Jake (4 page)

              “You also work too much,” he continued, “and you could use a little more common sense.”

              He stole a sideways glance in time to watch Ivy’s eyebrow arch.

              “You should have been more concerned about being alone in the middle of the desert,” he insisted.

              “I call that confidence,” Ivy said.

              “Sometimes the line between confidence and casualty is blurred. It’s easy to find ourselves in trouble.”

              “Are you speaking from personal experience?” she countered.

              “I could be,” he admitted.

              His words, and their solemn tone, made her think back to the moment on the side of the road when Jake’s whole demeanor had changed. Everything about him had stilled. She had sensed him withdrawing, drifting out of reach. Some thought had haunted him. She had watched the shadows shift in his eyes, his face grow dark.

              He turned on his signal light and cruised into a lane change. Ivy looked at the approaching signs and noticed they were connecting with Interstate Fifteen. They were still at least an hour from the hospital. The clock on the dash read five-twenty-five. She would make it. She didn’t doubt him for a minute. But it would be by the skin of her teeth.

              That was one thing Ivy knew about Jake. She could take him at his word. But why did she know that? Because he was a Marine? No, there was more to it—to him—than that. He had shown honor in a number of ways. First, by stopping to help. Then by distancing himself when the pot started to boil. He had called an end to their game when it became more than that.

              Jake was a man she could trust. That was a foreign idea to Ivy. Her father had never so much as dropped a birthday card in the mail. He had left her and Holly long before Ivy had a decent memory of the man. And at this point, for all she knew, her father could be dead. Trace had done little to inspire trust. He had, in fact, crushed even the hope of finding that with the beatings.

              “You learn anything about me, Ivy?”

              She nodded but it took a moment to find her voice. Even so, she sounded breathless, “You’re a man I can trust.”

              “That scares you.”

              She nodded. “You’re dangerous.” And it had nothing to do with his size, his confidence or the certainty with which he conducted his life. Trust made a woman vulnerable.

              “And you want to run.”

              She turned to him, even though her eyes were flared with fear. “You’re wrong about that, Jake. I stopped running a long time ago.”

              He nodded. “I won’t push. Not too hard.”

              “And I might pull left, but I’ll stand my ground.”

              She watched a smile lift the corner of his lips.

              “It looks like we got the communication thing down.”

              “So far,” she agreed. “So we’re going to see each other again?”

              “Oh, yeah,” he said. “Count on it.”

              She liked his swift and sure answer, but decided to test it anyway.

              “But we’re not in any hurry.”

              He turned quickly and shot her a look. “Define hurry.”

              “Is dinner Saturday night too soon?” That was a whole week away. She tried to look at him with wide-eyed innocence, but a teasing quality had entered her voice. Jake noticed it, too, and smiled into her challenge.

              “You’ll need your car before then,” he pointed out.

              She frowned. Ivy had no idea how she was going to get home from work at the end of her shift. But there was time enough to figure that out.

              “Tuesday?” Jake offered.

              “I work until seven.”

              “You’ll need to eat.”

              She nodded. “I’ll need exercise, too. I usually take advantage of the long days and run after work.”

              “Sounds good to me. A run and then a late dinner.”

              She let her eyes dip to his legs, powerful against the denim. “You’re a runner?”

              “I’m a Marine.”

              She thought about that. She knew there was a certain amount of physical aptitude required to join the Corps and that maintaining it was expected. Still, she had been running for almost two years now. “You’ve met your match,” she declared.

              His bark of laughter startled her. “Competitive, too,” he said.

              Ivy smiled. “Not really. Running is a very solitary sport. For me, anyway.”

              “You’ve never run with anyone,” he guessed.

              She thought about Holly. They had never run together. They talked about it, about when

she would be ready and how Ivy would be right by her side. She hoped that day came, and soon. She hoped they weren’t grasping at the impossible.

              “No, but I think I’ll like it.”

              “Me, too.” He looked into the rear view mirror and then changed lanes. They passed a sign that read
San Diego 67 miles
.

              “You want me to tell you more about the Grand Cayman’s? The G version,” she promised.

              “No way. You can tell me more about your Caribbean vacation, picking up exactly where you left off, on our second date.” He paused and put a little more thought into that. “No, better make it our third or fourth.” He turned to her and smiled. “How’s that for pacing?”

              Ivy pursed her lips as she pretended to think about it. “About the blinding speed of a freight train stuck in neutral.”

Chapter Four

              Ivy made it to work with four minutes to spare. She had punched her number into his i-Phone, and then placed herself on speed dial using an image of ivy, with clear heart-shaped leaves, as her icon.

              “In case you forget my name,” she told him.

              “Not a chance.” His mouth softened and when he accepted his phone back from her, his fingers trailed smoothly over the sensitive skin of her wrist. It was a deliberate touch and when her lips parted in reaction, his smile became decidedly roguish.

              He leaned into her space. “We’re going to wait on the physical, but when we do come together,” he warned softly, “it’s going to be explosive.”

              His breath fanned her lips and Ivy thought about closing that space between them. The tension was like a ribbon running down the center of her and he was pulling on the raveling end. She felt her nipples bead and wondered if he could see them pushing against the thin fabric of her tank top.

              He swore and it was a single, husky word of need. She opened her eyes to find his fastened on her breasts.

              “This is crazy,” she whispered. She’d never felt even half this aroused with Trace. Of course, she had been a school girl then. And later, all feeling for him was gone.

              “Never this fast. This hot. This
need
,” he agreed.

              “I think I waited too long,” she blurted. “That has to be it.”

              He took her confession with his lips, grazing over hers softly. He took her breath as his own as her mouth opened on a shuddering sigh.

              “How long, Ivy?” he asked.

              But she was beyond words. She was all about the scent of him, warm and close. The taste of him, moist and hot. Her fingers drifted over his shoulders, tracing their strength, and settled on his chest. She could feel the beat of his heart, accelerated but steady, an elemental rhythm that called to her.

              “How long?” he asked again.

              “Years,” she admitted.

              His tongue plunged into her mouth then, sliding against hers, tangling in an erotic dance that melted Ivy from the inside out.

              And then it was over. A bucket of ice water couldn’t have left her any colder than his sudden withdrawal.

              She heard herself gasp. Felt her body pull into itself.

              “Sorry,” he muttered. And she could tell from the anger in his voice that he was, truly. So

she spared him a glance.

              His face was flushed. His  lips wet from her mouth. His chest lifted in an agitated rhythm.

              “Our first date,” he announced, “will be hands off.”

              “What?”

              “There’s more to us than sex. There has to be. But we’ll never discover it if we touch each other.”

              “Because touch won’t be enough.”

              “Not ever,” he agreed.

              “Maybe it
is
just sex. A really strong attraction,” she pointed out. “Maybe we could work each other out of our systems.”

              He shook his head and reached over her to open her door. “I don’t want to work you out of my system, Ivy.”

              She gathered her purse and slipped out of the truck. Standing inside the open door, she held Jake’s gaze. His eyes reminded her of the ocean, a tropical green mixing with the blue and made more intense from his emotions. She nodded, pushed the strap of her purse over her shoulder, and cleared her throat.

              “Thanks,” she said. “Really.” She gestured toward the truck and her car hooked up in back.

              “You’re welcome. Really.”

              “Mind parking it and leaving the key at reception?”

              “Of course,” he promised.

              Ivy shifted on her feet. She was probably down to two minutes now and would have to race through the lobby, but she had trouble shifting from fully aroused to work mode. “Well, OK. I’ll see you Tuesday.”

              “Definitely.”

              Ivy turned and dashed around the fountain with the children frolicking in the water and slid through the front doors of Rady Children’s Hospital. She loved this place. There were cheerful murals of children at play and many of the floor tiles had been painted with tic-tac-toe boards and row boats stuffed with giraffes and bears.

              By the time she got off the elevator on the third floor, it was the stroke of seven. She should be dressed already and on the floor. She stopped at the nurses’ station. They were in the middle of shift change, too, but she caught the eye of the night supervisor, Genny.

              “Car trouble,” Ivy explained. “I’m suiting up. Give me five.”

              “Take your time, doll,” Genny called after her. “It’s not like you’ve run late before.”

              True. Ivy was always early. She knew a good thing when she had it in hand.

              Was Jake a good thing? He felt like it. But she was no judge of male character. And he had warned her that he was no Boy Scout. He’d gone so far as to tell her not to forget it.

              But he was a man of honor. He’d proven that. He had follow through. He’d driven Ivy more than a hundred miles out of his way and while he was looking for a diversion, that was a

high level sense of duty.

              Ivy ducked into the staff locker room and found her cubby which she’d stocked with clean scrubs, lotions, tooth paste and mouth wash. She even dug a bottle of water and an energy bar out of a plastic shopping bag hanging from a back hook. She dressed quickly, went through a brief hygiene check, and peeled back the wrapper on her dinner as she hustled back to the floor.

              How was Jake able to figure her out so quickly? He was observant and practiced at making quick applications of what he saw. Skills that probably kept him alive when he was in the Middle East, or wherever he did his tours of duty.

              But Ivy was also pretty much what you see is what you get. She put it all out there, even if it meant having to rein it in later—or have someone else do it for her.

              Her body reacted to the memory. Maybe the heat she was feeling should stem from embarrassment, but that wasn’t it. Not even close. Jake made her burn. Yeah, their game had gotten out of hand, kind of like a dry bush bursting into spontaneous flame. It had been a long time since her imagination was pushed into play. Eye candy was about as exciting as it got for her and usually she was jogging and unable to take more than a passing appreciation of the view.

              Jake made her forget to breathe. And that was before he’d kissed her.

              That thought was quickly followed by a curling through her body that was anything but warm and exciting. It was a realization that was weighted with dread.

              Her reaction to Jake was high school. It was hormonal. It was purely sexual.

              Wasn’t it?

              She’d done that already and didn’t care for a repeat. She’d paid dearly for what she’d thought was love.

             
When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.
Ivy lived by this nugget of wisdom. How she wished she had been strong enough at sixteen to follow it.

              But she had sharpened her instincts since then. She had learned a thing or two about self-preservation. She had built up her confidence and knew she was a woman of great value. None of this had come easy. It had taken years. It had been a process—a good counselor, going back to school, a job where she gave good and gave daily, and reconnecting with her sister. So why weren’t there warning bells going off inside her head? Why wasn’t her body on full fight or flight alert?

              Ivy joined the shift change at the white board just inside pod c—the intensive care unit for children emerging from surgery. It was seven-ten. The briefing was already a quarter of the way down the list of patient names and needs. Ivy put Jake to the back of her mind. As she worked through the hours, monitoring ventilators, adjusting filters and pausing over each of her patients to stroke a chubby cheek or coach them through the ‘cough up’—extubation—Ivy was aware of her body, still on slow-simmer from her time with Jake.