Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 78760 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78760 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
I had a damn dog during med school, and I’d forgotten to feed him multiple times. How she was able to get her schoolwork done while caring for her child, not to mention holding down a job, was fucking amazing.
“You’re with me today,” I said. “Dr. Wild is on call, but he’s spending time with his wife who just had surgery on her thumb that she broke two days ago.”
She frowned. “That sucks.”
My dick hardened in my scrubs, and I cursed myself for wearing the snug ones.
This was going to be a long goddamned day.
***
The day continued to get longer as the flooding got worse.
The water was getting higher everywhere, and roads were now starting to flood.
Ambulances were having trouble getting to the scenes of accidents, and it wouldn’t be long before they couldn’t get there at all without risking their own safety.
“My boat’s in storage on Pine Street,” I was saying into my speaker phone to Ghost, my club brother. “It’s not locked up during the day. The key to the motor is in the glove box towards the left side.”
“All right,” Ghost’s deep baritone filled the area surrounding me. “We’re gonna start looking for anyone that needs help. Get them where they need to go.”
Meaning the shelters or higher ground.
The water was flooding the lower half of the city, and it was slowly creeping up into dangerous territory.
It wasn’t there yet, but it would be soon.
“Sounds good. I’m here for the long haul, so don’t expect me to come help. The other doctor that was on call is stuck outside of town thanks to the officers refusing to let him in due to a power line being down and threatening the immediate vicinity. He’s pissed, but that’s probably for the best since they’re not letting anyone else in anyway. It could get dangerous.”
“Agreed,” Ghost said. “Over and out.”
I hit the end call button but shouldn’t have bothered because when Ghost was done talking, he was done. There were no niceties or quick goodbyes with him. He was short, abrupt, and I wouldn’t have him any other way.
“He sounds rough,” Tally said as she made her way up to me. “Did he gargle with gravel or something?”
I snorted, surreptitiously adjusting my cock underneath the desk.
Why, at thirty-three, I got a hard on just at the sound of her voice, was beyond me.
God, I was going to hell.
“No,” I shook my head. “He had some smoke inhalation damage to his throat and lungs a few years back. Makes him sound rougher…though he looks like a tough son of a bitch. The voice is just icing on the cake.”
She grimaced. “I lost a brother to a fire.”
I blinked, then cursed.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I apologized. “I didn’t realize that you had any other siblings besides your brother and sister.”
She shrugged.
“It was before we moved here,” she explained. “Or, more correctly, it was why we moved here.”
“What happened?” I asked, leaning back in my office chair at the nurses’ station and staring at her as concern started to roll through me.
“Mom and Dad used to live in California,” she explained. “In the hills. A wildfire swept over the mountain and started burning hot before we even had a chance to react. Phillip was out with friends. He and the entire car of boys got caught up in one of the fires. They burned alive.” She licked her lips. “I was five. Morgan was ten. Brett was Eleven. Phillip was sixteen.”
My heart started to ache.
“That’s terrible,” I murmured. “I’m so sorry, Tally.”
She looked at me, those green eyes of hers so wide and filled with pain, and I wondered how the hell I’d missed the sadness before. I could see it clearly now, the heartbreak that lived inside of her.
“Tallulah, the poor girl, was stuck with a mouthful of a name, since I ended up naming her after him.” She smiled wistfully. “Tallulah Ophelia Slater.”
“Not too bad. You could shorten it to Lula,” I grinned. “Though, I sense a touchy subject there, seeing as every time one of the nurses asks about ‘Lula’ you get all stony faced.”
Apparently, her mother called Tallulah ‘Lula’ at work when she spoke of her, causing the other nurses to refer to her as that.
It was clear after the first four times that someone had called her Lula that Tally didn’t like it, and I’d been wondering why ever since the first time I noticed her reaction.
“I don’t like the name,” she admitted. “There’s really nothing to it. I just don’t like it. I named her Tallulah because that’s what I wanted her to be called.”
I grinned.
“It’s a mouthful, as you said. Gotta be hard for her to say,” I informed her.
She sighed.
“I’m sure it will be,” she confirmed. “I just…”
The ER doors opened, and a soaking wet Seanshine, another member of the club, came barreling in with a patient. Seanshine was a medic, and he was damn good at his job. I’d work with him at my side any day of the week and twice on Sunday.