Doctor’s Duties by K.C. Crowne
Chapter 3
ABBY
Was I crazy? I had to be. What normal woman would go out on a date with some guy she just…bumped into at a coffee shop? And more than that, what normal woman would kiss him?
Then again, I considered as I drove home from the coffee shop, my heart still racing and my panties soaked, had I ever considered myself a normal woman?
The drive back to my neighborhood in Aurora near the Med School took about thirty minutes. And I spent the entire trip thinking about what had happened, how this amazing, handsome man had fallen into my lap.
It all seemed too good to be true and maybe it was. Maybe he was totally crazy, some weird almost middle-aged guy who lusted after younger women. I sighed as I drove, realizing I was making myself paranoid over nothing. So far, Logan had made himself out to be nothing but a perfect gentleman.
As I pulled up to my southwest-style townhome, I spotted the white Kia belonging to my roommate, Lexi Braswell. A smile spread across my face at the sight of it. I needed to vent about what had happened, and Lexi was always down for a good gossip session.
I hopped out of the car, the muffled sounds of Animal Collective playing through the open windows. The scene inside the townhome was a typical one when living with Lexi – she was in the living room dressed in a pair of cut-off jean shorts and an oversized white T-shirt. She stood in front of her latest painting, one eye squinted and her head cocked to the side, her strawberry-blonde hair tied in a ponytail. Lexi was petite and slender and cute-as-hell, which meant she never had any trouble finding boyfriends around town.
Lexi turned to me and said something. I couldn’t hear her over the music, so I twirled my index finger in front of my ear and shook my head. She smiled and winked before picking up her iPhone and pressing pause.
“I asked, ‘what do you think’?”
It was the question I never knew how to answer when it came to Lexi and her art. I stepped up to the canvas and took it all in. The picture was of a woman drawn with loopy arms and an eggplant-shaped body, with one arm wrapped around a man with an equally strange body. The colors were purples and reds and whites.
“It’s…um, very abstract.”
“That’s what you always say,” Lexi complained as she stepped over to the bottle of Essential on the end table and opened the cap. She took a swig then grinned.
“I’m not an art person. I mean, the colors are cool.”
“Everyone’s an art person. You love French Impressionism, right?”
“Yeah, that’s cool. But this…I mean, it’s good, but I just have no way to process it.”
“Well, think of it like impressionism,” she said. “Don’t focus on trying to figure it out. Focus on how it makes you feel at first glance.”
I did as she asked, turning my attention back to the painting.
“Well, it’s two people, and they’re in…love?”
“There you go!” she said, her face lighting up. “Simple stuff. It’s about how people these days are so disconnected that when they fall in love, it’s hard for them to know that’s what’s happening.”
“And that’s why the people are so goofy-looking.”
She laughed. “Right. Because doesn’t it kind of feel goofy looking to be in love these days? Everyone’s so nervous about their own feelings, not sure if they’re being too much or whatever. But I made this to show that this is how we all feel. And the solution is to get more comfortable in your own skin and just go with it!”
I smiled, the painting taking on a new light.
Lexi was good at what she did. She worked as a graphic designer by day for a local advertising firm, and in the evenings perfected her art, busting her butt to show her paintings around town. In this respect, we couldn’t have been more different. Because she had her own work she could afford to live without her mom and dad helping her out. However, we were alike in that we both came from wealthy families and were both black sheep in our own ways.
“Remember that you’re talking to someone who’s never been in love before in her life.”
“I still don’t believe that” she said, turning off the nearby lamp and opening the blinds to fill the place with bright, natural light. “You’re hot as hell! How on earth has someone who looks like you never been in love before?”
“It’s called being an overachiever in high school, then a pre-med, then a med student. You give it a shot and tell me how much time you have for love.”
“Well,” she said, dropping onto the couch. “I was there during undergrad. Not like you were hurting for attention from guys.”
“You always say that, but I’m ninety-percent sure it’s only to make me feel better.”
“No way,” she contended. “I’d never lie to a friend like that. Family tells one another the truth, right?”
I sat down next to her, glancing up at the painting again. The man and the woman depicted looked strange as hell, but I couldn’t help but be reminded of my chance encounter with Logan.
“Well, shit,” she said. “Here I am blabbing about my art when you’re coming home from brunch with the parents. How’d that go?”
My stomach tensed at the thought of it. “Miserable. Not only did they give me the same business about having the audacity to work for a living, but they also ambushed me with none other than JoshBramble.”
She was confused. “Wait, JoshBramble? They brought him to brunch?”
“It’s a long story. And it gets weirder the longer it goes on.”
She placed her hands on her knees and leaned in, a totally excited expression on her face.
“You start talking, and I’ll be right here listening.”
I took a deep breath and went into it, telling her about Josh, how he’d showed up out of nowhere at the restaurant, then managed to make another appearance at Rocky Roasters. And then I got to the best part – when Logan showed up.
“Wait,” she said, her eyes flashing wide. “He just waltzed over and said that he was your boyfriend?”
“Believe me, I was as shocked as you are. More, as a matter of fact. But it worked – he got Josh to leave me the hell alone.”
“And then what happened?”
I told her the rest, told her about how he joined me, and we hit it off right away, how things went so well that he asked me out for dinner tonight. By the time I got to the kiss, she was on the edge of her seat.
“That’s…wow,” she said. “He must’ve made one hell of an impression for you to kiss him like that within an hour of meeting him.”
“He definitely made an impression,” I agreed. “It was so weird. I’ve never had a guy make me feel that way before after just one conversation. If you would’ve told me yesterday that today, I’d be kissing some guy I’d just met in broad daylight I’d have said you were out of your freaking mind.”
“OK,” she said. “We need to get to the bottom of who this guy is.” She grabbed her nearby MacBook and opened it, clicking until she was on the Amazon homepage. “Alright, you said he was an author, right? What was the book he worked on?”
“It’s this series about a guy called Jake Roland.”
Her eyes flashed with surprise. “Wait, Jake Roland? He wrote those?”
“Yeah, you’re into them?”
She shook her head. “Not me, but my dad is. I bought one of them for him last Father’s Day. They’re like, the ultimate Dad thriller books.”
“So I hear.”
She typed and clicked around, an eager smile on her face. “Oh! There it is! ‘A Myriad of Issues.’ Check out the cover.”
The cover of the book was total dad-thrilled fare. There was an athletic looking doctor standing in a jungle village, a gun in his hand with shady-looking guys who appeared to be up to no good hiding among the trees. A sexy, professionally dressed woman was there with him. But I could tell by the way she carried herself that she wasn’t meant for eye candy – Jake Roland’s assistant looked ready to kick butt with the best of them.
“Join Dr. Jake Roland on his very first, best-selling adventure,” she said, her eye tracking over the summary on the screen. “A routine mission with Doctors-Without-Borders brings the always capable Jake Roland into a battle for his life against international human traffickers. But lucky for him, he’s got the beautiful and brilliant Dr. Amy Sharpe, the world’s leading oncologist and CIA liaison on his side.”
Lexi cocked her head to the side, flicking her eyes back and forth between me and the screen.
“She kind of looks like you, now that I think about it. Like, in the face. And she’s a beautiful and brilliant oncologist.” She gasped. “What if…this guy’s been, like, stalking you from afar, and you’re his muse or something.”
I laughed. “Stop. Logan was all manners, total gentleman.”
“Aside from when he kissed you after not even knowing you for an hour.”
“A good gentleman knows when a kiss is wanted, and when it’s not. And in that case, it was very much wanted.” I was surprised as hell to hear the words come out of my mouth. But they were true – I’d been all about the kiss.
“Hmm,” she said, turning her eyes back to the screen. “Oh, wow.”
“What?”
“There’s a picture of him and a little bio blurb.”
I craned my neck to see the screen. Sure enough, there was a photo of Logan. He looked just as hot as he did an hour or so ago, dressed in rugged, dark jeans, a green utility shirt with the sleeves rolled up around his powerful forearms, and a heavy-duty pair of boots. His ice-blue eyes were almost too intense to stare at. He was seated on a porch with his legs crossed, the majestic Rocky Mountains in the background.
Lexi continued reading, this time starting in on the bio. “Dr. Logan Frost is a renowned physician and senior professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine…” She snapped her eyes up at me. “The Colorado School of Medicine? As in, the school where you go?”
I was surprised as hell to hear the news. “Wait, that’s what it says?”
She turned the computer toward me. Sure enough, it was written there in plain English.
“He never mentioned that?” she asked.
“Our conversation got cut short when someone texted him. We never got to it.”
“Have you seen him on campus?”
“The school’s huge, so not so far. And it’s totally possible that I’d never end up in a class of his.”
“Wow,” she said, shaking her head. “Small world, huh?”
“Born near Auckland, New Zealand, Dr. Frost cites his years working with Doctors Without Borders as inspiration for the Jake Roland series of novels. When he’s not writing or teaching, Dr. Frost enjoys keeping in shape…” she grinned. “I can tell by those forearms that he’s not lying about that,” Lexi said with a crafty smile.
“Lexi!” I replied with a laugh.
“What? I mean, look at those things.” She cleared her throat. “Anyway, ‘Dr. Frost enjoys keeping in shape, volunteering at a local clinic for the disadvantaged, and taking hikes through the scenic beauty of Colorado.”
She shook her head, as if trying to process everything she’d spoken.
“Wow. I mean, this guy sounds perfect. But…there’s one little detail I’m sure you’ve noticed.” She tapped the screen on one of the sides of his head, pointing out the silver at his temples. “Little bit of an age difference.”
“I know. Is that weird? I mean, setting aside the fact that I now know he’s a professor at my school.”
Lexi shrugged. “Sounds fine to me. He’s handsome, stable, has a ton going on. Hell, dating someone his age sounds a shitload better than the guys I’ve been seeing. I met this guy off Hinge the other day, no job, lives off his trust fund. I went back to his place which was like, this gross pad with four other guys, and get this – he doesn’t even have a mattress frame.” She tapped Logan’s picture on the screen. “This guy? I bet you he has ten mattress frames. What were you guys planning on doing tonight, anyway?”
“We’re meeting at this place downtown.”
“And I bet you he’s going to pick up the tab.”
“I don’t care about any of that. Money’s not the reason why I would date a guy.”
“Oh, I know. But it’s the principal of the thing – he’ll know how to actually act like a mature man.” Lexi turned her attention back to the screen. “And look – there’s an audiobook read by the good doctor himself. Let’s hear it.” She clicked the purchase button for the audiobook, and within seconds Logan was speaking through the laptop’s speakers.
“Dr. Jake Roland gripped the leather steering wheel of his jeep tightly as he sped down the winding path carved through the outer reaches of the Brazilian Amazon. He was driving like a madman – and he knew it. But he didn’t have the luxury of caution. A dozen lives hung in the balance. And he was the only one who could save them.”
Lexi arched her eyebrows, then reached forward to press the pause button.
“Well, I’m hooked. Handsome, smart, a gentleman, and a good writer? Sounds like you’ve struck gold, bestie.”
I shifted in my seat, all of it feeling too much to take in.
“There’s another book too,” she said. “Oh, it’s called Children of Blood. I’m going to buy it and send it to your email address, OK?”
“Oh, you don’t need to do that.”
She tapped the keypad and smiled. “Done.” Lexi flicked her eyes down to the clock in the corner of the screen. “Shoot, I need to get going. I’m supposed to be looking at gallery space with this artists’ collective downtown.” She hopped up and grabbed her things. “Now, have fun tonight. And you best believe that you’re going to be telling me every last detail later.” She grinned. “Or tomorrow morning, if things go really well.”
“Lexi!” I laughed and she did too.
“See ya.”
She opened the door, her hand flourishing in a wave as she stepped outside and was gone. Once the door was shut and I was alone again, I turned my attention back to the laptop, Logan’s steely eyes gazing back at me. Just a picture of him was enough to turn me on. Part of me wanted to, ahem, take care of things before the date tonight.
But I pushed that idea out of my head, instead directing my energy to cleaning up the apartment and going a little studying. That afternoon, I downloaded the audiobook for A Myriad of Problems to my iPhone and listened to it as I went for a jog, letting Logan’s deep, sexy voice fill my thoughts.
I couldn’t wait to see him. And I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been this excited for a date.
It almost scared me.
