The sound of my phone ringing too loudly startled me awake. My eyes caught sight of the barely risen sun peeking through my bedroom window, and I groaned. It couldn’t have been past eight in the morning, and that left me wondering who in the hell was calling me at this god-awful hour.
I reached out from under my cozy comforter, and the cool air hit my skin, urging goose bumps onto my arms. I snagged my phone off the nightstand and slid my entire body, including my head, back under the warm cocoon of blankets. Even though the ringing had stopped, I tapped the home button and my phone came to life.
The numbers 7:45 glowed bright and blinding while a notification sat in the center of the screen.
3 missed calls Scott.
What the hell?
Before I had the time to send an angry message of Stop fucking calling me, he sent a text message, making my phone ping loudly.
“Shit!” I yelled, bobbling it a little before getting it back under control.
Scott: Rise and shine, Harlow. Get ready. I’m taking you somewhere special today.
Me: Are you on drugs? Do you have any idea what time it is?
Scott: Lol. No drugs. Just coffee.
Me: I’m not going anywhere right now. It’s fucking Saturday morning and it’s not even 8.
Scott: I’m on my way to your apartment.
He was on his way to my apartment? Was he joking with me right now?
Hell no. I didn’t care how persistent he was. I wasn’t going anywhere but back to dreamland.
Me: I fucking knew it was a bad idea for you to have my address.
Two days of him having the information, and he was already using it for outright evil purposes.
Scott: Get dressed, Harlow. I’ve got a surprise for you.
A surprise? Even though it was too goddamn early, I was intrigued. I really fucking liked surprises.
Me: Does it include breakfast and coffee?
Scott: Yep. I just added it to the already awesome list of things I’m doing with Harlow today.
Ugh. There’s a list of awesome? It shouldn’t have been sounding better by the second, but goddammit, it was.
Me: I kind of hate you right now.
Scott: No, you don’t. And stop texting me. Get your cute ass out of bed. I’ll be there in thirty minutes.
Me: Thirty minutes?! Fucking hell.
Scott: Less texting and more dressing.
I giggled at the irony of his words and sat up in my bed and typed out another message.
Me: This is the first time you’ve ever encouraged me to put clothes on. It feels like a momentous occasion.
Scott: Because today is important. And it’s our first official date.
Me: We’ve been on a date before.
Scott: Um, no. I’m pretty sure you’ve blandly called everything we’ve done so far, outside of the sex, “hanging out.”
Me: That’s a technicality. Besides, does it have to be at 8 in the morning?
Scott: Yes. And I promise, you’re going to have fun today.
Me: What kind of fun? I mean, what if what you have planned isn’t something I’d find fun? You should just tell me what it is, and then I’ll decide if it’s worth getting out of bed for.
Scott: Get dressed, Harlow.
He wasn’t giving in, and I couldn’t stop my curiosity from getting the best of me. Goddammit. He was a genius. I sighed out loud and threw my comforter off of my legs and removed my ass from my mattress.
With my hands held above my head, I stretched out the kinks and creaks from my muscles, and, while drumming up the motivation to hop in the shower, I sent him one last text message.
Me: Bossy bastard.
Forty-five minutes later, I was showered, dressed, and riding the subway with Scott to an unknown location. His large frame—clad in a nice pair of dress slacks and a button-up, collared shirt—stood beside me as we careened through the dark tunnels of the city.
“Ready?” he asked with a grin. “We’re almost there.”
I glanced down at my skinny jeans and tank top and then back up at him. “I feel underdressed.”
“You’re perfect,” he whispered and pressed a soft kiss to my cheek.
I quirked a brow in his direction, and instantly, he laughed. Probably because he already knew what my next question was before I even said it. “Where are we going?” I asked for the millionth time. “Seriously, Scott. A woman needs to be prepared. Do I need bail money? Should I have gotten a Brazilian wax?”
He waggled his brows. “Not today, and you’re sexy no matter what.”
“Even with a seventies bush?”
“Harlow.”
“Fine. But where are we going?”
“It’s a surprise,” he replied, sighing deep and long, like he was actually annoyed with me. I didn’t believe him.
“I don’t like surprises.”
“Liar,” he said with knowing smile, confirming that he wasn’t annoyed with me at all. “The fact that you love surprises is the one and only thing that got you out of bed this morning.”
“You were using my love of surprises against me?” I nudged his stomach gently with my elbow. “Asshole.”
“Not necessarily against you,” he answered. “Just using it to my advantage.”
“You’re such a pain in my ass.”
He wrapped his arms around my shoulders and pulled me in for a tight embrace. “You know,” he whispered into my ear. “I love your cute and curvy little ass.”
I rolled my eyes. “Of course you do. It’s a nice ass.”
He chuckled into my neck. “It’s my ass.”
I scoffed. “Pretty sure it’s connected to me.”
“Yeah, but it’s mine. I’m laying claim to it.”
“Don’t waste your time on the macho alpha male bullshit,” I retorted. “It doesn’t work on me.”
My words didn’t deter him one bit, though. His persistent fingers slid down my shoulders to my back until they gripped my ass…hard. And in the middle of the crowded subway, Scott tugged my body toward his and kissed me soundly on the mouth.
My first reaction was to pull away, especially considering the crowd surrounding us, but the instant his tongue slipped past my lips, I was a fucking goner. With the warmth of his mouth and the strength of his arms wrapped around me, I couldn’t stop myself from melting into his kiss.
Good God, this man can kiss.
He gripped my ass again and whispered, “Mine,” into my ear as his mouth moved a trail across my jaw to my neck and then back up to my mouth.
A shiver rolled up my spine, and for some unknown reason, I couldn’t find the strength to refute his words.
Because you really like him. Maybe even more than like him…
The subway jolted our bodies a little as it started to slow down, and Scott ended the kiss with a soft peck to my lips. A little whimper of disappointment left my mouth without permission, and he smirked down at me in response.
“We’re here,” he said, grabbing my hand and linking our fingers together before leading me off the car and toward the stairs of the subway exit.
“Okay. Seriously. What is here?” I questioned as we got to the top of the stairs, but Scott was determined and completely unwilling to spill the beans. “Where are we going?” I asked again, and he just laughed.
I sighed in annoyance and petulantly let him lead me toward the unknown.
After a quick stop at Magnolia Bakery for some muffins and two cups of coffee and a quick two-block walk, we stood in front of the doors of St. Luke’s Hospital.
Scott turned toward me and smiled. “We’re here.”
“Huh?” I looked at him and then back at the hospital and then back at him again. “You’re taking me to a hospital on our first official date?”
“Yep.”
“A hospital?” My brow scrunched in confusion. “Do you understand that a first official date should be something romantic?”
He laughed, but it did nothing to clear my confusion.
“I’m just having a hard time wrapping my brain around how a place of medical emergencies would spell out romance…”
“Today, you get to be Dr. Harlow Paige for the day,” he explained with a proud smile. “We’re going to spend the next four hours taking care of pediatric patients in my emergency room.”
Holy shit.
“Are you serious?”
“As a heart attack.”
A barking laugh left my lips, and he grinned.
“There’s no pressure,” he said and wrapped his arm around my shoulder. “But after you told me about your original goal of becoming a pediatrician, I wanted to give you a chance to really explore it. It sounded like you’d spent most of your life working toward that goal, and plus, you already know I think you’d make one hell of a pediatrician.”
God, he remembered all of that?
Not to mention, he’d arranged a whole day for me to experience what it would be like to be a pediatrician on his day off?
A flock of butterflies took up residence in my stomach, fluttering around erratically as I stared at him in awe. These weren’t the actions of an asshole. They were the actions of a man who put others’ wants and needs before his own.
The exact kind of man I want to spend my life with…
“Wow. This is so sweet, Scott…” I briefly paused as I tried to find the right words—tried not to belittle the gesture with a smartass remark like I normally would. My saliva felt thicker than normal as I murmured the heartfelt truth. “It’s probably one of the most thoughtful things anyone has ever done for me.”
“It’s never too late to accomplish your dreams, Harlow,” he answered with tenderness in his voice. “If this is still your dream, then I know you can achieve it.”
“You really think that?”
“I’m certain of it,” he said and then held out his hand. “Ready to play doctor for the day?”
I smiled. “I’m ready.”
My day in the ER had careened by in a blur of adorable tiny humans. Scott and I had managed to see twenty pediatric patients in a matter of three and a half hours, and I’d found myself mesmerized and invigorated by the experience.
Sure and precise and way too much fun, he awed me as a physician. Dr. Shepard was an asset to the city of New York. He had a friendly and playful bedside manner, and even during the most emergent situations, he always found a way to get his patients to relax and laugh, while giving them nothing less than top-notch care.
He was a good doctor, and, I was quickly finding, an even better man.
And I couldn’t deny working side by side with him—obviously, with Scott doing most of the actual medical work while I watched—had been the most fun I’d had in a long time. Having already cleared the necessary paperwork with the hospital, he’d handed a permission form to each family we’d worked with and explained that I was simply an intern and not an actual physician. And thankfully, not one family had turned down my participation.
“All right, Dr. Paige,” he said with a grin as he handed me the patient’s medical chart. “We’ve got one last patient to see. Go ahead and give me the rundown on what to expect.”
I grinned and scanned the chart for the pertinent details. “Josie Morrows. Age five. No significant past medical history. Came in about an hour ago after she fell out of a tree. Only injury appears to be a small gash to forehead.”
“Hmm…a head injury? That feels oddly familiar…” he teased, and I nudged him with my elbow.
“Shut up,” I muttered, and he chuckled as we headed toward Josie in Bay Six.
Scott winked as he pulled the curtain back to reveal an adorable little girl with a big white bandage taped across her entire forehead. She sat on the exam table with her legs swinging back and forth while her mother stood beside her.
“Hi, Josie,” Scott greeted. “I’m Dr. Shepard, and this is Ms. Paige. It looks like someone took a little fall today, huh?
“Yep.” She nodded, and her blond curls bounced with the motion. “Out of a tree in my backyard.”
“It’s a big tree, but she didn’t get very high,” her mother chimed in. “One I told her not to climb, by the way,” she added with a disappointed glance in her daughter’s direction.
Josie frowned. “But Joey did it first!”
Her mother sighed. “Yes, but you’re five and he’s ten. That’s a big difference, sweetheart. You’re too little to climb that tree.”
“Ugh,” she muttered and looked at me. “My brother always gets to do everything. It stinks.”
I grinned. “Yeah, but one day you’ll be ten too. And then your mom might let you climb trees like your brother.”
Josie’s blue eyes brightened. “And then maybe I won’t get a cut on my head, huh?”
“Exactly,” Scott said as he slipped on exam gloves. “Okay, Josie, I need to make sure you didn’t injure anything else besides your head, okay?”
She nodded. “Okay.”
While he did a quick assessment of the patient, I donned a pair of gloves and got the supplies ready to clean the wound. I was surprised and a bit relieved how quickly everything I’d learned in college was coming back to me. It was like it was yesterday that I was taking pre-med classes and doing short internships at various hospitals in the city.
“Can I remove the bandage so Ms. Paige and I can see the cut, Josie?” Scott asked once he had finished his assessment.
She nodded slowly, but I didn’t miss the hesitancy in her response. I couldn’t blame her. Head injuries weren’t any fun at twenty-nine; I couldn’t imagine how scary they were at five. Fucking Barron the Bore and the Case of the Glass Headboard taught me that.
“You know,” I mused as Scott winked at me and slowly, carefully, removed the bandage. “I once got a cut on my forehead.”
Josie’s curious eyes met mine. “You did?”
“Yep.” I nodded. “Dr. Shepard had to give me stitches.”
“Did it hurt?”
“Nope,” I answered honestly. “Thanks to the numbing medicine he’d applied, I didn’t feel anything at all. Cool, huh?”
Once the bandage was off, both of us took a good look at the gash on her forehead. It was small and, thankfully, most of the bleeding had already stopped.
Scott turned to me. “What do you think, Ms. Paige?”
“I don’t think Josie is going to need stitches.”
“Me either,” he agreed with a smile.
“I’m not?” the little patient questioned excitedly. “I’m not going to need stitches?”
“Nope,” Scott said and tugged gently on one of her ringlets. “Looks like you lucked out, little lady. We just need to clean up the cut really, really good so it doesn’t get an infection and put a new bandage on it to protect it.”
“Oh, thank God,” her mother said on a relieved sigh. “I wasn’t sure, and I know I probably could have just taken her to her pediatrician, but I panicked when I saw all the blood.”
Scott nodded his understanding. “We’re glad you brought her in today,” he reassured. “Head injuries tend to bleed more than most, and since she’s so young, it’s always better to err on the side of caution.”
“Thank you,” she responded and looked at both of us. “You made this trip to the ER a lot easier than I thought it would be. You’re both fantastic.”
Obviously, I wasn’t a doctor, but her words hit me hard.
I really helped…contributed something.
Was it really too late for me to go to med school?
Scott flashed a knowing smile in my direction before whispering for my ears only, “It’s never too late, Dr. Paige.”
I feigned annoyance with a roll of my eyes, but I couldn’t deny that the day had put a bug in my brain. Could I really go my whole life without achieving my dream?
I honestly didn’t know the answer to that, but I did know I’d felt more invigorated by today than I had by anything I’d ever done at Gossip.
Four hours in the ER with Scott and I felt like I was falling in love with medicine all over again.
Maybe medicine isn’t the only thing you’re falling in love with.
Oh. Boy.