Attending Physician

  “Dinner, baby!” called Raven after ten minutes.

  Have you thought about how much time humans spend on food? It’s one of those things that amazes me. I’m not that interested in food, to be truthful. If I could put my hand to a wall, and say, `Three hundred fifty calories of protein,’ and that would be that, it would be perfect for me. Not for most other folks.

  I walked in on Raven saying, “Cord and I both used to play, and Angie too, also Terry when we could talk her into it.”

  “Play what, darling?” I asked unfolding a cloth napkin as Raven pulled out my chair.

  “Softball,” she spoke with a youthful glint in her eye. “You’d make an adorable cheerleader, baby.”

  “I’m a better scorekeeper, sir,” I said crisply, “runs, hits, errors, plus a kick-ass announcer.”

  Mickey gazed at me dreamily, “Yeah, you have a great voice for announcing, Verity. Doesn’t she, Raven?”

  “She does,” said Raven evenly eyeing Mickey.

  “No, it’s not what you’re thinking!” exclaimed Mickey protesting.

  “What am I thinking, Mickey?”

  “That I have a crush on Verity,” she filled in promptly.

  “Do you?” asked Raven completely serious.

  “No!” she reacted. “That’d be like having a crush on my ... my ... my mother.”

  I cracked up.

  “She doesn’t, sweetheart,” I said. “I’d know.”

  “Good,” growled Raven, teasing but not.

  “Good is right,” mumbled Mickey. “But don’t get me wrong, I love Verity. She’s listened to me a lot over the years, and she’s an extraordinary mentor.”

  “And I love you, Mickey,” I said putting one hand over hers and running the fingers of my other one along Raven’s inseam. That calmed her right down. So talented I am! Patting my head and rubbing my stomach, not to mention breathing and talking at the same time.

  “Now that we’ve established the territorial lines, gentlemen, ... how was your day, sweetie? I know how Mickey’s and mine was.”

  “Good. I was able to stay close to on-time most of the day. That’s always a good marker.”

  “So not a lot of crisis?” I pressed.

  “No. Except I told Lucy you’d call her to say goodnight no matter how late. Will you?”

  “Who’s Lucy?” asked Mickey.

  “My daughter,” said Raven.

  “Of course, darling!” Raven removed her phone from the breast pocket of her jacket and pushed one button. “Lucy ...,” I called.

  “Lady!” said a sleepy voice.

  “Sweet dreams, baby girl. Fairies and unicorns watch out for our little angel till morning! Night-night, Lucy.”

  “Night-night, Lady ....”

  “Will it disconnect?”

  “Eventually,” said Raven.

  Something was going on with her. Tears in her eyes? I reached for her.

  “Later,” she murmured against my hairline.

  She guided our conversation to softball, and engaged Mickey till she kicked her out. Raven wanted her femme to herself.

  Chapter 47

  I had put away the food and was loading the dishwasher.

  Raven stood in the kitchen doorway watching me. “I forgot how lovely you are,” she said.

  “Since this morning?” I asked. “I mustn’t have made much of an impression on you.”

  “Maybe not, milady,” she said. “Perhaps you ought to press harder next time.”

  “Just what I was thinking, milord,” said I, snapping shut the dishwasher.

  I spun toward her and she reached out to catch me, then I slid my arms around her neck and reached for a kiss. No matter what we tried to tell ourselves, we were starving for each other. Raven’s mouth opened the instant mine touched hers and she demanded mine open for her. Her kiss was insistent, forward, brash. She wanted me, and she wanted me to know it. My panties were slick with desire.

  “Raven,” I said as she bit down on my earlobe, and proceeded to probe my ear with a delicate tongue.

  “Milady,” she ran her hands over my breasts, down around my waist, and over my hips to my ass.

  She pulled my skirt up and slid a warm hand between my hip and my panties. I couldn’t help but move toward her. Then she pushed aside the panel of delicate silk and buried her fingers deep inside my throbbing sex. I nearly sobbed. Moving quickly, she took me thundering into ripples of pleasure under her powerful hands. I clung to her shoulders. Had it not been for her weight pushing me against the doorjamb, I would not have been able to stand.

  “Darling,” I said shakily.

  “Beautiful,” she looked down at me, “so enticing. I have to fuck you, sweetheart.”

  “Yes, sir,” I agreed, “you do.”

  “Naughty girl,” she said, her eyes dark with heat. She wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me into the bedroom. “For that sassy mouth, we’re going to do this my way.”

  I raised an eyebrow at her, but said nothing.

  She walked me over to the bed, and rotated me to face it, away from her. Then she wrapped an arm tight around my waist. The other hand went for my breasts, kneading, holding, tweaking. Then she let me go for a split second and my skirt fell around my feet as she bent me over the high bed and ran her hands over my ass and down the softest part of my inner thighs till I panted with craving her inside me. Then with no warning, my panties were gone, my sex and ass exposed to her, and her cock had plunged home. I moaned and arched my back.

  “Work for it, wench, fuck yourself on my cock, and let me watch you,” she growled with her weight over my back, biting her mating mark and making me shiver. Then she stood, holding still, and let me move. And move I did. Writhing, bucking, and twisting on the bed. I wanted the pleasure her cock would give me and I was not shy.

  I came more times than I could count and finally, gasping, I said, “My lord, I need you to fuck me now, and take your pleasure. Please.” She broke, and began to move, and I screamed it was so good.

  “Baby, beautiful lady, you feel so good to me,” Raven huffed out on partial breaths. She wanted this, she wanted me, and she wanted to make it good for both of us. Her thrusting got faster, and deeper and a coil of yet-untapped passion began to unwind in my belly.

  “Raven, Raven, Raven,” I breathed. Her breaths came faster, as did mine. We matched each other. The power of her body drove mine to places I hadn’t been.

  “Verity,” she gasped as she came and undid me yet again. She wrapped herself around my shivering body and let us both recover. Then she pulled out of me gently, which is always a moment of profound loss, only to gather me to her chest, and cover us both with the quilt.

  “Baby,” she touched my face, “that was exquisite. I loved watching you.”

  I blushed, despite that kind of intimacy, and said, “I want you.” Then I pushed against her chest. “It seems like every minute lately! A girl learns what she’s been missing lo, these many years, and all at once she can’t get enough!”

  Raven laughed. “There’s plenty more where that came from, milady. I promise you.”

  “I’ll hold you to your promise, milord,” I threatened.

  “Please do, milady,” she chuckled, and let me sleep, at long last, on my right side. I was gone to the world in an instant after her kiss.

  I woke her in the middle of the night.

  Dreaming she was making love to me, I reached for her. She was awake enough to reach back and when I started to cry, she held me and fucked me sweet till I began to be soothed. Kissing my face, my neck, my shoulders, the tears streaming down my face, she murmured nothing and everything to me. I didn’t need to understand her. I needed to hear the care and the burgeoning love in her voice.

  Blessedly, she knew this was one of Verity’s emotional catch-ups and didn’t need an explanation. Raven held me and let me weep, stroking my hair. After a few minutes, I stopped.

  “Okay, baby?”

  I nodded.

  “Sure?”


  I nodded again.

  “I’m here, you know, and not going anywhere any time soon.” When I didn’t speak, she said, “Talk to me, milady.”

  “Raven, I ...,” I began, “I ... do this. Sometimes.”

  “This?”

  “React after the fact.”

  “Is this the ... incident?”

  “And Seligman, and the Butch Brigade, and Gretchen’s meanness, and Marcia, and Mickey, and the Dean today, and ....” The tears overflowed again.

  “Sh-sh-sh, baby,” she held me close. “It’s alright. Every bit of it is alright, baby.”

  “I ... I know,” I sniffled.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever made love to a crying femme,” she mused.

  “How was it?” I asked, a small burbling in my throat.

  “Damp, but sweet.”

  And at once, I decided to show her sweet. I pushed her onto her back, and climbed astride her hips. “Sweet, did you say, milord?”

  Then I raised myself and sat on her cock, squirming slightly, to be sure she was as deep as I could take her. The breath whooshed out of Raven.

  “I did, ma’am,” she said, when she’d recovered from her surprise.

  “No, darling,” I said, “here’s sweet.” I began to rock, slowly, deliberately, swirling my hips against hers to put the most pressure on her as well as raising and lowering myself gently. Every time I did, she lost more breath.

  “Right you are, milady.”

  “Come for me, milord, please. It would please me so much.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” she said. I moved faster, causing my own breath to hitch as my arousal began to peak. My orgasm triggered hers and she thrust high and hard into my pussy, bruising my cervix but creating a more intense spasm through my sex.

  I leaned forward to kiss her and my breasts tightened against her chest. “Baby,” she said, “that was indeed very sweet. Thank you.”

  “Thank you, milord,” I said, asking for her tongue which I sucked gently. “My pleasure.”

  Morning was easy again. Over coffee and tea, I asked her, “Do you know ... something amazing happened in my life one week ago today.”

  “Oh? What?” she asked, seeming to be genuinely curious.

  “I had a hot date with this butch doctor who called me at the last minute and cancelled. To say I was disappointed understates the case. But things changed after midnight.”

  “They did?” she prompted, and now she was amused.

  “They did. That same butch doctor, who had, by the way, already sent me flowers—very smart,” I added, “arrived on my doorstep and gave me my first real kiss in eleven years.” I gazed dreamily. “It was perfect.”

  Raven rose from the table and pulled me close. “Has she kissed you since?”

  “Oh, yes, sir,” I gave her innocent eyes, “plenty of times.”

  “Every one of them perfect?”

  “No,” I mused, “some better than perfect.”

  Raven did it again. Taking my face in her large hands, she tilted my head to improve her angle and then kissed me till I swooned. Goddess. Thank. You. There’s nothing quite as delicious as a butch who knows how to kiss a femme. Except maybe one who knows how to fuck a femme, but those two particular gifts usually go hand in hand.

  “Such a sweet femme,” Raven spoke against my lips fingering the bruise on the back of my neck.

  “Your sweet femme,” I corrected.

  “Yes, mine, milady.” I delighted in the flash of pride in her eyes.

  Her phone rang.

  Chapter 48

  “Lucy? Is that you?”

  “Is Lady there?” asked Raven’s angel daughter.

  “My own daughter doesn’t want to talk to me anymore?” she huffed, handing me the phone.

  Lucy shrieked, “Papa! Papa! I love you, Papa!”

  “I love you too, baby girl,” Raven hollered.

  “Lucy, it’s Lady.”

  “Lady, it’s Lucy.”

  “Yes, I know, sweet girl. What can I do for you?”

  Well, a few minutes elapsed as I squared away the details, but I was called upon to arbitrate a dispute related to appropriate garb for preschool, and an argument she was having with her favorite Nana. No idea when I became a fashionista, but I had a feeling it happened when we met. Lucy decided that I was a far more reliable `girl’ authority than her Papa or her Nana (which was probably true, neither one exhibiting particularly feminine attributes). After some solemn deliberation, Lady came down on the side of Nana. (I’m not stupid, darling!) And the dispute was resolved.

  “Bye, Lady!”

  “Bye, Lucy!”

  I might have dodged a bullet. I exhaled. Raven interrupted my thoughts.

  “Verity, after your son died, did you want to be a mama again?” Raven asked from across the kitchen.

  “Whoa, Raven, that’s a big question!” I eyed her. “What do you think?”

  “I think you’re a mama every day to the people you care for.”

  “I am,” I agreed.

  “I also think there might be a certain blonde poppet, as you call her, gunning for special status amongst your tribe of children. Watch out, you may be way beyond a choice!”

  “I think that’s a ways away,” I replied in my best Prim. “And besides, that’s not up to me, it’s up to her Papa.”

  “We’ll see, milady.” She kissed me again, not seeming to want to stop, and I didn’t want her to either. “I’ll call you later. Shall we take Gretchen and Lucy to dinner tonight?”

  “Before the biopsy? Absolutely. What a good idea, milord.”

  “I’ll come get you and then we’ll go get them, alright?”

  “Yes, darling.”

  “That way we’ll have some time alone,” She sounded like she already longed for it.

  I focused hard as I kissed her, letting her know I felt the same way and slid my hands into the back pockets of her jeans as I did so.

  “Great ass, doc,” I said as I closed the front door to my flat.

  I think I startled her because her eyebrows bounced to her hairline. I liked where my femme fatale wanted to go. Sassy’s good, no?

  I’d refused to leave a referral for Ellie with Mr. Hanrahan’s secretary the day before, and when my phone rang, it had to be him.

  “Hold for Mr. Hanrahan,” said an anonymous woman’s voice. Old-fashioned power politics, I mused as I held. This wasn’t the world we lived in any more.

  After five full minutes, I disconnected. That was long enough.

  She called again, “Hold for Mr. Hanrahan.” Not even a please.

  Immediately, before she put me on hold again, I said, “Fine, but he’s already wasted five minutes of my day, and I will hold for no longer than a minute. One ... minute. The man can call me when he can talk, and if I’m not in session, then I’ll talk to him.”

  She was taken aback. No one, apparently, talked to or about her Mr. Hanrahan that way. Well, I did.

  I hung up again.

  She called again; this time, giggling. My behavior had struck her funny bone at last.

  “One minute for Mr. Hanrahan,” she said, not bothering to stifle her giddy laughter.

  “We’ll see,” I said right back, sending her into more gales of laughter. I still wasn’t finished with my toilette, and a patient was due in fifteen minutes.

  This time—three’s the charm—Shakespeare said that—he picked up in under his allotted one minute, and I explained why I would no longer see Ellie and who I thought would be good for her. I also explained the possibility of a restraining order if he wasn’t able to keep her away from me, and how I thought such a public record might reflect poorly on his run for the bench. Truth be told, I mused, if the man can’t keep order in his own house, how is he going to keep order in his courtroom? I ask you.

  The lofty Mr. Hanrahan slowed down enough to soften the tiniest bit for a teensier zeptosecond to understand the gift I offered him. “Thank you,” he said. “I’m sorry Ellie ... did this.
”

  “So am I, Mr. Hanrahan. And you’re welcome. Good-bye.”

  The buzzer rang. My patient was early. I went to check the video display which did not show my patient. Oh no, it was Ellie.

  I went right to my desk and called the Somerville PD number Terry had given me. I explained the situation, and asked them to come take her home. Her father’s driver hovered nearby in the limousine. I repaired my lipstick—which I had to do a lot lately. That made me grin at myself in the mirror like the Cheshire Cat.

  Ellie rang the buzzer nonstop until the SPD arrived; they put her in her father’s car, as I called papa’s secretary and introduced myself properly this time, which made her laugh all over again, and asked her name.

  “Sheila Siddons,” she said.

  “Sheila,” I began, “we have a problem, and kick-ass attorney Hanrahan hasn’t a clue how to solve it although he has already assured me this morning that he would.”

  “Okay ...,” she said attempting to control her laughter. “What is it?”

  “In a word, Ellie. She’s already been on my doorstep this morning, ringing the buzzer for fifteen minutes straight. I called the Somerville PD and they came and put her, protesting, into daddy’s limousine, but it’s obvious that he has no control over her. She could come here again and again —and harass my patients which is a big no-no. My next call is going to be to my attorney to get a restraining order against her.”

  “Shit,” said Sheila.

  “Exactly, my friend,” I responded. “My next patient is here. I’ll be an hour with her. Then I’ll call you. Go talk to his High Kick-Assedness and make a plan. Tell him he was saved only by the buzzer.”

  “You got it, Dr. Spencer.”

  “Sheila,” I said dryly, “we’re in this together, hon. Call me Verity.”

  “You got it, Verity,” she said.

  I checked my lipstick, and buzzed my patient in.

  What with one thing and another, my patient had hit a wall, and had an added crisis, so our session went over which happens sometimes. Then Mickey and Sara arrived on a day that wasn’t usually their day (I suspected that Raven had asked Mickey to be there) so we had to brief Sara who was back from her trip and appeared to be less than glowing. What with one thing and another, ninety minutes went by before I called Sheila.