that would not end. Opening the folder, she reviewed the Reason for Visit: patient injured at strip club. Attacked by bouncer during lap dance. Pain in left eye, left cheek, jaw, abdomen and right ribs.
Ali listened outside the door before knocking. All was quiet until a male voice called out, “Come in.”
“My name is Allison,” she said as she pushed the wedge under the door to keep it open. “I’ll be your nurse.” Before entering, she evaluated the room’s four occupants—three visitors with their dress pants and button-down shirts disheveled, two of whom were slumped in chairs, one leaning with his back to the wall. They looked tired. Sedate.
Good. She placed the patient chart on the counter by the sink and walked toward the dark-haired man sitting with his bare legs hanging over the side of the stretcher, his head hanging low, both arms braced at his hips, not quite holding him steady. “Can you tell me how much you’ve had to drink tonight?”
She placed her hand on his wrist to take his pulse and began her assessment. AOB—alcohol on breath.
He looked up. “Enough to make you the most beautiful woman in the world.”
“Gee, thanks.” Left eye swollen, partially closed, mild bruising, dried blood in the outer corner. Left cheek swollen and red. Dried blood noted to the left nostril.
He blinked as if trying to clear his vision. “Ali?” He lowered his eyes to her name badge. “Well, hot damn.” He turned to his friends, swayed and latched on to the bedrail for support. “Looks like my chances of getting lucky are on the rise, my friends.”
Hell. A guy she knew from high school. His face battered, she hadn’t recognized him. “Your pulse is fine.” She snapped the plastic covering over the thermometer probe. “Hold this under your tongue.”
“There are other things I’d rather do with my tongue.” He stuck said body part out and flicked it rapidly from side to side. His friends snickered.
“And as soon as you leave the E.R., you can do them all,” Ali replied. “But right now I need you to lift it and hold this thermometer under it.”
He smiled and slid the probe between his closed lips. Slowly.
Ali took a moment to return to the chart to document his pulse rate and learn his name. Robert Braylor. Oh, no.
Bobby “B.B.” Braylor.
A beep sounded. Bobby’s sojourn into silence ended. “Ali here is my favorite backseat cowgirl,” he said. “She likes a hard ride. Isn’t that right, Cream Cheese?”
Cream Cheese. Bobby’s high school nickname for her. Because her thighs were so easily spreadable. As a stupid teenage girl she’d found it amusing. As an adult she recognized it for what it was, a shameful and humiliating moniker for a girl so desperate for affection and love she’d tried to find them in the arms of boys who’d doled them out in ten-minute increments. Usually while half dressed, in the backseat of a car, in the woods, or, if she was lucky, in a bed when no grown-ups were around. Good for sex and nothing more.
Ali considered walking out of the room, letting someone else deal with Bobby. But no. She was a trained professional, skilled at handling every type of patient. So she ignored his rude comments and proceeded with her evaluation. The sooner she finished the quicker she could leave, without shirking her duties.
Removing the blood-pressure cuff from the metal basket on the back wall, she fastened it to Bobby’s upper arm. “After I take your blood pressure I’ll get Dr. Padget. He’ll probably want some X-rays.”
Ali tightened the cuff around Bobby’s arm, ignoring a twinge of dread at the thought of Bobby meeting Jared, the two of them discussing her, Bobby reinforcing Jared’s opinion of her. Instead she listened through her stethoscope, focusing on the beats while she watched the mercury in the sphygmomanometer drop. One eighteen over seventy-four. Ali removed the cuff and placed it back in the basket.
In the few seconds it took to reach over the head of the bed, Bobby stood, grabbed her by the waist and ground himself against her butt. “I’ve got another pressure that needs tending before you go.”
Ali swung her upper body around. They were alone—the visitors had left, closing the door to the room behind them. “Stop it, Bobby.”
“Come on, Ali.” He ran a hand up her belly to her chest and squeezed her breast. Hard. “For old times’ sake.”
“No.” She tried to pull away, did not want this. She was a different person now, didn’t sleep around anymore.
He turned her to face him, pushed her back into the wall, forced his body against hers, making it difficult to expand her chest to take a breath. He jammed his erection between her legs. She tried to move. Couldn’t. Alcohol had not affected his strength one bit. When had he gotten so tall? Aggravation turned to fear.
“I know I was one of your favorites,” he said.
Because ten years ago he’d had a car, a fake ID and a never-ending supply of money for beer and cigarettes. For a wayward fifteen-year-old girl looking to escape her life, he had been the perfect date.
“I need you so bad,” he said, moving one of his hands to the back of her head, crushing her mouth to his so hard she tasted blood. His other hand fumbled with the drawstring of her scrub pants.
“Get your hands off of me,” Ali yelled. She tried to twist away, to lift her knee. Neither worked. So she bit his lip. When he jerked back his head she screamed, “Help! Dr. P. Anyone. Help!” She prayed someone would hear her.
“Quiet, Ali.” He clamped his hand over her mouth. “You know you want it. You always wanted it.”
CHAPTER TWO
JARED was on the computer behind the front desk of the E.R., checking a patient’s lab results, when Ali cried out for help. Without hesitation, he closed down the confidential screen, jumped to his feet, his chair rolling into the file cabinet behind him with a loud bang and ran in the direction of her scream.
The door to Exam Room One, where Ali had gone to admit a new patient, was closed. Jared slammed it open. A tall man, the back of his hospital gown flapping open, exposing his red and blue plaid boxer shorts, had Ali pinned to the wall, one arm clamped around her waist, holding her, while his hips jabbed in her direction and a hand behind her head crushing her lips to his while she fought to turn her head and push away.
“Get your hands off my nurse,” Jared said, keeping his voice deadly calm, trying not to escalate the situation.
“Easy, Doc,” the assaulter said with a minimal slur. “Ali and I go way back. We were just getting reacquainted.”
Ali struggled in his hold. “We were not. Let go of me, Bobby.”
“I’d listen to the lady,” Jared said, walking into the room, one careful step at a time, letting the door close behind him. “Or you’re going to find yourself flat on your back on that stretcher, in four-point restraints, with a garbage bag full of ice on your groin.” He walked up next to Bobby, close enough to smell the booze on his breath and see the lust in his bloodshot eyes. “Here in the emergency room, that’s the only treatment we offer for swollen genitalia.”
“Come
