by B. J. Harvey
Slowly exhaling, I look up at Noah and see a gleam in his eye that instantly relaxes me.
“Right.” I look at the ground, but fail to hide the pleased smile that appears.
“I see you like that news.”
“Well, still being with her would make coming out for a drink with me pretty awkward, don’t you think?”
But despite the reassurance he just gave me, the way he talks about her rings warning bells loud and clear in the back of my mind. Bitter? Maybe. Been there, written a damn book about it. Regretful? Yes again. Note me down for being there, done that.
Despite that, and because I’m a woman who needs to know everything, and deciding that I won’t be able to put anything behind me until I know what happened, I bring up what happened at Mac’s wedding.
“So that kiss?”
“Fuck . . .” he groans, running one hand through the top of his hair. “That kiss is going to haunt me, I think. You told me it was the best kiss of your life and more than anything I want to remember it, especially if it was as good as you said.”
Elephant in the room? Time to make your appearance.
“Noah, it’s okay. A lot happened that night. A small kiss is nothing in the scheme of things.”
“Zoe, I really want to—”
“Noah? Noah Taylor? Is that you?” a man in a suit walks up to us and holds his hand out to Noah.
Noah stands and smiles at the stranger. “Greg Thompson. How the hell are you?”
They do a weird man-hug, back-slap thing—the need for which I’ve never quite understood—then stand back and just grin at each other.
“How have you been?” Greg asks, looking down and smiling at me before returning his attention to Noah.
I kind of drown out their conversation, trying to slow down the thoughts running through my head. My phone vibrates in my purse and looking up to see Noah and Greg still occupied, I pull it out. Justin’s name flashes across the screen and I immediately close my eyes to block it out.
It’s not that he scares me. It’s more that he’s unpredictable. And it’s escalating. He’s becoming more persistent, more irrational. Something that is hard to combat when you don’t know what’s going to happen next. I ignore the call and put my phone away, noting that it’s been almost an hour since Noah was waiting outside the house for me.
“Look, Greg. Give me a call during the week and we’ll catch up for a game of golf or something.”
“Well aren’t we the fancy doctor now,” Greg retorts and they both laugh. God, Noah’s laugh is almost as hot as his voice.
“Still a resident. But getting there. Greg, let me introduce you to Zoe, my date.”
“Hi Zoe,” Greg says cheerfully before turning back to Noah. “Catch up soon, yeah?”
“Have a good night,” the man says as he moves away from the table.
“I’m sorry. He’s an old friend from college. I haven’t seen him in years.”
“It’s okay,” I reply with a nod and a smile.
“So where were we?”
“You were telling me about your life-changing decision . . .”
“Enough about me. I want to know more about you, Zoe. Tell me about your family, your life before Chicago, your job. I want to know what makes you happy and what frustrates you. I want to know it all.”
Whoa! That’s beyond a pick-up line. That’s even beyond a ‘come home and fuck me’ line. That is epic. The girls weren’t lying when they said he’s got game.
“That’s a lot of information for a first date.”
“Then let’s plan a second, make sure we have enough time to cover all the bases.”
Bases. Home run. He could have a home run with me with a simple look and flick of his wrist. Well, maybe more than just a flick, but that’s merely semantics. Why is it that he turns my brain into that of a wanton hussy?
“Noah, I don’t think . . .”
Now the waitress is back at our table, sending a heated look in Noah’s direction. I roll my eyes as she leans down and rests her hand on the table, putting her cleavage-baring top right in his line of sight. “Are you ready to order some tasting plates? I’m sure you’ll find everything here to your liking.”
I bet you think that too!
Thankfully, Noah doesn’t react to her blatant invitation, or not-so-subtle innuendo. Instead he looks over at me, and he smiles, his eyes wary at first but then warm when he realizes I’m not bothered by the waitress. Well not outwardly anyway.
“Zoe, did you want to order anything to eat?” His voice is like melted chocolate, the kind you want to roll around in.
“I’m okay,” I reply hoarsely, still suffering the effects of the chocolate mental image. Imagine Noah covered in chocolate, and all the ways I could get him clean.
“We’re happy to wait a while, if that’s okay.”
“Sure thing. You make sure you come find me when you’re ready for me.”
Oh smooth, lady. Real smooth.
Noah brings his attention back to me, effectively shutting the skank down—much to my amusement. “So you were saying?”
“Tell me about you, Dr. Taylor.” I give him a knowing smile and take a sip from my wine glass.
He narrows his eyes as he studies me, his thumb and index finger pinching his chin. “You’re kinda secretive.”
“There’s nothing that exciting to tell.”
“What you are, Ms. Roberts, is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, and I’ve always liked a good puzzle.”
Jesus Christ on a cracker. Someone throw a bucket of water over me, stat! “Churchill?”
“One and the same,” he retorts with a grin.
“Hey, Noah. I haven’t seen you here for ages.” Noah turns his head just as a stunning redhead sits at the table next to us. She does a polite scan of me over his shoulder before giving Noah her full attention.
“Lisa, isn’t it?”
“Lauren.” Her voice isn’t so sweet anymore.
“Lauren, yes, that’s it. You reminded me of my friend Lisa. How are you?” Nice save.
Sorry he mouths at me before he spins his body toward her and again, I’m pretty much on a date by myself. One interruption I could handle, but a beautiful woman demanding, and receiving his focus—and that woman not being me—is too much.
As much as I’d like to continue talking and finding out more about him, it’s probably time to admit defeat with this date. He hasn’t even introduced me this time.
My phone lights up again. Fed up with Noah getting side tracked – again – and Justin bombing my phone – again – I grab it, holding down the power button to turn it off, then chuck it in my purse. Out of sight and hopefully out of mind.
Grabbing my glass, I down the rest of my wine and swing my arm out in front of me to get my date’s attention.
“Hey, Noah. Look I’m going to leave. I’ve got a . . . dress fitting with Kate tomorrow so I should head home.” I actually do have a fitting tomorrow, but it’s not until the afternoon. He doesn’t need to know that though.
He says something to Lauren and then stands and makes his way over to me. Taking a seat next to me, he grabs my hand and tangles our fingers together. His hand on mine brings flashes of the last time he touched me, and how he made me feel. Definitely not what I need to be thinking of as I plot my escape.
“Zoe, I’m sorry. I’ve been rude. I thought this would be the perfect place to bring you.” His voice is soft and remorseful which just makes this whole situation worse. He hasn’t done anything wrong—well not really—and I’m starting to think it’s just not meant to be.
“It’s okay,” I reply. “You stay here and catch up with your friends. I’ll catch a cab home.”
“We can go somewhere else if you like. We haven’t even had food yet . . .”
“I think I’d rather just go home.”
“I can take you,” he offers quickly, almost as if he’s on autopilot.
“Noah . . .” Okay Zoe, think. You need to giv
e a decent reason why he shouldn’t take you home. “Zander might be home and that’s a whole other headache we both don’t need.”
“I am sorry. More than you know.”
I nod at him, not willing to give anything else away because there is a myriad of emotions racing through me right now, and not all of them are good. I stand and as expected, he follows.
Putting my hand on his bicep, I lean up on my toes and place a barely-there kiss on his cheek. “Thank you for the drink,” I whisper. “Goodbye, Noah.”
There’s weight in the farewell that he doesn’t miss. I know this when his arm snakes around my waist and he pulls me tight against him, our bodies touching thigh to shoulder, my eyes locked to his.
“Next time?” he asks softly. There’s a hint of uncertainty in his voice that makes my heart hurt.
All I can say is a raspy, “I’ll see you round.” My heart is beating out of my chest and whatever this tidal wave of emotion is, it’s about to hit me and fast. He looks down at me for what seems like forever before slowly loosening his hold and taking a step back.
“Bye, Zoe.” He sounds resigned to the fact that this is most likely the last date between us.
“Bye, Noah.” I turn and walk out of there, resisting the urge to run for the hills—or back to Indiana.
On my way out the door I catch a whiff of my favorite men’s cologne, the smell that used to tickle my senses in all the right ways now making me feel sick because I’d bought Justin that same brand. I must be losing the plot if simple things like a smell can repulse me. On that thought, I quickly make my way out the door and into the first free cab I come across.
Hello, Universe. Thanks for the epic date failure. Next time, don’t bother.
Chapter 9
“Good Life”
Noah
If ever there was a time when I wished I didn’t know so many people in Chicago, it was Saturday night. I felt the date was going well. She looked fucking gorgeous. She wore heels that made her legs look like they went for miles—which they did. Her hair was pinned up off her face but she left it straight down her back, which didn’t help the hard-on that seemed to plague me most of the night when I was with her. Gorgeous hair gets me every time. Long satin soft hair that you can imagine fanning over your abs while a woman’s giving you head, that’s almost guaranteed to get my cock twitching.
Then just as we were getting to know each other, I got a text from Nikki asking what I was up to and whether I wanted company, acting as if nothing had changed between us.
My reply was short and to the point because honestly, there was no need to say anything more than “I’m out on a date. I’m moving on and you should do the same.”
I can’t pinpoint the exact moment the night turned to shit. There was the overtly forward waitress who blatantly ignored Zoe, then my college buddy Greg came up and started talking to me. But what sealed the deal was when an ex one-night stand sat behind us. By that stage I think Zoe had simply had enough.
She gave some excuse about having a busy day on Sunday and how she should get home, refusing to let me drive her there, and gave me a seemingly innocent goodbye kiss on my cheek, which signified a hell of a lot more to me than it probably meant to her.
Now I’m even more determined to take her out again. Having her body leaning into mine as she said goodbye simply made me even more resolute in my desire to kiss her again. To feel what she felt the first time we kissed. The one I still can’t fucking remember.
After rounds on Monday morning, I make it my mission to hunt her down and apologize again. It doesn’t take long to find her in a small office finishing off an MRI.
“Coffee?” I ask, as I watch her previously lax body tense up.
With wide eyes, she turns her head toward me. “Hey . . . you bought me coffee?”
I walk toward her, putting the takeaway coffee cup on the desk beside her. “Well since the culinary apology didn’t eventuate, I thought I’d try its caffeine equivalent.”
She scoffs but I note with interest how she grabs the cup and takes a long sip of the latte I bought her. “You’re just missing a splash of Hazelnut creamer and you’d be in the clear.” she teases.
“I’ll make sure I remember that next time.” I’m struggling to gauge her mood, let alone her demeanor toward me. I fucked up Saturday night but I want to make it right. She’s plagued my thoughts all weekend and it’s time I did something about it.
Just as I’m about to state my case, Greta walks in.
“Dr. Taylor, what a pleasant surprise to see you here with Zoe . . . without a patient . . . or records . . . Is there something I can help you with?”
“Ah Greta, you’re like a little ray of sunshine whenever I see you. I was just bringing a coffee to my friend Zoe but now I’ll be on my way. Have a good day.” I look over her shoulder to Zoe and wink at her, earning a not very well hidden snort and a huge smile, her eyes warm and full of amusement.
Mission accomplished.
Then my pager went off and my day got hell busy.
I’m now in my last year of my surgical residency, working toward passing my boards. Once I accomplish that feat, I’ll be on the home stretch. Then I’ll need to start applying for trauma surgery fellowships around the country. My first pick is definitely going to be Chicago though, because it’s home.
Tuesday morning, I catch Zoe in the lobby as I’m heading home. Despite being bleary-eyed and totally wiped out from my shift, I don’t have it in me to let the opportunity pass to talk to her.
“Hey.”
“Oh hey.” She looks up from her phone with a frown that turns into a friendly smile. She sees me. “Wow, you look exhausted.”
“You trying to say I look like shit?”
“I . . . ah . . .” she stutters, making me grin.
I put my hand on her forearm. “I was joking, Zo. I’ve been here for twenty-four hours—I probably don’t look that shit-hot.”
“It’s not that bad,” she says with a grin.
“You’re a great liar. Bet you know that already.”
She looks at me with a weird rather out-of-place expression, but quickly recovers. “You need your beauty sleep, Dr. Taylor.”
“Some of us aren’t lucky enough to be as gorgeous as you are.”
“Smooth, Noah. Very smooth.”
“I only speak the truth.”
“I bet.” She looks down at her phone. “Shit, I better get going, otherwise I’ll miss my train.”
“You want a lift?”
She looks at me and her eyes soften. “I’m fine. But thanks for the offer.”
“Anytime, Zoe,” I murmur as she rushes ahead of me, my line of sight dropping straight down to its new favorite attraction. “And stop watching my ass, Dr. Taylor,” she yells over her shoulder, snapping me out of my continuing visual appreciation.
“Never.” Ten hours later, I was at the hospital again.
And this scenario repeated itself for the rest of the week, but thankfully it was a mix of twelve to sixteen hour shifts. Lots of OR time too, so I was kept busy and out of trouble – the good kind that would see me finding excuses to visit radiology.
Unfortunately this meant I was also kept away from Zoe, and I knew this would make it even harder to get past that wall of hers. Any downtime I got, I would think about her—her ass, but mostly her as a person. The few times I did try to get down to radiology to see her, I got paged back to the ER for a consult or into the OR.
Friday night and I have twenty-four hours off, so I arrange to meet Daniel at 42nd Street Bar. I decided it was worth asking the Master of Miracles himself for advice, because when it comes down to it, he achieved the impossible by taming the untamable in Mac, and not only getting her to settle down but also get married.
It’s not that I want the picket fence and the two-point-five kids in the ‘burbs next week. I’ve already got the house in the ‘burbs. It was the first thing I did when my trust fund from my rather wealthy grandparents was handed o
ver to me the day I turned twenty-one.
I’m not close to confirming whether Zoe is the woman of my dreams—well she has been lately but that’s a whole other story—but she is the first woman in a long time who has me wanting to rise to the challenge.
“I got you a beer. I figured after a long week you probably needed it.” Daniel hands me a bottle of Millers as I sit down in a booth across from him.
“Cheers, brother,” I say as I hold up my bottle to tap against his.
“Zander might come down later. He wanted to go to the gym first.” Shit
“What’s that look for?” Daniel asks with a puzzled frown.
I try a quick recover. “Nothing. It’s nothing.”
“Bullshit. Spill or I’ll ring the girls and they’ll nag you until you give in.”
“I went out with Zoe last week.”
Daniel chokes on his mouthful of beer but recovers quickly. “Come again?”
“I asked her out on a date and we went out last weekend.”
“So you took her out to apologize?”
“Yeah, that too.” I take another swig of my beer. “But it was also supposed to be a date.”
“What about Nikki?”
“What about her?” I narrow my eyes at him, wondering where the hell he’s going with this.
“You still seeing her?” He tilts his head and raises one eyebrow. “Fuck no,” I spit out. “That’s over. I ended it the morning after I threw myself at someone else.”
“And threw up all over Nikki's expensive shoes. Mac thought that was hilarious. I would've laughed my ass off if I wasn't so pissed off at you.”
“She was seeing red way before that. She watched you marry Mac.”
“It was her choice—well yours if you want to get technical about it,” he states.
“It’s old news now.”
His expression turns serious. “You can’t play Zoe, man.”
My head jerks back. “I’m not planning on playing anybody. I’m single. She’s single. Game on.”
He shakes his head, his smile disappearing just as quick. “You don’t go after sisters. You know that. And if you thought you had a sore mouth after the wedding, I can imagine Zander doing much, much worse to you if you actually pursue something with Zoe.”