Chapter 14
THAD
Professional distance came easily to me. It always had. A body equaled anatomy, an injury a problem to solve. I separated the person from the work my hands needed to perform without issue.
Until Cash Benjamin showed up in my life, injured and in need of a helping hand.
Cash was not anatomy.
He was flesh and blood.
Wet skin and flexing muscle.
A low moan that escaped when the water washed away the sweat and residue clinging to him.
Sexy sass that made me smile and laugh.
And a vulnerability I wanted to protect and trust I had yet to earn.
Yet. To. Earn.
I was determined to fulfill those words because the alternatives made my brain revolt. The brain that refused to cooperate and return to the status quo.
I envied every drop of water, every sud of soap, every fiber of loofah that touched his skin. I groaned, dragging my gaze away and shoving my hand through my hair. But my eyes floated back to him like a moth to a flame.
Cash opened his eyes and caught me staring.
“You okay over there, Doc?”
“Perfect.” A frog would’ve sounded clearer than I did.
He laughed. Loudly. His hand traced over his defined chest and sculpted abs. How in the hell he’d managed to keep that six-pack through a year of reconstructive surgeries and rehab, I couldn’t say. But whatever he’d done left me breathless and fighting my body’s reaction.
I rolled my eyes. “Wash your hair.”
He grinned as he worked shampoo through it. The expression faded when he reached for the handheld sprayer.
“Stop!” I yelled, surging forward. “Sit upright.”
“What’s wrong?” he asked, doing as I told him to.
“Your knee twisted.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re naked, wet, medicated, and sitting on a slick tile bench covered in water and soap while holding yourself in place with one functional leg. You are not fine.”
His eyes sparkled with amusement. “You noticed I’m naked? I thought you’d gone blind.”
I stepped into the shower with him, thankful I was barefoot and in athletic shorts.
“Close your eyes.”
He stared up at me before his lids slid over his beautiful blue eyes. The intimacy of the situation struck me hard. I took a deep breath and worked my fingers through his hair, rinsing away the shampoo. Cash went still beneath my hands.
But not quiet.
He moaned and groaned and hummed until my cock lengthened and filled, slithering down the leg of my shorts.
There was nothing clinical about the way his head tipped back or how his body relaxed when my fingers moved over his scalp. Nothing professional about my awareness of every inch of wet skin sitting before me.
As soon as the shampoo was gone, Cash held up the conditioner, and I swallowed the groan. My cock throbbed, and I seriously considered crying in frustration.
The moment I rinsed the last of the conditioner away, I asked, “You finished?”
His eyes opened, and he looked up at me, his head moving slowly left and right. He grabbed the conditioner and drizzled it over his rock-hard dick with one hand while the other slid up and down his length.
“Fuck,” I groaned. “Stop. You have to stop.”
“No, Doc. I don’t.”
“Yes,” I said. “You do.” I twisted the faucets before I turned and snagged a towel from the pile to pat his leg dry. “I’ll wrap everything once we get you dried off,” I said as I slipped his brace under his leg and locked it in place.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw his erection had flagged, but the position I was in had me imagining leaning forward to swallow him whole. Using tongue and lips to coax him back to full hardness until he flooded my throat with the load of cum he’d been trying to stroke from himself.
Cash’s smile vanished when my gaze met his. “Sorry. That was…”
“Don’t apologize. This situation is difficult for us both.”
He nodded, and I sighed. “It’s not because I don’t…”
“I don’t need platitudes, Doc.”
“God dammit, Cash. You had surgery two days ago. You’re taking pain medication. You’re injured. Dependent on me for basic care. Staying in my house. And on top of all that…I am still your physician.”
“I feel like a fucking burden.”
“That is not what I said.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“You are not a burden.”
Cash looked away.
“And I am not pulling away because I don’t want you. It’s because I do. So fucking much.”
His eyes came back to mine. I forced myself to hold his gaze.
“I’m pulling away because I have to.”
Neither of us moved.
Cash’s voice dropped. “I want you too, Doc.”
“This is not the time or place for this conversation. It’s also not a revelation. We knew how we felt. We agreed.”
“True, but—”
“No. No buts. You are in an extremely vulnerable position, and I’m trying not to take advantage of it. Of you.”
“You think I don’t know what I want?”
“You’re a man. I would never make the mistake of telling you what you want, but wanting something doesn’t automatically make acting on it right.”
His chest rose with a slow breath. “I fucking hate this, you know that?” he asked.
“I do. And I hate it as well.” My hand cupped his face, my thumb brushing over his cheekbone, hating the lingering bruising under his eyes from how violently ill the anesthesia made him. “But…there’s a widget on your phone counting down to the end of the madness.”
“Just mine?”
“No. Not just yours.” I admitted to adding the same widget to mine with the exact same date.
Understanding gradually replaced the frustration that mirrored mine. Taking a deep breath, I opened the brace and carefully removed the protective covering, leaving the Steri-Strips in place.
“Everything looks good,” I stated once the dressing underneath was revealed. It had remained dry.
“You say that like you’re surprised. My doctor is the GOAT.”
I laughed and said, “Yeah, he is. And I’m never surprised when my work looks good.”
“Arrogant asshole.”
“You picked me.”
“I didn’t have many options.”
“You had other surgeons.”
“None I trusted.”
My hands stilled on the brace.
Cash seemed to realize what he’d said at the same moment I did. He looked down. I secured the brace again, giving him time to decide whether he wanted to say more or let what he said fall away.
“Hold on to me and push up from the bench. Keep the right leg forward so you don’t mistakenly put any weight on it,” I said.
We got him back to his feet without incident and into the wheelchair we used when he felt unsteady. Once he was seated, I handed him clean clothes and turned away.
He managed his shirt fine, but getting his shorts over the brace proved impossible without help. I guided the fabric over his foot and worked it carefully up his leg.
“This isn’t how I imagined our first shower together,” he said.
I glanced up.
His smile was quieter this time.
“How did you imagine it?” I asked, even though I knew I shouldn’t.
He laughed. “That feels like another conversation we’re not allowed to have.”
“Probably.”
I finished adjusting his shorts and rose.
Cash caught my wrist before I could step away.
His grip wasn’t tight. I could have freed myself without effort.
I didn’t.
“Thank you,” he said.
There was no joke waiting behind the words. No sarcasm to make the gratitude easier for him to offer.
“You’re welcome.”
“And I meant what I said earlier.”
“About my sheets being ugly?”
“About being glad you stayed.”
His thumb shifted against the inside of my wrist. One small movement that felt far too intimate.
“I’m glad you were there,” he said.
Something inside me gave way. Not enough to make me forget what he needed from me. Enough to make me understand the danger had never been limited to wanting his body.
I could keep my hands to myself.
I would keep my hands to myself.
He deserved that from me. I would maintain the boundaries required by his injury, his dependence, and the trust he had placed in me. And my medical license.
But every time Cash allowed me to care for him, he gave me another piece of himself, and I knew two things: one, professional distance had long since disappeared, and two, it was no longer a question of how not to give him a piece of myself in return.
It was how I kept from handing myself over to him completely.
So much for following the rule.