Tamara rolled her eyes at him. “There is nothing you have I haven’t seen every day since becoming a doctor.”
“The difference is you haven’t seen mine.”
“Don’t tell me you’re reluctant to take off your pants because you go commando.”
“What do you know about going commando?”
“A lot of men come into the E.R. sans underwear. Most of them say they find underwear restricting.”
“Anything is restricting if it’s too small.”
Throwing back her head, Tamara laughed heartily. “Please, let’s not talk about people wearing too-small garments. I had a patient come into the E.R. with a certain part of his anatomy swollen to twice its size because he liked wearing his wife’s thong panties. He confessed that she’d come home unexpectedly so he’d pulled up his pants, still wearing the thong. It was another four hours before he was able to take them off, but by that time he was in agony. When I first asked him how he’d sustained his injury he lied, saying he was playing baseball and someone had accidentally hit him in the groin. But when I saw the deep imprint of where the elastic had bitten into his flesh he confessed. He pleaded with me not to tell his wife that he liked dressing up in her underwear. I reassured him I was bound by doctor-patient confidentiality.”
Duncan struggled not to laugh. “Were he and his wife about the same size?”
Tamara chuckled. “No. She weighed about one-twenty and he was twice that much.”
Duncan affected a grimace. “Ouch.”
“You’ve got that right. I gave him some medication to take the edge off the pain and told him to apply cold compresses to bring down the swelling.”
“Did you tell him to stay away from his wife’s lingerie drawer?”
“Even if I told him that, I knew he wasn’t going to take my advice. What I did tell him was to go to a store that sold plus-size garments and buy something closer to his size and weight.”
“No, you didn’t tell him that!”
“Yes, I did, Duncan. I knew he wasn’t going to stop cross-dressing or wearing women’s underwear, so I wanted to save the man another embarrassing trip to the E.R. and permanent injury to his gonads.”
He shook his head. “You really must see some strange things in the E.R.”
“Try bizarre. I’ll be right back with your scrubs. I don’t need you catching a chill. Then I’d have to treat you.”
Duncan brought his hand to his mouth, faking a cough. “I feel a cold coming on.” He coughed again. “Does the doctor make house calls?”
Tamara laughed at his antics. “For you, yes.”
Turning on her heel, she walked out of the kitchen to Rodney’s bedroom. Her roommate favored loose-fitting tunics and drawstring pants, and had purchased dozens to wear when lounging around the apartment. She selected a light-blue set.
Rodney was the ideal roommate. He was quiet and neat. Tamara didn’t have to concern herself with picking up after him, and he had heeded her warning not to water her plants. She’d rescued the exotic bonsai plants from the doctors’ lounge where they’d been sorely neglected. It had taken more than a year of cutting, grafting, pruning and feeding them to return them to health. The plants, along with her collection of crystal votives, made her apartment feel like home.
* * *
Duncan rose to his feet when Tamara walked back into the kitchen. He was thankful that the situation with his aunt’s tenant had ended without fanfare. As promised, Internal Affairs Officer Jackson Cleary had called for an unmarked car to take Philip Hughes to the local station house. Police technicians were dispatched to the apartment to seize his computer and search every inch of space for more evidence of the teacher’s involvement in child pornography. What Duncan found frightening was that the man had had direct access to children every day of his fifteen-year career.
Duncan had waited until he walked with his aunt home to reveal the perversion of the man who’d lived so close to her. And for the first time in twenty-four years he heard his aunt use profanity, her response shocking him into silence. Once she recovered from her explosive diatribe, she apologized so demurely that Duncan couldn’t stop laughing. When he teased her about “going ghetto,” Viola was quick to say she had to work and pray every day to maintain a ladylike demeanor.
Duncan took the hospital attire from Tamara and went to the bathroom to change out of his wet clothes. Tamara probably thought he was reticent about undressing in front of her, but nothing was further from the truth. In fact, he was rather comfortable with his body and his views toward sex. He hadn’t believed the myths that he would go blind or crazy if he masturbated, that he couldn’t get a woman pregnant if he pulled out before ejaculating, or that the beauty of the nude body was only acceptable in art. Stripping off his shirt and jeans, he hung them over the shower rod before he slipped into the scrubs.
Walking on sock-covered feet, he entered the kitchen to find Tamara had turned on an under-the-counter television. The television was tuned to a cable station featuring classic movies. The grotesque image of Charles Laughton as Quasimodo filled the screen.
“‘Why can’t I be made of stone like these?’” Duncan intoned dramatically.
Tamara froze. She hadn’t heard Duncan come back into the kitchen. Her eyes widened in surprise when she stared at him in the scrubs. She was mistaken. He and Rodney weren’t similar in size. Duncan’s tailored clothes were a foil for a lean, hard body incongruent with someone who spent hours sitting at a desk. She’d bragged about not being affected by a man’s naked body, yet she found herself staring numbly at the mat of crisp hair displayed in the V-neck of the tunic.
She blinked slowly, as if coming out of a trance. “You must have seen this film a lot to remember the dialogue.”
Duncan closed the distance between them. “I think I lost count after the fifth time. My aunt is a black-and-white-film buff. Whenever a movie house showed a retrospective of films dating back to the 1930s she took me with her. At the time, I would’ve preferred Star Wars and Indiana Jones.”
“Which of the Laughton films is your favorite?” Tamara asked Duncan.
“It’s a tie between Mutiny on the Bounty and Les Misérables.”
“I thought he was truly magnificent as Inspector Javert.”
“But he was diabolical as Captain Bligh,” Duncan argued good-naturedly. He and Tamara continued their discussion of classic films as she opened containers.
“How on earth do you expect me to eat all this food?” Duncan had bought her Chinese, Caribbean and Indian cuisine.
“I bought enough so you’d have leftovers.”
“Thank you, but I’m going to pack up some so that you can have leftovers.” She held up a hand when he shook his head. “Please don’t argue with me, Duncan. This is entirely too much food, even for two people.” All totaled, he’d bought eight containers, each with a different selection.
Duncan flashed a sheepish grin. “I have a confession to make.”
“What is it?”
“I don’t cook.”
Tamara stared at Duncan, baffled. “You don’t know how to heat up leftovers?”
“I don’t heat up leftovers because I only order enough food for a single meal.”
Resting her elbows on the butcher-block counter, she leaned closer to him. “You don’t cook or you can’t cook?”
Duncan, assuming a similar pose, leaned forward until their noses were inches apart. “I don’t.”
Tamara met his eyes behind the lenses of his glasses. “Why not?”
“I don’t know how to cook for one person.”
“All you have to do is follow a recipe that serves two, then half everything.”
“That’s too complicated. My life is about simplicity.”
“Do you want me to show you how it’s done?”
“Will you?” he asked.
“I will, but only if you want, Duncan.”
“I want…” he whispered, his words trailing off. Rising slightly he angled his
head as he pressed his lips to hers, caressing her mouth until her lips parted.
Tamara swallowed a groan as Duncan’s mouth began a gentle sensual assault on hers. One moment she was leaning and the next she’d straightened as Duncan pulled her to his chest. He fastened his mouth along the column of her neck, pressing a kiss there.
Bracing his hips against the edge of the island, Duncan eased Tamara to stand between his outspread legs. He smiled, and she returned it. Her hair, a mass of tiny curls, framed her face and the nape of her neck in sensual disarray. He wanted to tell her what he was feeling but didn’t want to move too quickly. They hadn’t known each other a week, yet Duncan felt as if he’d known Tamara Wolcott forever.
Tamara’s eyelids fluttered wildly when she felt the hardness of Duncan’s thighs brushing against hers. She saw desire in his gaze and knew she felt the same. She felt the gentle strength of his fingers on her upper arms and wanted to get closer, yet she was afraid to move because if she did it would communicate wordlessly how much she wanted and needed this stranger to make love to her.
“Duncan—”
“Don’t say anything,” he whispered, interrupting her. “Please, let’s enjoy this moment.”
Smiling, Tamara closed her eyes and rested her head against his shoulder. She inhaled what now had become the familiar scent of his aftershave. Her arms went around his neck. She didn’t know how, but Tamara could feel Duncan’s heartbeat in her ears keeping time with her own.
She lost track of how long they stood together in a comforting, healing embrace. However, when she lowered her arms and eased out of his embrace, what she felt was akin to the peace she experienced after climaxing.
“You started to tell me what you want,” she said, stepping back to put some space between them.
“I want you to show me how to cook for one person.”
“It’s easy, Duncan.”
“It’s easy because you know how to do it. Whenever I prepare a meal I usually make too much, then after a couple of days I throw it out. It’s criminal and immoral to throw away food when so many people go hungry not only in this country, but all over the world.”
“We’ll treat it like a field lesson. It’ll be up to you to make up a menu of what you want to eat. We’ll go to the market to buy the ingredients, then we’ll cook together. It shouldn’t take more than three lessons for you to get the hang of it.”
“What if I’m a slow learner?”
“You’d better learn fast, because my sister and I have to plan a surprise birthday party for our father and we only have a month to pull it off.”
“Where’s it going to be held?”
“My sisters are volunteering their homes, but I believe a restaurant would be a better venue because they won’t have to concern themselves with the clean-up.”
Duncan told Tamara that he wanted to host a get-together for his friend and his friend’s fiancée. “I’m thinking about having it in my home only because the setting would be more intimate than a restaurant or catering hall.”
“How many do you intend to invite?”
“I haven’t taken a head count.”
“Can you give me an approximate head count?” Tamara asked.
Duncan angled his head. “Maybe twenty-five or thirty.”
“Sit-down or buffet?”
“I don’t know.”
“Have you set a date?”
“Yes. It’s the third Saturday in September.”
Tamara gave him a facetious grin. “Thank goodness for that,” she said under her breath.
“I heard that, Dr. Wolcott.”
“I meant for you to hear it, Mr. Gilmore. Have you thought of hiring a party planner?”
He gave her a blank stare. “Why hadn’t I thought of that?”
“I don’t know, Duncan.”
He took several steps, leaned over and kissed her cheek. “Thanks for the suggestion. Are you going to hire a planner?”
“Not if we hold it at a restaurant. I’ll tell the banquet manager what we want and they’ll take care of everything.”
Tamara sat down at the dining bar in the island to enjoy a dinner of tandoori chicken, yellow rice and steamed broccoli in a garlic sauce. She finished eating at the same time the credits rolled across the screen, indicating the end of the movie.
Duncan pumped his fist. “Mutiny is coming on next.”
“If you want, you can watch it in my bedroom.” Tamara had given up watching television in the den when Rodney moved in.
“Only if you’ll watch it with me,” Duncan countered.
She glanced at the clock on the microwave. The movie was scheduled to start in ten minutes. “Go into the bedroom and turn on the TV while I clean up here.”
“It’ll go faster if I help you.”
Tamara was able to store the containers in the refrigerator and rinse and stack her dishes in the dishwasher with Duncan’s assistance in half the time that she would have taken alone. Taking his hand, she led him to her bedroom, flopped down on the bed and, using the remote control, turned on the television.
Patting the mattress, she smiled at Duncan. “Come, Duncan, get into bed.”
Duncan hesitated. Tamara had invited him to share her bed and he wondered if she would ever invite him to share her body. He got on the bed and propped a mound of pillows against the linen-slip-covered headboard to cradle his back. Pillows, sheets and blankets in monochromatic colors, shades ranging through chocolate brown, café au lait and ecru, complemented the headboard’s pale palette. An oatmeal-beige chenille throw was folded at the foot of the bed.
Small round pedestal tables doubled as night-stands, and a cream-colored area rug on the bleached-pine floor gave an open invitation to stay a while. Linen-look woven window treatments provided privacy.
Tamara shifted into a more comfortable position, her shoulder touching Duncan’s “Do you want me to adjust the air-conditioning?” She smiled at him.
“Are you cold?”
“A little.”
Dropping an arm over Tamara’s shoulders, Duncan pulled her to his body. “Let me warm you up.”
She snuggled against him, feeling the heat from his body seep into hers. “Nice.”
It was the last word Tamara uttered. Halfway through the movie her eyelids fluttered then closed and she fell asleep in Duncan’s embrace, as if it was something she’d done often.
She never knew when he flicked off the television and slipped out of bed to change into his clothes. Tamara didn’t stir when he opened and closed the self-locking door behind him.
The sun was high in the sky when she woke, fully dressed, to find the space beside her empty, but the scent of aftershave lingering on a pillow. She’d gotten her wish; she’d shared a bed with Duncan Gilmore.
CHAPTER 8
Tamara met Rodney as he was exiting a train in Pennsylvania Station and she was waiting to board. He looked different. The sun had darkened his face and a reddish stubble had replaced the flyaway curls. He caught her hand, pulling her away from the other riders filing out of Long Island Railroad trains and shuffling toward the staircase.
“What’s up, Wolcott?”
She took a breath. “I’m on my way to my sister’s place. She called to say she has a dilemma.”
Rodney stared at her quilted overnight bag. “How long will you be away?”
“I plan to spend the night. I can only take either of my sisters in very small doses.”
Leaning over he kissed her cheek. “Good luck.”
“Thank you, Fox.”
Tamara boarded the train and sat down in a window seat. She’d told Rodney she expected to spend the night, praying that was all she would stay. It wasn’t often that she stayed over with either Renata or Tiffany and if she did it was to placate her nieces and nephews.
Renata wasn’t usually prone to tears or histrionics, but when Tamara had answered the phone earlier that morning it was to hysterical crying. She had tried to get Renata to calm down enough to tell
her why she was upset, but to no avail. She told Renata to hang up, because she was coming to see her.
Tamara didn’t want to believe she was on a train heading for Long Island to comfort a sister who’d made her childhood a living hell. If she hadn’t known for certain that Tiffany and Renata were her sisters, Tamara would have felt like Cinderella. Very few days had passed when Renata and Tiff, as Tiffany liked to be called, hadn’t teased her about her weight. The teasing had become so mean-spirited that Tamara had stopped eating for long periods of time. The result was intense headaches and fainting spells. She’d lost weight, but at the expense of her health.
One day when watching a TV talk show, Tamara had heard a guest speaker talk about turning a negative into a positive. A person should work to enhance their best qualities rather than focusing on their worst. For Tamara it was her intellect. She had entered pre-kindergarten with a third-grade reading level. She’d accelerated a grade, going from seventh to ninth and had graduated high school with two years of college credits.
It had taken a while, but Tamara had finally realized boys liked pretty and brainy girls. That had become more than apparent when she entered college. She had her first very serious relationship, but it had ended when her lover returned to California to start a career in film.
After the conductor punched her ticket, Tamara closed her eyes rather than stare at the landscape whizzing past the fast-moving train. Why, she thought, did Renata have to have a meltdown just when she was starting her vacation? Just when she’d begun dating again?
A secret smile softened Tamara’s mouth as she recalled crawling into bed with Duncan to watch television. Being in his arms, sharing his body heat, felt as natural as breathing.
Call it fate, fortune or destiny, but there had to be a reason why she’d been in that high-rise elevator with Duncan Gilmore when it had stopped between floors. She’d thought about it, concluding she didn’t want or need an answer. There were some things in life that just happened.
Tamara planned to enjoy her time with Duncan, and if or when it ended she would be left with memories that would exceed what she’d had with Edward, because this time she had no expectations. She didn’t want to marry, she wasn’t ready to become a mother and she had a rewarding career. And if things worked out well between her and Duncan, then she could possibly have a rewarding love life.
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