by Thorpe, Elle
“Thank you for those kind words. But no. Unfortunately, it wasn’t me making women scream last night. Jess, on the other hand…”
“Oh.” Cleo gave me an understanding nod. “That’s right. Millie got back from France yesterday, didn’t she? She and Jess must have been happy to see one another after three months apart.”
I flicked the lid off a pen and scribbled on a form that was marked for my signature. “Happy is an understatement. We had a few friends over for a housewarming party, and the two of them snuck off to bed before everyone had even left. Then kept me awake all night with the world’s loudest sex.”
Cleo patted my shoulder sarcastically. “I’d feel sorry for you, but I like Jess more than you, so good for her.”
I clutched my heart dramatically as she shoved another stack of papers my way, pointing at the places I needed to sign. “Anyway, it’s tough luck for you if you’re tired this morning. You need to look alive. Doctor Simpson from head office is here for the next two weeks, remember?”
I grimaced. I hadn’t remembered. “Shit. Really? Is he already here?”
She nodded.
“You couldn’t have told me that before I stood here gossiping with you about my roommate’s sex life?”
She shrugged. “Hey, you’re my boss. Not the other way around.” Then she winked at me, because we both knew who really ruled the roost around here. And it wasn’t me.
“Your first patient of the day is a Mrs Braun. She’s new. Hopefully she’s a super rare or interesting case you can use to impress them. I heard a rumour they’re looking at you for a promotion.”
I’d swear the woman knew everything that happened around here. “That so?” I loved my job, but I also hoped Mrs Braun was just a run-of-the-mill case, with nothing too problematic going on. For her sake. I turned to the waiting room and called loudly so all the patients would hear. “Mrs Braun?”
A woman, in her mid-twenties perhaps, stood and smiled nervously. I indicated to the office on my left, holding the door open for her, then closed it behind me. At my desk, I settled into my chair, and she took one of the facing seats. It wasn’t completely unusual for a woman to come in for a first consultation on her own, but most came with their partners, so I was curious.
“I have your referral here,” I began, smiling warmly at her. The woman looked so nervous she might puke. I hoped not. Despite being a doctor, I hated vomit. “But I’d rather just hear from you. What can I help you with?”
She took in a shaky breath. “I want a baby.”
She’d come to the right place. Making babies is what I did. I hated that I couldn’t help every patient I saw, but I was good at my job and I’d helped a lot of families conceive. I had a wall full of baby photos behind me to prove it. “And you’ve been trying but nothing is happening?”
She nodded.
“For how long?”
She lowered her eyes. “Five years.”
I tried to keep the surprise from my face. “Five? And this is the first time you’ve sought medical help? May I ask why?”
She sighed. “At first, we weren’t really trying properly, you know? Just not preventing. So I didn’t think much of it. But over the last few years, it’s been a different story. I’ve tried everything. Ovulation sticks. Different diets. Charting my cycle. Nothing helps. I wanted to come earlier, but my husband…”
“He didn’t want to come?”
She shrugged. “He doesn’t like talking about it. He wants a baby so badly, but each month nothing happens, it’s like he takes it personally.”
It wasn’t an uncommon reaction in men. They often buried their heads in the sand, preferring to ignore any potential problem with their reproductive system, rather than come in and talk about it. Their biological clock often didn’t tick as loud as their partner’s. Mrs Braun twisted her hands nervously in her lap, waiting on my reply.
“I understand. How about I order some tests for you first, and we take it from there?”
She nodded, her ponytail bouncing up and down. “Thank you. That would be great.”
I typed up the necessary paperwork, printed it, and walked around the table to hand it to her. As I opened the door, I patted her reassuringly on the shoulder. “We’ll get to the bottom of the problem. I can’t promise a baby, but I can promise I’ll do everything I can to make it happen.”
Her bottom lip trembled as she thanked me. Over her shoulder, Dr Simpson from head office looked up from where he was drinking coffee while reading the paper. He nodded at me approvingly, as if being polite to my patient was something to be commended. Weird. But hey, if he wanted to give me Brownie points for just doing my job, I wouldn’t complain. The promotion rumour that had been circling the practice hadn’t been lost on me.
I wanted it.
I also wanted the blonde living in the next apartment. And I needed to come up with a way of impressing her. ASAP.
The doctors from head office wanted to go for a drink as soon as the practice closed, so it was almost eight by the time I unlocked my bike and began riding home. I still hadn’t come up with a way of impressing my new neighbour, and it was all I could think about. I wanted to see her. Tonight. But I couldn’t just rock up there for no reason. I had to come up with something that would show her that I wasn’t always a cocky bastard. Sometimes I could even be a little bit charming.
The smell of fresh, hot pizza drifted by as I passed a local Italian place and I hit the brakes, skidding to a stop.
I’d just realised how to get the girl.
5
Damien
I took the stairs two at a time to our fourth-floor apartment, and crashed through the door, impatient to get my plan underway. The pizza wasn’t getting any warmer after all.
Jess and Millie looked up from where they were making out on the lounge. “You’re late,” Jess said, eyeing the pizza box. “But you brought dinner, so you’re forgiven.” She dropped a kiss on Millie’s upturned face and wandered over to where I was searching every cupboard and drawer in the kitchen. “What are you looking for?” She opened the pizza box, but I smacked her hand away.
“Hey! What’s that about?”
“Ha!” I yelled as I came up triumphant, brandishing a permanent marker I’d found in an unpacked box on the kitchen floor. I uncapped it, opened the pizza box, and began scrawling text across the inside lid.
Jess came around my side of the kitchen bench and laughed at what she read over my shoulder. “So, you’re going after the sour puss next door?”
“He’s doing what?” Millie yelled from the lounge, springing up to come study my artwork. She laughed, too.
“Think it’ll work?”
Jess squinted at me as Millie wrapped her arms around her middle, resting her chin on Jess’ shoulder. “I don’t know. She looked pretty pissed last night. And this morning. What did you do to her anyway?”
“Nothing.” Then I scrunched up my face. “Besides maybe accidentally knocking her off her bike.” There was that unfortunate incident. And then I’d asked her out, and she’d rejected me. And then I’d laughed at her as she’d been leaving her apartment this morning. She hadn’t seemed too happy about that either…
Jess punched me in the arm. “Damien!”
I shrugged. “I didn’t mean to!”
Millie rolled her eyes. “You’ve got Buckley’s chance, mate, but I want to see how this plays out. So go on. Get over there.”
“You think?”
Jess nodded. “She probably already hates you. You can’t make it worse. What’s her name anyway?”
“I really wish everyone would stop asking me that.”
Millie shoved the pizza box in my hand and pushed me out the door. “For Christ’s sake. Go. And don’t forget to ask her name, ay?”
I shuffled over to the door the gorgeous blonde had come out of this morning and knocked, shooting a quick thumbs-up to Millie and Jess when movement sounded from inside the apartment. Jess and Millie, who had their heads poking ou
t the door, grinned back. Jess mimed eating popcorn, and I stifled a laugh.
I opened the pizza box so it covered my face as the lock clicked. The door opened, and for a moment there was only silence. Then she read out my words. “Would it be too cheesy if I asked you to have dinner with me?”
I dropped the pizza lid and gave the woman standing there my most charming smile. “Would it?”
She scowled at me in return. Right. Well. This was a good start. She shoved her hands on her hips. Shit. She was mad.
“Is this a prank?” she fumed.
I glanced over at Jess and Millie, whose eyes were wide, before I snapped my head back to face her. The woman stepped out of her apartment, forcing me backwards into the hall and swung her head from side to side as if she were searching for hidden cameras or Ashton Kutcher to jump out and yell punked!
Jess and Mille pulled their heads inside just in time to avoid the woman’s glare. Me, however, not so fortunate.
She turned back to me, fury in her eyes. “This isn’t funny.”
She tried to slam the door, but I caught it. “Wait. Stop.” I dropped all traces of charming grins and turned serious. “I’m not pranking you and I’m not trying to be funny. I have this whole pizza and I thought you might like to share it with me. Honestly. No hidden agendas.”
Her gaze turned sceptical, but a little of her fire died, and it spurred me on. “It’s double cheese, meatlovers with stuffed crust? It’s good. I swear.”
“Not if you’re vegetarian.”
My face fell. “You’re vegetarian?” Damn. So much for this brilliant plan. I hadn’t even considered that.
The tiniest of smiles pulled at the corner of her mouth. “No. But I could have been.”
Relief flooded me, and I realised how much I’d honestly wanted her to agree to this. Something about her intrigued me, and the fact she kept knocking me back and beating me down with her words only made me want to get to know her more. I’m sure one of the shrinks in the complex at work would diagnose self-destructive behaviour because she looked like the sort of woman who could make me cry, but damn. I wanted to know her anyway.
“Since you do like to eat dead animals, at least on occasion, do you want to do that with me tonight? It’s a big pizza.”
She cocked her head to the side. Then opened the door wider. “Fine. Come in. But just so you know, I'm only agreeing to this because I haven’t had dinner and that pizza smells so good I’d sell my firstborn child to eat it. This isn’t a date. Because I already told you, I don’t do those right now.”
“I’ll take that.”
She pointed to a little round table that sat off the side of her kitchen. A fat grey cat watched me from the windowsill on the other side of the room. “Cute cat.”
“Not really. She hates everyone but me and she has the potential to claw your eyes out. It’s not a great combination.”
The fluffball hissed from her perch on the windowsill, as if to accentuate the point, and I edged around the table away from her.
“Thanks for the warning.” I wondered if the cat’s owner possessed similar qualities. She seemed the type to bite. Though in the right setting, I wasn’t completely opposed to that.
We settled in chairs next to each other, and both of us grabbed a slice.
“So, uh, this is awkward, but I don’t even know your name.” Then I tacked on, “I’m Damien, by the way.”
She paused with her slice in midair. “Yes, I know your name, Doctor Damien of Damien’s House of Debauchery. I saw it on your name tag yesterday. I’m Bree.”
“Pretty name.”
“Thank you. Can I eat this now?”
“Sure.”
We ate in silence as I glanced around the neat apartment. The layout was identical to the place I shared with Jess. Kitchen by the door flowing into a living area. Bedrooms and a bathroom off to the right of the room. I spied a pile of text books on the edge of the kitchen bench and twisted to read the spines.
“Naturopathy?”
She bristled, as if I’d offended her. I had no idea how, though. My presence in general seemed to offend her.
“Yes. I just started.”
I nodded as I leant across and plucked one from the pile to flick through it. “That’s awesome. Good for you.”
She stared.
“What? Do I have food on my face?”
“No, I just…do you mean that?”
“Mean what?”
“You don’t think naturopathy is some fake, hippy crap that really has no benefit to anyone?”
“Uh, no. Is that what you think?”
She wiped her fingers on a napkin before placing it back on the table. “Of course not. But you’re a doctor. And most doctors think naturopathy is ridiculous.”
“Most doctors are old-school. I’ve only been qualified a few years. I like to think I’m not old-school yet.” I smiled at her, now understanding some of her prickliness towards me. “I think there’s a lot of good that can come from natural healing. I use some of it at my practice. And I regularly refer my patients to holistic healers before we try more invasive procedures.”
Her posture softened. “I’m sorry. I’m always having to defend myself in one way or another. It’s nice to not be laughed at. Most people think it’s a load of rubbish.”
I sat back in my chair, dead serious. “Well, I don’t.”
She gave a tiny nod. “I had my first exam today. I think I failed it, though.”
“Why would you think that?”
She shrugged then rolled her eyes at me. “I didn’t get to study as much as I wanted. Some jackass doctor knocked me off my bike.”
“The jackass doctor is still really sorry about that. Is your arm okay?”
She waved a hand. “It’s fine. It wasn’t just the arm that made studying difficult. It was more the fact I couldn’t study while you were having the world’s loudest threesome.”
I choked on my pizza and had to take a sip of my drink before I could answer. Her expression was smug, like she knew exactly who and what I was, and I couldn’t help laughing. “You think I had a threesome last night?”
Her smile faded. “Well, didn’t you? I saw those women leave your apartment this morning.”
I shook my head. The thought of Millie, Jess, and me having a threesome was too hysterical to comprehend. Jess had been my best friend since we were eleven. Even back then, we’d both known she wasn’t into guys. We’d lived together all through university and my residency. She’d met Millie six months ago, and the two of them had been tight ever since. It had nearly killed Jess when Millie had gone to France for three months on a work trip.
“That was my roommate and her girlfriend.”
Bree’s mouth formed at little round O, which fascinated me. Her lips were a delicious pink colour and naturally plump. I suddenly found myself wondering how they’d feel against mine. I cleared my throat. “I’m somewhat proud you thought I had enough game to pull two women, though. I feel like I should thank you for that, but the truth is, I'm nowhere near that cool.”
Bree leant her elbows on the table. “In that case, could you let them know how thin the walls are here? It was like being on a porn set last night.”
I picked up another piece of pizza. “Don’t worry, I had to hear it all, too. They’ve already had a talking to and have promised to keep it down in future.”
She nodded and reached out to thumb through the text book I’d left on the table. It made me remember that she’d said she thought she’d failed her exam. “Maybe I can help you study sometime?”
She looked up, surprise written all over her features. “Why would you want to do that? Surely you’re pretty sick of studying by the time you get a doctor’s degree.”
“I feel bad. The bike. The party. Millie and Jess’s theatrics. Let me help make it up to you.”
Her expression changed, as if something had only just occurred to her. But with my eyes on her lips, I didn’t get a chance to analyse what she m
ight be thinking. I inched closer. She really was pretty. Not just her mouth either. Her high cheekbones and perfectly shaped eyebrows and all that golden hair falling around her face.
“I don’t need study help, but there is something else you could help me with…”
“Name it.”
“It’s going to sound weird.”
“Okayyy,” I said slowly.
“I need a date.”
I quirked an eyebrow. “You said you don’t date. Though, we’re already on one. Sort of.”
She ignored my deliberate needling. “I need a date for a family dinner. And not just a date. I kind of need…a boyfriend.”
“A what now?”
“You heard me.”
“I heard you say you want me to be your boyfriend. Maybe buy me dinner first? Geez, I feel so used.” I grinned at her, and she rolled her eyes but she was laughing. And fuck me. If I’d thought her pretty when she smiled, she was fucking stunning when she laughed. Straight white teeth between those pink lips. Her cheeks rosy, her eyes crinkling slightly in the corners. Laughing Bree nearly knocked me off my chair.
“So, will you?”
“Will I what?” I’d lost all train of thought. My brain was short-circuiting.
“Will you come to dinner at my sister’s house and pretend to be my boyfriend.”
“That depends. I have a counter offer.”
“Is this a negotiation?”
“Maybe. I’ll be your fake date if you’ll be mine.”
“You need a fake date.” The look on her face was pure scepticism. “That’s convenient.”
She had a point. But the more I thought about it, the more this plan seemed like a good idea. “I have a little work dinner on Friday night and I’m up for a promotion. There’s a lot of people there I want to impress. And showing up with you on my arm would be impressive.”
She tapped her painted fingernails on the table while she mulled over my offer. And I found myself holding my breath, hoping she’d say yes. She was an impressive woman, I’d meant that. She was tall and blonde and hot as fuck, but beyond that, I liked the way she didn’t take bullshit. She wasn’t afraid to put me in my place. She had an exterior that very well may have been made of stone, but damn if I didn’t love a challenge. It was why I’d gone into medicine. Was there anything more complicated than the human body and all the millions of things that could go wrong with it? I loved the daily puzzle of trying to fix people. And Bree’s external barriers had to be sheltering something soft. There had to be a reason she had walls up.