Prescription for Desire (10 page)

“
It has, and I’m glad you
asked me to come.”

“
Well, on behalf of Doctors
Unlimited, we appreciate it,” he stated, looking at her with a
puzzled look.

“
Why do you keep staring at
me like that?”

He shook his head and shrugged. “I
don’t know. I can’t figure it out yet. Oh, by the way, I spoke to
Maria at the orphanage. I didn’t realize you were volunteering
there. She said you’ve been quite a few times.”

“
Yes. I love going there.
In fact, I went yesterday with Kay. There was a birthday party for
one of the little girls. We did a princess theme with tiaras, glass
slippers, and Cinderella dresses. The girls had a lot of
fun.”

“
Perfect. Well, I gotta
run. Taking Yasmine to a pregnancy yoga class. I’ll touch base with
you over the next few days about your return flight
home.”

“
Okay. Have fun. Kiss Yaz
and the baby bump for me.”

“
Will do.”

The next day Raven decided she needed
to get away from the clinic, considering she was off for the rest
of the day, including being on call. Plus, she figured if she
wasn’t there, she couldn’t run into Armand. She remembered reading
about a park not far from the medical facility. Raven had been
meaning to check it out, as well as touring Buenos Aires before
heading back to the States. Her heart sunk a little at the thought,
but she shook her head, hoping to rid her mind of wanting Armand.
Unfortunately, it didn’t work, but she refused to start something
with him that wouldn’t go anywhere. Raven had never been one for
casual relationships. She’d only had four real boyfriends,
including her husband. She didn’t want a fling with Armand. He was
the type of man she’d desire forever and that just wasn’t going to
happen.

That morning she’d ordered a picnic
basket lunch from one of the eateries she frequented, which had
American food, before heading down to see a few patients on her
schedule. In addition to a couple of F150’s and some other cars,
the doctors also had bicycles and golf carts at their disposal to
get around the town, and she lucked out by reserving the last cart.
She’d decided to tell no one of her plans. She just wanted to be
alone with her ereader and her thoughts. When she was done with her
last patient, Raven trekked quickly back to her apartment, threw on
a sundress, and made her way down to the garage area to retrieve
the cart.

Once she arrived at the park, which
she didn’t realize had a manmade lake, she found a spot on the lush
green grass to settle with a beautiful view of the water and the
trees that led into a wooded area. Moments later, she had
everything spread out on the blanket. She poured a glass of white
wine and munched on a cheeseburger while reading a book on her
ereader. Except she couldn’t concentrate. The cheeseburger, which
wasn’t as good as Armand’s, kept reminding her of the tryst in his
apartment and their other stolen moments. It didn’t make it any
better that she was reading a love scene between the hero and
heroine of the novel, and kept imagining her and Armand. The couple
in the book weren’t nearly as passionate as they had been. However,
she couldn’t read it a second more as she found herself getting hot
and bothered. She decided to skip over the scene, only to land on
another one of the couple making love on the desk in the heroine’s
office, which reminded Raven of the night that could’ve
happened.

“
Humph.” She tossed the
ereader on the blanket and grabbed her wine, taking a sip followed
by a gulp. She slid the shades from the top of her head down to her
eyes, laid back, and stared up at the sky, saying a little wish
that she could get through the next month without giving into her
desires again.

Chapter Six

Armand stared down at the lovely woman
on the blanket as she slept peacefully. He’d gone for a dip in the
lake after riding a bicycle down to the park. He’d tried to reserve
a golf cart, but was told Dr. Arrington had reserved the last one,
so he settled for the bike. He was quite surprised when he arrived
to see her there perched on a blanket, having a one person picnic.
She was breathtaking in a long white sundress spread out around
her. The thin material complimented her warm, brown-sugar skin, and
the thought of getting lost in all of her sent his heartbeat on a
rampage.

He was going to go over and say hello
to Raven, but decided against it. Apparently she wanted to relax
alone since she had a glass of wine and was reading. Plus, she’d
been purposely avoiding him for the last few days. Instead, he
headed over to his favorite spot, threw off his backpack, tennis
shoes, shirt, and dived into the water. Once he was done with his
swim, his plans were to leave unnoticed … until he realized she was
curled up, sleeping soundly. Even though the park was safe, he
preferred she’d be awake since she was by herself. He’d hate for
her to wake up when the sun was going down, and she’d have to drive
in the dark in a golf cart barely going twenty miles per
hour.

Armand knelt and tapped her shoulder
gently. She let out a soft moan similar to the ones she made when
her head had rested on his shoulder on their way back from the
orphanage.

“
Raven, its Armand,” he
said, shaking her lightly.

She jerked all the way up and yanked
off her sunglasses, showing wide almond eyes staring at him in a
daze. “What are you doing here?” Her eyes trailed down his naked
chest, settling briefly on his lion tattoo—which raised an
eyebrow—before resting on his face. “Wet and naked?”

He chuckled at her perusal. “I’m not
naked. I’m wearing swim trunks. I came to take a dip in the lake
when I saw you resting. Just wanted to make sure you didn’t
oversleep.”

“
Thank you. I didn’t mean
to take a nap.”

He pulled his towel from around his
neck and spread it out on the ground next to her blanket. She
raised an eyebrow at his gesture. “You weren’t asleep for a long
time. Perhaps thirty minutes. When I first arrived, you were
reading and finishing up your cheeseburger.”

“
Oh.”

“
Was it as good as mine?”
he asked, stretching his legs out in front of him and tossing his
backpack onto the grass.

“
What?” she asked in
disbelief.

“
The
cheeseburger.”

She smiled embarrassingly and turned
her head away for a moment before answering. “Um … no. I prefer
home cooked … like yours, but it was good.” She leaned over to the
picnic basket and pulled out a wrapped one, holding it up for him
to see. “You want it?”

“
Sure. Got anymore
wine?”

“
Yep.” She reached into the
basket and pulled out another plastic wine glass, along with a
paper plate and a container of pasta salad. She made him a plate,
adding mixed fruit, and poured him some wine along with another
glass for herself. She plopped a strawberry into hers.

“
Gracias,” he said as she
handed him the plate. “Glad I ran into you.”

“
De nada.”

“
So I hear you’re leaving
earlier than expected. I bet you can’t wait to get back home to
your family and friends. Your life in Memphis,” he said, taking a
bite of his burger.

She sighed with a wistful, faraway
look in her eyes as she rummaged through the picnic basket. “I
suppose. I’ve enjoyed my time over here, but I do miss my family,
and even my patients.”

“
I understand completely. I
miss being around my family as well.” He looked at all of the
things she pulled out of the basket. A folded picnic tablecloth, a
couple of candles, matches, some more food, napkins, and two
bottled waters. “Goodness. All of that was in there?”

“
I had no idea.” She
laughed her cute giggle that he found adorable. “I brought the
blanket off my bed because I didn’t realize an actual tablecloth
would be in here.”

“
You know that’s property
of Doctors Unlimited,” he said jokingly, tugging on the blanket as
she gave him a smug smile.

“
Bill me,” she replied,
taking a bite of a chorizo taco.

“
So tell me about the
Arrington family of doctors. That has to be awesome, by the way. A
whole family of doctors.”

“
Well, I’m not sure if we
had a choice in the matter. My parents always pushed me and my
siblings in that direction. We knew things at a young age that
you’d learn in medical school. They were forever quizzing us on
medical terms and medical procedures. On family game night, instead
of playing Monopoly or Clue, we were having quizzes on operations,
medications, the proper way to sanitize our hands, and dissecting
small rodents.”

“
Wow, and now all of you
work at the family practice your parents started.”

“
Almost. The baby, Shelbi,
is doing her residency. She has about three more years, even though
at one point she didn’t want to be a doctor. During her
undergraduate years at Spelman, she took classes at a culinary
college part-time and didn’t tell anyone in the family. My father
was livid when she finally told all of us. This is after she
graduated from medical school.”

“
Medical school isn’t
cheap.”

“
Tell me about it.” Raven
reached into the glass for the strawberry. “My dad was not a happy
camper.”

While Armand heard what she said, his
attention was on her tongue. Licking the wine off of the
strawberry, she took a bite of it and sighed pleasantly in the
process. Her inviting lips wrapped around the fruit sent his
imagination running with thoughts of how he would love for her
luscious tongue to lick and tease him wherever and however she
pleased.

He coughed to remove the frog in his
throat, and cleared his brain of feeding her wine-soaked
strawberries. “But apparently she changed her mind.”

“
Yes, only after being a
food critic for almost a year. Her husband is the chef that owns
the blues restaurant I was telling you about on Beale Street, so
she’s still around food. In fact, Shelbi has created some of the
signature dishes and has a blog called “Cooking up Love” on the
Memphis Tribune website.”

“
Good. She’s able to do
both. What about the rest of your siblings?”

“
Of course you know Cannon
is a pediatrician. My other sister, Bria, is an allergist, but she
also practices holistic approaches such as acupuncture and the use
of herbs.”

“
I saw her on
Sports Fanatic
a while
ago. She’s married to one of my favorite retired basketball
players.”

Raven nodded. “Rasheed Vincent is one
of the best point guards to ever grace a basketball court, and a
really nice guy. They have a four-month old baby boy, and Cannon’s
wife is about three months pregnant.”

Armand nodded knowingly. “I had the
pleasure of meeting Yasmine briefly when Cannon came this summer.
That’s great they’re expecting.”

“
As her sister-in-law and
her Ob-Gyn, I hate not being there during this process, but her
pregnancy is going well. And then there’s Sean, the middle child.
He’s the only non-white coat at the practice. He’s a
psychiatrist.”

“
So he wasn’t paying
attention during your family medical Jeopardy,” he stated, taking
the last bite of his cheeseburger.

“
Just the medication part.
He hated dissecting the animals.”

“
He has a wife and
kids?”

“
Ha! No. Dr. Player is not
married and no kids that we know of. Sean was a nerdy geek until
some cute girl in high school gave him the time of day. By senior
year, he’d grown out of his nerd phase and has been a player ever
since. I don’t know if he’ll ever settle down and get married. He’s
too picky. He likes a certain type.”

“
What’s that?”

“
The model type. Tall,
trim, glamorous, and no brain. Not to say models don’t have brains.
It’s just his don’t. I don’t think Sean wants anyone smarter than
him, but whenever one of us says it, he shrugs it off and says it’s
not true.”

“
I’m sure he’ll meet his
match some day.”

“
We can only hope,” she
said sarcastically as she looked around the park at the handful of
people. “It’s so pleasant and peaceful. I thought surely there
would be more people here.”

“
Usually on the weekends,
but then it’s not so pleasant and peaceful. That’s why I try to
come during the week for a quick swim or maybe a hike. I love
working out in nature instead of cooped up in the medical
facility’s gym.”

“
There’s a hiking
trail?”

“
Yep, and a bike
trail.”

“
I’ll have to check that
out before I go back to the States.”

Raven closed the picnic basket and
stretched her arms out, over her head, and down to her sides. He
assumed she was ready to head back. However, Armand wasn’t ready to
go yet. He enjoyed the alone time with her. In fact, he could lay
out in the sun with her and do absolutely nothing and be
content.

“
How about now?” he
suggested. “The trail starts by the lake.”

“
With you?”

Armand chuckled. “I promise not to
bite. Now, the animals you might come across will.”