Page 31 of Careless Whisper (Modern Vintage Romances #11)

Elias

R eggie looked like someone had hit her with a defibrillator at full charge.

She didn’t say anything at first. Just stared at me like I was a ghost she couldn’t believe had crawled out of her past into her present—alive and inconvenient.

“You’re the new hire?” she demanded, voice flat, arms crossed like armor.

“I am.”

Her lips pressed together, and her eyes narrowed. “My grandmother hired you.”

It wasn’t a question, so I nodded.

“Hi, I’m Juanita,” the woman who was sitting next to Reggie said as she got up, her hand out. “ Hablas Espanol ?”

I grinned. “ Si .”

“Stop getting friendly with him; he’s not staying,” Reggie muttered in Spanish as she pulled her phone out of the pocket of her scrubs.

“She’s just tired.” Juanita smiled flirtatiously at me. “You want a drink?”

“Coffee would be nice.”

I had landed in San Miguel de Allende in the morning and spent most of the day settling into the apartment I’d rented from Seattle, which took some doing.

Apparently, getting access to your housing in this city required at least three rounds of small talk, two cups of strong coffee, and one very polite but confusing conversation about a missing envelope that may or may not have existed.

I chatted with a dozen people—neighbors, a property manager who kept calling me doctorcito like I was a kid playing a grown-up, a flower vendor who swore she knew Reggie’s mother, and finally, a teenage boy named Hugo who handed me a single key on a worn leather loop like it was sacred.

“Third floor, white door, don’t touch the plant on the balcony. It belongs to Senora Teresa, and she’s watching,” he warned, dead serious.

The apartment itself was small but surprisingly beautiful—tucked off a cobbled side street near the Mercado de Artesanías.

It had arched windows with faded wooden shutters, hand-painted tiles in the kitchen, and a balcony that was just big enough for one chair and a glass of wine.

The walls were thick adobe, which kept the heat out, and the scent of lime and dust clung to everything in a way that was oddly comforting.

There was one bedroom, which was barely big enough to turn around in after they put a full-size bed in it.

Great! My legs won’t fit.

The living space felt more like a cozy reading nook than an actual room.

The shower had exactly one temperature setting—lukewarm—but the water pressure could strip paint.

The place was humble and lived-in. It couldn’t have been more different from my condo in Seattle, with its glass and stone and silence.

I liked it very much.

I could hear Reggie yelling at her grandmother, or maybe it was her mother, on the phone as Juanita led me to the small kitchen in the clinic. It was small, with one counter that had a stove, a coffee machine, and cups, a sink, and a round table that could seat four.

Juanita turned on the coffee machine, leaned against the counter, and looked me up and down.

“So, you’re the man she ran away from.”

“Yes.” There was no point in subterfuge, and I needed all the allies I could get in my quest to win back my woman, who was still screaming at someone on the phone, which meant she wouldn’t be making it easy for me.

“You’re a big-time cardiac surgeon, so what do you think you’re going to do in this clinic?” she demanded as coffee began to drip-drip into a ceramic cup.

“Whatever needs to be done.”

“You don’t have a job in Seattle?”

This was an interrogation, no doubt about it.

“Yes, I do. I took a sabbatical.”

She raised an eyebrow. “To work at a small clinic in San Miguel de Allende?”

“To work in a small clinic that the woman I love runs, yes.”

She turned to check on the coffee, and since the carafe was still filling up, faced me again, her features stern. “If you love her, why did she leave you?”

“I…fucked up.”

“She called you a pendejo the last time I tried to talk about you,” Juanita was happy to inform me.

I took a deep breath and exhaled. “I kind of am.”

“But you’re here now, having left your fancy job behind,” Juanita stated as the coffee machine beeped. She poured a cup and handed it to me, and got one for herself.

We sat down at the round table and winced when we heard Reggie yell, “You’re all nuts in this family. This is my clinic; you can’t just hire some rando and expect me to put up with it.” Pause. Then we heard rapid fire Spanish swearing.

“You love her?” Juanita chuckled.

“ Si .”

Juanita drank some coffee. “Okay. I will help you because I like Reggie.”

“How will you help me?” I asked.

“Watch and see,” she said sneakily just as we heard Reggie’s footsteps coming toward the kitchen.

“Fine,” she snapped, looking at me, her hands little fists on her hips. “You’re technically on the payroll…so, I guess, you can stay. But don’t think for a second that this means we’re okay.”

“ Ay , Reggie, stop being like that.” Juanita put her hand on mine. “He’s a big-time doctor, and you know we need one here.” She said this as she jutted her breasts out.

Reggie glared at our hands and then at me. I tried to yank my hand away but Juanita held tight.

Jesus! This is not helping, Juanita!

Reggie didn’t answer. Just turned and walked out of the room with the kind of posture that said I was lucky she hadn’t punched me.

“What the fuck?” I demanded as soon as Reggie was gone.

Juanita grinned smugly. “You know if a woman doesn’t care about a man, she doesn’t give two shits who he touches or who touches him. She was ready to pull my hair out for putting my hand on yours.”

I thought about it and nodded appreciatively. Juanita had a point.

“This is going to be so much fun,” Juanita declared.

She was right and wrong.

The clinic was small, busy, and stretched thin in every direction—under-resourced, overworked, and full of heart. In other words, it was like every other medical facility in the world.

Reggie moved like she’d been managing clinics all her life. The staff adored her, and the patients trusted her. Watching her was equal parts awe-inspiring and gut-wrenching—she was damn good at whatever she did, and I’d fucking lost her.

The first week, she only spoke to me if it was related to work. Every time I tried to have a social conversation, she shut me down. Since we were working side-by-side coordinating treatments and shoulder-to-shoulder at triage, her rejection didn’t sting as much.

By the end of the week, to Reggie’s obvious chagrin, I was getting along well with the staff, and after I assisted on a small trauma case after a motor accident, even the skeptical intern who’d been giving me side-eye was laughing at my passable Spanish and handing me sutures like we’d trained together.

Reggie freaking hated it—and didn’t bother to hide it.

“So, you’re the man that broke her heart,” one of the other nurses said, tutting. “But you’re here now, and that girl needs to be loved.”

The whole staff was Team Elias. Everyone thought it was a grand gesture that I was here, leaving my big-time gig in Seattle—but I didn’t feel that way at all.

I was here because she was, and it wasn’t a grand anything—it was a matter of survival.

I didn’t want to be apart from Reggie any longer, not after I’d wasted so much time with my head up my ass.

I’d rather have an angry Reggie in my life than not have her at all.

If Reggie was miffed that her team liked me, she was fucking pissed when Juanita—young, stunning, and full of mischief—winked at me over the medicine cart and said that I looked “ muy bien in scrubs.”

Reggie’s eyes narrowed. It was like watching a sudden vasospasm—seconds away from full-blown myocardial infarction.

Later that day, when we were restocking supplies, Reggie snapped the cap off a bottle of antiseptic as if it had personally offended her.

“You and Juanita seem to be getting along,” she said tightly. It was the first thing she’d said to me that didn’t have anything to do with the clinic.

“The team here is great, Gigi. You’ve done a really awesome job.”

“She’s only twenty-four,” Reggie snapped.

“Who?” I feigned ignorance.

“Juanita,” she bit out through clenched teeth.

“Yeah! I did notice that.” Even though I’d had concerns about Juanita’s approach of making Reggie jealous, I was now fully on board .

She slammed the cabinet door shut. “Stop flirting with her.”

I blinked. “I’m not flirting with her.”

She scoffed.

“ She is flirting with me ,” I added and enjoyed how her chocolate brown eyes widened with annoyance.

“She’s a kid.”

“She’s around the same age you were when we hooked up in Boston,” I reminded her and then wondered about the good sense of provoking her while she was in the vicinity of sharp medical instruments.

“Stay away from her.”

“Why?” I looked at her perplexed and then nodded as if a sudden epiphany had struck. “Are you jealous, Gigi?”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Dr. Graham,” she sneered.

I gave a nonchalant shrug. “ You brought it up.”

“Because it’s distracting.”

“Why is some innocent flirting distracting you?”

She took a step toward me, eyes blazing, her finger aiming for the center of my chest. “You don’t get to come here, insert yourself into my life again, and act like nothing happened.

” Poke . “You hurt me.” Poke . “You destroyed me.” Poke .

“And I’m still trying to figure out if I even want you in the same zip code. ”

I grabbed her finger in my hand. “Gigi, baby, I’m so sorry for hurting you. I hate that I did.”

“I hate you ,” she snapped and pulled her finger away.

“I know you don’t.” I stroked a finger down her cheek, loathing myself for what I put her through, what I let Maren put her through. “But you’re angry with me.”

“You have no idea, buddy.” She jerked her face away from my touch.

“So, if you want to make me scrub toilets for the next month, I will. You want to throw a scalpel tray at me—hell, I’ll stand still.”

“You should,” she muttered, though her eyes softened just a little… very little. “You deserve worse.”

“I know.”

She stormed off. I didn’t follow. I figured I’d earned her anger and then some.

My spirits rose when I overheard her conversation with Juanita in the backroom while they were sorting medical donations.

“It’s unprofessional the way you’re behaving with him,” Reggie scolded.

“ Qué te pasa ?” Juanita mused.

“You’re flirting with him all the time.”

“I flirt with everyone …well, everyone who is male and handsome.” Juanita sounded amused.

“Stop doing it.”

“Why?”

“Just stop it, Juanita,” Reggie ordered, but it sounded like she was pleading.

There was a long pause, and then Juanita spoke softly, so I had to all but press my ear to the open door to hear her. “Why are you acting like a martyr when you’re clearly in love with the man?”

“I’m not in love with him,” Reggie replied.

“Please. You look at him like you want to kill him and kiss him. Both at the same time.”

“Juanita—”

“No one gets that jealous unless they care,” Juanita added with what I thought was smug satisfaction. “So maybe take your head out of your culo and go get your man.”

“He’s not my man,” Reggie exclaimed.

“Then you should have no problem with me climbing him like a tree. The man is caliente! ”

I heard the cabinet doors slamming before I even reached the supply room and veered away—a coward with a stethoscope.

Yes , I was eavesdropping. No , I didn’t feel bad about it.

That conversation stirred hope in me, which only soared when she assigned Juanita and me to clean bedpans the next day.

“She’s so mad, it’s kind of sweet,” Juanita whispered, handing me gloves like we were passing contraband.

“You think she wants to kiss me or kill me?” I murmured back.

Juanita grinned. “Kill you. No question . But she also looked like she wanted to throw down when I complimented your eyes, so…you’re not dead in the water.”

“Great,” I muttered as I got to work. “So, I’m attractive enough to inspire homicide. That’s progress.”

“ Major progress.” Juanita wiggled her eyebrows. “If she assigns you to mop the clinic floor with a toothbrush tomorrow…she’s in love.”

“With the floor or with me?” I mocked.

“That depends upon how well you clean, senor .”