Read Can't Always Get What You Want Online
Authors: Chelsey Krause
Can't Always Get What You Want
Can’t Always Get What You Want
is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A Loveswept eBook Original
Copyright © 2015 by Chelsey Krause
Excerpt from
Once Loved
by Cecy Robson copyright © 2015 by Cecy Robson, LLC
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States of America by Loveswept, an imprint of Random House, a division of Random House LLC, a Penguin Random House Company, New York.
L
OVESWEPT
is a registered trademark and the L
OVESWEPT
colophon is a trademark of Random House LLC.
This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming book
Once Loved
by Cecy Robson. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.
eBook ISBN 97811
01883624
Cover design: Caroline Teagle
Cover photograph: © Image Source/Getty Images
v4.0
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Contents
Chapter 2: It’s Only Rock ’n’ Roll (but I Like It)
Chapter 4: Sympathy for the Devil
Chapter 14: (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction
Chapter 16: Sweethearts Together
Chapter 17: Street Fighting Man
Chapter 18: Let’s Spend the Night Together
Chapter 19: We Were Falling in Love
Chapter 23: Little Red Rooster
Chapter 28: Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown
Chapter 32: Time Is on My Side
Chapter 33: Waiting on a Friend
Chapter 36: You Can’t Always Get What You Want
Chapter 1
Start Me Up
I hate running shoes. They are the ugliest (albeit, functional) piece of clothing ever worn by mankind. Oh, and wearing pajama pants in public. I cringe when I see people trudging through the grocery store aisles, shopping in their ducky-print pajama bottoms.
And what do I choose for a career?
Nursing.
My job requires runners. And not just any runners—the nastiest, matronly, most I’ll-never-have-sex-again shoes ever invented.
And scrubs, which, let’s face it, are basically pajamas.
What was I thinking?
Ding. Ding. DING.
Oh, how I love call bells.
“Can I help you?” I ask into the intercom.
“My dick is bleeding.”
I choke back a surprised laugh.
“Are you sure?”
“You don’t think I’d be sure if my own penis were bleeding? Damn it, you’re all idiots. I have half a mind—”
“I’ll be right there.”
It’s Mr. Donaldson again. It’s the seventy-fourth time he’s rung his call bell since noon. Well, maybe more like the eighth. But it feels like seventy-four.
I walk to the end of the hall and peek into his bathroom. He’s standing by the toilet, turned away from me. Yellow pajama bottoms and a soaked adult diaper are pooled at his feet.
“Hi, Mr. Donaldson, what seems to be the trouble?” I ask.
“I’ve pissed my pants,” he says. “And there’s blood in my underwear.”
I squat close to the ground and shuffle myself a bit closer to his legs.
“That’s okay. I’ll help you get cleaned up,” I say soothingly. “If you could just lift this foot, I can slip off—”
He whirls around, bringing his private region a little too close to my face for comfort. My nose curls up at the powerful scent of old urine.
“Just look at this,” he moans, lifting his member for my inspection. “Where’s the blood coming from?”
Thank God for gloves.
I look over his man parts, looking for any sign of damage. How long has he been incontinent for? He’s a new admit, and hasn’t allowed anyone to help him with personal care yet.
Ah, there’s the culprit.
“Mr. Donaldson, your testicles are excoriated.”
“What?”
I hear shuffling beyond the closed bathroom door, and several female voices blending together.
“Your testicles. They’re quite red, and I see a few tears…”
“Wilbur? Where are you?”
“We’re in here,” I reply. “Just helping him get cleaned up.”
“Speak English, lady!” he says tersely. “Excori-what? And what are ‘tessicles’?”
“Testicles. You know, your privates,” I say quietly.
“Oh! You mean my balls?” he yells.
“Balls?” I hear a woman’s voice repeat outside. “What’s going on in there?”
“Well, I—”
Before I have a chance to explain, the door is pulled wide open. An older lady with chunky gray hair looks down at me, kneeling in front of her husband.
Who is naked from the waist down.
This looks bad. Very bad.
I quickly stand, and clear my throat.
“Hi, I’m Sophie, Mr. Donaldson’s nurse. And you must be…”
“His wife,” she replies shortly. “What’s this all about?”
“Oh, right. Well, he had some concerns about…”
“Myrna? Come look at this. My dick is bleeding.”
I suddenly realize that the door is wide open, and that his guests have a full view of Mr. Donaldson in all his glory.
“I was just about to get him cleaned up,” I explain, while closing the door halfway. “Actually,” I add quietly to his wife, “his testicles look very inflamed, and I think I could see several tears. Could be the source of his bleeding. It’s quite common for someone with incontinence issues to have skin problems. How long has he been—”
“My husband is not incontinent. And what were you doing, kneeling on the floor like that?”
I’m beginning to feel a bit light-headed. This cannot be happening.
“Umm, he’s had a bit of an accident. I was just helping him get new pants on…” I lean toward the bathroom sink to pick up some washcloths, an incontinence pad, and new pajama bottoms.
She snatches the bundle from my hands. “I’ll do it. You can go now.”
Once I’m in the hallway, I rake my hands over my face.
How did that just happen?
Ginny, another nurse on staff, walks by. Gin is the best. Nothing ever ruffles her. She’s always calm, poised, and professional.
Bet she’s never been suspected of servicing patients.
As I pass the front desk at the end of my shift, I see Mrs. Donaldson talking heatedly to the charge nurse.
I overhear bits of the conversation.
“Unprofessional…on her knees…don’t want that nurse around him again…”
Ugh.
On the bright side, I won’t have Mr. Donaldson as a patient again.
—
I’m crashing at my best friend Samira’s house tonight. We’ve been friends for forever. She works on a pediatric unit, while I work in acute care and casually in ER.