Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 9

through me like warm sunshine. It surprised me how right this felt. I was in serious trouble. There was still so much I wanted to say, but I settled for the obvious.
    "You're an idiot," I whispered against his lips.
    Logan hovered a millimeter away from my mouth. "I know. Princess."
    THE END
    Author bio: Hello fellow readers and writers! I'm originally from the UK but currently living in and loving the USA. I have been reading and attempting to write m/m stories for around three years. It's a not so new guilty pleasure. I have been fortunate to have my first short story "The Traveling Show " published by Dreamspinner Press early in 2012. I used to work in finance but am currently a stay at home mom to two young children under the age of four, so free time doesn't come along that often. When it does, writing about hot guys doing sexy things is the perfect antidote to the 'terrible twos'…
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TAKE A BREATH
    by Tam Ames

    Colorized black and white - muscular doctor with bicep tattoo, wearing dark blue scrub pants falling down, with pale blue boxer briefs with a blue stethoscope around his neck.

    Dear Author
    As an ER doc, I work extremely long hours and barely have time for a relationship. With all the heartbreak and despair, I feel myself slipping from humanity. I need something or someone to breathe new life into me.
    Sincerely,
    Summer

    genre: contemporary
    tags: ER; medical personnel; teacher; smoking; Star Trek fandom ext
    content warnings: brief descriptions of child abuse scenarios not related to main character's personal history/experience
    word count: 15,968
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    Author’s Note
    Special thanks to Jen and Chris for their beta skills, and I would like to state that any medical inaccuracies in this story are solely the responsibility of the author. The hospital scenarios were created to move the romantic storyline forward, and are not intended to accurately depict the lives and responsibilities of real-life personnel working in an emergency room environment. My apologies for the parts I got dreadfully wrong.
     

     
    TAKE A BREATH
    by Tam Ames
    Eli slumped in a chair exhausted, pouring over the charts of the last six patients he'd seen. He was absolutely anal about making sure there were no errors. The administration was constantly riding the doctors' asses with threats of potential law suits, and horror stories of vengeful family members. He glanced up at the clock and sighed. Twenty more minutes, and he was out of there. Twenty more minutes until he could have a cigarette. It had been a damn long 17 ½ hours, insane by anyone's standards, except for his bosses. They probably thought he was getting off easy if he was at the hospital less than 23 ½ out of 24.
    The door burst open and one of the nurses flew into the room, hands flapping. "Oh, Doctor. Thank God you're still here."
    He rolled his eyes. Where the hell else would he be? It wasn't eight o'clock yet. "What is it? I didn't hear the call for an ambulance coming in."
    She crossed the room and placed her hand on Eli's shoulder, giving him "the look", as he referred to it. He got it fairly often, mostly from the female staff, but the occasional male staff member tossed it his way as well. Eli jumped to his feet and put some distance between them, clutching the charts in front of him. "What?"
    "A man brought in a small child with a head wound. He's panicked and the kid is screaming. I really don't want to call security, but he's insisting he see someone immediately." She took another few steps until she gripped his forearm.
    He juggled the charts to his other arm in an effort to dislodge her, and then moved even further to the side. Why did everyone have to touch him? God! Could they not just back the hell off? He understood patients, sometimes. They were panicked and they wanted help, so they reached out and grabbed for the nearest life line, usually the doctor… him. But why did the staff have to be so goddamned touchy feely? Much as he wanted to tell her to keep her hands to herself, he couldn't afford to alienate the nurses. He was smart enough to know they were the ones who kept things under control in the ER; they were just humoring the doctors.
    He needed a force field. Something that would keep people at least two feet away from him. Scotty could create something to keep the idiots at bay. Dr. McCoy didn't have that problem, did he? No one got all grabby-hands on his ass, did they?
    He snapped out of his thoughts.