Page 39 of Owned (Office Intrigue Duet 8)
He looked good. Still just as wickedly handsome as I remembered, still lean and muscled. He’d probably look damn fine naked.
Not that I wanted to see him naked. Nope.
“You don’t look like a doctor,” I groused.
“Would you like to see my license?”
Yep, still ornery. “Maybe.”
“Perhaps another time. Right now, I’d like to recline the chair so I can take a look at you.”
“A little forward for a submissive, no?” I countered, opening my eyes fully and meeting his.
We were locked in that moment for long seconds, neither of us moving, no one saying a word. I tried to force back the memories of a time better forgotten, but it was nearly impossible. Of all the people I’d ever expected to see again, Jasper Tate was not one of them.
“If I recall correctly, I’m no longer your submissive,” he stated firmly, his tone reflecting the hurt and anger I remembered from so long ago.
True. He wasn’t. However, it hadn’t been by my choice.
I attempted to sit up straight, the move making me grunt.
“Just give me something for the pain,” I told him, closing my eyes once more and relaxing into the buttery-soft leather.
“Not until I check you out.”
Only because it hurt to breathe did I relent. “Fine.”
I was aware of Jasper lifting the armrest, then my chair beginning to recline fully until I was completely flat.
Huh. Would you look at that? This chair made into a bed. Would’ve been nice if someone had clued me in earlier.
“You were run off the road?”
“Something like that. It’s all a bit fuzzy.”
Gentle fingers brushed my forehead and my eyes shot open. I stared up at Jasper and suddenly the pain dissipated almost instantly. Emotions swamped me. Memories of that long ago time, the hours I’d spent with this man, all the ways he’d submitted to me for the few years we were together. The defiance, the punishment, the amazing sex.
His hand shifted to my head, pressing lightly as though feeling for…
“I’m not concussed,” I stated, trying to turn my head away.
Jasper was having none of it, his other hand pressing against my jaw and holding my head still. “Headache?”
I met his gaze once more, and my inner Dominant sat up straight, rejecting the firm hand keeping me in place.
“Yes,” I bit out, reaching for his hand, curling my fingers around his wrist, intending to pull it away, but he stopped me, his grip loosening.
“I’ll be gentle, Ransom.”
He stood there, staring down at me as though he was waiting for my approval. I gave it to him in the form of a quick nod before I closed my eyes again.
If he expected me to get through this examination, no way could I watch him while he did it.
*
Jasper Tate
From here on out, I was going to insist Talon give me more information about the people he wanted me to check out. Had I known Ransom Bishop was the injured man who needed my attention, it was possible I would’ve donned a parachute and jumped out of the plane. Hippocratic Oath be damned.
Okay, maybe not. But at the very least, I would’ve prepared myself for seeing him again. Never in my wildest dreams would I have expected to come face-to-face with the sexy Dominant who’d turned my world upside down and left me flailing.
Not in this lifetime.
But this wasn’t a social call, and I didn’t need to know what the man had been doing for the past nine years just to diagnose what plagued him. My IQ was in the genius range; surely I could accomplish this task without being sucked into the past, dredging up memories better left buried. Hell, I’d graduated high school at fourteen, finished medical school by the time I was twenty-two. This I could handle.
When Ransom’s grip loosened on my wrist, I lightly swept his hair back from his forehead, inspected the small gash near his hairline. It didn’t look too bad. Mostly superficial. Stitches weren’t needed, but I would clean it and keep an eye on it.
“Where do you hurt?” I asked as I gently swept my fingers over the bruise on his face once he stopped glaring up at me, his eyes closing tightly.
“Everywhere.”
“More specific.”
“Every-fucking-where.”
Despite my efforts, I smiled. The man was very much the same as I remembered. Still ridiculously attractive even when his hard-chiseled face was slightly rounded from swelling, tinged black and blue, his brown hair longer than I remembered and currently sticking up every which way.
“Back, shoulders, legs?”
“Yes.”
“Head?”
“Both of them, yes,” he growled softly.
Of course Ransom would go there. I hadn’t been referring to that part of his anatomy, but leave it to my former Dominant, and the only man I’d ever loved, to turn a perfectly innocent examination into something sexual. That was the way Ransom Bishop operated. From the first day I met him, his internal setting had been adjusted to sex, and it looked like it was still dialed there.
