn lucky to have me for a wife. Damn lucky. Do you know how many women out there would be willing to put up with even one-tenth of what I put up with from you? Here’s a clue. Zero. You’re an arrogant, selfish ogre, Harlan. Especially lately.”

  Harlan bit his lip and stared at the carpet. “I don’t deny that.”

  Joanna just kept right on going. “You know what else you are? A liar and a cheat.”

  Harlan’s jaw tensed. “No, Joanna, I am not. I’ve never lied to you, and I’ve never cheated on you. Ever.”

  At this, Joanna, actually laughed. “You really expect me to believe that after the way you were openly flirting with that floozy Starla Berring right in front of me? You expect me to believe that after somebody found you with your pants down in your office?”

  “No, I don’t expect you to believe it. But I do expect you to give me a chance to explain myself. So I’ll ask again. Joanna, please let me explain.”

  “Fine. Go ahead.” She flopped backward into a chair. “I’m all ears.”

  Harlan took a deep breath, then blew it out though his mouth. “All right, here goes. I know you saw how Starla Berring was throwing herself at me in the OR. I know it might have seemed like I was enjoying it from your point of view, but truth be told it made me furious. How can someone be so completely lacking in morals that she openly flirts with a married man right in front of his wife? I mean, it’s just mind-boggling. Don’t you think so?”

  Joanna agreed with every word Harlan had just said. But she wasn’t about to give Harlan the satisfaction of showing it. She just folded her arms across her chest and stared her husband down.

  Harlan shook it off and kept on with his story. “After you stormed out, I tried to drop a few subtle hints for Starla to back off and leave me alone. You know what she did instead? She flashed me her tits. They’re fake, by the way. Cheap boob job if I ever saw one.”

  Joanna gasped.

  “You want to know what happened then?”

  Tongue-tied, Joanna gave her husband a single nod.

  “I had to get out of there. For two reasons. I was disgusted, for one. And I had the world’s biggest hard-on, for another.”

  “But—you just said you didn’t cheat on me!”

  “I didn’t, Joanna. But you have to forgive me for being human. A male human. Unfortunately, most members of the male species can’t help getting erect when they see a pair of naked breasts, even if they are made mostly of cheap silicone. I bolted out of there as fast as I could and headed for my private office. Not just because I felt dirty and wanted to hide, but also because there was something really important that I had to do.”

  “Such as?”

  Harlan reddened. “This is where it gets sort of embarrassing.”

  “I don’t give a damn whether you’re embarrassed or not,” Joanna snarled. “Out with it.”

  Harlan wrung his perfect surgeon’s hands together. “Joanna, I think it goes without saying that you and I haven’t been doing much in the bedroom lately. We’ve both been working too hard. But all of that tension still has to go somewhere. And today, it went into the shower stall in my private office.”

  Joanna’s eyes widened. “You mean—“

  “Yes, Joanna. I jerked off in the shower. Then I fell asleep without getting dressed. That’s it.”

  Joanna covered her mouth and giggled like a young girl. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously. I had so much—well—stuff backed up in those parts that I pretty much passed out afterward. Maryam Malone had to wake me up with smelling salts.” He grimaced. “Boy, that woman is not a nice sight to wake up to. Unlike you.”

  Harlan took both of his wife’s hands in his own. “Joanna, what we have together is rare and special. I don’t want to throw it all away just because we’ve had a rough couple of months. Do you?”

  Joanna lowered her eyes and shook her head. “But things can’t go on like they have been.”

  “I know. And they won’t. I promise.”

  “How do I know that, Harlan? You don’t always follow through on your promises the way you should.”

  “I know. I’ll try to get better about it.” He paused and bit his lip again. “We could, ahh, we could go to counseling, if you like.” He squeezed Joanna’s hands hard. “Though I can’t guarantee it will work. I’m kind of hard-headed, if you haven’t already noticed.”

  “We’ll have to make it work, Harlan. No matter what. Do you know why?”

  “I can only imagine.”

  “Harlan, I’m pregnant.”

  Harlan swept his wife up out of her chair and carried her over to their bed. He set her down gently upon the rumpled bedspread, and covered her with passionate kisses. After a long moment they finally came up for air, and Harlan gently stroked his wife’s cheek with his fingertips. “I’m the luckiest man on earth, Joanna.”

  “Yes, you are,” she replied, and smiled.

  “How about you remind me of just how lucky I am? Think you can do that?”

  “I know I can.”

  There were no more words spoken between them. There was no need for them. Frantic hands seized upon clothes and tore them off bodies. They soon rediscovered each other, the incredible feel of naked skin upon naked skin, the heady sensation of their hot, mingled breath, the animal sounds and scents that arose whenever their bodies touched. All the weeks and months of anger and animosity melted away, and was replaced with nothing but bliss.

  There’s a reason why make-up sex is always the best sex of all.

  Harlan caressed his wife’s perfect body, taking special care to be gentle. Joanna carried precious cargo, after all. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t still love that body of hers to the fullest extent. No, Harlan had no intention of hesitating when it came to pleasuring his wife. He would pull out all the stops in that department, just like he always had.

  Harlan went down on his wife and gave her the tongue treatment of her life.

  Every touch of his ton
gue on her clit was pure joy. She came almost instantly, and her body responded again and again and again, becoming a live wire of nonstop ecstasy. He passed the tip of his tongue over ground zero again and again, turning her hot little nub into molten lava with each pass, all the while moving his nimble surgeon’s fingers in and out of her, pulsating them against her G-spot until Joanna thought her entire body would dissolve.

  All at once, Joanna remembered why she married this man. The arguments, the tension, the misunderstandings—none of it mattered now. All that mattered now was their sweating, straining bodies, and how they made each other feel.

  Joanna was so desperate to have Harlan inside her now that she grabbed him and physically lifted his entire body so that he hovered over her, his cock at the perfect angle for penetration. He slid into her satin sheath without being asked, knowing instinctively when and how to cleave deep into her body. They moved as one, sharing the best part of themselves, with the tiny embryo they’d both helped create tucked safely inside the space between them.

  Harlan thrust into his wife softly and gently at first, concerned about harming the precious cargo she carried deep within her. But Joanna’s primal nature took over, moving her body in ways she never thought possible, ways that showed Harlan that his wife’s so-called delicate condition didn’t necessarily mean delicate where sex was concerned.

  Quite the contrary, in fact. Something about being pregnant made Joanna feel more sexual than she’d ever felt in her life. All her senses were elevated, her arousal was more intense, and her orgasms seemed endless, taking over her entire body. Every cell of her body exploded with desire and love for her husband and her child, turning their lovemaking into a deep spiritual experience. It was a level of passion she’d never known was possible.

  They rode the wave together, higher and higher, deeper and deeper, until the tide rose and flooded their entire worlds.