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She shook her head. “It—it takes a lot to get a business going. I have friends at Pacific Coast House—”
“Ashley Waterstone,” he interrupted, a little grin spreading across his face. “She made me come to see you.”
“I know.” Mandy pursed her lips to the side at the memory of Ashley’s call. She’d been nearly as intimidating as her six-foot-two SEAL husband when she’d told Mandy that she had a friend in need of help. Mandy just hadn’t planned on the man sitting across the table from her, his crooked grin and boyish charm a little too disarming. A little too much like Gary’s.
She’d made the right decision turning Luke away.
She had.
She was certain.
Almost.
Luke’s head bowed as his shoulders rose and fell in an even rhythm. He almost looked as if he was praying, until he glanced up without moving his head. “I think we both know that Ashley, Staci, Jess and the others at Pacific Coast House can’t afford to get mixed up in this situation. They have families to think about.”
His tone was filled with as much compassion as she’d heard from him, but it didn’t take away the sting of his words. The truth of them. She pulled her hand from where it still rested beneath his and hugged her arms around her middle.
She was going to have to face this alone.
Do not be afraid.
The words rang through her, true and clear, and she knew in that instant that she could face whatever was coming.
His mouth quirked to the side. “Of course, that wouldn’t stop them. I get the feeling they like you a whole bunch.”
A tear tried to force its way out, and she blinked it into submission, swallowing the lump in her throat. “I like them, too. And I’d never ask them to put their families in danger for me. I can do this. On my own.”
He tapped his long tan fingers on the table where her hand had been, and she suddenly missed the reassurance of his touch. But the warmth in his eyes wrapped around her heart.
She could face this. Whatever it was. Whoever it was.
“So here’s the thing. Those ladies, they’re like my big sisters. And their husbands, they’re my bosses and friends. If I let anything happen to you, I’m pretty sure they’d take out my other knee.” He chuckled at the half joke, but the truth about his injury kept his jaw tight.
“What are you saying?”
He shrugged. “I’m available.”
She knew what he meant, what he was offering. She just wasn’t ready to give him an answer. Accepting him meant allowing him into her life, and her track record with that had led to her very worst mistake. Even if this wasn’t a romantic relationship.
But refusing him left her out in the open, unprotected.
Neither was a good option.
So, instead of responding to his offer, she asked a question of her own, forcing her smirk back into place and hoping to make him squirm. Just a little bit. “Are you trying to ask me on a date?”
Without missing a beat, he winked and replied, “Whatever it takes to keep you safe.”
With a shake of her head and a low chuckle, she sighed. He was far too charming for his own good. For her own good. But his proposal was too important to ignore. “Don’t you have something better to do?”
“As a matter of fact, I don’t.” He thumped the brace on his leg. “I’m supposed to be resting my knee when I’m not in physical therapy. My life is looking pretty dull from where I’m sitting.”
“A SEAL without a mission...”
“About the worst hand a guy could be dealt.” There was truth in his tone, a longing in his voice to return to a life of significance.
Except...well, she wasn’t sure a guy in his condition could keep her safe.
As soon as the thought crept in, she laughed it away. He’d saved her from a speeding car while using crutches and carrying his dinner. And he’d kept his cool the whole time. He was capable, even with his injury.
But letting him help her also meant allowing a man back into her life. It meant being reminded of another relationship that had turned sour, that had turned her into someone she hated.
Do not be afraid.
She could handle this. She would handle this, by setting up the boundaries from the start.
“Just so we’re clear, I was joking before about you asking me out.” He raised an eyebrow in question. “There’ll be no—” she waved her finger back and forth between them “—dating.”
He winked again, that saucy grin falling back into place. “Whatever you say.”
Her stomach swooped and tightened, and she leaned toward him, needing him to understand, to agree. “That’s a nonnegotiable. I don’t date patients. Period.”
Both of his eyebrows went up this time. “So, I’m a patient now?”
She was as surprised as he looked. When had she decided to take on his case? She hadn’t. Not consciously anyway. But...
“I suppose so. I spend most of my time at the office, and if you’re going to be around, you might as well be getting your feet back under you.”
His smile turned from playful to appreciative. “I won’t let you down.”
She wasn’t going to overanalyze whether he was referring to her situation or his healing. Either way she was stuck with him now. At least it would be on her terms. “All right. But no dates.” His Cheshire grin never wavered, and she had a sinking feeling that his flirting was going to play a prominent role in their relationship.
It was worth it.
Because maybe, just maybe, he could help her stay safe long enough to figure out who was trying to kill her.
THREE
Mandy spent the entire night before Luke’s first appointment calling herself every name in the book. She was a special kind of crazy to take him on. If she had half a brain, she would have found a way to put as much distance between them as she could.
Except she hadn’t had a choice.
And his eyes had spoken volumes across the table two nights before. He could help her. And as much as she didn’t want to need him, she did. The exact kind of professional help he could offer.
But the more she thought about having Luke around, the more she recalled the other man in her life. The one who had wormed his way into her personal life and into her home. Who had made her miserable.
Chills raced down her arms, and she hugged her knees into her chest, pushing away all thoughts of someone else being in her house.
Suddenly being alone was too much, and she threw back the covers on her bed and ran for the bathroom. Slamming and locking the door behind her, she got ready in record time. Her hair was still damp as she raced down the road to her office.
She skidded into her regular parking spot on the side of her building and ran through the nearly empty lot, past the scene of the would-have-been hit-and-run.
When she reached the glass double doors, they were already unlocked. She hesitantly ducked her head inside until Tara waved at her from behind the desk. “Morning, boss.”
“Hi, Tara.” Mandy slipped the rest of the way in, wrestling her overstuffed tote bag through behind her.
“You’re in early today.” Tara’s grin sparkled as though she knew a big secret.
Mandy covered a yawn with the back of her hand. “I didn’t get my paperwork done last night.” There. That was a very valid excuse for running away from her own home.
“Su-ure.” Tara singsonged the word as if she knew more than Mandy gave her credit for.
“And I need you to pull out an inactive file. I took on a new client.”
Tara’s eyebrows rose, her forehead wrinkling as she steepled her fingers beneath her chin. “Oh.” Again, that knowing tone. “Do tell.”
“Dunham. Luke Dunham.”
With a low cackle, Tara pulled his file from a stack on the side of her desk. “I had a feeling we hadn’t seen the last of him.”
“It wasn’t... I... Things changed.”
“Uh-huh.” Tara tapped the point of a pen against her tongue before scribbling a note on the chart. “First appointment?”
Mandy hated the guilt that tumbled within her. She still owned this practice. She was still in charge. So why hadn’t she told Tara about Luke’s appointment until today?
There wasn’t time to dig into her real reasons for it, and if she let the conversation go any further, she’d have to explain to Tara about nearly being hit by a car and someone breaking into her home. Better to keep this conversation short. “Four o’clock. Today. I’ll be in my office until my first appointment arrives.”
The rubber soles of her shoes squeaked against the laminate flooring as she kept her stride even and unhurried. She had no reason to run. At least not from Tara.
The day passed like a minute, each patient taking all of her focus, deserving all of her energy. It was after three when she finally looked up and realized she hadn’t eaten anything since the banana she’d snatched on the way out the door that morning. Her stomach growled loudly as she marked another patient’s progress in his chart.
With a quick sweep of the exercise room, she confirmed that the only other occupants, a teenage girl working on a balance ball with one of Mandy’s physical therapy assistants, hadn’t heard her body’s retaliation for not feeding it. Stretching her back and shoulders as she stood, she headed for the front office to see if there were any leftovers to be had.
“Haven’t seen you all day.” Tara didn’t even look up from the computer where she navigated complex medical-charting screens that fed to area hospitals. “I thought you were avoiding me, boss.”
“I was.” Mandy laid the sarcasm on thick, and Tara glanced up just long enough to offer a smile.
“Hungry?”
“So much. Anything good back there?” Mandy peeked down the hall toward the office kitchen. It was a tiny room with a round table big enough for only two chairs. The counters boasted only a coffeemaker, sink and a toaster oven. Even the fridge looked as if it belonged in a dorm room rather than in an office.
As Mandy slipped toward the break room, Tara scrambled out from behind her desk, the wheels on her chair clacking against the tiled floor as she ran to catch Mandy. “So are you going to tell me what happened with the SEAL?”
Mandy frowned as she eyed a half-eaten salad and a tray of veggies left on the counter. A wilted piece of roast beef squished between two slices of bread sat beside the tray, the last in what had been a plate of sandwiches. The soggy bread and warm meat looked as appetizing as congealed gravy. Someone had ordered in, and she’d missed the invitation.
Rats. Now she was going to have to face the SEAL in question on an empty stomach.
“He has a name, you know.” Mandy plopped several pieces of limp lettuce onto a plate before digging her fork into it.
Tara nodded. “I do. But if the rest of his team had any intelligence, they would have nicknamed him Adorable.”
Mandy snorted so hard, she nearly choked on her bite. Quickly swallowing the offending mouthful, she was about to respond when the bell on the front door rang, and Tara dashed to man her post.
She’d just taken another bite when Tara called down the hallway, “Mandy? You have a visitor.” Her words were stilted, hesitant, as though she didn’t really want to say them. And they turned leaves of lettuce into gravel as Mandy swallowed.
Setting the plate on the table, she tiptoed down the hallway, poking her head around the corner just as the bell above the front door jingled again.
Luke appeared at the entrance. The setting sun behind him left him in shadow, but she could still feel the weight of his gaze as he maneuvered his new crutches through the door.
“Luke.” Her voice went higher than she’d expected, and she quickly cleared her throat. “You’re early.”
“Thought I’d bring back the chair you let me borrow.”
“Thanks.”
Suddenly someone else cleared his throat. It was low and tinged with mild annoyance, as if he’d been put out by her short exchange with Luke. Mandy didn’t really need to look at him to identify the visitor Tara had announced.
He was tall and broad, his dark hair still falling over his forehead, no matter how many times he pushed it out of the way. His smile still ticked up to one side, but where it had once been charming, now it was smarmy, turning her skin to gooseflesh at first glance. His eyes were deep brown, but they lacked any compassion or understanding of the part he’d played in her greatest regret. And now they shot from Mandy to Luke and back, filled with questions.
But she didn’t owe Gary Heusen any answers. In fact, she had plenty of questions of her own.
“What are you doing here, Gary?”
He held out a bouquet of roses. More white roses. More reminders that he’d once known her and claimed to care about her.
Her heart picked up speed, and a bead of sweat formed on the back of her neck, trailing below the collar of her shirt. She pressed a hand to the wall for support, hating her body’s reaction. Hating that she couldn’t control the way she responded to the memories and that the broken heart he’d left behind suddenly felt all too fresh.
“Luke, why don’t I go with you to get the wheelchair?” Tara’s voice broke the trance in the room, but Luke scowled at the idea.
“Are you okay, Doc?” While he clearly addressed Mandy, his eyes narrowed on Gary, a warning written across his features.
“I’m fine. Please, would you go with Tara? I can handle this.” She could. She would. Forcing her shoulders square and her back straight, she watched Luke follow Tara out of her office.
When the door closed, she turned on Gary in a hushed but firm voice. “What are you doing here?” she repeated. “I don’t want you here.”
Gary’s eyes looked in the direction of the path Luke had just taken. “So you’ve replaced me?”
Anger shot through her like a volcano, unbridled, untamable. “What are you talking—”
Two voices from down the hall suddenly joined them, and Mandy clamped her mouth closed, trying for a stabilizing breath. “We can’t do this here.”
“Then let’s go to your office.” He tucked the flowers back into the crook of his arm and held open the wooden door to the back hallway. She didn’t have any choice. She knew he wouldn’t be going anywhere until he said whatever he’d come here to say.
Marching down the hall, she led him to her office. The minute he was inside, she spun on him in a hushed growl. “You have two minutes. This better be good.”
The cool assurance on his face dimmed for a split second, before he amped up his toothy smile and held out the flowers. “You’re as pretty as ever, Dee.”
“Don’t call me that. I don’t like it,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
“You used to.”
No, I didn’t. But this was not the time to argue with him. “Get to the point. What do you want?”
He twisted the bouquet in his hand, showcasing his empty ring finger. “A lot’s been going on lately.”
The last time she’d run into him, Gary had been wearing a gaudy gold ring, a symbol of his marriage. The one he hadn’t bothered to tell her he was about to enter while he wooed her. The one she hadn’t asked about. Mandy pinched the bridge of her nose and pressed her other hand to her hip.
“I’m not interested in playing your games. I have a busy day, and you don’t need to be here.”
“Don’t you understand? Camilla and I aren’t together anymore. You and I can finally have a future.”
“What?” She shrieked the word so loudly that everyone in the building probably heard it.
Gary reached for her hand, but Mandy jerked away, shaking her head. “Camilla knew,” he continued. “She knew that I always loved you best.”
“Love? Is that what you call it?” Mandy gave up trying to keep her voice low, her tone even. This man was crazy if he thought she’d have anything to do with him after what he’d done. “Lying to me? Leading me on? Breaking my heart? That’s love?”
“Baby, it was you the whole time.” He gave her his best smile, and it succeeded only in making her stomach turn.
“Listen to me very carefully. You’re not welcome here. I don’t want your flowers. I don’t care what happened between you and Camilla. I don’t want to see you again.” She took a step in his direction, hoping he would back up, but he didn’t, and suddenly they were closer than she wanted.
His smarmy grin turned just a little bit cruel.
How had she ever fallen for his act, for the facade? Oh, he’d been a good actor, for sure. Attentive. Interested. Caring. And she’d wanted to see those qualities in him. She’d wanted to believe the best in him so much that she’d ignored every warning.
Except he’d done it all to feed his own ego, to prove to himself that he still had whatever it took to win a woman’s heart. But after the winning, he’d been more than happy to crush it. And now that she knew it, it was easy to see in every facial expression, easy to hear in every word.
“Oh, you’ll see me around,” he said. “You forget we have ties to the same circles.”
“What circles?”
“The Pacific Coast House carnival fund-raiser is next week.”
“You wouldn’t.” She narrowed her eyes and pressed her hands to her waist. “You’ve never cared about anyone as much as you care about yourself. You wouldn’t show up at the carnival.”
“Sure I would.” He let the flowers drop to his side, still holding her gaze. “And Camilla might be there, too.”
“Why? She has no connection to PCH.”
He shrugged one shoulder beneath his dark brown leather jacket. “She always said she didn’t like you. Maybe she thinks you’re the reason our marriage fell apart.” He turned on the charm as if he’d flipped a switch. “Of course, I know that’s not true. We were doomed from the start. She has a terrible habit of lashing out when she’s angry.”
A scene from Mandy’s waiting room four years before flashed through her mind, and her insides twisted like a screw. Camilla’s eyes had been wild with rage, her motions fierce. She had knocked over chairs and broken a lamp and left the office in disarray. Gary had sworn she wasn’t normally like that. When she was on her medications.
Mandy covered her mouth with her hand, her breath suddenly short.
If she wasn’t taking her medications, Camilla was prone to lash out. Like trying to run someone over.
A brick settled on her lungs, and Mandy fought to speak. “Is she taking her meds now, Gary?”
He shook his head. “I’m not sure.”
“Okay. You need to go now.”
Gary opened his mouth to refuse the request, but instead of his voice, another one filled the room. “You heard the doc. It’s time for you to go.”
* * *
The guy Mandy had called Gary took one look at Luke—even on his crutches—gave a silent nod, tossed the flowers on Mandy’s desk and ducked out of the room. The bell on the door declared his exit from the building.
Luke kept his distance from Mandy, trying to read her face, but she’d put a mask on, all professionalism. “Let’s get to work.” She marched past him and down the hall toward the exercise room. She pointed to the closest exam table. “Hop on up.”
He bit back every question racing through his mind and did as she said, letting her have this moment of control.
When he was settled onto the table, she rested her hands on his back. Even through his T-shirt, they were like icicles, and he jumped.
“Sorry.” She blew on her palms and rubbed them together until they whistled at the friction. “Go ahead and lie down. Let’s get this brace off and see where your range of motion is at.”
He did as she instructed while she began loudly peeling back the Velcro strips. “Lift your leg.” She helped him raise it just enough to slide the brace out of the way. He felt a hundred pounds lighter and also as if he might fly apart given a stiff breeze. The knee brace had been his companion since the surgery, and without it, he was incomplete.
“All right. Really carefully, we’re going to bend your knee.” She put her hands around his calf and pulled gently.
He inhaled sharply. His leg felt as if it would split into two pieces. Like a freight train running him over, the pressure against the stiffness was more than he could handle. He pinched his eyes closed and brought a fist to his mouth.
“Good. You’re doing really well.” Mandy’s tone was soothing and calm as she straightened his leg and then bent it again.
“Are you trying to tear my whole leg off?”
She laughed. “No. But this is your first appointment. You never know about next time.” On the fourth pass, she said, “Think about something else. What did you think about when you were in SEAL training?”
“About how much I wanted to be a SEAL, but now...” He let the silence that followed finish the thought. He didn’t have to say it. They both knew that now there were no assurances. There was no certainty that he’d ever be on another mission with his SEAL brothers.
Nothing was a guarantee. No matter how much he’d begged God to heal him, to give him a new knee, he hadn’t heard anything from above.
But he did have a mission now. His assignment was Mandy’s safety. And he could think on that.
“So, are you going to tell me about the guy in your office?”
“No.” There was no humor in her response.
“Okay. What about the Camilla woman? Sounds like she might be holding a grudge.”
Mandy kept her hands gentle, but her tone firm. “Maybe.”
“What happened with her?”
“I don’t know.”
Luke frowned at her.
Even though she kept her gaze firmly locked on his knee, she said, “I only met her once.”
“Then why would she have it out for you?”
“She thinks I tried to steal her husband.”
Something strange and altogether unwelcome roared inside him, but he couldn’t call it by name. It burned like anger but not quite. It twisted his insides like bitterness, only not as strong. It was indistinct but demanding.
One thing he knew for sure. Mandy hadn’t stolen anyone’s husband.
He’d known her barely three days, and he already knew she wasn’t capable of such a thing.
“Why does she—” He groaned as she bent his knee farther than it had moved since Lybania. Since the explosion.
Mandy didn’t bother to apologize, but she did give his quad muscles a gentle massage. “You’re going to be a little stiff tomorrow, but it’ll be the good kind of sore.”
After a few more minutes, she reached for his brace.
“Already? I can do more.” He swiped his arm across his upper lip, wiping away the sweat that had pooled there, even from such a light workout.
“I know you can. But you shouldn’t.” Helping him sit up and swing his legs back over the edge of the table, she looked right into his eyes. “I have a feeling half of your battle is going to be just letting it rest. The surgeon didn’t repair your medial collateral ligament. That’s only going to heal with rest. So you have to take it slow.”
He leaned into her until their foreheads were only a couple inches apart. She smelled of hand sanitizer and citrus, and he offered her a compromise. “Then you’ve got to give me more to work on than the first name of a woman you haven’t seen in years.”
She reached for his crutches and wedged them in front of her. “You need to rest.”
“And you promised to let me help you.”
She lifted her eyes toward the ceiling as though asking for patience from above. “I don’t have anything else to give you right now. I’m going to call Detective Fletcher, who I reported the almost hit-and-run to, and tell him what Gary said so he can look into Camilla. And then I’m going to go home.”
“At least let me walk you to your car?”
A slow smile lifted her cheeks, despite the shadow of fear reflected in her eyes. “All right.”
He trailed after her as she went to her office and called the detective. It must have gone straight to voice mail, and she left a short, succinct message. “This is Mandy Berg. I have a tip on someone who might be taking her frustrations out on me. Would you call me back as soon as you have a chance?” She gave him her number before hanging up. Then she tossed the flowers, which were still sitting on her desk, in the trash and scooped up her tote bag. “Let’s go.”