by Tina Beckett
Well, he needed to un-rivet them. Now.
He forced his steps to quicken, opening her door and pulling the webbing of the seat belt away from her, taking care not to touch her, this time. “Can you get out on your own?”
Deus do céu, he hoped she could.
She swung her legs out of the car and planted them on the ground, but his low-slung car wasn’t helping her.
“Here. Give me your hand.” He gritted his teeth and forced himself to add the obvious, “The left one.”
You’re a funny, funny guy, Roque. As if she’s going to give you the other one.
She let him pull her up from her seat, her grip on his firm and warm and lingering maybe a second longer than necessary. Then stood in front of him, her head tilted to look at him, the overhead lights shining on cheeks that were slightly pink and far too appealing. “Thanks, I appreciate it.”
“The least I can do.” And it was. Especially since his thoughts were now having to run some pretty impressive evasive maneuvers, like a footballer trying to stay just out of reach of his opponent. Which in this case happened to be common sense.
She followed him to the elevator. His steps still felt a little off, but he draped his cane over his arm. And he wasn’t quite sure why. He wasn’t ashamed of that hitch in his stride. Was he?
And when he’d stepped on her dress. Was he being prideful by not using it? And if he had used it, could he have avoided this whole damn mess?
“Did you hurt your foot?”
Her question came out of nowhere, seeming to echo his earlier musings as the elevator doors opened. “What floor are you on?” He stalled for a few seconds, trying to collect his thoughts.
“Four.” She licked her lips. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked that.”
“No, it’s okay.” He pushed the button for her floor, and leaned against the wall to look at her. Her arm was pressed against the neckline of her dress, and he noticed two tiny scars on her hand. Very lickable scars.
Hell, where had that come from?
He forced his attention back to her question. “My injury... It seems I am not only good at tripping over dresses, but my own two feet. It’s an old sports’ injury.”
“Which sport?” Her gaze flicked over his chest, down his abdomen...
He cleared a throat that was suddenly dry. “Futebol.”
Her eyes were now on his thighs and it was as if she could see right through his clothes. And pretty soon, she was going to see something that was visible despite his clothing.
“Have you had physical therapy?”
The shock of her question hit him like a bucket of ice water, scalding him in a way that heat couldn’t touch. If she only knew. Yes, he’d had therapy. And more therapy. All it had done was pile more grief onto an already existing wound. It seemed every female he met thought they could magically fix him and put him back to rights.
His jaw tightened until twin points of pain appeared. “Are you offering me your professional services, Amy?” He made it as clear as he could that she was overstepping her boundaries.
“No. I’m sorry. You’re an orthopedist. Of course you have.”
“It happened a lifetime ago. And it’s permanent. What you see is what you, and everyone else, gets. All the physical therapy in the world won’t change it.”
Diabos. Why had he gone on the attack? She was trying to help. She wasn’t like his ex-therapist or any of those women he’d gone out with who’d shown a morbid interest in his damaged leg.
He moved a step closer, so he could touch her hand. “I’m sorry. That came out badly.”
They arrived on the fourth floor before he could explain further. She got out in a hurry and stuck her key into the lock of the nearest door, only to jiggle it. She took it out and tried again. “That’s weird. It worked earlier. I’m not sure why it’s not this—”
The door opened, and the doctor from the gala appeared.
Amy recoiled a step. “I’m so sorry. I must have the wrong...” She glanced at the key. “Heavens, I do. The key says 402. I’ve only been up here once.”
Lara had a glass of wine in her hand, and when her eyes met his, they widened.
Perfect. She was probably wondering what he was doing coming up to Amy’s apartment straight from the party.
As was he.
Should he tell her why? That he’d almost ripped Amy’s dress off her at the party and had now come here so she could remove it the rest of the way? That sounded pretty damning actually.
“There were no cabs left.” The lie flew off Amy’s tongue with incredible speed. Evidently she wasn’t any more anxious to give the real reason for his visit than he was. But anyone who’d thought about it long enough would realize, there’d been a whole fleet of taxis parked outside the venue. Even if there were no cabs, it didn’t explain why he’d come up in the elevator with her. Or why the strap to her dress had suddenly disappeared. Maybe Lara hadn’t noticed how she was dressed.
Amy’s chest rose as she took a deep breath. “And actually, my dress strap ripped, and Roque’s mother is a professional seamstress, so he offered to have her sew it back together for me.”
He blinked. She’d backtracked. Why?
“Oh, that was nice of you,” Lara murmured.
“Anyway, sorry for disturbing you. See you in the morning.”
The other woman smiled at them and said good night, closing the door and leaving them alone in the corridor.
Roque couldn’t contain a grin. “I’ve never known anyone who can make even the truth sound like a lie.”
But when she swung around to look at him, her face was white as a ghost.
She whispered, “You don’t care that she might think we’ve come up here to...?”
He wasn’t about to admit that he’d entertained a thought or two himself.
“No. I really don’t. I don’t worry about what people think of me.”
At least he hadn’t until a minute ago when he saw the look on her face.
“My mom was like that. It must be pretty freeing.”
“Freeing? I don’t understand.”
“Never mind.” Amy moved to the next door down, double-checking the number, and inserted her key into the lock. This time it turned smoothly, opening to a white-tiled corridor and living room just beyond it. She entered, motioning him in behind her.
Roque followed her into the space, glancing around.
“Make yourself at home. I’ll just go and change. There’s not much in the refrigerator, since I haven’t made it to the grocery yet.”
“It’s okay. I don’t need anything.”
Her suitcases were in the living room and one of them was open wide, a pair of—diabos!—lacy pink briefs hanging over the side of it. His gut immediately tightened and all the thoughts he’d banished came rushing back, followed by a few thousand more.
She hurried over and kicked the offending garment into the case and quickly folded it closed.
What she couldn’t close was the part of his brain that had imprinted itself with that image, making him wonder what other forbidden wonders she had hidden in her luggage.
Which was none of his business.
Setting her bags upright, she wheeled one of them toward a room to her left. “I won’t be a minute.” With that, she shut the door with a thump.
* * *
Her panties!
She leaned against the back of the door, shutting her eyes in horror.
Oh, God, they’d been lying there right in front of him! Not minutes after being seen—and recognized—by her neighbor, someone she would have to work with day in and day out. At least for the first month and a half.
But her underwear! Why had she left that case open?
Well, she hadn’t expected to have a man in her apartment on her first night.
Or the second or third nights. And now that she knew who was living next door, probably no other night, either. Any hookups would now have to happen “off campus,” so to speak.
Roque might not care what people thought, but she did. Far too much. And she certainly didn’t want him to hear secondhand that she was entertaining men in one of the hospital’s apartments.
Entertaining men? What was this? The 1920s?
Opening her eyes, she went over to the bed and hefted her suitcase onto it, one-handed. This was ridiculous. He couldn’t see her now. She let go of her dress, and sure enough, the top of her bodice slid past her waist. Quickly finding a pair of yoga pants and a loose-fitting T-shirt, she opened the side zipper on her dress and let it slither the rest of the way down.
There, are you happy now?
She glared at the garment at her feet, stepping out of it and tossing it onto the bed with a little more force than was necessary.
She then dug through her bag, aware of a little time clock ticking in her head as she tried to find her bra. She blinked. She’d worn one on the flight over, so it had to be here somewhere. Or another one. That maybe she’d packed in the other suitcase that was still in the living room. Or not?
Ack. She’d left the bra she’d traveled in in the bathroom when she’d changed for the party, since she hadn’t needed it for the dress. She was not leaving this room to go grab it and waltz her way back to the bedroom with it dangling from her fingertips. That would be almost worse than him seeing her underwear. Although maybe he hadn’t noticed.
Oh, he’d noticed, all right. His eyes had been right on them.
So what to do? She’d always been small up top, wishing as a teenager that she had more oomph in that department. But right now, she was glad she didn’t. She pulled the T-shirt over her head. It was black and loose. Peering into the bedroom mirror, she decided you couldn’t really tell as long as you weren’t staring at her chest.
So hauling her yoga pants up over her hips and sliding her feet into a pair of flip-flops, she took the decorative comb out of her hair, tired of it digging into her scalp.
“I don’t worry about what people think of me.” Wasn’t that what he’d said?
Well, maybe she could practice a little of what he—and her mom—preached. She shook her hair out, trying not to care that it was curling in all kinds of crazy directions. She then folded her dress in as small a ball as possible and shoved it into one of the plastic grocery bags she’d included in case she had any wet clothes to pack on the return flight.
There. She was ready.
Sucking down a quick breath, she opened the door and sauntered into the living room as if she hadn’t a care in the world. As soon as she saw him, she wished she hadn’t agreed to let him take the dress. He was lounging on her sofa, both arms stretched out over the top of it, looking as fresh in his dark suit as the moment she’d laid eyes on him. And she was...
Not caring what people thought, that’s what she was.
His glance trailed over her hair, before arriving at the plastic bag in her hand. “Is that it?”
“Yes.” She handed it to him. “Thanks again.”
“For ripping your dress?”
Maybe. Could it be that this little mishap had provided a way to break the ice? To give her that little flaw in his perfection that she’d been searching for?
“You make a pretty intimidating figure—did you know that?”
His head cocked. “No. I didn’t.”
“I think even Peter and Lara felt it.” Although he wasn’t intimidating in a bad sort of way, like whoever Flávia had been referring to.
“Then I’ll have to work on that.”
He uncurled himself from the sofa and stood over her, and there it was again. That shiver of awareness. And whether it was because of the T-shirt fabric brushing over her bare skin or her reaction to him, her nipples tightened as a swirl of sensation spiraled down her belly to points below. She had to fight the urge to hook her arm back over her chest like she’d done while holding up her dress.
“You don’t have to work on anything. I’m sure it’s just part of being in a different country.” Why on earth had she said anything to him? “Pretty much everything is intimidating to me right now.”
“Don’t be intimidated, Amy. You’ll find Brazilians are quite amigáveis.”
“I know they’re friendly. I didn’t really mean that.”
“What did you mean, then?”
“I’m not sure. I just feel a little bit out of place. Everyone I’ve met has been either a doctor or an expert in their field.”
“You are an expert in your field, or you wouldn’t be here.”
She hadn’t thought of it like that. She’d heard the vetting process was tough and was actually surprised that she’d gotten in, even if it had been because someone else had dropped out. “Well, thank you. But not really.”
“Don’t sell yourself short. The team decided you were right for this position.”
Something caught her attention. “The team. But not you?”
“The heads of the departments are given a list of applicants that are préselecionados... I think you say it as ‘short-listed,’ yes? And then the selections are made. You were on that list.”
He was evading the question about whether or not he had wanted her. Or was he?
“But I only got on afterward, when there was a cancellation.”
“There was no cancellation. The powers that be were merely trying to find where best to place you. The physical therapy department couldn’t spare anyone to oversee your month-and-a-half shadow period. So you are now with me. I almost said no. Until I read one of your case files. It made me change my mind.”
He almost refused to work with her? And if he had, she’d still be sitting in the States.
She did not want him to see how much that stung.
He changed his mind, Amy. That counts for something.
“Which case file?”
“The spina bifida patient who went on to practice martial arts.”
Bobby Sellers. She almost hadn’t included him, because he hadn’t been the stellar success story she felt the hospital was looking for. But he’d touched her life. And when he told her he’d always wanted to break a board in tae kwon do, something her mom had insisted on her participating in, it had struck a chord. And she’d helped him work toward that, even going as far as attending the event where Bobby had indeed broken his board. It had brought her to tears.
“But why that case?”
“It showed that you are able to think outside the box—that you don’t keep pushing where it will do no good. You tweaked the prescribing doctor’s treatment plan slightly to include your patient’s own personal life goals. That is exactly what I want to see at Paulista. Things don’t always follow a prescribed path. As the saying goes, medicine is sometimes more art than science.”
“I believe that as well. We have to look at patients as a whole, not as a conglomeration of symptoms. We have to help them adapt and change when the body won’t cooperate.”
He smiled and stood, leaning on his cane a little more than he had been. “And that is why I said yes. I should go. I might not care about what people think, but I have a feeling you do. And since Dr. Smith knows I’m here in your apartment...”
* * *
Yes, it was time for Roque to go. But not because of Lara Smith. Or the fact that the pink scrap of lace peeking out of her suitcase was going to haunt him for days to come. He was pretty sure she wasn’t wearing a bra under that T-shirt. But none of that was what drove him to say goodbye. It was because of the vulnerability he’d seen in her when they were talking about how she’d gotten into the program.
He’d sensed a bit of imposter syndrome, and he probably had fueled that even more with his honesty. But he hadn’t wanted to work with someone like the physica
l therapist he’d been assigned after his surgery. He didn’t want a fix-it mentality. He wanted someone with the ability to set realistic expectations for his or her patients. In the end, Roque would not have agreed, if the candidate absolutely didn’t meet that qualification. His patients were too important to him.
But to have stepped on her dress.
Hell. He definitely did not have the coordination he’d had back in his days with Chutegol, his football club. But then again, his injury had resulted in muscle and nerve damage, and although you wouldn’t know it from the single long scar on his outer thigh, the damage to the underlying structures had ended his football career. Fortunately, he’d earned enough from his five years of playing to put himself through medical school.
“Well, thank you for coming.”
Amy’s voice cut through the fog of his thoughts, and he swung his gaze to her, avoiding looking at her chest.
“I will let you know when it is done.” He held up the bag containing the real reason he was here. His mother would be happy to repair it for her. But not without a question or two, or a mention of their earlier conversation, which made him wonder if he’d been right to offer her services. After having women throw themselves at him during his football days, and the messy breakup of his engagement, and then the pass his physical therapist had made during treatment, he was leery of believing someone could be interested in him...as someone who came from simple roots, who’d worked hard for everything he had. So his relationships were short and sweet, and very, very superficial. No one who would try to “fix” whatever they thought was wrong with him.
So yes, his mother would ask some pointed questions.
But Roque took care of the mistakes that he could. And the ones he couldn’t? Well, he walked away from them.
Amy wrapped her arms around her midsection. “The dress was my fault, so don’t worry about it. Like I said, it’s too long. I shouldn’t have worn it.”
