Page 40 of Come Back to Me

“Huh? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She smiles shyly, pretending it wasn’t intentional.

“Well, I read over your shoulder, and I know that you just got to the part where he spreads?—”

“Oh my gosh, Jack! Stop…” I love how red her cheeks turns.

I chuckle at her and kiss her on top of her head, then get back to my studying.

Hell, I love that she’s in that book club. I’ve benefitted from the inspiration she gets from those books. What I don’tlove about her joining theSpicy Girlsis that she invited Shayna to join.

Emily has tried to get Shayna to join before, but Shayna always said she was too busy. Now I think she doesn’t want to be left out when all her friends talk about their books, so she finally gave in.

I’m a little creeped out that my sister is reading the stuff I see in Annie’s books when I catch a glimpse.

I’m lost in my thoughts when the radio goes off, signaling a medical call. Looks like I’ll get to see my girl today, after all.

Hopefully, I’ll see Teddy, too. We were supposed to have dinner last week, but he cancelled on me again. I’ll have to see if I can nail him down on some plans. It strikes me that this is the least we’ve spent time together in the fifteen plus years I’ve known him.

Forty-five minutes later, Fitz and I walk into the ER with our patient, an elderly lady who passed out while volunteering at her church soup kitchen.

Annie’s at the main station talking with a group of nursing students huddled around her. When we get close enough, I overhear that she’s teaching them about abnormal heart rhythms on an EKG. She’s breathtaking, so clearly in her element.

They look at her like she’s an ER rockstar.

She glances up and makes eye contact with me as Fitz and we head into a room to hand off our patient to the ER staff. A moment later, Annie walks into the room and silently hands me a folded piece of scrap paper that just reads, “Meet me in room fourteen.” I can’t take my eyes off her as she struts out.

Five minutes later, I head to the back of the ER. These rooms are quiet, with no patients back here right now. As I come through the door of the room, Annie grabs the waist of my turnout gear bottoms and pulls me toward her.

Before I can even say hello, she talks. “Two things,”she says, hurriedly. “First, I’ve been waiting for you to come in all day to do this.” She lifts her mouth to mine, and we crash together in a perfect dance of lips and tongues and teeth.

I smile against her mouth because the desperation of her kiss tells me she missed me as I much as I did her today. We’re both panting by the time we end the kiss.

“I missed you, too,” I say as we stand with our foreheads touching. I look down and groan. “Jesus, Annie. Look what you did to me. How am I supposed to walk back out there with a raging hard-on?”

She gives me one of her sexy smirks and says, “Sorry, not sorry.”

Her look turns serious.

“Now I need to talk to you about Teddy. He’s not acting like himself.”

She tells me the events of the morning and it worries me a bit.

I need to catch up with him and make sure he’s not going down a dark rabbit hole he’ll struggle to find his way out of.

CHAPTER 19

ANNIE

I look at the clock and it’s already four-fifteen p.m. so I pick up my desk phone, call our secretary, and ask her to send Sadie back to my office when she has a minute.

A few minutes later, there’s a knock on my open office door.

“Hey, Annie. You wanted to see me?” Sadie asks.

“Yes, thanks. Can you pull the door shut and have a seat, please?” I wait for a second while she closes the door, then turn to her. “Sadie, I know you’re new here, but I want you to know that if something is upsetting you or someone is making you uncomfortable, you can come to me to talk about it.”

“I’m… I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says, not making eye contact.

Let me try this again.

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