Chapter 8 Lizzie
LIZZIE
“Liz.”
Marla’s voice snapped me out of my trance. “Hm?”
She giggled. “Are you even listening to me?”
I did my best to put a smile on my face. “Sorry, just preoccupied.”
My best friend, bless her soul, whose neck was covered in hickies, scooted toward me on the bed. “You wanna talk about it?”
I yawned. “Just the pain medication catching up to me.”
“You haven’t taken your nighttime dose yet.”
I shot her a look. “Are you stalking me?”
She giggled and poked me with her foot. “You’re crazy, you know that?”
I reached out and nudged her back. “Crazy for you.”
“All right,” she said as she stood, stretching her arms above her head. “Let’s get you out on this walk before we drug you up again.”
“Actually,” I said as I let my face wince, “I think I’m going to pass on the walk tonight.”
Marla’s face fell. “Are you okay?”
I waved my hand in the air as I faked a yawn. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.”
“Are you in pain? Do I need to go get Doc? I knew we were overdoing it with your walks. We should’ve—”
“Marla.”
“—taken it easier. How do I always let you talk me into—”
“Marla,” I said with a soft smile.
“—things that I know we shouldn’t be—”
I giggled. “Em.”
She blinked. “What?”
I snickered. “The reason why I’m passing on the walk tonight is because Doc told me a couple of days ago I was overdoing it.”
“Oh.”
“So I think I’m just going to hang here for the night.”
She eyed me warily. “I didn’t know you went to see Doc a couple of days ago. Is everything okay?”
I didn’t want to regale her with the picture debacle. Doc fussed over my memory enough. “I’m fine, Em. I just need rest. I’ve been doing too much.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Who are you and what have you done with my best friend?”
I laughed and picked up a pillow. “Get out of here and go hang with your boy toy.”
“Ah!” she yelped as I threw the pillow at her.
She ducked down before reaching for the door and pointed at me. “You’ll pay for that.”
I gasped and placed my hand against my chest. “You would wound a cripple?”
Her face fell and she clicked her lips. “You’re hardly crippled.”
I winked at her. “Tell Ranger I said to keep it down. He’s too loud.”
She wiggled her eyebrows. “I’ll keep the deep throating to a minimum tonight.”
My jaw dropped. “Em!”
“Byyyye!” she giggled out as she swung my bedroom door closed. “Love yooou!”
“Love you, too!”
I felt relief when I heard her slinking down the hallway, humming to herself. Her healing was coming along swimmingly. She put on weight. The last of her bruising was finally fading. Her appetite roared back in leaps and bounds.
I was proud of my best friend.
I was ready to be that recuperated, too.
I laid back in the bed, staring up at the ceiling. I tucked the blanket beneath my arms and laid there on my back, practicing my deep breathing. Once upon a time, I was into meditation. It helped me calm my racing mind, especially at night when it wouldn’t let me sleep.
I got four deep breaths in before my door crashed open.
“You aren’t walking today.”
I drew in a deep breath and groaned as I sat back up. “Thanks for knocking, Doc.”
He strode over to me and I gazed up at him, finding him wearing a set of glasses. “Why are you not walking this evening?”
I crooked an eyebrow. “So Marla told you I wasn’t walking, but didn’t tell you why?”
“She didn’t tell me, no.”
A slow grin spread across my face. “So how do you know?”
“Know what?”
And this was supposed to be the genius of the group. “That I’m not taking a walk tonight?”
He came and perched on the edge of the bed. “Are you tired, Miss Elizabeth?”
I didn’t miss how he shirked my question. “Yes.”
He tilted his head. “Would you like a cup of tea? I could go downstairs and make up—”
“Didn’t you just tell me two days ago that I was walking too much? Too many laps, or some shit?”
He clasped his hands in between his knees. “The twice-a-day walks are part of your recuperative regimen. I didn’t mean scale back on the number of walks. I meant to scale back on the length of each walk.”
I sighed as I leaned back against the pillows.
“Missing one walk isn’t going to set me all the way back, Doc.
I’m going to rest tonight. I just had a nice dinner with Em.
I’ve got a nice, full feeling going. I’ve got my pain medication here in a few minutes.
I’ll be out like a light within the hour. ”
I felt his gaze on me for a while before he spoke. “I’m going to do an exam on you.”
“What?”
He bactracked toward my bedroom door. “Let me go get my bag. I’m going to—”
“Doc. I’m fine.”
He wheeled around with a speed that took my breath away and pinned me with a look that shivered my veins.
“I am your doctor, and I’m asking you to let me do my job.
And so long as you are under my care, you are not going to be neglected.
Now stand up or lie down, whichever you feel more comfortable with, and I’ll be right back. ”
I blinked as he slipped out of my bedroom. I realized after a few seconds that my mouth was actually opened, so I clicked it closed.
Did Doc just… command me?
Did I… like it?
“Just get it over with,” I muttered to myself as I wiggled down into bed.
He was back in a flash, perched on the edge of the bed with his doctor’s bag slung up onto my bedside table.
I listened as he clicked and zipped his bag open.
I watched as he pulled out a stethoscope.
He placed the listening part of the contraption into his ears before he moved toward me with the rounded end.
“This may be cold, Miss Elizabeth.”
And we were back to formalities.
I flinched a bit when he put the ice cold stethoscope against my skin. Dear God, did the man keep it on ice for cocktail parties or some shit? My body shivered as he moved it around a bit.
“Big, deep breath,” he said as his free hand moved to my wrist.
His fingers settled over my pulse point.
I did as he asked before he nodded and moved the stethoscope again.
“Another big, deep breath,” he said as he kept a clock on my pulse.
And again, I did as he asked.
“Sit up for a moment for me, Miss Elizabeth.”
I shoved myself upright, only for his arm to wrap beneath mine. He helped with the tug forward, and I was thankful because something in my ribs twinged and reminded me of how much more healing I still had to go. I grunted a bit, wincing as I shifted around.
“One more big, deep breath. As big as you can without it hurting,” Doc said.
So with the stethoscope from the ice age plastered to my back, I did as he asked.
Over, and over, and over again.
He had me lie back down so that he could palpate my bruises. He slid my shirt up so that he could examine my ribs. There was a concentration in his eye that captivated me.
I never had someone take such care with me before.
Outside of Marla, that was.
“Bit of a touch, Miss Elizabeth,” Doc said.
I felt his fingertips gracing my collarbone.
His touch was so warm. So gentle and intentional.
It was light and feathery, a great contrast to the dark concentration of those stormy gray eyes of his.
Like his soul mission in life was to make sure that there wasn’t anything about my body that he didn’t already know.
It was intimate in a way that I’d never experienced.
And with him that close up, I realized he had freckles.
A lot of them. He was covered in them. His face was splotched in dots that were maybe only two shades darker than the white of his skin.
I couldn’t stop counting them.
“All right, Miss Elizabeth,” he said as he tucked me back into the bed, “let me get a few notes jotted down.”
“Anything I should know, Doc?”
“Just that you’re healing as well as can be expected. I’m pleased.”
“Well, thank God for that.”
He paused and looked over at me, so I smiled and wiggled my fingers at him.
I swear. Those lips of his cracked the smallest, barely-there grin before he snickered and shook his head.
I watched as he jotted down some notes, his body hunched over at the dresser while he scribbled things down into my medical file.
But when he turned around, the sunset started.
I knew the sunset started because the rays of sun poured through the only window in the room. It was a bay window with curtains that could be drawn to block out the light. However, as the sunset coursed its way through the room, it chiseled itself along his features.
I couldn’t help but stare at him.
I didn’t even realize I sat back up in bed just so I could watch him.
Doc had a strong set of features with a sharp jawline and high cheekbones that gave off just enough of an air of enchantment that could have been misconstrued as Greek beauty.
While most of the men around us were brutish with broad foreheads and calluses on his hands, he was leaner. Trimmer. Long-legged and long fingered.
I wasn’t sure why I studied his fingers.
Bet they’d feel good.
“Miss Elizabeth?”
I quickly cleared my throat and whipped my eyes up to his face. “Hey, Doc.”
“Cap and Ghost are the men that will be here tonight, outside of myself and Brutus.”
My God, he really is good looking. “Thanks for letting me know.”
“You have eaten dinner, yes?”
I thought about the food I pushed around on the plate that Marla brought me. “Pretty much.”
He tilted his head. “Pretty much?”
I nodded. “I ate a bit with Marla.”
“A bit with Marla.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Are you a mimic?”
That got him to snicker before he reached for the doorknob of my door. “Catch a bit of a nap, Miss Elizabeth. I’ll be back in two or three hours, and we will take a small walk and have dinner while the guys… visit.”
I wrinkled my nose a bit. “Ah. So they’re arriving in two or three hours?”
He nodded. “They are.”
“And that’s what we’re calling it now? Visits?”
Doc chuckled, and for a moment, I committed myself to the sound. “We could call it ‘fucking their brains out,’ but that seems a little crass.”
I couldn’t help but giggle back. “Is it bad that I’m jealous? Bet it’s not doctor’s orders, getting your brains fucked out.”
It was out of my mouth before I could even catch it, and the silence was deafening.
Blood roared through my ears as my wide eyes found Doc as he stood there in the doorway of my bedroom.
He watched me through those black-framed glasses of his.
Rounded off, and somehow managing to only add to the regal beauty he naturally carried around with him.
I wanted to say something.
I wanted to apologize for being a weirdo horndog.
But the intensity of the silence weighed my voice down in my throat.
“I’ll be back after a while,” he said as he swung the door closed. “It’ll be a beautiful night to eat around the pool. Get some rest, Miss Elizabeth.”
He left me with that command as the door clicking closed made me groan.
I flopped back against the pillows and pulled the cover over my face.