Page 10 of Doctor Bossy

“Yeah.” She turned her head as she digested the new information, and then a bright look entered her eyes. She glanced at me surreptitiously. “Well, if you truly want to help, how about offering me a position on your research team at Center of Hope?”

I cocked my eyebrow. I hadn’t been expecting that.

“It could be paid or unpaid,” she rushed to continue, as though sensing my rejection. “I could even just be a part-time intern, but I would love to be able to work on your research.”

“No.” I instantly shook my head. If she had asked for just about anything else, I would have granted it, even if she wanted me to sign over a check for a million dollars. That would not have been a problem. But my research was way too important and delicate to risk bringing in a newbie at this stage in development. “It’s not exactly something for a novice,” I said.

“But I’m not a novice,” she insisted, speaking quickly as she listed off her accomplishments. “I have a lot of experience in research ever since high school and have been working with the Kimmel Cancer Center since I was a freshman. I had hands-on experience with running Dr. Finley’s clinical trial last year and was in charge of collecting data for genetic lab analysis until I was fired. In addition, I have followed your research for years. I know just about everything there is to know about it.”

“Still,” I said insistently, “I don’t have any vacancies, nor do I have time to train someone new. Plus, I don’t have space. Everyone on my team already has their roles, and introducing a new person now might throw the chemistry off.”

I saw the sparkle leave her eyes. Her face fell in visible disappointment as she nodded, but I didn’t let it get to me.

* * *

I couldn’t sleep.

I’d been lying in bed for the past hour already, trying to doze off, but I couldn’t. Tension still lined my muscles. Before that, I had gone down to the basement gym and pumped iron until I couldn’t feel my limbs. I then ran on the treadmill for about half an hour and beat the shit out of a punching bag, hoping that I could eventually exhaust my body enough to drop off to sleep.

But no such luck.

Despite my exhaustion, my muscles were still buzzing with energy. I was physically tired, but mentally, my mind kept bouncing around before hyper-focusing on one thing.

Becca.

And that damn kiss.

I kept replaying it again and again like a damn videotape in my mind and remembering the sensations it sparked—sensations I nearly forgot existed. Now I couldn’t stop thinking about it, about her.

I knew it meant nothing. It was simply because it had been too long since I touched a woman like that, especially one that had Becca’s vibrant, innocent charm. The way she touched my lips, the fucking way she tasted like strawberries and cream…

I kept picturing the hazy look in her eyes right before she kissed me. The delicate way her lips touched mine captivated me and kept me hard throughout the night.

And even now, I was hard.

“Fuck.”

Unbidden, my hand traveled down to grasp my cock firmly. I didn’t do it slowly, didn’t waste time lingering, pumping up and down efficiently in a manner that would get me off the quickest. I told myself this was simply about the physical release and nothing more. In the morning, I would no longer think about Becca or imagine her lips to the point of obsession. I just needed to damn orgasm, and then I would be fine.

I felt the electricity zip up my spine as the tension drew tighter and tighter. I gritted my teeth to keep from making a sound. There was no one home, but giving in to the urge to moan would make this too real, like I was enjoying it far too much. I tried to imagine Heather and her soft scent as I always did when I jacked off, but the details had become fuzzy in the last few years. Still, I struggled as pure lust overwhelmed me, and I went faster and faster in the frenzy of reaching the end.

But it was Becca’s eyes in my mind when I came.

5

BECCA

“He’s a complete psycho,” I told my best friend, Kayley, after my phone rang for the umpteenth time. I didn’t even have to glance at the caller ID to know it was James. I had set his ringtone to the tune of DEFCON 5 by Metallica. “He just won’t quit no matter how many times I ignore him.”

“I told you he was an asshole,” Kayley said in between bites of her yogurt. We were currently sitting in her small apartment in downtown Detroit, demolishing a whole tub of greek yogurt while she braided some of the wigs she sold for a living. “You just didn’t see it because he hid it well underneath all that smarmy charm.”

“Yeah, you were right. About everything.” I was embarrassed to say that I fell for everything James had fed me—hook, line, and sinker. Even when Kayley told me all her suspicions about him, I didn’t even stop for a second to think that he wasn’t who he said he was. I was so blinded by love…or what I thought was love anyway. Now I wasn’t so sure.

Because while I’d cried my fair share of tears over the end of my relationship, anger was still the prevailing emotion rather than grief.If I loved him, shouldn’t I be sadder?

Maybe if he hadn’t leaked my nudes and gotten me fired from my job, I would have been. Right now, I was simply embarrassed that I’d been made a fool of and, I guess, sad that James wasn’t the man I thought he was. I’d wept over the end of the dream of being with someone who loved and cared for me. I thought that I’d finally found the person who I could spend the rest of my life with, but he turned out to be another manipulative, cheating bastard. I guessed daddy issues could do that to a girl. “I can’t believe I was so stupid.”

“Oh no, don’t do that, hon.” Kayley rapped her comb against the mannequin’s head in emphasis while frowning at me. “You’re not stupid. You just trusted the wrong guy, that’s all.”

---