Jamison (Beautiful Mine #3) (10 page)

“Jamison,” I said, cheeks burning red as if I’d been caught doing something I wasn’t supposed to. “What are you doing here?”

He held up two paper bags. “Brought you a late dinner. Have you eaten yet?”

I shook my head as he walked toward me, unloading the bags on the counter in front of me.

“Think you can close up shop a little early tonight?” he asked.

I glanced outside at the blistering January night. We’d been dead most of the night. And Mia was on her date. She wouldn’t know if I closed up a half hour ahead of schedule, anyway.

“Sure.” I walked around the counter and clicked the sign off and turned the lock on the door, watching as he pulled Styrofoam container after Styrofoam container from one of the bags. From the other bag, he pulled out a gray, merino wool blanket and spread it out on the floor. “Can you hit the lights?”

I flipped the lights off and he pulled a couple of small candles from one of the bags, striking a match and lighting them before carefully setting them down around the blanket. Only Jamison could take something so ordinary and make it magical.

JAMISON

“Thanks for meeting me,” I said the following night, staring across the table at an older version of myself. It was almost like looking into a mirror, only I barely knew the asshole looking back at me.

My father unfolded his napkin and placed it in his lap, his dark eyes burning into mine. They were the only features of his I didn’t have, and I was quite certain every time he looked into my eyes he hated that he was reminded of my mother.

“I was in the city,” he said. “It worked out.”

“You’re a tough man to track down,” I said, taking a sip of the scotch I’d ordered earlier to calm my nerves as I waited for him. My body tensed in his presence, the way it always did when we’d see each other once in a blue moon. As a child, I’d fantasized about having the kind of doting father my friends always had, the kind of dad who would throw a football with me in the yard or hoist me up on his shoulders during parades and ruffle my hair as he looked at me like I was the best thing since sliced bread. Instead I got Dr. James Fowler, number one neurosurgeon in the United States of America. Top five in the world.

And my stepfather, Arthur, was a second-rate stand in. I’d never met a more self-serving, spineless excuse for a man than him. Everyone thought the pot-bellied, balding man with the kind smile and jovial laugh was harmless. I knew better. He was nothing but my mother’s minion, and as long as he stayed loyal and kept her happy, she rewarded him with a generous bank account.

My father’s impossible-to-please persona and my unquenchable need for a taste of unconditional love was what fueled me. The number one driving factor that made me who I was sat across from me, annoyed as if he were doing me some sort of favor by having dinner with his son.

When I’d graduated from Johns Hopkins, I’d sent him an invitation to the ceremony. He showed up. Clapped for me. Even took a picture with me. When I asked him what he was doing after the ceremony, he mumbled something about meeting an old colleague for dinner. He wasn’t there to support me. He wasn’t there because he was proud of me. He was there because I made him look good. I was nothing but bragging rights and an excuse to fly into town to have dinner with some old friends.

“I’m speaking at the Garrison Convention in Midtown,” he said, sipping his still water and scanning the room. As per usual he was completely disengaged, and I could only imagine how he badly wished he were anywhere but there. With me.

“I saw an article about your latest research the other day on peripheral nerve surgery,” I said. “Featured in the American Journal of Neurology. Nice work.” Small talk with him pained me. I wanted to crawl out of my skin, and each second that ticked by was pure torture. I drew a deep breath, forcing myself to smile and be pleasant. I wasn’t there for me. I was there for her.

He shrugged, as if it were just another day for him. Another award given to him for a job well done. Another plaque on the wall. “How’s your mother?”

It was the dreaded question that always came up anytime we were together, though it never made any sense. He’d abandoned her when I was not quite six, but I was old enough to remember everything about that day. It was the day he turned my warm and loving mother into an ice queen with a heart of frozen steel.

She was never the same after he left. Shortly after the divorce, she changed my last name from Fowler to Garner, after her side of the family, as if to get one last dig at him for leaving us.

But he didn’t care. He didn’t try to stop it.

“She’s good,” I lied. I hadn’t spoken to her in years, but he didn’t deserve to know a damn thing. It was none of his business. He had stopped giving a shit about both of us the day he chose work and accolades over his family.

“And your brothers? What are their names again?” he asked, wrinkled corners of his brown eyes scrunched. Twenty-some years and he could never bother to remember the names of my two younger half-brothers.

“Julian passed away last year,” I said, neglecting to tell him that no one told me until after the fact. I grieved him silently, from afar, and ignored my mother’s passive aggressive tactic to try to hurt me for leaving Kansas—and for leaving her.

“Sorry to hear that,” he said, though he couldn’t be bothered to put an ounce of gentility into his tone.

“Jude is living in California,” I said. That was really all I knew about him. We’d lost touch over the years, as well.

“How is Nancy?” I asked, referring to his second wife. I always knew her name. Every summer, my mother would ship me off to my dad’s in the Hamptons for two weeks to spend time with him, but I spent most of my time with Nancy. My father was always working, and when he wasn’t, he was out on his boat. He taught me to sail, and that was about the only thing he’d ever taught me.

“Good. She’s good.” He took another sip of his water, not bothering to elaborate and probably knowing that none of it mattered anymore, anyway.

Our server walked up and clasped his hands behind his back. “Hello. I’m Miguel, and I’ll be taking care of you tonight. Can I start you with any appetizers? We have parmesan encrusted—”

“No,” my father cut him off. “I’ll have a glass of Riesling. I won’t be staying for dinner.”

A slight panic stung my chest. The clock was ticking. I’d never asked my father for a single favor in my life, and already he couldn’t even be bothered to stay long enough to have dinner with me.

“I’m good.” My eyes burned into my father’s, my fists clenching beneath the table. I hated everything about that man, yet he held the power to save the one thing I gave a damn about anymore.

“So,
Dad
,” I said, clearing my throat. The title sounded unnatural and forced. “I have a small favor to ask you.”

With one eyebrow raised, he turned his attention toward me. “Okay.”

“I have a patient who needs surgery, only I can’t operate on her.”

He ran his hand up to the scruff of his cheek, a smile twisting upon his lips. I recognized that smile. It was mine.

“You know you shouldn’t be messing around with your patients, son,” he said, as if he were going to give me fatherly advice for the first time in his fifty-odd years.

“It’s complicated,” I said.

“It’s not Daphne, is it?”

Of course he remembered Daphne. He’d met her maybe twice in his life, but he’d never forget a pretty smile. Or long legs. Or the way she flirted with every man she ever came in contact with, including him.

“No. Not Daphne.”

He sat back in his seat, chuckling and looking at me as if I reminded him of a younger version of himself. His glory days, he called them. Those wondrous years after he left mom and me and spent his days working and his nights fucking everything that walked. I particularly recalled his penchant for young, pretty nurses. I wasn’t like him. Not at all. I had made sure of that.

“The surgery,” I said, getting back on track. “If you could fit her into your schedule. It’s a coiling procedure, but she needs it as soon as possible.”

“You know I’m booked out for months,” he objected.

“I’ll fly you in.” I wasn’t taking “no” for an answer. Perhaps another doctor in the city could’ve performed it, but I didn’t want Sophie to worry. She was convinced I was the best and didn’t want anyone else. My father was the best in the country. If I could get him to agree to do her procedure, she’d feel better about it. “You can perform the surgery at my hospital. I want her to recover here, where I can keep an eye on her.”

“You’re playing with fire, son,” he said, shaking his head and taking a sip of the white wine the server had just delivered. “I’d hate to see all those years of school and research down the drain over a hot piece of ass.”

“Trust me, you need not worry about me.”

You never have. Why start now?

“You’re really putting me in a bind here.” He swirled his wine and sniffed the rim of the glass. I wasn’t getting through to him.

“Please,” I said, trying to mask my disgust with kind words. “I’ve never asked you for a thing. I’m asking you now. Are you willing to work on my patient?”

He stopped what he was doing and looked across the table, his face softening for only a moment, as if he were looking into the eyes of a little boy asking his dad for help.

“Can you do it next week?” I asked, unable to stop pushing for the one thing I wanted and the one thing he owed me.

“Next week?” he scoffed, swiftly returning to arrogant-asshole mode. He sighed and shrugged, staring down at the table. “I’ll call my assistant and see if she can move my schedule around. You’re really putting me in a tough spot here, you know.”

“I know,” I said. “I appreciate this.”

He glanced down at his watch.

“Somewhere to be?” I asked.

He pushed himself out from the table, tossing his unused napkin over his place setting and downing the last of his wine. “I’ll be in touch.”

***

I found myself standing at Sophie’s door. Sometime during my walk home, I’d crossed the street across from my apartment, heading to her building and not my own. I had to see her.

I knocked on her door, praying she’d be home, and my prayers were answered the second the door pulled open and a smile spread across her pretty mouth.

“Evening, stranger,” she said, eyes sparkling as she placed a hand on her hip. Smears of paint on her cheek and chin and across the faded t-shirt that hugged her frame told me she was in the midst of crafting another masterpiece. “Come on in.”

I stepped into her warm apartment, pulling off my hat and unbuttoning my coat and setting them in the first place I could find. Sophie didn’t have a coat rack or any other type of organizational system that I could see.

She slid into my space, her arms slinking around my hips as she stood on her toes to kiss me. My entire relationship with Daphne was a series of carefully scheduled dates and events. Red marks all over my calendar, placed by Daphne herself, told me exactly where I had to be and when. Sophie was the exact opposite. Nothing was scheduled. Everything was of the moment. She brought out a spontaneous part of me I never knew existed before.

I placed my hands on her hips and pulled her in closer, tasting bergamot tea on her lips and smelling the warm musk that radiated from her wild hair.

“Let me show you what I’m working on,” she said, beaming proudly as her hand found mine. She led me across the apartment to her little studio. “It’s you.”

Against a backdrop of blues and grays was a portrait of me. Clear blue eyes stared back at me and a serious expression consumed my face.

“I haven’t been able to paint people or things for years,” she said, eyes glued to her work as if she couldn’t believe her hands had created such a thing. “Until you.”

I stood behind her, unable to resist her any longer. I moved her hair from her shoulder, exposing the flesh of her neck, and leaned in to taste it. Pressing my lips into her soft skin, I closed my eyes and breathed Sophie in. Pure, unadulterated intoxication filled my lungs as tiny gasps escaped her lips, responding to each peppered kiss.

She spun around, gripping me as she forced me backwards to her bed. We fell together, she on top of me, as she straddled her thighs around my lap. A force to be reckoned with and a hunger in her eyes like I’d never seen before, she lunged for my mouth. But I was hungrier. I wanted her more than she could ever possibly want me. I needed her like the air I breathed, like the hot blood that coursed through my body and kept me alive.