Page 50 of Dr. Fellow

Usually, my bestie and I work the same shifts, but I picked up overtime at the last minute with the hope that I could put some cash toward breaking my lease. Though, based on what I know about Claire’s tastes, the more likely scenario is that I’ll be using all of the extra money on our Vegas trip.

“Oh yeah,” she says casually, “Cass is the only one at home, but I couldn’t call her since I had an idea for the bachelorette party.”

I let out a nervous breath as I reach my car because Claire scares me when she has ideas. Not that they aren’t always amazing, just that I know whatever she comes up with is going to be over the top.

I hop behind the wheel, transferring the call to Bluetooth before I respond. “I think you mean joint bachelor and bachelorette party, thanks to benevolent Beau.”

“Awww,” she sings into the phone. “I love that nickname. He is pretty benevolent, isn’t he? Especially in bed.”

I roll my eyes. I can just picture Beau checking in every five seconds to make sure the sex is good for her, which is the absolute last thing I want in a lover. I want a man who takes what he wants from me, not a man who worships the ground that I walk on.

Snooze.

“There’s someone for everyone,” I say flatly, rubbing my tired eyes as I pull out of the parking deck.

My brain desperately wants to shut off and watch reality television until I fall asleep, but my body is on high alert because Walker got back from his lame-ass conference today and asked me to come over after my shift. We haven’t seen each other since he stayed over, but we’ve been texting nonstop.

Something crinkles on the phone line, and I hear a faint, “Sit, Frosty,” before Claire’s voice returns to normal volume. “Sorry, Beau and I are trying to teach him tricks. He’s already learned how to fetch because he’s my smart kitty.”

I stop at the light outside of the hospital, leaning over the center console to pull a handful of Nerd Clusters from the party-size bag that resides in my passenger seat. “Y’all are insane.”

“God, our baby boy has such a big brain,” she coos excitedly. “Wait, can you just come over on your way home? He’s getting so big, and I know he misses his auntie Morgie.”

“Uh—”

I hesitate, trying to come up with an excuse so that I don’t have to tell her that I’m going to Walker’s house after I shower. I’m not ashamed of the fact that we’re fuck buddies, but I just know that she’s going to freak out and make it a huge deal. I can literally hear her squealing about how we’re all just one big happy family, and that’s not what this is.

This is just sex.

Actually, it’s not even sex because we haven’t gotten that far yet. After I held his dick in my mouth like an oversized pacifier, he stayed the night and took over my bed with his big-ass body. But I didn’t have the balls to tell him to get out, nor did I have the heart—especially not when he passed out and unconsciously wrapped his arm around me like he had been doing it his entire life.

“I can’t tonight,” I tell her, hoping she’ll drop the idea.

“Boo, you’re no fun,” Claire whines dramatically. “Okay, but we do need to talk. Will Cass kill me if I reserved a table for all of us at the Hurricane Heatwave show? I know we joked about sexy, dancing men, but we may or may not officially be VIPs.”

Absolutely unhinged images of our weekend flash through my head, quickly vanquished by a car horn behind me indicating that the light has changed.

“Cass should be fine,” I reply distractedly, stepping on the gas, “but Doctor Dingleberry will definitely not be pleased.”

Claire cackles on the other end of the phone, and I can hear her struggling to catch her breath. “I’m obsessed with you. Will you please marry me?”

“Back at you babe. And if I believed in marriage, you’d be the first person on my list.”

“Not true,” she counters. “It would for sure be one of your kinky-ass book boyfriends.”

She’s not wrong—there’s just something about a fictional man that hits different. They’re broody, hot as hell, and have the filthiest mouths known to man. If I could find one in real life, I might be convinced to think about holy matrimony.

“Speaking of book boyfriends . . . did you see the rec I sent to Team Daddies? The plot was average, but the spice was insane. I had over two hundred highlights on my Kindle.”

Nobody responded to the reverse harem recommendation that I sent yesterday, though Caroline did like it which automatically makes her my new favorite person. I feel like behind her posh princess exterior, she’s a total freak in the sheets—my goal for Vegas is to get her drunk and break that icy shell of hers.

Claire scoffs into the speaker. “I’ll never understand why you picked that group text name. All you send are unhinged dark romances where the female main character sobs when they’re having sex.”

I roll my eyes because she and Cassidy are on a rom-com kick right now. And listen, I get it—everyone loves rom-coms. But you just can’t get the right level of kink with that type of book. One of my favorite things about reading is that I learn new things about myself, and the only thing I learn from reading a book with a cartoon cover is that I suddenly have the urge to vomit.

“First of all, they’re happy tears,” I argue as I come to another stoplight on Peachtree. “You would know, if you actually read them. Second of all, Cass vetoed all of my other suggestions.”

“Even Happy Hour Hoes?”

---