House Calls

by Michelle Celmer

  “Just give me a minute or two to get dressed and brush my teeth,” she heard him say, and as the door snapped shut, she could swear she heard him laugh.

  Ugh! What was wrong with her? It was understandable that she had been awestruck by the guy four months ago, but now he was a patient and that kind of behavior was inexcusable. Of course, she didn’t usually see her patients naked. Not to mention that the majority of her male patients were wrinkly, shriveled-up old men.

  She planted herself on the sofa. Okay, Mags, get a grip. It’s not like you’ve never seen a naked man before—an aroused naked man. A really aroused and gorgeous naked man. Aroused and gorgeous and—

  Sheesh! Get over it already. She’d fallen for a patient before and it had been a disaster. She was never making that mistake again.

  By the time the door to the bedroom opened and Pete wheeled himself out several minutes later, she was back in professional mode, and intended to stay that way.

  “Stop right there,” she said. “I want to see you walk again.”

  His brow furrowed. “What for?”

  “Humor me, okay?”

  He glanced at the door.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “I locked it. The only way anyone is going to see is if they scale the side of the house and peek in the windows. It’s just us.”

  Pete blew out a frustrated breath. She looked awfully determined, and a long, drawn-out debate didn’t sound like a whole lot of fun right now. He had the sneaking suspicion that he would lose, anyway.

  He’d humor her, just this once.

  Pushing himself up on the arms of the chair, he rose to his feet, wincing at the familiar sting as he put weight on his bad leg. He’d taken only a few unsteady steps when she vaulted herself up off the couch.

  “No, no, no! Not like that!”

  “Jeez,” he said, startled by her outburst. “What did I do?”

  “You’re favoring your good leg. You’ll never get used to the prosthetic if you don’t use it.”

  “I can’t put that much weight on it. It hurts like a sonofagun.”

  She circled him, her brow crinkled. “Straighten it out.”

  He grabbed hold of a table for support. “I can’t.”

  “When you work out, do you spend much time stretching it?”

  “A little. Mainly I’ve been trying to build the muscle back up.”

  A pained look crossed her face, and he saw her take a very long, deep breath. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but are you out of your friggin’ mind?”

  He mirrored her irritation. “What’s wrong with trying to build up the muscle? The stronger my leg, the better I’ll walk, right?”

  “You doctors can be so dumb sometimes.” She pointed to the couch. “Sit.”

  “Get up, sit down, get up, sit down—this is worse than Sunday mass,” he grumbled, but he hobbled over and sat down anyway. She cringed with every step.

  “Okay, give me your leg,” she said, kneeling in front of him. When he hesitated, she sighed loudly. “I’ll give it back.”

  He lifted his leg and she grasped his calf firmly. Then she pulled and he nearly went through the roof. “Hey! That hurts!”

  She gave him a satisfied smile. “Do you know why it hurts, doc?”

  “Gee, I don’t know, it might have something to do with you pulling on it!”

  She popped the bottom snap on his exercise pants, then paused, glancing up at him. “May I?”

  “What, you didn’t see enough in the bedroom?”

  “Funny.” She yanked the pant leg open to his thigh. He waited for her to gasp at the angry red scar tissue surrounding his knee, but she didn’t even flinch.

  “You must have been a lot of fun in the hospital,” she said, fingering the muscle. “The nurses must have loved you.”

  He stifled a grin. “When I left the ICU, they threw a party. They said I was a lot more fun when I was in a coma.”

  She laid a hand on his thigh, just above the knee, and eased his calf up, watching his face. “You were that bad?”

  “Yeah, I was pretty bad.” He winced and she eased back. “I was still in the angry stage of my recovery.”

  “It’s a wonder the nurses didn’t murder you in your sleep.”

  He let a smile slip through. “You know what they say about doctors making lousy patients.”

  She pulled the leg of his pants together and fastened the snaps. “That’s the second time you’ve smiled today.”

  The fact that she’d noticed, that she cared, made him smile again. It was an odd sensation. So many of those muscles in his face hadn’t been exercised in a very long time. “You’re counting?” he asked.

  “I wouldn’t normally, but I get the feeling you don’t do it very often.” She gave his leg a pat, then sat next to him on the couch. “But you should, it’s nice.”

  Her comment made him feel better than it should have. It shouldn’t have mattered at all that she liked his smile, but at that moment in time, it meant everything.

  Moments pass, he thought ruefully. “So, Maggie, what’s your diagnosis?”

  She drew her knee up and used it as a chin rest. “You need to cool it on the weights, doc. Now is not the time to be trying to look like He-Man. Not only are you working the wrong muscles and completely defeating the purpose of the exercises, but the muscles you should be extending are actually getting shorter. You need to work on stretching the leg first, then add some resistance. We’ll work out a routine together.”

  “I told you—”

  She held out a hand. “Before you get all defensive and cranky, hear me out, okay? I know you don’t want people to know what you’ve been up to, but I have an idea.”

  He scrubbed a hand over his face, realizing belatedly that he never should have gotten out of bed. He should have known she would be impossible to get rid of once she’d infiltrated his afternoon. “Okay, what’s your idea?”

  “Have you ever been to Gaylord?”

  “I’ve passed through on my way to the Upper Peninsula a few times. Why?”

  “Have you ever been to Turtle Lake?”

  He didn’t like the sound of this. “I don’t think so.”

  “And you don’t know anyone there, right?”

  “Not to my knowledge. Is there a point to this?”

  She smiled brightly. “Then it’ll be perfect.”

  He really wasn’t liking the sound of this. “Perfect for what?”

  “For us. You don’t want people you know to see you during your rehabilitation, so the obvious solution would be to go somewhere else, right? You don’t know anyone at Turtle Lake, so that makes it the perfect place to go.”

  “What did you mean by us?”

  “I mean pack your bags, doc. We’re going to spend the rest of the summer together at Turtle Lake.”

  He was off the couch in a millisecond. “No way.”

  “Give me one good reason why it isn’t a great idea,” she said. “My grandparents have a small place up there. It’ll be perfect. I’ve already arranged for the other PTs to cover my regular patients.”

  He limped right past his chair toward the bedroom. “You want me to stay with your grandparents? I don’t think so.”

  “It’s not like they’ll be there. They live in Florida year-round, but they keep the cottage so my parents and my sister and I can use it. It’s right on the lake and it’s semi-secluded. It’s perfect.”

  “Nothing about this sounds perfect to me.” He tried to close the door on her but she pushed it open and followed him. “Will you stop following me!”

  “Nope. I’m going to come to your house every morning and follow your stubborn rear end around until you agree to come with me. I’ll follow you around for the rest of your life if I have to.”

  He spun around, towering over her with a menacing glare. “You really would, wouldn’t you? You would make my life miserable just to get your way.”

  She didn’t even flinch. “You bet I will. I’ll be here every mornin
g when you wake up. For two hours a day you’ll be stuck with me. I’ll be your shadow, pal.” She poked him in the chest with her index finger. “You may be stubborn, doc, but I’m worse.”

  She was going to be harder to shake loose than he’d thought. “Even if I wanted to, my parents would never go for it. They want me close by so they can frown at me and give me disapproving looks.”

  “Already taken care of. I discussed it with your parents before I came up here. It took a little bit of persuading, but they finally listened to reason.”

  “My father, the king of I’m-right-and-you’re-wrong, listened to reason? Why do I find that hard to swallow?”

  “By the time I finished explaining it all to him I had him convinced it was his idea in the first place, and your mother seems to agree with just about anything he says, so she wasn’t too hard to sway. So, whaddaya say, doc? A few months up north?”

  He was running out of excuses—and energy. “What about your boyfriend? What will he think about you picking up and spending the summer with a stranger?”

  “Don’t have one. And you, doc, have run out of excuses.”

  His knee was beginning to throb, so he sat on the edge of the bed. “Give me a minute. I’m sure I can come up with something else.”

  She sat down next to him, close enough that he could feel the warmth of her arm next to his, though she wasn’t quite touching him. “Believe it or not, I know how difficult this is for you. And frightening, and confusing. I want to help you.” She laid a hand on his forearm, her voice barely above a whisper. “Let me help you.”

  He looked down at the fingers curled around his arm, disconcerted by the contrast between his pale, almost translucent skin and her rich, sun-burnished complexion. He’d become a ghost. A shadow of a man.

  Was that really what he wanted?

  Maybe a few months in a completely different atmosphere would do him some good. If he was looking for a compelling reason to go, he didn’t have to look any further than the woman next to him. What man in his right mind would pass up a few months alone with a woman like Maggie?

  The kind of man who knew that she deserved better—that she would expect it. To her, he was just another damaged human being she could fix. One that she was probably being paid well to fix. She’d said it herself yesterday, she didn’t really care if he rotted in the chair, it was just a job to her. A paycheck.

  But this wasn’t about her. It was about him, and damn it, as much as he would have liked to deny it, he wanted his life back. Besides, if he did go, and failed, he’d be no worse off than he’d been before. Right? With her help, he’d at least have a chance.

  “If you say no, I’ll have to reduce myself to kidnapping. You don’t want me to commit a felony, do you?”

  An honest-to-goodness chuckle rose in his chest and it felt…good. It had been a long time since anyone had made him feel this way. “You win. When do we leave?”

  Four

  “Aren’t you driving a little fast?”

  Maggie gripped the steering wheel with both hands. It was all she could do to stop herself from wrapping them around Pete’s neck and strangling him. He’d done nothing but complain since they left. She was driving too fast, or the music was too loud, or he didn’t like the station she was playing. It was too hot in the car, or it was too cold.

  He was never happy.

  At the rate they were going, this was going to be a really long summer. “I’m going the same speed as everyone else.”

  He glanced at the speedometer. “I’d like to get there in one piece if you don’t mind—and alive.”

  Yep, a really long summer.

  “I’ll get you there alive,” she said, and added silently, if I don’t kill you first. Although it would be really tough to strangle a guy who smelled so darned good. Maybe duct tape over the mouth would be the more practical solution. She was sure she had a roll in the back somewhere….

  “When was the last time you cleaned in here?” he asked, nudging two empty diet-soda bottles under the seat with his foot.

  Her grip on the steering wheel tightened and her knuckles went white, but she kept her mouth firmly shut. She knew he was just saying these things to annoy her, as some sort of revenge for dragging him from the safety of his suite.

  He was scared.

  “So what is this place called that you’re taking me to?” he asked.

  “Turtle Lake. It’s about ten miles outside of Gaylord.”

  “You went there a lot when you were a kid?”

  Maggie felt a familiar, deep sting of resentment. She’d spent her summers on the fat farm while her parents and sister went to the cottage. Until she turned fourteen and flat-out refused to go to that horrible place again.

  “Not as often as I would have liked to,” she told Pete.

  “You have brothers and sisters?”

  “One sister. Molly.” The perfect child. The thin, pretty daughter who could do no wrong. Straight A’s in school, valedictorian of her class—a feat she repeated in college. Met the perfect man five minutes after graduation and married him in a fairy-tale wedding complete with horse-drawn carriages. When Molly got pregnant six months later, Maggie secretly hoped she would balloon up to two hundred pounds, get horrible stretch marks and have fat ankles. Of course she didn’t gain an ounce over the acceptable twenty-five pounds, and she’d lost it all by the time Maggie’s niece was a month old—complete with pancake-flat stomach. No stretch marks either, thank you, cocoa butter. Molly had the perfect body, the perfect husband, the perfect child, the perfect house. The perfect life.

  It was so unfair.

  “How about you?” she asked Pete. “Any brothers or sisters?”

  “Only child.”

  “Were you spoiled?”

  He shrugged, and looked out the window. “I was away at boarding school most of the time.”

  As they approached the exit for Gaylord, she merged over into the right lane. “Now there’s a concept I’ve never understood. Why bother having kids if you’re just going to ship them off to live somewhere else?”

  “Never made much sense to me either, but as you pointed out, my parents aren’t exactly warm and fuzzy.”

  She detected a distinct note of bitterness there. “I suppose you went to an Ivy League college, too.”

  “University of Michigan. I’ll be paying off student loans for the next ten years.”

  “You paid for your own college?”

  He flashed her a look, one that said back off. “Long story.”

  Point taken.

  She took the exit for 32 and headed into town, passing the IGA and Wal-Mart, remembering they would need supplies. Although she doubted Pete was in any condition, physically or mentally, for a trip to the grocery store. On the way up she’d suggested stopping at a greasy spoon for lunch, but had to settle for drive-through fast food when he refused to get out of the car. Not that she was surprised. His confidence had been shattered. It would take him a while to get that back.

  They had all summer.

  She would get him settled in the cottage first, then make a trip back into town.

  “Before we get there we should probably hammer out the specifics of living together,” she told Pete.

  He just smirked and shook his head.

  “What?”

  “I’ve never lived with a woman, much less one I’ve known for only three days. This is going to take some getting used to.”

  “You didn’t live with your fiancée?”

  He looked out the window again. “She came from a very traditional family. She wouldn’t move in with me until we were married.”

  And from what Maggie had gleaned from the rumor mill at the hospital, she’d hit the road not long after the shooting. Maybe the prospect of having a disabled spouse was more than she’d bargained for. God knows, Maggie had seen it before, though the majority of spouses and significant others stood by their partners. The strong ones did, anyway.

  “Well,” she told Pete. �
��I don’t do anyone’s laundry but my own, I’m a lousy cook, and don’t expect me to clean up after you. I think it’s only fair that we share the chores.”

  When he didn’t respond, she glanced over at him. His brow was furrowed. She knew exactly what he was thinking. “Give me a little credit, doc. I’m not going to ask you to do anything you’re not physically capable of. We’ll take it one day at a time, okay?”

  He nodded and absently rubbed his knee.

  “Maybe someday you’ll tell me about it,” she said.

  “About what?”

  “The shooting.”

  Not likely, Pete thought. He’d never talked to anyone about that day. They’d tried to get him to go to a shrink a couple of times—his parents had even had a few come out to the house—but he didn’t need to rehash what he’d been through. God knows he’d been over it a thousand times in his mind—what he could have done differently. If he’d only run away from the sound of the gunfire and not toward it, if he hadn’t stayed to work that double shift because half the staff was out with the flu. If only.

  What happened had happened, and talking about it wouldn’t change anything. It wouldn’t give him back his knee, or make his colleague Rachel any less dead.

  It was over and he was putting it all behind him.

  “Interesting architecture,” he said, noting the Bavarian theme and chalet-style buildings as they passed through the main part of town.

  Maggie nodded. “Butt out. Gotcha.”

  At least she could take a hint. Although he still wasn’t quite sure what to make of her. He’d tried, without much success, to push all of her buttons on the drive up. He didn’t even do it on purpose anymore. He was just so used to antagonizing people, to pushing them away, it was second nature. But it made sense, if he was to be stuck with this woman for the entire summer, that he should at least make an attempt to be civil.

  They exited town and hit a long stretch of green, rolling farmland. The road twisted and turned for several miles, then Maggie veered the SUV down a narrow dirt road. She hadn’t been kidding about the remote location. They appeared to be in the middle of nowhere.