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“You swore you’d decided against renting a town house.”
“That was before I looked all over town,” Jason said. “I honestly tried to find a place somewhere else. I combed the newspaper and an Internet referral service.”
“You haven’t been looking very long,” Heather retorted mercilessly.
“I’m sick of the hotel and I’ve got a busy week ahead.” He knew it was a low blow, to use work as an excuse for encroaching on her territory, but it truly was part of the reason for his rush. “There’s no reason for us to see each other except in passing.”
“We’ll run into each other at the pool,” she countered.
The image that came to mind, of Heather’s full breasts and slim waist displayed in a bikini, almost broke down Jason’s determination to regard her purely as a colleague. His voice catching, he choked out, “I don’t plan to do much swimming.”
“Good.” Returning her attention to the azalea, she cut the broken branch and tossed it into a plastic bucket. “I trust you won’t be running over to borrow a cup of sugar or a pair of pruning shears.”
“Scout’s honor.” She hadn’t mentioned laundry detergent, he thought. He might run out of that.
“And don’t you dare go anywhere near my health club!”
“Which health club is that?” he asked, his interest perking.
“Never mind.” Heather appeared fascinated by a weed near the base of the bush. “I’ll see you around.”
“You bet.” Although he would have enjoyed lingering, Jason knew he had a lot to accomplish this evening.
With a wave, he strode away, his thoughts flying ahead to the process of moving. The heated buzz in his nervous system abated too slowly for comfort.
A health club, eh? He’d make a point of finding it. A man needed exercise, after all.
“OH, COME ON, Mom,” Olive said. “You can’t tell me his moving here doesn’t mean he likes you. I can’t wait to meet this guy!”
“Jason Carmichael is my boss and an annoying one, at that.” Heather glowered. The last thing she wanted was for her daughter to start trying to pair them off.
“That doesn’t mean he can’t be interested in you! Besides, he’s your supervisor, not your boss. He doesn’t have the power to fire you, does he?”
“No.” The hospital administrator was the only one who had that right.
“See?” Olive crowed.
“He needs a place to live. That’s all.” Heather clicked to another page on the computer screen. “What do you think of this one? I wasn’t sure whether you liked scooped necklines.”
“So I can show off my nonexistent cleavage?” Her daughter sighed. “I wish I’d inherited your figure, Mom.”
“You have a great figure!”
“Not as great as yours.”
“I have a hard time finding clothes that don’t make me look fat,” Heather protested.
“What you look is stacked,” Olive said. “No wonder this hunky guy wants to be our neighbor.”
When Heather had mentioned Jason’s first visit the previous day, Olive had been too distracted by her armful of brochures and brainful of wedding ideas to pay much attention. After learning that he’d actually rented a place, however, she’d seized on the topic with glee.
“You’ve never met him,” Heather pointed out. “What makes you think he’s hunky?”
“The little smile you wear every time you mention him.” Leaning over her, Olive flicked from one web page to another so rapidly that Heather couldn’t keep track of what they were looking at. She supposed you had to be under twenty-five to master that skill. “You smile the same way whenever you see one of your favorite actors.”
“Oh, seriously!” she scoffed.
Olive paused at a Victorian-style gown, studied it intently for about five seconds, then zoomed onward. “Let me guess. He’s tall, dark and handsome.”
Heather wondered if her daughter were psychic, since her taste in movie stars was wide-ranging. “How on earth did you know that?”
“Because my father must have been.” Olive paused in her surfing. “Obviously I didn’t get my coloring from you.”
“You have my eyes, though. Ned’s were darker.” Heather smiled. “It’s funny how the red hair skipped a generation.”
“You haven’t met John yet,” Olive pointed out.
In Olive’s favorite photo, they both wore ski caps and jackets. Until now, Heather hadn’t realized she’d never seen his hair.
“He has red hair?”
“Like a carrot with a sunburn.”
Olive logged off the Internet. She must be nearing wedding overload, at least for the moment. Besides, it was dinnertime.
The younger woman set the table while Heather made spaghetti. “You should invite him for dinner,” Olive said as she worked.
“By ‘him,’ should I assume you mean Jason?” Heather checked the hot water, but it wasn’t quite at a boil yet.
“None other.” Olive clinked down two plates.
“I’d be happy if I never saw him outside the office again.” She meant it. Brisk professionalism was the best attitude to adopt where that man was concerned.
“What’s his voice like?” Olive turned to offer Ginger another spoonful of baby food. Strapped into her high chair, the little girl swallowed it hungrily.
“What difference does it make?”
“There’s nothing like a sexy voice.” Olive paused as if listening to something Heather couldn’t hear. “John has a slow, sensuous way of talking. I guess it’s the Texas accent. What kind of accent does Jason have?”
“Boston.” Heather hadn’t given it any thought until now. “Not a strong one, though.” And a deep voice, but she wasn’t going to give her daughter the satisfaction of mentioning it.
“Mom, have you had a serious relationship in your entire life?” Olive resumed feeding Ginger. “I mean, aside from my father?”
After their reunion, Heather had related the story of their ill-starred romance, softened to depict Ned as immature rather than self-centered. To Heather’s relief, her daughter had shown no interest in locating him.
“No. I haven’t met a man I could love. Sometimes I doubt he exists.” Although Heather dated from time to time, her self-protective instincts had led her to keep men at bay, at least until that night with Jason. In retrospect, she was grateful that he’d fallen asleep. If they’d made love, his thoughtless remark the next morning would have been devastating.
“Stop!” Olive waved excitedly.
Looking down, Heather discovered she’d been about to drop the uncooked spaghetti into the simmering tomato sauce instead of the boiling water. “Oops. Thanks for warning me.”
“Don’t try to convince me you weren’t daydreaming about someone of the male persuasion.” Her daughter grinned. “Care to mention any names?”
“Brad Pitt,” Heather said quickly. “Ewan McGregor. Heath Ledger.”
“Jason Carmichael?” suggested her impish tormentor.
“Why does he fascinate you so much?” Heather stirred the spaghetti with a pasta fork, separating the strands.
“It’s long past time you got over my father being such a jerk.” Apparently Olive had drawn her own conclusions about Ned’s behavior despite Heather’s attempt to spare her the worst. “Maybe it’s because John and I are so happy that I want you to find the right man, too.”
“I have no problem with that,” said Heather. “When I find him, I’ll let you know.”
“Sure you will.” Skepticism rang in every word.
Heather hoped this was the last she’d hear of the topic. She didn’t need a matchmaker living in the same house, particularly one who’d seized on the misguided notion that there was some kind of chemistry between her and Jason.
With luck, plans for the wedding would put the whole thing out of Olive’s mind soon enough, she told herself, and switched off the burner under the tomato sauce.
THE PATIENT was thirty-four years old and had been trying to get pregnant for five years. She and her husband had undergone a battery of tests with no definitive explanation for their infertility, which was often the case despite advances in medicine.
Loretta Arista was also, Jason knew, the public relations director at Doctors Circle. She’d organized a press conference for him last fall to announce his appointment to this position.
Sitting across the desk from her, he recommended in vitro fertilization, which she hadn’t yet tried. “It’s a lot simpler than it used to be,” Jason said. “We no longer have to perform surgery. Both the egg retrieval and the implantation are out-patient procedures.”
“That’s good.” Loretta hugged herself defensively. She had short, dark hair with a vivid white streak in the front.
“It’s basically a three-week procedure.” Jason produced a brochure to illustrate his words. “For two weeks, you’ll be intensively prepped with hormones.”
When the eggs were ripe, they would be removed with a needle under local anesthesia and grown in a laboratory for several days. After fertilization with her husband’s sperm, they would be implanted in her womb. The odds of a pregnancy resulting were about one in four.
“That means a 75 percent chance of failure, doesn’t it?” Loretta explained that her sister, Rita, was pregnant with triplets, which only made her more eager to have a child herself.
“I understand.” Jason was pleased to see from her file that Loretta had been seeing the staff counselor to deal with the emotional fallout of infertility. “Have you and your husband considered adoption?”
“We already went through the home-study process, but I understand it’s difficult to find an infant,” Loretta said. “Besides, I’m not ready to adopt yet. Can my eggs be ready when the embryologist comes on board in two weeks?”
“The timing looks good. Let’s set up our next appointment and we’ll get started,” Jason said.
“Thanks, Doctor. Is it okay if I put on my public relations hat now?”
“Of course.” He grinned at the metaphor.
Loretta visibly relaxed, becoming more animated as she switched gears. “I want to photograph you in the new facility when it’s closer to completion. I’ll need to interview you and the embryologist for a press kit, too.”
“Just let my secretary know what day would be convenient,” he said.
After she left, Edith appeared. “Can you help her?”
“I hope so,” he said. “Wait, don’t say it. I know we have to keep the love flowing around here.”
His nurse chuckled. “You got that right.”
The rest of the day flew by, with patients lined up for appointments. Many, he concluded after reviewing their charts, were candidates for the latest techniques. Like Loretta, most couldn’t wait to start.
After work, Jason stopped by the supermarket. Having transferred his few possessions to his new home yesterday, he’d been too tired to do more than send out for pizza.
On his way to the checkout stand, a bag of puppy food landed in his cart. One minute he was passing a display of chow, and the next minute there it was, nestled among his selections. Jason nearly put it back, until he told himself that he should give it to the little boys. Maybe it would convince their mother to let them keep Frodo.
At the town house, he stowed the puppy food near the washing machine and fixed himself a meal of rotisserie chicken, mashed potatoes and salad. Afterward, silence settled over the town house like a shroud. He hadn’t realized how much larger this place was than the bachelor flat he’d leased in Virginia.
Jason threw on a light jacket and went out for a walk. What a peaceful place this was, he reflected as he admired the lavender azaleas and orange-and-purple birds of paradise. As he passed one unit after another, he heard the murmur of voices and the clink of pots and pans.
When he was growing up, his mother had often missed dinner while selling houses and his father, a doctor, had frequently worked late, too. Still, they’d made a point of dining together two or three times a week.
Meals were meant to be sociable. Jason shoved his hands into his pockets and hurried on.
On the far side of the pool and spa enclosure, he heard yipping noises coming from one of the units. Jason didn’t even have to think about it. He walked right up and knocked on the door.
It was answered by the older boy he’d met on Sunday. “I don’t suppose Frodo’s still for sale, is he?” he heard himself ask.
“I thought you weren’t allowed to have pets,” the boy replied.
Did the kid have to have such a good memory? “I’m not,” he said. “I was asking for a friend.”
The boy’s father came to the door and introduced himself as Gordon Gray. While they were shaking hands, a small black-and-tan whirlwind flung itself at Jason, leaping at him until he couldn’t resist picking it up. His reward was to have his chin sandpapered by an eager tongue.
After he explained that he was considering buying the pup but was concerned about leaving it alone all day, the man said, “My wife, Alice, runs a service, taking dogs for walks. That way they don’t get so lonely.”
“It sounds perfect,” Jason said.
The dog was still for sale and the price of Alice’s service proved reasonable. Jason tried not to think about the fact that he was breaking his newly signed lease by acquiring a pet. After a lifetime spent living by the rules, he figured he was entitled to a minor infraction.
There was also the issue of whether he’d be able to take a dog with him to wherever he might move in the future. Jason decided to worry about that when the time came.
He tucked Frodo inside his jacket, where the pup settled contentedly, and went outside. Some brave soul had ventured out to soak in the spa, he realized when he heard the rumble of the jets. As long as the pool gates were unlocked, he might as well cut through to get back to his place.
Halfway across, Jason came abreast of the spa. Steam formed a pillar in the chilly air, ghostlike beneath the overhead lights.
He broke stride when he spotted the woman lounging in the water with her eyes half-closed. There was no mistaking that auburn hair or that familiar face. Although most of Heather’s shape disappeared beneath the roiling water, her breasts made an impressive appearance in a skimpy bikini bra that more than matched his fevered imaginings of the previous day.
They strained the fabric almost beyond endurance. Almost beyond his endurance, anyway.
Beneath his jacket, Frodo chose that moment to protest his confinement by squirming. The normal complement of two arms and two hands weren’t nearly enough to hold one puppy while maintaining a nonchalant attitude, Jason discovered.
Heather’s eyes flew open. “Jason? I thought you weren’t going to use the pool!”
“I’m not,” he said. “I’m just taking a walk.”
“Then what are you doing in here?” She frowned at the way he clutched his chest. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” he said. “I’m in kind of a hurry, actually.”
“I don’t understand. What…” She stopped as a nose poked out of his jacket and a sharp yip disturbed the evening calm. Heather’s expression warmed. “What a cute puppy.”
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