My Forbidden Doctor (Forbidden Medicine 7)

I forcibly kept my mouth shut as Laurie's question seeped deep into the crevices of my brain. She was right— Melissa wouldn't say anything, and I wouldn't say anything... and no one else knew about it. Some of the tension seeped out of my shoulders and down the ceramic bowl against my back, and it suddenly became a little easier to breathe.

"You are a great man, Carl, but for God's sake... you really, really need to learn to bend your back a little. You don't have to make a habit of breaking the rules, but you slipped up, and it wasn't even that bad a slip up. It's not like you screwed her in an exam room or something, stone cold sober, with no intention of trying to cover your ass. Okay, you did most of it right, and that's gonna have to be enough."

I inhaled deeply through flared nostrils, and my heart slowed its furious pace as Laurie sighed.

"You know, I think I'm the one that's supposed to call you after a bad hookup, not the other way around."

"You've always been the levelheaded one, Laurie. I... I just thought I was better than this... The Code of Ethics is a thing for a reason, and I've gone and broken one of the most important ones. You wouldn't sleep with a client, would you? No."

"I couldn't say that with certainty, Carl. I would do exactly what you did if I were in your position with a client. I'd refer him to another lawyer and just be careful not to use what privileged knowledge I have about him professionally in his personal life. You said it yourself— you didn't break any confidentiality clauses with her information. In your own words, you just keep bumping into each other, and you find yourself wanting to more and more. That's not unethical. That's simple human attraction. You're a doctor, you should know how it works, Carl."

"... I'm sorry for waking you up." The line crackled lightly, and the blood drumming in my ears died down a little. "Sometimes, I think we should've been born the other way around."

"My alarm was going to go off in ten minutes, anyway. What's Melissa's number so I can shoot her a text?" Taking my phone from my ear to thumb the screen, I exhaled a shuddering breath and wiped my eyes and face with my free hand. Laurie was ten years younger than me, but in times like this, it felt like the roles were reversed. She was so calm and cool, determinable, even. Relationships weren't something she got flustered about, and I was beyond grateful that I had called her instead of stewing in my own shitty thoughts. Giving her Mel's number, I inhaled sharply and cleared my throat of the dense lump that clogged it.

"Okay. I'll text her right now. You just... don't snitch on yourself, Carl, okay? I know you want to, and you feel like it may help ease whatever punishment you think will happen if you're truthful, but just give it a week or two for Mel to switch doctors."

"Yeah, okay. I may call out today. I don't have any appointments. I was just doing admin work." Glancing around the steamed bathroom, I climbed to my feet as Laurie grunted in acknowledgment in my ear. "I'm sorry, again, for waking you up."

"I need that extra ten minutes to grill you about Mom going to Vegas? I didn't know about that. What did she say? How long is she going? Who's paying for it? What's up with that shit?" Blasting me with questions, Laurie sounded increasingly frustrated. "Doesn't she see he's an asshole? Maybe she didn't tell me because I'm not as polite about disliking him as you."

"I'll call you back, okay? I'm gonna shoot my secretary a text and convince myself you're right." I hung up before Laurie could hound me for answers, and I heaved a massive breath. "Fuck... What do I do, now?"

My question had no answer other than the pounding of water on tile, and I ran my hand through my wet hair to shake my head. The obvious solution is to talk to Mel, but I couldn't until after she did her intake at Sahper's practice. Chances are, if I leave my apartment, I'll run into her by some fucked up twist of fate... so I think I'll stay in today.Chapter 16MelissaYawning as I stared blankly through the television screen, I sniffled hard through my swollen sinuses. My eyes watered constantly, and the stress of the past few weeks seemed to finally catch up to me. I hate May, and the past two weeks had been particularly miserable. All of a sudden, all the trees decided to attack me, and I hadn't been able to do anything.

Terry offered to get my groceries, for God's sake. I'd watched almost everything on my Watchlist on Netflix. I got a Hulu subscription because I ran out of stuff to watch!