Owned (Office Intrigue Book 8) by Nicole Edwards (year 2 reading books TXT) 📗

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.

Not surprising. This man was one of the most sexual beings I’d ever come into contact with. Sometimes to distraction.

“You going to help me with that, too, Doc?”

His words were slurred, which had me a little worried, otherwise I would’ve come back with a quip.

I considered giving him some pain meds and letting him sleep it off until we reached Sapphire Island. If we didn’t have six more hours in the air, perhaps I would’ve done just that. Unfortunately, based on what Zion had told me about the state of Ransom’s car after the fact, it was possible he had internal injuries and, at the very least, a concussion. Leaving those unattended wasn’t something I could do in good conscience, which meant I would have to do an exam now.

“I need you to take off your shirt,” I told him.

“Uh-uh.”

“Ransom, there’s no way for—”

“You want it off, gonna have to cut it off,” Ransom grunted.

Well, shit. “Hurts that bad, huh?”

“Yes,” Ransom muttered. “Shoulder. Ribs.”

At least he’d gotten a bit more specific.

Reaching for my medical bag, I retrieved the fabric shears I kept there. It only took a few minutes to get the ruined button-down shirt cut away. If that tux was a rental, he was screwed.

With every inch of flesh I uncovered, I did my absolute best to view him from a clinical perspective, rather than letting my body’s response kick in.

Sucked that almost a decade later, I still had this insane reaction to the man.

Even this older, more refined Ransom. He was still as ridiculously attractive as he had been back then. Maybe more so. His body was honed to perfection, his muscles defined, every cut line visible even beneath the tattoos that covered the majority of his body. Most of which were new. A new addiction of his? Something other than sex?

“Which shoulder?” I asked as I retrieved my stethoscope so I could give his lungs and belly a listen.

“Right.”

I gave it a cursory glance. No cuts or scrapes, no bruising. I would save that for last.

As gently as I could, I examined him while he remained motionless, his eyes closed except when I pried each one open to flash my light and check his pupil dilation. Minimal discoloration on his skin. Mainly a few bruises, the worst of which appeared to be where the seat belt crossed his chest. His reflexes were in order. For the most part, it looked as though he’d been lucky. I honestly hadn’t known what to expect when Zion had informed me of the state he’d been found in. Upon initial inspection, I’d say he had bruised ribs, a mild concussion, and a dislocated shoulder.

Definitely lucky.

For a moment, I thought Ransom had gone back to sleep, but he disproved that theory by speaking.

“You one of Talon’s playthings?”

“Would it matter if I was?” I countered instantly.

His eyes opened and those dark orbs pinned me in place. “No. It wouldn’t matter.”

Of course it wouldn’t. Ransom had written me off long ago.

I continued my exam, hoping like hell he would discard this line of questioning.

“You one of those other people’s playthings?”

No such luck.

I paused, holding the stethoscope’s diaphragm against Ransom’s skin. “A little personal, don’t you think?”

His heartbeat was strong, lungs unobstructed.

“Says the man who cut my shirt off.”

I hated that he made me smile. Not because I harbored any ill will toward Ransom—I’d gotten over that long ago—but simply because I was a doctor and he was, for all intents and purposes, my patient.

“Is that a no?” Ransom asked when I continued to listen to his lungs.

“I’m no one’s plaything,” I informed him.

“How’d you end up with Talon?”

“Long story.”

“Long plane ride,” Ransom countered.

“Won’t be when I give you some drugs.” At least for one of us.

The smile that turned up the corners of Ransom’s mouth had me pausing. It had been so long since I’d seen it, but even now, all these years later, that damn smile had the same effect on me as