Chapter Four

The Doctor Will See You Now

“Um, hi, um, Ollie?”

Ollie glanced up from the mound of blue card files he had been flicking through for the past couple of hours. He couldn’t stop the beam radiating from his face. His mouth curled upward, removing the previous frown he had been displaying. Of course, he always had a smile for patients and their families. But this smile had erupted before he could even decide which one to put on. It grew tenfold when the nervous flicker of lips opposite curved up into a returning grin.

“Jacob.” Ollie flopped the files onto the desk. “How can I help?”

Jacob scratched his short and, Ollie noted, perfectly manicured nails across the surface of the nurses’ station reception desk. Ollie stared at the hands that screamed all male. Apart from the tended-to fingernails, Jacob’s hands were as masculine as they came. Thick, chunky, and scattered with dark hair that protruded from under his long-sleeved shirt, over the back of his thick-veined hand, and up to his knuckles. It wasn’t a grotesquely hairy hand. The man was no hobbit, regardless of what he’d called his fish, but Ollie could almost feel the touch of the silky smooth hairs, and he licked his lips involuntarily.

“Oh, I, er,” Jacob stammered.

Ollie’s grin grew to Cheshire-Cat levels. His hand barely covered it.

“Wondered if there were any cups about? For the machine?” Jacob waved a hand at the watercooler that was, indeed, absent of any of the plastic variety of cup.

“Right, yes, of course,” Ollie replied. “I’ll need to go get some from supplies. Can you hang tight for a couple of minutes?”

“Sure.” Jacob cleared his throat to rid the deep crackle, then laughed. “Thanks.”

“If you’re overly parched, I have a bottle under my desk you can use?” Ollie then offered up the sweetest smile he had probably ever given in his entire life. It seemed his face had overtaken his ability to categorize his choice of responsive lip curling. Jacob was beginning to have a category all to himself.

“Oh no, that’s okay.” Jacob backed away from the desk. “I can wait.”

“I promise I don’t have mouth cooties,” Ollie replied with a suggestive tilt of his head.

What am I doing? That was not the sort of thing he should say to a patient’s father. Maybe to a stranger in a bar or club. Perhaps he could blame the recent lack of social life and the involuntary need to flirt, like his resolution had allowed, now seeped out in his place of work. He needed to get a grip on that. It wouldn’t bring him good fortune. Not here.

Jacob stumbled, almost hitting a passing bed being pushed by an orderly. The child within displayed a multitude of tubes sunk into his body, and Jacob grabbed the traveling mattress, offering up an apologetic hand to the little boy. The orderly didn’t stop for pleasantries, and Ollie knew that kid was heading somewhere he’d rather not. It didn’t help to curtail his tickled smirk at Jacob’s misfortune, though. Jacob blew out a concerted puff of air from rounded lips and stroked his super-silky hair from his face, the locks flowing between each of his fingers. The man could be in a medicated shampoo commercial. Not that he needed it—the guy clearly didn’t have dandruff. But Ollie doubted any of the football stars they used to endorse the product suffered from a flaky scalp either.

“Oliver?”

Ollie ripped his gaze from Jacob to address the incoming interruption. And probably for the first time that night, his smile faltered.

“Yes, Doctor?” Ollie replied in his all-professional tone. He even added a bit of height to the delivery. He needn’t have bothered. Dr. Rawlings was a good six foot three and he a mere five-ten.

Dr. Rawlings did his usual scan, glancing around the reception area. Ollie rolled his eyes while the doctor wasn’t looking. Jacob backed off toward his daughter’s room, and Ollie snapped out of his blatant ogling of the man when the doctor slapped a hand down on the counter and leaned forward.

“I need to see you.”

Ollie supposed the doctor could have been attempting a whisper, but his deep and vibrating voice simply came out a hushed baritone.

“Here I am.” Ollie smiled with his mouth, not his eyes.

“End of shift.” Dr. Rawlings either didn’t notice Ollie’s standoffishness or chose to ignore it. “Not my place. We’ll go to the Radisson.”

He tapped the desk and started to walk off.

“Er, Doctor?” Ollie called, leaning forward on the desk. “No.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I said, no.”

Ollie folded his arms across his chest, making his pen and timer flick up from his top pocket. He stood his ground, but the deep, penetrating dark eyes firing their lasers across the desk made Ollie sink back. He loosened his arms and couldn’t help the quick glance across the corridor to room one. Jacob had his back to him, standing by the door to his daughter’s room. Ollie was pretty sure that from there, he could hear every damn word. Closing his eyes, Ollie faced Dr. Rawlings and awaited the inevitable reply.

“That isn’t welcome this time, Oliver.”

“I’m busy. This time. Doctor.”

“Doing what, may I ask?” Dr. Rawlings’ brow furrowed as if he couldn’t believe that Ollie would have another life outside this hospital. And the occasional fraternizing with him. Not that he isn’t far wrong.

Ollie picked up the paper files on his desk and continued to idly flick through, avoiding looking directly into those eyes that had had him rooted to the spot and caving in numerous times before, until he realized that he could do this. It was the new him. The New Year’s resolution. He wouldn’t feel a goddamn thing. “I’m seeing my dad.”

“Fine.” Dr. Rawlings, unperturbed, tucked his hands into his chino pockets. “That’s fine. We can do that first.”

“We?” Ollie widened his eyes. “And first?”

“Yes. I’ll drop you there. I can go to the coffee place around the corner. I have some charity work I need to catch up on, and you’ll be, what, an hour?”

Ollie snorted in utter contempt. He shook his head violently, and his eyes shuttered closed, so he was unable to see the doctor’s next reaction.

“No,” Ollie said again with more conviction this time. “No, Elliot.” He gritted his teeth, bold enough to utter the first name here. “I don’t want a time limit as to when I can see my father. I don’t want you to wait around the corner like some shameful pay-for-play. And I don’t want to go the bloody Radisson. It’s sleazy. You’re sleazy.” Ollie waved a hand across the desk, moving it up and down the doctor’s tall and muscular frame he knew intimately well yet had no desire to ever see again. His voice rose as he spoke, but he no longer cared.

“Oliver,” Dr. Rawlings warned, making a quick scan of the ward.

“Ollie!” Ollie barked through clenched teeth. “My name here is Ollie. Everyone calls me Ollie. The only person who is allowed to call me Oliver is my father!” He stomped out from behind the front desk and around the side to head off toward the supply cupboard. “Well, when he isn’t calling me Tilly, that is.”

“Right.” Dr. Rawlings had his hands on his hips. “I see you’re being this way again. We’ll talk later.”

Ollie wanted to scream, but instead he listened out for the slap of dress shoes on the linoleum floor and the swing of the exit doors before scratching his nails through his closely cropped blond hair. If he had hair like Jacob’s, he would be yanking it right now to get some cathartic release. But he didn’t, so he took a deep breath and slapped his ID badge on the reader to the supply cupboard. It buzzed, turned green, and Ollie shoved open the door. Finding the box of plastic cups in the corner, he grabbed a couple of the piled tubes and grumbled his way back up the corridor.

Jacob stood waiting at the water machine. His smile said it all. He had heard. His opinion had changed, and he now awaited the cups to grab some water and never venture from his daughter’s room for the entire night shift. That was fine. Ollie had far too much work to do to waste it chatting with someone he wouldn’t ever see again after his daughter’s discharge in forty-eight hours.

“Thanks.” Jacob held out a hand for Ollie to pass him the cups. “I’ll put the rest in for you, if you have things to get on with?”

And there it is. Bugger off, Ollie, you disgusting prostituting specimen of a man. I can’t believe I wasted my precious time here with my daughter talking to someone who sleeps their way to the top.

It wasn’t like that, but Jacob wouldn’t know. No one would understand. Ollie had a hard time understanding why he’d let it happen. All the women around the hospital would slap him on the back with a “well-done.” He didn’t want that either. And he certainly didn’t want that look from Jacob. Because that hurts.

“Dr. Rawlings and I.” Ollie had started before he even realized his mouth was speaking. He tucked the tower of cups to his chest, cradling them like a protective barrier. “We had a sort of thing. It’s totally over, though. Like, totally.”

“So I heard,” Jacob replied, and the nod indicated that he didn’t believe a word Ollie had uttered and chose to believe his ears.

Ollie squeezed past Jacob to the watercooler and began tucking the tower of cups into the holder. It didn’t require as much brute force as Ollie was giving it, and he was sure he’d cracked a few of them in the process. He made a mental note to fill the paper towels too, just so the nurses wouldn’t have to clean up when the inevitable spill happened. He was then momentarily stunned when Jacob curled a hand around his and tugged him away. A few of the cups fell to the floor with a clap.

“People make mistakes, Ollie.” Jacob began tucking the cups into the tube more cleanly. “You’ve met mine, remember.”

Ollie breathed out a laugh. He crouched and gathered up the spillage. As he stood, he handed them to Jacob to ease into the holder.

“I mean, Daisy isn’t a mistake,” Jacob rushed out. “I love Daisy with all my heart.” He swallowed. “She was an accident, yes. But never a mistake. Becky was the mistake. I sometimes think this is all my fault. My penance.”

“That’s ridiculous!” Ollie blurted and quickly bit his lip. One thing never to do was give his own opinions on things he didn’t know the full story on. But there was something about Jacob that screamed a decent sort and being treated so unfairly. Ollie’s overprotective nature spilled out, unannounced. “What I can honestly tell you from all my years being in a hospital is that illness is completely unprejudiced. It doesn’t care who it attacks.”

Jacob nodded, his smile solemn. He appeared stacked with guilt. Ollie didn’t know how to assure him that, no matter what he did with his life, Daisy’s hole in her heart would have been there regardless. Just like his sister’s cancer had.

Ollie filled a cup with water and handed it to Jacob. He took it with gratitude and downed the lot in one gulp. The hospital’s air-conditioning often made people parched. Jacob refilled the cup and swished the contents before taking a slower sip this time. Ollie knew he needed to back away, but his overwhelming desire to hear more kept him rooted to the spot.

“If you don’t mind me saying…” Jacob lifted his eyes from staring at the swirling water. “I’m sure you can do better than him.”

Ollie’s throat caught, and he had to hack up a bit, Daisy-style, to rid it of the congealed saliva. He glanced down to the floor and suddenly felt the need to explain. To make someone understand why.

“He’s a great doctor,” Ollie said. “One of the best. Daisy’s in good hands with him.”

Jacob nodded. “I’m sure she is. But doctors aren’t known for their bedside manner, right? I mean, that’s why they have nurses.”

Ollie snorted. “Good point.” He nodded and filled up another cup to wash down his guilt. “I’ve known him since I did my placement here. I really wanted this job when I’d finished my course. I guess…” Ollie shrugged. “He could help with that.”

“Aren’t nurses in demand?” Jacob asked, his voice light and low, with no trace of judgment in it. A mere statement.

“Yes,” Ollie replied. “But pediatric nurses not so much. And especially in this place. It’s the best hospital in the country. The pay is better. The conditions much better. Getting a job here straight out of nursing school is rare.”

Jacob nodded and glanced away. He scanned all the pictures and thank-you cards scattering the walls and desk. There were a fair few written and drawn directly for Ollie. No one gives thanks like a child who’s enjoyed playing with their nurse.

“My dad has dementia,” Ollie blurted out, still trying to rectify his actions and how it all came across to a complete stranger. It had been hard enough for Taya, with whom he’d been friends for years, to understand why Ollie continued to fall back into bed with Dr. Rawlings, when each morning he was made to feel as unworthy as something stuck on the bottom of the doctor’s shoe. “He’s in a good nursing home. The best care.” Ollie took another swig of water, and, swallowing, he met Jacob’s concerned gaze. “It costs a fortune, and I need to help my mum pay for it. Getting this job was vital in that.”

Jacob simply nodded. No further conversation. No further sweet mutterings about Ollie’s smile making the world a better place. No further offer of pizza. In a mere couple of hours, Ollie had managed to make someone devalue their opinion of him. He had to remember that he wasn’t going to feel anything about that. Or Dr. Rawlings. Or his lost watch. Or his father calling him by his sister’s name, seemingly forgetting he had a son as well.

“I’m sure he offered you the world,” Jacob finally muttered, pressing his cup to his lips as though to hide his next words. “Anyone would if they could.”

Ollie stopped breathing, and his brain tried to process what those words meant. He wasn’t able to comment further because a loud alarm bleeped from the nurses’ station, followed by a distinctive childlike wail. Ollie spun and checked his monitor. As he turned, Jacob was already in room one, arms around his daughter as she threw up all over the bed, the obs machine’s bleeps drowning out her tears.

Jacob clung to Daisy as she curled over to vomit once more. Ollie rushed around the bed, picked up another cardboard pot from the side unit, and held it out to Daisy, while pressing the buttons on the obs machine to stop its incessant shrill.

“What’s happening?” Jacob demanded. “What’s the alarm?

“Her heart rate and blood pressure will go up when she’s sick,” Ollie explained. “As they do usually. It’s not abnormally high. She’s just clearly upset, and the machine is letting us know.”

Daisy continued to sob through her vomiting.

“I’ll call the doctor to come check, anyway.” Ollie handed the pot to Jacob and slipped off the bed to use the phone mounted on the wall by the door. “Just to be safe. But I’m sure all’s fine.” A few taps, and Ollie was through. “Room one, Daisy Monroe,” he said into the receiver. “She’s been sick again. Can you come check?”

Ollie paused and offered over a wink to Daisy. Vomiting over, she leaned back into her father’s warm embrace. Jacob wrapped his arms around her frail body and slid his hands up and down her arms, kissing her forehead.

“Yes, all meds up to date. Yes, I gave her that about a half hour ago. Yes.”

Ollie slammed the phone down harder than he needed to. With a deep breath, he turned to his patient. “Dr. Rawlings is on his way.” He did his best not to catch Jacob’s eye and remain fixed on Daisy, but the urge overtook him. He was relieved to catch a brief curvature on Jacob’s lips.

Dr. Rawlings burst in a few minutes later, and Ollie gave him the rundown on Daisy’s obs, status, and sickness. He stood at the end of the bed, rubbing his chin, reading and rereading the notes. Ollie stood back, allowing Jacob to give Daisy the comfort she needed. Plus, he felt ridiculously uncomfortable with Jacob now knowing his history with the doctor. If Dr. Rawlings found out, Ollie would be in a world of pain that in no way compared to Daisy Monroe’s.

“Right.” Dr. Rawlings slapped the clipboard down on the table. He turned to Ollie. “You gave the oral morphine at the stated time?”

“Yes, Doctor,” Ollie replied. “Eleven twenty-five.”

Dr. Rawlings’s gaze didn’t flicker. Ollie felt ever more uncomfortable.

“I was here, Doctor,” Jacob said. “That was the time Ollie gave Daisy the drug.”

Dr. Rawlings turned his gaze on Jacob. The hum of his reply was the only other sound in the room now that all the machines had been turned to silent. Jacob didn’t move. He kept his eyes on Dr. Rawlings, arms firmly around his daughter. Eventually, the doctor turned back to address Ollie.

“Dosage?”

“Naught-point-one milligrams,” Ollie replied.

Dr. Rawlings sighed. He shook his head.

“I do apologize, Mr. Monroe,” Dr. Rawlings replied. “It would seem my nurse has been distracted and gave the wrong dose of morphine to Daisy.” He turned back to Ollie. “I clearly stated on my notes to reduce the amount to naught-point-zero-five milligrams, due to the nausea-induced side effect. Perhaps keep your mind focused on the job, Oliver?”

Ollie sank, his stomach plummeting to the floor. He was fairly certain he looked as pale as Daisy right then. Racking his brain, he tried to remember the notes or even the verbal notification on the reduction of medication. He couldn’t. All he could remember was sitting on that sofa behind him, eating seafood pizza.

“Hopefully, she has thrown that all back up now,” Dr. Rawlings continued, eyes back on Jacob. “I think we will give her a night off morphine and stick to paracetamol should she require it.” He turned to Ollie. “Can you make a note of that, Oliver?”

“Yes, Doctor,” Ollie muttered. He straightened his shoulders to appear more confident than he was. “Paracetamol only.”

“Good.” Dr. Rawlings turned his attention back to the bed. “Mr. Monroe, I can only apologize once again on behalf of the hospital and my staff. There is no immediate concern. I’m afraid Daisy is having an intolerance to the morphine. Her body is acting accordingly. Which is a good sign.”

“Thank you, Doctor,” Jacob replied, and Ollie noted it was said with trepidation as he flicked his gaze from the doctor to Ollie.

“Oliver?”

Ollie glanced up, chewing his bottom lip to stop it quivering.

“My office, half an hour.”

Ollie nodded. Dr. Rawlings marched out of the room, and it took a couple of moments before Ollie could make eye contact with Jacob.

“I’m so sorry.” Ollie swallowed. “I will check all the notes, but I don’t recall a change in dosage.”

Jacob nodded.

“I’ll get some more sheets, change the bed, and get Daisy a new gown.”

There was no further eye contact.

* * * *

Ollie tapped on the door to Dr. Rawlings’ office lightly, in the hope it wouldn’t be heard. The bark from behind indicated it had been, and Ollie opened the door with a resigned sigh.

“Close the door,” Dr. Rawlings ordered, not looking up from his computer screen.

Ollie closed the door reluctantly. Being alone in this office didn’t fill him with much confidence. Adjusting his scrubs, he stood to the side of the desk and clasped his hands together behind his back. At least his glasses lenses would mask some of his fear. Dr. Rawlings gave a few more fierce taps to his keyboard, twisted around in the swivel chair, and clasped his hands over his stomach.

“Rookie mistake, Oliver.”

“I checked all the notes.” Ollie attempted to inject his voice with confidence. “There was nothing on there about a change of dose. I maintain I gave the correct amount to Daisy Monroe according to the doctor in charge.”

“That being me.”

“Yes, Doctor.”

“Well.” Dr. Rawlings waved a nonchalant hand. He slapped it down on his leg and leaned forward in the seat. “What’s done is done. The girl will feel a little nauseated for a while, but that’s the extent of the concern.”

“I trust then this won’t be taken any further?”

Dr. Rawlings smiled. His pearly white teeth shone as he shook his head with a chuckle. Ollie was hard-pressed not to knock a few of the caps out of alignment.

“As always, Oliver,” Dr. Rawlings said, twisting the seat from side to side, “this will remain between us.”

Ollie nodded. He knew the drill.

“As long as we can think of some way for the father not to report it to the Patient Advice and Liaison Service?”

“I’m sure he won’t,” Ollie muttered.

“Yes.” Dr. Rawlings tapped his clasped forefingers over his lips. “I can see your undeniable charm has worked miracles on him too.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Oh, come off it, Oliver.” Dr. Rawlings slapped his hand down viciously. “You could bend the straightest of straight men.”

“I beg your pardon?”

The doctor stood and strode toward Ollie. He leaned forward to breathe into his ear.

“Don’t say no to me again. It’s not nice. And we both know how I like you being nice to me.” He lowered his voice to a deep rumble. “Unless I deem it necessary for you to act otherwise.”

Ollie shuddered and stepped back.

“Dr. Rawlings,” he snapped. “I ask you not to speak that way to me again or I will file a sexual harassment case against you.” Turning on his heel, Ollie ripped open the office door. “And I ask that all further work-related discussions are conducted in an open space or accompanied by a chaperone.”

The doctor chuckled. Ollie shivered, straightening out his shoulders and attempting to get his jelly legs to move out of the office. It was as if he were stuck. He knew why.

“Are you insisting we play it this way again?” Dr. Rawlings dragged his hand down the nape of Ollie’s neck.

Ollie glanced over his shoulder, his chin hitting the doctor’s thick fingers. “It’s over, Elliot. Over. I don’t want to play it any way, anymore. Not with you.”

Dr. Rawlings pouted. “That hurts, Oliver.” He pressed his lips to Ollie’s ear and dug his fingers into his neck. “You’ll have to make that one up to me.”

Ollie squirmed out of the doctor’s grip and marched up the corridor, the soles of his shoes squeaking with every hurried step away. He was going to make it all the way back to the cardiology wing without feeling a goddamn thing. He was—

“Oliver?”

Oliver stopped dead in his tracks at that tone.

“How’s your father?” The doctor’s cruelest words yet rebounded off the sterile walls and stabbed Ollie right through the heart.

Fucking New Year’s resolutions.

* * * *

Ollie marched through the double doors and into the gusting snowfall. It was freezing, obviously, so he wrapped his quilted jacket over his scrubs and around his shoulders. When he looked up at the night sky, the flakes landed with a delicate tickle on his lenses. Now, where could he go in the middle of the city of London to scream as loudly as his lungs allowed?

“Taking up smoking, Ollie?” Taya leaned up against the wall, drawing on her usual menthol cigarette.

“The resolution going as well for you, then?” Ollie inquired with a nod.

“I have a whole year to achieve it.” Taya sucked in another lungful. “Seems a bit rushed to do it on the first day. You okay?”

Ollie nodded. He soon changed his mind and shook his head. He sighed, and the steam billowing from his mouth rivaled Taya’s menthol breath.

“He really can be a wanker,” Ollie remarked.

“Amen, sister.” Taya waved the hand clutching her cigarette. “Finally over him, then?”

“I’ve been over him a good long time,” Ollie admitted. “Trouble is, I don’t think he’s quite ready to give me up.”

Taya took a long drag, sucking it almost to the end of the butt, and exhaled with one elongated blow. She flicked the cigarette end to the floor, stamped on it with her black Crocs and tucked her arm through Ollie’s. “Don’t go dwelling on things that happen on shift.”

“I did not make that mistake.” Ollie’s jaw clenched and not just because of the freezing-cold air. He took pride in his work. Giving the wrong dose of controlled medicine to a child wasn’t something he could come to terms with. He’d thoroughly checked every note and every file—there was nothing mentioned about a change in dosage. His only doubt was due to Jacob. Maybe Ollie had been paying too much attention to the man to have heard any verbal instructions.

“I know you didn’t, hun.” Taya lifted up on her tiptoes to kiss Ollie’s cheek. “He’ll find a new toy to play with soon.”

What she said wasn’t meant to be hurtful. Ollie had been the doctor’s toy. For far too long. Ollie had always known that Dr. Rawlings liked to have a favorite nurse, or more often than not a student nurse, which was where it had started with him. The doctor’s previous playthings had all moved on. Ollie wasn’t sure when or where: Elliot didn’t speak of them. But Ollie knew they’d existed. The doctor kept mementos from past relationships. Ollie had been shown them, Elliot brandishing them like trophies. Ollie hadn’t been sure why. Perhaps it was that sick part of the doctor’s character that liked to “collect” people, the way he’d collected Ollie. Having then been ordered not to leave any trace of his existence at Elliot’s place, Ollie had meticulously followed the rule in some insane attempt at not providing the man with any more keepsakes. Leaving his watch there had been a mistake, one he would no doubt pay for in more ways than one.

Ollie sighed. He’d expected Elliot to toss him aside as soon as Ollie became part of his medical team and move on to someone who didn’t work directly under him. But it seemed Dr. Rawlings hadn’t quite finished with Ollie yet. “I pity the toy he chooses next,” he said. “They’re in for a whole world of pain.”

“Lucky for you, that pain ceases in a few minutes, right?”

She meant the resolution. Ollie nodded. “Abso-bloody-lutely.”

Taya sniffed. She opened her mouth. Then closed it.

“Go on. Say it,” Ollie urged.

“Do you really mean it?” Taya’s banter and playfulness morphed into a concern Ollie couldn’t accept. “This time?”

Ollie exhaled heavily into the freezing air. The loud blast of sirens cut him off as an ambulance bolted from the side road and screeched past them toward the crossroads, throwing a bumpy left over the miniroundabout and vanishing out of view. Ollie hung his head, tapped the toe of his shoe on the pavement. Lucky ambulance.

Doctors were meant to perform miracles. Mend broken hearts. Why is mine so unfixable?

“Let’s go back in.” Ollie nodded at the door, avoiding Taya’s last question. He wasn’t sure he could lie anymore. “I’m freezing my nuts off out here.”

Taya laughed. Before they had a chance to walk through the sliding doors into the hospital’s main reception, Ollie’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He stopped, fished it out, and, on checking the incoming message display, his stomach wrenched.

“You go.” Ollie nodded toward the hospital.

Taya did, and once she was out of view and the double doors closed to shut, Ollie spun on his heel to put his back to the hospital entrance. With a shaky thumb, he clicked on the incoming video message.

The screen opened up to blackness, but it was the doctor’s deep, resonating, and gruff voice that made Ollie continue watching.

“Strip.” A heavy inhale of breath blasted out from the speaker, and Ollie pressed his thumb to the volume control. “Then lie on the bed.”

Ollie appeared on the screen, naked and crawling onto the silk sheets of a king-size hotel bed. Lying onto his back, he awaited the next instruction like the obedient man he had been. The camera lowered, Elliot slipping into the soft chair at the foot of the bed, fully clothed in the pristine tuxedo he’d worn at a charity dinner Ollie hadn’t been invited to—instead Ollie had been made to wait for Elliot’s return and he’d had no access to a keycard to leave.

The camera refocused to zoom in on Ollie.

“You know what I need you to do.” Elliot’s voice was as smooth as the sheets Ollie lay upon.

“Aren’t you going to lend a hand?” Ollie’s reply had an air of confidence and bravado that Ollie, standing there in the freezing January temperatures, knew he hadn’t possessed on that day in the autumn.

The following resonating chuckle made the camera jiggle.

“Curl your fingers around your cock.”

A brief pause and Ollie obeyed. He didn’t tug. He waited. For what felt like an eternity.

“Now stroke.”

Ollie slid his hand up, losing the tip of his cock into his palm. The flesh thickened, making the demanding head reappear on the downslide.

“Mmmm,” Elliot rumbled. “That is nice.”

Ollie licked his lips. Eyes set on the camera, he performed for the audience of one.

“Keep it slow.”

Ollie had done as instructed; the instinctive reaction to pump harder had been almost unbearable not to give in to. Each glide of his hand and purr of the doctor’s pleasure as he’d watched had sent gluttonous desire through Ollie. One he couldn’t comprehend or control. He had no control. It was obvious who in that room did.

His cock rock hard in his hand, Ollie grunted.

“That’s it.” Elliot inhaled. “Now speed it up.”

Ollie pumped harder, his back arching off the bed. Closing his eyes, he panted with each stroke.

“Open your eyes, Oliver.”

Ollie did. He remembered the doctor’s smile of approval.

“Who are you thinking about?”

“You.”

“Hmmm.” Elliot zoomed the camera in to Ollie’s face, pleasure and torment written all over his flushed cheeks. “Who?”

“You. Always you.” Ollie sped up his strokes, his balls tightening.

“No, Oliver. Who?”

“You, Doctor.”

“Good. Harder.” Elliot’s tone came with more force, and he zoomed the camera out to reveal Ollie’s erratic jerking on his impatient cock. “Eyes on me, Oliver.”

Ollie did as commanded. The doctor purred in delight. Ollie struggled to keep up the relentless jerk, his cock nearing ready to explode. He had to breathe deeply not to give in to his desire and wait for the doctor’s.

“Not yet, Oliver.” Elliot tutted. “Calm and slow.”

Ollie relaxed his hand, reducing his strokes to an almost painful slide.

“Please…” Ollie panted.

“Are you begging, Oliver?”

“Yes, Doctor.” Ollie writhed on the sheets and involuntarily sped his strokes.

“Denied.” Elliot sat forward, elbows on his knees. “Only when I say.”

Ollie exhaled, desperation searing through him. The need to quicken the pace was now unbearable. Elliot hummed, panning in closer to watch Ollie pleasuring himself through the excruciating torture of having to keep it slow.

“Are you ready?”

“Please, Doctor, please,” Ollie garbled the reply, eyes firmly on Elliot.

“Faster.” Elliot sat back.

Ollie sped up, grunting to quicken the strokes. His arm hurt, his fingers clenched, and his joints cramped. But none of that compared to the desire to finally be allowed to succumb to the doctor’s demands.

“Tell me how it feels, Oliver.”

“Good,” Ollie gasped out. “So fucking good.”

Elliot moaned a deep, low, rumble. Then the words Ollie had to wait for were uttered in a soft, oozing, tone. “The doctor will see you. Now.”

Ollie groaned into the vacant air. His orgasm shot from the end of his cock, landing with a splat onto his chest. Ollie could breathe again, once the shivers had subsided. He risked a look over at the camera and to the doctor who ripped off his bow tie in one swift flick.

“Now come here.”

The video ended, blanking the screen. Ollie’s hand trembled, and he gripped the phone. He peered up to acknowledge a family walking past and into the hospital.

“Did you enjoy that as much as I did, Oliver?”

Warm breath heated Ollie’s neck. He didn’t need to turn around. The doctor sauntered past him. Whistling, Elliot crossed the road and into the corner coffee shop, leaving Ollie to shiver alone.