Chapter 9 #2
Gibson turned his head to look at Kay and saw genuine worry in her eyes. “Hmm?”
She narrowed her eyes at him and leaned closer.
For a moment, one of his favorite fantasies reared its head as he imagined her in her scrubs, leaning over his naked body, ready to put her stethoscope to his chest and her mouth on anything she deemed swollen.
“Here,” his fantasy Kay whispered to him as she moved in for a kiss, “let me take your temperature. You look feverish.”
Gibson’s lips parted and he leaned closer only to come up short when he felt something touch his forehead.
It was the back of Kay’s hand.
The sexy siren from his late-night fantasies had just taken his temperature like you would do to a child.
He wanted to fall through the floor at that very moment.
But the world wasn’t that kind to him.
Not at all.
“Hmm,” she moved away and looked into his eyes, “you feel a little warm, but nothing that I’d worry about.”
Kay’s concern didn’t stop there.
“But…” she drew out the word as she looked deep into his eyes, “maybe I ought to see…”
She reached out with both hands and touched her fingertips to the sides of his face, holding him still as she half-stood and leaned her cheek against his forehead.
She was so damn sexy without even trying.
With her cool cheek against his skin she’d unknowingly given him a tantalizing look down the neckline of her dress.
The sparkling black fabric looked like the night sky against her ivory skin and while he only got a hint of the shape and size of her breasts, he knew one thing for certain.
He could spend days just worshiping her breasts.
His hands.
His mouth.
What he wouldn’t give to know if her nipples looked like they did in his dreams.
Gibson’s hands lifted from his sides, and he was reaching for her before he could stop himself.
Right at the moment that she pulled away and met his dazed eyes with her own gaze fraught with concern, his hands found her hips and he tugged her onto his lap, his lips meeting hers as she gasped.
He could taste the moonflower cocktail on her lips, and he chased that flavor into her mouth.
The hands that she’d touched his cheeks with shook with some kind of emotion and while he wanted to know what it was, he wasn’t going to stop kissing her for fear that she might come to her senses.
He knew that he’d lost his a few minutes before when she started touching him.
Gibson slipped one hand from her hip up the center of her back until he found skin above the neckline of her dress and before he could grasp the nape of her neck in his hand, a sound made it past the throb of his heartbeat in his ears.
It was a sound like rain, repetitive and yet there was a wildness to the rhythm that drew his attention away even the littlest bit.
Her tongue stroked his and he barely resisted feasting on her mouth when that sound interrupted his thoughts again.
It was irritating, like the drone of a fly, or a bee and he wanted it gone so he could focus on Kay, but when he cracked open an eye to see what the issue was, he wished he hadn’t.
The whole wedding party was watching, clapping, and fuck him, cheering them on.
His soon-to-be-former friend was standing on the dais with the band and trying to get everyone to quiet down for a minute.
Unsure of how Kay would take the attention, he lifted a hand to cup to her cheek. “Kay?”
Her eyes were half-lidded, her voice barely a vibration that he felt through his hand. “Hmm?”
“Kay? Everyone is watching.”
That got her attention, and he hated how quickly she shot up in his lap, but he loved that she grabbed a hold of his shoulders to steady herself before she got up.
They stood nearly at the same time and yes, as ridiculous as it felt, Gibson stood at least partly behind her.
He needed the block to keep everyone from knowing exactly what he felt for the stunning doctor with him.
As the applause died down, Taylor lifted his wife’s hand to his mouth and gave her knuckles a kiss. “Leave it to our firefighter friend to find a woman interested in his ugly mug at a wedding a few hundred miles away from his home.”
Gibson scoffed at his friend. “Don’t make me kick your a- butt, Taylor.”
Emily leaned into the microphone and gave her husband a hard stare. “Keep it up, Taylor and I’ll help Gibson hold you down for a beating.”
Taylor addressed the crowd with a wincing smile. “Ouch, then again,” he nodded a few times, “I might enjoy that.”
Emily rolled her eyes. “Stop it, Taylor. I don’t even know why you had to interrupt them in the first place.”
Holding his hand to his chest, Taylor gave his wife a fake look of pain. “I don’t think it’s fair for him to get more action at my wedding than I do.”
Gibson worried that Kay would make a run for it. She certainly had no idea that this was just how Taylor and Emily were. He didn’t want her to think that they were trying to shame her. Or something like that.
He didn’t want to ruin the night for her.
Emily snatched the microphone from her new husband and shooed him away. “Gibson, don’t hate Taylor too much, but he’s really happy to see you happy and in love.”
Taylor stepped up to speak into the microphone over his wife’s arm. “Maybe we should have waited to toss the bouquet, babe!”
"Okay, stop embarrassing him." Emily pushed him back and gave him a look. “Keep it up, Tay, and I’ll shove cake up your nose.”
Taylor bussed Emily with a smacking kiss and stepped back.
Emily sighed loudly and everyone at the celebration laughed good naturedly.
Gibson rubbed Kay’s shoulders softly. “They’re not trying to be mean.”
Kay lifted a hand across her chest and gave his hand a squeeze. “I’ve had worse thrown my way during med school and my residency, just not about kissing.” She sighed and shook her head. He heard and felt her laugh and he relaxed a little.
“So, Taylor and I wanted to invite you two up to the dance floor for a special dance. A little welcome to the family for Gibson and…”
Gibson wasn’t sure if he should give her name. With the whole world online now, it wasn’t like he could keep people from looking her up.
He’d asked her to save him from unwanted attention and with this introduction he might be opening her to more of the same.
Gibson leaned closer to ask her what she wanted him to say but-
“Kay.”
She'd said it herself.
Taylor and Emily were beaming at them.
“Welcome, Kay.”
Emily gestured for them to come forward and Kay, who still had a hold on his hand, turned and started to walk with him onto the dance floor.
Gibson walked with her until they were just a few feet in front of the dais where the band was.
It wasn’t until Taylor dropped his gaze lower and blinked in shock that Gibson remembered that he’d just had a serious hard-on a minute before and given his friend’s pale complexion, he still had something going on down there.
He could tell by the color in Emily’s cheeks that she’d noticed it too, she just wasn’t making a big show of it.
“I’ve already asked the band to play a special song for our old friend and his Kay. So, if you’ll let them take the lead on this dance, we’d be really grateful. Thanks again.”
Before he could try to make some excuse for his friends, the band started playing and he didn’t want to make excuses anymore.
He just wanted to hold Kay close, because he had no idea if this night was just some kind of serendipity. Or maybe this might be the start of something new.
So he’d just have to take what he could get and worry about the rest later.
The song was actually one he knew.
One that Taylor and Emily both knew from the last time he’d gotten drunk around them.
It was the song that he’d confessed after too many drinks that he’d think it was a sign if it was the first song that was played when he danced with a woman.
Yellow, by Coldplay.
Gibson turned to her, and she stepped into his arms as the lyrics started and heaven help him.
It was damn serendipity even with the nudge of help from his friends, because holding Kay in his embrace was everything.