Chapter 7
Jake
It’d been a week since my daughter shoved half a dozen jellybeans up her nose, and the fact that I was clocking time by this incident was truly pathetic. I’d gotten a mountain of shit for it from everyone around me, but I expected nothing less.
“Dr. Mitchell,” my nurse said, walking through the opened door of my office, “there’s a delivery for you?”
I frowned. “Are the monitors I requested finally here?” I questioned.
“It’s a bouquet of—”
“Hey gorgeous,” Collin said, walking into my office carrying a candy-filled jar wrapped in cellophane with a large blue bow. “Got you a little something since I haven’t seen you since you lost the patient last week.”
“Thanks, Jackie,” I said. “Would you mind keeping an eye out for those monitors? I’m afraid they might end up on the wrong floor.”
“No problem. I’ll ask admin if they know anything,” she said.
“You’re the best,” I said as she rolled her eyes, waved her hand at me, and walked down the hall.
I looked at Collin, standing there like a party clown who’d come bearing gifts. “Thanks, buddy, but you brought that to the wrong recipient,” I said, leaning back in my office chair and running my hands over my face.
I was so fucking tired. I’d felt like this since I lost my patient in the ER the night that Ash brought Kaley in to have Cam extract the jellybeans from her nose.
“Kaley didn’t laugh when I told her I had a side business growing candy from my nose,” he chuckled and sat in the chair across from my desk.
“Yeah, well, I think she’s scarred for life from the total humiliation she suffered after her ER fiasco. You know our kids can’t handle being teased and pranked like we can,” I said, arching an eyebrow at him.
Collin rolled his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. He seemed to be in a great mood when he walked in, but I’m sure my lack of amusement was taking the wind out of his sails.
“Come on, Jakey. Are you still wearing the G-string Ash likes when you two get kinky, or are you just being a dick because you enjoy it?”
I smiled. “That thong rides up too high when I wear my slacks,” I half-laughed, knowing I was just edgy because it had been a long week.
“That’s why I wear the lace ones,” Jace Stone said, walking into my office with the GQ fashion and charisma that made all the ladies in the hospital follow him around.
“I thought that was because you were thinking about switching teams,” Collin said, casually placing an ankle over his knee while Jace took the seat beside him.
“Meh, I’m kicking it around, but men might be too hairy for my taste, and after last night with Michelle Parker? Holy shit,” he said, prompting me and Collin to narrow our eyes at his cocky ass.
I smirked, needing this reprieve from my continual overthinking.
My work was stressful enough—assessing patient charts, monitoring, performing procedures, and daily stuff that came along with being Chief of Cardiology—but the stress of losing a patient added on top of that always brought me to the brink.
“You know, when you kiss and tell, you’re giving yourself away.
You may as well come out and say you’ve been in a dry spell for months, and you haven’t actually been laid in mind-blowing fashion, right?
” I said, challenging the young doctor who started working with us at Saint John’s close to a year ago.
This eligible bachelor wore his cockiness on his sleeve.
He also hadn’t yet learned that Collin and I thrived on giving each other hell; we enjoyed it even more when we got to turn it onto someone else who reminded us of who we were before we settled into our married lives and started having our own families.
“Nah, man. It’s true,” Jace contested.
“Well, it may have been mind-blowing for you, but I doubt it was for her,” Collin said.
“I guess you wouldn’t know,” Jace bantered back.
“Oh, we’d know whether you gave that girl the sexual experience you’re in here bragging about,” I added.
“I’m not even going to ask,” Jace answered, knowing he was walking into the shitshow circus, where Collin and I were proud ringleaders.
“You don’t need to because we’re going to tell you,” Collin continued. “You see, your sexy ass may have it on the operating table, kicking ass and proving to Jake he made an excellent decision to bring you on the team; however, your skills in the bedroom suck.”
Jace laughed as I did because of Collin’s fake sincerity, trying to sound like a professional sex therapist. I got up and closed my door because I wasn’t trying to get all of us reported to HR for trying to be funny when it was entirely inappropriate talk for the workplace.
If I weren’t in such need of being elevated into a better mood, I would’ve told Collin to knock it off and save it for the bar, but I needed a good dose of stupidity.
John had a band recital tonight, and since I’d already missed too many events, I didn’t want to miss this one too.
I also didn’t want to show up in a lousy mood with a thundercloud over my head.
“Man, you haven’t been single for years. You probably forgot how to—”
“You haven’t learned when to stop challenging Collin, have you?” I said, chuckling. “Walk away now, and you might still—”
“Too late,” Collin interrupted, placing his hand on Jace’s shoulder and giving him a devious smile. “This dipfucker has bragged that he doesn’t suck in bed,” Collin looked at me, “and he thinks we believe him.”
“It was just a one-night hook-up,” Jace said. “And it doesn’t matter if you two dipshits think I was good or not, she did. Her moans and screams proved that.”
“You realize women fake that all the time, right?”
“Fake it?” he said with confusion.
“Uh, yeah,” Collin said.
“Well, yeah, but why?”
“Why? Because your dick is too small and wasn’t doing anything for her,” Collin said.
“Or maybe you were a selfish bastard trying to get off. Women have a sixth sense, you know? They’ll fake it so you can’t hold back.
Then, after you lose your load, she can go home, shower, and wash the disgusting feeling of you off her. ”
“Uh,” Jace muttered, looking like he was recalling the night’s events, analyzing all his moves, and wondering if Collin was right.
I couldn’t refrain from laughing for busting this player’s balls and knocking his ego down several notches.
“Yep,” Collin nodded, keeping Jace’s paranoia going. “And the reason Jake and I know you sucked is because the receptionists aren’t hunting you down to tell you that a woman is harassing them, asking questions about your schedule, demanding to know where you’re at, and that kind of thing.”
“Oh, God,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Your logic is that I sucked in bed because Michelle isn’t hunting me down?”
“It’s very telling, man,” Collin shrugged. “You suck in bed. We don’t.”
“This is fucked up,” Jace laughed, yet it was apparent he was second-guessing whether he was good in bed.
“It’s not easy when the one thing you pride yourself on proves to be a failure,” I teased. “But thank God you’re an amazing surgeon because if you weren’t, you wouldn’t be able to use your profession to snag unsuspecting minxes like this Michelle character.”
“I feel like my job here is done,” Collin said, standing up. He looked at Jace, “Next time? I want to see a crazy chick in this office begging for your attention and pissed off about the false promises you made her in bed, or you might as well give it all up.”
“You guys can be such dicks,” he said with a laugh. “So much so, I forgot why I even walked in here to talk to Jake.”
“Finding out you’re a sack of shit in bed from your two favorite doctors makes the head spin,” Collin looked at the folders that Jace held in his hand.
“Edna Marshall and Harold McKinley seem to be the reason you’re here to visit the Chief,” he said, opening the door and reminding Jace of the charts on our two newest patients.
I’d wanted to schedule them for surgery, but I needed to discuss a few things about them with Stone first.
Just as Collin opened the door, Cassidy Blake, one of our front desk administrators who had a serious crush on Stone, was standing there, red in the face, and about to knock on the door.
“Hey, Cass,” Collin said. “If you’re looking for Dr. Stone, he’s in a meeting with Dr. Mitchell.”
It was apparent to everyone that Cassidy wanted this man to step out of her dreams and into her car, but sadly, Jace had a lot of learning to do before the man could or would ever settle down, and none of us saw that happening anytime soon.
Why else would Collin and I be giving the man so much shit?
“There’s a woman at reception asking for you, and she’s bothering the staff,” she said, looking at Dr. Stone.
“Her name is Michelle Parker, and she called a bunch of times demanding to be patched through to you. Levar transferred her to your line, but you weren’t in, so she kept calling back, asking him to walk the halls to find you.
After Levar told her no for the sixth time, she randomly showed up, asking if she could go looking for you herself. ”
Collin and I looked at each other in shock and humor.
Now it was our turn to get shit from Jace about the hell we just gave him.
Naturally, Jace looked at us, arching his eyebrow smugly.
Great. All we needed was this tall, dark, handsome man strutting around and shoving his peacock feathers in our faces.
“What do you want us to tell her?” Cassidy demanded, obviously hurt that her crush’s chick was here, harassing the staff with psychotic urgency.
“Let her know I’ll be out in a minute,” Jace said, dismissing Cassidy’s anger.
He turned to Collin and me, “I’m sorry. What were we just speaking about?”