Page 35 of Full Moon Frenzy

“Take a deep breath in, Gil.” The orc inhaled sharply, holding it without any sudden catch or pain. “Negative Swillup’s sign.”

His eyes met hers once more, gleaming with an unadulterated hatred that caused a rush of heat between her thighs, her own breath catching instead. The air between them felt pressurized, as if all it would take was a single spark to ignite.

“Differential diagnosis confirmed. Are you satisfied with my anatomical boundaries, or do you need me to recite the vascular supply to the biliary system next?”

Her heart hammered against her ribs, the sheer physical proximity of him making the entryway feel suffocatingly hot. Had he always been this big, this muscular? No, she decided, chest heaving. He’d always been athletic and toned, but hitting the gym hard had clearly been a priority in the intervening decade since she’d seen him last. If she thought he’d been able to lift her like a doll then, it would be nothing compared to the way he could manhandle her now.

She was able to sense the growl of his wolf and the snap of his jaws. A whimper from within, but whether it was in fear or in need, Adriana couldn’t be sure. The anger radiating off him was intoxicating, a venomous cocktail of wounded pride and competitive adrenaline that she found herself leaning into, wanting to taste his skin. What is wrong with you?!

“The assessment is acceptable,” she choked out, her voice tight, sucking in a rasping breath when he stepped back, breaking the moment between them. “But he’s going to need a CT scan, which we can’t do, and a surgical consult. Why wasn’t he brought next door in the first place?!”

“Because they’re currently on a three-hour throughput,” he snapped. “All bays are full. The appendix hasn’t ruptured yet. If you get him into the system and call for an emergency pick-up—”

“—He’ll be seen by someone before the appendix ruptures in triage,” she finished, swallowing hard. That was the point of the clinic, Dr. Marsh had told her. To ease the burden on the busy hospital next door and give non-critical patients the opportunity to be seen for minor maladies without waiting weeks for an appointment upstairs. Are you working together for the greater good? Is that what this is?

Adriana nodded, sucking in a stabilizing breath. “Transfer of custody is accepted. Take him to exam three.” She stepped back as he and the troll wheeled the orc past her, but not far enough, and the fabric of his uniform sleeve brushed against the hand she had wrapped around the cot Shileen had been wheeling.

It was brief and accidental, but it felt like an electric shock, one that went straight to her core, and her clit throbbed. Is this what you like, Adi? I want you to come on my tongue before we get back to work. She was able to perfectly envision his heavy-lidded eyes sparkling up at her from where he knelt on the library floor, his cocky grin, the stroke of his tongue making her whole body shake. Adriana shook her head, forcing the memory of the past away.

The ambulance was long gone by the time she left the exam room, leaving Sora to deal with the bulk of the strep-infected third graders still coming in every day.

He hadn’t cracked. He hadn’t thrown a fit, had met her play for play, and it was clear from the way he looked at her that he hated her, hated every molecule of her entire being. Adriana didn’t know why the thought thrilled her so much.

It would be better to let this go, to petition for another doctor to be hired . . .

She closed the office door, needing three minutes alone to clear her head, to push him from her thoughts. An impossibility, for he’d occupied every inch of her brain space that wasn’t devoted to work since that very first day his ambulance had pulled up to the doors. Now, she could do nothing but replay the past.

What she had neglected to mention at both the coffee shop and over those oversized glasses of sangria was that once upon a time, she’d had the type of crush on Trapp Hemming that took her breath away when she thought about him, which was every minute she wasn’t studying.

She would try to imagine what it would be like to be in a relationship with someone like him. Someone who’d never wanted for anything, someone who came from a life of abundance, the type of people who buy all their furniture at the same time, her Aunt Rita would have said.

It wasn’t long before “someone like him” wasn’t good enough, once he’d approached her to study together, for there wasn’t anyone like him, not that she’d ever met. Adriana found it impossible to believe that there was anyone else in the world as smart as him, as funny and as charming, who shared his sparkling eyes and bright smile, someone as warm and kind as he had been.

She’d had a persistent daydream, one that involved them matching into the same residency program, relocating together across the Unification, far away from her life and anyone else she knew. It wouldn’t matter where she was from, once the hospital wiped everyone’s slate clean. It wouldn’t make a difference when she was intubating a patient that the only generational asset she possessed was trauma, wouldn’t matter that there was a portrait of his great-uncle hanging in the Mercycrest library when they were both working back-to-back twelve-hour shifts. It wouldn’t matter who they’d been — only the doctors they were becoming and the life they shared together. He would bring her coffee, and she would ensure there was a plate waiting for him when he came trudging home at 7 a.m., bleary-eyed and exhausted.

And then after that one fucking exam everything had changed. He was cold, ignored her when he could and was antagonistic when they were forced together. She couldn’t imagine where he’d learned such professional meanness, but he’d employed it at every opportunity. They spent that last year of medical school hating each other, and by the end, he and his equally mean girlfriend were living together, planning the life together that she had first claimed.

She needed to let this go.

She needed to put the past back in the past and focus on who she’d become since then. And who is that? A burnt-out, anxious wreck? Someone who had to run away from the last decade of her life? She needed to focus on herself, her new future here. Needed to put all thought of Trapp Hemming out of her mind for good.

Eyla had forwarded over the reports she’d requested. The digital footprint he left behind every single time his ambulance had pulled up to these doors. It was almost disappointing to remember that she hadn’t even been there for thirty days, and the list was short. Eleven runs. Still. It gave her somewhere to start. Eleven opportunities to find a single, tiny flaw in Trapp Hemming’s perfect record.

He hated her, and that was fine. He could go on hating her. And if she found something, anything on these sheets, it would be a way to force him under her authority, and maybe she’d get to smell his fury and see that angry gleam in his eyes up close one more time.

Trapp

The mattress beneath his hand was firm enough to give purchase as he supported himself against a single flattened palm, his hips moving in a steady cadence, seeking a singular aim — come hard enough to put Adriana Brunelli out of his mind long enough to get back to work with a clear head.

He hated this. Hated her. Especially hated the way the smell of her was doing something to his brain, rewiring him, ensuring that every time his nose caught the scent of her, an electrical impulse was sent straight to his cock, like a code three emergency dropping at the station. Lights and sirens, fully erect, on the double. Every time they sparred over a patient intake, he would go back to his rig throbbing, the inside of his boxer briefs sticky with precum from arguing with her, heedless that he was edging ever closer to professional ruin in doing so. Edging in more ways than one.

She infuriated him, had him stiff twenty-four hours a day, and there was no relief in sight. That his memories had no shortage of personal, first-hand knowledge of how she felt beneath him, astride him, only made it worse.

Her skin had been like silk. Soft and pale with a sallow undertone that sometimes made her look a bit sickly, only ever emphasized by her darting, untrusting eyes. Pale skin and thick, dark hair, heavy in his hands. He could still feel the way she’d arched herself beneath him, small and soft, but bucking back against him, unwilling to present herself to him as a pliant bitch, her small teeth snapping at his neck anytime he leaned too close. The smell of her was all at once strange and foreign and familiar, confusing his wolf, making it jump within his skin.

Trapp closed his eyes against the spinning of the room, tightening his grip around his swollen shaft. His knot was only just beginning to make its presence known this close to the turn — the start of a hot bulb, feverish to the touch, and it would only increase in size and heat.

The first time he’d brought her home to his apartment, after one of those aborted study sessions, Adriana had acted as though it was her first time indoors. She’d seemed afraid to touch anything, as if the sheets on his bed were made of fine porcelain that she might damage, but it hadn’t mattered once he was climbing over her, her nails raking down his chest.