Love on Call (9 page)

 

Brad's thoughts had been occupied during the ride in the balloon, but now that he and Mallory were on the ground again and headed back toward their everyday lives, his mother returned to mind. She was in Texas, only a few hours away by plane. She'd been there for years. What could he make of that? Why had she left them and never returned? Why had she stayed close to where they lived and never tried to find them? For twenty years he'd wandered around, wondering where she was and if she was looking for them. And all the time she'd been only a few hundred miles from where they lived.

He'd been back to Texas often. While he'd still lived in Texas he would sometimes visit the old
neighborhood, staring up at that apartment in the run-down section. He would scan the faces of every woman walking by. He would walk the aisles of the grocery and convenience stores, knowing at the next turn he might come face-to-face with her and she would open her arms to him, glad to be together again. Whenever Brad ran away from foster homes he would go there. It was where they'd found him the last time he was in trouble, and where his adoptive dad took him when Brad had finally opened up and cried his story out to the Claytons.

He didn't know if Owen ever returned to the apartment. It was something they didn't talk about. But now Brad no longer had to wonder where his mother was. He had an address. He knew where she was. What he didn't know was what to do about it.

To figure that out, he was going to need more therapy.

Mallory pulled the truck into the driveway of a garage Brad didn't recognize. They weren't at her home. The garage door went up at the push of a button, and she pulled the truck inside.

“We're here,” she announced in a cheerful voice, opening her door. Brad got out on his side and came around to where she stood. Next to the truck was her car.

Brad was beginning to respect Mallory more and more. Intuitively she seemed to know what he needed. At the moment what he needed was to take his mind off his problems and she gave him something else to think about. He needed solitude to ponder his options,
and she drove without speaking and without interrupting his thoughts.

Silently Mallory stepped around to the driver's side and got into the car. The convertible top was up and he couldn't see her.

Brad opened the door and bent down to look at her. “Don't you want me to help you get the basket down?”

“I have someone who does that.”

Brad got in. He should have known she was resourceful. The basket and gas weighed over six hundred pounds and it had already been on the truck when he got to her house at four this morning. She was average height for a woman, not as tall as his model sister, Rosa, but taller than most of the nurses and female doctors. Still, she couldn't lift six hundred pounds herself.

Brad's mind drifted back to Texas. He thought of the things he'd done to survive after his mother left. He'd been on his own, he and Owen. Most of the time they stayed together, but when the cops got after them they'd split up and meet back at the apartment later. Brad wondered what Mallory had done to survive and get as far as she had.

Glancing sideways, he took in her classic profile. Her skin was a smooth, even brown, kissed by the sun. Her eyes had smiled brightly when they were in the balloon. He liked seeing her smile at him.

She drove through the streets without speaking. While the air had been sunny and clear in the balloon-filled sky, a slight rain had begun to fall over Phila
delphia. By the time they reached her house, rain was coming down in buckets.

Water coursed down in sheets. “There's no way we can get to the door without being drenched,” he said, peering out the side window.

“I have an umbrella,” she answered.

He turned back to her, hearing the humor in her voice. “But it's in the house?”

She laughed. He did, too, and it felt good. Brad got out and stripped off his jacket. The water splattered cold on his back. He rushed to Mallory's side, and as she emerged from the car, he covered them both with the jacket.

Though the car couldn't be more than ten feet away from the door, they were soaked to the skin by the time they reached the porch. Mallory pushed the door open and they both fell into the foyer as a gust of wind splattered more rain in their faces. Brad pulled his jacket free. It dripped water all over the foyer.

“I'm afraid I'm messing up your floor,” he said. Mallory was shaking water from her hands and pulling her wet shirt away from her skin.

“Hang it up there.” She pointed to a hook on an old mahogany coat rack. Brad looked at it. He was sure it was an antique, but it had been meticulously cared for.

“I'll get a towel.” Mallory disappeared into the back of the house. She returned almost immediately carrying a wad of paper towels. Handing several to him, she smoothed one over her hair and neck.

Brad could only watch as her movements stirred
something inside him. He couldn't budge. Since seeing Mallory early this morning, when the sun hadn't yet tinged the sky, he'd wanted to kiss her, and now seeing her so deliciously drenched in water gave her the look of a summer flower waking up after a refreshing rain.

They stood in her foyer, in the soft, intimate light from the over-the-door window. Brad was losing touch with reality and he knew it. He should be saying goodbye. He should be running in any direction except the one in front of him. Yet he couldn't make his feet move. His eyes bored into her, seeing her body outlined by her rain-soaked clothes. She'd pushed her hair back from her face.

She grew more beautiful to him by the minute. He couldn't tell what she was thinking, but he read her body language, which spoke the same message his was giving. She wanted him, as much as he wanted her.

Brad crossed the space in two steps and stood in front of her, still not touching her. She didn't move, either, but looked up at him. He could feel the warmth of her, smell the rain and that indefinable perfume that was Mallory. He breathed in, filling his nostrils with her scent.

“Every time I get near you I want to take you in my arms,” he whispered.

Her eyes opened wider. She looked at him as if she were unsure she'd heard him correctly.

“I don't understand why you drive me crazy, but you do.”

Brad touched her then. He took her in his arms and pulled her close. His eyes shut as he hugged her to him, buried his face in her hair. For a long while he just held her, he didn't know why. And he discovered he didn't need a reason. It felt good holding her, but it was more than that. He couldn't explain; he just needed her.

“Is this about your mother?” Mallory asked.

He pulled back and stared for a long time into her eyes. He didn't really know how to answer that question, and hesitated, trying to determine the truth. He had no intention of telling her anything except the absolute truth. Mallory was the only person he'd ever told about his mother. She was the one who came to his side when he called. She was the one keeping his secrets. And she was the one he needed.

“It might be,” he finally said. “But only indirectly.” Then he lowered his mouth and kissed her.

 

His mouth was soft on hers, though he only touched her lips briefly before lifting his mouth. Then he tasted her again, tentatively nibbling at her mouth in a manner that shouldn't have caused ripples of sensations radiating inside her to work their way to her toes. A growing weakness made her body slack. She grasped his biceps with her hand so Brad's arms went around her waist and he pulled her into full contact with him. He deepened the kiss. Mallory bent her head back and opened her mouth to the welcome invasion of his tongue.

“We work well together,” he whispered into her mouth.

“Is this work?” She could barely manage to get the words out.

“Call it therapy then.”

“This isn't part of your therapy.” His mouth was on her neck. She squeezed her eyes shut as powerful waves of pleasure rolled through her.

“It's part of yours,” he said, and slipped his arms up her back. Brad dipped his head and touched his mouth to hers.

Mallory had never felt like this. It was as if he'd lifted her off the ground and together they floated on a plane of sensation—a place where feeling and emotion were supreme.

Something inside her snapped. Her arms went around his neck as she rose up on tiptoe, pulling his mouth to hers and allowing the waterfall of emotions to pound through her system. She'd never known these kinds of feelings. She could sense her entire body changing. His hands massaged the contours of her back as his mouth worked magic on hers.

He had a power, something dark and delicious that spanned time from the days of dungeons and dragons, magic potions and superstitions. Mallory was caught in it.

Need pumped through her bloodstream like a drug. Rapture so strong it was almost visible took hold of her. She spread her legs slightly, feeling Brad's growing hardness pressed against the juncture of her legs. Her body arched forward, a groan escaping her lips.
He was strong, his body hard, muscular, yet he held her as if he'd discovered in her a priceless object.

Brad's hand moved up, his thumbs gently tracing circles on the sides of her breasts. Mallory felt her nipples stand at attention, craving his hands.

“Brad, I'm burning,” she moaned in between the hot, wet kisses he traded with her.

“So am I,” he told her. “Where's the bedroom?”

“Upstairs.” Mallory didn't have the breath available to form complete sentences. “Top…left.”

Brad's hands went to her hips and grasped her firmly. Without removing his mouth or breaking contact with her body, he walked her backward to the base of the steps. Mallory didn't realize they were climbing them, only that she and Brad were like hormonal teenagers, unable to keep from touching each other.

By the time they reached the bedroom door Brad had worked his hands under her shirt. He raised it up and she lifted her arms as he pulled it over her head. Her hair tumbled from its knot and fell around her shoulders. Brad pushed his fingers through it and on down her neck, to her shoulders and waist. Mallory shuddered at his touch. Reaching her hips, he tugged her pants down over them, until Mallory stood exposed, her brand-name underwear bright and colorful in the blurred light. She wore red, never imagining anyone other than herself would see the skimpy pieces of lace, but glad she had them on.

Brad's eyes took her in like a chocolate sundae with a red cherry. “You're beautiful,” he said. He
pulled her back into his arms. This time his kiss was passionate, steeped in hunger, raw with desire. His mouth devoured hers, his tongue sweeping inside her mouth and tasting her. Mallory felt his touch all the way to her core.

And she wanted him there.

Pulling the snap on Brad's jeans, Mallory unzipped them and pushed them over his hips, just as he had done with hers. She loved the feel of his skin, so smooth and hot against her hands. She could detect tremors going through him wherever she touched, and reveled in the knowledge that she stirred him, not only with her hands stroking his muscled legs, but inside him, where it counted. She knew she'd done so as surely as if Brad had said the words out loud. Some connection had been made between them. She could tell what he wanted and he knew exactly what she wanted, too.

Brad lowered her to the bed. Mallory had lain in this bed hundreds of nights, yet lying there tonight she seemed to feel the sheets for the first time. Her sensitized body was aware of everything—the height from the floor, the depth of the mattress, every fiber that caressed her skin as she lay on it. Brad's hair-roughened skin covered her, his mouth heating her part by part as if his tongue was laced with fire. Mallory expected to combust in seconds, but he wasn't ready to give her the relief she sought.

He began his seduction, kissing her all over, giving her body his undivided attention. Inch by inch he touched her, kissed her, placed his open mouth on
parts of her that hadn't ever been touched by a man. Mallory moaned, writhed, dug her hands through his hair. She stretched, arching with the pleasure-pain sensations that Brad, the master of the universe, was evoking.

Mallory's breath was coming in short gasps when he finally worked his way back up her body and entered her. She jerked as a sonic pulse of pleasure shot through her, engulfing her in something so erotic a strangled cry broke from her throat. Throwing off every inhibition, she hugged him close and pulled him farther inside of her, as close as two people could get. Brad set the rhythm hard and fast, and Mallory followed him, then took the lead as her body tasted the pleasure he gave her. She strained against him, fitting herself to Brad as if they had been created for each other.

She relished the closeness, the intimacy, the new world that Brad and she forged out of the fire the two of them kindled. It surged around them, brilliant and colorful, taking on its own life.

Mallory heard a long scream—her voice!—as she finally attained the release she craved. Brad's climax came a second later, then the two of them collapsed against each other. Her heart pounded in her ears as satisfaction overtook her, pulsing waves in a raging sea. Breathing through her mouth, she tried to calm her rapidly beating heart, but was helpless in the moment. Brad had invaded every cell of her body, and extracting herself would take time.

She hugged him closer. Let it take all the time it needed, she thought. Mallory had never been so content in her life, and she was willing to remain where she was for the rest of eternity.

T
hrough the stethoscope the sound was steady and strong, though slightly fast. Brad listened for several seconds, then moved the instrument several inches and listened again.

“Take a deep breath and let it out slowly,” he instructed. The girl in front of him did as she was told. Ellen Grant looked at the ceiling. She held her body still. Brad knew she was scared and was covering it up with belligerence. He should try to help her relax, but he was too distracted this morning. Normally, he would be more talkative. Sometimes the new ones didn't talk back. Ellen fell into that category.

“It's all right,” he said in a calm voice. “You're doing fine.”

Brad was amazed he could remember a simple sentence, let alone the procedures of a doctor. He was at the shelter, his usual monthly visit to take care of any new arrivals or those needing his care. The girl he'd been accused of kidnapping bit her bottom lip and stared at the floor.

“I am fine,” she said.

Brad sat back. “You can get dressed now,” he told her. “Your heartbeat is sound, your lungs clear, and I find nothing wrong with you.” She hid her face, trying not to let him see the relief there. He didn't push her. She wasn't ready to be pushed, and there was someone else on his mind.

Mallory Russell.

What had happened last night? What had he been thinking? That was the problem—he hadn't been. She'd looked at him and something inside him detonated. Something as strong as a nuclear bomb had gone off in his loins, and his mind had been blown away with it. It was the only explanation he could accept for what had happened.

Brad had rules he lived by. At least he thought he did. That was until Mallory Russell had come into his life. He didn't want to count the number of rules he'd broken yesterday. First, he'd been more interested in Mallory than he should be. He'd gone ballooning with her on what amounted to a date. He'd eaten with her and laughed. And to top things off they'd made love.

“You may go now,” he told Ellen. “I want you to make friends with the other kids.” She threw him a sarcastic look and left.

When she closed the door, Brad stared at it. He didn't see the opaque glass, the wood frame or the old-fashioned glass knob. He looked back into yesterday's events, into Mallory's eyes. His body stiffened as the memory aroused him. What was happening to him? He should have more control than a fifteen-year-old kid, but that's exactly what he felt like. He couldn't see another patient like this. Thankfully, Ellen had been his last, but Christina Margo, the resident nurse, would be knocking on the door soon, ready to go over his findings. He had to get control of himself, and thinking of Mallory wouldn't allow that.

What was he going to do about her? These feelings?

Still, he couldn't forget their lovemaking. The light had begun to wane when they'd woken in the late afternoon. Mallory's lids were heavy when she opened them. She'd smiled and curved her naked body around his. She was warm and slick against him, with smooth legs and full breasts. And so soft, like cotton caressing his body. She'd kissed his arms and shoulders, stroked his skin with her hands, up and down his arms and across his belly. His reaction to her seduction couldn't have been more immediate if she'd given him an aphrodisiac. He'd wanted her, with a need so strong it scared him, yet not strong enough to prevent him from taking her again.

The first time had altered his conception of a lot of things. He'd thought he knew what lovemaking was all about. He'd thought he knew what having sex en
compassed, but their joining had taught him that he knew nothing about how things worked between men and women. All the knowledge he'd gained in his thirty-odd years was nothing compared to experiencing one afternoon with Mallory.

Their second time was even more explosive than the first. She had shown him a world he didn't know existed, a place without hurt or heartache, where lovers spoke a language that required no words. It was a paradise that needed visiting often. And he knew that he could go there with only one person.

Mallory Russell.

“Hi, Dr. Clayton.” Brad looked up as a thin, happy voice interrupted his thought. He smiled at seven-year-old Michael Jamison.

Michael always came to see him. When Brad had first found him and brought him to the shelter he'd stayed with the frightened little boy. Mike had lost his family in a fire and clung to Brad as if he were a savior. Traumatized, the child had walked the streets for days, in shock, afraid and hiding. Brad had found him in the early hours of the morning, weaving back and forth like a drunk, or someone going into insulin shock. The child had passed out from hunger. For weeks he hadn't said a word, then one day he'd started to cry and scream for his parents. Brad had stood in as a surrogate until the worst of the trauma was over.

“Hi, Mike. What are you doing here?” he asked him now.

“I'm not sick,” the little boy said. “I'm okay.”
He emphasized the second syllable. “So I don't need a shot.”

Brad laughed. “I don't always come with shots,” he told him.

“I know.”

“So are you doing all right in school?”

Mike frowned. “I don't like school.”

“But…” Brad left the word hanging. They had an agreement about school.

“But I promised I'd try.” He hung his head as he said it. Mike had promised Brad he would try his best to do well.

“I hear your teachers have good things to say about you.”

“They do?” He perked up as if it were Christmas morning.

“They do.” Brad's eyes narrowed on the boy. He was tall for his age and extremely observant. “Mike, how is Ellen doing? Has she made any friends?”

He hung his head again. “She doesn't like anyone. She kicks or screams at everyone who goes near her. I don't like her.”

Brad looked at the boy with compassion. “She's been hurt, Mike. Remember when you first came here? You had been hurt, too.”

Mike's face transformed as he remembered his parents. “Yeah, but I didn't try to kick anyone.”

“She doesn't mean it. She's just scared.” He paused to let the words sink in. “Could you try to be her friend? She needs a friend.”

“How can I do that?” The seven-year-old frowned.

Brad gazed at him fondly. “Smile at her, even if she frowns at you. Sit with her at meals, even if she tells you to go away. And if she asks you what you want, just tell her you want to be her friend.”

Mike stared at him for a long time. Brad wondered if the boy was weighing his words or trying to find a way to back out. “All right,” the child agreed slowly and reluctantly.

“Trust me, Mike. She's not a mean person. She's more afraid of you than you know.”

“Why's she afraid of me? I ain't done nothing.”

“Haven't done anything,” Brad corrected.

“I haven't.” The child missed the short lesson in grammar.

“Try it, Mike?” The boy looked at his shoes. “For me?”

“All right,” he said, drawing out the last word. “But…” He stopped.

“Go on,” Brad prompted. “But what?”

“It's nothing.” Mike looked at the floor.

“It must be something.” He lifted the boy's chin. “You can tell me anything.”

“Detective Ryan says you try to save everyone.”

Detective Ryan told Brad that, as well. And often.

“It's something you'll learn about as you grow older, Mike.”

“Detective Ryan also says you can't save everyone even if you do try.”

“That's true,” he agreed. “But try with Ellen.”

“I will. He also says you have to try, even if you don't always win.”

Mike left him with a smile and a grown-up handshake. Brad smiled to himself. The child who'd once clung to him desperately now walked away with a handshake. They grow up fast, Brad thought. The street did that. But at least Mike had taken his mind off of Mallory.

And Mallory had taken his mind off of Sharon Yarborough.

 

Mallory had already started up the stairs when she heard footsteps coming toward her. She pressed herself into the shadows against the wall. Consciously, she controlled her breathing, careful not to make a sound in the hollow stairwell that climbed to the top of the building. She didn't want the person to hear her. The stairs weren't often used, and at this hour she usually had them to herself.

Her heart pounded so loudly she could hear it in her ears. It muffled the approaching footsteps. Who was it? Where was he going? Would he come down to where she stood? She glanced at the door to the fifth floor; there was a station right inside it, she knew. She didn't want to go past it unless absolutely necessary. Mallory wasn't due back in the hospital until Monday, and she would have a hard time explaining her presence here if someone found her.

Don't panic,
she said silently, closing her eyes to calm herself. She opened them again. It wouldn't be the end of the world if she were found. She would have some explaining to do, but she wasn't breaking any laws. Maybe unauthorized entry, but that would
be a stretch. She didn't want to be found because of her patients. They needed her. They needed her to talk to them, to help wake them up.

The steps were heavy and continued toward her. A man, she thought. She would have to make a decision soon. She looked up. One more floor and she'd have to retreat. She would take her chances going down.

Mallory took a silent step toward the stairs, but stopped suddenly when she heard a door open below her.
Damn,
she cursed. There was someone below her, too. She was sandwiched between them. Mallory had no choice but to go onto the fifth floor. There was a slight chance that the staff on duty would be making their rounds and that the nurses' station would be clear. It was three o'clock in the morning, but remaining where she was wasn't an option. She snapped her head upward as the door on the sixth floor opened. The footsteps above her went silent. Mallory looked down as if she could see through the cement. The footsteps below were slow, but still coming. Quickly she left her place, racing up the stairs on feet that were as silent as feathers. On the seventh floor she peered through the door and checked the halls. It was clear. Mallory slipped through the door and quickly went into the darkened coma wing.

“Hello, Margaret,” she whispered, out of breath. Her heart beat so fast it could keep time with “Fascinating Rhythm.” “I know I'm a little late. I had trouble on the stairs.” Mallory gulped to fill her lungs, then went into her one-sided questions, asking how Margaret was, as if she could answer. Then si
lence fell between them. Mallory thought of her own concerns. Brad.

She looked down at Margaret, a woman old enough to be Mallory's mother. Maybe if she talked to her, she could figure her way out of what was going on.
If
there was something going on.

“There's a doctor here in the hospital that I'm…involved with.” She wasn't sure if that was entirely true, but it was as close as she could get to whatever was going on between herself and Brad.

“At first he needed someone to talk to and I was there.” Mallory knew Brad had used her, but it was harmless. She'd listened to him and nothing more. Until last night. “Things have gone a little further now.”

A little further. She wanted to laugh out loud. A little further was like saying the Grand Canyon was just a hole in the ground. What had happened between her and Brad was like the earth moving off its axis.

“I don't mean that he's using me. He isn't.”

Mallory took hold of Margaret's hand. She herself was the one who needed the touch, the consoling.

“I think I'm falling in love with him.” Mallory said it quietly. She stared at the window blinds. Through them she saw the moon and stars. Outside it was cold, but inside Mallory there was a roaring furnace. “I can't be in love with him.” She was no longer talking to Margaret Keller. “Falling in love would screw up everything. I have too much to do.” She looked around. “Here. These are the people who need me. The poor ones. The ones without family or
visitors. Falling in love would mean accounting for my time to someone else.” She couldn't do it. She knew what it was like to be in one of these beds. She knew the loneliness, the hours of time that passed by slowly and without the kindness of a human voice to fill the darkness. She couldn't condemn these patients to that.

And Brad—he had his own demons to deal with. But he had the most important thing. He had family. People who loved and supported him. He had a mother, even though she'd left him years ago. She was still alive and there was a slim chance that they could now develop a relationship if they both wanted that.

Brad and Mallory had too much to separate them and not enough to bring them together. Then she thought of Brad kissing her, making love to her. She closed her eyes as her mind took her back to the tangled sheets of her bedroom and the hard body that had kept her there.

“There has to be another option,” she said.

 

By the time Mallory's week of forced vacation ended and she returned to work, she hadn't seen or heard from Brad. She wondered if he had the same misgivings about their night together that she had. She'd tried to rationalize her actions. She'd tried to tell herself it meant nothing. She'd tried to talk herself into believing it hadn't happened, but then she would remember their lovemaking and her body would heat up to a point of meltdown. Denial was futile.

In the E.R., she picked up the chart of her first patient and read it as she opened the curtain and looked inside.

“Good morning, Cindy.” She smiled at a pretty twenty-three-year-old lying in the hospital bed. “I'm Dr. Russell. What happened to you?” Mallory hated that she always had to ask the same question a nurse and sometimes the police had already asked. In Cindy's case there were no uniforms around. Mallory was glad of that. After Wayne Mason, her heart tripped each time she saw police in the E.R.