“Come on. Indulge me. I indulged you by trying on this dress, so it’s only fair. And besides, it’ll make you look like you just got back from an island vacation or something.”
Visions of Sarah on a beach—in a skimpy bikini that left nothing to the imagination—danced in Joss’s head. And the visions didn’t end there. Long cool drinks, hot sweaty nights under the stars, the quiet lap of waves caressing the sand as the two of them walked hand in hand. Her legs trembled. God, I need a vacation! And not with Sarah! “All right, fine. But that’s it for the makeover session. I’m not a dress-up doll, you know.”
Sarah winked at her. “I was enjoying having my own little makeover doll. Although I don’t remember my childhood dolls complaining so much.”
Joss threw her a scowl, but it wasn’t long before she was smiling. “Let me guess. You had twenty-nine kinds of Barbie dolls when you were a kid. I’d name some, but I haven’t a clue what Barbies are out there.”
“I still have a few of them if you’d like to come over and play some time. Ooh, and I had Doctor Barbie!”
Joss bit back a flirtatious retort—something about offering to be Sarah’s real-life Doctor Barbie. “I tried to perform surgery on my best friend’s doll once. She wasn’t very pleased with the huge slit I made down its torso with my jackknife.”
Sarah laughed. “I can totally picture that. What else did you play with? Tonka trucks? Cap guns?”
“Not quite. Tools. Lab kits. All my play pretty much mimicked being a doctor.” Like her father. She’d dress in shirts and ties like he did, had a little black doctor bag identical to his, wore a toy stethoscope around her neck most of the time, even at the dinner table.
Sarah stopped, placed a hand tenderly on Joss’s arm. “Did you ever once want to be anything else?”
Joss shook her head lightly. She’d never considered there were other options.
Chapter Seven
Sarah was inordinately pleased with herself for not only managing to convince Joss to buy herself new clothes, but to go through with the appointment at the hair salon. And she’d complied with only a few token complaints. The new suits were powerful and sexy on her, and the blond highlights were striking, instantly transforming her into someone more youthful, someone much more carefree and playful. If she threw on jeans and a pullover right now, Joss would look more like a medical student than an accomplished surgeon and professor and heir to the legacy of the great Dr. Joseph McNab.
A Google search before their first meeting had provided the goods on Joss. She was considered one of the top heart valve surgeons in the state, helping three years ago to pioneer something called a transcatheter aortic heart valve replacement procedure. It was minimally invasive, replacing a patient’s main heart valve without having to open his or her chest, and the procedure was only being done at a few hospitals across the country. Impressive, to say the least. But Joss had barely discussed anything about her work with Sarah. When she did, it was only because Sarah pressed and never in a way that would suggest bragging. If anything, Joss was too modest, but unlike a struggling artist, she didn’t need to sell herself, Sarah supposed. Nevertheless if they were going to be friends, business partners, whatever they decided to call themselves, Joss would have to let Sarah in. At least a little.
Between bites of the linguini in clam sauce, Sarah asked, “Was it as simple as following in your father’s shoes that you decided to become a heart surgeon?”
“Basically,” Joss said after swallowing a mouthful of chicken marsala.
“So you idolized him, obviously?”
Joss shrugged lightly. “I was good in science and math. And my father was an impressive man, an important man, in a child’s eyes. Why wouldn’t a kid want to emulate a parent like that?”
“Did you do it to please him?”
“My, aren’t you full of questions.”
Sarah casually sipped her wine, an expensive Barolo. She had insisted on going dutch, since this wasn’t an official working event, but the sixteen dollars a glass price tag was giving her heart palpitations. “I thought we agreed it would be a good idea to get to know each other better.”
“Right.” Joss sighed impatiently, clearly not used to being grilled this way and not, it seemed, very happy to be talking about herself. “Well, my father was a legend in medical circles. And medicine seemed to come easy to me, so it made perfect sense to follow in his footsteps.”
It wasn’t lost on Sarah that Joss hadn’t exactly answered her question about whether her career choice had been to please her father. She assumed it had, but given her relationship with her own father, she didn’t assume much anymore where family was concerned. As Linda liked to say, you never knew what was boiling in someone else’s pot.
“Do people compare you to your father?”
“I specialize in valves. His was almost exclusively coronary bypass surgery.”
Sarah tried not to take offense at Joss’s brevity, but she seemed to be barely trying. “But, in general, I mean, you must be compared to him. You’re the cochair of the medical school department named after him. You do surgeries in the same operating rooms he must have worked in. You’re both cardiac surgeons—although with different subspecialties. You were named after him—Joss, Joseph—right? Old photos show that you look a lot like him.”
Joss’s stare was hard, unyielding. Her shoulders had noticeably stiffened.
Sarah lowered her voice. “You didn’t think I’d accept your offer without doing any research, did you?”
“Obviously. But it leaves me at a supreme disadvantage, don’t you think?” A twinkle suddenly flashed in Joss’s eyes, instantly replacing the guardedness that had been like tiny shields in her irises. “Fess up, Sarah Young. Time for you to tell me something extremely personal.”
Stalling, Sarah twirled linguine around her fork. “I will, but not until you tell me how you deal with living in your father’s shadow.”
Joss sighed again. The mask was firmly back in place, and it made Sarah wonder how open she was with friends, girlfriends, colleagues, anybody. Not very, it seemed.
“I deal with it fine. He’s been gone for almost five years, was retired for three before that. I chose a different subspecialty so the comparisons would only go so far. I don’t expect to match his professional notoriety or accomplishments.”
“Why not? You’re well on your way, by the looks of it. And you’re only thirty-eight. What was he doing at your age?”
“At my age, he was performing bypass surgery on the Vice President of the United States.”
“Oh,” Sarah said, momentarily at a loss for words. She sipped her wine. “Do you always put this much pressure on yourself?”
“Pressure, I can handle. Spilling my guts? Not so much.”
“Well, thank you for being honest.”
“Your turn,” Joss said eagerly. “Girlfriends. Any serious ones lurking in your past? Or present?”
“A couple. Past tense.”
“So I won’t have a bunch of jealous girlfriends worried about our arrangement?”
Sarah hadn’t missed the number of times Joss’s gaze kept drifting to the cleavage exposed by her blouse, which she’d intentionally unbuttoned a little further than usual. She didn’t want to think much about whether she was purposely testing Joss. Or how much she was enjoying the little game of cat and mouse. She wasn’t normally a tease, but something about Joss made her want to push the boundaries a little. Maybe it was as simple as wanting to crack that icy shell she kept around herself. “No. And I’m not a dating machine, if that’s what you’re implying.”
Joss had the decency to blush. “I didn’t mean to imply that you were. Only that, you know…”
“What?”
“Well. You’re so pretty. And fun to be with. I figured…”
Sarah was in no mood to accept flattery. “You forgot to throw in career-challenged. Not many women are attracted to a perpetually impoverished artist who may never make it. My last girlfrien
d told me there was no future in someone who spent so much time on something she would never make a living at.”
Joss took her last bite and wiped her mouth with a linen napkin before setting it neatly back on the table. “So what’s holding you back, Sarah? You’ve criticized your father for not believing in you and now your past girlfriends. But what about you? Do you doubt yourself as well? I mean, who cares what they think?”
Heat roared up Sarah’s neck. How dare Joss cast such judgment about something she knew nothing about? Her snarling retort was preempted when the waiter came to remove their plates and ask about coffee and dessert. By the time they’d ordered two decaffeinated coffees, Sarah had cooled down enough to deliberately change the subject. She asked Joss about her romantic past, only to be told there hadn’t been anything but a few superficial hookups. Oh, and a college sweetheart who wanted to travel the world after graduation and settle in Lebanon.
“Why Lebanon?”
“Because she heard the women there were hot.”
Sarah gaped in surprise. “And that didn’t bother you?”
Joss laughed quietly. “We weren’t meant for the long haul, so no. I encouraged her. I was about to head off to Stanford anyway.”
They used the car ride back to Sarah’s to get their stories straight about how exactly they’d met and how long they’d been dating, should anyone ask.
“Would you like to come up for a drink?” Sarah asked in the awkward silence, not convinced it was a good idea, but it was the polite thing to do. “My roommate will still be at work.”
“No thank you. Long day today, and I have my weekly Sunday breakfast date with my mother tomorrow morning.”
“All right, another time,” she said, reaching for the door handle. It was probably wise that Joss wasn’t coming up for that drink because this wasn’t a date, and she didn’t want to confuse things. Still, the rebuff felt personal somehow. “Your new hair looks great on you, by the way.”
“I’m not so sure, but thank you.” Joss suddenly reached over and lightly tugged on her elbow before she could exit. “By the way, you never answered my question. The one about whether you doubt yourself. A loved one’s criticism—or their indifference, for that matter—can wear a person down.”
Needles of heat pricked Sarah’s cheeks. “And you didn’t answer when I asked if you went into medicine to please your father. Or maybe it was to get his attention?”
How dare she imply I don’t believe in myself? Does she think I enjoy accepting handouts? Being Daddy’s little princess? That I’m incapable of doing anything else? Doesn’t she realize I’m only being her damned escort so I can support my art?
Sarah had had enough. She was about to bolt when Joss, still clutching her elbow, leaned toward her. Her mouth was only inches away, so close that she could simply…
Without another thought, Sarah placed her hands on either side of Joss’s head and pressed into her mouth, wanting nothing more than to sear away the anger and indignation she felt for this stranger who intuitively knew exactly which of her buttons to push. The kiss held not a shred of tenderness. It was deep, hard, full of emotion that bordered on anger. Pushing, pulling, devouring, fitting perfectly together, their mouths fought the battle that had taken root in their minds, in their blood, in their words.
Damn if this woman isn’t turning me on, Sarah realized as arousal flared deep in her belly. Her lungs fought for air and her body thrummed like an electrical current. Unable to stifle her desire any longer, she moaned, causing Joss to pull back with a sudden decisiveness that felt like the ripping away of a scab.
It was dark, but Sarah could see shock and fear—regret too, perhaps?—on Joss’s face.
“Shit,” Joss murmured. “I’m so sorry, Sarah.”
Sarah stumbled out of the car. “I’m not,” she threw over her shoulder, unsure—and not caring—if Joss heard her.
* * *
By the time she knocked and walked into her mother’s house, Joss had given up hope that she’d be summoned to the hospital. The weekly brunch with her mother was not usually a chore, but today’s she would have gladly skipped. Madeline would undoubtedly fire questions about Sarah at her with the speed of a machine gun. Worse than that was her expectation that Madeline would somehow guess that a slow fire had begun to burn between her and Sarah—a fire that was sometimes fueled by anger, other times by a powerful attraction that threatened to blow their little agreement into about a million pieces.
And oh, that kiss, Joss thought as she called out for her mother. She’d kicked herself in the ass about it all the way home last night and into the early morning hours too. What had she been thinking? Okay, she hadn’t truly been the one to start it, had she? Sarah had started the damned kiss, but Joss had asked for it. In slow motion, she replayed it over and over in her mind, wondering why she hadn’t stopped the kiss sooner, why she’d even set herself up for it in the first damned place. There was no rational explanation. If anything, she and Sarah had been irritable with each other leading up to the kiss. Maybe their brutally honest accusations had sparked it, or maybe it was the residual heat from seeing Sarah change into that tight-fitting dress earlier in the day. There had been that luscious cleavage over dinner too that had made her forget her food. Made her forget her head too, it seemed.
Joss berated herself. Again. You can’t go kissing Sarah, any more than you can go kissing one of the nurses at the hospital or one of the other surgeons. This is a professional thing! Absolutely no mixing business with pleasure. It’s unethical, uncalled for and extremely inappropriate.
Joss knew better than to kiss Sarah, and yet, that forty-second act had nearly obliterated the carefully constructed control that was her hallmark around women. She’d been seconds and inches away from running her hands all over Sarah’s body and sliding her mouth down to that lovely, silky throat. It was some consolation that she hadn’t technically paid for the kiss, since yesterday wasn’t part of their official arrangement. That, at least, let her off the hook a little.
Annoyance over some of the things Sarah had said at dinner continued to simmer. Like asking her why she put so much pressure on herself. Well, of course she put pressure on herself. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t be where she was today. Pressure was her motivation. And her reward. She did her best work in the pressure cooker that was the OR, and she was harder on herself than anyone else ever could be. For that reason alone, she had nothing to fear about her mother intuiting the underlying and unwanted attraction she felt for Sarah. Her mother couldn’t caution her more seriously than she was already cautioning herself.
“Hello, dear,” Madeline said, planting a kiss on Joss’s cheek. “You’re looking chipper this morning.”
“I am?”
“A little color in your cheeks. It looks good on you. Come in for a spell and make yourself a cup of coffee. I’ve got a breakfast casserole in the oven.” Madeline’s hands flew to her open mouth. “Oh, your hair! You added highlights.”
“Yes, Mama. Don’t look so shocked.”
“I am shocked. Completely!” She grinned. “It makes you look so youthful. I like it very much, Joss. It’s very attractive on you.”
“Thanks. I think.”
The house smelled of sausage, potatoes and rosemary. And coffee. Joss’s stomach growled. Her hour at the campus pool this morning had built up an appetite. So had all the emotional energy she’d expended thinking about Sarah.
Something on the way to the kitchen made her stop in her tracks. She’d never really paid much attention to the odd tapestry of small paintings on the foyer walls and along the hallway leading to the kitchen, because her mother was always adding to the busy collection. But now she wanted to examine them, perhaps because Sarah was a painter. She lingered over a watercolor of a forest, then a small oil painting of the Cumberland River at twilight, the cityscape in the background. She checked for the artist’s signature and found it on the bottom right of the painting—SY.
“Mama, who did
this painting?”
“Why, your Sarah.”
“My what?”
Madeline’s smile was smug and conspicuously triumphant. “Your companion friend, Sarah Young.”
Joss tensed. “She’s not a teddy bear or an old suitcase on my closet shelf. She’s not my anything.”
Her mother shot her a slow, teasing wink. “Would you rather I called her your ‘wife’?”
Joss refused to rise to the bait, instead returning her eyes to the painting. “I never noticed this painting before. How long have you had it?”
“I bought it from Sarah’s stepmother, Linda, a year or so ago. It’s very good, isn’t it?”
It was extremely good, Joss thought, her eyes riveted on the intricate shades of gray, blue, brown, gold. There was texture to every stroke, some bold, some nuanced. A tiny speck of color here, a wisp of a shadow there. The overall effect was instant, but it took several minutes of staring at it to realize the sophistication and complicatedness behind the piece. “I didn’t realize she was so good.”
“Not all struggling artists fail to make it because they aren’t talented enough. You should know that by now, growing up in Nashville. Did you know that when Sarah was a teenager she was offered a three-month scholarship to paint in Paris at the Cite Internationale des Arts?”
“That sounds important. And like it would be a real career boost.”
“It would have been if she’d gone. According to her stepmother, her father wouldn’t let her go.”
She’d never met the man, but Joss was really beginning to dislike Sarah’s father. “Why not?” Her own parents would never have held her back from such an opportunity.
“Oh, that man,” Madeline ground out between pursed lips. “He said he needed her at home and that she was too young to go so far away.”
Joss finally pulled her attention away from the canvas. She was eager to see more of Sarah’s work, but not with her mother hovering. More blown away than she’d expected to be, Joss wondered if she too had secretly doubted Sarah’s abilities. She had. At least a little. Sarah was broke, mostly living off her father and some part-time teaching work. Joss could see that she too had fallen into the trap of defining Sarah’s talent simply by how much money she earned—or in this case, didn’t earn—from her art. She vowed to herself that she would never again be as foolishly judgmental as Sarah’s father or her old girlfriends.
By Mutual Consent Page 6
