Page 23 of Doctor Bossy

Because it seemed the longer she worked here, the more I found it difficult to control myself when I was around her. She drove me to distraction every time I saw her across the room or even smelled the remnants of her scent in the hallway. I tried to avoid her as much as I could, but yesterday, she came to my office to discuss some vital aspects of the research, and it had taken everything in me to keep from grabbing her and throwing her on the desk like a savage.

The thoughts were disturbing.

I didn’t know what was wrong with me, but I still could not get that stupid kiss out of my head.

It wasn’t even really a kiss. It was a mere brush of lips, something even middle schoolers did, but it replayed over and over, tormenting me.

And that was ridiculous, especially at this point in my life and career.

Come on, Griffin,I thought for the third time that day after my mind drifted. You’re far too old to be this gone over a girl young enough to be your daughter.

I knew some men would not be bothered to go after younger girls, but I had never been one of them. And I didn’t want to be. Besides, I was pretty sure I was only like this because Becca was the first woman I had had any type of intimate touch with since my wife died.

Not that I did not have any sexual desire, but I shut down that side of myself against lusting after women, choosing to deal with my urges on my own. Eventually, even that reduced in frequency, but now it seemed my sexual appetite was flaring back to life with a vengeance, and no matter how much I tried to shut my mind against Becca, it was her that my libido chose to fixate on. All those years, I thought my sexual desires had finally died off.

But no. They were merely buried under years of guilt.

And now they were once more fighting to the surface.

Shit.I rubbed my hand across my face, trying to figure myself out of this predicament. Perhaps I needed to get laid—take up one of the various offers I’d gotten from other women over the years—but even the idea of it disgusted me. I’d never been with anyone but my wife, and even though she had been dead for twelve years, the idea of having sex with someone else felt like a massive betrayal.

Until Becca.

But I couldn’t do it with her either.

I was stuck.

Just then, my phone rang, distracting me from my disorganized thoughts. I didn’t often answer calls during work hours, but it was James calling. He never called me unless he needed something or there was some kind of emergency, so with a sigh, I answered the call.

“What is it?”

“Hey, Dad,” he started, his voice sounding merely mildly curious. “I just heard this weird rumor going around that you hired Becca to work for you in your lab. That’s…that’s not true, right?”

I could hear the undercurrent of tension at the end of the question. This wasn’t a question of curiosity.

“And what about it?” I said.

There was silence on the other end for a few seconds.

“You can’t be serious, Dad,” he finally said, incredulity coloring his tone. “Tell me you’re not serious.” His voice was rising in a fit of agitated anger. “How could you hire her?”

“I wasn’t aware that I had to run it by you first before I hired someone.”

“Of course you don’t, but…come on, man.” He waffled about, and I could picture him pacing as he tried to find the words to express what he was trying to say. Usually, James had a supreme talent with words, but when he got nervous or agitated, his vocabulary flew out of the window.

“She’s my ex-fiancée,” he finally said.

His words sent anger shooting through me. “The same ex-fiancée that you cheated on and then leaked inappropriate photos of?”

“I didn’t—”

“I despise when you lie to me, James,” I said, my voice a low growl. “We both know you leaked those photos, and there’s nothing you can say that will convince me otherwise. What you did was utterly disgraceful. Who the fuck raised you to think you could do such a thing to someone?”

“Yes, yes, you’ve already given me the whole spiel.” He sounded annoyed at being reminded, and I felt angry again. My son wasn’t even the least bit remorseful over nearly destroying someone’s life, someone he claimed to love. What kind of psychopath did I raise?

“But that’s not what we’re talking about now, is it?” James continued. “Dad, you can’t possibly work with her. I didn’t want to tell you this before because I care about her, but…she isn’t that good at her job. That’s why they fired her. The biochemistry department kept getting regular complaints about her work ethic and the fact that she rarely ever showed up on time and took credit for other people’s work. They had to let her go because of it. Ask Dr. Robinson if you don’t believe me.”

I quickly understood what was happening even as he spoke. There was no way James would know the intricacies of Becca’s job and work ethic unless he had spoken to Dr. Robinson himself. He must have played on the man’s dislike for Becca because all of what he said sounded identical to the accusations the man made about Becca, accusations that, on further research, turned out to be unfounded. Now the details surrounding Becca’s firing made more sense. I wouldn’t put it past James to get her fired—simply because she would have nothing else to fall back on and would have to go back to him.

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