Hotblooded (6 page)

“But—”

“I have to,” Brooke said firmly.

Carla didn’t argue, but she was looking at the cappuccino machine sadly when Brooke glanced back.

“For the record,” Carla said, “you don’t have to do it all on your own. I’m in this with you.”

Brooke turned back. Her throat felt tight. “Thanks, Carla.”

That was nice. But Carla came with the clinic. Her job was secure no matter who provided the medical care and there would be someone after Brooke. Someone who patients would actually come to see. Walter and the rest of the City Council wanted medical care in Honey Creek. They just didn’t want Brooke.

“Did Mr. Silver mention what company he ordered the computer from?”

Carla sighed. “Yeah.” She touched the silver side of the cappuccino machine lovingly. “They faxed an order confirmation a little bit ago. It’s in my top drawer. I was saving it for Jack.”

“Thanks.” Brooke found the paper right away and went to her office to make the call. A woman answered after a two-minute hold period. Brooke explained the situation and that she wanted to cancel the shipment.

“I will have to inform the gentleman who placed the order of this…development.” The woman’s tone was icy.

“Oh, I hope you do,” Brooke said sincerely.

She disconnected the call, leaned back in her chair and propped her feet on the desk. Maybe Carla would even bring her a cappuccino while she waited for Jack to show up.

She couldn’t avoid a face to face with him any longer.

“Is she here?” Jack asked Carla as he strode through the front of the clinic.

“Oh, yeah. In fact, I have a feeling she’s been waiting for you.”

He couldn’t help the smile. “She figured I would come?”

“I think so.” Carla pointed down the hall toward Brooke’s office. “I’d knock before you go in.”

“Of course.”

He did knock, but he didn’t wait for her to invite him in.

She was sitting behind her desk, a pair of glasses balanced on her nose and a thick paperback book open in front of her.

She pulled the glasses from her face and shut the book, turning it over so he couldn’t see the front, and stood all in one fluid motion.

“Mr. Silver.”

His body reacted before his brain fully caught up.

She was dressed in black slacks, a white button up shirt, her hair pulled back into a severe twist, so it took his mind a few seconds longer to process the fact that Brooke Donovan was, in fact, his cleaning lady.

And then it made sense.

Kind of.

His reaction was surprisingly strong. It was more than a male appreciating a beautiful female. It was more than a man recognizing a woman he wanted. It was like every cell in his body was remembering hers all at once—how her lips felt, how her breasts felt, how her legs felt wrapped around him like he was a life preserver and her ship was going down.

He stopped in front of her desk, not sure what to say or do. Perhaps asking if he could taste the sweet skin just below her ear wasn’t appropriate but it seemed to be all he could concentrate on. “I’m sorry the computer system isn’t what you wanted. The new system will be here in the morning.”

“It better not be,” she protested. “I don’t want anything from you.”

He didn’t think that was entirely true. He thought there were some things she wanted as much as he did. And he wasn’t opposed to reminding her of that given half a chance.

“That’s not an option.”

While giving Brooke
things
wasn’t his ultimate goal—and wouldn’t be ultimately satisfying as David had pointed out—he needed to be around long enough to find out what she really needed. Carla had assured him that if he bought Brooke some outlandish thing she would confront him face to face. It was pure coincidence that the most unusual thing they could come up with was something Carla was dying to have.

That was just the first step anyway.

The second step was, well, to hang around as long as necessary to figure out a way to satisfy them both. And he didn’t even mean that sexually. Much.

It was strange how quickly he was adjusting to the fact that the two Honey Creek women he’d been obsessing about were one and the same.

In fact, Brooke’s insistence about not seeing him made more sense this way.

He wondered if the stain of pink on her cheeks was about something more interesting than ire. Embarrassment? Arousal?

He liked that idea. And he liked the realization that he’d won round one—they were face to face. He wasn’t worried about round two either. Or the entire battle.

There was no way she had a better reason for declining his help than he had for giving it.

No way.

He took a seat in the chair in front of her desk. He crossed one ankle over the opposite knee and leaned back, casually. “I’m glad to see at least you’re enjoying the cappuccino.”

He looked pointedly at the large mug on the corner of her desk.

She followed his gaze to the steam rising from the creamy brown liquid. And she blushed.

Somehow, Jack held back his smile.

She took her seat again, folding her hands primly on the huge calendar on the surface of her desk. Primly wasn’t a word he would have ever associated with the woman he’d met yesterday and it bugged him that it fit today. She might look all buttoned up and serious right now, but he knew that she could let go.

“Carla brought that in to me.”

“Pretty good, huh?”

Brooke laid her glasses to one side and leaned onto her desk on her elbows. “I’m not going to let you buy me a cappuccino machine, either.”

“Actually, that was more for Carla than you. But that’s just a detail.” He shifted and perused her office instead of concentrating on how much he hated that her shirt was buttoned nearly to her throat and her hair was pulled back.

He couldn’t pinpoint why—because it was ridiculous for him to even imagine that he knew her—but this look didn’t fit. Sure, the first time he’d met her she’d been without a bra—he had to shift again to try to get comfortable in his pants—but there was something more bugging him about her appearance today. She seemed…uncomfortable. And it couldn’t be because of him. At least not entirely. Could it?

Her office was incredibly dull.

The ivory walls had only her framed degrees to break up the monotony. The windows were hung with very plain off-white blinds and no curtains. Her desk was at least thirty years old and the chair older. One glaringly bright black metal lamp illuminated the workspace while fluorescent bulbs shone from above. The chair he sat in was hardly comfortable, though he gave every pretense of being totally at ease.

“Nice office,” he commented, looking down at the gray carpet.

She frowned. “It does exactly what it’s supposed to do—give me a place to do my paperwork and make phone calls.”

“You need a decorator.”

“I need one less cappuccino machine.”

He smiled. He could tell it irritated her, but he did it anyway. In fact, the smile grew as her frown deepened.

“You can’t send the cappuccino machine back. It’s been used.” His gaze dropped to her cup.

She watched him for a moment. Then she pushed back from her desk and stood.

“I don’t need a fancy office. I’m hardly ever here.” Then she swept around the edge of her desk and out her office door, like a queen promenading at a ball.

He got to his feet, somehow enjoying all of this more than he should. He found her a minute later at the front counter.

Carla handed her a slip of paper even as the nurse gave Jack an apologetic shrug.

Brooke dialed the phone and stood listening, ignoring Jack. Or at least pretending to.

“Purchasing, please,” Brooke said into the phone. It only took a moment to connect evidently, because she then asked, “I have a cappuccino machine, model number 77896. I need to know the total price of the machine, including delivery to Honey Creek.” She glanced at Carla who took a sip from her own cup. “Rush delivery I assume,” Brooke added. She gave the address of the clinic and then waited again.

He moved in behind the counter and leaned against the edge of Carla’s desk. “She’s going to try to send it back?”

Carla shrugged. “She just asked me to get the model number off the machine.”

He raised his voice slightly. “I promise you, if that cappuccino machine disappears, I’ll offer you another job Carla. No one should have to work for such a stingy boss.”

Brooke gave no indication that she’d heard him. She studied the numbers on the front of the phone instead of looking at him or Carla.

“Yes,” she said a moment later. “It was delivered today.” She paused again, listening. “Okay.” She scribbled something on the slip of paper with the machine’s model number. “Thank you very much.”

Jack continued to sit next to Carla, waiting to see what Brooke would say next.

She said nothing. Instead she started dialing again.

“Hi, Ashley. This is Brooke Donovan.”

Jack straightened away from Carla’s desk. Who was Ashley?

“I’m fine, thank you,” Brooke said, smiling slightly. “Ashley, I have some really good news. I’m going to be sending a donation on behalf of a Mr. Jack Silver. The check will be for two thousand, three hundred and forty-four dollars and sixty-one cents. Will you let Mary know?”

She paused and listened, then said, “Oh, no, he doesn’t want any thanks at all. In fact, he’d prefer to keep his name out of it entirely.”

Jack couldn’t help his smile. The check amount was the exact cost of the cappuccino machine, including delivery.

He wanted to shake her, and to laugh, all at once. The urge to laugh overpowered the other in the end.

She looked at him as if she was questioning his sanity. “There, that’s taken care of.”

“Who’s Ashley?” he asked.

“A volunteer at the Mary Elizabeth Girls Home.”

“Never heard of it.”

“It’s a home in San Antonio where pregnant teens can live until they deliver their babies. I did pro bono work there while I went to school, then started a job with them just before I moved back here.”

He stared at her, surprised and fascinated and certain those were not good things considering the circumstances. “Did you clean the place or give medical care?”

“Whatever needed to be done at any particular moment. Like here,” she said, meeting his eyes without flinching. “I’m really good at…lots of things.”

He responded, probably exactly as she’d expected. He was suddenly very warm, very aware of her, and very impressed. That was the closest they’d come to talking about yesterday and their initial meeting and she’d definitely taken the upper hand.

“So we’re keeping the cappuccino machine?” Carla asked, her eyes bright.

Jack took a deep breath, but couldn’t wipe the smile from his face.

“Yes, we’re keeping it.” Brooke didn’t break eye contact with him. “I’m not a complete witch.”

He didn’t even try to protest her misinterpretation of his comment. He just kept grinning broadly.

“I’ll be in my office,” she told Carla who had just moved to answer the ringing phone.

As Brooke turned away, Jack could have sworn he saw a faint smile on her face.

Chapter Three

Brooke didn’t even make it five feet toward her office.

“We’ve got a situation,” Carla announced, hanging up the phone and striding toward the door that led to the garage where the clinic’s pickup was stored. “Amanda Cartwright fell down the steps at the post office.”

It took Brooke two seconds to switch gears and change directions. It took Jack only one.

“When?” Brooke asked, following Carla—and Jack—out.

“Five minutes ago.”

Jack held the truck door open for her and then climbed up onto the front seat beside her.

“Any other details?” She frowned at Jack as she was forced to slide to the middle toward Carla.

“Laura didn’t think her water broke or anything, but I guess she’s carrying on loud and clear about her ankle hurting.”

Laura Clark was the postmistress in Honey Creek. She’d likely been too scared of Amanda and a potential lawsuit to get close enough to truly check things out.

“She’s pregnant?” Jack asked as Carla sped through a stop sign.

“Thirty-three weeks,” Brooke answered.

Carla tore around the next corner, throwing Brooke up against Jack.

He was solid. As she knew intimately. She’d certainly pressed enough of herself against enough of him to know that. And she wanted to be against him more. Which was the stupidest idea she’d had in a long time. She didn’t think he’d mind but that definitely didn’t make it any smarter.

There had been a heat between them in her office. Even as he was clearly stunned to find out who she actually was, it was as if memories from their first meeting were zinging back and forth telepathically. She remembered his mouth, his hands, his…well, everything.

Her cheeks heated and she fought the urge to fan herself.

“Any problems with the pregnancy so far?” Jack asked.

She forced herself to concentrate on their conversation. Pregnancy, Amanda, fall. She shook her head. “Nothing really. She complains a lot, about every ache and pain. But she’s very healthy, as is the baby.”

Not that she’d know firsthand. Amanda went to an OB/GYN in Amarillo for her regular pregnancy checkups. For her routine, minor complaints she would only see Mike. Not just because Brooke was Dixie Donovan’s daughter and the Cartwrights never associated with anyone they deemed to be beneath them, but because Amanda hated Brooke.

And it wasn’t just rivalry dislike. It was outright hatred.

“Is this her first pregnancy?” Jack asked.

“She has a set of twins who are three.”

She wondered at his interest and was going to ask him when they pulled up in front of the post office.

A small but concerned crowd was gathered around the front steps in spite of the fact that it had been sprinkling on and off all morning. A little rain wouldn’t stop good gossip. Brooke excused her way through the circle of people that stood three-deep where Amanda sat on the top step. She was holding her stomach with one hand and her head with the other.

Brooke concentrated on being straightforward and businesslike as she knelt on one knee in front of Amanda and put the stethoscope into her ears. She needed to keep her mannerisms, tone and eye contact steady and confident. She could get through this. In spite of the command performance in front of an audience. The most important thing was Amanda’s unborn child.