Page 3 of Lovetown, USA

Trey

She’s barefoot now.

Actually, one shoe is off, and the other is in the hands of the husband in one of the couples she’s dancing next to.

I can’t stop watching her.

I mean, yeah, she’s a trainwreck, but a fine one.

There’s something very raw, and very real about her. She moves with confidence, but she’s not courting an audience. She does whatever she wants and dares the rest of us to have an opinion on it.

That’s so damn attractive to me.

She catches me staring.

Our eyes lock.

We hold the gaze for a little longer than an accident, and something inside me stirs. Something outside me stiffens. Then she looks away as if she knows exactly what she just did to me.

Goddamn, that woman is sexy.

And she’s trouble.

The kind of trouble I like.

I watch her make her way over to a table occupied by an older married couple. They light up at her presence, and she’s already talking with her hands, laughing loudly, pulling bright smiles out of them. Then she orders another drink.

I start to wonder if she’ll be okay.

“What’s up, Doc?”

I glance over to my right. “Reed, what’s good?”

I know Reed from my rec basketball league. We dap, then he starts in about next week’s game—who’s guarding who, whether Marshawn is still faking his knee injury—and I nod, smiling along as my eyes drift back to the dance floor.

She’s out there again, spinning around in the small crowd of couples. And then, she stumbles, and her shoe slips off again and skitters under a table. She laughs as she crouches down, almost hitting her head on the way up. A waitress rushes to help, but she waves her off.

“Jesus,” I mutter.

I wave down the bartender. “Let’s close out,” I say. “And don’t serve her any more drinks.”

She nods. “I was thinking the same thing. Is she riding home with you?”

“Nah. But I’ll get her a ride, don’t worry.”

The nearest Uber is eight minutes away. I figure she’s gotta be staying at The Standard, so I book the trip, then pay my tab.

I walk over to the hostess. “Can you help me get that young lady out to the curb? Her Uber’s on the way.”

She nods and gets my little drunk Cinderella outside.

When her car pulls up, it hits me that I booked a male driver. Something about seeing the hostess help a drunk woman into a strange man’s car gives me an uneasy feeling.

So I jump in my car and follow them.

I maintain a safe distance, watching the grey Camry snake through the sleepy streets of Lovetown. I park behind them in front of The Standard, watching as she stumbles out of the car, heels in hand.

She gets all the way to the door before she glances back.

She spots me.

She squints, then rolls her eyes before she disappears inside.

I sit there for a moment, engine running, mind filled with regret.

I should have introduced myself properly. Given her my number. My card. Something .

But the truth is, it’s probably for the best. She was a sloppy, slurring, wobbly mess. It lowkey turned me off.

But her beauty and sex appeal are undeniable, which turns me right back on again.

I drive off, settling in for the ten-minute drive to my house. I’m on the easternmost side of Lovetown in a little blue bungalow in a quaint little subdivision that renamed itself Sweet Home.

Lovetown is kind of corny, but it’s safe, and I wanna fall in love again.

It’s a new day today, and I’m back in my white coat and Jordans, charting vitals and reviewing labs while I chug black coffee and munch on a homemade blueberry muffin.

Family medicine ain’t glamorous, but I like the pace. I like being the doctor who catches things early, the kind who notices a new mole or catches an off-hand comment that turns out to be something.

Knock, knock.

I look up at Asia, my nurse.

“Room twelve,” she says. “General malaise and heart palpitations.”

I nod, then make my way to my second patient of the day.

She smiles when I walk in.

I take a quick glance at her chart. Thirty-two years old. Weight’s in healthy range. Blood pressure’s normal.

“What brings you in today, Mrs. Whitmore?”

“Ms.” she corrects as she slowly crosses her legs, which are bare under her skirt. “I feel kind of achy, and I have these strange flutters in my chest.”

Speaking of…her top is cut so low, I can practically see her heartbeat behind half a foot of cleavage.

“Have you had any shortness of breath?”

“No. Just fluttering.” She uncrosses her legs, smiling at me as she does it.

Oh.

Okay.

So, this is one of those visits.

I blow out a sigh, resisting the urge to shake my head. As soon as these people heard a handsome, divorced black doctor was moving to town, it was all she wrote.

Eligible men are public property here.

If I were the hit it and quit it type, that would be a good thing. But I’m more of a relationship kind of guy. I wanna get married again one day. The universe owes me a fucking do-over.

I go through the motions with Ms. Whitmore. Stethoscope, gentle questions, vitals. My ultimate diagnosis is that she’s a perfectly healthy woman suffering from an extreme case of thirst.

“My nurse will follow up with you,” I say as I nod toward the door. “Take care.”

She stands, turns, and bends over to pick up her purse, and I look away with an eyeroll.

I don’t like anything that’s too easy.

And I hate having my fucking time wasted.

Asia knocks again.

“Room 6. Gash on palm. She thinks she has tetanus.”

I finish my coffee in three gulps and head back down the hallway. When I walk through the door of exam room 6, I stop dead in my tracks.

It’s her .

The drunk goddess from last night. My little Cinderella. Wearing sunglasses on her face and a towel wrapped around her left hand.

“Oh, hell no. You’re a doctor?” she says, her voice full of shock.

I take a seat and pull up her chart, bound and determined to be professional even though her mere presence is making me sweat. “Is that shocking?”

She sighs. “No, but you should have led with that last night.”

“Why. You one of them white coat groupies?”

“Hardly,” she scoffs. “I prefer intelligent men. Knowing you’re a doctor cuts out some of the guess work.” She watches me type. “Although you could still lack common sense. I’ve seen that with your type.”

“My type?” I chuckle at that. “What brings you here, Ms. Washington?”

I know her name, now, at least. Danielle Lane Washington.

She holds her hand out towards me. “I think I have tetanus.”

“Why?”

“I cut my hand on a rusty cabinet fixture. Then, this morning, I woke up with a sore throat.”

“How’d you manage to cut yourself?”

When she shrugs, the strap of her sundress falls down her shoulder. The same shoulder I wanna bite while I’m inside her.

“I was a little tipsy last night.”

That tracks, but I let it pass. She seems embarrassed.

“Alright, let’s see what we have here.”

I roll myself over to her and take her hand in mine. With the other, I unwrap her makeshift tourniquet.

The wound is deeper than I expected, but it’s a pretty clean cut. No jags.

“Well, you need a couple of stitches,” I say softly. “The location of the wound would impede the healing process otherwise. Every time you open your hand, you’ll risk reopening it.”

She nods. “Is that something you can do here?”

“Absolutely. Now, as far as tetanus, it’s not the rust that does it. It’s the bacteria the rust can harbor.”

She leans back on her other hand, her head tilting to the side.

“Do you mind taking those off?” I ask of her glasses. “I feel like I’m talking to myself.”

“Go ahead,” she purrs.

I frown, then realize what she’s saying. As soon as it hits me, my body warms all over.

I reach up and pull her sunglasses gently by the bridge. Our eyes lock instantly, and I’m the first to look away. That shit ain’t like me.

“What was I saying?” I ask, and now I’m the one who’s embarrassed.

“You were telling my what causes tetanus.”

“Right.” Fuck, she’s so damn pretty. Them pouty ass lips, my God. “Did you clean the wound last night?”

“I ran cold water over it.”

“Yeah, that doesn’t count.”

I place her wounded hand on her lap and stand.

I grab what I need out of the cabinets, then I set about taking care of Ms. Washington.

Clean. Irrigate. Suture. Dress. She doesn’t so much as flinch through the entire ordeal.

“Keep this dry for the next forty-eight hours,” I say. “My nurse will give you a care sheet you can follow along with when you get home.”

She nods.

“Now, when was your last tetanus shot?”

“I have no idea.”

“Have you had any shots in the last ten years?”

She stares up at the ceiling, then sighs. “I have no idea.”

“Well, a booster can’t hurt you, so if you’re really worried, I can do that today. But it’s my professional opinion that you’ll be fine.”

“What about my sore throat?”

“That could be something else. Strep. COVID. Allergies. With tetanus, symptom onset is usually a few days after injury, and jaw stiffness is far more common than a sore throat.”

“I’ll take a strep test, then. And a COVID test.”

She says this like she’s ordering off the menu at Burger King.

I grab a swab and stand in front of her.

“Open for me.”

I swab as gently as I can without looking into her eyes, then drop the swab in a vial.

“That went well, right?”

I look at her, brows creased. “What do you mean?”

“The test. No gag reflex,” she deadpans.

I pause, meeting her eyes.

She smirks. “Just saying.”

I clear my throat and drop the vial into a bag. “That’s…not medically relevant, but thanks for sharing.”

And now I’m hard.

I’m sure that’s exactly what she wanted.

Asia walks by and grabs the rapid test. While we wait, I return to my stool. We’re only about ten inches away from each other. The air between us is tight. The silence is charged. She sits there with her eyes closed nursing a pounding headache, I’m sure. I take the opportunity to stare at her.

At her full lips. Her skin, which I now know is soft as silk. Her hair, pulled back off a gorgeous face that appears to be untouched by makeup. Nice perky breasts. Curvy waist…

I clear my throat. “Where are you from?”

She opens her eyes and smiles. “You have the honor and the pleasure of speaking to a real live Georgia peach.”

“Interesting.” I rub my chin. “What brings you here?”

“I’m writing a story on the town. I’m a journalist.”

“Let me guess…Lovetown. Real Love, or Bullshit?”

She snickers. “I might just win a Pulitzer for exposing the grand conspiracy.”

“Good luck with that,” I say as I settle in front of the computer to see if I can find her electronic health record. It’s a long shot, I know, and sure enough, it’s not there. Whoever she normally sees doesn’t share records with the system I use.

As I switch back to her chart, I’m acutely aware of her eyes on me. It’s almost like I can feel them heating my skin one inch at a time.

I don’t know shit about this woman beyond what’s on my computer screen, but that’s just data. What my body’s feeling right now is so much deeper than that.

Then a notification pops up. “According to the rapid tests, you are officially negative for COVID and negative for strep. It’s probably just a little irritation.”

“And what do you suggest I do about it, Doctor?”

My fingers pause over the keys as my skin prickles. Goose bumps erupt all over my body, and there’s a little tickle in my brain from the way her voice sounded when she said that to me. Nah, she didn’t say it. She purred it.

“Get some rest,” I say. “Plenty of fluids.”

“Cool. I can do that.”

It seems safe to turn around and look at her, but just when I do, she stands and stretches. I stare at her again, her legs, her mouth, the confident way she slides her sunglasses onto her face.

Something about this woman is mesmerizing.

I clear my throat. “Stop by the counter on your way out, and my nurse will get you squared away. Don’t hesitate to call the office if your condition worsens.”

She stares up at me. “Your office?”

“Yes…”

She smiles. “Okay. I’ll call your office .”

She lingers at the door, and a long beat of silence ensues.

Finally, I nod. “Take care, Ms. Washington.”

And then she’s gone.

And I’m kicking myself. Again .

But there was nothing to be done. That’s a line I cannot and will not cross. When a woman is in my office, she’s a patient, and patients are off limits.

But I’d be lying to myself if I said I didn’t want her. No, I have to have that woman, and soon. So, what has to happen now is that I need to see her again.

And when I do…

It’s on.