Page 44 of Doctor Mile High
“Thank you for doing that for me. Thank you so much, Dove.” I kiss her deeply, cupping the back of her head to control our movements.
My tongue slips over hers, the rightness of us settling in my chest. This is the moment I know that Dove Blair is the only woman I’m going to love for the rest of my life. I feel like I’ve loved her since the first night I met her.
Maybe I’m being irresponsible loving a woman I barely know anything about.
Here is what I do know.
She sees me. She sees past the wealthy man with the Warrick name. She seeswhoI am. No one else has ever been able to do that. My walls were always up to protect myself. I used work as an escape to focus on. Work needed me and I’ve never been needed like that before.
Until now.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell her that I love her, but I don’t want to scare her away. We’ve already rushed things by having a baby together. Anything more might scare her and that’s the last thing I want.
I do know, whatever happens, she will be taken care of for the rest of her life.
Her struggles are officially over, and she never has to work for Landon ever again.
12
DOVE
The last twenty-fourhours have been a whirlwind. I’ve gone from traveling while pregnant, to giving birth on a plane, to having surgery, and now Winston is pushing me in the wheelchair through the hotel doors.
“Maybe I should fly home?” I hold baby Winston against my chest, hoping he stays asleep until I can get into my hotel room. “I mean, I’m not going to be able to help Landon at all. He’s going to be furious with me. It’s best if I fly back to New York. I can call my best friend Hanson and my parents, so I won’t be alone while you finish conducting business here,” I add, wanting Winston to know I’d be safe.
I still can’t believe this is reality. There’s a part of me that’s wondering if this is all a dream. It has to be, right? There’s no way the man I’ve been dreaming about for eight months delivered our baby in an airplane and has now taken full responsibility for not only his son, but me as well.
I don’t care about Winston’s wealth. Don’t get me wrong, it is a very nice luxury, but that’s not why I wanted, ached, or dreamed of him. Money has never ruled my life—though, if I want to berealistic, I know it would solve a lot of my issues. I come from a family who worked paycheck to paycheck and who made sure we never went hungry. They try to help me out financially when they can, and I also deny them. I do okay. Sure, I live paycheck to paycheck too, but I can afford a roof over my head and food on the table. What more is there that’s important?
I don’t want Winston to think I want him for his money and I have no idea how to prove that to him. Less than forty-eight hours ago, he was a single bachelor living in New York, and now he’s carting around the woman he had a one-night stand with. I don’t want him to feel forced into responsibility.
“Mr. Warrick. May I help you with your bags?” the bellhop asks, standing straight in his red uniform with gold buttons.
“Yes, they’re in the car. We’ll be checking into the penthouse suite. You can have them delivered there.”
“Right away, Dr. Warrick.” The middle-aged man gives a slight bow with his hands behind his back.
“Wow, they know you by name.”
I want to slap myself across the forehead when I say that. Of course they know him by name. It is called War-Med Conference. Warrick Medical Conference. His name is literally on the damn event title. It’shisconference.
“Ignore what I just said,” I mumble, embarrassed that those words would come out of my mouth. “I’ll blame it on the insane twenty-four hours we’ve had. Oh, and sleep deprivation. That too.”
Winston chuckles, pushing the wheelchair through the automatic doors that open to a large crystal chandelier hanging in the middle of the lobby.
“Wow,” I say in awe, looking up to the high ceilings that have gorgeous art painted on them. Gold metallic flecks outline the airbrushed clouds painted against a light blue sky. Winged horses fly, pulling chariots belonging to warriors with long silver swords. To the right, painted on the same ceiling, are a group of women being fed fruit, lounging as if they don’t have a worry in the world.
That sounds lovely. Who wouldn’t want a life without worry? Worrying is such a disease. It’s crippling to the soul and mind, pushing you lower and lower into the ground until that worry turns into so much more to be worried about. It’s a messy endless cycle.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Warrick stops pushing the wheelchair as we wait for the employee at the front desk to help the person before us. “My father paid a lot of money for that artist. Do you know every single room in this hotel has a painted ceiling? Each room has a different piece of art.”
“Wait, your parents built this hotel?”
“They own it,” he says with a smirk.
“Do they own everything?” I whisper, my eyes rounding as I continue to survey the white marble floors.
The countertop at the front desk is black, polished to the point that it looks like deep pools of black ink. Even the employees seem rich with their crisp uniforms. The men wear black tailored suits with a gold tie while the women wear something similar, though I’ve seen a few wearing skirts while others wear trousers.
