by BETH KERY
“Hello?” she called out, her voice echoing off the walls in the wide-open space of the garage. She walked into the path between the two rows of cars. “Are you here?”
Silence. She’d tried to prepare herself for a variety of scenarios that might occur tonight, but hadn’t considered this one. He wasn’t here. Disappointment flooded her. Should she wait for a bit? Perhaps he’d run into a delay traveling back to Chicago?
A scuffling noise at the back of the garage distracted her. Her heart jumped. She heard a door click open and then shut and the sound of shoes on the concrete floor. She saw him coming toward her in the distance, emerging from the shadows at the back of the garage. He wasn’t wearing coveralls this time. She’d been wrong about thinking he was gorgeous.
He was devastating.
“Hello,” he said soberly, approaching her.
“Hi.”
He wore a light blue and white button-down shirt and jeans, but it was what he did to the garments that left her tongue-tied. She could see his body more clearly when he wasn’t sitting at a table or wearing the coveralls. His waist and abdomen were leaner than she’d thought, his shoulders and chest even more powerful looking. He wasn’t like some of the guys she’d seen at the gym who lifted weights constantly with thick necks and muscles bulging all over the place. Instead, he was perfectly proportioned, his strength apparent in every line of his long, fit body. She recalled how hard he’d felt pressed against her, how solid.
He came to a halt several feet away from her.
You look . . .” she faded off, realizing she was about to make a fool of herself by blurting out how amazing he appeared. “You look taller without your coveralls,” she finished lamely.
There was a scruff on his jaw tonight, but the goatee was still absent. The whiskers highlighted his mouth almost as well as the goatee had. Or maybe it was just that she couldn’t stop looking at his lips and remembering what they’d felt like on her own. His thick hair was finger-combed back from his forehead. His eyes looked especially light in the shadows as they lowered over her.
“You look beautiful,” he said. She blinked in surprise. He said what she’d been thinking about him so effortlessly. Plus, she wasn’t used to his complimenting her. It packed a punch. He finished a perusal that left her feeling extra warm, and met her stare. “I like that color on you.”
“Thanks,” she murmured, glad she’d settled on the new blouse. It was a pinkish, apricot color and much more feminine than her usual clothes. Even she—who was normally very severe on her appearance—thought it did good things for her skin and eyes. A gleam of amusement and something else—was it pleasure?—entered his gaze.
“I like your tomboy look, but this suits you even better. You should dress up more often,” he said.
“I’m not dressed up,” she said, feeling a little prickly that everyone kept seeing through her so easily. Her heart started to thump erratically. His expression took on a bland cast and he nodded quickly as if to say, of course not.
“Are you teasing me?” she asked incredulously after a second, seeing the lingering trace of humor in his face. It seemed so uncharacteristic of him, she couldn’t quite be sure.
His eyebrows went up. “Maybe we’re both acting a little out of character tonight.”
He grinned then, slow and sexy. His untainted smiles were so few and far between, she couldn’t resist smiling back. His gaze settled on her neck. She touched the gold necklace at her throat.
“Thank you again for it,” she said breathlessly. “I’m not sure I should take it, though. It looks very valuable.”
“Of course you should take it,” he said, his expression sobering. “I thought of the artist who makes them by hand almost immediately when I met you. It’s a petit ange. Fitting for you.”
“Really?” she asked, her tone flat with incredulity, fingering the charm at her throat. “What does petit ange mean? It’s so pretty, but I wasn’t sure what it was exactly. A fairy?” she wondered.
His gaze flickered over her wistful smile. “Little angel,” he said quietly.
“I’m no angel,” she assured wryly.
His smile left her flustered. She grasped for a safe topic. “Did you have a good trip?”
“Good enough. I was a little preoccupied.”
Emma nodded in understanding. “Cristina isn’t any better tonight, but not any worse, either,” she said softly.
They stared at each other. Against her will, the memory of being pressed against his length, of his possessive mouth covering hers, coaxing . . . demanding, of shaking against him as he played her flesh like a master, entered her awareness. She moved restlessly on her feet as the subsequent memory of his harsh, crude words sliced through her like an ice pick.
She wasn’t used to feeling this level of uncertainty and intense awareness with a man. It seemed to encapsulate them in some sort of airless bubble.
“Cristina and I are not the best of friends,” he said. “We never have been. It’s . . . complicated.”
“I understand,” Emma said quickly. “Every family has their history. Their stuff. I’m not trying to intrude or judge. That’s not part of my job, and it’s not a part of who I am, either. You’ve provided for Cristina extremely well, despite this obvious . . . rift between the two of you.”
“A rift implies we were once close. Trust me, that’s never been the case,” he said, and once again, she sensed a razor-sharp edge to his tone.
“But when I told you she asked about you, you seemed—”
“I’ve left my number with the night nurse, and Mrs. Shaw will inform the day nurse. If Cristina says she wants to speak with me, I’ll come. Now I’ve told you as well. But just so you know, I’m not holding my breath for anything,” he said pointedly. Emma nodded.
“There’s something else I’d like to discuss with you. Would you like to go for a drive?” he asked, taking a step back.
She started and stared dubiously at the rows of cars. “I . . . yes.”
“Which car do you want to take?”
“I get to pick?” she asked, a grin breaking free. She couldn’t help it. An unexpected, giddy feeling of excitement rose in her.
His gaze caught on her smile. “Lady’s choice,” he assured quietly.
Chapter Nine
She eyed another sports car, perhaps swept away by the uncustomary feeling of euphoria she’d experienced on that other brief ride with him. She pointed hopefully at a fierce, fast-looking, dark red car. His small smile and raised brows seemed to say “nice choice,” which only enhanced her feeling of giddiness. The whole scenario took on the feeling of a waking dream when he opened the passenger door for her.
He slid into the seat next to her. The little car hummed to life, and as before, an unidentifiable thrill went through her. She had the strangest feeling when she was with him that anything could happen.
Anything would.
And that it could be heaven . . . or scary as hell.
He lowered the convertible top. Emma glanced cautiously sideways, admiring the virile, powerful image he made; the long, bent legs and strong, jean-covered thighs.
“How have you been doing?” he asked quietly once they had started down the dark drive. She thought he was referring to Colin.
“I’m fine,” she assured. “I had a talk with Colin. It’s over.”
He gave her a flickering sideways glance. “So you didn’t . . . I don’t know,” he shrugged. “Go ballistic on your boyfriend?”
She laughed and shook her head.
“Is that normal for you?” he asked. “To be so even-tempered?”
“No,” Emma replied honestly. “Maybe that’s how I know for certain that we weren’t meant to be together. I’m not mad at him. I’m not jealous. I hate to admit it, but I’m actually relieved.”
“You seem awfully certain.”
&nbs
p; “I am,” she said. “About that, anyway.”
She hadn’t told him she’d found Colin with her sister. The inevitable shift in her relationship with Amanda was a source of vulnerability. She was too uncertain of Montand, unsure of his interest in her, to open up about that. She didn’t completely understand her own motivations concerning him, either. It was as if part of her understood the unprecedented, intense attraction to him all too well. Another part of her seemed clueless in her motivations. No . . . not clueless, necessarily, but her intentions seemed murky. Clouded.
“Colin and I were just too comfortable with each other,” she continued thoughtfully. “There was no . . .”
He paused at the turnoff to the country road. Her cheek felt warm and she knew he looked at her.
“. . . spark,” she finished quietly. The word seemed to hang in the area between them for a second, vibrating, charging the atmosphere.
He swung the little car onto the road.
“What does he do for a living?” Montand asked gruffly after a moment.
“Colin? He’s a computer programmer—a forensic science technician. He’s very, very smart. Most of what he says goes right over my head. Between him, my sister, and me, I’m definitely considered the slow one. Oh.”
He’d accelerated. The wind whipped her short hair against her cheeks and swirled around her body, giving her a weightless sensation.
She’d worried a little he’d drive superfast on the dark country road. Wasn’t he the scion of a car dynasty with roots in racing? Wasn’t it inevitable he’d speed? She realized, however, that while he drove faster than the speed limit, it wasn’t by a large amount. It was the sheer power of the car that had thrilled her. It couldn’t have been more obvious that he had complete control.
“Faster?” he asked her quietly after a moment, and she realized he’d been accustoming her to the sensation of forceful, precise acceleration.
“Yes,” she said, her voice vibrating with excitement.
The car accelerated smoothly. There was no sense of hurtling chaotically through space. Instead they glided. Zoomed. She felt like she flew along the road in a tight, fluid flight. The car responded to his slightest touch, as if all he had to do was to think a command and it followed his bidding, like machine and man were one. She realized after a moment that she was grinning broadly.
“Is it the car, or you . . . your driving, I mean?” she asked a few minutes later when he rounded a curve with effortless, pinpoint precision. Which is it that’s causing this feeling inside me?
He kept his eyes trained on the road.
“The car,” he replied shortly, but she wasn’t sure she believed him. His mastery over the machine was singular. He downshifted and they rounded a curve. She saw the lights of the city on the horizon.
“Where did you grow up?” he asked.
“In the city,” she said, nodding toward Chicago. “On the north side, the Rogers Park neighborhood. My mother was a nurse at an Edgewater nursing home.”
“Is that how you got interested in nursing?”
“We spent a lot of time at the nursing home after school. My mom worked the evening shift, and it was really the only time we could see her while school was in session.”
“They didn’t care about having little kids there?” he asked, his brows bunching slightly in consternation as he stared at the road. “The managers or administrators of the nursing home?”
“No. We made ourselves useful. We played games with the residents. Read to them. Visited with them. It wasn’t a wealthy nursing home,” she explained, familiar with the fact that many people thought it odd that children spent so much time in such a facility. “The residents were mostly low-income people. A lot of the time, they didn’t have family. None who visited, anyway.”
“So you and your sister became their family,” he stated rather than asked.
Emma shrugged. “For some of them.”
“They must have lit up every time they saw you,” he said thoughtfully after a pause. “It certainly sounds like a unique way to grow up.”
“That’s a pretty good way to describe it, yeah,” she said with a laugh.
He glanced at her. She saw his small, grim smile in the glow of the dashboard lights. “I guess I shouldn’t expect anything less.”
“Why’s that?” she asked.
“It had to be some unique circumstances. To make you,” he added, his gaze trained on the road again.
It was like a precise, electrical caress in the darkness.
She was so giddy with speed, so caught up in the promise of being with him on that country road as the warm, fragrant summer air rushed around them and the little car ate up the asphalt, that she momentarily forgot their tense parting last Friday night. She was so fascinated by the vision of his hands on the leather wheel that it took her a moment to register they’d come to a halt. She turned to him. He wore a small smile as he watched her unsuccessfully trying to smooth her windblown hair out of her eyes and cheeks. His thick, waving hair looked artlessly sexy, like it’d been fashioned to be caressed and whipped by the wind.
“That was amazing,” she told him. “You’re an excellent driver. How did you get so good?”
He shrugged, his hands still loosely holding the wheel. “My dad loved cars almost as much as I do.”
“Was he a mechanic as well?”
“Yes. And an engineer, although he was never formally trained as one. He put me behind the wheel when I was only six.”
“Six?” she repeated, shocked.
His quick, flashing grin made something leap deep inside her. “He’d put me in his lap to prop me up.”
They laughed. His low chuckle struck her as delicious in the warm, still air, his smile impossibly beautiful on such a typically aloof man. It was like a crack opened up on his cold surface and a bright light shone through. A tightness grew in her chest.
She realized she could see him because of several overhead lights. She blinked, recognizing the parking lot belatedly.
“Lookout Beach,” she said, giving up on her mussed hair and looking around. “My mother used to bring Amanda and me here when we were little.”
“Amanda? The sister you live with?”
Emma nodded.
“Is she a nurse, too?”
“No. She’s going to be a doctor. She starts medical school this fall.”
He studied her for a moment and then abruptly glanced toward the lake, the patrician, cool man returning. “Do you want to walk down? I want to talk to you about something.”
She nodded, too anxious and anticipatory to speak.
A minute later they stood at the rocky bluff overlooking the lake, he to the left of her and several feet away. The sound of the waves rhythmically hitting the shore lulled her a little. They both watched the black lake rippling in the distance. He seemed so lost in his thoughts, so intent, she started a little when he finally spoke.
“How come you didn’t go to medical school?” he asked.
“I didn’t want to. I wanted to be a nurse.”
“The kind of nurse that you are now?” he asked, perhaps a little delicately.
She glanced over at him and saw the slight puzzlement on his face. “Yes. A hospice nurse. That’s what I wanted from the first. I didn’t just fall into it by accident,” she said amusedly.
He frowned. “I didn’t mean to be offensive.”
She broke into soft laughter. “No, it’s not that. It’s just I’ve seen that expression a time or two—or a hundred—when I tell people what I do for a living.” She saw his slanting brows. “That puzzled expression you wore a second ago,” she clarified. “When people understand I actually chose to be a hospice nurse, that I don’t do it just because I couldn’t get another nursing job, they seem confused. Trust me, it’s a pretty good way to clear a room at a party, saying you’re a
hospice nurse.”
“I know what that’s like.”
“You know what it’s like to clear a room when you say what you do for a living?”
“No. To have people decide everything about you before they know you. But in your case, it’s the idea of death that makes people prejudge you.”
“Yeah. It does,” she said quietly. “But just because death makes people uncomfortable doesn’t mean that it should be uncomfortable.”
“It’s not uncomfortable for you?” he asked.
She sighed and looked out at the black water. “No. Not anymore. It can be sad at times. Poignant. Full of meaning. But no, not uncomfortable.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t agree with you. Death is random and cruel.”
She blinked at the harsh finality of his tone.
“You’ve known a lot of it?” she asked softly.
“So much so that I wonder at times if life isn’t playing some kind of sick joke on me,” he said, his lip curling. He was trying to be funny, and failing.
“Death is a natural part of life.” He gave her a burning, sardonic glance. “Sounds like an empty platitude to you, does it? It does for lots of people,” she mused thoughtfully, looking at the lake, not at all put off because they didn’t agree.
She looked around when he gave a dry laugh. “What?” she asked, her gaze caught by the flash of white teeth against tanned skin.
He shook his head while a breeze ruffled his hair. He peered at her as if he wanted to bring her into better focus.
“Why are you so confident talking about death?” he demanded.
She hesitated, but then shrugged. “I died before,” she said simply.
She gave a small smile when she saw his blank expression segue into one of incredulity.
“What?”
She didn’t know why she’d told him. Given people’s reactions to such a declaration, she’d learned early on to avoid the topic at all costs. She sighed.
“I was born with a condition called alpha thalassemia. My body had a hard time making hemoglobin, so I was always mildly anemic as a kid. It wasn’t bad enough to cause any severe symptoms except occasional fatigue, but when I was nine, something happened. My iron count plunged and my organs weren’t getting enough oxygen. I had a heart attack.” She noticed his stiff expression. “Don’t look so worried. I hardly remember any of it. Long story short, when I recovered, I had a profound certainty that death was nothing to fear. Also . . .” She repressed a smile because she was sure he wouldn’t believe her. “I was cured.”
