Declan

“Fuck!” Another roar rushed past my lips. “Doesn’t anyone work around here?” I pressed the towel tighter against my thumb, desperate to quell the throbbing. “Got time enough to put up these stupid-ass decorations, but no time for a bleeding man. Great emergency room response here. I’ll be sure to tell all my friends—”

“Hello, Mr. Callaghan, is it?” The curtain pulled away, revealing long, blond waves and a pair of iced-over blue eyes, trained directly on me. “So you’re the guy who’s been moaning like a dying cow back here.”

Both my eyebrows shot up, the incessant throb in my mangled thumb increasing another notch. “Pounding a nail through your thumb will do that, I guess.”

For the first time, my eyes dipped down her neck, over the soft swell of ample tits, a curvy little waist, and hips that looked perfect for digging my hands into when I—

“Can I get a look at the damage?” She stepped closer, eyes zeroing in on my aching hand.

This woman had more curves than a country road. Suddenly, the throb in my hand wasn’t as persistent as the throb in my dick.

I sucked in a quick breath when she slowly unwound the white towel, stained with dark slashes of red.

My blood.

Oh, shit.

My head swam as she discarded the towel and leaned in for a closer look. “That’s gonna need stitches.”

“You don’t say,” I blurted before I could put a lid on my mouth.

“You always such an asshole to people tryin’ to help you?” She shot me a glare.

“Well, I nearly bled out on the table waiting for ya. Isn’t the customer always right or some bullshit?”

She narrowed her eyes, the faintest hint of a grin turning up one side of her lips. “That’s in retail, so, no, that’s not a rule the emergency room subscribes to. Actually, we prioritize patients, and the elderly gentleman in cardiac arrest trumped you.” Her eyes were on mine again, mesmerizing in their depths. “And according to your intake paperwork, you’ve been here about four minutes, so I don’t think that constitutes bleeding out.” She took hold of my thumb to wrap it with a roll of gauze. “Are you always so dramatic?”

I shot her a cocky grin. “You’ve got a winning bedside manner—” my eyes shot to the name tag on her chest “—Dr. Snow.”

A soft grin ticked across her face at my words before she took a step back, cocking her head to the side. “My patients call me Dr. Aurora, and since it looks like I’m stuck with you for at least the next few hours, you’re welcome to as well.”

“No shit?” I settled a little deeper into the cot underneath me.

“No shit, what?” She pressed the clipboard to her tits, eyes holding mine.

“Your name is really Aurora Snow?” I didn’t believe it. I’d never met anyone with a name like that.

“Yup.” She began wrapping a blood pressure cuff around my bicep.

“Anyone ever tell you you look like that Disney ice queen? Ya know, the blond hair, the blue eyes?”

A soft huff pushed past pretty pink lips, and my heart nearly shattered like a fallen icicle. “The mean one? Nothing I haven’t heard before.”

She stood close as she waited for the machine to stop its incessant buzzing. I sucked in a quick whiff of her scent. Sweet, warm, like cinnamon hot chocolate on a winter day, she soothed my mind and made me hungry for something, way down deep.

I’d never met anyone like Dr. Aurora Snow.

“So how long am I gonna be holed up here with your sparkling personality?” I couldn’t help the dig. Something about the way she could take my sharp tongue drew me to her, made me want to demonstrate all the other things I could do with that tongue. The waves of pleasure cascading through her while she called my name at the top of her lungs.

“I’m off at eleven Nurse Harriet will be in after that—”

“Eleven?” I glanced at the clock hanging above the door. “It’s already nine.”

“Indeed, it is.” Her eyes glistened as they lit on mine. “Mind if I ask how it was you drove a nail into your thumb this time of night?”

I shoved my uninjured hand through my hair, thinking back on the hellish day I’d had. “Been on the worksite since six this morning, trying to get it finished before the holiday.”

“So you were at work?” She unwrapped the cuff on my bicep and set it aside.

I shook my head again, wishing to hell it was that easy. “Nope, left a little after eight and went straight to Mama’s house to hang up Christmas lights.”

A soft chuckle filled my ears. “You put a nail through your thumb hanging Christmas lights for your mom?”

“Seems so,” I grumbled.

“How sweet.” Her lips teased up in a smile. “Didn’t peg you for the festive type.”

I shrugged. “I’m not. I fucking hate the holidays, but hell if I can say no to Mama.”

“Well, you probably should have waited until daylight…also maybe on a day you didn’t work fourteen hours. You shouldn’t be so careless.”

“I know what I’m doing. I don’t need any advice from an—” Her eyes darted up, waiting on my next word. “Ice queen.” I winked at her.

She tried to stifle a smile behind her hand, but she failed, her cheeks pinking up the prettiest shade of red I’d ever seen.

A vision came to me of her spread underneath me, all that golden hair fisted in my hands, those lips attached to mine, and stealing all the air from her lungs.

“You work tomorrow night?” I asked, no longer giving a fuck if I ever got a stitch. My thumb could fall off for that matter, and as long as Dr. Aurora was in the room, I’d be just fine.

“That’s a probing question.” She averted her eyes as she tried to act busy. She wasn’t busy, just trying to hide her reaction to me. The way her thighs were shifting back and forth, how her gaze kept landing on my eyes, and everything in her expression again told me I was right.

“I can get a lot more probing than that.” I cocked a sideways smile.

“Are you always such a wiseass?”

“Just wondering what poor bastard is gonna be graced with your lovely personality next.”

“You’re a real…” She shook her head, no longer able to stifle her laugh.

“Bastard?”

“Cocky bastard,” she added, pushing that clipboard against her tits again before stepping away.

Hell, I wasn’t ready for her to leave yet. My stubborn ass began conjuring ways to keep her here. I didn’t give a fuck if she had a job to do. I wanted to be the center of her universe.

Aurora Snow might be walking away now, but not for long. Not if I had anything to do with it.