Chapter Twelve
Where’s my cowboy?Trauma consult in 45 min. OR 3.
He harrumphed at Meyer’s message, even though disappointment dragged him right back down into reality like an anchor in his gut. And yet, shit, he sure hoped this shift wasn’t going to be one of the “Grand Central Station” shifts where patients rotated across his operating table like kids racing through a revolving door. Yoda still needed his paw examined. It would be a long-ass twenty-four hours, and he had every intention of checking on the stray dog, and on Sky, and on Brandon, and getting to know this new part of Skylar’s life more the second his shift ended. He’d prefer to do it with some sleep in his system.
“Is everything okay?” Skylar asked, as if she could tell it was a doctor pager.
He pulled out his cell and rattled off a text to Meyers instead.
Travis:Patient stable?
A response popped back.
Meyers:Working on it. A lotta blood loss. Cardiologist doing workup right now. Lawnmower accident. FUBAR.
Shit. Meyers had been in the army, too, and that acronym meant a messed-up case.
“I’m on call,” he admitted to Skylar, huffing. “As of a minute ago.”
She yanked away from him swiftly, nudging him back with her fingertips and whipping the ties of her scrub pants into a bow again. “Go—you have to.”
“I’m right where I need to be for the moment,” he murmured, pulling her back to him. “But yeah, lawnmower accident. They’re being stabilized right now. I better run Yoda home in a few. Can I bring him back tomorrow?”
“Why? Leave him with me, and I’ll check out his foot. Sign consents now in case he needs sutures, and I’ll bring him back to my place.” She lifted her shoulders and bit her lip, that sweet, uncertain look that, until now, she hadn’t worn for him since their reencounter, even as she strode with experience for consent paperwork, shoving aside the brochure mishap sprawled upon the counter.
Leave Yoda? It would be just like the Sky he knew to extend herself for an animal at the drop of a hat, he thought as he scanned the paperwork and signed. She hadn’t changed as much as she thought.
“I don’t wanna use you, Sky. You got enough on your plate with the stray and with Brandon’s injury…and yours.” His finger traced the bruise from the airbag.
She grimaced at him. “I’ve literally got taking care of animals down to a science.” She added with a playful smile, “And you’ll get a bill, with a shameless request for donations to the TRDM Legacy fund, so…”
He grinned at her temerity, set aside the clipboard with a clatter, and grasped her hips to position her back in front of him, fingers curling into her scrub fabric, the best grip for pounding swiftly into this body. Shoot, if he didn’t extricate himself soon, he might not extricate himself, period. After years of placating his needs with his fist, he had time to make up for and the determination to see the job done, too.
His eyes flitted back and forth between hers. “I could be gone all night.”
She shrugged, a tiny smile pulling up her delectable lips. “Okay, and? He can cuddle up next to me in bed, all warm and snug…”
That fire nipped at him. That primal need to lay his desires bare and back her up to the wall and lift those legs around his hips and ride her to oblivion wanted to override all good sense again. In bed with her? Naw, Sky might blush like a sweetheart, and she’d definitely flinched, but from that glint in her eyes, she knew she was playing with matches.
His hands slid up and down her sides, his thoughts a mix of sunshiny hope, lingering disappointment in himself, and lust straight from the gutter.
She laughed unexpectedly and bit that lip he wanted between his teeth again.
“He’d have plenty of room to play on the ranch, and Bran, for all his prickles, would probably spoil him.” He let her change the subject. He knew all he needed to know in that sparkling glint still flashing in her eyes, that she was game to see if something new between them would work. “He loves the animals and, if he’s not zoned out on a video game, is usually found out in the barn with my patients. Yoda would get fresh cooked chicken each meal, and—”
He chuckled now. “Okay, okay, you make it sound like paradise. I’ll text my dog walker and let him know he’s off the hook because I got Doolittle fanning Yoda with palm leaves and feedin’ him grapes.”
She beamed up at him now, a fresh sparkle of pride illuminating her crystal-blue eyes. “As he should be treated because, I mean, dog spelled backward is god.”
“Don’t tell Yoda that. He’ll take it to heart.” His chuckling intensified.
She smiled fondly now as he dusted another kiss upon her head. If Yoda was at her home, it would give him a solid reason to go to her ranch, not to mention check out her operation firsthand for Lopez. He fingered her phone, pulling her pelvis flush with his again with the crook of his finger around her drawstring.
“Gimmie your cell number so I can text about Yoda.”
She looked up into his eyes. She seemed so unsure, and he could hardly stand it. One moment she was taunting him about his dog cuddled in her bed, and next she was hesitating like a virgin, and it did nothing but douse those matches of lust with lighter fluid. His mouth quirked up in a lopsided smile, the dimple she’d once said she loved creasing. Jutted that chin. Bit his lip in the way he knew used to drive her wild for a taste of her own. So cocky, but with her, it felt so damn right.
“Is it just Yoda you want to check on?” she hedged.