Burning Lust (An MMF Bisexual Threesome) (4 page)

You’ve been in way worse places
, she told herself.
Just walk, you’ll be fine
.

Saturday morning, Katie woke at seven to her phone buzzing and buzzing on her bedside table. Sleepily, she tried to shut the alarm off, but it kept buzzing.

Finally, she opened her eyes enough to realize it was a phone call.

“Hello,” she said, her words slurred and sleepy.

“Hi Katie, I’m sorry to wake you,” the crisp voice on the other end said.

Katie’s eyes flew the rest of the way open. It was Dr. Malcolm, her boss, and she sounded
quite
awake.

“Dr. Malcolm,” she said.

“I realize that it’s a Saturday, but I’m afraid I need to call you in for an emergency consultation,” Dr. Malcolm said. Katie thought that she detected a note of apology in the older woman’s voice. “There was a very large fire in East Montpelier last night, and some people were injured. It’s all over the news. Would you be willing to do an emergency session with Patrick Tahoe today? He was on the scene.”

Katie’s stomach dropped.

“Who was hurt?” she asked.

Not Sam,
she thought.
Not Sam, not Sam.

“An older couple, I’m afraid,” Dr. Malcolm said. “They had to be airlifted to the burn unit at the University over in Burlington.”

“Are they going to be okay?”

“They think so,” said Dr. Malcolm. “But those injuries are never pleasant. It’s my understanding that Patrick carried one of them out of their house.”

Katie stared at her ceiling, trying to imagine it: a house in flames, the firemen on the scene. How terrifying it must be to hear your alarm go off in the middle of the night.

“Of course I’ll see him today,” she said. “Just give me an hour to get dressed and get into the office.”

“Thank you,” Dr. Malcolm said.

Patrick was waiting outside when she got there, looking tired and stressed.

“Hey,” she said, flipping on lights, the only person there with a key. “Come on in, if you don’t mind while I get set up.”

“Thanks,” he said, his voice sounding a little hollow as he sat in one of her armchairs while she turned on lamps and lit a candle.

“Why do you do that?” he asked.

Katie blew out the match, setting it on a little ceramic dish there just for that purpose.

“It smells nice,” she said. “I find it gives me patients something to focus on besides me, if they’re having trouble talking about something.”

She sat in the chair opposite him.

“You can tell me anything you want,” she said, and then she was quiet.

“They’re going to be okay, I think,” Patrick said slowly, staring at the floor. “They got to the burn unit in time, I heard.”

Katie nodded. “Does that make you feel better?”

“Of course,” he said. “But, you know, I still think — what if we’d been faster? What if I’d driven quicker, what if I’d gotten out of bed sooner. Then they might not be in that unit at all.”

“But without you, they’d be much worse off.”

“I guess,” Patrick said.

“Is this the first time something like this has happened since you joined the force?”

Patrick sucked in a deep breath and then blew it out. “Yeah,” he said. “It’s usually more rescuing people who forgot to open their flues, that kind of thing.”

Katie smiled a little on the inside, picking up on Patrick’s subtle, teasing dig at her, even right now. He was going to be fine.

“It’s easy to blame yourself for something like this,” she said. “Easy to over-empathize with the people you’re helping, but most people couldn’t do what you do.”

Patrick suddenly stood and began pacing her office, his hands tangling in front of him. Then he stopped, turned, and looked at Katie.

“I almost put her down,” he said. His eyes bored into hers, and she thought she was tears forming there. “She’d already passed out from smoke,
 
and there was this moment — there was a backdraft, and I had to move fast, and—“ he took a deep breath. “I almost tossed her down in the hallway and ran.”

“But you didn’t.”

“But I thought about it.”

Katie felt overwhelmed, her heart pounding, every sense on high alert. This was incredibly unprofessional of her, she knew — there was absolutely no way she could be a good doctor to this particular patient, since she was still — even after all these years — too emotionally tied up with him.

She stood and put her hands on his shoulders, making him stop pacing.

“Patrick,” she said, locking eyes with him. “You did a wonderful thing. If you’d put her down to save yourself, you still wouldn’t be a bad person, but you didn’t. You saved a woman’s life, and you have to celebrate that and forgive yourself for not doing the impossible.”

He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down.

“I guess,” he said. “It’s just so easy to see what I could have done better.”

“I know,” she said. “It’s because you care.”

“I still feel so bad, though.”

“You went through something intense and hard. It takes time.”

Slowly, he lifted one hand to Katie’s hair. She usually pulled it back while she was at work, but she hadn’t had time that morning, and he tugged gently on one brown strand, thinking.

“This is normal, right?” he asked.

“It’s very normal.”

His hand moved to her cheek, his fingers tracing along the bones, down to her chin. Katie felt like she was trembling. She knew she should stop him but felt completely powerless to do so — she’d wanted this since she was sixteen, and with his hands on her now, there was no way she could run.

“I’m going to refer you to another doctor,” she whispered, looking up at him.
 

Instead of responding, he bent down and kissed her on the lips, pressing firmly against her. Katie was almost overwhelmed, feeling almost dizzy and high at first.

Patrick Tahoe is really kissing me
, she thought.

His lips moved against hers and she came unfrozen, parting her own just slightly, tilting her head and pressing against him. His tongue swiped along her lower lip and she parted them, letting him in. Her hand found its way around the back of her head, and she pulled him into her.

Finally he straightened, pulling his mouth away from hers, her lips still parted and her eyes still closed. She’d been wishing that it would never end, because unlike almost everything else, this was better than how she’d imagined it would be.

“Now will you go out with me?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“I can’t,” she said. She wanted to cry, but it was true.

“You said you’d refer me,” he said.

“But I haven’t yet,” she said. “We can’t be seen in public while I’m still your doctor.”

There was also the small matter of Sam, who she’d kissed not twelve hours ago — sweet, wonderful Sam, who also made her heart beat faster and her palms get sweaty. Sam, who she hadn’t crushed on endlessly in high school, who didn’t have all that baggage.

Patrick took a step away from her, and she could see something change in his face change, like storm clouds coming over him.

“When?” he asked.

Katie looked at the floor, helplessly. As much as she wanted Patrick, it wasn’t enough to risk her job for, even though her heart was saying,
do it
.

“A week?” she said. “A month? I don’t know. We can’t give off the wrong impression.”

“Fine,” he said. He took his hands off of her and jammed them in his pockets, suddenly angry.
More
than angry; he was irate.

“Call me when you’re finally interested,” he said, stalking to her office door. “I’m not coming around again.”

Then he left, slamming the door hard enough to shake the walls.

Kate collapsed onto her chair. She knew the sudden, wild mood change wasn’t completely his fault — he’d just experienced a trauma and hadn’t even slept since then, it looked like. In a few days, he’d be much more reasonable, and then she’d call him, explain the situation.

What IS the situation?
 
She wondered. On one hand, yeah, she’d been madly in love with him for years, but on the other hand, she was different than she’d been in high school. She’d had her share of boyfriends, and was no longer some short, chubby dork.

Also, there was the small matter of Sam, who she also liked very, very much. He made her feel warm and tingly in the same way Patrick did.

I could date them both
, she thought, but quickly dashed the idea. They’d probably get jealous, and good luck keeping the secret, especially since they seemed like they were pretty good friends.

I guess I’ll have to choose
, she thought sadly.
I wish I didn’t.

She stood and blew out the candle, and then her eyes fell on the jacket slung over the back of the chair: Patrick’s of course. When he’d left in his sudden, odd rage, he’d left it behind.

Quickly, Katie left her office, turning out the lights and locking the door, but her car was the only one in the parking lot.

“Shit,” she muttered underneath her breath.
 

Sooner or later, she was going to have to see Patrick again.

She looked down at the dark blue fleece on her arm.

He’s got other jackets,
she told herself.
You can put it off for a little while.

She put it off for a week. A week when she did little but work and flirt with Sam via text message. Saturday he’d been to exhausted to go out, and Sunday morning she woke to a text that said
Gotta go to a weeklong ski instructor’s retreat :( Be back Saturday!

Kate was bummed, but she tried to take the time to finally unpack her house a little, take some alone time to reflect on the whole situation.

What would have to happen, she decided, was she had to be honest: she was interested in them both, and would like to date them each for a while before she decided. She had a feeling that they might not be cool with it, but it was the best she could do.

It was Friday night when she finally called Patrick about his jacket. It had been in her car for nearly a week, and she was tired of looking at it all the time.

“Katie,” he said when he answered the phone, sounding pleasantly surprised.

“You left your jacket,” she said.

“
That
’s
where it is?” he said. “I looked everywhere.”

“Want me to swing by and give it back?”

“Do you mind?”

“Of course not.”

There was a brief pause.

“Katie,” he said. “I want to apologize for my behavior Saturday. That was... I was tired, and I felt awful, but it’s no excuse.”

“I know that’s not how you really are,” she said. “Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m at the firehouse, hanging out with the guys,” he said. “Want to swing by?”

Is Sam there?
she wondered.
Great. This should be awkward
.

“Sure,” she said.

At the firehouse, she rang the front bell and waited, listening to someone descend the staircase from the common room above the garage. Finally Patrick’s face appeared and he opened the door.

“Thanks,” he said. “Want to come upstairs for a drink? It’s just me and Sam.”

Shit,
thought Katie.
Well, it’s now or never
.

“Sure,” she said, then followed him up the rickety firehouse stairs. Like so much in Montpelier, it had been built a hundred or more years ago and retrofitted into what it was today.

The upstairs room was a couch, a coffee table, and a TV. Sam was sitting in front of a paused video game, watching the staircase.

“Look what I found,” Patrick said.
 

“Hey, Katie,” said Sam, his easy smile on his face.

“Hey,” she said, nervously.

“Did you walk home the other night?” he asked, his brow furrowing a little.

She’d forgotten about that. “Yeah,” she said. “My car was only like fifteen minutes away.”

“You shouldn’t walk that late,” he said. “I meant it when I said you could stay.”

“It’s Montpelier,” she said. “I’m fine.”

Patrick was looking from Sam to Katie and back, an undecipherable look on his face. Confusion, definitely, anger, maybe.

“Are you two... involved?” he asked carefully. He and Katie were still standing, Sam sitting on the couch in front of them.

“We had... sort of a date?” Katie said, her words coming out in a rush. “The fire last week happened, though, and we had to cut things short.”

“And then on Saturday you made out with me in your office?”

“We did not
make out
,” Katie said. She crossed her arms over herself, defensively.

“You made out with him the next day?”

“Stop!” Katie shouted, and both men stared at her. They were on their feet now, both looking at her, startled.

“I like you both a lot,” she admitted, her heart pounding. “And I didn’t mean for you to find out this way, but there it is. I don’t know what to do about it, other than see you both.” She took a deep breath in the total silence of the room. “I understand if you’re not interested in that sort of thing, but I can’t — I can’t decide. I don’t have enough information.”

Both men still stared at her, then looked quickly at each other.
 

Neither seemed really angry, though, and she couldn’t decipher the look they gave each other.

“So, just think about it, okay?” she said. “I’ll see you guys later.”

With that, Katie fled the firehouse, practically running down the stairs. She could hear both of them shouting at her to wait, but she got into her car and zoomed off into the night, her heart still practically beating out of her chest.

Two hours later, Katie was on her couch, in her bathrobe, drinking wine and staring into her fire. The chimney cleaning service Doug had recommended had done a great job, she thought absently. No smoke anywhere besides up the chimney.
 

Her house was still full of moving boxes, but they were going to have to wait, she thought. One woman couldn’t work full time and also be expected to have unpacked in under a week.

There was a knock on her door. Katie sat up straight. It was eleven at night, and knocks this late were never a good thing.