Four Billionaires for St. Patrick's Day

by Sierra Sparks

  He nibbles my neck and hugs me tight before lowering me back down, so that I’m sitting on the desk looking up at him.

  “I love you too,” I tell him, looking up into his eyes. “I really do.”

  “I’m glad,” he says. “I thought I might be too late.”

  “You’re not.” I grab a hold of his hands, taking them in mine. “I love you. And that’s why there’s something about Dr. Davis that you’re really not going to like, but that I really have to tell you.”

  Chapter 48 – Harlow

  “Well good,” I say, as I help Whitney off the desk. “I was hoping you had some dirt on him.”

  I pull up my pants as she does the same and then goes to sit at her computer chair.

  “Can you please hold off on the official business for a minute?” I ask her. “I just need a moment to sit here and bask in how hot that sex was just now.”

  “It was amazing,” she says, smiling.

  I had waited for what felt like a really long time, without really thinking I would ever get to be with her again. But as soon as I was with her, my body knew just what it had been needing. I finish getting dressed and then I sit down at the chair across from her desk.

  “I think the signs were always there for me with Dr. Davis. I just didn’t want to see them,” I tell her. “But the more I thought about it, the weirder things seemed. What I’m the maddest at myself for, though, is not trusting you. I know you would only ever have my best interest at heart. I just couldn’t believe it because I’m not used to being in a relationship.”

  “So we’re in a relationship, are we?” she says, grinning.

  “You’d better believe it. And you’d better remember it if you keep wanting wild office sex.”

  “About that…”

  Her grin turns into a slight frown.

  “Yes?”

  “I think we should cool it at work. Seriously. Dr. Davis said that he received a call informing him that you and I are having a relationship at work.”

  “What?” I ask, astonished.

  “Yeah, and the funny thing is that at that time we hadn’t even had sex! And I wasn’t even your physical therapist. But of course, Dr. David blackmailed me with that, and a bunch of other things. He said that he would report us if I didn’t stop working with you.”

  “He must have really thought it would work,” I tell her. “Because he told me you wouldn’t be contacting me. But you sure did.”

  “I sure did,” she says, smiling. “You can’t keep a crazed woman down.”

  “You needed some more of those orgasms, didn’t you?” I ask her, and I love her mischievous, flirty smile she flashes back at me.

  “Yes I did. But I decided not to be worried about him anymore, and instead of to figure out what was up with him. But still, it’s probably not a good idea to be doing this in the office in the future— and giving anyone any evidence to back up his claims.”

  “So someone reported us?” I ask, still stunned at that news.

  “It was obviously Tony,” she says, waving a dismissive hand as if he was so last year’s news. It’s an adorable gesture. “I saw a mutual friend of ours when we were at Apothecary. She’d always had a crush on him so she must have told him she saw me out with you.”

  “Poor girl,” I joke. “To have a crush on someone like Tony.”

  “I know, right?” She says. “Someone like that must have really high aspirations in life.”

  We both laugh and it feels good to be together, relaxing, talking.

  “So, I agree that we shouldn’t do anything to get either of us into trouble,” I tell her. “But there has to be some kind of loophole. Aren’t physical therapists and patients ever allowed to date? To have sex? On top of that, you’re not even my physical therapist any more. Lance is.”

  “I know,” she says, with a sigh and a shrug. “And at the time, I was thinking it didn’t matter since you weren’t my patient and then we weren’t together anymore.”

  She looks down at the floor, and I still feel so bad for leaving her like that. I reach out and take her hand.

  “Lance had originally mentioned something about I could lose my internship over being with you,” she says. “So, I kept meaning to go look up the rules about that. In the HR policy. But then everything changed and plus I was focused so much on discovering the truth about Dr. Davis that I didn’t have time to worry about my own problems.”

  She laughs.

  “But now that we’re back ‘on,’ which I’m really happy about of course, it could mean danger at work, because they might assume we were together during that time period where I was your patient. Especially since Dr. Davis will tell them that. So I do need to look at the policy to see where we stand. But it’s probably best to just keep things on the downlow for a while.”

  “But I don’t want that little twerp Tony to win,” I protest. “If people can’t know we’re a couple, then he’ll get his way. It would suck to have to sneak around with my own girlfriend.”

  “Whoa, hold on, back up,” she says, laughing her amazing laugh. “Girlfriend?”

  “Well, of course I want you to be my girlfriend,” I tell her. “I just told you I love you. I guess I just assume those two things go hand in hand, but, I don’t know, since, just like you’d never orgasmed before you were with me, I’ve never told a girl I loved her before just now.”

  “Awwww,” she says, leaning over to kiss me.

  Then she backs up and we both realize at the same time that she hadn’t said it back.

  “I love you,” she says, kissing me all over my face. “I love you, I love you, I love you. And yes, I want to be your girlfriend. I just think we should keep it on the downlow for a while, because… there’s some other news I have to tell you….”

  She looks so excited that I can’t possibly think of what it could be.

  “What?” I ask her, curiously.

  “I’ve applied to medical school.”

  “That’s great! Whitney, really? All because of what I said?”

  She shrugs.

  “Well, it’s something I always wanted to do. You had a point. And I didn’t see a future here for me anyway. At the time anyway. But now I do. Of course. But back then, I thought that the best thing to do was to move on, and to take part of you with me— your advice.”

  “Smart move.” I wink at her. “And I’m sure you were also taking awesome memories of how I fucked you silly and made you come for the first time.”

  “Of course. But seriously, now we really have to be careful,” she says. “I don’t want anything to ruin my application. I need this internship to still be active when they look at it.”

  “Or, we could find a loophole,” I tell her. “Why don’t you pull up that HR policy or employee handbook or whatever it is, so we can find a way to be together for real? I want to show you off. Let the world know how hot my new girlfriend is.

  She laughs.

  “Okay, okay. But after I fill you in on what’s up with Dr. Davis. So now can I tell you what I’ve found out?” Whitney begs, obviously anxious to spill the beans.

  “Sure. I’ve sufficiently recovered from our knock-down drag-out sex session.”

  “Okay, here’s a print-out of all the patients Dr. Davis has treated,” she says, reaching to retrieve a piece of paper from her printer, and handing it to me. “I’ve redacted their names and any other identifying information for patient privacy sake, but, the important thing to look at is the colors I’ve used to highlight them.”

  “Little Miss Type A,” I say, impressed.

  I look at the sheet of paper but it’s not very helpful since I have no idea what I’m looking at. It’s full of red and green highlights, so it vaguely reminds me of the different flavors of chile. Or a Christmas decoration.

  “The red color represents all the patients that Dr. Davis has treated initially but never went any further with. The green color represents patients that he’s continued to treat, and referred to physical therapy.�
�

  There are only three green names.

  “One of those is you,” Whitney says.

  “Is the other one named Alex Crenshaw?”

  Whitney looks surprised.

  “I can’t say. HIPPA laws.”

  She shrugs, still the rule-follower despite the fact that she just let me fuck her on her desk. But her reaction gave it away. One of them was Alex Crenshaw.

  “But the other two are recent post-surgery patients. They were in traumatic accidents but, like you, they recovered rather quickly.”

  “I guess the other one isn’t Jesse Morrow?” I ask, already knowing the answer since Dr. Davis had told me, but hoping that he somehow still made it through.

  “Have you talked to Jesse Morrow recently?” Whitney asks, her eyebrows raised.

  “You know Jesse Morrow?” I ask, wanting to know the answer to her question first.

  “I did a little recon,” she says, her cute cheeks blushing a shade of rose.

  “Very nice,” I tell her.

  “Let’s just use him as an example,” she says. “Since both of us are familiar with his situation. He’s an average service member, wounded in the line of duty, with some pretty major injuries and a lot of work that needs to be done.”

  I nod.

  “He’ll probably never end up back in active duty— but still, very few do— and he could benefit from intense physical therapy and further treatment, probably with an integrated approach. Occupational therapy, counseling, and some sort of guidance or transition as to what he should do with this future.”

  “Sure,” I say, nodding my head. “Jesse Morrow deserves that. They all deserve that.”

  “You know…”

  She begins, and I can tell she almost thinks better of telling me whatever she was about to say.

  “What?”

  “It’s just, when I was talking to Jesse, he mentioned that he’d asked you to come to his surgery, and had never heard another word from you. I mean, he was really understanding and nice about it, and I knew that you had gone to visit him because Lance told me he saw you there, but I didn’t say anything because I wasn’t sure…”

  “Fuck,” I say. “Fuck fuck fuck.”

  “What?”

  “Damn Dr. Davis. I did go to see Jesse but his surgery had just finished and he was too doped up to recognize me. I left a card for him. Dr. Davis acted hella sketchy, which makes perfect sense now. He said he would make sure he received it, and would let him know I dropped by.”

  “Well, lo and behold, Dr. Davis didn’t live up to his word. Shocker,” Whitney says, and I nod.

  “How can I get in touch with him? I need to explain what happened.”

  “I may be able to get you some contact information from his file,” she says, with a sly smile.

  “Awww. You’re the best. I knew there was a reason I was into you.”

  And I knew she’d bend the rules when the right situation presented itself.

  “Very funny,” she says. “But let’s get back on track. We are using this patient as an example, correct? He deserves further treatment, correct?”

  I nod.

  “But Dr. Davis doesn’t want to work with him,” she concludes, marking a big X next to his redacted name. “Or him, or him, or her, or any other average service member.”

  Soon her X’s line the page, and it’s obvious how angry she is. And it’s touching to see how much she cares.

  “So, this is where I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it affects you.”

  “Okay. Shoot. I’m ready.”

  I’ve been on such a roller coaster ride since meeting Whitney— or since my helicopter crashed, actually— that I shouldn’t think it’s possible for me to be surprised by anything anymore. But I never expected her latest revelations, and I know I can’t be sure of what’s coming down the pipeline. I just want her to tell me, so that we can deal with it together.

  Chapter 49 – Harlow

  “Well, the three of you who were referred for more treatment are really cream of the crop type scenarios,” Whitney continues. “You’re all in some type of Special Forces, and although your accidents were certainly traumatic, they didn’t affect you to the extent that some of the others were affected by their accidents. You also had an advantage when it came to possessing natural strength and willpower after your accidents. Much of what Dr. Davis is taking credit for, you would have already done naturally on your own.”

  “But. I was helpless without Dr. Davis,” I protest. “I couldn’t even write my own name. Neither could Alex.”

  “And don’t you think that’s just a little coincidental?” Whitney asks.

  I pause. Just when I think I had figured out all the clues, she has to go and point out something obvious.

  “Look,” she continues. “I thought about all of this. I’ve had a lot of time to work on this, since I was jilted by my lover for the heinous crime of trying to help him out.”

  “Very funny,” I sneer, but I still feel a strong twinge of guilt.

  “When I first saw Dr. Davis’ videos of you, and even the modern day version of you on the stage, I thought he was somehow exaggerating your current condition to make it seem better than it was. There was no way that someone could go from nearly brain dead— which is how Dr. Davis portrayed your original condition— to fully functioning and normal, in such a short amount of time.”

  I crinkle my eyebrows at her, not entirely convinced.

  “I mean, I’m no neurologist,” she continues, “but neither is Dr. Davis. And that got me thinking too. I’ve never seen or even heard of a patient making much such giant strides in my experience in physical therapy school, and Dr. Davis isn’t even a physical therapist. He’s a facial reconstructive surgeon. His latest technologies in that field are definitely very impressive, and he deserves credit where credit’s due. But I started to wonder why he’s trying to take credit in fields in which he has no experience.”

  “Yeah. That is pretty weird.”

  “So then it struck me that Dr. Davis is exaggerating, or flat out lying, in the opposite direction than in the one I originally assumed. You weren’t nearly as bad off as Dr. Davis claims.”

  I look at her, not sure if I want to believe her or not.

  “You did have a bad accident, and you required facial reconstruction surgery if you ever wanted to look like anything resembling normal again,” she continues, gently. “You also benefitted from physical therapy-type exercises, but you would have been doing those on your own anyway. Basically, Dr. Davis had little to nothing to do with that part. And you didn’t have brain damage.”

  Whitney spins her monitor to face me and then she pushes “play” on a video. It’s the one where I can’t write my name, except that it’s a longer, uncut version, showing wider angels and obviously unedited.

  “See, there’s an IV. You’re hooked up to morphine. This was right after one of your surgeries. You were clearly drugged out of your mind.”

  “And who could write their name when they’re in that state?” I wonder.

  “Exactly. It’s the same with Alex, and the other guy. Once the medication wore off, you were perfectly fine to write your name or do any other task.”

  “Hrmph. This really is making so much sense now. Especially because I saw Jesse Morrow right after his surgery, and he was definitely on a lot of meds. Couldn’t tell up from down.”

  “Now you’ve got it,” Whitney says. “I imagine Dr. Davis soon had him try to write his name in that condition, just in case he needed to show it later, as ‘evidence’ that he was so bad off and had come so far.”

  “Oh my god. Dr. Davis is the worst.”

  My normally confident attitude is fading. I’m glad that most of my recovery has been something for which I alone can take credit, but I feel stupid for letting Dr. Davis dupe me. And I can’t even figure out why he would do it. But before I can wrap my head around it, Whitney drops even more devastating news.

  “Now here’s the pa
rt that I really wish didn’t exist,” she says, pushing my file over to me. “But I think you need to take a look at that.”

  I open it up to notes from the military about my progress. The board says I’m “cleared for service,” but Dr. Davis says I need more treatment first. According to the minutes from the sessions, the board took testimony from Dr. Davis and then decided I did need additional work, but wanted a third party to treat and evaluate me.

  “So everything Dr. Davis has told me has been a lie!”

  I can barely control my anger. I want to go find him and wring his neck right now.

  “It’s been the exact opposite of what’s really going on!” I nearly explode.

  “Apparently,” Whitney confirms. “He was telling you that he recertified you but the military wouldn’t accept it. In reality, it was the other way around.”

  “But why? Does he just get some sick pleasure in screwing with people’s lives? Or only with mine?”

  “The way I see it is like this,” Whitney says, reaching across the desk and gently squeezing my hand.

  It’s clear that she’s had more time to think everything through, and I appreciate her telling me, but I feel like such a putz.

  “Dr. Davis needs funding, and then he needed to sell his company. He needed to have the military on board. And for a while you were his only good candidate: the perfect turn-around patient success story. He needs you to trot across the stage for him and demonstrate how he helped you overcome all your issues. He needs you to talk other service members into being treated by him, and not giving up or having a bad attitude, etc.”

  “I sure did that job well,” I admit, feeling guilty.

  “It’s fine, Harlow. You didn’t know. He’s just a total user. If someone doesn’t show the immediate progress you did, he cuts them loose. There are many, many service members who can’t show that progress, and so almost none are good enough for Dr. Davis’ purposes. And he keeps you on the hook until he can find some other worthy candidates.”

  “Well, at least I’m not the only sucker anymore,” I say. “But I don’t know whether that should make me feel good or bad.”