Chapter 26
twenty-six
LACHLAN
“The practice is falling apart.” Baylor didn’t even stutter over the accusation.
It was all exhausting. Lachlan tried to lift her head up high and say she could do it all, but it was wearing on her, especially with Nathalie being out of the office for so long in an unplanned way. She’d spent more hours at work in the last two weeks than she had in the last year—at least it felt like that. She just wanted to come home, make herself a glass of wine, and maybe take a bath to relax her weary muscles.
Instead, she was face-to-face with her ex-husband, who had stayed at her house when picking up the girls in order to ambush her with this when she showed up. Lachlan took a steadying breath, gathered whatever energy she had left for the insanity she was about to face, and planted herself right in the middle of it.
“It’s not falling apart.” Lachlan bit her cheek at that. He didn’t even know the half of what was going on right now. Abagail hadn’t even shown up because she really wanted to be there when Nathalie was in the office to observe her as well, but that would only add fuel to this fire for sure.
“Where’s Nathalie?”
“She’ll be back on Monday.” Lachlan ran her fingers through her hair and smoothed her jacket over her sides. “And she’ll be back full time the following Monday.”
“Three weeks without her!” Baylor shook his head wildly. “Because of the flu.”
It wasn’t just because of the flu, but Lachlan wasn’t about to tell him that. And if he wasn’t being such a bull-headed idiot right now, he would know that. He’d been around for before. Then again, sometimes compassion wasn’t always his best feature—mainly because he didn’t have very much.
“Yes, three weeks without her at full time. Two weeks without her at all. She’ll be back to catch up on charting and prepare her patients for her return. This is part of what working at a practice is. We all shift our schedules to help each other out.” Lachlan decided she didn’t want to wait anymore.
She went to the fridge and pulled out the open bottle of white wine she’d left in there sometime last week—she couldn’t even remember—maybe it was two weeks ago now? She eyed the bottle, decided to hell with it , and found a glass.
“Is there anything else you’d like to complain about?”
“You need to sell me Ivy’s shares. You need someone else to help you when shit goes south like this.” He pointed directly at her as she sipped her wine.
Lachlan shook her head. “No.”
“Someone needs to be managing all the staff, all the turnover we’ve had recently, all the complaints against Nathalie. Someone needs to be doing something other than putting Band-Aids on where holes don’t exist.”
Lachlan narrowed her gaze at him. “What complaints about Nathalie?”
Baylor stilled. “She’s had complaints. We all get complaints.”
“Yes, but which ones are you referring to?” Lachlan set her wine glass down. “Because those are confidential, and if you know what’s in them, then we have a whole other discussion right now.”
“I don’t know what’s in them.” Baylor threw his hands up in the air. “But I know there’s complaints. There’s been a lot of gossip going around that Nathalie isn’t actually sick, that she’s been put on some sort of leave while she gets these complaints sorted out and while legal figures it all out.”
“Who’s behind those rumors?” Lachlan went back to drinking her wine as calmly as she possibly could.
Baylor shook his head. “I’ve heard it from a couple nurses, and one of the receptionists.”
Lachlan hummed and rolled her eyes. That was something else to add to Abagail’s list of things to investigate, and they should probably have her come in toward the end of next week. Lachlan would make that call tomorrow when she had some brain power and maybe some time—though she doubted she’d have the latter.
“We’re not selling Ivy’s shares. The goal was to never have anyone else be a part of owning the practice other than the three of us. Ivy wanted out, so we bought what she owned from her. There’s nothing else to it.” Lachlan finished her glass of wine and poured herself a refill. Her gurgling stomach reminded her that she’d skipped lunch that day and probably hadn’t eaten enough breakfast to make it worthwhile. She really needed some food in her belly if she was going to stay sober.
“You’re making a mistake,” Baylor lowered his voice and moved in closer to stand next to her. “I can help you if I’m a partner in this practice. I can help figure out what’s going on and keep everything on track. I’m good at managing those things, you know that.” He put his hand on Lachlan’s upper arm and rubbed up and down.
She glowered at the touch and pulled away. “No, and don’t touch me like that, Baylor. We’re not married anymore, and that is the exact reason why Nathalie and I will never sell to you.”
Baylor put his hands up like he was under arrest, but he stepped away from her. She’d never feared that he would actually do something that he shouldn’t, but she did worry that he often didn’t realize there were new boundaries and rules in place since their divorce. Like staying at her house until she got home was unacceptable. What if she’d had a date? Or what if she’d gone directly to Nathalie’s like she’d debated on doing?
“I’m going to add one more rule to your list tonight, and then this conversation is over.”
Baylor frowned at her. “Who are you and what have you done to my wife?”
“Your wife that you divorced when she wasn’t giving you what you wanted? She got a backbone. You’re welcome to pick up the girls at my house, and you’re welcome to drop them off here in the mornings. Other than that, if I’m not here or Greer isn’t here, then I don’t want you in my house. This is my space. Not yours.” And she’d gotten it in the divorce easily. The last thing Baylor had wanted was to live next to Nathalie and Ivy.
“Fine. Fine.” He stepped away from her. “But think about selling to me.”
“We’ve thought about it. And we reject your lack of an official offer.” Lachlan put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Now get the girls and go home to your new wife—fiancée—girlfriend… whatever she is.”
“Fiancée.”
Lachlan raised her eyebrows at him with a look telling him that she really didn’t give a rip who that woman was to him. She said nothing else as she sipped her second glass of wine, said goodbye to her girls, and then watched them leave through the kitchen window.
God, that man could be infuriating sometimes. But at least he was respectful, mostly, and not a complete tool like Penny. Divorcing him had been simple enough, and they’d managed to get it done in six months.
Knocking back the rest of her wine, Lachlan grabbed a small snack from the fridge, ate it, and then headed straight for Nathalie’s. She needed to unload, and Nathalie was the obvious choice. Also, the quiet of her house after the girls had left was nearly too much for her to manage on her own. She always needed a few hours to ease into it.
She kept telling herself that she’d get used to it someday, but someday hadn’t come yet.
Not bothering to knock, Lachlan let herself in through the garage door and toed off her shoes as soon as she went inside. She smiled at Greer, hugged Alaric, and then asked, “Where is she today?”
“Couch.” Greer nodded toward the living room. “She’s been coming downstairs more these last few days.”
“That’s good.” Lachlan walked directly into the living room and plopped herself down onto the couch next to Nathalie. “My ex-husband is a jerk.”
“Well, that’s quite a greeting,” Nathalie said, muting the television. “Do you see why I never got married now?”
Lachlan harrumphed and shook her head. “No, because there were good things about it.”
“You can name them later. Right now, I think we’re harping on exes.”
“We are.” Lachlan leaned back into the couch. “Do you need me to put Alaric to bed first?”
“Do you need Alaric in bed first?” Nathalie answered the question with a question of her own.
Lachlan mulled that one over for a minute. “Probably.”
Nathalie glanced at her watch. “He’s got thirty minutes to bedtime. Can your complaints wait that long?”
“Yes, they can.” Lachlan rested her head on Nathalie’s shoulder and closed her eyes. “Just wake me up when it’s time.” Maybe by then some of the anger would have dissipated a little too. That’d help her out in the long run, wouldn’t it?
Lachlan wasn’t sure how long it had been, but when Nathalie shook her awake, Lachlan wasn’t resting on her shoulder anymore. “Hey, I wasn’t sure if you still wanted to talk or if you just wanted to sleep.”
Lachlan brushed her fingers over her eyes and narrowed her gaze. The house was decidedly darker than it had been before, most of the lights turned off. “What time is it?”
“A little after ten.”
“You let me sleep for hours, Nathalie.” Lachlan groaned, pushing herself to sit up. “I told you thirty minutes.”
“You crashed pretty hard. I did try to wake you. Even Greer tried. We both gave up.” Nathalie smiled down at her. “Want me to make you a drink?”
Lachlan shook her head, still wiping the sleep from her eyes. She hadn’t realized just how exhausted she was lately, and she knew it was all from the stress of everything happening at once. “No, just give me a minute to get my brain working again.”
Nathalie smiled at her and slid down onto the couch to sit next to her. “I’m glad I’ll be back next week. It’s too much for you to take on.”
There was no disagreeing with that fact. It was a struggle when emergencies came up for them to cover all the bases. Planned absences were one thing, but unplanned were another entirely. “Baylor is pushing for us to sell again.”
“I told you no.”
“That’s what I told him.” Lachlan looked directly at Nathalie. “I don’t exactly want to sell to him either, though I do think it might be a viable option to get Penny off our backs, but the problem is that we might just be going with the lesser of two evils.”
“Exactly.” Nathalie frowned. “Is he harassing you about it?”
Lachlan moved her head back and forth slightly. “Not in so many words.”
“He keeps bringing it up, though.” Nathalie sat down heavily and took Lachlan’s hand in hers. “Even when you tell him no. Typical male bullshit, if you ask me.”
Again, Lachlan couldn’t disagree there. Baylor was far more in the patriarchal mindset than any of them had ever been. “I need you back at work on Monday.”
“I’ll be there. I promise.” Nathalie smiled at her, genuinely smiled, and it was so beautiful to see. “I need to get back. Being cooped up in this house is driving me crazy.”
Laughing lightly, Lachlan took Nathalie’s hand and squeezed her fingers. “Good, because as much as I can hold down the fort, we’re fighting a lot of battles right now. I need you.”
Nathalie lifted Lachlan’s hand, kissing the back of it. Lachlan’s heart stuttered, skipping a few beats before she finally came down to earth. She hadn’t wanted to bring it up, or to ask Nathalie if she’d thought about it more, because she was scared of what the answer would be. That this was all a mistake, that the kiss at the hospital had been a mistake, that they couldn’t go down this road, not at a time like this and that?—
“Stop coming up with excuses, Lachlan.” Nathalie’s voice was so soft and controlled, but firm in the sense that she knew exactly what Lachlan had been fearing.
“You haven’t mentioned anything…” Lachlan faced Nathalie, needing to see her physical reactions to what they were talking about.
Nathalie shook her head. “I was thinking, and to be honest, I was feeling—which is something we all know I don’t like to do.”
Lachlan smiled at her. That was absolutely true. Nathalie would avoid emotions any day of the week if she could.
“And I have come up with one thought through all of this, and it’s something I don’t think I ever doubted,” Nathalie continued.
“What’s that?” Lachlan asked.
“I do love you.”
“But?” There sounded like there was a but there, some kind of pause to whatever was going on, the halt that Lachlan had been waiting for.
“No buts,” Nathalie whispered, sliding in closer. “None at all.” She pressed their lips together softly.
Lachlan breathed in deeply, her eyes fluttering shut as Nathalie’s mouth touched hers. She moaned and reached up to pull Nathalie in closer, intensifying the embrace. Lachlan’s heart raced with happiness, threatening to beat right out of her chest. She held Nathalie close, threading her fingers into Nathalie’s hair and sliding her tongue along Nathalie’s.
Oh God, this was so much better than the first time. Lachlan’s body heated instantly, wanting more and more touch, to know what Nathalie would do next, to see where Nathalie would kiss her again and again. Lachlan leaned backward on the couch, pulling Nathalie down on top of her and not breaking the kiss for a second.
She cradled Nathalie with her legs, sliding her hands up and down Nathalie’s back and sides, over her breasts to test the waters. Nathalie sighed each time Lachlan touched her, her breathing picking up as she broke the kiss.
“As much as I would love to continue this in my bedroom, Lachlan, I’m not cleared for sex yet.”
Lachlan sighed. She knew that. She wasn’t an idiot, and Nathalie was still on light bed rest for a few more weeks, but still, Lachlan wanted so much more. She slowed her touches, though, not intending to incite arousal but simply to comfort and feel and be in this moment. She could stay here all night if Nathalie would let her. She knew Nathalie wouldn’t, but at least they could spend some time together like this, lips locked, bodies intertwined, and pure love flowing between them.