AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He disappeared into a walk-in closet next to the bathroom, and I saw him flick on the light. He came out with a white button-down open at the front and a tie between his teeth. He slung it over his neck and ripped a pair of black socks out of the top drawer of his dresser. “If you feel light-headed, or your fever spikes,call meand I’ll come right back.”
Lachlan issued his directives while he rushed to pull on his socks and black sneakers, and then buttoned his shirt as he looked around for something.
I watched him with a big, dopey smile on my face. He wasso cute.
He found his wallet in a natural wood dish on his dresser, stuck it in his other back pocket, and turned to me as his fingers flipped up his collar to work on the tie. “Um,” he said, eyes on nothing as he thought. “I think that’s it. Anything here is yours. I shouldn’t be too long.” He brought his gaze to mine, and his fingers on the tie stilled. “What?”
“I just like watching you do the doctor thing,” I said with a grin.
He gave me an answering smile. “Yeah, good thing I kidnapped you. My evil plan to get you to fall in love with me is working.”
I coughed out a laugh.
“Seriously, I’m just going as a consulting physician for a head injury. Once they pick my brain, I’ll bring some lunch.” He pulled a watch out of the dish and clasped it around his wrist. “Do you need anything before I go?”
“Nope.” I made a shooing gesture. “Go save people.”
His phone rang, and with another wave at me, he answered it, hurrying out the door with his tie still half-done and shirt untucked. “Dr. Cade. Yeah, tell him I saidCTfor a reason.”
I stared at the empty doorway he’d gone through with a realization that dawned slowly but surely.
His evil planmight beworking.
Ten
Lachlan
My evil plan was going to backfire.
I had joked that my evil plan was to get Laurel to fall in love with me, but the truth was, I was the one who liked her. A lot. When she’d lost her composure during my exam the night before, I hadn’t been able to stop myself from kissing her. I wanted to taste her like a starving man needed sustenance—my mouth literally watered at the sight of her. It was delusional and addicting all at the same time.
I usually got pretty hyped up when a new Call of Duty version would come out and I had even taken off work to play it once, butneverhad I felt the kind of delirious obsession I experienced when I was around Laurel.
No woman had ever even come close.
I couldn’t put my finger on why, either. Laurel was impetuous, careless, and clearly tangled up in a dangerous web of problems that would scare any sane man away.
But she was also clever and empathetic. She had so much depth to her character, so much pain and joy wrapped up in her five-foot-three,sexy-as-Hellbody, I wanted to drink her in every day. Refreshing, revitalizing, delectable Laurel. Even the woman I had dated for two years hadn’t vined around my heart the way Laurel had in one day.
It was crazy.
And yet, I would be crazy to let her go.
She clearly had an attraction to me, and I could work with that. What I couldn’t work with was her obvious inability to give two fucks about her own well-being. I wasn’t all about changing other people, but I would have to teach her the value of that one. Because if I cared about her, then I’d damn well ensure that she did the same.
I left her on the bed and prayed to God she actually stayed there.Fat chance, I thought, knowing the truth. Knowing her, she would try to shovel my driveway or something.
Shit.
I would have to hurry with whatever Clemens had called me in for, and then I could take her vitals again and make sure the infection was abating satisfactorily.
See? Distracting. Addictive. And I didn’t want it to end.
As I backed out of my garage, a call lit up the display on my SUV. The name Amos Brady accompanied his number, and I tapped the green button to answer the call, my attention half on getting out of my snowy driveway and half on his call. “Hey Brady, what’s up?”
“Cade,” his voice intoned on the other end. We called each other by our last names, a habit from medical school, and I had gotten so used to it, I caught myself using my own last name in my thoughts.
Dr. Brady, a brilliant neurosurgeon based in Salt Lake City, had the kind of baritone voice that choirs dreamed about. But he didn’t sing. He saved lives. And he did it brilliantly.
