Fortune by Annabel Joseph (ebook reader for comics TXT) 📕

To her chagrin, she found she had never wanted him more.

She made her way through the throngs of hard, sweaty bodies and pounding drumbeats to the fresh coolness outside. She headed to a pay phone only to realize she had no change. She sweet-talked a lesbian in line out of some change and returned to the phone only to remember she didn’t know his number. She thought just a moment before she turned and began to walk. So convenient, that he lived in Cambridge. Cambridge was close, a few blocks walk. She knew his street and was fairly sure she would remember his house. She looked at her watch. It was nearly one. She hoped she remembered his house or she might really alarm somebody.

When she got to the door she thought was his, she knocked softly. If this wasn’t his house, she hoped no one answered with a gun. After another moment, she screwed up her courage and rang the bell. She had to be crazy. What was she doing here? She took a deep breath, a couple seconds away from aborting her mission, when the lock turned. The door swung open and he stood looking out at her through the storm door, rubbing his tousled hair. He was shirtless, in jersey gympants that rode low on his hips, drawing her eyes there. She quickly looked back up at his face, blushing.

He opened the door to let her into the foyer. “Kat. Are you okay? What are you doing here?”

It suddenly occurred to her that he had most certainly been sleeping. He probably had work early in the morning. God, he was probably going to screw up and kill someone on the operating table, all because she’d decided she had to see him tonight.

“I’m sorry I woke you.”

“I wasn’t sleeping. Answer my question. What are you doing here?” He looked over her shoulder, outside. “Did you walk?”

“I walked from Club Bronze. It wasn’t far.”

He made a face, a quiet sound of frustration. “And now here you are. It’s one in the morning. I called you several times today to see if you wanted to come over.”

“I…I didn’t answer.”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry. You have to understand…understand—”

“You need to understand this, Ekaterina,” he said, cutting her off in a curt, impatient voice. “If I let you in here, you’re not just going to take what you want and skip on home.”

“Take what I want? I don’t… I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

His jaw tightened. He reached behind her and opened the storm door. “Out.”

“Please…” She bit her lip, at a loss for words. She needed him, needed his help, but he was too annoyed to give it to her. She looked up at him in the semidarkness, at his nearly black eyes, his pursed, impatient lips. She felt guilty, desperate to mollify his irritated mood. “Please let me stay, Ryan. Please…I…I need you.”

“Why?” he asked sharply. “Why do you need me?”

“Because. Because…” She knew she had to come up with something plausible, something believable. “Because…” She put her hand over her heart, thought of her papa. “Because I feel something here. And it really hurts. Can you help me? You’re a doctor.”

His expression softened. He might have even chuckled softly under his breath. “Cardiac is not my field, Kat.” He put his hand on her waist, just a tentative brush of fingertips, but it held her immobile. He gazed at her, hard intention and seriousness again. “If I let you in, you’re spending the night with me. You’re sleeping in my bed until morning.”

“I’ll spend the whole week. I’ll spend the whole month in your bed if you want. Just please—”

Her voice cut off on a quaver as his arms came around her. He bent his head to her, nuzzled her neck, ran insistent fingers into her hair and tugged a little, tilting her head back. His lips settled over hers and she went loose and shivery in his arms. All the loneliness and confusion, all the numbness went away. He was warm and solid, clasping her close. He smelled fresh and clean, just-showered, not smoky and brittle like her. “I’m sorry,” she said, and “I missed you.” She breathed the words against his lips when he let her come up for air. He didn’t reply, only kissed her again, pressing against her so she felt the solid outline of his cock against her front.

“It’s late,” she whispered then.

“Never too late,” he whispered back, leading her toward his room.

She felt a strange peace, a warm fuzziness as he pulled her down the hall behind him. She felt it in her chest and in her pelvis. She loved the way his hand clasped hers so tightly. She gazed up at his broad back and straight shoulders as she followed him, stared at the movement of his hips. A faint light issued from his room and again she felt guilt that she had awakened him.

But as she slipped behind him into the bedroom, she saw he hadn’t been sleeping at all. His bed was covered in a mess of glossy multicolored paper squares and already folded cranes. There were piles of them, perhaps a hundred or more. He looked sheepish for a moment, the corner of his lip drawn up in a self-deprecating smile. “I make them sometimes when I’m anxious. Frustrated.” He moved to the bed and swept them to the floor in a careless movement that startled her.

“Oh, Ryan. They’ll break. They’ll get crushed down there.”

He spun to her. His dark eyes blinked, once, twice. “They’re only paper. Isn’t that what you said once? You’re more important right now. Come here.”

She went to him, feeling mournful about the swiped-away, scattered figures. “What are you so anxious about?” She thought of the stressful work he did, complicated surgeries and consultations.

“You,” he growled. He kissed her again, harder, deeper, his fingers fumbling with the zipper at the back of her dress. She sensed anger in