Tempted by the Heart Surgeon

by Lucy Ryder

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Dr. Knight. Perhaps you could be more specific.”

  “I’m talking about that look,” he said, jabbing a finger in her direction. “And the fact that I’ve known you long enough to know when you’re up to something. Why do I have the feeling the other shoe is about to drop?”

  Coco chuckled. “You’re getting paranoid, my dear boy. Perhaps you’ve been working too hard. Come,” she said, rising from the table. “You look hungry and I know you must be dying to talk to Sammie.”

  Geez, was he so damned transparent? “I am?”

  “Of course you are.” A smirk flashed across her face. “She has a million ideas for fundraisers that are bound to make us a lot of money.”

  He narrowed his eyes as she swept from the room, leaving him to follow. Yep, he decided, she was definitely up to something. And yep, he was dying to talk to Sammie, but not about her fundraising ideas. First, he was going to ask why the groomsman had called her Amanda—he’d neglected to ask, having better things to focus on during that heated night they shared—and then he was going to—heck, he didn’t know what, he thought with a buzz of frustration. He only knew that all he could think about was undoing those four large buttons holding her dress together and sliding his hands up her smooth thighs. He wanted to taste her mouth to see if it was as sweet as he remembered and maybe muss her up a little.

  Okay, he decided when his gaze instantly found her laughing at something someone had said, so maybe he wanted to muss her up a lot. He wanted to get her alone and put his mouth on that spot beneath her ear that gave her a full body shiver and hear her breath catch in her throat.

  For the next half hour, Adam pretended to enjoy the food and conversation as he stalked Samantha around the room. He’d casually work his way to the group she was with and watch in amusement as she quietly excused herself. Just as he was beginning to lose interest in the game, she murmured something to Coco and slipped from the room.

  Taking it as his cue, he followed, catching sight of a flash of turquoise as he got to the door. By the time he pushed through the outer suite door, the ladies’ bathroom door halfway down the passage was closing, telling him where she’d disappeared.

  After a quick over-the-shoulder glance to make certain they were alone, he followed.

  * * *

  Sam stumbled into the ladies’ room and collapsed against the rich cream-and-sage-green wall. Gulping air, she pressed a shaky hand to the awful cramping in her belly. Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God. The man she’d spent a reckless night having hot sex with in San Francisco was an executive member of the foundation she was now running—in San José.

  Granted, the two cities were close, but never in her wildest dreams—fine, nightmares, she corrected a little hysterically—had she thought she’d see him again.

  She squeezed her eyes closed, hoping that when she opened them everything would be back to normal because this was the worst thing that could have happened. She was supposed to be starting over with a clean slate and having her past come back to bite her in the ass wasn’t part of her pla—

  “Running away again, Amanda?” a deep voice asked quietly.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  SAM JUMPED SO high she was surprised she didn’t give herself a concussion on the ceiling. Her eyes flew open to where Adam leaned against the door a few feet away. Hands thrust into the pockets of his black scrub pants, he looked casual and relaxed. She hadn’t heard him enter, but then again the entire fifth battalion could have entered guns blazing and she wouldn’t have heard anything over the wave of panic rushing over her.

  She lifted a shaky hand to press against her racing heart and hoped he couldn’t hear it flopping around in her chest. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Despite her denial, memories of the night they’d spent together assaulted her and she suddenly wanted to thrust her hands into all that cool black hair and pull his mouth to hers. Or maybe slide them beneath his black scrub top so she could feel those fabulous satin-covered abs.

  Aghast that she was imagining stripping him naked, Sam stayed where she was and eyed him warily. He looked even better than she remembered and that bothered her because she’d remembered plenty.

  For long moments, they studied each other until Sam pushed away from the wall, annoyed that she was letting old insecurities surface. She went straight to the vanity counter, hoping the distance would clear her head.

  “My name is Samantha.”

  One dark brow arched up his tanned forehead. “Uh-huh and was that just for the benefit of the board members or are you really going to pretend we haven’t met? That you have a twin somewhere in Frisco who looks exactly like you,” he murmured, his eyes sliding across her face. “Right down to the freckles sprinkled across your nose?”

  “Freckles?” she gasped in outrage, totally forgetting that she’d decided to pretend they’d never met. “I do not have any freckles.”

  “Wanna bet?” he challenged softly. “There are fourteen across your nose, five on your—” His gaze dropped to the reflection of her breasts in the mirror, causing the breath to back up in her lungs when her nipples tightened. “A dozen scattered down your back and three on the inside of your right thigh.” He reached out to run a teasing finger slowly, tortuously, down the length of her spine, scattering her senses and sending goose bumps stampeding across her skin, racing down the center of her back to the base of her spine. “I know,” he murmured wickedly, “because I tasted every one of them.”

  Heat spread outward at the careless sensuality of that caress but she suppressed it. “N-not everyone is lucky enough to have s-skin that doesn’t blemish in the sun,” she managed to say through the rush of sensation.

  He stilled, and for a moment she thought she’d offended him, but then he leaned forward to blow on her neck. And heck if her scalp didn’t prickle along with the soles of her feet. For an instant, she wondered if her hair was smoldering, but a quick glance assured her she was still Samantha Jefferies, cool and elegantly professional.

  Except for the wild flush staining her cheekbones, wide eyes and dilated pupils. Oh, God, she thought spinning around to avoid the truth staring back at her. But when she found him close enough to feel the heat pumping off him like a nuclear reactor, she wondered at the wisdom of the move because he was so close she could see each individual speck of gold glinting behind the thick fringe of sooty lashes that drooped over his shimmering eyes. Eyes that abruptly reminded her of a stalking lion.

  Her pulse jolted, because that’s exactly what he’d been doing. All through the meeting, he’d watched her watching him, and once it was over, he’d subtly stalked her from one group to the next until the only thing left was to escape into the ladies’ room.

  “What are you doing here, Adam?” she demanded, attempting to infuse her voice with cool outrage and cursing inwardly when it emerged husky and breathless instead.

  Amusement came and went in his expression, infuriating her because he was too close, too disturbing, too—everything. She lifted her hands to his chest, intending to push him back a couple of inches but it was like moving a boulder.

  “This is the ladies’ room,” she pointed out, ignoring the heat seeping into her palms and spreading up her arms; ignoring the very basic need to spread her fingers and feel all those amazingly hard planes and dips. “And the last time I checked, you don’t qualify.”

  “So,” he murmured, taking advantage of their proximity to toy with her earring. “You admit there was a last time, that you were the woman in Room 2014 who used her tongue to—”

  “Stop!” she interrupted on a breathless squeak when she recalled exactly what she’d been inspired to do. Dammit, she was never mixing shooters and champagne again because that was the only explanation for the things she’d done that night. “Okay, so maybe I let you um...think my name was Amanda, but only because I never expe
cted to see you again and didn’t think it mattered.”

  His eyes darkened. “You don’t think it matters to a man that he knows the name he groans whilst buried deep inside of that woman’s body?”

  She felt her core shudder at the memory of him doing just that in a voice so deep and rough her body instantly heated and melted in anticipation. “I...um—it does?”

  His hands dropped to her hips and he tugged her against him, the move—and the feel of his substantial erection—leaving her in no doubt about what he meant. “Why don’t we put it to the test, hmm?” he murmured, dropping his head to feather his lips along the soft underside of her jaw.

  A painful rush of yearning gripped her and she found herself curling her fingers into his scrubs, tilting her head back to give him room to explore. She’d only spent a few hours with him and yet the way he touched her, skated his mouth and tongue across her skin, seemed achingly familiar.

  “I d-don’t think this is such a good idea,” she heard herself say, heard the soft moan and wondered at the war going on inside her; to climb all over him or push him away and see that he stayed there.

  Her mind yelled at her to step away while her body urged her closer.

  Horrified that she might do something reckless, like rip off his shirt and sink her teeth into some part of him, Sam shoved him back and scuttled out of reach. She spun around and automatically reached out to turn on the tap and dispense a blob of foam hand soap into her palm.

  “I—uh, this isn’t what I want,” she said in a voice she didn’t recognize as her own. It sounded husky and throaty, as if they were stretched out on a bed in the dark.

  Rubbing her hands together to spread the foam, she cleared her throat, not daring to look at him in case he saw past the desperate attempt to appear professional and in control. Heck. How was she supposed to act with a man who in many ways knew her better than the man she’d been engaged to?

  “I left Boston because I needed a change,” she explained, rinsing her hands and turning to address his chest because she couldn’t look him in the eye. After a couple of beats, he wordlessly pulled a length of paper-toweling from the dispenser and held it out. Not seeing any other option, she took it and began to dry her hands. “Coco offered me this job about a year ago but I was um—occupied with other things at the time.”

  Dropping the damp mess into the trash, she leaned her hip against the counter and folded her arms beneath her breasts in a move she knew was defensive but hoped looked casual. Just being in the same room with him made her nervous and edgy, because she couldn’t recall ever coming across a situation like this in her grandmother’s etiquette book.

  Grimacing inwardly, Sam finally lifted her head and forced herself to meet his hooded gaze. “Then something happened and—” Pausing, she bit her lip and let her gaze slide away from his. It was one thing to admit how hurt she was at the discovery that Lawrence had been satisfying his physical urges all the time he’d been preaching abstinence until the wedding night, and quite another to have the man she’s supposed to spend the rest of her life with lie to her.

  “San Francisco.”

  Lost in thought, it took Sam a few moments to mentally catch up with the conversation.

  “What? Yes—no.” She paused to breathe in, then exhaled in one long shuddery breath. “Partly,” she admitted shakily, rubbing at the tension between her eyes. “I, uh, realized that I was trying to please too many people and it took certain um—” she paused and flushed as one dark brow rose up his forehead “—events,” she said more briskly, straightening her spine and glaring at him. “Before, during and after that weekend to show me I needed a change.” She paused to swipe her tongue across her bottom lip and smooth a loose curl off her forehead. “I, uh—I didn’t intend to have a one...um...night stand with you...or anyone else, for that matter. I want—no, I need to make a success of this to prove to myself that moving wasn’t a mistake.”

  “And you think everyone knowing we slept together will jeopardize that?”

  He sounded so amused, damn him, that Sam narrowed her gaze. “Yes—no.” She broke off and lifted her chin at the open skepticism in his gaze. “Maybe. I don’t know, but as we’ll be working together, I don’t want to muddy the waters with um—” She broke off and sucked in an unsteady breath.

  “Sex?”

  It was only when her breath whooshed out that she realized she’d been holding it.

  “Yes.”

  After a long silence, during which Sam had to force herself to hold his stare, Adam’s gaze dropped to her mouth, scattering all her good intentions. Her lips tingled and parted, her breath hitching softly in her throat.

  The air thickened and warmed, swirling around them like a firestorm of sensation that she couldn’t ignore no matter how much she wanted to. A warning buzzed through her the instant his gaze returned to hers. Sensuality curved his mouth and blazed in his amber gaze, all but hypnotizing her.

  “Okay,” he murmured, shifting closer in a move that had the warning buzzing louder. “I’ll be the soul of discretion in public.” He paused to let his words drift between them before continuing. “But in private—” he lifted a hand to toy with the large button above her left breast “—I have no intention of letting you forget anything.”

  Distracted by his proximity, it took her a moment to realize that he’d very sneakily issued a challenge while her body and mind were in meltdown.

  Sucking in a shocked breath, she lurched backward, knocking his hand aside. “Excuse me?” she demanded, outraged. “There won’t be anything in private and there certainly won’t be a repeat of...of...” She broke off to blush and curse at the dark brow rising up his forehead. “Of whatever it is you’re thinking about. I told you. I’m done living my life to please everyone else. From now on, I’m going to please myself. I’ve got a plan and—and you’re not in it.”

  In an instant, his eyes went flat and his jaw hardened. On a roll, Sam waved her hand in his direction. “And don’t give me that look,” she snapped. “Because it has nothing to do with your...your—” She broke off abruptly, unsure how to explain without offending him.

  “My what?” he drawled smoothly, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “The fact that you had a wild steamy night with a man whose skin is too dark to fit into your rarefied blue-blooded world?”

  Her mouth dropped open at the bitterness in his tone and she had to blink past the hot tears burning the backs of her eyes at the implied insult. Pressing a hand to the painful tightening in her chest, she sucked in air that felt like ground glass. “You r-really think that? You think I s-slept with you because...because—” She ground to a halt and swallowed convulsively.

  “It’s exciting to have a reckless fling with someone from the wrong side of the tracks before heading off to marry someone from a more suitable family?” His brow arched up his forehead. “You wouldn’t be the first, Sam.”

  “Well, I’m not the latest either,” she snapped, incensed that he would accuse her of bigotry when he didn’t even know her. “For your information, it has nothing to do with your ancestry and everything to do with the fact that I’m not looking for a relationship right now, especially with a doctor.” She said the word like it was something offensive and turned to fling herself away from him. When he said nothing, she spun back around to find him staring at her incredulously.

  “All this is because I’m a doctor?” he demanded skeptically. “You can’t be serious.”

  “My entire family consists of doctors and surgeons,” she said heatedly. “I was an unplanned late-in-life baby and spent my childhood wishing I had some mysteriously interesting medical condition that would get my parents to notice me. And don’t smile,” she fumed. “It was awful. I was foisted onto nannies, housekeepers and finally my grandmother who had as little time for me as my parents did.”

  She sucked in a steadying breath because the last thing she wante
d was pity from anyone. Especially him.

  “I used to think that I’d been abducted by aliens at birth and given to the wrong family, because that was the only explanation for the fact that I had no aptitude when it came to medicine and panicked at the sight of blood.”

  “Aliens?”

  “My point is,” she said, rolling her eyes in exasperation. “I get that doctors are driven to save people with their superpowers but I’m not interested in anyone determined to prove he’s God’s miracle worker. It’s too—lonely.”

  “So you’re what? Looking for a man who stays home and rubs your feet?”

  “Who says I’m looking for a man at all?” she snapped, incensed.

  Adam’s eyes gleamed with amusement. “Seriously?” His mouth curved into a wicked smile. “After San Francisco, you’re trying to sell me that?”

  Sam felt her face heat and huffed out in annoyance. Trust a man to twist her words into something sexual. “I’m not trying to sell anything,” she informed him primly. “I’m merely explaining why I’m not looking for a relationship right now. Besides, with my track record with men—look, it’s nothing personal,” she added hastily.

  “Nothing personal, huh?” he demanded softly, his eyes gleaming a sensual warning that skittered down her spine. He gave a short laugh and propped his shoulder casually against the wall. “I’m not supposed to take it personally that I’m good enough for a hot night of rebellion against your family but nothing else?”

  “I didn’t sleep—” She gulped at the look on his face. Drawing in a shaky breath, she tried again. “I didn’t have sex with you to get back at my family.”

  “Who then? Your husband? Your fiancé?”

  Sam felt herself go pale. “Who—who told you I had a fiancé?” she demanded hoarsely. For several beats, Adam stared at her, then reached out and caught her left hand. She tried to pull away but he easily lifted it and turned her hand so her ring finger was visible.