Chapter One – Thank you Aimee
Chapter One
Maisey
THANK YOU AIMEE
Performed by Taylor Swift
FOURTEEN YEARS LATER
HIM: Are you coming to One-Eyed Frank’s tonight?
HER: Nope. I have leftover enchiladas and a new book calling me.
HIM: I need protection, Maisey-girl. Your protection.
HER: You’re six foot four and roughly the size of a barn. What kind of protection could I possibly provide that you couldn’t give yourself?
HIM: If I’m with you, other women stay away. I don’t risk offending someone and getting slapped. You’re protecting my cheeks from taking a real beating.
HER: It isn’t your cheeks but your ego that needs a beating.
PRESENT DAY
I opened my locker door and stared at the woman who appeared in the mirror inside. I scowled at her. “You are not going to Frank’s.”
Especially not looking like this—like I’d just gotten off a twelve-hour shift that had started at seven this morning.
With my plain brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, makeup all but worn off my long, narrow face, and in scrubs with unicorns on them, I looked like I was sixteen instead of twenty-six.
I locked my sage-colored eyes on the reflection. “Maisey Campbell, you will not go to One-Eyed Frank’s. He will not crook his finger, and you show up.”
It was a battle I’d been waging for two decades when it came to Beckett. Sometimes I won. Sometimes I lost. And every time I lost, it reminded me I was the same idiot girl who’d fallen for the heroic boy-next-door, who’d patiently taught her to read.
If he’d been hard to resist as a beanpole of a teen who’d shared his deepest, darkest wounds with me, it was impossible to resist the muscle-bound fire captain he’d become, especially with that perfect dimple in his right cheek and his confidence the size of the entire state of California.
I ripped the band out of my hair and tried hopelessly to fluff it up.
It didn’t cooperate, especially without any of the multitude of products I usually used to help it.
The strands had always been straight as a board and were a generic brown that no one asked their hairdresser to repeat.
I’d tried highlights and different colors over the years, but it had ultimately ruined the fine texture and made things worse.
So these days, I stuck with plain brown. I stuck with who I was.
Maisey the sidekick to two best friends.
Maisey the helper.
Maisey the nurse.
I’d never been hot Maisey, who had equally hot guys drooling after her.
I’d stopped expecting any sort of miracle like that in college. One too many “hot guys” had made it clear I should be grateful they’d “chosen me” for sex, but I shouldn’t expect anything more. I shouldn’t expect dates and romance.
Even still, I hadn’t given up on love and companionship the way Beckett had.
I still felt like it was out there for me, somewhere, with someone.
But I also wasn’t going to let some disappointing-in-bed guy make me feel bad about the hardly noticeable scars on my jaw from the surgery that had finally and permanently corrected my severe malocclusion.
I snagged my reusable water bottle off the shelf, shoved my bag onto my shoulder, and slammed the locker door. A horrifying screech escaped at the face that appeared in front of me.
“Holy potatoes, Meredith, you scared the hell out of me.”
Her face remained serious as she said, “I need you to cover Lisa’s shift tomorrow.”
Part of me groaned at the idea of working another shift, while another part of me was excited at the thought of being in Labor and Delivery.
I’d loved working L&D at my first hospital after college.
But when I’d joined Swift Rivers Community Hospital, they’d only had a job in the floater pool available, and due to liabilities, floaters rarely got to work in specialty departments.
“What’s wrong with Lisa?”
Meredith frowned. “She took off to Vegas with her new boyfriend and isn’t coming back. With that summer cold flying through the staff, the last thing we need is to be down another body.”
If Lisa was gone, it would mean a permanent position in Labor and Delivery had opened up. That vicious bitch, otherwise known as Hope, leaped through me, but she was just as likely to crush me as she was to give me what I wanted.
And as tempting as it was to say yes at the chance it would help me get the permanent job, I’d just worked five twelve-hour shifts in a row, instead of my usual three, covering for people at Meredith’s request. I needed a break and had planned on spending the morning on my horse at the Harrington Ranch, training for the Fourth of July show, and then binge-reading a new cowboy romance.
I sidestepped Meredith and headed for the exit. “Ask Wendy.”
“Wendy is going to a wedding. If you want the spot on the Labor and Delivery team, this is your opportunity to show you can handle it. Plus, you promised when I hired you that you’d pull every shift needed.” Meredith pouted.
I felt that old, familiar twinge deep inside—guilt at being the reason others didn’t get what they needed or wanted. My therapist had almost yanked the tendency out of me, but it still surfaced now and again. I inhaled deeply and let it out slowly before responding.
“That was three years ago, Meredith. I’ve proven my loyalty and my willingness to be a team player since then.
I’ve proven I can handle any ward you’ve thrown at me.
If the managers here don’t think I’m ready for a position in Labor and Delivery, perhaps I should consider looking for a job elsewhere. I hear County is hiring.”
“That isn’t what I said,” she backpedaled, knowing the hospital couldn’t afford to be down two nurses, and I felt another pang of guilt at pushing her. But damnit, I’d paid my dues.
As I headed for the door, I did something I rarely did—I made a demand on my own behalf. “I want the Labor and Delivery spot. If you and Becka can guarantee I’ll be the first person in line for the job, then I’ll cover tomorrow. Otherwise, find someone else.”
My heart was pounding, but I didn’t look back as I left.
A weird mix of pride and remorse surged through me.
I’d earned the spot. I’d put in the time and done what I could to help the hospital, and yet I could still hear Chelsea’s voice in my head, telling me I was being selfish for demanding more.
She wasn’t right, but she also wasn’t wrong.
As a kid, I’d taken so much of our family’s time and resources that it had scarred my sister almost as much as it had scarred me.
Outside, I took a deep breath, surprised at the heaviness in the air.
It had been nearly ninety today, normal for summer at the base of the Sierra Mountains, but the humidity was unusual.
It had hung over the town for a week now, as if a storm was brewing somewhere out past the mountains, waiting to break.
Or maybe that was just the thriller novel I’d finished last night getting to me.
The sky was still light, but the shadows were stretching toward my faded-blue pickup as I climbed into the driver’s seat and started the engine, hoping it would start. When it coughed to life, vibrating my seat with its deep shudder, I sighed with relief.
I just needed it to last a few more years, at least until a pay raise and more savings gave me some breathing room to purchase a car. And even then, I’d rather buy back my horse Dad had sold off first.
Even though it had happened over a decade ago, just thinking about how I’d almost lost Titan was enough to make my chest contract.
My friend Fallon and her billionaire family had stepped in to save the day, buying my horse and letting me treat him as if he were still mine.
I was even more thankful for that gift than I’d been for the college scholarship they’d given me, and I was overwhelmingly and deeply grateful for the funds that had let me graduate debt-free.
My phone buzzed, a welcome interruption to the spiral into my troubled childhood that threatened to ensnare me. But when I saw it was Beckett calling, I almost didn’t answer.
If I talked to him, I’d weaken. I’d head to Frank’s like he wanted.
Except, Beckett rarely actually called—he was strictly a texting kind of guy—so what if something was wrong? What if he needed help?
I hit the accept button, confronting any request for me to show up head-on. “I’m not going. I’m dead on my feet.”
Loud chanting greeted me on the other end. “Maisey. Maisey. Maisey.”
Deep voices mingled in with a few female ones, and my cozy night at home all but disappeared. If all my friends were all at the bar, asking me to come, I’d never be able to say no.
“That’s low, Beckett, even for you.”
He laughed. A slow, deep rumble that I felt all the way down to the pit of my stomach. Dangerously delightful. Dangerously off-limits.
“Fallon and Andie are attempting to pull off a trivia win. They need you, darlin’,” Beckett taunted. “You don’t show up, and you’ll be the sole reason the Femme Fatales lose tonight.”
On the other end, I heard Fallon demand, “Let me talk to her,” and two seconds later, she came on the line, pleading. “We’re down twenty, Maise. Twenty. And I’ve got something big riding on this with Parker.”
I couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped. “Stop betting sexual favors with your husband, and then you won’t have to worry about winning or losing.”
Her voice turned quiet and muffled, as if she was using her hand to cover her mouth so the others wouldn’t hear. “It’s not sex. Well… Not sex, per se. This is a very important bet. You remember what I talked to you about the other day?”
She’d been talking about having another baby.
Her little girl, Lila, was just over two years old now, and Fallon had gotten it in her head it was the perfect time to start trying for baby number three.
This time, one she and Parker created together, rather than one they’d adopted or the one she’d had with the loser who’d knocked her up.
I sighed. “I need to go home and change. I’m still in my scrubs.”