The Doctor (Nashville Neighborhood Book 1) Read online

  The air in the room thickened until it was like breathing in a sauna. I felt lightheaded. Anxious, yet excited to try something new, with a partner who cared about what I wanted. Maybe even more than his own desires.

  Greg climbed onto the bed, straddling the backs of my thighs as he dug his cock out of his pants and put the condom on. My breasts were flattened under the weight of my body, and I shifted to make myself more comfortable.

  Damp hands caressed up the length of my spine, sending tiny bursts of fireworks across my skin. I arched into his touch, practically purring like a cat. His tie tickled me when he leaned over, putting his chest against my back, and he tangled a hand in my hair. He used his hold to turn me into his kiss.

  “Stop me,” he uttered.

  It wasn’t a challenge. The soft way he’d said it was a check-in. He wanted to make sure I was okay with going further. I sipped air through my lips and let his hot mouth glance over the shell of my ear.

  “Is this your fantasy?” I asked.

  “Yes.” His hard cock rested where my cheeks split, and he moved his hips subtly, sliding it back and forth in the valley. “Fuck,” he said, “I might just come from the idea of it.”

  The undone buckle from his belt was cold against my hip, but everywhere else I was warm and shaky. His lazy, teasing thrusts made me insane. They whispered all sorts of naughty things, telling me how badly I wanted to have him. It didn’t matter where. I trusted him to make it good. My pleasure seemed to be his top priority.

  He supported himself on his hands on the outsides of my shoulders and lifted as I rose onto my elbow. I curled a hand behind his neck, keeping him from going too far.

  I blurted it out before I lost my courage. “I want to try it.”

  A shudder rolled through the body pressed to me, and he made a cut-off sound of surprise, as if too excited to hold it back. I loved that I could do that to him. Having that kind of impact made me feel powerful and confident—something I’d never had before when it came to sex.

  Greg fumbled a hand on the bed beside us, fishing for the bottle of lube, and once it was located, he sat back on his heels. Cold, thick liquid dripped where we’d need it, oozing down in an enjoyable slide.

  He leaned forward again, resting his left hand right beside my elbow, and his clothes brushed against my back. I imagined what we looked like, him in his serious doctor’s attire and me pinned beneath him, stark fucking naked. Every muscle in me squeezed tight with anticipation as I felt the tip of his cock gliding back and forth over my asshole, teasing what was about to happen. God, he was thick. I scrunched my eyes closed, mentally preparing myself.

  “Relax,” he breathed. He dropped a line of soft kisses on the curve of my shoulder, trailing up my neck.

  He pressed against me, increasing the pressure as he tried to get inside, and then abruptly—

  “Oh!” I gasped.

  The burning sensation was a lot. Almost overwhelming, but I blew out a long, slow breath, trying to even myself out. He’d stopped the moment I’d made a sound and held absolutely still. I shoved my face against the pillow, but couldn’t breathe, and when I turned my head to gain air, his hand was right there, splayed out on the mattress beside me.

  “Slow,” I ordered in a hollow voice, but the command must have rung as loud as thunder in his ears because he did exactly as I said. He slipped a fraction of an inch further along.

  I wasn’t in control of myself. I let my body take over, and as he eased deeper, I sank the edge of my teeth into the knuckle of his index finger. Anything to distract from the strange, powerful sensation that was so confusing, I had no idea if I liked it.

  If my soft bite was hurting him, Greg didn’t let on. His tentative, gentle movements caused my brain to fracture into pieces. And as his impossibly slow tempo went along, the sensation began to shift. I relaxed, loosening up to his invasion, and with that . . . I got a hint of the pleasure he’d told me about.

  It shouldn’t have felt good, yet it did. He made soft sounds of enjoyment. Tiny sighs and groans of satisfaction, and I quivered in response. It was so sexy. I unclamped my jaw, releasing my hold on his finger, and the bite I’d given him morphed into a kiss. It was my wordless signal I was comfortable, which he seemed to read loud and clear.

  He lifted the finger and slipped it into my mouth, allowing me to suck on it.

  I nearly came from his simple action. He matched the sluggish pace of his body moving inside me with the pulse of his finger pushing in and out of my mouth. I sucked hard, hollowing out my cheeks, and simulated going down on him.

  “Fuck,” he moaned. His lips landed on the nape of my neck, ghosting damp kisses. “Oh, fuck, you feel so good.”

  Heat flashed through me as a jolt of electric current. I was doing it. Letting Greg have me in a way no one else had. The connection between us grew stronger and more intense with every breath we took together.

  “How did you do it?” he asked and continued before I could question him. “How’d you get yourself off tonight?” His right hand slid between me and the sheets beneath my stomach, coursing further down until his searching fingertips found my aching pussy and stirred. “Like this?”

  The buzz he created in my body was so loud, it was deafening. A moan poured from my mouth, and his cock, lodged deep within me, throbbed with my sound of approval. He rubbed faster, generating more friction.

  Tension coiled in my belly. My breath came faster and faster, so hard I could barely keep up. My heart pounded in overdrive. I was going to fly apart—his swirling hand was the devil. I couldn’t resist, even if I tried.

  “Jesus, Cassidy.” The long strokes he gave began to pick up in pace. “You make me feel like I’m twenty goddamn years old.” His finger withdrew from my mouth, and he pushed my hair back over my shoulder, out of his way. The scruff of his short beard chafed against my neck. “I can’t get enough of you. Tell me what you thought about.”

  “You,” I said. “Fucking me.”

  His tone had a hint of teasing and a lot of smugness. “That’s all?”

  My defenses were down, and I wasn’t worried about judgment, and still my face heated. “The first time, yeah.”

  “And the second?”

  I rolled my hips, moving with his fingers. His touch was enough of a distraction, I didn’t hold back the truth. “That Preston walked in on us.”

  Greg tensed, and just the hesitation in his body was enough to make me want to die of shame. Why the hell had I admitted it? Worse, why the hell had my twisted mind thought it up in the first place?

  But the fingers touching my clit flexed and resumed their task, and I bit down on my bottom lip. He began to move again, only this time his slow, deep thrusts felt darker. Dirtier, more carnal. His voice was gravel. “Yeah? What did he do?”

  “He . . . watched.”

  His cock jerked, and a grunt came from Greg. It sounded like my statement had turned him on. I should have guessed it would. We seemed so evenly matched in the bedroom. My fantasies were his too. He lowered down until his firm chest pressed against my back. “What’d he see?”

  God, that question was corrupt, right along with my answer. “He saw your head between my legs. Going down on me until I begged you to fuck me. And when you did, he watched you do what he never could.”

  Greg froze a second time, only this wasn’t in hesitation. From the pulsing motion of his cock, I could tell this was caution. He’d gotten extremely close to losing it. His fingers worked furiously between my legs, urgent. “Shit, I need you to come. Are you close?”

  I swallowed a huge gulp of air, nodded, and my vision narrowed. My legs shook uncontrollably as he pistoned his body over mine, sawing his thick, hard dick in and out of my ass. Never in a million years did I think I’d end up here. Not even my fantasies tonight included this, but . . . dear God. I latched a hand around his supporting wrist and clung to him, panic welling up from within.

  I was going to come, but worried it was going to be on a whole different
level than I’d had before. It was inevitable, this new experience, yet I was a little terrified of what was going to happen. He’d delayed the orgasm so long. Would I scream? Would I do something embarrassing?

  I jammed my hand in between my body and the bed, fumbling toward his expert fingers to slow him down and control the pace, but I was much too late. My climax hit me like a gunshot and ricocheted through my body, burning a thousand degrees. A desperate cry burst from my lips as pleasure flooded my core. It was followed by spiderwebbing tendrils of satisfaction, sweeping along my limbs as I convulsed beneath the crush of his strong body.

  “Yes,” he murmured. “Yes.”

  And then the muscles in his chest went rigid. His body locked up for a half-second and began to shudder in mindless jerks. I could feel every throb of him as he spurted his orgasm, wave after wave. It was intense and overwhelming.

  I went hazy in the aftermath.

  Everything was tingly numb as he slowly retreated, dropped a kiss on the sensitive spot right below my ear, and climbed off the bed. I vaguely acknowledged him in the bathroom, moving around and running the tap. The bathroom light was clicked off, plunging the room into darkness. When he came back to me, he was warm and naked, and pulled my leaden body into his arms.

  His kisses were deep, slow, and passionate. It was like he wanted to learn the taste of me, and I squeezed my eyes closed tight—strange tears threatened to fall, but I successfully held them back.

  “Are you okay?” he whispered.

  “Yeah.” I ran my fingers over his chest, wondering what was going on in the heart beneath my fingertips. Was he okay? After I’d confessed such sinful things? He seemed to be, but nerves fluttered in my ribcage anyway.

  It was quiet and peaceful between us for so long, I was sure he’d dozed off, but then he let out a deep breath.

  “Tonight in the operating room,” he started. His embrace tightened, like he feared I might pull away. “I’ve lost patients before. It’s always rough, but this one was . . . really hard.”

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. It didn’t even compare, but I’d had a rough day too, and it felt good to be able to be there for each other.

  He used his fingers to stroke lines up and down my arm. “I’m glad you texted me.”

  “I wanted to see you.”

  “I wanted that too.” In the darkness, I could see the displeased look cross his expression, but it seemed self-directed. He tried again. “What I meant to say is, I’m really glad you’re here, Cassidy.”

  My chest swelled and tightened, and I pressed my palm flat over his heart. I wasn’t invisible—he made it sound like my presence was everything. It was something I hadn’t had in a long time, was desperate to hear, and it meant even more coming from him.

  I’d been nothing but honest tonight, yet this was truer than anything else I’d said to him. “Me too.”

  TWENTY-SIX

  EVERYTHING CHANGED AFTER THAT NIGHT.

  I hadn’t allowed myself to think about a future with Dr. Gregory Lowe, but that restriction vanished as the sun rose the following morning. We had everything working against us. His schedule, the age difference, and the Preston situation. Despite it all, I wanted to try, and he seemed to as well.

  We saw each other as much as we could during the final week while Preston was out of town. Greg inflicted his “new classics” movies on me while I tried to teach him how to use Snapchat. He told me the filters were stupid, so I put flowers in his hair and showed him how gorgeous he looked. He’d ripped the phone out of my hands, threw it onto his bed, then tossed me down beside it, his hands going for the button of my shorts and an evil grin on his face.

  On Thursday evening, he texted me he was leaving the hospital and invited me over for a late dinner. I quickly replied.

  Cassidy: See you soon.

  I was halfway out the door, my purse slung over my shoulder, when my mom’s voice rang out from the kitchen.

  “Where are you going?” she asked lightly. “Preston’s?”

  I skidded to a stop. It wasn’t until that moment I realized I hadn’t told her we’d broken up.

  My mom was a genuinely busy person. When I was in high school, she’d been crazy active in volunteering. PTA vice-president. Music boosters. Senior class trip chaperone. She didn’t do it to invade my life, and hadn’t either. She just liked being involved and couldn’t sit still. Even during the weekends when she was home from her demanding IT job, my mom was go-go-go with her nine million hobbies.

  The latest one was her garden in the back yard. She was growing everything from vegetables to roses, and determined to make it all the best it could possibly be. She was out there from sunup to sundown, digging and planting and fertilizing and watering.

  It meant I rarely saw her this summer.

  I closed the door and pivoted on my heel to face her. She wore an old marching band t-shirt from my sophomore year, cotton shorts, and a baseball hat to shield her eyes from the sun. She stood at the fridge filling her water bottle. Even in worn-out clothes and no makeup on, she looked good. Young and pretty, with sharp eyes and mouth that was quick to smile.

  The easiest, fastest way to get out the door was to say yes. It wasn’t a lie technically. I mean, I was going to Preston’s.

  My mom and I were close-ish. In high school, I’d felt like I could tell her anything, but the year away at college had changed us a little. After eighteen years of it just being the two of us, I thought we both liked the privacy. We got to be women on our own.

  “Uh.” Guilt coated my insides. It tasted like a lie as I said it. “Preston’s. Yeah.”

  The water dispenser dripped, and my mother wiped her hand on the side of her shirt. “Oh, I saw Dr. Lowe yesterday.”

  My breath caught. “What?”

  “I took my car into the dealership. Turns out I had a nail in the back tire, and he was there, waiting on an oil change.”

  “Yeah?” Could she hear how I forced casualness into my voice? “Did you say hi?”

  “Yeah.” Her tone was matter-of-fact, but then her eyebrows pulled together. “Well, sort of. He was on the phone at first.” She screwed the cap shut on her water bottle. “I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop, but I heard him asking for restaurant recommendations to take his girlfriend, so I told him about that seafood one we went to last month. That place was great.”

  My heart slammed to a stop. “Girlfriend?”

  She must not have heard me squeak out the word. “He gave me the strangest look.” Her blue eyes abruptly zeroed in, and I used every ounce of acting strength I possessed to look indifferent, even as I cracked into a million pieces inside. Somehow, my mom didn’t seem to notice. “If anything,” she continued, “he was kind of rude.”

  It hurt to speak, and I didn’t know what to say anyway, so I just stared at her.

  “Frankly, I’m surprised he has time to date.” The change in my mom’s expression wasn’t subtle. The corners of her mouth ticked downward as she soured. “I hope it doesn’t bother Preston.”

  “What?” I didn’t understand what she meant, but also the world was starting to turn upside-down. Greg had a girlfriend. How was it even possible? When was he squeezing in time to see this other woman?

  My mom shrugged. “You said you hardly ever see Dr. Lowe. Now it sounds like Preston has to share his father’s limited time with someone else.”

  And in my mother’s eyes, Greg still had a lot to make up for.

  I blinked, readjusted the purse on my shoulder, and stalled to give my brain time to come back up to speed. “I didn’t know he had a girlfriend.” All I could think about was getting answers from him. “But I’ve gotta go.”

  “Okay.” My mom brightened. “Have fun.”

  As I opened the door and trudged through it, the voice in my mind whispered back it was highly doubtful.

  During the drive over, I attempted to organize my thoughts on what I should say. Should I mention the meeting with my mom and see if he’d come out with it? Or
did I go in, guns blazing and full of wrath? That was a tall order. Sure, I was angry. It was inside me somewhere, but it was buried under two tons of hurt and disappointment.

  I nearly slammed on the brakes when I pulled up to the vacant house down the street from Greg’s. The ‘for sale’ sign on a white post flapped in the breeze, and a large red sticker cut a diagonal across it, boasting it was now sold. Which meant I couldn’t hide my car in its secluded driveway anymore. I had no choice but to park in Greg’s, where I knew Judy would see it.

  Fucking great.

  I parked, went inside without announcing myself, and found Greg in the kitchen. He took one look at me, and concern swept through his expression. He’d been setting the table, but hesitated. “What’s wrong?”

  I slapped my purse down on the island and gave him a hard look. “You ran into my mother yesterday.”

  “Oh. Yeah, I did.” He abandoned his task and strode toward me. When I took a step back, his concern grew ten-fold.

  “She said you were rude to her.”

  “If I was, I’m sorry. She completely caught me off guard. As soon as I got off the phone, she was right there, and I didn’t know what to say. I don’t think she realized she was giving me a restaurant recommendation on where to take you to dinner.”

  “What?” Circuits crossed in my brain and fried out. “She told me you have a girlfriend.”

  It was his turn to look confused. “Isn’t that . . . you?”

  Me? His question physically knocked me back. I was thrilled and scared at the same time. Putting a label on us meant it was serious, and I wanted that, but I also didn’t want the consequences that came with it.

  My reaction didn’t go over all that well with him, and his expression went plain. “I’m forty years old.” He sighed. “Honestly, I don’t have time for games. I like you, and you like me, and we’ve been doing . . . whatever it is we’ve been doing for over a month now.” He put his hands on his hips, showing off his perfect frame and his toned arms. “Even though I know it’s complicated, I’d like to keep doing it. Don’t you?”