"Significantly elevated," he continued, moving the stethoscope again. "We'll need to determine the cause."
His voice was still maddeningly neutral. Clinical. Like he was dictating notes for a chart instead of touching a woman who was rapidly losing her mind.
He stepped back, and for a moment I felt the loss of his warmth acutely. Then he started to circle.
Slow. Deliberate.
"Turn, please. I need to examine your posterior."
I turned. Faced the wall where he'd hung a map of New York, territory lines and shipping routes marked in colored pins. Bratva business, probably. Now backdrop for whatever this was.
His fingers found my spine.
Not a medical touch. Nothing I'd learned in anatomy class or practiced during residency. Just fingertips trailing down vertebrae, one by one, pressing points that had nothing to do with neurology and everything to do with making me shake.
"Sensitivity appears heightened," he noted. Still that clinical voice. "Particularly in the thoracic region."
My medical brain tried to protest.The thoracic region is your mid-back, not an erogenous zone, this is ridiculous—
His hands moved to my hips. Pressing. Testing. Thumbs digging into the muscle just above my pelvis in a way that made my knees want to buckle.
"Here as well." He released the pressure, and I sagged slightly. "Significant tension in the gluteal area. Common in patients presenting with anxiety symptoms."
God, he was going to kill me. Death by medical roleplay. What a way to go.
His hands traced higher. Skimming my sides, brushing the curves of my waist, moving with the kind of thoroughness that suggested he intended to examine every single inch of me before this was over.
The undersides of my breasts.
His palms cupped them from behind, lifting slightly, testing weight in a way that had absolutely no diagnostic purpose whatsoever. My nipples were already hard—had been hard since I'd walked through the door—and when his thumb finally, deliberately, grazed across one, I couldn't stop the gasp that escaped.
He wrote something in the folder.
I didn't know when he'd retrieved it. Hadn't heard him pick it up. But there he was, scribbling notes with one hand while the other continued its "examination," and the absurdity of it all crashed into the arousal until I didn't know whether to laugh or moan.
"Nipples responsive to stimulation," he said, like he was noting it for medical records. "Consistent with elevated arousal state."
"That's not—" I started.
"Please remain quiet during the examination, Miss Cross. Unless you're reporting symptoms."
I shut my mouth. Pressed my lips together hard.
His hand trailed down my stomach. Slow. So fucking slow. Past my navel, along the soft skin below it, following the path that led inevitably to where I was desperate for him to touch.
"I'll need to check for inflammation," he said.
His fingers slid between my thighs.
I was wet. Had been wet since I'd stood outside the door, and the time since then had only made it worse. There was no hiding it—his fingers found slick heat immediately, parting me with clinical precision that felt like the opposite of clinical.
"Concerning," he murmured.
I could hear it now. The smile he was suppressing. The crack in his professional facade that said he wasn't nearly as unaffected as he was pretending to be.
"Significant fluid accumulation." His fingers moved, exploring, not quite giving me the pressure I needed. "This requires further investigation."
"Doctor—" The word came out strangled. Half plea, half protest.
