Chapter 17 - Catalina
I brush my thumb up the scar, memorizing the feel of the raised skin.
"I never minded the scar," he says softly. "It reminds me of you now. Reminds me that I’m not invincible anymore, too.”
“You could practically be,” I whisper. “If you gave riding up. You could live a safe, long life, you know?”
His jaw ticks. There’s a quick flash of tension in his gaze. “I don’t like when you tell me to give up the one thing I love most.”
I study his gaze. I can see he's upset. I've been direct with Jensen in the past and it's usually rolled right off him.
This is one of those moments where I'd normally shrug off his frustration and annoyance and move straight to cold.
But I don't want to be cold with him tonight. I don’t want to be cold with him ever again.
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I won’t say it again.”
He gives me a small nod. “Thank you. I had a girlfriend who tried to control my decisions once. Long time ago. Back when I first got into riding at twenty and was still a wild kid. She never understood that it’s the only thing I have.”
I file that away for later. He had a girlfriend at twenty years old before the media started reporting on his relationships like he was a celebrity.
She didn’t understand or support his career.
I wonder if that’s why they broke up. I wonder what she looked like.
Whether she was soft and easy, and the kind of woman who could make a man feel like staying put.
I wonder if he tried to be something different for her and couldn't, or if he never tried at all.
I wonder which version of that would hurt more.
I know which version I recognize. Davis never asked me to be different. He quietly found someone who already was. He found someone warmer.
“But bull-riding isn’t all you have,” I say.
His jaw clenches. “It is. At least until something better comes along, Doc. Until I find something worth loving more.”
I watch him. He watches me. This silent limbo that we've always felt comfortable in stretches between us but tonight something in it has shifted.
For as outgoing and talkative as he is, I like that Jensen's comfortable in the silence with me.
That he doesn't feel the need to fill the empty space between us with words that don’t have meaning.
“I don’t like when you call me Doc,” I tell him.
His brow lifts slowly, like he’s both curious and amused by that response. “Really?”
I nod.
“Would you prefer I call you Doctor Alba?”
“At work, yes. But that's not because I need to be reminded of my credentials. It's so that the other guys respect me and don't think that I'm giving you special treatment because we're... um... you know." I can’t even use the word friends.
He nods. "I understand."
I shift slightly in the water. "But when we’re not working...” I wet my lips, heartbeat thudding in my ears. “You can call me Catalina.”
He sits back a little, thinking, the moonlight turning his eyes a softer shade of brown that makes him even more attractive.
His hands rest wide behind him on the edge of the tub, broad chest rising and falling slowly.
That nose ring he's had in since the day I first joined the circuit glistens a little.
I thought I hated piercings. I thought I hated tattoos.
Now I don't think there’s anything about Jensen I could hate.
“You told June you’ve never had a nickname,” he says.
“That's true.” He was listening to that?
His gaze flicks down to my mouth, then back up again. “May I give you one?”
My heart stutters. Because no one’s ever cared enough to want to do that. Nicknames feel intimate. They feel familiar.
My sisters got theirs from our parents—Daniela got Dani, a logical choice.
Isla’s nickname became Lala. I was always just…
Catalina. Serious. Focused. Armored in ambition.
And when I became a doctor, the title became a shield that I could hide behind.
Then, the only people who called me Catalina were my parents or sisters.
Formality instead of softness. Title instead of affection. Names mean something, especially in my culture, which is why we often hyphenate the mother and father's surnames. They give identity. They indicate placement in a person's world. They help you feel safe and known.
My ex never called me babe or sweetheart. Those were pet names reserved for cute women who giggle, and not serious ones like me. To him, I was always Catalina, or even Doctor Alba at work and out of it.
And now Jensen—half-naked, steam-laced—is looking at me like I’m something worth naming. He’s asking if he can give me something I’ve secretly always wanted to have but never had the voice to ask for.
“A nickname?” I ask again.
He smiles. "Yeah. If you don’t mind. Catalina’s beautiful, but I’d like to give you something new.”
“Only my parents and sisters call me Catalina. Everyone else calls me Doctor Alba. I don't even know what my nickname would be.”
He studies me for a moment; his eyes sweep over my face in the moonlight. “What do your friends call you?”
“I… don’t really have any of those.”
Don't really have friends. How sad is that to say out loud? How sad must that look to a man like Jensen who's friends with everyone?
Everywhere we go, he makes new friends easily. Whether it's with the announcers, the judges, or just random people in the crowd who come to watch him ride. And they all have their nick names for him.
Cowboy.
Ace.
Grant.
Rider.
Star.
Buddy.
Grandson.
I have none of that. No one to give me a name. No friends.
His expression softens. “Catalina, you’re my friend.”
He says it the way he says most things. Completely unexpectedly and without any ceremony. Friendship with Jensen is something he decided sometime between Austin and Nashville, and now that’s it. We’re friends. I’ve never had someone that just decided that about me before.
My parents decided I was capable to handle the family. My ex decided I was impressive enough to be his fiancée. My colleagues decided I was useful to them as long as I worked for the hospital. And Jensen decided I was his friend.
Something in my chest tightens.
He smiles slowly. “How’s Kitty? Cat feels too predictable.”
I burst into a laugh. “Kitty?”
“Do you hate it?”
I think about it, then shake my head. “No. Oddly, I don’t.”
“Another thing only I know about you now that no one else does. You’re soft like a kitty." His voice dips lower. "And you know... a pussy purrs when it’s played with.”
My eyes widen just a fraction. “Jensen…” I whisper.
He leans back into the tub like he's trying to give me space, but his gaze never leaves mine.
“I know,” he says softly.
His fingers skim the surface of the water and then dip just below.
I watch his hands disappear and think about the fact that I’m a woman with an advanced degree and a decade of surgical precision with the ability to make life-or-death decisions under pressure.
He’s not touching me, but he’s close enough now that if I moved an inch, my thighs would bracket his hips under the water and his fingers that disappeared would fall to my hips.
I already know I’m going to take that inch.
“I liked watching you tonight,” he murmurs, eyes half-lidded. “Even if it was with another man.”
“Why?”
Under the water, my fingers glide forward until they're touching his knees softly. His entire body stills.
"Is this okay?" I ask, checking in.
He sighs and relaxes a little. "Kitty, what did I tell you? You never have to ask to touch me."
I move forward a fraction, then inch up a little, along his thighs—slow and cautious. "Why did you like watching me tonight?"
“Because…” His voice thins to a gravelly whisper. “I like being around you. Being near you. I like seeing you happy. You looked happy tonight. I liked that.”
That shouldn’t affect me as much as it does. My fingers tighten around his legs, my knees drifting to either side of his hips until I’m fully straddling him—hovering but not yet sitting on him.
His hands lift, brushing up my arms before cupping my chin firmly.
“Catalina,” he says softly, “I don't want to make assumptions here, but the way you're looking in this Tennessee moonlight got me thinking you want to be fucked properly right now, and I respect you too much to sleep with you again.”
“Is sleeping with me disrespectful?” My voice is barely a breath. His eyes search mine in a way that tells me he feels this too.
“No,” he rasps. “But the things I want to do to your body are.”
I sink down onto his lap, feeling the stiff, undeniable press of him beneath me. His free hand grips my hip, steadying—no, holding—me there.
“Kitty,” he murmurs, almost like a warning. “Fuck.”
“I like that you gave me a nickname,” I whisper. "I like that no one else has ever cared enough to do that."
He looks tortured. Absolutely wrecked. He drags his thumb across my lips, then presses just past the seam.
Instinct kicks in—I close my eyes and suck the tip of one finger lightly.
I’ve never done anything like that before, but the taste of warm water and chlorine on his rough skin and the way he tenses beneath me when I do it makes me bolder.
When I open my eyes again, his are molten.
“I like having your attention,” I say.
“You have it,” he growls. “But I hope that’s not all you want from me.”
I don’t answer. Because I’m terrified that it might be. That I might only be doing this because I've been starved for affection and a man's focus for so long that I'm mistaking what Jensen's giving me for more.
He leans forward, lips brushing the corner of my mouth softly like he wants to kiss me there but won't allow himself, while his hand keeps my chin exactly where he wants it.
“I said I respect you,” he murmurs, “then you go and suck my thumb like it’s my cock.”
My pulse jumps. I can't remember the last time I've given head. I wonder if I’d still be good at it.
“Would you let me?” I ask.
He pulls back half an inch, breathing rougher. “I’d let you do whatever you want to me.”
I slide down more fully onto his lap, and the hard length of him fits right against me, throbbing against my clit.
“Will you have sex with me in this hot tub?” I ask.
“Catalina…” His voice cracks, thick with restraint, his thumb still on my chin, his other hand gripping my hip like he’s barely holding the line.
I reach under the water, past his waistband, and dip inside his boxers before wrapping my fingers around him. He’s stiff and hot and heavy in my hand. I stroke from base to tip, twisting slightly at the top, and the groan he gives me is pure sin.
My other palm finds his chest—right over his heart, right over the bull tattoo, like my hand belongs there. I can feel his heart beating wildly beneath the skin.
“I said I respect you too much to do that,” he grits out like that’s going to stop me.
“Disrespect me tonight.”
His eyes darken, narrowing like he’s fighting himself. His hand slides between us, hooking into the side of my soaked underwear and yanking it aside before thrusting two fingers deep inside my pussy.
“You want me to disrespect you,” he says roughly, twisting his wrist until he's practically lifting me with his hand from the inside.
“Yes,” I whimper when he rubs the front of my walls. “Disrespect me and make me come again.”
He presses his forehead to mine, releasing my chin only to slide his free hand into my hair and tug gently, opening my mouth for his. And then his lips crash into mine. They're hungry, desperate, like he’s been starving for this since the minute we left for the bar and my date tonight.
My bare breasts flatten against his chest, right over the scar I gave him months ago.
Surgeon and patient, tangled up again—except this time, it feels like something more important than a one-night stand.
I'm not sure if I'm crossing any lines by sleeping with Jensen again, but right now I feel too alive, too free, too turned on to even care about my usual list of rules.
He lifts my hips with both hands, lines his cock up at my entrance, and pulls back just enough to look in my eyes first.
“Sit on it,” he says, voice rough. “Fuck yourself on me in this water while I watch you come. You deserve this, but please know that I think you deserve a lot more than a quick fuck in a hot tub.”
I reach under the water, grip his tip, guide him where I want him, and then sink down slowly. The stretch, the burn, it feels so good to be full of Jensen again.
“Oh… f-fuck,” I sigh.
And for now, this is all I’m focusing on.
I'll think about the rest of what he said another time.