by CATHY L. CLAMP; FRANCIS RAY; BEVERLY JENKINS; MONICA JACKSON; GERI GUILLAUME
Andrea didn’t have to see Nicholas’s face to know he probably wore a stunned expression. “Thank you. I’ll let you know.”
“Please do,” Beverly said, then proceeded to introduce Nicholas and Andrea around the room.
Andrea already knew some of the other guests, or they knew of her through her aunt. She’d never had any difficulty meeting people, and she didn’t tonight. She wouldn’t have lasted a week in New York if she had. Beverly’s daughter almost hadn’t made it. But with all her timidness, she had managed to find a man to love, a man who would love her back.
Andrea was still looking.
With Nicholas by her side and Beverly’s obvious approval, most of the guests responded warmly to Andrea. If the single women were less than enthusiastic to see her she readily understood. She wasn’t quite sure how she’d respond when the woman Nicholas was fated to marry showed up.
For only the second time in her life Andrea toyed with the idea of making a wish, a wish to hold back time. But she realized that the wish would be as futile as that first wish she’d asked for when she was nine.
She’d lost then, and she’d lose this time.
As the evening progressed, Nicholas could see that the plan was working. Andrea had been right. Once women thought he had the woman he’d wished for, they left him alone. In the hour and a half since their arrival, the number of women had thinned out to about ten.
You could actually move around the lavishly decorated gold-and-white living room or sit on one of the overstuffed white sofas, if you were so inclined. For himself, he leaned against the side of the black baby grand nursing a glass of chardonnay and watched Andrea.
He’d been doing that a lot tonight. He couldn’t help himself. Something about her drew his gaze, again and again. And each time it did, he discovered something he hadn’t noticed before. How delicate her hands looked holding the stem of a wineglass, how her soft auburn hair shone in the artificial light, how kissable the smooth column of her neck looked when she laughed.
Desire stirred. He wanted her in his bed. She protected him from other women, but who would protect her from him?
“You lucky dog, I don’t blame you for staring. Wish I had seen her first.”
Nicholas turned to see Samuel Ferrell, a surgical resident who worked part-time at the hospital. Nicholas didn’t even try to suppress the spurt of jealousy. “Not if you want to use your hands to operate again.”
Samuel chuckled, then tipped his glass. “Message received and understood, but if this wish thing doesn’t work out, surely you won’t begrudge me asking her out.”
“What makes you think she’d go out with you?” Arrogant twerp.
“Women like doctors’ bedside manners, if you catch my drift,” he said, and strolled off to the buffet table.
Nicholas felt like going after him and pushing his big head in the punch bowl. If he so much as touched Andrea, he’d draw back a nub.
“Nicholas, why are you frowning?”
He looked down at Andrea, saw the concern in her face, tried to relax, and couldn’t. “If you’re ready, we can leave.”
“Of course.” She allowed him to lead her through the house to find their host and hostess. After thanking them, they said their good-byes to the other guests and left.
In Nicholas’s car, Andrea kept sneaking secretive glances at him as he drove her home. He was angry. She didn’t understand why. She’d thought he’d been pleased with the way things had gone. They hadn’t had to say a word. People had just assumed they were a couple, that she was the woman he had wished for. They’d soon find out how wrong they were. Her hands clutched her shawl and drew it tighter around her shoulders.
“You’re cold? You want me to turn the heat up?”
She shook her head. “No.” That wasn’t what she needed, wanted. She glanced out the window as he turned onto the narrow two-lane road leading to her house. Darkness surrounded them. She’d traveled this road thousands of times, but she’d never felt so alone or so lost.
Nicholas pulled into her driveway and parked. The twin porch lights on either side of the front door gave off a muted glow. Through the curtain in the living room another light shone. Opening his door, he went around the car and helped her out.
Silently they walked up the porch steps. “Give me your key.”
“I can do it,” she said, trying and failing to insert the key the first time. Her hand shook so badly, it took three tries before the key slipped in. Twisting the key, she unlocked the door and stepped over the threshold.
When she turned, her gaze went no higher than the middle of his broad white-shirted chest. “Good night and thank you.”
“Aren’t you going to look at me?”
It hurt too much. “I’m really tired.”
“Regretting your decision already?”
Before Nicholas, she’d never been afraid to face the truth. Her chin jutted. Inch by inch her gaze climbed higher until their eyes met. The light cast his face in shadows. “Perhaps you’re the one regretting your decision.”
“Never.” He brushed his knuckles down her cheek. Andrea was unable to control the tremor that raced though her. “You’re cold. Go inside.”
She shook her head. “Why were you angry?”
“We can talk about this later.”
“I want to talk now.”
A deep sigh drifted between them. Removing his jacket, he placed it around her shoulders. It enveloped her just as he wanted to. “You’re going to be stubborn, I see.”
She said nothing, just continued to stare up at him. He almost smiled. He hadn’t noticed the stubborn streak before. But he wasn’t about to admit the entire truth. “I’m not sure what’s the matter. Maybe it’s the holiday blues. I may be thirty-three, but this is the first time I won’t spend Thanksgiving with my family. Since Mom and Dad are the oldest children and both their parents are gone, their sisters and brothers all come to our house. Mom and her two sisters are fabulous cooks. We stuff ourselves; then the men settle in for some serious football watching on TV.”
“And the women clean up the kitchen, watch the children, admire the new babies, and catch up.”
This time he did smile. In his too-large jacket, she looked like a little girl playing dress-up. “Sounds as if you’ve been to a few family gatherings yourself.”
“When I was younger. It’s just the two of us now,” she said.
Disquieted, he pulled the lapels of the coat closer together. “That’s rough. I come from a big extended family.”
“Auntie and I both have a lot of friends here,” she told him. “In fact, many of them will probably drop by on Thanksgiving. Why don’t you come for breakfast and stay for dinner?”
“I don’t want to impose.”
“You won’t,” she told him. “Please come. I’ll fix your favorite dessert. What is it?”
You, whipped cream, and cherries. Nicholas blinked. He couldn’t believe the thought had just popped into his head like that. He was definitely losing it. “Ah, whatever is fine. You’d better get inside. Good night.”
“Wait.” Slipping off his jacket, she handed it to him.
“Thanks.” Firmly he pushed her inside, then closed the door.
Andrea stared at the door. She just didn’t understand Nicholas. Sometimes he looked at her as if he’d like to gobble her up, then other times, like now, as if he couldn’t get rid of her fast enough.
Men.
Chapter 5
The hospital’s grapevine was alive and well.
By eleven the next morning Nicholas was able to move about the hospital without a woman in his path. There was a briskness to his walk that had been lacking. He was finally getting back on schedule and getting some work done. He didn’t even hesitate to get on the elevator when he saw three female staff members already inside.
“Hello, Mr. Darling,” said a curvy young woman in an abstract-print smock. “I think it’s wonderful about you and Andrea. I had a chemistry class with her in high
school. Tell her Nancy Logan said hello.”
“Good morning. I’ll tell her,” Nicholas said, mulling over the fact that Nancy was the fifth woman to ask him to tell Andrea hello. He had no idea that many people in the hospital knew her.
“She was three years behind me,” commented a lanky orderly, his hand wrapped around an IV pole. “I remember she was cute and kind of scrawny. Saw her the other day. She’s filled out some since then.”
“That’s an understatement. She’s gorgeous.”
Nicholas turned to see who had spoken. Samuel Ferrell grinned back at him. Impertinent twerp. “A wise man doesn’t need to be told the same thing twice.”
The grin slid from Ferrell’s thin face. The silence was so thick in the elevator, you could slice it. The doors slid open and no one moved as the two men stared at each other.
“I believe this is your floor, Mr. Darling,” Nancy said, holding the door open for him.
“Thank you.” This time Nicholas didn’t have to worry about giggles as he exited, but there wasn’t a shred of doubt in his mind that the story of his confrontation with Ferrell would be all over the hospital by the end of the day.
It took less than an hour.
Women thought it was romantic. Men thought it was manly. Nicholas just thought why hadn’t he kept his big mouth shut? Especially when he received a call from Beverly Hawkins, who told him point-blank not to worry about Ferrell. Andrea, in Beverly’s opinion, was too intelligent to fall for Ferrell when she had Nicholas. She was just as down-to-earth and charming as the day she had left for New York six years ago.
Nicholas was trying to think of a polite way to end the conversation when Beverly dropped a bomb. “I guess now she’ll forget about going back to New York and stay here.”
“Andrea can work anywhere,” he said, repeating what she’d told him and fighting the sudden unease he felt.
“Isn’t that just like a man, to think his career is more important than a woman’s?” Beverly scolded. “In New York she could make more contacts. In this day and age, women can have both a career and a marriage.”
The word marriage was like a bucket of cold water over him. But if he corrected her, the madness would start all over again.
“Well, I have to run. I’ll see you at the hospital party on the twenty-fourth. Guess your ranking on the wish list has dropped since Andrea has grabbed you.” Soft laughter echoed over the phone. “A parting word of advice on Andrea’s engagement ring: Nothing warms a woman’s heart like diamonds. Big ones.”
With Beverly’s last words ringing in his ears, Nicholas hung up the phone. He hadn’t thought past getting women off his case. They expected him and Andrea to become engaged. When that didn’t happen, where would that leave Andrea? An unpleasant picture of Samuel Ferrell popped into his mind.
Coming to his feet, Nicholas left his office. “I’m going out for lunch.”
“You have an appointment in thirty minutes with Mrs. Ratcliffe, the head of food services,” Michelle told him.
“Let her know I may be late and see if she wants to wait or reschedule,” he said, never breaking his stride.
“But you’re booked up through the end of the day,” she protested.
“Then tell them all the same thing.” Opening the door, he left.
It took Nicholas exactly nine minutes to reach Andrea’s house. His frame of mind worsened with each second that ticked by. Seeing both cars in the garage, he took a chance that Andrea might be in back and went around the side of the house. His gaze immediately found her.
Sitting beneath the same giant maple tree she’d been under last week, she was bent over a legal pad. Today her bulky sweater matched the purple wool scarf beside her. He’d bet anything Augusta had knitted both.
This time Andrea saw him well before he reached her. Her eyes widened. She placed the pad on the grass beside her.
He crouched in front of her, their knees almost touching. “Half the people in the hospital know you. Several asked me to tell you hello.”
Not sure if it was an accusation or a statement, Andrea said nothing.
“What’s going to happen when there’s no wedding?”
That she did have an answer for. “There’ll be a wedding; it simply won’t be mine.”
His eyes narrowed to slits. He obviously hadn’t liked that answer. “Do you know a doctor by the name of Samuel Ferrell?”
Andrea frowned, trying to follow Nicholas’s train of thought and failing. “Wasn’t he at the party last night?”
Nicholas’s expression turned cold. “He wants to take you out if we break up.”
Since they weren’t officially in a relationship they could hardly break up, but with the fierce way Nicholas was watching her, Andrea didn’t think it prudent to remind him of that fact. “What he wants is immaterial to me.”
Nicholas wanted to haul her into his arms, taste her mouth, stake his claim. “You might as well know I warned him away from you.” He’d never been possessive or jealous or irrational about a woman in his life. “Last night, then this morning in a hospital elevator. It’ll probably be all over the town by tonight. It’s already spread through the hospital.”
She tried not to let it matter that it was all part of his plan. “My hero.”
Fierce anger shot through him. “I’m not a hero. I don’t want this to hurt you. I know you believe in your aunt, but I don’t.”
Her eyes filled with unbearable sadness. “You will.”
He didn’t want to pick a fight with her; he wanted to lay her down in the grass and love her until she cried out in sweet ecstasy. “I’d better get back and let you work on your sketches.” He picked up the pad and noticed there was writing, not drawing, on the pages. “What’s this?”
Grabbing it out of his hand, she flipped the pages closed. “My special project.”
He recalled her mentioning a special project in his office. “What kind of project?”
“I’m writing a novel. A romance novel,” she qualified, her chin jutting out defiantly.
He sat there absorbing the information, thinking of the woman who believed wishes weren’t granted to her but didn’t begrudge those to whom wishes were granted; a woman who sketched happiness for others but not for herself. A woman who dreamed.
His hand grazed her chin. “What’s the hero like?”
Her mouth curved upward. “Braxton is an ex-operative. He’s intelligent, masterful, and a loner. Fiercely private, he’s fighting tooth and nail not to fall in love with Melissa, but he’s a goner.”
“Can I read it?” He was intensely interested in Andrea’s take on love and romance. She deserved so much of both.
Her arms tightened. “Perhaps one day.”
He reached out to stroke her hair. He couldn’t help himself. If she was within reach, he wanted to touch her. “Does that mean you’re sticking around and not going back to New York?”
She didn’t bother asking him how he knew. In a small town, gossip was the main source of entertainment. “I’ll go back eventually, but I’m not sure when. Perhaps after the holidays.”
The fierce look came back in his eyes. “Why can’t you stay here and work?”
“In my business, contacts count. Auntie is on a fixed income. I’m the only one she has to depend on. I have to help,” Andrea explained. “I mailed the illustrations Friday for the last book I had a contract for. Publishing houses slow down this time of year, but after the New Year things will pick up and I have to be there.”
It made sense, but he didn’t have to like it. He wanted her here . . . with him. “What if you sold your book?”
“I could stay here, but editors receive hundreds of submissions,” she told him. “It might not sell.”
“Do you believe in Braxton and Melissa?” he asked.
“Yes,” she answered immediately.
“Then the book will sell.” He pushed to his feet. “Don’t doubt yourself, Andrea.”
“I don’t usually.”
“Good. Get back to work. I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”
“Wear clothes you don’t mind getting dirty. After dinner we’re going in the woods to get the Christmas tree.”
“Another tradition?”
“Yes.”
He nodded, liking being included. Whistling, hands in his pockets, he strode off.
Andrea leaned back against the tree trunk and watched Nicholas round the corner of the house. She’d have to be careful and not get caught up in the pretense of caring for him. Nicholas could steal a woman’s heart.
Flipping the pad open, she began to write. Melissa had just dared Braxton to come skinny-dipping.
Thanksgiving morning Nicholas drove into Andrea’s driveway and a red haze of jealousy came over him. A giant of a man he’d never seen before was swinging Andrea around in his arms. Nicholas came out of his car like a shot. Andrea’s squeals of delight propelled him across the yard.
“Put her down!”
The man, three inches taller and forty pounds heavier, stopped and stared down at him. Andrea gazed at him with wide, uncertain eyes. “Nicholas.”
“I’m not going to say it again.”
Pushing against the man’s wide chest, Andrea scrambled out of his arms. “He wasn’t hurting me, Nicholas. Travis is a friend of mine. I’m sorry if my silly cries gave you the wrong impression.”
The man, who was built like a linebacker, smiled. “I don’t think that’s the problem.”
“Of course it is,” Andrea said, staring up at Nicholas.
Nicholas jerked his gaze to Andrea, then shoved his hand over his hair. What was wrong with him? He didn’t want any man holding her for any reason. First thing Monday he was putting in the request for the MRI machine.
“Travis Gabriel,” the man said, extending his hand. “Andrea and I go back to the third grade. I already know who you are.”
The handshake was firm even if the man’s lips were twitching. “Hello.”
Andrea moistened her lips. “Breakfast is ready. Come on in.”
Nicholas took Andrea’s arm and started toward the house. He wasn’t being possessive. He was being a gentleman.