Just Right: The Bradfords, Book 1

by Erin Nicholas

  “And you think for some reason that I’m this big hero and wouldn’t think of pressing my advantage, right?” he asked against her lips.

  “You are a hero. It’s not a matter of opinion. You’re a good guy.”

  “What if I told you my heroics don’t extend to gorgeous virgins who go soft in my hands?”

  It probably wasn’t a good thing that he knew his effect on her so well.

  “It does,” she said with confidence. “You don’t want to pressure me.”

  His hips moved into hers. “Don’t I?”

  But she could see him already resigned and it only made her infatuation with him stronger. She knew as well as he did that he could easily make love to her tonight and she wouldn’t even be upset tomorrow.

  The fact he was not going to push proved that he was truly one of the good guys—the kind of guy who saved strangers’ lives for a living.

  “I need a drink,” he said as they stepped apart. “I’m obviously thinking too clearly.”

  Jess readjusted her clothes. “Thinking clearly is not necessarily a bad thing.”

  “I’m not making love to you right now. That’s a bad thing.”

  She was so happy he’d backed off with a simple request—and with the fact that she’d been coherent enough to make the request—that she followed him to the bar.

  He ordered a glass of whiskey and downed it in one swallow. She ordered only a soda. They sat on two stools with Ben’s knees on either side of hers, claiming her as his territory with a possessive hand on her thigh.

  That she didn’t mind. His third whiskey she did.

  “I’m driving you to drink?” she asked when the third glass was set in front of him.

  “Gotta fill my free time somehow.” He shot the drink back.

  “No other ideas at all?” she asked dryly.

  “Yeah,” he said, looking toward the corner they’d been making out in. “But you said no.”

  “Sex and drinking are your only options?”

  “Pretty much.”

  “You could…oh, I don’t know, work.”

  He gave her a half smile. “Nah. That sounds too responsible.”

  “That’s one word, one of many, like respectable, rewarding…”

  “I know all about working,” Ben interrupted. “I’ve been working since I was fourteen. I’ve put in thirty-two hour shifts, I’ve seen more than my share of blood and guts and pain. And I’ve also got nothing to show for it.”

  She gasped. “How can you say that? You’ve saved lives!”

  “Yeah.” He shrugged. “But we’re talking about me.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. He was not this selfish. She hoped.

  “You get nothing out of it?” she challenged.

  He narrowed his eyes as if considering the question. “Nope,” he said finally.

  “The feeling of satisfaction, being needed, being someone’s…savior?”

  “Dammit, Jessica,” Ben snapped. “You make it sound like these people have pictures of me on their mantels and bring me sacrifices and pay homage.”

  She opened her mouth to protest, but Ben wasn’t done. He jabbed his index finger against the wooden top of the bar, emphasizing each point.

  “Nine out of ten of the people I work on don’t know my name and remember me only because of some scar on their body. Not to mention that most of them are going to leave the hospital and immediately do something stupid. One of them will light up a cigarette on the ride home. Another will decide that strapping on his seat belt is too damn much work. Someone else will decide that it’s a lot easier to get to sleep at night if she takes a few pills. Some other asshole will beat up his kid because he got beat up by his old man and he thinks that’s how he’s supposed to handle the fact that his life sucks.” Ben’s hand slapped the top of the bar loud enough to make the woman sitting behind him jump, then scowl at him. “Basically what I do is for absolutely nothing in the end. I put people back out there where they can screw things up worse.”

  He was breathing hard and the wonderful mouth that had done such awesome things to her only a few minutes ago was now set in a hard, cold line.

  She didn’t know what to say. If that was how he saw things, could she change his mind? He couldn’t have been a doctor—the doctor she’d watched all these months—without knowing what he did was good.

  “So, you get to walk away when things get tough?” she demanded. “You think things always have to be clean and neat and have happy endings and you have to always be the hero and always do the right thing? What’s the real deal? If you can’t win, you’re not even going to try?”

  Ben felt a hot anger that he would have never believed he could feel toward Jessica. It was so unfair. What she was accusing him of was total crap. But she didn’t know that, because he hadn’t told her. He hadn’t told anyone what had driven him out of the ER.

  “I’ve had plenty of pain and blood and death on my caseload,” he said caustically. “I know more about bad outcomes and defeat than any other surgeon in this city.”

  He wanted to tell her all of it, he realized. He was disappointing her and God knew why it mattered, but it did. Maybe if he told her about Africa she would understand, and forgive him for falling short of her standards.

  Jessica thought she knew what was best for everyone else and he wanted to believe that he only wanted her for a good time. Her expectations were way too much for him to worry about living up to. She was way too demanding for where he was in his life right now.

  But part of him wanted to lean on her. Jessica was led by firm internal directives. She didn’t waffle or flounder over what to do in any circumstance. She knew what to do and she did it.

  He was so tired of having his life turned upside down and not knowing which way to go when the spinning stopped. Maybe she could tell him how he could get over this.

  “I was a missionary in Tanzania for five years,” he finally started. “I led a team that was assigned to the poorest of poor small villages.”

  He took a deep breath. Memories were never far away. During his five years there he’d become part of the community. The people of the village and his team had become his surrogate family.

  “We treated the people medically, of course, but we also worked on prevention and teaching them to treat themselves and each other. We also gave them supplies and equipment and taught them how to use and maintain it.”

  Jessica was watching him with a combination of open interest—which touched him because of how much his missionary work had meant to him—and admiration. The admiration he didn’t want. He hadn’t gone to Africa for any kind of praise or prestige. He’d gone because his father had ingrained in him that those with plenty were called to share with those without. Ben had plenty—money, health, resources and talent. He’d felt drawn back to Tanzania where he’d spent four years with his missionary father. So he’d gone. Three weeks after finishing his surgical residency. And he’d stayed two years longer than he’d planned.

  “What happened?” Jess asked, obviously having grown impatient during his reflection.

  Bitterness rose from his gut through his chest and into his throat. He swallowed and said hoarsely, “A month ago I found out the entire village was wiped out by a rebel army trying to control the region. There weren’t any survivors.”

  Emotion choked him for a moment as faces flashed through his mind, villagers and missionary team members alike.

  He’d lost a lot of people in that one event. Friends, colleagues, people who’d trusted him.

  “Oh, Ben…” Jess reached out and touched his arm.

  He didn’t pull away, but he didn’t want her sympathy either. He wasn’t feeling sorry for himself. He was feeling guilty. To his very core.

  “I worked to save their lives for five years and then they were all wiped out in a day and a half. It was all for nothing.”

  “Ben…” Jess started again.

  He could see her eyes were glossy as if full of tears.


  “Don’t you see?” he asked harshly. “I taught them how to prevent and treat diarrhea, dehydration, infections; all of these things that were killing them off, but in the end I couldn’t keep them alive.”

  “You don’t blame yourself for what happened?” she asked, her tone shocked.

  He blamed himself for leaving them. Not that he could have defended them, but at least then he wouldn’t have been the only one to escape. He also blamed himself for getting into a profession where there was more grief than gratification. He’d seen how it had consumed his father and how his father had given the ultimate sacrifice for it. Why hadn’t Ben known better?

  He shook his head, struggling to put it into words. “I didn’t kill them,” he said, “But I didn’t save them, either. I went in thinking I was going to change their world. I was so full of myself and what I was doing. But in the end, nothing I did mattered. Training midwives to safely deliver babies who would grow up and be slaughtered instead? Did I do them a favor? How about the babies I delivered?”

  He went on before she could interrupt with an attempt at consolation. “I was so self-righteous. I was saving the world. But those babies were almost four when that army came through. They had to watch their village burn and their neighbors and families be killed, feel the terror and then the pain as they were killed. Did I do them a big favor?”

  Jessica seemed to be breathing as hard as he was and he felt her touch on his arm tighten as if holding on to keep him from running away from her.

  Which he considered.

  She was making him face all of this again, when all he wanted to do was forget. And he’d been doing okay at that. Mostly. Some of the time. She was also challenging him to return to the work in spite of knowing better now. He should resent her for making him miss it, for making him consider trying again, in spite of the fact that he knew there would be more bad days than good, more stress and helplessness and unsolvable questions. But he didn’t resent her. In fact, he couldn’t get enough of her.

  Jessica swallowed twice before she said, “But those babies… Their mothers had four years to love them and teach them and—”

  “And then they got to know the pain of losing them, of not being able to protect them. In the end, what I did amounted to nothing.”

  She looked at him for several long seconds. Finally, not sure what else to do, she went with her heart. She slid off of her stool, stepped forward, wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him.

  Ben grabbed her tightly, holding her against his thundering heart. She closed her eyes and simply felt him—and let him feel her.

  He seemed to be content to just hold her. His chin rested on the top of her head and he sighed deeply. Jess felt the sigh clear to her soul. She reveled in giving him comfort.

  They were touching in every possible place they could with clothes on. There was nothing at all sexual about the embrace. Jess also reveled in that.

  After several minutes of breathing together, Ben pulled back and looked down at her. The pain in his eyes had eased somewhat.

  “This is what I need,” he said gruffly. “Life, pleasure, happiness. It’s selfish but I can’t do it any other way. Not anymore. I gave up a lot of comforts in Africa. I missed out on time with my mom. And in the end it was all for nothing.”

  “Ben, sacrifice is part—”

  He put a hand over her mouth. “I want to enjoy now. I put my time in. I did my part.”

  “And now you’re going to party your life away?”

  “I’m going to celebrate life, the good things, the fun things.”

  “Booze?”

  “I was thinking more along these lines.”

  He bent and kissed her.

  It was a gentle, sweet kiss and she certainly had no reason to protest. Ben needed healing, affirmations of life and goodness. She got that. He needed a break. She could understand that.

  But the fact that the village and the events in Africa had meant so much to him spoke volumes about him as a person. A person like Ben wouldn’t hide from those who needed him for long.

  Would he?

  She pulled back, pressed her lips together and looked into his eyes. He had some major issues to deal with. Not only did she not want a man with issues, she wanted one who had some goals that went beyond wasting as much time and money as possible in bars. She needed focus. She needed purpose. And she needed to be with someone who supported that. Not someone who made it his personal mission to distract her from that focus and purpose whenever he could.

  In fact, right now was a perfect example. She was in yet another bar, trying to get Ben to behave, when she should be working on plans at the center, or picking up an extra shift at the hospital or…cleaning her refrigerator. Anything that she might succeed at.

  But she couldn’t leave him here. Lord knew what kind of trouble he would get into.

  “Let me take you home,” she finally said, pulling back from the embrace.

  He looked at her for several seconds and she could tell he was trying to read her expression.

  She understood that he was deeply affected by what had happened, but she wasn’t going to let him use it as an excuse to walk away from everyone who still needed him.

  “Part of winning is getting up no matter how many times your ass hits the ground,” she said. “It’s easy to stay down. It definitely hurts less. But anyone can stay down, Ben.”

  He took a deep breath, then nodded wearily. His eyes dropped to the empty glass in front of him. “It’s especially easy if you don’t have someone constantly pushing you back up.”

  There was no question about who that someone was and he didn’t exactly sound appreciative.

  “Let me take you home,” she said again.

  “Nah.” He looked up at her, a new determination in his eyes. “I’ve only had three drinks,” he said. He looked her up and down. “And I’m not gonna get lucky. At least not with you.”

  Jessica bristled. He was being difficult and contemptuous on purpose. But he wasn’t going to get lucky with anyone else either if she had anything to say about it.

  “Ben, you do not need any more to drink. Let’s go.”

  “Not unless you’re going to sling me over your shoulder and carry me out of here.”

  He motioned to the bartender and Jessica fought a surge of frustrated tears.

  She didn’t want to leave him. He could wrap his car around a tree. He could plow his car into someone else. He could pass out and get robbed. He could get into a fight. Or he could pick up some woman. Basically they were right back to where she’d found him last night.

  But she couldn’t stay. She was falling for him already. It would get harder and harder to remember that all of this was what she didn’t need. She’d had her time of aimlessness and idleness. If that was the direction Ben wanted to go, he’d have to go without her.

  She fought back the tears and picked up her cell phone, punching in Sam’s number. Russ was going to have to be okay with someone else keeping an eye on Ben for a while. She wished that angering Russ was her biggest concern right now. Yes, she wanted the promotion, but she wanted Ben even more—in spite of knowing better. She was potentially walking away from both tonight.

  When her brother answered, she said simply, “It’s your turn to babysit,” and gave him the address. Then she motioned the bartender over. “If this guy—” she pointed at Ben, “—tries to leave before his friend gets here to drive him home, call the cops and report that this car—” she scribbled Ben’s license plate number on a napkin, “—is being driven by a drunk driver.” She handed him a twenty for his help.

  The bartender agreed and pocketed the money with an interested look in Ben’s direction. Ben glanced at him, but said nothing to him or to her.

  “Try not to do anything stupid,” she said as she leaned in and kissed Ben’s temple. “Goodbye, Ben.” She pulled back and looked at him for a long moment. She didn’t want this to be goodbye. But just in case it was, she had to say it.


  As she walked out of the club she couldn’t help the glance back.

  He sure didn’t look like much of a hero sitting hunched over the bar with four empty glasses in front of him.

  “You know that you don’t have a clitoris, right?”

  Ben strolled into the kitchen where Sam was preparing grilled cheese sandwiches.

  Sam turned away from the stove, an incredibly funny expression on his face. “Excuse me?”

  Ben tossed him the bottle he’d found when looking for a towel in the bathroom. “Thought I should fill you in, just in case you were wondering why this stuff wasn’t working for you.”

  Sam looked at the label that claimed the oil inside had a warming and arousing affect on the clitoris if applied prior to sexual activity. He grinned when he realized what it was. “Oh, it worked for me—indirectly.”

  “Better than the leopard print panties?” Ben had also seen those in the lid-less shoebox in the cupboard under the sink.

  Sam set the bottle on the counter and turned to flip the sandwich in the pan. “I do my best work when panties are not involved.”

  Ben chuckled and grabbed a banana from the bunch on the counter. “What is that collection?”

  Sam shrugged. “Stuff people have left here.”

  “People? As in, how many?” Ben bit off a huge hunk of banana.

  Sam slid the golden sandwich onto a plate that already held two others. “However many are in there.”

  “Three panties, a bra, a garter and the oil.”

  “So, six,” Sam concluded.

  “They were each from a different woman?” Ben asked.

  “Probably. I don’t remember which is which anymore, though.”

  “They didn’t ask for their underwear back the next time they were here?” Ben asked.

  Sam shrugged again with a large grin as he added cheese to yet another piece of bread. “There’s no again around here. One night, that’s all they get.”

  Ben shook his head and bit off another bite of banana. Wow. Sam certainly didn’t have a problem getting wrapped up in other people’s lives. If his friends were getting too drunk in some bar, he sent someone in to get them. If a woman came up for some fun and left anything behind, he just chucked it in the shoebox.