Page 270 of The Doctors Will See You Now

It was only the sudden movement of Nicole hopping to her feet that pulled my attention away from my snack fixation. If you ever want someone to want something so badly they can hardly breathe, tell them they can’t have it.

“Oh! Scotty! Over here!” she whisper-yelled toward the main aisle, and my gaze followed her line of sight.

A tall, dark, and handsome drink of a man—at least that was how he appeared from my current shoulder, back, and tight ass view—stood a few feet away from my seat scanning the room across from us. The sound of Nicole’s voice did as she intended, though, grabbing his attention and turning it—and his body—toward us. Familiar chocolate brown eyes flashed with recognition when he finally spotted Nicole, and I nearly fell out of my seat.

Holy shit. It’s Scott Shepard.

What were the fucking odds?

“Scotty,” Nicole whispered again, for what purpose, I didn’t know and didn’t care. I was too busy hyperventilating. Dr. Erotic grinned as he strode toward our aisle.

The chances were fifty-fifty, whether he would give us his back or his front for the theater aisle shuffle, but as he got close, turning to the side and rearranging his feet to slide in, I knew I’d lost the odds. Fuck. He’s giving us the face.

Holy moly, I could not believe Scott Shepard’s mother was the one who’d been chatting with my father for the past twenty minutes.

I should have bought a fucking lottery ticket.

I did my best to shield my face with my hand, but my father was no help. Nudging me to stand up and let Scott into our row, he had no idea what a terrible fucking job he was doing of covering for me until it was too late. Even then, he didn’t really know what a clusterfuck he’d created. But I knew. Boy, did I know.

“Excuse me,” Scott said as the front of his body got close enough to heat the front of mine. It was nothing more than a polite statement to apologize for such an intimate position, but when his eyes locked with mine, recognition instantly set in. It took a moment for his mind to catch up with his eyes, but when it did, a slow, easy smirk kissed his lips. I wasn’t sure if it was all in my head, but it felt like it took him a tremendously long time to move on from me to the empty spot beside his mother.

“Scott,” his mother said the second his extremely fine ass touched his seat. “We have the best seat mates tonight.” She tossed a soft smile directly at my father.

“It appears that way,” he responded with a grin and a brief, and surprisingly not violent, glance in my direction.

Relief set in when it appeared that he might have just recognized me from my stint in his ER and hadn’t yet realized I was, in fact, the gossip columnist who’d written a few, and slightly embellished, articles about him.

Okay. This can work, Harlow. Just play it cool and avoid saying your name at all costs.

But that hope only lasted for all of ten seconds.

“I’m Bill Paige, by the way,” my dad introduced himself and shook Scott’s hand. “And this is my daughter, Harlow.”

Ah, fuck.

It was a real fucking shame Scott was such a smart guy. If he’d been stupid, it might at least have taken him a little longer to make the connection that was sure to ruin my night.

“Harlow Paige? As in the Harlow Paige from the Gossip column?” he questioned.

Goddammit…

“Yep,” my dad answered proudly. All I could think was uh-oh. “That’s my Harlow. Are you familiar with her work?”

“It’s you?” Scott’s—now glistening—eyes never left me. “I thought your name was Frances?”

How in the fuck did he know my first name?

My eyes all but bugged out of my head. My chart. “You said you weren’t going to look at my name.”

“I accidentally saw your name, you know, when I was signing off on your file,” he responded cynically. “It’s kind of a job hazard, Frances. Or should I call you Harlow? It’s kind of hard to keep up.”

“Frances is her first name, but she doesn’t go by it,” my father kindly explained for me, somehow not catching on to the underlying animosity. “She hated that name as a kid, and by the time she turned ten, she would only answer to her middle name—Harlow.” My father’s expression turned puzzled as he glanced back and forth between us. “Wait…signing off on your file? How do you two know each other?”

“We met a few weeks ago.” Scott’s mouth morphed into a cocky fucking smirk, and I wanted to strangle him. “HIPAA violations prevent me from being able to give the details, but Harlow could explain the situation that introduced us,” he added, and I could hear the amusement in his voice. “That is, if she wants to.”

Oh yeah, I’d love to tell my father a head laceration that occurred during sex was the reason I’d met Scott. What a fucking asshole.

“Oh! Did the two of you meet at the hospital?” Nicole asked innocuously. She couldn’t see the patch of thorns she was wading into for all the blinding love for her “do-gooder” son.