Jacked (Trent Brothers #1)(51)

He measured me up and down, definitely waiting on a reply, one that I was afraid to answer truthfully. “Can I get back to you on that?”

That sly grin warmed his face. “Yes, please do. I’ll wait.” He made a right onto Fairfax Road, snickering to himself.

I left it at that. “So what happens if you find my original plate?”

“Well,” he started, tapping his thumb on the wheel in tune with the music softly playing over the radio, “with any luck it will be attached to a stolen car. And if we’re really lucky, the thief who stole the car will be driving.”

Picturing what he would do once he found the car thief was all too familiar. I had to shake off the slight shudder. “Then he gets to wear your cuffs.”

“Yep. Then he gets to wear my cuffs. And then he gets to have his picture taken, we fill out a bunch of paperwork, and he gets a special visit with a judge. But I highly doubt we’ll ever find your plate. Just so you know.”

I thought about how one idiot swapping my plate was the catalyst for Adam and I even meeting. “If you hadn’t been driving by this morning, I’d probably be in that Officer Asshole’s cuffs.”

Adam growled. “Yeah, about that… You want to explain to me why he tried to get you for D.U.I.?”

I felt foolish all over again, recounting the circumstances leading up to me hitting my head on my own damn steering wheel. “I think he recognized me from the diner. He seemed to enjoy causing me grief—just like he did to you the day we had breakfast.”

I saw the hint of anger on his face, though he was holding most of it in. “You want to talk about it?”

“Talk about what?”

“What his beef is with you?”

Adam’s shoulder dropped slightly, hinting at that being a resounding No.

“It’s been years since… Honestly, it’s water under the bridge.”

“Adam.”

I saw his grip tighten on the wheel. He wasn’t the first guy to give me the stoic silent treatment, making a career out of building walls.

“I can tell it bothers you.”

“It really doesn’t.”

He was about as good a liar as I was, which was a dead giveaway.

He played it off as if I was digging for something that wasn’t there. “You looking for a confession, or what?”

“No, I’m looking for honesty and openness. I thought we were starting over. But it’s okay if you don’t want to talk about it. It’s your business and I respect your privacy.” I had my own past to protect.

He drew in a deep breath while I broke this physical attraction between us down to nothing more than a doomed proposition.

“You don’t pull any punches, do you? You go right for the deep shit.”

I shrugged. “I tend to search for the life-threatening issues first. You know—the stuff that kills you.”

He leveled his eyes on me. “You planning on trying to heal me, Doc?”

I didn’t care for his tone. It was one that I was quite familiar with, laced with hints for me to back off. Pity for him it was a challenge to me and provided even more incentive to rise to the occasion. “If you need healing, Detective. I might have to tear a few Band-Aids off first. Don’t quite know the severity of your wounds until you show me or let me look. Just so you know, some things are beyond my ability to fix, and subjecting yourself to receiving treatment is solely your option.”

He snorted at that. “Sounds like this might come with a probing physical. Grab my ankles and turn and cough. So what is it you’d like to know?” he muttered low, reluctantly conceding.

I rested my elbow on the edge of the window while I watched the sitcom of my life go by at forty-five miles per hour. Wow. If getting him to talk about the simplest of hurts was this hard, any deep shit that would come up in a relationship would be grounds for sitting in separate rooms. “Nothing. I want to know nothing,” I barely answered, hating the sound of the quiet resignation etching my own voice.

Randy never wanted to talk, either. Take me to bed and f*ck me—yes. Litter my apartment with his shit while eating on my couch and using my pillows as napkin—yes. Talk to me or share emotions or anything that truly mattered—hell no.

I’d fair better if I’d just learned that those were things I’d never have in a relationship, as my past surely outlined that to be a hard and cold fact. Men were stoic and women bottled their feelings until they erupted and overflowed. Those were lessons Randy drove home repeatedly. He gave nothing while I drowned in silence.

Less than twenty-four hours ago I properly diagnosed Appendicitis, treated a ninety-two-year-old woman with a fractured pelvis, and brought a patient out of afib, but there was no medical diagnosis for this moment. Stupidity, perhaps? Myocardial desperation? Don’t recall seeing that one on the MCAT.

It bothered me that every time I got involved with a guy the same crap repeated, even though my friends seemed to find men who didn’t fit the standard mold. Just a few days ago, this gorgeous man sitting next to me convinced me that our encounter could never bloom into anything even closely resembling a relationship, and here we were, repeating it all over again. Maybe one of us should have listened.

I glanced at my phone, willing the damn thing to ring or chime a new message or give me a reason to disappear into my own protective world. But I knew it wouldn’t ring. Those who truly cared about me were busy with their own lives. Perhaps being single had its benefits, as dealing with men was terribly exhausting. Exasperating. Debilitating. No, not quite debilitating. What’s the word I’m looking for? Annoying? Trying? Tiring?