But his smile was the same: cocky, sensual, one corner of his mouth tilting up lazily. His eyes were the same, as well: deep, almost-black orbs that looked like they could practically burn right through your clothes when he looked at you.
Which, given the look in he was giving me right now, and the way he was staring at my body, I wasn’t a hundred percent sure he couldn’t do.
I shifted my weight nervously from one leg to another and tried to look professional and completely undaunted by seeing him again after all these years.
“Well,” Kevin said. “I’ll leave you to it, then.” He turned to go, then leaned in toward me. “I’ll need to talk to you later, about another matter entirely,” he murmured in my ear, his tone teasing.
I cast my eyes down, feeling my face redden. “I’m sure we’ll run into one another at some point,” I stammered.
Kevin left the room, his footsteps moving away down the hall.
Caleb — or Trig, I guess — was still looking at me with those penetrating black eyes. “I don’t mean to be ungrateful,” he remarked in a lazy drawl. “But that guy’s kind of a prick.”
The corners of my mouth turned up in the beginnings of a smile, but I suppressed it. “He’s a very talented surgeon,” I responded primly.
He chuckled, then winced a little in pain. “He’s an asshole.” He watched me, trying to read my reaction.
I kept my expression completely neutral. “No comment.”
“You dating him?” he pressed.
“I said, no comment.” I walked to the foot of the bed and made a show of looking at his chart so I wouldn’t have to meet his eyes. “Dr. Larkin tells me you’re getting released today. You were very lucky, Mr. Jackson. If you hadn’t gotten to the hospital so quickly, you wouldn’t be sitting there talking to me right now.”
“So I’ve been told,” he said drily. “And it’s Trig, I told you.”
I flipped a page on the chart. “Trig, then.” I wasn’t going to have this conversation with him. Our relationship right now was strictly professional, and I intended to keep it that way. “Dr. Larkin tells me you’ve been having some numbness in your leg. Describe it to me.”
“Nothing to describe,” he grumbled. “It’s numbness. Feels like numbness.”
I sighed in exasperation. Great. He was going to be a difficult patient, to boot. That was going to make things easier. “Where is it numb?” I prompted. “Your thigh? Your calf? Your foot? Does it come and go?”
He frowned. “Kind of all over. And yeah, the foot, too. Just feels fuzzy.”
“Does it come and go?” I repeated.
“Look, do we have to talk about this?” he said impatiently. “Just get me doing whatever exercises you need me to do.”
“I need to know what your symptoms are, Caleb. Don’t be a baby,” I retorted.
Ha, that got a rise out of him. His eyes darkened in a flash of sudden anger. I was pretty sure people didn’t make a habit of calling Caleb Jackson a baby. In most situations, I sure wouldn’t, either. But I had found in course of my career that sometimes men had to be goaded into taking their physical therapy seriously, and anger was a good motivator. If he was pissed off at me, I knew from experience, he might work harder just to show me up.
“It’s Trig.”
“Trig. So. Does it come and go?” I repeated.
“No.” His voice was ice-cold. “It’s pretty much constant.”
I nodded. “Okay. Good to know.” I moved toward the bed and grasped the sheet. “May I take a look?”
He looked pained. “Do you have to?”
“I don’t have to, but it would help me to see the wound, to see the muscles affected. I’ve looked at the X-ray, but it would be better to see the actual leg.”
He groaned. “Fuck. Fine.” He shifted a bit in the bed and bent the knee of his other leg more. He pulled back the sheet and tucked it under the leg. I leaned down closer to look at the wound site. His thigh was hard and chiseled, like the rest of him. Even here in this hospital bed, he gave off a strong vibe of masculinity that was hard to ignore. I closed my eyes for a moment, then opened them again, forcing myself to concentrate on the task at hand.
The bullet had gone into his inner thigh, about midway between the knee and the groin. It was heavily bandaged, of course, but I could see enough to tell approximately where the bullet had gone in and through. “You’re very lucky,” I remarked. “If you had been shot much higher, sexual function might have been affected. As it is, you’re probably fine in that area.”
I had slipped into my role as a professional, and hadn’t really been thinking about what I was saying. Now that the words were out of my mouth, I wished I could have taken them back.
A low rumble of a laugh started deep in his chest. “Thanks for the compliment, Eva. I’d like to think I’m better than fine in that area.”
“I didn’t mean…” I started. He lowered his other knee a bit, and through the sheet, I could just glimpse ‘the area’ — which was now growing harder and larger the longer I bent to examine him. Oh, my goodness… All I could see was a faint outline, but what I did see was every bit as impressive as I remembered. Maybe more so. After all, at the time I had never felt or seen another man’s cock before, so I had nothing to compare it to.
Now, I could see that Caleb Jackson was every bit as much of a man as my memories had made him out to be.
Blood rushed in my ears as I realized I had actually been staring at his… Oh my God. Hastily, I stood.
“So,” I stammered. “Treatment. Basically, you’re going to be on crutches for a while, at least until your leg has healed and your strength has returned. What we’ll do during our sessions will be working on isometric exercises like quad sets, heel slides, hamstring sets. Eventually we’ll start adding resistance to strengthen your muscles, with Therabands, ankle weights, and the like. We’ll progress from gravity eliminated, to gravity neutral, to gravity resisted.” I took a deep breath and risked a look at him. “Does that makes sense?”
A lazy smirk had appeared on his face. “Sorry, I wasn’t really listening. A little distracted.” His gaze slipped from my eyes down to my breasts, burning a path on my skin. My nipples hardened; my breathing sped up as I felt myself grow wet between my legs.
This was not good. I had no idea how I was going to manage six to eight weeks of therapy with this man. Damnit. Even in high school, he had this effect on me, and apparently time had done nothing to make me immune.
Eva. Remember. Remember what he’s like. Remember what he did.
I scowled at him. No matter how his body and presence affected me, Caleb Jackson was the last man I would ever let myself get involved with. It had been ten years, and a lot had happened since then, but once an asshole, always an asshole. People didn’t change. He might be hotter and more handsome than I remembered him, but at his core, he was still the same Caleb. The same boy who had humiliated me and taken pride in doing so.
And now, he was some big, bad, alpha male in some stupid motorcycle club.
Hell, whoever it was who had shot him, Caleb had probably deserved it.
“The PT clinic is downstairs on floor three,” I said briskly, straightening my sweater. “You’ll need to come in daily for the first couple of weeks. The first session will be two hours, and subsequent sessions will be about an hour per day. You’ll need to set up the appointment with them. You can call them, or else they’ll call you if they haven’t heard from you by tomorrow.”
I reached into my pocket and handed him a card. “I urge you to take this therapy seriously, Ca… Trig. It could make the difference between you walking again without assistance or you spending the rest of your life using a cane.”
“I wouldn’t miss it,” he murmured, his voice low and sensual.
Between my legs, the puddle was growing to a pool. I caught myself right before my traitorous eyes glanced back at his groin to see if he was still hard. Damn. I had to get out of here.
“Well, that’s all, then.” Taking a
deep breath, I turned toward the door. I’ll see you in therapy.”
“Eva.” His low, rumbling voice stopped me at the threshold.
I turned, my actions jumpy. “Yes?”
His expression was unreadable. “How’ve you been?”
A tangle of emotions flooded up inside me, none of them good. It had been so long since high school, I couldn’t believe the stupid memory of it still had the power to upset me so. But damned if I couldn’t feel a painful lump welling up in my throat.
No, damnit. I am not going to give him the satisfaction of crying in front of him.
I swallowed. “I’m fine,” I said brightly. “I’ve been fine.”
Then I was out the door and back into the merciful coolness of the hallway.
Caleb Jackson.
My God.
What the hell was I going to do?
5
Trig
Cal wandered through the open door to my room just as Eva was leaving.
“Whew!” he whistled, watching her ass as she walked away. “Who’s that? Your nurse?”
“I wish. That way I wouldn’t have to see her again after I left the hospital. It’s my fuckin’ physical therapist.”
He whistled again. “She’s hot.”
“She’s a pain in the ass, is what she is,” I growled.
“I dunno, man. I’d take a lot of grief from someone who looks like her, in exchange for some one-on-one ‘physical therapy’,” Cal grinned. “You’re lookin’ a gift gunshot wound in the mouth.”
“Fuck you, Cal,” I grumbled. Normally the little punk cracked my shit up, but I wasn’t in the mood after the last couple of hours.
“Come on,” I said, swinging my legs over the side of the bed. “Grab my duffel bag from that closet and let’s get the hell out of here.”
The doc hadn’t officially released me yet, but I didn’t give a shit. I was releasing myself, effective immediately. I needed to put some space between me and the woman who had just flounced out that door.
Even more, I needed some time to mentally prepare myself for the hell that was about to be the next six to eight weeks.
I had the feeling that it was gonna be a fuckin’ doozy.
Eva.
Jesus, she was always prettier than she knew. You could always tell in high school she was going to end up being a knockout. But now, holy hell.
Over the years, she’d gone from a girl who was still not completely at ease in her own body, to a gorgeous, confident woman. One who moved with an effortless sensuality that I was pretty sure she was still mostly unaware of. She had clearly taken good care of herself over the years. Hell, as a physical therapist, she probably took her own health seriously, and one look at her tight, slim body in those yoga pants had me itching to peel them off of her and stick my face between those toned, shapely thighs.
Except.
Except she fucking hates you, Trig.
I never really knew what had happened between us. Or rather, what had almost-happened between us.
In high school, I had always been a player. Started early, I guess. I matured faster than most of the other guys my age, and girls began noticing me seriously when I was around fourteen.
Not just girls, either. Women, too. I had my fair share of sweaty back-room fucks with young, hot teachers who just couldn’t resist my charms. I’ve always had it easy with women, what can I say? My life is an ocean of pussy.
Eva, though? She was a challenge.
I don’t know what it was about her. Maybe it was just the fact that she was the only girl who didn’t seem to be gaga over me. She was petite and pretty, even behind those serious glasses she used to wear. The ones that made her look like a young, hot librarian. She didn’t wear any makeup that I could tell, and her clothes weren’t chosen for their ability to tempt.
But even so, somehow I was obsessed.
I used to watch her from behind in the two classes we had together senior year. She had this habit of nibbling on the end of her pen when she was thinking, and then biting her lower lip. My young, testosterone-crazed mind would watch those plump lips, and imagine her wrapping them around my cock. Instead of paying attention to chemistry or English, I’d envision fisting my hand in her cascade of blond hair, telling her in a whisper how good it felt to have her lips wrapped around my dick, and instructing her on just what to do to make me come in that sweet little mouth of hers.
I jacked off in the restroom after those classes more times than I could even count.
I started hanging around Eva’s locker every day, and eventually got her to start talking to me. Soon, I was walking her to the classes we had in common. I kept thinking I was getting closer to scoring with her… only somehow, it didn’t exactly feel like it would be just a “score.”
On the rare occasions that I could get Eva Van Buren to smile at me, or laugh at one of my jokes, it felt like the clouds had parted and a rainbow had appeared. I remember the actual physical sensation of my chest swelling one day when I made some offhand remark and she started laughing so hard that tears streamed down her cheeks.
Eventually, in the early spring of our senior year, I finally got up the nerve to ask her to hang out with me outside the walls of the school. I don’t know why I was so fucking nervous about it — normally, with girls, all I had to do was crook my finger and they’d come running. But I was legit worried that if I asked Eva out, she’d turn me down. And it took me a while to screw up my courage and risk it.
Finally, the day came. I had just bought my first motorcycle, with funds I’d scraped together from odd jobs and selling my shitty old pickup truck. That bike was my pride and joy, the first thing I was ever proud of owning.
And more than anything, I wanted to take Evangeline Van Buren for a ride on it.
At first, I thought she was gonna say no. When I led her out to the parking lot, the skeptical way she looked at the bike told me she had never been on one before.
“Come on,” I urged. “You’ll love it. Trust me. Look,” I said, pointing to the side. “I even have a helmet for you to wear.”
I thought my heart would bust out of my chest when she said yes.
I had grown up around bikes, having had my first ride on the back of my uncle’s when I was five. When most kids are learning to ride bicycles, I was learning to lean into turns and avoid burning the shit out of my ankle on the tailpipe. But I had never had one of my own before, bought with my own money. And I had never carried a passenger on the back.
There was no way I could have prepared myself for what it felt like when Eva tentatively climbed on behind me and gingerly wrapped her arms around my waist. By that point in my life, I had already fucked so many girls and women that I’d pretty much lost count. But nothing had ever felt like this.
I was all jumbled up between the pulsing erection that felt like it was going to rip a hole in my jeans, the powerful surge of protectiveness that coursed through me knowing she was trusting me to keep her safe on the bike, and something else I couldn’t quite name. Like, pride, almost. Like I was proud and happy to be the first one to show her a new experience.
As we rode out of the parking lot of the school, a group of the more popular kids stared after us, and I gave them a quick one-finger wave. Even that made me feel kind of funny. I knew they were staring because Eva Van Buren wasn’t the kind of girl I usually hung out with, and part of me felt kind of weird and almost defensive. Like I could already anticipate the ribbing I was gonna get from some of the guys on Monday.
But in a way, I didn’t care. Hell, I had never been one to follow any particular crowd, and I wasn’t gonna start now. I made my own rules. I didn’t follow the ones other people tried to make for me.
I took her out of town almost an hour north. My destination was the Piñon Valley Hot Springs, which I remember she said in passing she had never been to. I drove mostly in silence, noticing every subtle shift in her body language. Eventually, her thighs, which had been clamped around the outside of mine,
began to relax.
At one point, I felt rather than heard a deep sigh escape her as she nestled into my back. I knew she had no fucking idea the effect she was having on me. I wasn’t planning on pushing her to go any further with me than she was willing that day, and I was pretty sure I was gonna end up with a case of blue balls, but I didn’t care. It was worth it just to be with her.
We pulled up to the hot springs about an hour later. It was a Friday afternoon, and a few families with young kids were already there getting an early jump on the weekend. We hadn’t brought swimsuits, so we spent some time hiking around the rock slabs and in between the trees, enjoying the sights of the lazy heat trails drifting up from the water and the sounds of the water as it burbled and pulsed to the surface.
“It smells like sulfur,” Eva said, wrinkling her nose. “This is so cool!” She turned to me, her eyes shining. “How have I never come here before?”
“I dunno, you tell me,” I grinned. I resisted the urge to kiss her, but screwed up my courage and took her hand like it was the most natural thing in the world. “Come on, there’s a place over here I want to show you.”
We crunched through the pine needles, up over the damp, uneven rock to a secluded area not far from the springs. There was no one else there, but we were close enough that we could still hear the muted sounds of laughter and people talking as the splashed and kicked in the pool. I sat down on a low bench that had been constructed from the rocks and she sat down next to me.
Eva heaved a happy sigh. “Gosh, this is so relaxing. I don’t want to go back.”
“You don’t have to,” I teased. “We could just stay here forever.”
She laughed. “What would we do for food? Where would we sleep?”
“Hey, I’m sure there’s a snack shack around here somewhere. We could exist on hot dogs and stale popcorn. And I could build us a lean-to out of branches.”
She smiled at me warmly, then gazed over toward the area where the springs were. Her face turned more serious. “Caleb, what are you going to do next year? After high school?”
RIDE (A Stone Kings Motorcycle Club Romance) Page 3