Outside The Lines (5 page)

“
You’re looking for something with a little extra kick, though.”

“Yeah.” Now his nod became more enthusiastic. “Don’t get me wrong, I think the carnival idea is great. But it feels
just the smallest bit underutilized. Like something’s still missing.”

“
I’m guessing you don’t mean a pie-eating contest between the mayor and the chief of police. Although I would personally supply the baked goods if you wanted to go that route,” Jules said, leaning toward him with a spark of interest in her caramel-colored eyes.

“Thanks,”
Blake laughed, both unable and unwilling to tamp down the response. “But I’m thinking something…big. Something that will get everyone in the entire city talking, and more importantly, donating. Something different than the same-old silent auction stuff.”

Somethi
ng Jeremy would’ve loved.

“What about a bachelor and bachelorette auction?
”

He pulled back, his chair scraping against the tiled floor. 
“You mean like a riff on one of those reality TV shows?”

“Sure.
They’re pretty popular, so it would give you a decent draw, especially from outside the regular board-of-trustees crowd. The proceeds would go to the foundation, and the dates would be all in good fun. Everybody wins.”

Jules scooped up the pen she’d discarded a few minutes ago
, scratching out notes in earnest on a paper napkin as she kept talking. “There’s got to be a handful of eligible singles on the medical staff who would play along for a good cause. Oooh, maybe you could even get Aaron to help round up some firefighters. I bet they’d go for a mint.”

The idea swirled through
his brain as she spoke, picking up speed and intensity. “We do have some people in the emergency department who might go for this kind of thing.” Blake’s thoughts zeroed in on his cocky colleague, Dr. Cross, and he added, “We’d have to set some ground rules, but it shouldn’t be too hard.”

Convincing his mother might be a little more challenging, but if he got
all the details into place first, she’d have a hard time saying no, especially for this charity. Plus, this was a perfect complement to the more traditional silent auction, with just enough edge to make it fresh.

It was exactly what he’d been looking for.

“Thanks.” Blake took the ink-smudged napkin from Jules’s fingers, the excitement of the fresh plan still sparking in his chest. “I’ll have to work out the logistics, but this is a really great idea.”

“
No problem,” she said over a shrug and smile combo that did sudden, wicked things below his belt. “It’s nice to know all my late-night TV watching is good for something.”

“So you’re not spending your late nights with someone, then?”

Damn it
. Impulse had dared the question right past the limits of propriety but Blake held up a hand before she could reply. “You know what, I apologize. That’s totally none of my business. I think we’re set here for now, so I can just—”

“No.”

“Sorry?”

Her heart-shaped mouth quirked into a smile. “If I don’t get to apologize, then neither do you. No,
I’m not spending my late nights with anyone.”

Oh
. Hell. The next six weeks were going to last an absolute ice age, only there wouldn’t be anything cold about working with this woman.

On even more impulse,
Blake reached between to the tight space between them, slowly cupping his palm beneath Jules’s elbow. “I thought you said you weren’t having any trouble with this.”

“I’m not.” The answer sprang from her lips on in
grained toughness, but he met her brash cover head-on.

“Jules,
this bandage is hanging on for dear life. Your poker face might be better than mine, but I’m still calling your bluff.”

It only took a few strides to reach the first aid kit on the wall, then a few more to re-trace his way back to the table, and he flipped the plastic latches on the kit with a pop.

“In my defense, it’s really hard to put on a bandage one-handed,” Jules argued, but she didn’t fight him as he nudged the haphazard gauze pad from her arm to reveal a still angry-looking but slightly healing strip of blisters.

“
But not harder than asking for help, huh?” Blake tore open a packet of antibiotic ointment, sliding the contents over her skin with careful motions.

She rolled her eyes, but the blush climbing over her cheeks was unmistakable. “
Is that why you became an ER doctor instead of a surgeon? To help people?”

“
That’s the short answer, but yes.” It had taken barely two semesters of medical school before he’d done that one-eighty, much to his mother’s chagrin. But taking care of people, really helping them in their moments of emergent need,
that
was why he’d become an ER doc.

He might not have been able to do it for his brother. But he sure as
hell could make up for lost opportunities. He at least owed Jeremy that much.

“What’s the long answer?” Jules asked, and damn, her intuition was just as spot-on as ever.

Blake reached for a fresh bandage, re-setting his focus to his task instead of the pang growing out of his gut.

“Maybe I did it to be a little defiant,” he admitted, although he had no idea where it came from.
But the shock of his answer didn’t bother him quite as much as the peal of laughter coming from Jules’s lips.

“No offense, but you’re not the type.”

“No offense, but you don’t really know that.”

Rather than get offended or huffy, Jules
just lifted a coppery brow. “Bet I do.”

“Really?” Fuck. He should
be calm. He should be in control. He should
not
be so turned on at the shot of pure mischief blazing beneath her stare, but there it was, and yup. It was definitely hot in here.

“Fifty bucks says you
still go to the dentist every six months, to the day.”

Blake coughed out a laugh. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me. And don’t try to weasel your way out of this. Remember, your poker face sucks.”

“Okay, fine.” He dropped the gauze pad he’d been about to open
, rising to the challenge in her eyes even though he knew it was a bad plan of epic proportions. “Same fifty bucks says you still sleep with the lights on.”

Her lips parted over a sexy-as-hell gasp, and hah! That got her. “I do
not
sleep with the lights on,” she argued, but the wash of pink on her cheeks screamed
jackpot
.

“I suppose you probably
still call it accidental.” Blake’s tone emphasized the word like air quotes. “But you do, don’t you?”

“Double or nothing you still fold your laundry right out of the dryer
,” Jules shot back, but no way was he backing down now.

He leaned in close enough to
breathe in the scent of warm vanilla on her skin and said, “I bet the house and everything in it that you still hum while you cook, just as loud and off-key as you did eight years ago.”

For a second, the only thing Blake saw was the image of her in his college apartment kitchen, flipping French toast with a crooked tune spilling right past her lips. But then it was gone, replaced by the here-and-now of her
surprisingly wistful smile.

“
Okay, yeah. I do still hum when I cook.”

Blake’s thoughts stuttered to a graceless halt. “What?”

But she didn’t budge from her tell-it-like-it-is demeanor. “I still hum when I cook. Drives Serenity nuts, actually. But I don’t even realize I’m doing it.”

Jules slid a glance at the door leading down the short hallway to the kitchen, and damn, how had they gotten so distracted?

He reached for the temporarily forgotten bandage he’d been about to put on her forearm, steering the conversation back to less impulsive territory. “With your love of food, I’m not surprised you went into the culinary arts.” She’d always been able to make something out of the mishmash of ingredients he’d had in his cupboards. Really, he’d have been shocked if she’d chosen anything else.

“You
make it sound so upscale,” Jules said, shifting close enough for him to put the gauze in place. “It’s just me, working at Mac’s.”

Blak
e eyed the notebook full of ideas sitting among the detailed catering proposal on the table and shook his head. “You sure you’re not selling yourself a little short? The board chose your proposal out of at least a dozen. It’s definitely impressive.”

“
The planning is the easy part. But it’s even better to feed people.” A coppery wisp twisted free from her ponytail, fluttering over her neck as she looked down at his hands on her skin. “It feels important, if that makes sense. To take care of people who need something vital.”

“Looks like we have a lot in common
, then.”

Her smile became a laugh, and Christ, it was the best sound he’d heard in a month. “I
split my time between slinging burgers and signing order forms at a diner, and you graduated
summa cum laude
from one of the most prestigious medical schools in the country. How is it that we have a lot in common?”

Blake sn
apped back in surprise. “How do you know I graduated
summa cum laude
?”

Just like that, her expression slammed shut. “Lucky guess.”

Oh hell no. No way was he letting Jules tough-girl her way out of this one. “We’re really not so different at all. We both want to help people. We’re both devoted to making that happen. Just because we do it in different ways doesn’t mean we don’t have the same desire.”

He
fastened the last strip of medical tape into a crisp, neat angle over the gauze, but Blake didn’t let go of her arm.

And Jules didn’t pull away.

“You
are
pretty committed to this doctor thing. Maybe you’re right. Maybe we do have a lot in common.”

She tilted her head to examine the bandage, bringing her face dangerously close to his
. It would be all too easy to bridge the space, to impulsively pull her and that sweet vanilla-sugar scent of hers against his body and kiss her, to pick up exactly where they’d left off eight years ago.

But he’d already been down that road
of wanting to be with her, and all it got him was a Dear John letter two days before he left for medical school.

Blake pushed back in his chair, gathering his things at warp speed
and slipping them briskly into his laptop bag. “The burn looks like it’s starting to heal. You’ll probably only need the bandage for another few days.”

What
was he thinking, getting all close to her like that? They were supposed to be working on a project together, one that had huge implications, no less. Hadn’t he learned the hard way that being impulsive— especially around Jules— was dangerous?

“Right.” Her expression
was cool, completely unfazed by the proximity they’d shared only seconds ago, and it was further testament to the fact that recklessly kissing her would’ve put the idiot stamp right across his forehead. “I’ll get to work on the first phase of the proposal.”

“Sounds great.”

As long as they kept things all business, Blake would be just fine.

CHAPTER FIVE

Jules smoothed her hands over the front of her fitted white button-down blouse for the fortieth time in an hour, wondering how the hell Serenity had talked her into this. Okay, so she’d admit that the outfit Serenity and their good friend Violet had pulled together last night looked polished and sophisticated, with the now worry-creased blouse belted smartly over a pair of tobacco-colored dress pants and the only set of heels Jules owned. But she felt like an imposter all dressed up like this, and as she made her way down the brightly lit hallway toward the emergency department at Brentsville Hospital, her stomach did a set of aerial backflips.

It had been a week
since Blake had scrambled from the break room at Mac’s like his hair was on fire, and despite the dozen and a half cordial emails they’d exchanged about the carnival, Jules still felt like she was his own monogrammed version of the black plague.

Of course you are, dummy
. It had felt all too good to believe, just for a second, that she and Blake really
weren’t
that different, and that maybe, just maybe, his mother had been wrong. But clearly, Blake had intended the words as polite conversation, and she’d jumped to a major erroneous conclusion by taking them to heart, using her girly parts as stepping stones. The fact was, people like her didn’t belong in the world of trust funds and summer homes.

No matter how well they cleaned up for a business meeting.

“Can I help you?” A pretty blond nurse wearing scrubs looked up from her spot at the triage desk, giving Jules a swift head-to-toe. “Are you hurt?”

“Oh, no. I’m actually...”
Really bad at this
. “I have an appointment.”

“Gotcha. Radiology is down the hall that way, the lab is on
the second floor, and gynecology is—”

“No, no,” Jules interrupted, her voice
pinching the words. “I mean, I’m here to see Dr. Fisher. About the Carnival For A Cure.”

“Ohhhh.” The woman’
s sky blue eyes lit with curiosity. “Well in that case, let’s see if we can find him. I think he’s finishing up with a patient.”

But before
the nurse could round the desk, Blake appeared from the bend in the opposite corner, pushing a wheelchair for a pigtailed little girl who couldn’t be a day over eight.

“Okay, Brittany. The bad news is, you won’t be jump-roping again for a while.” He tipped his head at the air cast strapped firmly to the girl’s ankle. “But the good news is, all your bones look perfect. I’m going to give your mom the pictures so she can take them to your regular doctor in three days for a follow-up, but it’s only a sprain. It might hurt for a couple of days, but you’re going to be just fine, kiddo.”

“Thanks, Dr. Blake
,” Brittany said with a shy, gap-toothed smile, and Blake gave her a fist-bump before passing off some papers and directions for care to the girl’s mother. He looked so in control and at ease all at the same time, as if taking care of this little girl wasn’t just his job, but what he was meant to do, and Jules’s breath hooked in her throat.

She knew that feeling, because she woke up to it every single day.

Blake turned toward the triage desk where Jules stood, and the second his eyes landed on hers, she knew all business wasn’t on the menu of options.

The fluidity of his movements hitched, but he held her gaze for a long minute before switching it to the blond nurse behind the desk.
“Mia, can you do me a favor and take Brittany and her mom to the lobby? They’re all set for discharge. I’ll be down the hall if anyone needs me.” He exchanged one last goodbye with the girl and her mother, and a brief thank you with Mia before running a hand through his already mussed hair.

“Sorry I’
m late. It’s been packed in here today,” he said, and how could something so benign make her knees consider forfeiting every last shred of balance?  

“
That’s okay. You were great with that little girl.” Jules followed him down the double-wide hallway, trying with all her might not to stare at the lean outline of his shoulders beneath his rumpled white coat.

He shrugged, and God, was he trying to make her spontaneously combust with the
broad-shoulders thing? “Ah. Simple ankle sprain. Piece of cake.”

A thread of relief poked free from the knot of nerv
es in her chest, and she latched onto it with both hands. “Funny you should mention that. I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to eat yet, but I brought some breakfast from Mac’s.” Jules lifted the handles of the oversized brown bag she’d had down by her side, and Blake’s sandy brown brows followed suit.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know, but you didn’t get a chance to eat that apple turnover last week at the diner. Plus, it’s after nine.”

His stomach cut off his response with a
fierce
notice me!
kind of rumble, and it took all Jules had not to flinch from the desire to feed him.

“
Far be it for me to skip the most important meal of the day,” Blake laughed, pushing the door open to a small, windowless office. “Come on in.”

Jules took in the slight
nine-by-nine space, complete with its stark white walls, cookie-cutter office furniture, and tidily vacuumed gray carpet. “They say a neat office is a sign of a sick mind, you know,” she said, placing the bag over the desk to unpack its contents.

“If it were mine, I might be wor
ried. This is actually a room the emergency department uses for various small meetings. Less interruptions than in the staff lounge, but not as much pretense as one of the board rooms upstairs. Hey, is that a cinnamon roll?”

She took a quick inhale of the spicy-sweet pastry before liberating it from the bag and handing it over. “God, you really do still have that sweet tooth, huh?”

“The only thing better than one of these for breakfast is that crazy-good French toast you make with the jam and the cream cheese inside. I swear that stuff should be labeled as a narcotic.”

Her head snapped up
, a strand of hair bouncing free from the sleek twist she’d tried desperately to pin into submission this morning. “You remember that?”

“Are you kidding? I
still dream about it at night.” Blake settled into the flat-cushioned chair next to hers, kicking his long, scrubs-clad legs out in front of him with a grin. “I bet it’s the most popular dish at Mac’s.”

“It’s not on the menu, actually.
I haven’t made it since… ah. In a long time.” Jules took out a bottle of cranberry juice and cracked it open, mostly to have something to focus on other than her egregious lack of brain-to-mouth filter and the total surprise on Blake’s stubble-laden face.

“Oh.”
He dropped his attention to the cinnamon roll in front of him as if it were suddenly riveting. “Well, thanks for breakfast.”

“Sure.” Jules pulled a sweet cornbread muffin from the bag for herself, and t
hey ate for a few moments in silence punctuated only by Blake’s praise for the cinnamon roll. When his breakfast was more gone than not, he slowed enough to get down to business.

“Here’s a list of volunteers who are willing to work in the food tent on the day of the event. We also got the final approval on s
etting up a few smaller tents for refreshments in the other three corners of the Commons. It’ll likely be hot out on the day of the carnival. Having lots of places for people to get water especially is important.”

“
We can ask some of the volunteers to move through the crowd and hand out water bottles, along with keeping the smaller tents well-stocked.” Jules flipped her notebook open over one knee, taking a sip of juice before jotting down a few notes.

“Great idea.
” Blake leaned in, eyes on the page. “What else did you have in mind for those other tents?”

They traded information back and forth,
finalizing some ideas they’d already mapped out and coming up with even more fresh ones. The conversation flowed so well that Jules easily got caught up in the thrill of the plan, covering page after page in her notebook to take back with her to Mac’s.

“I’ve
never seen anybody use longhand to plan an event this involved before,” Blake said, indicating to her tattered, canvas-bound collection of ideas. “Wouldn’t it be easier on a laptop?”

Jules silently cursed the redheaded coloring that was certainly outlining the sudden prickle on her cheeks. “I’ve always done it this way, ever since I knew I wanted to feed people.”

Even then, sometimes in the beginning
a new notebook had needed to wait until her next payday, leaving her to cobble together notes on borrowed scraps and paper napkins. Jules flattened both palms over the threadbare notebook, but Blake was quick to cover her hands with one of his own.

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way. It’s just that you’re so organized.
How long have you been working at Mac’s?”

“Oh
.” His lack of judgment guided the words right out of her mouth. “Since Serenity bought the place a little over four years ago. She rebuilt it with her mom.”

“Right, right.” Blake shifted his arm to a casual lean over the back of his chair. “
Didn’t it used to be some artery-clogging dive? Chicken Something? The Chicken Hut?”

“The Chicken Shack,”
Jules corrected on a chuckle. “But I think
dive
is a bit generous. Serenity pretty much rebuilt the place from the bricks up. She hired me at about the halfway point, but I can tell you the project was definitely a labor of love.”

“So you’ve been there since the beginning, huh?
That’s a lot of apple turnovers.”

“Yeah
.” As the one who did the inventory and ordering, Jules could probably come damned close to pegging how many if she stopped to add it up. “We’re all more like family than co-workers though. I didn’t have any experience before working at Mac’s, so I’m really lucky Serenity took a flyer on giving me the job.”

“I don’t know. To be honest, it seems like you’re kind of made for it.”

“You’re getting a little deep over there. You sure that’s Dr. Fisher and not Dr. Freud?” Jules laughed, but to her surprise, Blake didn’t back down.

“Listen up, smartass.
All I’m saying is you’re clearly a good fit. The way you organize everything is actually remarkable.”

Wait…“It is?”

“Absolutely. I wouldn’t have the first clue how to manage the hands-on part of the catering for this carnival, and you can do it without a second thought. Not to mention you came up with the idea for the bachelor and bachelorette auction.”

“Well, yeah, but you’re taking care of all the details. All I did was make a suggestion.”

“A great suggestion,” he corrected, and whoa, had his eyes always been so serious and so green? “Don’t be so loath to take credit. You’re really good at your job, Jules.”

A tiny smile hitched at the edges of her mouth, and it
tasted dangerously good. “Thank you, but I’m not the only one. That little girl must’ve been scared when she came in today. I know you think it was easy, but you took great care of her.”

“Guess
we make a pretty good team,” Blake said, his eyes crinkling at the edges just enough to make her shift toward him involuntarily.

Oh God, this was a bad idea. A really bad idea, one with piercing green eyes and a mouth way too close to hers. “Blake, I—”

A sharp knock on the door lodged the rest of Jules’s words in her throat, and she slid her chair back to its original spot as he leveled a brisk
come in
at the interruption.

“Dr. Fisher
.” The man in front of them filled the doorway, his gym-toned body glaringly obvious even in his baggy scrubs. “Mia said you were looking for me?”

The doctor
took an uninvited step into the room, his too-blue-to-be-real eyes screeching to a halt as they swept over the spot where Jules sat, now primly cross-legged at the desk and cursing herself into next week.

“I’m sorry, I’m interrupting.” In an instant, Mr. GQ’
s demeanor did a complete walkabout, and he gave up a smile worthy of a toothpaste commercial during prime time.

“No problem.”
Blake’s spine straightened to its most rigid setting against the back of his chair. “This is Julianna Shaw. She’s in charge of the catering for the Carnival For A Cure. Jules, this is Dr. Cross.”

“Garrett,” he said, stepping in with another dazzler and a lingering handshake, and
wow, was this guy for real?

“
It’s nice to meet you, Garrett.” She tried on a smile, and yup. It still worked. And well, apparently, because Dr. Cross didn’t budge from his spot in front of the desk.

“The pleasure’s mine, I can assure you.”

“Okay,” Blake said, the word strung tighter than the percussion section in a marching band, and Garrett shifted his attention back in Blake’s direction. “I don’t want to keep you, Dr. Cross. I just needed to know if you’re in for the bachelor auction at the carnival.”