The Surgeon's Favorite Nurse (11 page)

Hope remembered his telling her that when you work to keep a roof over your head it’s hard to make friends. That must have been incredibly lonely for him, she thought as her heart squeezed tight. But all he’d said was that there was more time to study and he earned scholarships.

“I can’t even imagine what you went through. Jake told me a little about it. He said you went to the high school. To make sure he didn’t miss out on an education. Because of your situation,” she added.

“It was the lowest point of all. Humiliating to tell strangers that you couldn’t take care of your child,” Susan said, her mouth pulling tight. “But as bad as it was for me, it was a hundred times worse for Jake.”

“He didn’t talk much about that,” Hope commented.

“To their credit the teachers and administrators tried to be discreet. Every Friday they sent him home with a backpack filled with snacks for the weekend, to make sure he had enough to eat. A child can’t learn if he’s hungry. But the kids all knew who had money and who didn’t.”

Hope remembered Jake hinting that kids taunted him. He’d said the have-nots were targets for bullies.

“More than once Jake came home with a black eye or a fat lip when someone made fun of his clothes or his shoes. That just broke my heart.” Susan’s mouth trembled. “I didn’t know how to deal with that, how to raise a boy into a man. So I told him not to start trouble, but if anyone else did he should fight back and finish it. Don’t walk away.”

“That sounds like wise and practical advice to me,” Hope said.

Susan smiled. “Those are the experiences that build character, and my son has more than I’d ever have wished for him.”

“And now he’s a doctor,” Hope said. “You must be so proud of him.”

“Yes.” Tears glistened in gray eyes so like her son’s. She held out her hand, indicating her home. “He bought this place for me, made sure I’d always have a roof over my head. No matter what.”

The words tugged at Hope’s heart. Now she knew why he’d vowed never to be poor again. He worked hard to fulfill that promise, but he didn’t forget to give back to others less fortunate, too.

Her opinion of him had certainly changed since their first meeting. She’d thought him arrogant, ambitious and avaricious. Now she knew that he was gifted, good and sensitive. She wasn’t exactly sure what to do with the information.

“It says a lot about you that your son is such a remarkable man.” A man it would be far too easy to fall for.

A gleam stole into Susan’s eyes. “You know, you can tell a lot about a man by the way he treats his mother.”

Hope wasn’t going to the matchmaking place. Instead she asked, “Why do you think he’s never married and settled down?”

“Part of the reason is about being too busy. He’s driven
to establish a solid financial foundation. I worry that after what he went through, he’ll never feel secure enough.”

“Part of the reason?” Hope prompted.

“He’s also concerned about his DNA, that when the going gets tough, he’ll take off like his father did.”

“Even though you taught him to stand his ground and fight?”

“You’re a smart girl.” Susan smiled. “That’s what I keep telling him.”

The revelation made Hope sad for him at the same time it was a relief that he was unwilling to take a chance any more than she was. If that was really true, why was he trying so hard to change her mind about going out with him? The answer was easy. It was because his mother had taught him to stick around and fight. When he won the battle, then he could walk away. In her case, it was a campaign he would never win. She’d be walking away first.

Susan patted her knee and stood. “I didn’t mean to talk about that.”

“It’s all right. I can see why Jake is so proud of you.”

“That could change if I don’t get the salad made,” the other woman teased.

“Can I help you with anything?” Hope offered.

“Yes. You can go out and keep Jake company while he’s slaving over a hot barbecue.”

Hope knew protesting that assignment wasn’t the way to be a good guest, so she dutifully went downstairs and opened the sliding glass door to the patio. The backyard was as immaculately landscaped as the front. A built-in spa was situated in the corner of the yard. Rocks and shrubs covered the area that wasn’t patio.

She walked over to where Jake stood by the grill. “Hi.”

He looked over his shoulder. “Did you see everything?”

Even more than he knew. “It’s a beautiful home. Your mother is a remarkable woman.”

“You’ll get no argument from me.” He looked down at her. “Are you hungry?”

She nodded. “Working open house for the new campus really gives a girl an appetite.”

And looking at Jake Andrews gave her ideas that had nothing to do with food. Changing the subject was a good idea.

“So there’s a nasty rumor going around that you find grilling relaxing,” she said.

“Not a rumor. It’s the honest truth.” He lifted the barbecue lid and studied the steaks, focused as if it were the most complicated surgery.

“I don’t like to cook,” she said.

He stared at her, faking surprise. “I’m shocked and appalled.”

“Be that as it may, I find the whole ordeal stressful. I’m a frozen entrée kind of girl.”

“Dinner from a plastic carton stored in the freezer is just nasty,” he said.

“And turning raw meat over an open flame doesn’t make you tense?”

“Nope.” He looked at his watch, clearly timing the raw meat in question. “And after a day like today, I have a lot of relaxing to do.”

“What happened?” she asked.

Something that looked a lot like anger flashed through his eyes, but it was gone quickly. “A couple of surgeries. It was a rough day out on the roads. People in the wrong
place at the wrong time. Ruptured spleen. Lacerated liver. But everyone should be good as new.”

“Then they were lucky to have the new trauma medical director in the right place at the right time.”

“You think so?” There was an edge to his voice.

“Why do you ask?”

“Not so long ago you weren’t a fan. I’m just trying to figure out if you’re now on my side because of surgical skill. Or maybe my magnetic personality pulled you in.”

She groaned at the pun, then said, “I think it was your humility that made the difference.”

“Like everything else I do, I’m good at humility, too.”

She couldn’t help laughing. “You’re incorrigible.”

“Thank you.” He lifted the barbecue lid to check the steaks, then closed it.

She folded her arms over her chest and stared at the view. “I can see the Rio resort from here.” The distinctive pink and purple lines were easy to spot. “It’s beautiful.”

He didn’t follow her gaze, but was looking at her when he said, “Yeah.”

Her heart started beating too fast and she felt light-headed. That was the only explanation for what she said next. “I’m going to have to do some research on local hotspots. My sisters are coming into town from Texas next weekend.”

“I can help you with that,” he offered. “I know all the best places and would be happy to show all of you around.”

“Thanks. That would be nice.”

The words came automatically from her heart, not her head. She wanted them back desperately. This was exactly the reason she’d resisted going out with him. Every time he
was around, she got sucked in deeper. The last time she’d felt like this she was falling in love.

She didn’t want any part of love.

She also didn’t want any part of explaining Jake to her sisters.

J
ake wasn’t sure what alignment of planets, suns and moons was responsible for Hope’s agreeing to let him squire the three sisters around Las Vegas, but he was grateful.

It was a chance to spend time with Hope even if they weren’t alone.

He’d hired a limousine for the day and took them first to the new and impressive CityCenter. After that there had been stops at the Hard Rock Café, dinner at Delmonico in The Venetian and a club at Bellagio. Now they were sitting in a wine bar at Red Rock Resort where the two visiting sisters were staying. It wasn’t far from Mercy Medical West and Hope’s room at the Residence Inn. The four of them were having a nightcap.

The three sisters were all about a year apart in age and couldn’t be more different. Honey-blonde Hope sat next to him. Across the small table in a leather club chair was Faith, the oldest, a brunette with turquoise eyes. Beside her
was brown-eyed redhead Charity, the youngest. She wasn’t the least bit intimidated by being at the bottom of the birth order and gave as good as she got from the older two.

Each was beautiful and would attract male attention wherever she went, but Jake wasn’t attracted to Faith or Charity. If he had to pick a feeling toward them, it would be brotherly. Hope was the one he couldn’t stop thinking about, the one he wanted to touch. To hold. To bed.

It wasn’t rational or smart and he was normally a smart, rational guy. Not this time. If he were, he’d be with Blair Havens even though she wasn’t the woman who made his pulse pound and his palms sweat. She wasn’t the one who frustrated his need to take her in his arms. The one who kept resisting him. His life would be so much easier if she were
the one
.

Mitch had been right. Jake had done some discreet digging and found there was disturbing talk about his appointment to trauma medical director. More often than not information was deliberately leaked and rumors were based on fact. Former Congressman Ed Havens was probably behind a movement to oust Jake before he could sign on the dotted line, as revenge for Jake not being his daughter’s trophy boyfriend and arm candy.

Jake couldn’t deny that wanting the job was like a fire in the belly. It wasn’t enough that he’d bought his mother a house and had an impressive bank account. He wanted to be so important, so powerful that the embarrassed and humiliated boy he’d once been would cease to exist. And Hope was definitely an inconvenient complication to his plan.

“You’re looking awfully serious about something, Jake.” Faith tilted her head as she studied him and a silky strand of brown hair brushed the shoulder of her purple sweater. “Is it work?”

“Hospital politics.”

The three women groaned in unison before Charity said, “I work at Texas Children’s Hospital in the pediatric ICU and if there’s one thing you can count on it’s politics.”

Faith nodded ruefully. “I’m at Baylor in Fort Worth and it’s no different there. Why do you think every soap opera on TV has a hospital in it?”

“Do you have time to watch every soap opera on television?” Hope teased.

“I’m just saying.” Faith smiled. “I never thought you’d go to the dark side into hospital management.”

Hope shrugged. “The job came up and it’s temporary.”

“So was the last one,” Charity pointed out, twisting a strand of red hair around her index finger.

“That works for me.” Hope sat up straighter and her arm brushed Jake’s. She settled her hands in her lap before meeting his gaze. Her eyes were soft with sympathy. “Is there anything you can do about the problem that’s on your mind? Jake?” she prompted, touching his arm when he was lost in thought.

“No,” he said. “There’s nothing I can do about it.”

“Okay, then. No shoptalk,” Hope said firmly.

“I’ll drink to that.” Charity held up her chardonnay and the four of them clinked glasses. After sipping, she set it on the glass table between them. “Can we talk about that adorable hot-pink Michael Kors handbag?”

Faith and Hope groaned.

Jake was clueless. “This is about shopping, right?”

“Crystals. At CityCenter. It’s not shopping. It’s a religious experience,” Charity corrected. She crossed one jeans-clad leg over the other.

“How do you figure?” Hope asked.

“It’s as close to heaven as I ever expect to get on earth.”

“There’s something you should know about Charity.” Hope grinned at her sister. “She’s only working as a nurse to support her retail habit.”

The redhead smiled right back. “It’s my duty as a loyal American to stimulate the economy.”

Faith sipped her cabernet, then set the wineglass on a cocktail napkin. “If there was an Olympic gold medal for shopping, you’d definitely be a favorite to win.”

“Thanks.” The baby sister was completely undaunted by the teasing. “But you have to admit that I have standards. Otherwise I wouldn’t have thought twice about buying that handbag.”

“It was over a thousand dollars,” Faith protested.

“But I loved it.”

“That was obvious. And you definitely get points for negotiating,” Hope said.

Charity nodded. “You’re talking about my idea for all of us to chip in and buy it, then share.”

“Yeah. That was a creative plan, but doomed from the start.” Faith’s expression was wry.

“I don’t see why you both were against it. A designer bag that you get to use four months of the year. Seems like a sweet deal to me.”

Hope shook her head. “Let me say again that you’re a klutz who shouldn’t spend the equivalent of rent money on any one thing.”

“That wasn’t my fault,” Charity protested.

“What?” Jake asked. He looked at Hope when she touched his arm and barely resisted the urge to take her hand in his and link their fingers.

“You really don’t want to hear about that,” she said.

“Sure I do. Tell me.” With an effort, he dragged his gaze away from Hope’s.

“It was a date. The guy was a jerk, but that’s another story.” Charity shuddered, then continued. “We were at a concert and I had a glass of wine. Technically it was a plastic cup because they don’t use glass at that kind of venue. I put mine in the seat holder and when the lights went down for the show, he set his in the same one. The contents overflowed and nailed my purse which was on the floor. Poor baby was never the same again.”

“There are so many ways that was your fault,” Faith said. “Always pick the cup holder to your right. And don’t date anyone with a higher klutz quotient than yourself.”

Charity shook her head. “I still say that we could have worked out a purse-sharing plan that would have been mutually beneficial to all of us.”

“Even though Hope doesn’t live in Texas?” her sister pointed out.

“That’s temporary,” Hope reminded them.

“See? She’s coming home soon.” Charity seized the statement to strengthen her bargaining stance. “We should go back to CityCenter before we leave and invest in that handbag.”

“You’re persistent.” Hope sighed. “And before you turn that into another negotiating tactic, I’m going to excuse myself and find the ladies’ room.”

“I’ll go, too,” Charity said, standing.

Jake watched the two sisters walk down the two steps to the door, then out of the bar. Hope was shorter than her sister, petite and pretty. If only he could define what it was about her that appealed to him, maybe then, he could get over her.

“Penny for your thoughts.”

“Hmm?” Jake looked back at Faith who was watching him watch Hope.

“I’d ask you to tell me what’s going on with you and my little sister, but you’d probably tell me to mind my own business.”

“On the contrary. I’d be more than happy to clue you in, but I’m not really sure myself.”

“Oh?” Faith leaned forward and rested her forearm on her knee.

“Are you asking me my intentions?”

“Kind of.” A small smile curved the corners of her mouth.

“My continuing mission is to get your sister alone, but she’s not going for it.”

“So you want to sleep with her.”

“Yes.” The word popped out before he thought about it. “I mean no.”

“So you don’t want to sleep with her?”

He’d already slept with her and wanted to again with every bit of testosterone in his body. But that’s not something he would share. “I’ve asked Hope to dinner and she turned me down flat.”

“So she’s not interested in you.” The conclusion put a puzzled expression on her face. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look, Jake, I could beat around the bush and play coy, but that’s not me. I call it as I see it. All day I’ve been watching the two of you. A blind person could see the connection. You like her and she likes you.”

That was something he already knew. But maybe she could tell him the things he didn’t know. “How can you tell?”

“The way she looks at you when she thinks no one is watching.”

“How’s that?” he asked, curious.

“Like you’re a designer handbag that she wants more than her next breath.” She grinned briefly before concern clouded her eyes.

“Look, Faith, I could play the game, too, but honesty is all I know how to do. And the honest truth is that I’ve told Hope how I feel and she’s not willing to meet me halfway.”

“I don’t get it. She’s happier than I’ve seen her in a long time.”

“How so?”

“There’s life in her eyes again. She laughs and it’s genuine, not a front to keep us from worrying about her. I think the difference is you.”

He’d like to think so, but turning down his every invitation was a funny way of showing happiness. “I was completely up front about wanting to get to know her better and she said it was a waste of time. That she was married before and won’t go there again.”

“Did she tell you about Kevin? Her husband?”

“I know she’s a widow, but that’s all.”

“She doesn’t like to talk about it.” Faith sighed. “Her husband was killed in the line of duty.”

“A police officer?”

“No. Social worker.”

“Domestic dispute,” he guessed.

“Yeah. There were children who needed to be removed from an abusive situation and the cops brought in social services to take them from the scene. No one knew there was a gun in the home. Shots were fired and Kevin died.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Jake admitted.

“Horrible. Awful. Sorry.” She shook her head. “There
are no words to describe how devastated my sister was.” She met his gaze. “You’re a trauma surgeon, so you know better than anyone that violence happens. It’s your job to repair the damage when it does. Bad things happen to good people and Kevin was one of the best. He was just gone before anyone could intervene. It was horrible and awful. Everyone who loves Hope is sorry because the trauma damaged her in a place where we can’t fix it. You have no idea how much I hate that.”

Jake didn’t doubt what she was saying. He felt it, too. More than she could know. Illness and death were bad enough, but a life taken by violence just sucked because it didn’t have to happen.

Hope’s sister had just confirmed what he suspected. She kept herself in a protective bubble. A woman like Hope gave nothing less than her whole heart and that kind of shock would crush a sensitive soul like hers.

The revelation explained a lot, but he wasn’t sure how much it helped. He could repair bodies, but souls were not in his job description.

Especially when the lady in question didn’t want to be repaired.

“So, can we talk about Jake?”

Hope had barely walked into her sisters’ room at Red Rock Resort before her youngest sister, Charity, asked the question. There was no easy way to avoid a discussion because she’d planned to spend the night here. If she left in a huff, they’d tattle to her mother, which would cause her parents to worry. It couldn’t hurt to try evasive tactics.

There were two queen-size beds pushed up against a wall painted a bold shade of brick. The remaining paint was a soothing shade of pale yellow. In the bathroom, tile covered the floors and the shower had a glass door. All
the handles and faucets were gold. If she commented on the accommodations, that might deflect Charity’s question about her and Jake.

“Nice room,” Hope said, sitting on the rust-colored chair before settling her feet on the matching ottoman.

“Beautiful,” Faith commented, sitting on the bed across from her.

“Comfy,” Charity added, sitting next to Faith.

They both stared at Hope.

Evasive tactics hadn’t ever worked especially well with her sisters. They never let her get away with it. Plan B: Bluff. Maybe she’d lived in this gambling town long enough to pull it off.

“So what did you think of Jake?” She plastered a smile on her face. “Hottie? Right?”

Charity shifted into a cross-legged position on the bed. “He reminds me of that actor on the TV medical show. The character who needed a new heart and died.”

“You actually watch that?” Faith asked.

“Yeah. You don’t?”

“Too much like being at work. What about you, Hope?”

“I don’t have much time for anything
but
work. All my attention is focused on getting the hospital open on time.” All the attention not used up by thinking about Jake, that is.

“It’s time to move on, Hope.” Faith wasn’t talking about the job now.

“You’ve grieved long enough,” Charity said, suddenly serious. It was as if they’d planned a coordinated attack.

“How do you know it’s been long enough?” she demanded. “Have either of you ever lost the love of your life? Are you experts on the
dos
and
don’ts
of it all? Maybe Emily Post has a chapter in an etiquette book about just the
right way to handle the loss of a spouse so that you don’t offend your family.”

“I wouldn’t know about that,” Faith said quietly. “But I’ve heard it said that you always hurt the ones you love, the ones you shouldn’t hurt at all.”

“We’re only trying to help,” her little sister added.

“I know.” Hope felt like sludge—slimy, black and disgusting. “I’m sorry. If it weren’t for you guys, Mom and Dad, I wouldn’t have made it this far. It’s just—”

“Two years is a long time and—”

“And nothing,” Hope said before Faith could finish. “For the record, I’m not grieving anymore. I’ve made it through all the steps and reached acceptance.”