She cocked her head to the side, thinking. “Have you ever seenThe Princess Bride?”
“Nope.”
“No?!” Her outrage was downright cute. She hopped off my lap and headed for the front room, using the moist towelette on the way. I grabbed the other one, knowing my face was probably as messy as hers. I hadn’t cared while we’d been in the moment, but I didn’t want to spend the whole night with food on my face. I was trying to impress this woman, after all.
She swiped the remote and then scowled at it. “Do you have movies on demand?”
I gently took it from her fingers. “Yes. Though I hardly use it. I think I’m dating a movie connoisseur.”
“I have seen a lot of movies.” Emma chuckled. “The winters in Montana can get long and cold. Besides, if you want a romantic movie, this is a classic.”
“I’m not complaining,” I answered as I started a search for the film.Emma sat down and grabbed the throw off the back, tucking her legs up to one side. “I’ll take any excuse I can come up with to sit with you.”
Emma playfully tugged my arm. “Saved you a spot.”
I leaned against the corner of the couch, and Emma snuggled up next to me. I didn’t care what she wanted to watch—it could have been medical films, for all I cared. As long as she was sitting next to me, I was content.
She gave commentary through the movie. I could see why she liked it, it fit her quirky sense of humor perfectly.
Somewhere about ¾ of the way through the movie, her comments stopped. I moved so I could see her face and found her lashes resting peacefully against her cheeks as she breathed evenly.
I must be in a dream. My regular life was not this wonderful. Emma was an angel, and I worried that if I blinked, I’d wake up and she’d be gone.
I thought of the perfect kisses we’d shared, and the sense that Westley and Buttercup were meant to be together, bound by the bonds of true love. And I realized right then and there that I felt the same about Emma.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Emma
Monday morning, I breezed into work with a smile on my face. I couldn’t have wiped it off if I wanted too. Alex had put it there, and there was no way to remove it. Some of the nurses gave me a hard time about dating a doc. News traveled fast inside these walls of healing. But I didn’t care. For the first time in a long time, I was happy.
Getting all bubbly and excited over a man was something I hadn’t thought would ever happen again. I’d thought I was too jaded because of my divorce. So it was pretty amazing that I felt like everything that happened between us was the first time it’d ever happened to me. Although Eric hadn’t made me feel this way—why I’d ever married him was beyond me.
I was charting outside room #5 when Becca walked by, not stopping to deliver her news. “Dr. McDreamy is by room 3 if you want to say hi.”
“Thanks, Becca,” I hollered after her. I hadn’t seen her much lately, as I had been with Alex most of my days off, but Becca didn’t seem to mind. She was a low-maintenance friend, and I had never been more grateful.
I finished charting the saline bag I’d just hung, and I was on my way to see Alex when a code was called out on the overhead paging system. “Code Blue, ER, Trauma Bay 1. Cold Blue, ER, Trauma Bay 1.”
Alex hadn’t seen me, but I caught a glimpse of his white coat as he sprinted to the stairwell that would take him to the ER.
“Go get ’em, tiger,” I said under my breath as he raced away.
I turned around to go back to the nurses’ station, and I ran smack into Dr. Rasmussen, who’d been standing much too close.
“Just missed him, huh?” he said, trying to be friendly. I didn’t buy his buddy-buddy tone. The man had jealousy burning in his eyes and spitefulness dripping off his teeth.
“He is off to do his job,” I replied, and I kept right on walking. Dr. Rasmussen and I had been semi-friends for a long time, but I felt guarded now that I’d seen his ugly side.
“Emma, please wait,” Dr. Rasmussen said trying to keep up with me. We nurses could book it at a walk. “Who you date is your business, but I’m worried about you.”
“You’re right. Who I date is none of your business,” I deadpanned.
“I’m just saying I’ve been in this field for a long time,” Dr. Rasmussen said. “I’ve known surgeons like Dr. Mitchell. Something will happen and he’ll turn into a robot again, shut himself off from you and everyone else. I just don’t want to see you get hurt. People like him don’t change.”
“You don’t know him.” I turned to face Dr. Rasmussen with my arms folded. He didn’t know Alex, not the way I did.
But as I stood there, getting a warning from a coworker, I flashed back to the same situation in my other hospital. It hadn’t been a doctor that time, but the receptionist. She’d pulled me aside and said, “Your man should look at you like you hung the moon. Eric is looking at every other woman but you.”
