Dr. Good by Flora Ferrari

Chapter Thirteen

Macie

I wake with a feeling of dread moving over me, certain that Miller is going to kick the door open and roar at me to get the hell out of here if I’m not going to screw him.

Last night when I stormed into the bathroom I was so full of anxiety, so full of fight-or-flight panic, so convinced he was going to laugh at me or mock me, that I didn’t even stop to consider he could be telling the truth.

What if it wasn’t a lie?

What if he truly feels the same way I do?

But by the time I’d calmed down enough to maybe have a conversation, he was gone and I was left feeling like the biggest jackass in the universe.

I could’ve gone and found him, but without the heat of his lust burning through me, I found the necessary confidence difficult to latch onto, reverting back to my usual ways of sneaking around and hoping nobody noticed me.

Sleep came after hours of tossing and turning, my mind alight with what happened between us, replaying the conversation over and over and cringing every time I yelled at him and burst into tears.

But what the heck did he expect, for me to accept it right away?

It makes no sense.

I sit up and look around the room, filled with sunshine, and then grab my phone and glance at the time. It’s eleven o’clock, meaning that Miller is probably long gone by now for his office.

What am I supposed to do?

I can’t risk going back to my apartment without sorting the Derrick situation, but at the same time hanging around here feels strange and presumptuous.

I walk into the ensuite and take a quick shower, trying to blast away my thoughts with the insane water pressure. But then the water starts to morph in my mind, becoming Miller's exploring hands I have to jump out before I give into the swelling desire to touch myself at the thought of him.

I can’t use him as a freaking masturbation icon after I screamed at him to leave me alone, can I?

I’ve just gotten changed when there’s a knock at my door.

It’s not the pounding drum-knock of Miller, but a more ladylike tap-tap.

My belly drops when the truth thunders into me.

It’s his girlfriend, the one he laughs with when they discuss how they trick gullible inexperienced virgins like me, and he’s sent her here to throw me out. My throat starts to close with panic and I want to scream, but that would let her know I’m in here.

“I know you’re in there, dear,” the woman says, as though reading my mind.

She sounds older than me, more sophisticated, a woman more on Miller’s level.

“It’s Macie, yes?”

“Yes,” I say because I feel like I haven’t got any other choice.

I can’t hide in here forever.

His girlfriend probably has keys.

How was I so stupid?

“I’m just going to pack my things and then I’ll get going, okay?”

“What?” The woman titters in the most civilized way imaginable. “Why on earth would you do that? I was going to ask if you wanted some breakfast, dear. Although brunch would probably be more apt.”

“What?” I pause, staring at the door like this is another trick. “I don’t understand. Who are you?”

“I’m Miller’s mother. Kayla.”

I giggle, shaking my head, relief washing through me. “Oh.”

“Oh?” she says, with an ironic lilt to her voice.

Now that I listen closely, I can hear a little of Miller in the way she speaks. She says oh with the same tinge of sarcasm Miller would, but without any of the bullying undertones that might come with that sarcasm from anybody else.

I find myself feeling at ease and I haven’t even properly met her yet.

“Are you going to let me in? Or shall I wait in the kitchen?”

“Um, two secs. I need to get dressed.”

“That’s okay, dear. I’ll wait in the kitchen. Do you like syrup with your pancakes?”

A cruel thought slithers into my mind, a hateful taunting thought that tells me she’s going to follow up my answer with a twisted joke about my weight. I know it’s the sort of thing I should’ve grown out of by now, this constant on-alert state for insults and taunts, but somehow I still find myself expecting the worst out of people.

“Yes,” I say, realizing I’m standing here with my mouth hanging open like a real idiot.

“Great.”

I hear her walk down the hallway, and then I’m left to wonder what the heck I’m going to do. I have to go out there and face her, of course, but at the same time, horrible ideas and swirling throughs fill my mind.

If Miller is tricking me…

He isn’t, something from deep inside of me screams, trying to calm me down so we can get to the point where I can give my man a child without being so freaking self-conscious about it. He wants you. He’d never trick you. Everything he said is true.

But if he is, then maybe this woman isn’t even his mother. Maybe this is all part of the twisted game.

I shake my head, pushing those unfair and unhelpful thoughts away.

He isn’t tricking me.

I overreacted last night, letting my anxiety and my self-consciousness drive me when I should’ve listened to the thrumming moving through my body, the heat swelling up inside of me when we pressed our bodies together.

Everything he said he wants, I want too.

I wish I could turn back time so I could tell him that, holding onto his face with my hands, feeling the hard press of his jaw against my palms.

I throw on a summer dress and some simple comfortable shoes and then make for the door.

* * *

I walk down the hallway, still struggling to believe I’m really here, my footsteps seeming loud on the marble flooring as I move from rug to rug. I round the corner to find the most elegant woman I’ve ever seen standing at the kitchen island.

She’s tall and her hair is a proud white, pearls glinting at her neck and her ears, wearing a dress that’s patterned with little roses. Her smile seems genuine as she takes me in, and she has the same dark eyes as her son, the sort of eyes that seem to see into me.

I look at the sleek obsidian surface in front of her and see that she’s already laid out two plates of pancakes, one of them with a generous helping of syrup on it.

“Those look delicious,” I murmur, my belly rumbling.

She waves a casual hand, displaying expertly painted fingernails. “Oh, it’s nothing. The least I can do.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, as I pick up my plate and together we move over to the table by the window, overlooking the city that glitters in early-summer sunlight.

“For you, Macie. For the woman who’s finally melted my son’s heart.”

I gape at her and she grins with a note of thrilled wickedness in her expression.

“I’m too old to mince words, dear,” she says, grinning widely at me. “My son has changed since you came into his life. He called me last night to tell me, and I was stunned. Stunned. When you’ve been around as long as I have, that’s a very difficult thing to achieve. But it’s the truth. I’ve never heard him like that before. He was borderline smitten.”

I must keep gaping like a fish because she laughs in delight, reveling in this moment.

“I don’t know what to say,” I murmur after a long pause.

“We spoke this morning too. I called him this time, wanting to see what he’d planned to do. He’s given me bits and pieces. He wouldn’t tell me why you’re here. He wants to respect your privacy.”

“It’s not a big deal,” I say, cutting into my pancakes to distract myself from how surreal this moment is. “I’ve got a stalker. Miller’s helping me.”

“How is that not a big deal?”

“Well…”

I shrug. I have no idea what to say.

“Hmm.” She taps her fingernails against the table.

“Hmm, what?” I giggle.

She laughs. I find it easier to sit with this stranger than I could believe if it wasn’t happening right now. It’s like we’ve known each other for a long time like we can do away with the social niceties that would normally be required in this situation.

“I think I’ve been exactly where you are, dear. Devaluing your emotions. Not wanting to bother anyone else with what’s happening to you. So let me state for the record… having a stalker is a very serious issue. But if Miller has decided to help you, I trust it will all be sorted out in the end.”

I fork my pancakes, making a metal scrape sound, mimicking the feeling of my heartbeat pounding against my ribs.

“Well, you must be a mind reader,” I say. “Because that’s exactly how I feel. But I fail to see how Miller can help.”

Especially if he’s tricking me.

“Macie, I did manage to work one thing out of Miller.”

“Hmm?”

“He said you doubt he truly feels what he says he does?”

I bite my lip, letting my gaze flit over the sun-flecked city.

“You can’t tell me it’s not difficult to believe. He’s Dr. Miller freaking Marshall. He’s… him. And I’m me. And it’s so sudden—”

“Look at me.”

For a heart-tugging moment, I’m sure my aunt has come back from the grave. Kayla reminds me so much of her, right down to the commanding tone of voice she just used, but somehow she managed to soften it so she didn’t come across as over the top.

It’s a skill my aunt honed after years of working with belligerent movie directors.

I turn my gaze to her, staring into her Miller-like eyes.

“Whatever my son has said to you, it’s the truth. He’s… well, he’s never had many girlfriends. Don’t get me wrong, he’s had his share of women try to get their hands on him. He’s wealthy and he attracts certain types. But he’s never been in a real relationship. When I asked him why, do you know what he said?”

“What?” I ask, enraptured.

“He said he was waiting for his perfect girl. I laughed and told him no such woman exists. But he was adamant that if he couldn’t find her, the woman who made him feel, who he had to have, then he would die alone. Before you came along, he was ready to accept that fate. You changed everything. I could hear it in his voice last night. And there’s something else…”

Her smile spreads kindly across her face, her eyes twinkling playfully.

“You feel the same, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I say, even if I didn’t plan to. “Okay? Yes. Yes, I freaking do. But what if he’s lying to me?”

“He’s not,” Kayla says flatly. “After my husband, his father passed, Miller changed. He became more withdrawn. He was only twelve when my dear Trent decided to go hang-gliding. Hang-gliding. He always was a thrill seeker. It’s one of the things that made me love him so much. But hang-gliding in that weather? It was foolish.”

She sighs, moving a hand through her snow-white hair.

“In any case, Miller was not the same after that. I stopped believing a long time ago anybody would be able to puncture the defenses he’s built up around himself. But somehow, after only a short while, you did. You did the impossible.”

“He’s not tricking me? This isn’t some game?”

“Oh, Macie, I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” I snap with some fire in my voice.

“That your stalker and whoever else – whatever monsters bullied you and ridiculed you – have made you so wary. Perhaps you’re right to be wary. In most cases, this would be ludicrous. But you and Miller, this thing between you, it is not most cases.”

“I want to believe you,” I murmur. “But there’s still a chance…”

“I swear on my dead husband’s life. I swear on Miller’s life. This is the real thing.”

I gasp, both at the words at the solemn way she said them, as though intoning a spell from one of my beloved fantasy stories.

“But what if he’s lying to you?”

She shakes her head firmly. “Miller is a terrible liar, just like his father. It’s one of the things that makes – that made – my husband so special. And, on top of not being able to lie to me, he rarely does, except to say my cooking is delicious when it’s anything but.”

I laugh, gesturing at the pancakes. “I don’t know about that. These smell pretty great.”

“Yes, dear, but there’s a big difference between smell and taste, isn’t there?”

“So all that crazy stuff he said to me,” I murmur, “all this crazy stuff I’m feeling, you really think it’s real?”

“Yes,” she says, with iron certainty in her voice. “There isn’t a single doubt in my mind that Miller means what he said. He cares about you. I know, I know… it should be impossible. It doesn’t make sense. So what? Affairs of the soul rarely do.”

I sigh. “I freaked on him last night, Kayla. I yelled at him to get out of my room. It was like I was back in high school and Derrick – that’s my stalker – had barged into one of my classes and started making a scene. I couldn’t stop myself.”

She reaches over and places her hand atop mine, squeezing softly, looking at me with soft acceptance in her eyes. “Talk to him. I’m sure you can work it out.”

I nod, blinking back foolish tears.

“Oh, dear…”

She wraps her arm around me and pulls me into a hug.

I collapse into the embrace, angry at myself for letting go like this. But it’s like all the heartache I’ve been stowing up since my aunt’s death is spilling out now, a busted hydrant I can’t do anything to stop.

“I’m sorry,” I sob. “I don’t know what came over me.”

“Hush,” she whispers, stroking my back. “You don’t have to apologize.”

So I let the pain out instead, sinking into her embrace, letting myself dream for a warm moment about what it would be like to have this woman as my mother-in-law.