Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
SAbrINA
W e had multiple rounds of sex all through the storm and only left when day was giving way to evening. We didn’t want to get stuck in the shack overnight. Not that I would have minded, but I was getting cold, and the temperature was going to drop.
Putting on my damp clothes was worse than awful. When we got back to the ranch, Cal carried me to my shower before doing anything else. Brynna gave us a knowing wink. My ankle hurt like a son of a gun, but that wasn’t where my focus was. I wasn’t ready for us to be apart.
“I don’t know if I can manage this by myself,” I said when he plopped me onto my bathroom counter, then stepped to the shower to turn it on.
“Then, of course, I have to stay and help,” he replied, already peeling off his T-shirt.
Bless the person who’d designed the shower with its bench seat, because straddling him put no pressure on my ankle and good pressure on all the right parts. With his big hands on my ass, he helped me ride. All it took was his knowing hands soaping me up, and I was propositioning him. After the shower, he wrapped me in a towel and carried me to the bed, propping my foot up on pillows. He returned later with a tray of food, pain relievers, and promise in his eyes. Which he kept in spades.
In the wee hours of the morning, he tucked me up against him, his finger tracing a lazy path on the side of my thigh. He broke the silence. “You know, Jace asked me once if I had a death wish.”
His breath was on my neck, and I was right where I wanted to be. “Do you think you did?” I asked.
“No. I really did trick myself into believing that I was happy. Or maybe content. I knew I couldn’t have you, but I believed that was how it was going to be, so I tried to recognize that I had everything else I needed. But I was wrong.” He nuzzled my neck and left a path of featherlight kisses across my shoulder. “I needed you.”
“Did you not realize that you were cutting out your sister and mom too?”
He grunted. “I thought seeing them occasionally when they went on trips was sufficient, and if we didn’t see each other much, my dad would forget about them. Mom had moved out, so I knew Brynna was in a better home. But I see now how much Jace was right. I may not have just been throwing myself into situations that were high risk; I was also burning myself out.”
I rolled toward him and put my leg over his. “High risk? Like getting shot?” I kissed the wound on his shoulder.
“Yeah.” His voice was scratchy with emotion.
He slanted his mouth hard against mine and flipped me on my back. Conscious of my ankle, he lifted my leg to his waist, and I followed with the other leg, wrapping both around him as I wove my hands into his hair.
“I missed you,” I said. “So much. No one else ever felt right.”
He raked his teeth across my lips, pausing to suck on the lower one before responding. “There was this one time you were dating a doctor, and it looked like he made you happy. I took a protection assignment out of the country. It was grueling and a fit punishment for me. I didn’t come back until Jace told me y’all broke up.”
“We dated for eight months.” I met his kiss with one of my own as I clung tightly to him.
“One of the longest eight months of my life. And I hated myself for wanting to take out a doctor. Didn’t he do something great like…”
“Orthopedics. He never made me feel like you do.”
“Tiny dick, huh?”
I laughed. “Why is it always about the size?”
“I’m right, though, aren’t I? Not that I like even thinking about you and him.”
I slid my hand down his chest to below his hip to stroke what was pressing against me hard.
The next morning, he piggybacked me to the car and took me into town to see the doctor. I texted Cricket to tell her we should meet up. I was waiting on the cold patients’ table with that stupid paper on it. Every time I moved, it crinkled or ripped as it stuck to the back of my legs. Cal leaned up against the wall, checking his phone.
Bryce Jacobson, Hannah’s husband and the town vet, walked in wearing a white lab coat, with a stethoscope around his neck.
“Ha, ha.” I said. “Did Cricket send you? I don’t need a vet. I need a doctor.”
He held up a hand and smiled. “Sorry, not Bryce, just his twin, Bryant. People get us confused all the time. Even our parents.”
I leaned in close and could see no difference. He had the same face, laugh lines and all. The good doctor waited patiently, his hands in his pockets allowing me to survey him.
“Seriously, and you’re a hot doctor?”
He nodded, rocking on his heels from my compliment. “I moved here about six months ago. Bryce kept talking it up, and after my divorce, I figured a fresh start would do me good.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
He shrugged it off.
Bryant was the cliché of the handsome country doctor, and I would have bet cold hard cash he was being heavily chased by the local women. Hot, educated guys like him were prime pickings. In the years without Cal, Bryant would have been on my ‘consider pursuing’ list. He was the kind of guy that checked all the right boxes.
“I bet you are insanely popular in town,” I said. “Probably get a daily visit from one of the church ladies professing an ailment they don’t have, but they do have the phone number and a pitch for their single granddaughter.”
Bryant sat on a stool and rolled toward me, then took my foot in his hands. They were soft and warm. As I’d done over the last ten years when an attractive man touched me, I waited for a reaction—a fluttering of the stomach, a piqued interest. But nothing came. Only one man did it for me and always had. I gave Cal a smile, and my heart skipped a beat.
“How did you know?” the doctor said with a laugh. “Oh. Wait. Sabrina, right?”
I nodded.
“You’re Hannah’s matchmaker friend. I have heard all about you.” His smile widened. “You’re not going to jump into the mix with the church ladies, are you? Call me old-fashioned, but I’d like to meet the next Mrs. Jacobson by chance.” He flashed me a grin, then studied my ankle.
“Nope, I only work with people who want it.” I winced, and Cal took a step closer.
Bryant apologized and slowly started to move my foot, rolling the ankle. “Tell me when it hurts.”
We did this for a cycle of three, and Bryant wrote something on his notepad. “You going to be in town long?”
I shrugged. “That all depends.” I glanced at Cal. We were waiting for his dad to make the next move, and we hadn’t really talked about what came next for us.
Bryant looked between me and Cal. “How do you two know each other?”
“College,” I said.
“She’s my girlfriend,” Cal said at the same time.
CAL
Okay, a man knew when another man was sizing up his woman. And that was what the doc did when he came into the room and saw Sabrina. His posture straightened, his smile widened, and I caught a glimpse of him breathing hard in his armpit, probably checking his breath.
Then he saw me, paused midstep for half a second, and decided to take a gamble and try his hand at winning her attention. Poor sap. He was out of luck. Not that Sabrina and I had declared our intentions and had the Where do we stand talk, but I expected we would have it soon. Maybe even before the sun set. And this nitwit was reading the room all wrong. He was flirting and touching her. Granted, he had to touch her to look at her ankle, but still, his hands lingered a few seconds too long.
I ground my teeth to keep from growling at him. This would play out, and we’d get a good look at what kind of guy the doc was. I didn’t like the idea that I might have to snap off the good doc’s hands, beat him with them, then toss them into the fire.
I wiped a hand down my face. Goddamn. I was stupid crazy for this woman. So I understood where he was coming from. But when the good doc asked his question about her status, I thought it only fair the man knew the playing field.
“You an orthopedic doc?” I asked, thinking of our conversation earlier.
Sabrina stifled a chuckle, and her eyes met mine. I stuck my hands into my pockets and shrugged. I’d loved any memory of that doctor right out of her. Mission achieved.
Sabrina returned her attention to the doc. “I’m sorry—your question. I thought you were asking how we met. Which was college, but yes, we’re dating.”
Bryant looked between us. “And you’ve been dating since college. Impressive.” He said it like he didn’t mean it, as if I were stringing Sabrina along with promises of forever.
“Off and on,” Sabrina said.
“Not so much off,” Cal said.
Sabrina snorted. “He was out of the country a lot.”
“All in the name of safety.”
Bryant looked at me and snapped his fingers. “That’s right. You’re that securities expert. Hannah said what you did at the community center was fantastic. I’ve seen you on TV before. Sorry about the beating you’re taking in the news and about them taking away that Pinnacle award. Why shouldn’t you be awarded for something you did that they said was awesome but now are scared because of the press? Chickenshit, if you ask me.”
Sabrina sat up straighter, looked at me in surprise, then searched her purse for her phone.
“You left it at the house,” I said.
She narrowed her eyes, and I knew what she was asking.
“Paul told me about it when we got back. It’s like the good doc said. They’re afraid of bad press.” Just one more thing my dad had taken away from me. I hadn’t even told her about the award to begin with, mostly because I had forgotten about it with everything else going on.
She leaned back and crossed her arms. “Assholes.”
Sabrina was watching me, so I gave her a small smile and a shrug, then looked at her foot, hoping to hide my anger. “Paul is on it.”
Dr. Bryant, quick to pick up on the vibe, stopped looking at Sabrina with his romance eyes and moved into doctor mode. He reached into a drawer and pulled out ace wrap. “I don’t think it’s broken, but let’s X-ray it real quick to rule that out, then depending on what we find, I’ll wrap it to help with stability and swelling and give you something for pain and inflammation.” He smiled at Sabrina. “I’ll grab the machine. Hang on.” A few minutes later, he was in the room and taking an X-ray. “You’ve got some good tears in there. This is a pretty severe sprain, but nothing is broken.” He finished wrapping her ankle and inspected his work.
“Thank you, Bryant,” Sabrina said.
He tapped a notepad. “You want me to call these into the pharmacy in town? Are you set up there?”
She nodded. “I am. Thank you.”
He stuck out his hand. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Sabrina.”
And then he turned to me and put his hand out for a shake. “And you as well, Cal.”
The guy was all right—decent. I kind of liked this guy.
Sabrina and I left the appointment, with her on crutches, and went to meet Cricket in the town square. “When were you going to tell me about this award?” she asked.
“I’d honestly forgotten about it.”
She paused a few blocks from the square. “Help me get to this bench. Can you go get Cricket and tell her I’m here? I’m too tired to hobble my way there.”
“Tell me her number, and I’ll text her.”
She shook her head. “I need to get away from you for a minute. And when we get home, I’m going to talk to Paul. Getting answers from you is like squeezing water from a rock.”
I chuckled. “You need me to help you get away from me?” I picked her up and carried her to the bench.
“Yeah, it’s a new fresh kind of hell. I get so frustrated with you for not telling me things. Is losing this award a big deal?”
I wanted to tell her it wasn’t, but she’d see through that right away. “Yeah, it is. They don’t give it out every year, just when someone does outstanding work, and we were being recognized for our work on school safety. Paul’s pissed because it would have helped with the launch of the new division and the app. I’m more pissed because I think Hitchens had his hand in this. Not giving it to me because I don’t deserve it? Fine. But don’t take it away because of outside pressure.” I bent and kissed her on the forehead. “But I’ll go away, and then you can miss me when I’m gone.”
She swatted my arm and still looked pouty.
“Babe, seriously, Paul will brief us when he knows more.” I kissed the pout right off her lips.
Then I walked over to get Cricket. When we were coming back, we arrived just in time to see a woman slap Sabrina across the face and witness Sabrina return it with a punch.