"I knew you looked familiar." Chewing thoughtfully on chicken, crab and béarnaise, he stabbed the air with his empty fork. "I remember. You work day shift. Right?"
"Right."
"Of course, I'm right," he insisted, going for the crab again. "I know exactly who you are now. You're one of the efficient ones.
"Murleen," he mumbled, oblivious to Katie's surprise at the compliment as he nudged the woman seated to his left. "Did you know Randy Sheppard's daughter works at Memorial? She takes care of some of my patients."
Mrs. Aniston, a matronly woman in billowing black taffeta, turned her attention from Dr. MacAllister. "I know, dear. Dr. Brennan mentioned it when she was introduced. Maggie, Gwen and I had a delightful conversation with her while you men were discussing arterial plaque.
"Speaking of which…" Her voice trailed off meaningfully as she frowned at his plate. "Stay away from the crab and the sauce and eat your vegetables. You're a cardiologist, Clark. How do you expect your patients to watch their cholesterol when you won't watch yours?"
Mrs. Aniston cast a beneficent smile at Katie and returned her attention to the discussion her husband had just joined. Gwen Chapman, the forty-something wife of Dr. Samuel Chapman, and Dr. Chapman himself, a pleasant, wiry fellow with a receding hairline and silver-rimmed glasses, were laughing at something Dr. MacAllister had said to Mike. Finally turning his own attention back to his chief of staff, Dr. Aniston dutifully traded another bite of crab for a baby carrot.
If there was anything redeeming about the evening, it was seeing the usually overbearing Dr. Aniston with his wife. The woman easily matched his five-foot-eight-inch height, but she had to outweigh him by thirty pounds, a difference that might have seemed less disproportionate had she not been wearing huge, puffed sleeves. He deferred to the woman as if she were either adored or feared, something Katie would have found as amusing as she did interesting, had she been in a mood to feel amused at all.
The topic under discussion was the large number of doctors and nurses at Memorial who were natives of Honey-grove. It had been Maggie MacAllister's observation about Katie being a native—and who her parents were—that had elicited Dr. Aniston's question to Katie moments ago.
The man didn't seem willing to let the subject of her father go, either.
"Does Dr. Sheppard send any patients to Memorial?"
"Most of his go to Children's," Dr. MacAllister replied, speaking of another hospital not far away. "He uses us for his adolescent orthopedics, but we don't see him that often."
"Tell me," Dr. Aniston continued, turning to Katie. "With Randy Sheppard for a father, how is it that you didn't become a doctor yourself? Did you try medical school?"
"Clark, really," Mrs. Aniston scolded under her breath.
"No, I didn't," Katie replied with an ease that totally belied her discomfort with the subject. She'd never even considered medical school. With her father's prominent reputation, she would have lived her life constantly in his shadow. In some ways, she did anyhow. "Nursing appealed to me more."
Another carrot was skewered. "I'll bet he tried to talk you into medical school, though."
"Not really." Her father had actually talked more to Mike about Mike's aspirations than he ever had hers. Wondering as she often had if her father would have shown more interest in her if she'd been a son instead of a daughter, she murmured, "The choice was mine." With a little nudging from my friends, she had to silently add. It had actually been Dana and Lee who'd talked her into nursing school. They'd insisted she was a "natural."
"And an excellent choice it was." The rescue came from Mike. "Her other option was to be an astronaut, but she doesn't like to fly. She gets airsick."
"I can see where that would pose a problem." Mrs. MacAllister offered the observation with a smile. "So, did you always plan on coming back to Honeygrove after nursing school?" she asked, returning the conversation to its former topic.
"Always. I can't imagine living anywhere else."
"That's what our son says. He's moving back here next month, you know. It'll be so good to have him close again. And having him on staff will be such a pleasure for his father."
It won't be a pleasure for Dana, Katie thought, keeping her smile frozen in place. Trevor MacAllister might be a terrific surgeon and his parents might be delighted to have him home, but he had exercised his considerable charm on Dana in high school, then totally trashed her reputation. Ever since Dana had heard he was coming back, she'd been making noises about a transfer.
"It is a wonderful place to settle down, isn't it?" Maggie went on, oblivious to the pain her son had caused. "Perfect for raising a family. I'm sure that's why the young people return. Don't you think, Dr. Brennan?"
"It's probably one of them." With the grace of a man not easily cornered, he gave her a disarming smile. "But I don't think that's its only appeal. We have the river for sailing and windsurfing in the summer. We're only a couple of hours to skiing in one direction and an hour and a half to the beach in the other. We have great medical facilities, a high school football team that's always in the finals." The crease at the side of his mouth deepened with his obvious affection for the place. "There are a lot of reasons why a person would want to come back here to live."
"But isn't having a family something you think about?"
"Actually, no." Despite the obviousness of the woman's question, Mike remained remarkably at ease. "I barely have time to take advantage of the river or the mountains or the beach."
"But that's only right now." With a dismissing wave, her speculative glance shifted to Katie, who'd just slowly set down her fork. "Once you get yourself established, you'll have far more time…"
Dr. MacAllister laid his hand over his wife's.
"I'm not sure what it is," he said to Mike, "but women seem convinced that people just aren't happy unless they're married and going to Little League. You're the only bachelor at this table. That makes you fair game." He gave his wife an affectionate smile. "Leave him alone, Maggie. He's a busy man.
"Speaking of which," he continued, deftly changing the subject as he reached for his wine. "We have a toast in order here.
"To Dr. Brennan," he declared, after everyone had picked up their glasses, "and his presentation at the cardiovascular conference in Seattle next week. His work is brilliant, but it would have taken the world far longer to discover it if it hadn't been for me."
Dutiful chuckles accompanied the clinks of crystal, along with murmurs of congratulations and well wishes. Katie raised her water glass, her smile a ghost of what it had been when she'd first heard Mike's news. It was inevitable that someone would bring up his presentation, but all it had done was remind her that Mike no longer wanted her help. Between that and his very decisive response to Mrs. MacAllister's question about family, she was amazed she managed a smile at all.
She was thinking that the evening had turned into little more than an exercise in stress management when the orchestra geared up for dancing. They made it halfway through dessert and coffee before Dr. Chapman asked his wife to join him on the floor. Dr. Aniston, not to be outshone, held his hand out to his wife and escorted her off to the rustle of heavy taffeta.
"Well, Doctor," Dr. MacAllister said to Mike as he rose and pulled out his wife's chair. "I suppose we'd best join them. Save one for me, Katie."
There was no graceful way for them to refuse. But Mike was fairly certain Katie was trying to think of a way to do just that when he turned to find her reluctantly removing her napkin from her lap.
He doubted anyone who'd met her tonight had a clue that she was strung tight as a bow. She'd charmed the partners in his practice when he'd introduced her to them earlier, and she'd held up her end of the conversation beautifully during dinner. She hadn't even flinched when Dr. Aniston had stepped on the emotionally sore issue of her father. But her usual animation was history, and the tension between the two of them suddenly seemed thick enough to cut with a scalpel.
"This won't last mu
ch longer." He pulled her chair out, taking her hand rather than offering his. "I promise."
By "this" Katie thought that he meant the evening. But the edge in his voice robbed her of any certainty. She wasn't sure of much of anything where Mike was concerned anymore. The sense of command he exuded at the hospital, his tendency to simply take over, had never slipped into their personal dealings before. They did just then, however. He didn't guide her through the tables to the floor with his hand politely at her back. He led her there by the hand, refusing her any chance to think about whether or not she wanted to dance with him.
Or maybe, she thought when they reached the floor, his decisiveness was simply a way to keep himself from balking. The orchestra had just started the chorus of "Strangers in the Night" when he slipped his arm around her waist and drew her toward him.
The feel of his big, hard body seared her from her breasts to her knees.
"We're just going to dance, Katie." His voice was a tight whisper, a feathery brush of warm breath against the pulse pounding in her ear. "Relax."
With his muscular thigh flexing against hers, she'd have had a better chance of relaxing in an electric chair. But the censure in his tone had her consciously dropping her shoulders and untensing her arms.
"That's better," he murmured, easing her into the slow rhythm of the music. "I figure we have to stick around for an hour or so, then we can leave. Can you manage that?"
"I think Dr. MacAllister regards you as his guest of honor tonight. We'll stay as long as you need."
The heels she wore made her taller. When he'd held her before, the top of her head had just reached his chin. Now, she barely had to tip her head to meet his eyes.
For a moment, he said nothing. He just let his hooded glance stray over her face, the chiseled lines of his features totally unreadable. Behind her, all around her, couples swayed and turned, the music underscoring conversations and muffled laughter. They were moving, too. Barely.
"If you want to say good-night to your parents before we leave, you might want to do it soon."
"Even if we could find them, it's not necessary." She could feel his hipbone against her stomach, his thigh brushing hers. Without thinking, her arm inched higher on his shoulder, bringing her closer still. "Mom isn't expecting it and Dad won't care. Is there anyone you need to see?"
"I think I covered all my bases earlier," he said, preparing to challenge her statement about her dad. The feel of her body flowing toward his vaporized the thought as soon as it formed. Breathing her scent, wondering what she had on under the gown—it was all he could do to concentrate. The black velvet was so soft it begged to be touched. Like her skin. Her hair. "Once we leave the table, if we don't make eye contact with anyone, we should be safe."
"We sound like we're desperate to escape."
"Aren't we?" Steeling himself, he nudged her closer, picking up their pace so they could dance and talk without being overheard. His breath ruffled a curl near her ear. "Two more minutes of Aniston's theory on the moral decline of the country, or Mrs. MacAllister's veiled remarks about how man wasn't meant to live alone, and I'll be begging for a lobotomy."
"She means well. Family is important to her, so she thinks it should be for everyone."
"It is important," he muttered, nodding to Dr. Claire Griffen as she spun by with her date. "I just don't know that I need one of my own."
He spoke easily, the conclusion sounding no more important to him than the need to buy stools for the breakfast bar in his kitchen.
"Ever?"
"I won't say ever. I just can't see it in the near future." He gave a mirthless chuckle. "Or the distant future, for that matter."
Katie lowered her head, everything disappearing from view but the fine black fabric of his tuxedo jacket. Her voice, already quiet, lowered even more. "I didn't realize Maria had hurt you that much. I'm really sorry, Mike."
Her words, like the sympathy they conveyed, set him aback.
"Hurt has nothing to do with it, Katie. Not everyone wants what Mrs. MacAllister does. What you want," he emphasized, because he knew how badly Katie wanted children someday. Even as a child herself, she'd been in her element baby-sitting his little brother and the other kids in the neighborhood. He was pretty sure, too, that one of the reasons she worked at the free clinic was so she could hold the babies when their moms brought them in.
"It's not that I don't like children," he defended. "You know I'm crazy about my brother's kids. I just don't feel the need to commit to any more obligations. I don't see how I could even if I wanted to. Despite what everyone else seems to think, I'm happy with my life just the way it is."
There was enough defense in his tone for even Mike to question the conviction. But that defense was there because he was tired of everyone from his office manager to his mom and Katie trying to fix his life for him. He was fine with what he had. With the invitation to the conference, what he had was better than fine. In fact, as far as he was concerned, the only problem in his life was the woman in his arms.
If he could just move beyond the fact that their bodies seemed made for each other and get his old friend back, even that part of his life would be all right. He hadn't wanted to risk his relationship with her by pushing for something she didn't want. But he didn't want to go on this way any longer, either. Their relationship was already in trouble, and she seemed no more happy than he was. The fact that their bodies did fit so well wasn't something he could ignore, either. His own body wouldn't allow it.
"Sorry," he murmured, wishing to heaven that he knew what was going through her mind. Torn between pleasure and torture at the feel of her moving with him, he pulled her a little closer. "I didn't mean to take that out on you."
Katie's soft, "It's okay," was barely a whisper. Under the circumstances, it was the best she could manage. She knew he was just unloading on her in a way that he couldn't with their dinner companions. And there had been a time when she'd have thought nothing more of his claims than how incredibly sad it was that he was denying himself so much.
She still felt that sadness. Only it felt far more personal now. He didn't need, nor did he want, anything in his life that he didn't already have. He couldn't have made that any clearer if he'd written it out on a banner and strung it across the room. No matter how much she wanted to believe everything would be all right between the two of them, what he'd just said proved it might well never be.
She hadn't realized how easily she'd settled into his arms until she let her hand slip from his shoulder. Despite the warmth low in her stomach, or perhaps because of it, her body had fitted itself to his, her movements effortless as she'd followed his lead. Now, with his arms feeling a little too necessary, she had to back away. If sleeping together had stressed their relationship, she couldn't bear the thought of what would happen if that test in her bathroom turned out positive.
"Katie? What's the matter?"
All she could think to say was, "The music stopped."
The last strains of the piece were fading even as she spoke. But Mike was dead certain it hadn't been the end of the music that had pulled her out of his arms. Baffled by why she suddenly looked so lost, he stepped closer. His hand settled on her shoulder. "Do you want to leave now?"
She looked as if she wanted nothing more. He even thought that was what she was going to say when someone's beeper went off, causing half the people around them to start patting at their pockets.
"The next one's mine, Dr. Brennan." Dr. MacAllister's voice came from behind Katie. "And you may dance with my bride. Who, by the way," he added, winking at his wife as Mike reluctantly broke contact with the subdued woman stepping back from him, "has promised not to ask anything too personal."
Well versed in keeping up appearances, since she'd done it all her life, Katie gathered her composure around her like a cloak and graciously accepted Dr. MacAllister's hand. Offering his own hand to an extremely curious Mrs. MacAllister, Mike watched the younger woman charm his chief of staff with her soft
smile.
"Lovely girl, isn't she?" Maggie MacAllister asked, a speculative twinkle in her eyes.
"Yes. She is."
"I know you're old friends, but you two make a very nice-looking couple."
He didn't know how he was supposed to reply to that. So he just said, "Thanks," and thwarted her fishing expedition by asking when her son was to start at Memorial. Yet, even as they talked, his thoughts remained on Katie.
He wasn't sure why she'd gone so still and so silent moments ago. He didn't even know if she'd have told him had he pressed. He didn't know, either, why she'd become so quiet during dinner when his study had been mentioned. But enough was enough. When presented with a problem, he diagnosed it and fixed it if he possibly could. He did not ignore it, hoping it would go away.
No, he and Katie needed to talk. Tonight.
It was nearly midnight when Mike finally climbed behind the wheel of his black Lexus and the valet closed Katie's door. Slipping the sleek car into gear, he guided it from beneath the brightly lit portico into the dark and the rain. The rhythmic slap of windshield wipers underscored the rush of air from the heater and the defrosters.
Those droning, constant sounds did nothing but intensify the silence stretching between them.
"I owe you big-time for this one, Katie."
She turned from her window. "You don't owe me anything."
"Sure I do. You were miserable in there, but you stuck it out. Considering how uptight we've been with each other lately, I'd say you went above and beyond this time."
The lights from the dashboard provided only enough illumination to see shapes and shadows. Glancing at her profile to check her reaction, he caught the glint of an earring when she looked down at her lap.
He bit back a sigh. "That won't work. Ignoring what happened isn't going to make it go away." The frown in his brow revealed itself in his voice. "You won't even acknowledge how messed up things are getting, will you? And they are messed up," he said before she could deny it. "You can't even be happy for me anymore."
FROM HOUSECALLS TO HUSBAND Page 12