“Speaking of horses, Trevor told me to invite you over for a free riding lesson some time.” Charlie sat back, his shoulder bumping hers. “If you’re not too much of a city girl to consider it.”

  “Offer accepted,” she said. “I could use a hobby out here in the Bend.”

  “I noticed.” Charlie grinned, but it wasn’t his usual lascivious smirk. Dylan chanced a smile back and felt warmer for it. “And I didn’t mean what I said about Sabrina earlier. I think the two of you’d get along famously.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. I should know.”

  “Because you know famous?” she guessed.

  “Because you and I get along great, and don’t pretend we don’t.”

  Dylan blew a dark wisp of hair out of her eyes and grabbed for the popcorn. She was good at pretending when she needed to be—at covering her feelings with a professional smile—but tonight she felt transparent and brittle as glass. The way Charlie looked at her, it was like he could see her, and everything she kept tucked away behind her mask.

  “Admit it,” said Charlie. “I’m growing on you.”

  Dylan didn’t admit it. She didn’t say anything at all. But she felt secure and sheltered in the crook of Charlie’s arm, and here in the darkness, she felt safe enough to be herself. She could allow herself that, just for tonight, and in the morning, she would go back to fending off his advances. It was their dance, the performance they put on for his management and her supervisors, but here, free from prying eyes, she could let all that drop.

  “This is nice,” Charlie said. He turned to look at her. “No offense, but I think you’re actually less…uptight outside the hospital.”

  “I’m not uptight,” Dylan said defensively. “I’m just…strict.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And even if I wasn’t, Lockhart Bend General is a strict setting. There’s no room to mess around.” She turned toward him, and was surprised to find him so near. Had he inched closer when she wasn’t looking? The heat radiating off him was like a furnace. She might burn up if she got too close, but she couldn’t retreat now without attracting notice. Dylan straightened instead, to sit a little taller. “But you knew that already,” she pointed out. “I assumed that’s why you don’t like it there.”

  “What makes you think I don’t like it?” Charlie asked her. The question felt strangely pointed. Charlie’s easy smile hadn’t faded, but Dylan caught a hint of something else behind his eyes, that same spark of panic she thought she’d spotted in her office, just before he hit her up with a bad pickup line.

  Maybe it was time to change things up. Maybe it was time for her to inject some levity into the proceedings. Dylan pulled away with a snort and stole the popcorn. “Come on, all those rules? Applying to you?” She tossed a piece of popcorn and caught it in her mouth. “You must be going crazy. Everyone on your management team seems to think I’m the one keeping you in line, but I think we both know that’s bullshit. You do what you want. That’s why I’m here tonight, because I really do think you want to get better. You might play the fool, but you’re serious about football. And maybe you’re ready to get serious about your rehab.”

  “Maybe I am,” he admitted. “Even if that means subjecting myself to Lockhart Bend General.”

  “So you do hate it.”

  “Watch the movie,” he commanded. He grabbed a handful of popcorn, and Dylan had to react quickly to prevent the bowl from falling. As soon as she had righted it and looked up again, she realized the move had been a distraction tactic, allowing Charlie time to look away. For a while, they watched in silence, passing the popcorn back and forth. Then Charlie nudged her gently, and bent to catch her eye.

  “I didn’t mean that before, about you being uptight,” he said. “Or I did, but uptight’s the wrong word. Uptight’s a mean teacher, or a librarian going shh. You’re more like…you take yourself seriously, more than anyone I’ve met.”

  Dylan stiffened at that, and pulled away. “That’s just another way of saying uptight.”

  “It isn’t,” said Charlie, but Dylan was on a roll.

  “I take my job seriously. And I expect folks to respect that—patients and doctors, administrators, your people. When I say use your crutches, it’s not just me saying that. It’s based on thousands of doctors who came before me, and all their research, their trial and error. I’ve studied all of that, so I can help you. Do I take that seriously? Damn right I do, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll do the same.”

  Charlie sat back, his eyes widening slightly. “Hey, hey, I get it. I do respect you. If you thought I didn’t—”

  Dylan waved him off, her anger draining away. “It’s not you I’m mad at. You’re my patient, and I get it, what you’re going through. Does it frustrate me when you ignore my orders? Hell, yeah, it does, but at least you listen. At least you don’t talk over me, like that damn Smitty.”

  “He does that to everyone,” said Charlie. “But, yeah, it sucks.”

  Dylan leaned back, and the couch sagged beneath her, sliding her back into Charlie’s embrace. This time, she went with it, glad for the comfort. It felt good to be heard, and Charlie did listen. He saw her, he noticed her, and he understood her frustration. It had been a while since she’d had the chance to just vent.

  “You were right,” she said, smiling. “I do take myself seriously, but shouldn’t we all? Sometimes tooting your own horn’s the only way you’ll be heard.” She chanced a glance up at him and saw he was nodding. “How about you? Do you take anything seriously, besides football?”

  “Not really,” said Charlie. “I’m not a deep guy. Football’s about it for me, always has been.”

  “I don’t believe you.” Dylan laughed at his look of surprise. “I mean, of course I believe you take football seriously. I just don’t believe it’s the only thing you take seriously.”

  “Then you’d be the first,” Charlie said. “C’mon. You can’t deny that when you look at me, you see a—”

  “Dumb jock?” she supplied.

  Charlie shot her a wounded look. “I was going to say sex god, or maybe an unrepentant ladies’ man with great comedic timing. Fun as hell to be around, but not exactly the guy you take home to Mom.”

  “Maybe that’s just what you want the world to see,” Dylan suggested. “Or at least, what your management team wants the world to see. You don’t have to live up to the hype if you don’t want to.”

  “Don’t I?”

  “Not with me you don’t.”

  The living room lapsed into silence, punctuated only by the pop-pop of an onscreen shoot-out. The tension between them had faded throughout their conversation, but now that Charlie had gone quiet, it was building again. Had she said the wrong thing? Offended him somehow?

  Charlie shifted and grimaced, and she became instantly alert. “What is it? Your knee?” She moved to steady his leg. What could have aggravated it? Just sitting still? She hadn’t felt him move it—then again, they’d been cuddled so close, it was more than possible that she had moved in a way that…

  “No, Doc. Not my knee. I just realized I might be out of conversation. I’m used to talking football, when I’m not engaged in…other activities.”

  “Uh-huh.” She pressed her lips together, suppressing a smile to let him know she didn’t believe him. The corner of Charlie’s own mouth hitched up.

  “Don’t believe me?”

  “I don’t doubt your prowess, when it comes to, ah, other activities. But I doubt your conversational repertoire is limited to sex and football,” she said. “You grew up on a ranch. You must know horses. And, hey, you like Westerns. We’ve got that in common. Like it or not, I think I’m coming to understand you better, Charlie Wild.”

  “That goes both ways,” said Charlie. Dylan waited for the brow-waggle, the double entendre, but Charlie just smiled. The look in his eyes teetered between delight and surprise, like she’d shown him something he’d never seen before. Dylan found herself transfixed by his rapt gaze. She tried not to squirm beneath it, or even breathe, for fear of interrupting whatever private revelation had just sparked in his head.

  God, didn’t every girl dream of catching a man off guard and making him see her as if she was special? The first of her kind he had ever laid eyes on? That was the way Charlie was looking at her, and what was she thinking, meeting his eye?

  They both looked away at the same moment. Dylan sat forward and cleared her throat. When that didn’t prove effective in slowing her pulse, she grabbed a handful of popcorn and stuffed it in her mouth. She felt Charlie’s fingers toying with her hair. She didn’t think he’d even noticed he was doing it, and she said nothing to draw attention to the fact.

  “More?” Charlie rattled the popcorn bowl at her. They had already reduced its contents to kernels.

  “I never say no to popcorn.” Dylan grinned, remembering how they’d met. “But I’ll get it. You rest your knee.”

  Charlie pulled a face. “No. You’re my guest. You sit your ass back down.”

  “Something tells me you don’t usually talk to your guests that way. And anyway, if I’m anything, I’m your doctor.” She held her hand out for the bowl, and Charlie held it away from her. She lunged after it and he rolled to one side, forcing her into a surprised retreat as he stood.

  “Charlie, I mean it. I don’t want you aggravating that leg any more than you already—”

  “Ah!” The knee gave beneath him, and he pitched forward as if on cue. Dylan held her hands out to catch him, but she knew she wouldn’t be able to support his full weight. Charlie seemed to come to the same realization, because he dropped the bowl and twisted, falling back on the couch with a pained grunt. Dylan fell forward, caught in his momentum, and collapsed on top of him.

  “Ouch,” said Charlie.

  “What did I say? You need to rest it, not—”

  “I know, I know.” Charlie’s hands came up to steady her as she straightened. His touch set off alarm bells deep in her head, but she didn’t move off him immediately in case she jostled his knee. No getting up off the patient until she figured out exactly how they were entangled.

  “Hold still,” she said.

  Charlie’s hand slid down her waist to press against the small of her back. Dylan tried not to shudder in response to his touch. She was straddling him, bending over him, practically in his lap. His pulse was racing, keeping time with her own. And was that a banana in his pocket, or Charlie’s erection swelling against her thigh?

  If that was his cock, the length was absolutely dizzying. She managed to keep her gaze from flicking down, but there was no sense pretending she hadn’t noticed. Charlie’s flush said he knew she knew, and the hooded look in his eyes dared her to do something about it. Dylan propped her forearm against his chest, trying to reestablish some boundaries above the belt.

  “Don’t be embarrassed,” she murmured.

  “I’m not.”

  “It’s perfectly natural. It happens to— Wait, you’re not?”

  “If a beautiful woman falls in my lap, there’d be something wrong with me if I didn’t react.” His other hand slid up to tangle in her hair. Dylan resisted the urge to arch into his touch. His fingers tightened, and white sparks of pleasure-pain erupted along the back of her neck and skull.

  “We need to get you up,” said Dylan.

  “I am up.”

  “Not funny.”

  “It is, kind of,” said Charlie, his voice a low growl. She felt his chest rumble, and her body caught fire. Charlie’s lips brushed her ear, the touch not quite a kiss. “Would it really be so bad, if we let ourselves…” His hand slid from her hair to cup her cheek, his touch so gentle and reverent her heart skipped a beat. He turned his head, and Dylan’s eyes fluttered shut, and Charlie’s breath grazed her lips, and—

  “No. No, we can’t.” She caught him by the wrists and pushed him away, straightening up to put space between them. Every inch of her body yearned for more, for Charlie’s bold touches mapping her curves. But she was his doctor, and Charlie was her patient. His knee needed her attention, not his damn cock.

  “One kiss,” he said.

  “Absolutely not.” She was in full-on doctor mode now. She should have been in full-on doctor mode all along—he was her patient, for God’s sake, not a hookup. He needed her expertise, not her lips on his. “I never should have done that. Any of that.”

  “We did it,” said Charlie. “Both of us together. We’re equally responsible for what just almost happened.” He arched an eyebrow at her. “Or did you think you were taking advantage of me?”

  “I am taking advantage.” Dylan was determined to get through to him. To get through to both of them, since she clearly needed a reminder of where her boundaries lay. “I’m your doctor. You’re my patient. It’s absolutely against the rules.” She knelt without looking at him to examine his knee, palpating the joint with a careful touch. The muscles twitched and stiffened, and she knew he was in pain—though, not enough pain to affect his erection. It still stood at half mast, too close for comfort. Charlie leaned back, accentuating the bulge.

  “So, what you’re saying is, it’d be naughty to continue. You could always spank me, if—”

  “No.”

  “I could spank you.”

  Dylan blushed furiously. She didn’t hate that idea. “On a scale of one to ten, how bad is your pain?”

  “About a four,” said Charlie. “Unless you count my blue balls. Those’ll be—”

  “Nope.” Dylan let out a snort at that. She hated how easily Charlie could make her laugh. She hated that suggestive look in his eyes, an open invitation to break all the rules. How delicious it would be just to give in. And how destructive.

  She pushed back the dark, snarled curtain of her hair, trying to banish the knots his fingers had made.

  “It’d be far worse than naughty,” she said, for her own benefit as much as Charlie’s. “It would be taboo, but not in the fun sense. This is the kind of taboo that ends in lawsuits.”

  “I wouldn’t sue you,” said Charlie. “And it would be fun.”

  Dylan growled in frustration. “There’s a balance of power at play here, Charlie. It would be unethical for me to press any advantage I have over you—acknowledged or otherwise.” She crossed her arms to punctuate the point.

  Charlie fell back against the couch cushions, spread out like a particularly tasty deli platter. Delicious, really, but no. No. Just no.

  “I get it,” he said. “But admit that rule’s stupid.”

  Dylan said nothing as she repositioned his leg, propping it up carefully so it wouldn’t move.

  “Look at me,” said Charlie, when she didn’t respond. “No one has ever taken advantage of me in my life. I could be down both legs and an arm, and I’d still be in charge of the situation. Or at least totally complicit in it. You don’t have to feel bad about what almost happened.”

  Dylan sighed deeply. Part of her did feel bad, but that part wasn’t the problem. The problem was, she still wanted him, maybe more than ever.

  “I’m going to get you an ice pack,” she said at last. She turned on her heel and walked resolutely toward the kitchen. “Do not move from that couch. I’ll be right back.”

  “Would it count as doctoring if you kissed my knee better?” Charlie called after her.

  Dylan paused in the kitchen doorway. She took a deep breath, summoning all her self-control, then turned around. “I want you to keep that leg iced and elevated.” She was a machine reading off an internal script. “Barring trips to the bathroom, I want you to stay where you are for the rest of the night. I’m going to grab you a blanket and pillow and help you get situated, and then I’m going to go.”

  “I don’t need help getting situated,” Charlie growled, reaching down to adjust the front of his pants. Dylan knew she shouldn’t smile or take any sort of pleasure in the state she had left him in, but if she had to suffer, then so should he. She wanted him too, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t.

  “Hang tight,” she advised him, and turned away. She took her time in the kitchen, tidying up, breathing deep to restore her shattered calm. Be as cold as the ice pack, Dylan, she thought as she pulled open Charlie’s freezer. Cold as the ice pack. And when you get home…you’ll have earned yourself a hot date with a cold, cold shower.

  She touched her lips with chilly fingers, and let out a sigh. She’d tasted forbidden fruit, and she wanted more. Wanted it badly, but Charlie Wild was off-limits.

  “It’s different for him,” she whispered into her hand. Charlie kissing his doctor, that was no big deal, one more minor scandal in his storied career. But if she crossed that line again, her career could be forfeit. Everything she’d worked for, all up in smoke.

  Boundaries—she needed boundaries. And that cold shower.

  4

  CHARLIE

  “Quit looking at me like that,” Dylan whispered ferociously.

  “Like what?” Charlie asked. He knew exactly what she meant. He just wanted to hear her say it.

  Dylan sighed and leaned away from her office desk, pushing her hair out of her eyes. He still remembered the way it had felt wrapped around his fingers. He liked how the dark, voluminous waves framed her face, but he couldn’t help imagining the possibilities if she kept it secured in a ponytail. He could wrap it around his fist, steering the movements of her head. He imagined her kneeling down between his legs, that scowling, curvaceous mouth wrapped around his…

  “You’re doing it again,” Dylan hissed.

  He clung to his fantasy—Dylan bent beneath him, her creamy shoulders dotted with perspiration, her ponytail fisted in his hand as he positioned himself behind her…

  “Charlie!”

  Charlie started in his chair. Like most furniture at the hospital, the seat was several sizes too small for him. The legs seemed ready to buckle beneath his weight at any moment, and letting his doctor scare the hell out of him wasn’t improving his chances of staying upright.

  Dylan seemed to have buckled legs on her mind as well. “Mr. Wild,” she overcorrected herself, “I would appreciate it if you…if I could have your attention while we discuss your progress.”