It was delicious.
She must have whimpered or begged because he laughed evilly in her ear. “No mercy. I told you this time is going to be nice and slow.”
Each word was punctuated with a thrust. One more and she found herself falling over the edge of bliss, moaning and twisting underneath him as her orgasm rushed through her.
Not that he seemed to care. He was relentless. He didn’t speed up, but he also didn’t slow down. He just continued to pump inside her until she came again.
And again.
Round three took place in the shower. And it was everything he said it would be. He fell to his knees in front of her and did things with his mouth that were sinful. Then he let her run her soapy hands all over his body giving her all the leeway she wanted to enjoy his erection.
Slumped against the shower wall, the warm water rushing over her satisfied body, she concluded she wasn’t going to live through the night. Camille also decided it was a very nice way to die.
“Come on, sex fiend. You need to eat.”
He was standing in her bathroom, a towel wrapped around his hips. He looked relaxed and completely at home. Camille found herself focusing on the sight of his big bare feet on her pink bath mat.
“I figure we’ll order in,” he said as he ran his hand around his jaw as if debating whether he needed to shave. She knew he’d shaved for their date. His face had been cleaned of scruff when he arrived at her door and it made her happy that he’d taken the time to look nice for her. But his beard must grow rather quickly because she’d felt the scruff of his cheek on the inside of her thigh when he was doing the sinful thing with his mouth.
She didn’t want him to shave very often.
“Pizza okay with you? Or what about Chinese?”
Camille shut off the shower and shook her head. Not to expel the water from her hair but in an attempt to gain some mental ground. Wyatt reached out his hand to help her from the shower stall. She took it even though she’d been getting out of this shower stall on her own perfectly fine for years.
Once she was on the bath mat with him, he pulled the towel off his hips and used it to dry her. Her shoulders and arms. Then her breasts and stomach, working his way down to her legs.
“You’ll need to do your hair yourself. I don’t know how to make those turban things.”
“Turban things?”
“You know the way women wrap their hair up in the towel. I think it’s hot by the way.”
Camille bent over and wrapped her hair in the towel. When she looked at herself in the mirror she didn’t think she looked particularly sexy. But Wyatt was gazing at her through the reflection and the wolflike smile was back. He ran his hands over her breasts and seeing him touch her made her shudder again.
It couldn’t be possible, she thought. After so much sex she couldn’t respond to him again.
“I know I said four rounds, but we need to eat first. I need energy.” He kissed the side of her neck then left the bathroom.
“I say pizza. A large one with lots of meat on it,” he called to her from her bedroom.
Camille found her robe on the hook inside the door and wrapped herself in it, closing the ends over her chest. She walked back to her bedroom to find him putting on his pants and T-shirt.
“Please tell me you like meat on your pizza. So many women don’t and—”
“Get out.”
She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t have this man in her house with his big bare feet and his wicked mouth. He’d made her be someone else for hours, but now she remembered who she was. She was Camille Larson. She was a brilliant surgeon. She was a solitary individual. She didn’t have great sex. She didn’t shower with men. She didn’t enjoy post-sex pizza.
“Camille.”
She shook her head. “No, I mean it. I can’t…” The panic was nearly overwhelming. “You need to leave.”
He walked toward her slowly as if approaching a wild animal. “I know you’re freaked out by this. I know this isn’t typical for you—”
“How do you know anything about me? You don’t know me. We went on one date. One horrible date. And this…this was just sex.”
It wasn’t anywhere close to just sex. Which was why she was about to have a panic attack. She really didn’t want him to witness that.
“Camille, this wasn’t only sex and you know it. And I know about you because I’ve been watching you for months now. Hell, maybe even years. You don’t leave the hospital with anyone, ever. You’re on call more than any surgeon I’ve ever known. Your life is cutting people open and you do it better than anyone, but you can have more.”
“I don’t need more.”
“Do you want more? Because it sure as hell felt like you did for the past three hours.”
Was that how long it had been? Three hours. In some ways it had felt like a lifetime. She strove for a casualness she didn’t feel. “I don’t want a relationship if that’s what you mean. This was fun. But this was it.”
“You are such a liar.” He was angry. She could see it in his eyes and hard jaw.
“You can’t understand that a woman might not want to be in a relationship with the great and almighty Dr. Wyatt Holladay, is that it?”
“No,” he snarled, moving into her space. “I can’t understand why after three hours of the best sex you have ever had—and don’t even try to deny that—you’re pulling this act. We have a chance here, Camille. We can be happy. Don’t let your hang-ups get in the way of that.”
Hang-ups. He had no idea.
“Are you still going to look at those cases I gave you?”
He turned away from her then and she could see that he was biting his tongue to stop himself from saying what he wanted to. “Yes, I’m going to look at the cases.”
“Thank you.”
“No,” he said as he gathered his shirt and shoes. “Thank you. You’re one heck of a good lay.”
It was supposed to hurt and it did. She wrapped her arms around her body and held tight in case there was more.
He was at her bedroom door when he stopped. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. I’m pissed at you, Camille. Royally pissed. And this, whatever the hell it is, is not over.”
She didn’t move as she heard him pound his way down the hallway. She didn’t react when she heard him slam the front door. It wasn’t until Aphrodite found her and started curling around her ankles that she began to shake.
She shook for minutes until the numbness settled in.
Chapter 5
Camille left the hospital the next day with an immense sense of relief. Success. She had avoided Wyatt Holladay for ten hours. It had not been done without a degree of difficulty. As immature as it had been to want to evade the man she’d slept with last night—although she was sure women did it every year after office holiday parties—she told herself it was a necessity.
Maybe tomorrow she could face him. Maybe tomorrow if he cornered her and asked her why she threw him out of her home after some of the most intense sex she’d ever known, she could explain it. Maybe.
But not today.
Instead, today she’d broken several self-imposed rules. Rather than being at the hospital an hour before surgery to avoid any chance of a delay in her schedule, she’d waited until the last minute to show up in the O.R.
Plus she’d arrived already dressed in a pair of scrubs rather than her typical business attire. The locker room where she changed each day was too close to the clinic where Wyatt worked.
Camille could almost hear her grandfather’s severe voice in her head.
Dressing appropriately for work is a sign of respect for your employer, your patients and yourself.
It was his rule number fifty-six. Despite him being gone now for three years, she had never broken it. She had never broken any of them until today.
Camille strongly suspected that was part of her problem.
Her surgical schedule for the day had helped her avoidance efforts. Back-to-back surgeries hadn�
��t allowed for much of a break in between. She’d barely had enough time to change, scrub in again and return to the OR. A place where she knew he wouldn’t confront her. He would appreciate the concentration required to operate and would do nothing to distract her in that room.
Now she was out of the hospital, leaving through the physicians’ entrance to where her car was parked, seconds from a true escape. In addition to the relief of having avoided a confrontation, she couldn’t help feeling a sense of disappointment.
He hadn’t come looking for her. He hadn’t sought her out.
She was grateful for that and she was also bereft. Which made her contrary and quite possibly insane and in no way capable of having and sustaining a workable romantic relationship.
Annoyed with herself, she started to let the door behind her swing closed.
“Hey, Dr. Larson.”
Turning at the sound of the voice, Camille was relieved when she spotted Ruby running behind her. She wasn’t necessarily up for another round with her boss, either. The conversation she’d had yesterday with Delia regarding her role in Logan’s departure hadn’t sat well with Camille. That she’d earned her employer’s disapproval was clear. Whether it was justified or not. The only other person she could remember disappointing before was her grandfather.
He was a man who set the bar very high.
She held the door for Delia’s assistant and waited for the girl with the too vibrant tan to catch up.
A sudden thought occurred to Camille. “Ruby, tell me truthfully, how is Delia holding up under all the pressure?”
“You’ve seen her,” Ruby replied, hitching her purse over her shoulder as they both made their way down the cement stairs toward the paved lot. “She’s crazy. Everything she wants, it’s ASAP. She’s shouting more than ever, demanding more than ever. I used to think I liked my job. Of course, you giving Dr. Dade the heave-ho did not help.”
Camille stopped. “I didn’t fire the man. He chose to leave. That is not my responsibility.”
“That’s not the way most people see it. And when he and Delia were hooking up… Well, let’s say she was a lot mellower and easier to deal with.”
It took a second for Camille to process what the assistant had said. “Wait a minute. You mean Dr. Dade, Dr. Logan Dade was…was…”
“Shagging the boss?” Ruby supplied. “Uh, yeah. Everybody knew it.”
“No wonder she’s been so annoyed with me.”
At first, Camille had taken Delia’s sudden coolness as a joke. Like she was only pretending to be mad that Dade had left. But yesterday, it became too real. Surely a reasonable, intelligent woman wouldn’t hold Camille at fault for Dade’s ego. But if she’d been sleeping with him, that changed everything. Reasonable, intelligent women could become irrational and mindless when their hearts were on the line. Camille knew that for a fact.
“She never said anything to me,” Camille muttered.
It wasn’t as though she could call Delia a friend. Camille really couldn’t call anyone a friend. She chose to isolate herself and it worked. Still, sometimes she sat at the same table with Delia in the hospital cafeteria. Other times they talked about shoes. That was sort of like a friendship. At least a fond acquaintance. But Delia never told her that she was sleeping with Logan. Camille was certain that was something two female friends should have discussed.
Unless Delia thought Camille was sleeping with him, too, and she didn’t want to know.
“It’s not like it was a big deal. Dr. Dade was pretty much banging everyone in this hospital. The man was a legend. And apparently into some pretty kinky stuff. I’m sorry I never had my chance at him, but I couldn’t very well take my shot while he was also banging the boss. That’s a little too…close for comfort, if you get my drift.”
For Camille the idea of sleeping with Dade was nauseating. That was the only drift she needed to catch.
Ruby looked at her with an admonishing expression. “You are to blame for a lot of broken hearts around here. I mean, people were really mad at you. I hate to tell you this, Doc, but some people still— Oh, wow. That is messed up.”
They had reached the first row of parking spots. Camille already had her automatic starter in her hand. As she approached the engine roared to life but then she saw exactly what Ruby had so accurately described.
It was, in fact, messed up.
A brutal, ugly, gash ran along the side of her silver BMW. Her windshield sported a crack that hadn’t been there when she parked it that morning. Moving around the vehicle, trying to absorb the impact of what was done, she saw a sister streak on the other side dug into the paint.
“You got keyed. That isn’t right. I don’t care how pissed off people are at you, taking it out on a Beemer is flat out insane.”
It took a second for Camille to clear her thoughts and process what the girl was saying.
“Ruby, no one did this to me. It was a kid. Some vandal.” Camille studied the damage. She didn’t want to believe that anyone could harbor this much anger toward her. To be the target of so much rage, it wasn’t right. She had done nothing to warrant it.
“If you say so. But how come none of the other cars are trashed? Sorry, Doc, this looks like someone is still not over Dr. Dade in a serious way.”
“But he left a month ago,” she said, more to herself. “If anyone was that in love with him, why didn’t they continue to see him? City General isn’t even a half hour away from here.”
Ruby moved close and ran her finger along one of the key scrapes. “You know how it is, Dr. Larson. You start somewhere new you want a clean break. Dr. Dade has moved on and someone has decided to take it out on you.”
“Who?” Odd, Camille thought. For a second Wyatt’s name floated through her head. He seemed this angry last night. This hurtful. But as soon as she thought of him, his name disappeared. Confronting her face-to-face was more his style.
This sneak attack wasn’t him at all.
“Don’t know. Like I said, there are plenty of candidates. See you, Doc. Good luck with the car.”
With that the girl practically skipped away. Thank goodness she was leaving for the day. The news of Camille’s car vandalism wouldn’t spread like wildfire until first thing the next morning.
As she made her way home, Camille had to tilt her head to avoid the crack that ran through the windshield. She’d call the insurance company when she got home, but she wasn’t going to the police. To call them would make it seem too real. As if Ruby had been right about someone doing this to her maliciously. Camille thought about Delia and Logan and wondered how much the hospital CEO had been impacted by the end of their relationship.
Had Delia had wanted to pursue the relationship outside of work? It wouldn’t have been easy for her. The woman hadn’t left the hospital before 10:00 p.m. for the past month and she was there most weekends. Much like Camille. If she was seeing someone, they weren’t spending a great deal of time together. And it wasn’t like Logan to change his schedule to accommodate someone else.
Then again, quickies, by their very definition, didn’t take a lot of time.
Camille shuddered with the memory of what one of those looked like.
She’d caught Dade once in the on-call lounge. A quiet spot with two beds where a doctor could catch some sleep. He’d had Marie, a surgical nurse, cornered up against the wall. Her back to him. It had been rough and quick with a great deal of grunting. Mid grunt Dade had turned his head, aware that someone had entered the room. He’d smiled at Camille. It had been smug and twisted and it sent her flying out of there faster than if the floor had been covered with spiders.
The thought of Delia being a partner in that made her sad. Realistically, Dade had probably ended their affair as soon as she was no longer useful to him. Camille had no problem imagining Logan using Delia for what he could get out of her. She only hoped that Delia hadn’t realized his true purpose.
And she hoped she hadn’t been one of those women in the on-call lounge.
An intelligent, driven woman who ran a hospital shouldn’t be used that way. As nothing more than a body with her face pressed into the wall.
The next day Camille entered the hospital determined to put the vandalism out of her mind. She would let someone in administration know what happened, of course. They might want to post a warning on the message board in the staff lounge regarding being on the lookout for a vandal in the area.
That was only courteous. It also made it less about her in particular.
She’d made the appointment with her dealer to get the car fixed and was now driving a loaner. She hated the idea of knowing that if someone had done this to her on purpose they would see how she’d been inconvenienced. She hated knowing that this might have been done to her at all.
First, Delia’s disapproval. Now, someone’s irrational anger aimed at her. These weren’t things Camille was used to dealing with. She had no skill set to combat it.
With her grandfather it had been easy. She needed to live up to his expectations. A difficult but clearly defined goal. How did someone fight an enemy she couldn’t identify? Or deal with anger that was unjustified?
It was vexing but ironically it wasn’t the car that bothered her most last night as she lay in her bed not sleeping. Thoughts of Wyatt filled her head and she’d been unable to eject them.
He hadn’t tried to contact her yesterday.
When she’d gotten home and had time to think about it, she thought it was strange he hadn’t sought her out at least once. Despite her tactics, he could have found her if he really wanted to.
He could have called her.
Someone had vandalized her car, and even though there was no possible way he could have known that, she thought how soothing it would have been if he’d called to see if she was all right.
The Doctor's Deadly Affair Page 5