Dr. Tempt Me - A Possessive Doctor Romance

“Like I said, I don’t know much about them. If you’re tangled up with the mafia, you should go to the police.”

“You didn’t.”

“And look what it got me.” He hesitated and let out a breath. “I guess it could be worse.”

“I’m looking for a contact. Someone relatively friendly. I know you talked to a lot of people, when you guys went through your little problem.”

“There is one guy.” He didn’t sound sure, and I had a bad feeling in my gut. “But he’s not exactly friendly.”

“Give it to me anyway.”

“His name’s Dr. Chen. I don’t know his first name, so don’t ask. I can text you his number.”

“He’s in the mafia?”

“Works for them. He’s their house doctor, the guy Dante and Vincent wanted me to replace.”

“Dante and Vincent?”

“They’re like the big bosses. I don’t have contact info for them, and even if I did, I wouldn’t give it to you. You need to stay far away from those two if you can.”

“Understood.”

“If you’re in trouble, seriously, Fiona, go to the cops. Don’t try to make this work on your own. Erica and I got lucky, and who knows how long that luck will hold. They might chase us down out here.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You never know.” He grunted and I got the sense that he was standing up for something. “Seriously, Fiona, you need to be careful. And if there’s anything I can do—”

“That phone number will be a good start.”

“You got it.” He chuckled again. “Dean, huh? How’s he doing?”

“He’s doing fine, and it’s not like that.”

“You could do a lot worse.”

“Gavin.”

“Whatever. Enjoy yourself and stay out of trouble, okay? These guys are no joke.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Good. Erica worries about you sometimes.”

I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “She worries about me?”

“Sure, I guess because your ‘fuck you’ barriers are up all the time and it’s hard for you to get to know people. She’s worried you’re lonely and miserable.”

“That’s… sort of insulting.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“And I don’t have barriers.”

He snorted. “You absolutely do. You were convinced I was going to hurt Erica from the start, even though I did nothing but prove over and over that I wanted what was best for her.”

“Can you blame me? That whole situation was crazy.”

“True, but you’re in it now, aren’t you?”

I let out a breath through my nose. “I guess I am.”

“Be careful then. And let down the shields from time to time, all right?”

“Goodbye, Gavin.”

“Later.”

I hung up the phone and leaned back on my couch. I shut my eyes and tried to picture Gavin and Erica together in their little house at the edge of the mountains—and for some strange reason, I felt a pang of jealousy. I got up, walked to the refrigerator, took out a bottle of wine and poured a glass.

I took a long drink as I returned to the couch and sat back down, legs curled underneath me. The phone buzzed and a phone number appeared on the screen. I saved it in my contacts as Dr. Chen then considered calling Dean to tell him about the news.

But I hesitated. I thought about the accident again, like I did so many times over the years, and my fingers strayed to the scar that ran down the length of my stomach, bisecting my belly button, and ending two inches above my crotch. It was ugly still, even after all these years, and I hated it so much. I remembered how it’d felt for that big, jagged piece of glass to slice down my front, the feeling of warm blood on the seat, of my boyfriend groaning in pain.

I was barely sixteen when it happened. At the time, I was dating an older boy named Jim O’Malley, a handsome guy that played on the basketball team for our parochial school. He was nice to me and we had a good time together, at least until that night, driving too fast down a quiet Buck County back road, laughing wildly with the windows down, swerving slightly. I hadn’t realized how drunk he was, not until we got into the car. I was a little drunk too, not as bad as him, but enough to take the edge off, to blur the danger enough.

One second, we were turning around a bend to the left, and the next he jerked the wheel to the right, narrowly avoiding a head-on collision with a truck, but losing control and smashing into a tree. I smelled burned rubber, heard the tires scream. He said something, I’d never remember what, and his hand pressed against my chest like he wanted to hold me in place. Impact was instant. Most of what happened after was a blur: the smell of oil and gasoline, bits and pieces of glass and tree bark in my hair, pain hot and wild all over my limbs, my spit rolling down my chin as I rolled onto the damp grass, someone shouting to get moving, the car horn blaring. I remembered stumbling from the car, blood all over me, and an ambulance’s lights flashing along the road, illuminating the cornfield nearby. Dogs barked somewhere, angry.