Hot Bodies Boxed Set: The Complete Vital Signs Erotic Romance Trilogy (7 page)

The routine gallbladder operation had proceeded uneventfully—well, uneventfully save for Dr. Wilkinson letting his right hand get shredded, anyway. Now that both he and his booty-call-slash-surgical-nurse Joanna Watson were both out of the way, Shirley Daniels could finally get down to business.

Shirley disconnected the patient from the anesthesia and prepped her for Recovery. All the while, she kept one eye on Dr. Grenoway’s backside, which she could tell even through the baggy, bulky surgical scrubs was nice and tight. She couldn’t wait to get her hands on it. And her newfound confidence told her it was only a matter of time before she did.

And hopefully she’d get a piece of that luscious, young-surgeon ass sooner rather than later.

Once the patient was safely tucked into Recovery, Shirley followed Dr. Grenoway into the men’s postop locker room. He’d already discarded his scrubs into the hamper and was decontaminating in the steam shower.

It was technically against hospital regulations for nurses and doctors to be in the same locker room after an operation, but Shirley didn’t care. And since Dr. Grenoway had been the only man in the OR, it wasn’t as if she would be running into anybody else in there. If she had her way, Shirley knew that the postop locker room was a perfect place for an impromptu tryst. Preferably standing up.

Shirley loosened her face mask and chuckled to herself. If only her parents knew just how naughty a girl she’d become. Hell, she might even tell them so herself—she was past due to visit them at the nursing home. Maybe she’d give them a glimpse of her new, sexually liberated self tonight when she brought them fresh sets of clean pajamas and a tuna-noodle casserole.

Hmph. Or maybe not.

Shirley didn’t care what her parents—or anyone else, for that matter—thought about her newfound sensual self. All she did care about was satisfying the itch that needed scratching.

As she watched the shadow of Dr. Grenoway’s lithe, muscular young body through the shower curtain, Shirley pondered exactly how she’d go about seducing him. Then she decided it was probably easiest just to jump in with both feet.

She shimmied off her scrubs, booties and underwear until she stood naked in the chill locker room. She grabbed a condom from her purse and tucked it between her teeth. Silently padding on bare feet to preserve the element of surprise, she tiptoed up to the shower stall and flung the curtain open in one swift motion, revealing herself to the younger doctor in all her naked glory. And the condom clutched in her mouth made her objective obvious.

He stared back at her, eyes wide and mouth agape. “What the—“ he stammered, then trailed off. But even if his face looked shocked, his cock looked mighty happy to see her—it perked right up, literally, as soon as its owner laid eyes on her hot, naked bod.

“That was some mighty nice operating you did in there, Dr. Grenoway,” she cooed at him. “Now how about I do some operating of my own. On
you?”

With that, she jumped into the shower stall with him, rubbing her naked body against his, which was slick with hot water and PhisoDerm.

Things were about to get steamy. And not from the shower, either.

Shirley clamped her mouth over Dr. Grenoway’s gaping one and started a slow, deep tango with his tongue. At the same time, she began to run her palms up and down his rippled chest and abs, tracing intricate designs in the soapsuds on his skin with her fingertips. She started at his Adam’s apple and collarbone, slowly working her way down until she reached the dark, furry clump of hair perched just above his cock.

And what a cock it was! A good ten inches long and two inches thick, it was by far the biggest, baddest cock Shirley had ever laid eyes on. Fully erect, it pointed straight upwards, forming a 180-degree angle against his groin. It also had a gentle curve to the right, which her nursing training told her would feel delectable against the walls of her sheath.

She knelt down and closed her mouth around his glans, tonguing over the ridge and then slowly but surely taking more and more of his cock into her mouth until she was deep-throating him. Dr. Grenoway groaned and involuntarily ground his hips against Shirley’s mouth, fucking her right down her throat. Shirley could tell he was inches away from coming, and pulled herself off his cock just in time for her to pinch its tip hard enough to hold off his orgasm. He gasped at the sudden pain-pleasure mix.

“Don’t worry, sweetie, there’ll be plenty more to come,” Shirley cooed. She slipped the condom over his slippery wet dick. Then she shoved him against the porcelain tile, braced herself against the wall, and wrapped one leg around his waist while she shoved his cock deep into her sheath. She ground on him in perfect counterpoint to his thrusts, which came fast and urgent. After only a minute or two of fucking, Shirley vibrated in a raucous orgasm, and the young doctor’s climax immediately followed. They collapsed into one another, breathing heavily under the steamy shower stream and reveling in the afterglow.

“What the hell was that for?” Dr. Grenoway breathed into Shirley’s damp shoulder. “Not that I’m complaining or anything.”

Shirley looked up at him and smiled. “Just for being you,” she said. “By the way Dr. Grenoway, what’s your first name?”

“Dick,” he said.

How appropriate
, Shirley thought. “I hope you don’t mind, Dick, but this was just a one-off thing. I’m not looking for a relationship right now.”

Dick Grenoway looked relieved. “Good,” he said. “Because if my fiancé found out about this, I’d be royally screwed.”

“My lips are sealed,” Shirley promised. And they were.

For now, at least. One never knew when that kind of information might come in handy.

Joanna and Harlan were off to Raleigh-Durham in Joanna’s battered old Honda.

They rode up Interstate 40 in silence. The car rattled along the highway on its worn-out shocks. She’d meant to buy a new car this year, but with all the legal bills from her divorce she hadn’t been able to scrape the money together. The Honda embarrassed her—and not just because of how old and worn-out the car looked. All Joanna had to do was stare out through the windshield onto the hood to be reminded of her last wild tryst with Harlan.

And given what had just happened, the chance of her having another wild tryst with him across that car hood was next to nothing.

For the first forty miles of their drive, Harlan stared silently out the passenger window, never once glancing in Joanna’s direction. He held his right arm up by the bent elbow to keep his injured hand above the level of his heart. In his heavy, forced silence, he seemed defeated—even small.

Joanna glanced away from the road and over at the sulking surgeon for a moment too long, and before she knew it, the old Honda clattered over a pothole. The entire car gave a heavy jerk.

“Ow!” Harlan hissed, clutching his injured hand to keep it from banging against the dashboard. “Doesn’t this damn car have any shocks?”

“Sorry,” Joanna replied in a small voice. “I’ve been meaning to replace them for a while, but my money’s been very tight lately, and—“

Harlan scoffed. “Please. You’re practically the best-paid nurse at Covington Community Hospital. And with all the overtime you put in, you should be swimming in cash.”

Joanna had to force herself to keep her eyes on the road. “Pardon me, Doctor, but how exactly do you know how much money I make?”

“I looked it up. As chief of surgery I have access to payroll information whenever I want it.”

“I see. But that doesn’t mean you know anything about my financial situation, Doctor, which frankly is none of your business.” Joanna was surprised at herself. An hour earlier she’d been grasping for some excuse—
any
excuse—to repair her shattered image in Harlan’s eyes, and now she was back to being curt and defensive with him. Why? Joanna searched her mind for an answer, but could find none.

Except maybe the fact that she
enjoyed
arguing with this man.

Harlan was silent for a few minutes. The only sound was the whooshing vibration of the Honda’s tires against the asphalt. After a long pause, he spoke. “Joanna, I don’t mean to pry, but if you’re having some financial problems—“

“You
are
prying,” Joanna’s tone was sharp, but inside she was secretly thrilled that he was taking personal interest in her again. “If you don’t mind me saying so, Doctor—“

“Please, call me Harlan,” he interrupted.

Joanna kept her face pointed straight at the road so Harlan couldn’t see her smile. “All right,
Harlan
. What business is it of yours that I’m broke?”

“You’re broke?”

Joanna bit her tongue. Already, she had revealed too much. She was as inept at male-female relations as ever. “Well, not
broke
, exactly. Just—just in a tight position, is all.”

“I see. And given your income, how exactly is that possible?”

Joanna didn’t answer. She glanced over her shoulder to check her blind spot before changing lanes.

Harlan wasn’t taking her silence lightly. “Joanna, I asked you a question.”

“And I already told you it was none of your damn business.” Joanna merged the Honda into the exit lane.

Harlan heaved a heavy sigh. “Joanna, it’s obvious that this accident happened—“ Harlan gestured with his bandaged hand—“because you were distracted by something. If one of my nurses is distracted in the OR, I want to know
why
. I’m asking you this question strictly for professional reasons.”

Joanna’s heart sank.
Strictly for professional reasons.
That meant Harlan Wilkinson cared nothing for her personally.

And she wasn’t about to confess that she’d been distracted in the OR because she was desperate for sex—and not because she was broke. “I would still prefer not to talk about it,” she finally said, her voice tight and squeaky.

“Fine,” Harlan snapped. “But given what you did to me, Joanna, at some point I would appreciate an explanation as to what might cause a nurse of your considerable skill and experience to make that kind of a mistake. You owe me that, at least.”

Joanna didn’t answer. She braked the car to take the steep curve of the merge ramp onto I-340. They rode on in silence for the next six miles, until Joanna adjusted the car’s speed to meet the slower pace of city traffic. She scanned the green-and-white highway signs for the correct exit. They would be at University Hospital in a matter of minutes.

“So is this hand surgeon you’re taking me to any good, Joanna?”

Joanna swallowed a few times before answering. Her mouth had gone cotton-dry, and she was getting a splitting headache. She tightened her grip on the steering wheel. “Yes, he’s very, very good. Dr. Larry Rosenbaum’s his name. He and Dr. Turnblatt were very good friends. Dr. Turnblatt referred a lot of patients to him.”

“Does a little hospital like Covington see a lot of severe hand injuries, then?” Harlan posed the question politely, but she could still hear animosity in his voice.

“Oh yes. More than you might think. Many of the hand injuries we get are farming-related. Most of them are treatable in the emergency room, but the more serious ones—the ones where someone has gotten his hand caught in a thresher or something—require surgery. Covington’s never had the resources to afford having a full-time hand surgeon on staff, so Dr. Turnblatt would just do what he could to stabilize those patients and then send them up the road to Dr. Rosenblum.”

“Uh huh,” was Harlan’s dismissive reply. Joanna cut her eyes in his direction and saw he was staring intently at his bandaged right hand, as if he could scarcely believe the sight of it. The knowledge that one careless act on her part could potentially destroy this obviously brilliant man’s entire career tore at her insides—the same insides that were still aflame with heady desire for him.

Joanna blinked back tears as she pulled her car off the freeway and onto the city street that dead-ended into University Hospital’s main parking garage. She wouldn’t show him a moment’s weakness—she
wouldn’t.
Joanna knew that she needed to show Harlan Wilkinson just how much strength she possessed. Perhaps, just perhaps, her show of strength in probably the most frightening, uncertain time in Harlan’s life would be the way into his heart. . . .

“Joanna, what the hell are you doing?” Harlan shouted, and grabbed hold of the steering wheel with his left hand, turning it sharply to keep the car from ramming straight into a streetlight. Joanna shuddered as she realized that she had been so lost in lust for Harlan Wilkinson that she’d very nearly crashed the car.

What on earth was this man doing to her?

Joanna took several deep cleansing breaths in a futile effort to calm herself down. Now running on pure adrenaline, she somehow managed to pull the car into the University Hospital parking garage and to secure a parking space. She brought the car to a stop, and as soon as she pulled the key from the ignition, against her will, her head laid itself down on the steering wheel. The conflicting emotions racking her body were fast becoming too much for her to handle. Joanna squeezed her eyes shut and stiffened her throat muscles to keep from sobbing out loud.

Joanna felt a hand on her shoulder. A strong, masculine hand that still carried a soft, gentle touch. The feel of Harlan’s hand on her body was enough to stir her entire being. She could feel the waves of his sexual magnetism wending their way through his fingers and into her skin, making her entire body pulse with anticipation. The prolonged buildup of her desire for this man was fast becoming unbearable.

Something had to give, and soon.

Joanna looked up and her green eyes met Harlan’s pale blue ones, which peered at her with deep intensity. Her stomach did a flip-flop, and she had to break off her gaze from his to keep from losing control.

“Joanna?” Harlan’s voice was soft with concern. “Are you all right?”

Joanna swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and replied “Yes. I—I’m sorry, I guess I’m a little shook up, is all. I’ve never lost control of my car before. Hell, I’ve never lost control of
anything
before—“

“We all have our bad days,” Harlan said. “Take me to this damn hand surgeon, will you? I need to see if I have a career left.”

With that, Harlan stepped out of the car and headed for the parking garage elevator.