Dr. Attending (Midtown Memorial #4)

16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Caroline

“ G ood job, buddy,” Cassidy coos excitedly as Carter reaches up to pop a bubble with his chubby finger.

He giggles when the soapy liquid mists his face and presses his hands together to communicate that he wants more. They’ve been doing this for a solid thirty minutes now, and I don’t think I’ve seen either one of them happier.

I lean back on my forearms, letting the afternoon sun soak into my pores. I think I’m either Vitamin D deficient, or I forgot what it was like to live a life outside of school, but I don’t think I’ve felt this happy in a while, either. Which is surprising because my sister just started talking about Weston Southerland.

“Ugh,” Claire sighs as she reaches up to adjust her curly ponytail. “I swear he gets hotter each time I see him. Who knew he would be such a good dad?”

“I won’t comment on how hot he is because your brother would probably divorce me after less than twenty-four hours of marriage,” Cassidy laughs. “But yeah. He’s doing a great job. I’m proud of him.”

“He’s not that hot.”

The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them, and they taste just as bitter as they sound because I know they’re nothing more than a bald-faced lie. I’m just trying my hardest to convince myself otherwise.

My sister scoffs and glares at me like I’ve just personally offended her. “What are you talking about? The man has had an insane glow-up over the past few years. I mean, did you not see that deep V? Hot damn. No dad bod in sight.”

My cheeks heat against my will because I saw it alright . . .

I saw it. And I touched it. And at one point, I even seriously considered licking it.

“Why would I have seen it?” I stammer, trying to push away the memory.

What happened last night was the last thing I would have ever expected from the man I used to know. I thought that as soon as I gave him permission, he would want to go from zero to sixty in an instant. That he would get me naked, offer a few minutes of half-assed foreplay, and then fuck me.

But what he actually did was so much worse . . .

Weston Southerland devoured me. He consumed me. He worshiped me. And he shook me to the core—both literally and figuratively—until I had forgotten everything I knew to be true about him.

It was so different from that reckless Fourth of July night when I was eighteen. It wasn’t a dare or a game—it was an awakening. A memory that will forever be ingrained in my psyche as the first time a man put my pleasure first. The only thing I knew in that moment was that I didn’t know anything anymore. I had just let Weston do the one thing I swore to myself I would never let him do again.

And I liked it.

“You’re kidding, right?” Claire blinks rapidly at me a few times like I’ve just told her that Diet Coke is being discontinued from the U.S. market. “Beau and I literally saw you two half-naked in the kitchen last night. You’re telling me that you didn’t let your eyes wander even a little bit?”

Morgan snickers beside me, and it makes me instantly want to crawl into a hole because I know exactly what she’s thinking. She wants to know why we were found in the same room, late at night, wearing only towels. It’s like we’re playing some sort of kinky Clue game, and she’s about to put all of the pieces together to win.

Fortunately, before she can say anything, Carter reaches out and knocks over the bubble container, spilling soapy liquid all over the grass.

“Whoopsy,” Cassidy sings as she picks up the bottle and places it out of his reach. “You’re just a silly goose. Aren’t you?”

She reaches out to tickle Carter’s belly, and he flails around with a toothy grin.

“I know,” she coos, pretending like she can understand his babbles. “But you’re so dang cute that it doesn’t even matter, does it? Ah. I can’t even stand it. I can’t wait to have a little monster just like you. And then you guys can be best friends, just like your papas.”

My forced scowl shifts into a pained smile as I watch my sister-in-law with Carter.

She’s going to make an amazing mom one day—it’s written all over her face. The way she holds him and soothes him is almost instinctual, like she knows exactly how to speak his language. And it just makes my heart sink because I doubt that’s ever going to be me. I don’t have a maternal bone in my body.

It’s not that I’m against becoming a mom, but it isn’t something I ever fantasized about. Even when I was a kid, my friends would play house with their baby dolls, acting out their roles as doting mothers. I remember not getting it, not feeling that same pull. I always figured it was something I’d grow into, that one day I’d wake up and feel that tug in my heart that everyone talks about.

But the older I get, the more it scares the shit out of me. And every time I’ve looked at Carter today, I’ve been reminded of that. Of how out of place I feel around him. Which is why when I finally have the chance to talk to Wes alone today, I’m going to tell him the truth—that last night was a mistake.

“Such a handsome little guy like your da-da.”

Claire looks up at me with a knowing smirk before sitting on her heels.

“Speaking of that,” she says casually, glancing back at Cassidy. “Did you ever find out why Wes named him after your brother?”

“Nope,” Cassidy responds. She dips the bubble stick into the half-full bottle with one hand and tugs Carter’s army-green shirt down with her other. “I wanted to ask him that day in the hospital, but he didn’t seem like he was in the mood to share. We’ve only had pretty surface-level conversations since then.”

My sister frowns like she’s disappointed by the lack of juicy gossip.

I’m honestly a little surprised as well. I wouldn’t think that I’d know before Cassidy, especially because of their history together.

“Yeah,” she continues with a sigh. “But it’s just really weird because I genuinely thought he didn’t care since he never came to my brother’s funeral. And the one time I confronted him about it, he brushed me off.”

My heart twists, and I can’t help myself from butting in to defend him, once again.

“Maybe he feels guilty, and this is his way of saying that without, you know . . . saying it.”

Cassidy shrugs as Carter pivots on his grass-stained bottom and plants both hands on her thigh, trying to stand on his own.

“Maybe. I could see that, I guess.” She bites her bottom lip and then lets out a soft laugh. “Actually, I can definitely see that. For a guy who’s so personable and outgoing, you would never think he would be so s-h-i-t-t-y at expressing his emotions. But now that I think about it, we dated for years, and he never once told me he loved me.”

“Yeah, and then he cheated on you like a dimwit,” Morgan scoffs from beside me, sliding her sunglasses down the bridge of her nose to make eye contact with her best friend. “Just know that I’d never cheat on you, babe. You’re the love of my life.”

She’s laying out on a pink striped pool towel beside me, trying to act disinterested in the baby who will occasionally try to crawl his way to her.

“I appreciate the loyalty, Morg,” Cassidy replies as she redirects Carter’s attention to the bubble container. “But I forgave him for that a while ago. We were just kids, and like I’ve been trying to tell everyone for the past year, he’s really not a bad guy.”

“I’m not the one who thought he was a bad guy,” she argues, shooting me a pointed glance before looking back at Cassidy. “But anyways, I’d just let the name thing go. Clearly, all men are terrible at expressing their emotions. I mean, look at Walker. The guy got a tattoo on his arm to remind himself of me when we broke up. Can you say obsessed ?”

Cassidy looks up and rolls her eyes. “Weird . . . because I seem to remember that situation differently.”

“Me too,” I tease, thinking back on the front-row seat that we all had to their romance.

While Walker did get a devil tattoo for her after Vegas, she was the one who was terrible at expressing her emotions. She refused to admit that they were serious, and ignored everyone for a month because she couldn’t handle the fact that she was in a stable relationship.

“Semantics.” Morgan waves her hand around like she’s batting away the clouds above our heads. “The point is that you can’t trust what men say, you can only trust what they do. And Weston named his son after your dead brother to apologize for treating you both like shit. The other details shouldn’t matter.”

I flop down onto my back and stare up at the sky, trying to tune them out while they form some sort of Weston Worshipers fan club.

“Where’s your swimmy from?” Morgan asks after a while, turning her head in my direction.

I glance over at her with a frown. “Why? It’s not like your massive jugs could fit in it anyway.”

She pushes her gold Ray-Bans down her nose and wags her eyebrows at me. “That’s kind of the point.”

A ghost of a smile finds its way to my lips but quickly dissipates because I genuinely can’t pinpoint how I’m feeling. I’m overwhelmed, but I’m satisfied. I’m flustered, but I’m excited. I’m all of the goddamn above. And all at the same time.

Morgan studies me for a moment before she takes my hand in hers. “You look like you need a margarita.”

***

T he bar at our lake house makes you feel like you’ve been transported back to the 1920s. I never got to ask my dad why he designed it this way when the rest of the house has a more rustic vibe, but it’s one of my favorite rooms. Every time I enter the space, it’s like I can feel the stress leave my body . . . until Morgan nearly knocks a very expensive and very old decanter from the counter.

“Whoops.” She shoots me a sheepish grin.

“Morg. I swear to God if you break something in here, I will invoice you for it.”

Morgan reaches for a bottle of tequila from the wood-paneled shelf above her head.

“As long as I can pay it off with sexual favors,” she says, winking as she spins back in my direction.

I sigh and drop my head into my hands. A joke like that should make me laugh, or at least crack a smile. But right now, it just makes me want to go to bed because I’m exhausted, cranky, and not feeling like myself. I just need a minute alone to sit and think, which is ridiculous because I’m always alone, and the one time I’m not, it’s all that I want. I can’tbelieve I’m saying this, but I think I’m actually looking forward to going home tomorrow.

The sound of a closing cabinet door makes me glance up from my pity party because I’m expecting to have to direct Morgan to the glassware. But—of course—she has some sort of radar for margaritas, and she’s holding a glass in each hand.

“Want me to ask . . . or do you want tequila first?”

I shift on the leather barstool. “Depends what you’re asking.”

Like my sister, Morgan has no filter on her thoughts. Most of the things that come out of her mouth are absolutely off the wall, but I am surprised that she waited until now to confront me because discretion isn’t exactly something she’s known for.

She places the crystal glasses between us as one side of her mouth quirks up like she has a secret that she’s been dying to share, and it’s been eating her up inside.

“What happened between you and Weston last night?

“Tequila,” I answer, hoping the liquor will camouflage the flame that I can feel spread across my cheeks and down my neck.

Morgan’s smirk transforms into a salacious grin as she pours her concoction and slides it across the bar.

I pick up the drink and down half in a single gulp.

“Fuck,” I sputter because it burns more than I’m expecting on the way down. “What did you put in there? Gasoline?”

She rolls her eyes and takes a long sip of her drink, swallowing it down like it’s a glass of water instead of a poisonous cocktail. “It’s Mezcal. And it’s perfect . . . just like your tits, apparently.”

What the—

Fucking Wes.

“Woah there, killer.” She laughs, probably realizing that she needs to talk me down from the look on my face.

“He told you?” My words come out uneven, almost like I’m about to cry.

I don’t know why I’m surprised. Of course, it wouldn’t matter to him that we promised to keep things between us until we could talk today—all douchelords like to flaunt their conquests. And that’s what I was to him.

Once again.

“Chill,” Morgan hisses, stealing my glass out of my hands before I can chug down the rest of my drink. “He didn’t say shit, even though I made a very convincing appeal for dirty details at lunch.”

I stare at her, not understanding.

She shrugs as she pours my cocktail into her glass. “I guess he has two interconnected video baby monitors, or something, because he left one on the coffee table downstairs. I got bored of the documentary Walker was making us watch last night and picked it up because I thought it was a radio.”

My pulse steadies slightly until I remember that I’m speaking to the world’s biggest gossip.

I narrow my eyes in warning. “You better not—”

She waves me off. “Why do you think I kept my mouth shut earlier when Claire said she saw y’all in the kitchen?”

I want to find a way to continue to be upset about this because, after years of practice, frustration is a much easier emotion for me to process when it comes to Weston. But this clearly isn’t his fault. He was respectful, deliberate, and honestly kind of cute with the whole thing. He even sent me several texts last night after we went to bed which made me fall asleep with a smile on my face for the first time in a while.

I shake my head, unable to stop my grin.“Because you’re a greedy little gremlin who enjoys watching drama unfold.”

“Ouch.” She raises her hand to her heart like she’s offended. “Wait, actually, call me names again. That was kind of hot. Almost as hot as the porn-worthy moans you made last night.”

“I wanted to listen for longer, but my lame-ass husband made me turn it off,” she adds casually as she sips her toxic concoction. “Such a fun sucker.”

“Poor Walker.”

Morgan rolls her emerald-green eyes dramatically. “Relax. The man doesn’t care about what anyone else does or who they do it with. If I told you half of the shit that we get into, you’d probably send me for a psych eval.”

She pauses to lick the sugar from the edge of her margarita, wagging her brows at me over the glass rim. “Actually, do you want to know? Will that make you feel better? Tit for tit, if you will?”

I laugh, feeling a blanket of warmth wash over me from the small amount of tequila I drank. “Don’t you mean a perfect tit for a perfect tit?”

“Exactly.” She giggles back at me mischievously. “Well, I just want to make it known that I knew y’all were going to hook up. There’s no way you could share a bed with a man that fine, and not want to jump his bones. I mean, I could feel the sexual tension between you two all day. So much mutual pining. So much simmering beneath the surface. Was he good? Cassidy never told me anything because all she talks about is your brother like a boring boobie, but I bet Weston was good. Sooooo good.”

I let out a long sigh because I want to tell her the truth—that he wasn’t just good, he was the best. That I’ll be thinking of that night for a long, long time and probably dreaming about it too, if I’m being honest. But if I give her an inch, she’s going to take a mile.

So I tell her a lie.

“He was fine,” I answer casually. “Nothing to write home about. Kind of vanilla.”

Morgan’s face drops like I’ve just given her news that she has a terminal illness. “Just fine? Are you sure? I mean, I did hear that he sucked in bed. But that was years ago from Kayla in the ICU, and her coworker Lauren told me the opposite. She claimed he was some sort of sexual savant or something. Hmmm . . . I guess it’s true how they say there are different strokes for different folks.”

She lets out an exasperated exhale and squints like it’s going to help her think more clearly. “But it just didn’t look like he sucked from the way he was stroking your—”

“Morg!” I yell, feeling my eyes blow wide.

“What?” She laughs, nearly spitting out the sip she just took. “The video feed might have accidentally turned itself on when Walker went to the bathroom.”

She shrugs, brushing off my incredulous expression. “Chill. I just wanted to make sure that you were okay. And as soon as I confirmed that you were definitely okay, I turned it off.”

I stare at her, speechless. My brain is scrambling for a response, but I’ve never been a great liar, and if I try to spew more bullshit, she’s going to see right through it. So, instead, I reach for the tequila bottle in front of me and take a long, slow swig, no longer caring if it ruins the lining of my esophagus.

“So what’s Parker-pooper going to say?” Morgan asks as she watches me with amusement.

I wipe the corner of my mouth with the back of my hand, and this time I don’t have to think before I speak because I’m telling the god’s honest truth when I respond, “Nothing. Because it’s not happening again.”

It can’t happen again. But if it did, it wouldn’t be any of my brother’s goddamn business. And I’d have no problem telling him that.

Morgan gives me a skeptical look, like she thinks I’m full of shit. “That’s what we all say.”

“Well, I mean it.”

She rolls her eyes and then bites her bottom lip like she’s holding back a massive fit of giggles.

“What?” I ask, already dreading the answer.

A wicked grin sweeps across her face.

“Just thinking about how you and Cass are lumberjack sisters now too. You know . . . because you’ve shared the same wood.”