Second Chances: The Seahaven Series - Book One (12 page)

Buster sees me on the deck and makes a beeline, running across the sand, up the stairs and straight for me.

“Whoa, buddy, whoa!” I laugh, as he wiggles and barks and bangs into my legs. I scoop him up and give him kisses and ear scratches. “Good boy, Buster. Good boy.” He tries to lick me and I laugh.

Matt jogs up the steps and puts the tennis ball down.

“Thanks for picking him up,” I say. “Did they give you a hard time?”

“Nah,” he shakes his head. “One of them asked me to examine a sprained ankle, and I said I'd do it if she agreed not to charge you overtime.”

“Ah,” I say, “the old sprained ankle routine. I bet it was the redhead.”

He cocks an eyebrow and moves toward me. “It was indeed. She has a reputation, I take it? For ankles?”

I laugh. “Mostly just for trying to sleep with any eligible bachelor in sight.”

He comes closer still and puts his arms around me in my blanket, around my waist. I feel a shiver go through me, and it's not from the chilly air.

“Well, there's a problem with that. I don't consider myself eligible. What do you think?” He tilts his face towards mine and I'm a goner. I breathe in his breath and shake my head no. He shakes his head no back and smiles.

“You are not eligible for anyone else,” I say.

He kisses me, really kisses me, deep and long. My legs go weak and my body burns. I feel hot and wet all at the same time as he becomes hard against me. He scoops me up and carries me into the house, Buster scurrying underfoot. I break the kiss long enough to say, “Buster, lay down,” and Buster lays down in the kitchen.

Matt puts me on the couch and as he does I pull his sweatpants down around his hips, finding what I've been longing for right in front of me.

But instead of tearing off my pants, he hovers over me, looking into my eyes.

“Are you okay?” I ask him.

He nods. “Better than okay.” He brushes away a piece of my hair. “The thing is... I want to make love to you very slowly.”

I take a breath in, dizzy at the thought. I can barely breathe as he kisses his way down my stomach and then slides my pants off slowly. He lifts my shirt over my head and then takes his own shirt off. The sliding door is still open, sending the sound of waves crashing through the room, the breeze covering our bare skin with chilly goosebumps.

He takes my hands in his and puts them over my head, so he's on top of me and our bodies are together. Then we kiss, slow and long. Just when I don't think I can stand not having him inside me anymore, he slips in with a sighing exhale. I catch my breath.

I have to fight not raising my hips or trying to make us move faster. He's in command and is setting an amazingly sensual pace that's making me crazily turned on. And then he slows down and pulls out.

I writhe in protest as he runs his hand down my body and over my breasts.

“Please,” I beg him. He takes his penis in his hand and rubs it over my clit slowly. “Please,” I moan, “I need you in me.”

He smiles and slides back inside me. Slowly he moves in me, deeper with each thrust. He feels huge, like every part of me is full with pleasure.

“Are you close?” he whispers, and I nod as he pushes into me steadily and fully, a little bit faster now.

“I want you to come for me,” he whispers again.

I gasp and immediately let go, screaming with all the pent up emotion of the past week. “God!” I yell. “Oh!” and then he comes right after me with a long, guttural moan.

He collapses into me, his face in my shoulder. He kisses it, then my neck, then finds my lips.

“I could do this all day,” he murmurs.

“Except then we'd both get fired,” I say, my eyes closed.

“Probably not fired,” he says. “Just reprimanded. It'd be worth it.”

He slowly rolls off me and then gives my butt a sharp slap.

“Ow!” I say, laughing. “Reprimand me some more.”

He laughs. “Later I'll reprimand you all you want.” He walks to the kitchen, naked.

I watch him. “You're pretty confident nobody's docked on a boat out there with a high-powered telescope checking out your goods,” I joke, looking him up and down. He is a fine looking man.

He turns back toward me, not missing a beat. “It so happens I have nothing to hide, and if they want to take the trouble to gaze at me, maybe I should put a tie on. Would that be a good look? Starkers and a tie?” He indicates his naked body. “And maybe shoes. Or just socks.”

Suddenly we hear footsteps climbing the stairs outside. We grimace at each other and then I dive under the blanket and he jumps behind the kitchen counter.

The mailman pokes his head into the sliding door frame. “Knock, knock,” he says.

Matt gives him a wave from behind the counter. “Hello, Harry.”

“Package for you, Doc.”

“Great, thanks. You can leave it there on the step,” says Matt.

I peek out from under my blanket, trying not to move or be noticed.

“Need a signature today,” the mailman calls.

I stifle a laugh. Matt shoots me a look, like, “What do I do?”

“Apron,” I whisper.

He starts opening and closing drawers. “Just a minute!” he yells to the postman.

“Sure,” says the postman, in a hurry, looking around.

When the postman turns back toward the door, Matt is standing in front of him with a woman's small flowered apron around his waist.

The mailman looks up to hand Matt the device to sign, and then doubletakes when he realizes what Matt's wearing. And not wearing.

“Cleaning day,” Matt says to him. “Don't want to get my shirt messy.”

The mailman nods, hands Matt the package, and practically runs away down the driveway.

I pull the blanket off and laugh.

“That was priceless,” I say. “I wish I'd had a camera so I could keep that guy's expression forever.”

“It's nice, though, right?” asks Matt, and hops up and down so I can see all the parts he was hiding from the mailman.

“Very pretty,” I say. “You should wear it when you do rounds.”

Matt tosses the package on the counter and jumps on the couch next to me. I slide my hand under his apron.

He throws his head back. “Danger, danger. We have—” he checks the clock, “—approximately twenty minutes to get to work.”

I give him a little squeeze and he groans. Then I jump up and run for the bathroom. “I'll shower fast, you make us food!”

“Herring sandwiches it is,” he calls from the living room.

I climb in and start to shower quickly. I see his shaving cream can on the shelf and pick it up and smell it. The smell alone makes me want to call in sick and spend the next twenty four hours in bed with him.

I come out of the bathroom pulling my shirt on over my head, and when I get it on I notice Matt is video chatting with someone. The laptop is pointing towards me with a woman's face on it, and Matt is turned toward me chuckling.

“Wait, my shirt— Did she—?” I stammer, wondering if the woman saw me getting dressed. This is the same woman I'd seen freeze-framed on his laptop when I brought it in from the deck outside.

“Nice to meet you, Ellie,” says the pretty Australian face on the screen. “I'm Matt's sister, Betsy.”

“Hi,” I say back, smiling, embarrassed.

Matt smiles at me. “I've been telling her about you. In fact, she's the one who told me to get my head out of my arse and explain why I started acting like a fool.”

“I owe you one, Betsy,” I say to the screen. “It's really nice to meet you, too.”

“All right, Matty and Ellie, I must run. James and Julia are in school but they send their love. Maybe one night we can have cocktails together over this contraption, on beaches on different continents.”

Betsy smiles at her brother. She loves him, I can tell. And when he smiles back I can see that he loves her, too.

“Let's do it,” he says. I stick my head in the frame. “I'd love it, too,” I add.

“Good!” Betsy says. “It's a date! Miss you. My love to you.” She blows a kiss at the camera and signs off.

Matt sighs and closes the laptop. “My sister,” he smiles.

“She's great,” I say. “You must really miss her, too.”

“I do, I do. This sort of thing makes it easier to cope, though. High-tech cocktails.”

I laugh. He looks at his watch. “Well,” he says, “we're officially late.”

We both jump up, grab the sandwiches he's made from the counter, take our coats and bags and Buster and run out the door.

Chapter Twenty

My shift is incredibly busy again, filled with a disproportionate amount of cardiac arrests, which is always depressing. On days like this I end up thinking hard about how life should be lived in the moment because nobody has any idea of what's coming tomorrow.

The first time we go to the hospital, Danny and I drop off our patient and then go to the desk to wait for our exit paperwork like we always do. I see Matt standing across the room talking to a pretty nurse, and she is obviously into him. She's trying to make him laugh.

I watch them for a minute, and catch his eye. He rolls them at me so she can't see, and I smile. Then I bat my eyes a little, put a hand to my mouth to cover a giggle, and slyly unbutton my top button to show him some cleavage. Instead of laughing, Matt's eyes go big and he drops the file he's holding. Then I cover my mouth for real so no one will hear me laugh.

Danny looks over. “What's up?” he asks.

“Nothing,” I cover, waving it off. “I'm okay.”

Danny points at my shirt and then looks away. “You might want to, uh, button...”

“Oh!” I laugh, buttoning my top button. “Sorry.”

Danny smiles, embarrassed. “It's okay.”

When I look back over at Matt he's totally flustered. He glances over at me quickly and shakes his head and smiles.

I scoop up my paperwork and head for the ambulance bay, Danny right behind me. I give Matt a glance as I walk by, and he gives me a smile back. We're perfecting the surreptitious office romance: nobody knows what's going on right under their noses.

Danny and I get to our ambulance within the row of ambulances, and climb in the back to check supplies.

“I think we're set,” I say. “I ran saline, so end of shift we'll restock, but we're good for now.”

Danny opens and closes drawers and nods. “Looks good.” He turns around to climb down from the rig so he can get into the driver's seat, and that's when we both at the same time see my brother coming up the ER sidewalk.

“Cesar?” I jump out of the ambulance and walk towards him. He's smiling, but something's wrong. As I get closer, I can see it isn't a smile. It's his face in pain, a twisted grimace. He's holding his side and it looks like blood is coming through his fingers. I run the rest of the way to him.

“Cesar!” I say, and he looks at me with droopy eyes.

“I'm sorry, Ellie,” he says, and collapses on me.

“Danny!” I yell, but he's right there next to me, helping me lay Cesar on the ground.

I pull Cesar's hand off his stomach and lift up his shirt, where I find a gaping knife wound gushing blood.

“Danny!” I gasp, almost crying. It's my baby brother; I can't think. Danny understands and goes into pro mode.

“Get the kit, get a stretcher!” he says.

I run back to the ambulance and grab the kit. As I'm pulling the stretcher out, I yell, “Get Doctor Runyon!' to a nurse outside on break.

I push the kit and stretcher fast towards my brother, and when I reach them Danny has taken off his own shirt and is using it to staunch Cesar's bleeding. Blood is coming out faster than he can stop it.

“I think it got the artery,” Danny says. “We got a geyser.”

I get right in Cesar's face. “Cesar! You stay with me! You hear me? You stay right here!”

Cesar's eyes flutter and roll and he coughs. I grab his hand and squeeze hard. He doesn't squeeze back. I yell at him to keep him alert. “Cesar!”

Matt comes running up behind us.

“What's going on?” He feels Cesar's pulse and looks at the wound. “Let's get him in.”

He and Danny hoist him onto the stretcher and I hold the shirt against his wound, which is still pumping out blood.

“OR two,” says Matt to a nurse as we push Cesar fast towards the automatic doors. “We're going to need about five pints of blood.”

“He's A negative,” I say.

Matt looks at me, puzzled. “He's what?”

“A negative,” I repeat, squeezing Cesar's hand.

“It's her brother,” says Danny, pushing the stretcher fast into the ER.

“Oh my God,” says Matt, staring at me. I can't look back at him or I'll lose it. “A-negative,” he yells out to a nurse.

We swing the stretcher into an empty ER operating room and Matt throws on a mask and gloves lightning fast. As medical personnel stream into the room, he calls orders to them. Irrigate, put in a line, blood pressure, o-sats, pulse.

Everything is blurry and swirly like a dream. My little brother is on the table bleeding out and there's nothing I can do about it. I look around past the crowd of nurses and see Cesar's face, which is now intubated. I consider trying to help but know I'll be in the way.

Danny's next to me the whole time, saying, “He'll be okay. It's gonna be okay.” Then I feel Maria's hands on my shoulders, holding me together, as Danny fills her in on what happened.

I find myself saying a prayer, begging. Forgive him, I plead. For whatever he's done. Help him and keep him safe. My brother. My family.

I move away from Danny and Maria, too agitated to stand still. I pace in the background, trying to figure out how bad Cesar really is and if the tide is working in his favor or pulling him out to sea.

Matt is working hard, moving around, still calling out orders. The nurses are responding to him and they're working like a well-oiled machine. I know my brother is in good hands, but I don't know if that will be enough.

I watch Matt's hands go deep into the cavity of Cesar's stomach. I see thread come out, then Matt's hands dive in again and again. He's sewing him up quickly.

“Blood,” says Matt.

They hang up more blood.

“Suction,” he says, to clear the pond that's grown in Cesar's stomach.

Matt peers in, mops around with some gauze. He checks the monitors and I see his eyebrows furrow in concern. Cesar's vitals are low, and his heart is jumping all over the place. The alarm for irregular body function readings is going off constantly.