DR. MOM AND THE MILLIONAIRE

by Christine Flynn

  "For Pete's sake, Kelly…"

  "So, back to this denial thing," she continued, overlooking the way Alex rolled her eyes as she handed her purse back to her. "We've had considerable experience with Malones. I'll admit this one is a bit of an enigma, but is there anything we can help you with?"

  Alex didn't hand back the condoms her irrepressible gynecologist friend dispensed with abandon. She didn't answer her, either. Ryan and Chase were headed for the table, the two four-year-olds darting and weaving between the tables ahead of them.

  Right behind them came the rest of the crew. When the men had headed for the games with the kids, Chase had stayed with Tyler and Griffin. It was the only age group there that he knew.

  His glance caught hers even before he stopped behind Kelly, but she was spared her friend's knowing looks by the clamor of kids wanting to stay longer and adults reminding them that it was a school night.

  "Mind if I catch a ride home with you?" he asked. Except for those few minutes with the family photos, there had been a deceptive ease about him all evening. She could see that mask cracking again now, though. He was ready to leave. Had been for a while from the strain she saw in his smile when everyone started saying their goodbyes and gathering their things. She just hadn't realized how tightly he'd been holding himself together until an hour later—when he thought there was no one else around.

  * * *

  Chapter Eleven

  « ^ »

  Tyler chattered all the way home in the car. He'd still been at it when Alex ushered him into the house ahead of her and Chase, but Chase had seemed to welcome the diversion of her little boy's constant questions about the electronic games they'd played. He'd actually talked far more to her son than he had to her. But then, her little magpie had talked enough for both of them. Tyler had continued his running commentary about how Chase had helped him zap the Black Raptor all the way to his bed. Then he'd fallen asleep within a minute of his head hitting his pillow.

  As late as it was, Alex should have crawled in with him. Instead, thinking Chase had gone out to the patio because the lights out there were on, she headed out to see if he was all right.

  He wasn't on the patio. She could see him, though. The way the house wrapped around the pool, he was clearly visible through the wide, open sliding-glass door to his bedroom. Still dressed in his white dress shirt and jeans, he sat on the edge of the big bed in the cream-colored space, staring at something in his hands. He wasn't moving. He just sat in the pool of light from the brass lamp on his nightstand, his dark head bent and his shoulders bowed as if the weight of his thoughts were simply too much to bear.

  From the conversation at dinner, it was obvious that he was becoming an important part of his brothers' lives. As uncertain as she'd suspected he'd felt about how they would accept him, and with his acquisition having gone so well, she would have thought he'd be feeling wonderful tonight.

  What she saw instead, was a man in pain.

  When he tossed aside whatever it was he held, and put his hands over his face, she wasn't sure she'd ever seen such dejection.

  She felt like an intruder. This was private. This was a man stripped of the armor he'd built around himself. There was nothing protecting him now. Part of her knew she should turn around, slip back into the house, pretend she hadn't seen. He'd hate knowing how vulnerable he looked. He'd hate even more that she'd seen him that way. But there was another part of her that held her there, freezing her feet to the flagstone when he pushed his hands up through his hair and he lifted his head.

  Bleakness carved his face. That desolation ran soul-deep, seeming to engulf him in a weariness she couldn't begin to comprehend. In her loneliest moments, she'd never felt the ache he caused her to feel as she watched him glance once more at what he'd discarded.

  He couldn't seem to leave the pictures alone.

  Even as Chase lifted his head, his glance drifted to the photographs he'd tossed onto the bed. He'd gone outside a while ago just to get away from them. He'd thought the cool air would clear his head, that maybe Alex would come out after she'd tucked Tyler in and he could distract himself with conversation. But being with Alex hadn't seemed like a good idea in the mood he was in, so he'd come back in and found himself staring at the photos again.

  He'd had them for nearly three months now. Yet, they hadn't really meant anything to him until he'd seen where they'd once been.

  Or maybe it had been everything going on around him that had put the fading snapshots into perspective.

  He took a deep breath, forced it out in a rush. He needed to shake this. He needed to focus on something other than the images of the attractive young couple with their little family of three. Anger would be good. Anger he could deal with. It was familiar. The ache in his chest was not. The cold rage of resentment should have been easy to access. Heaven knew he'd buried it often enough for it to be inside him somewhere. But he didn't want to feel. He didn't want to think. He was tired. Lacking an acceptable alternative, he might as well go to bed and seek the oblivion of sleep.

  Reaching for his crutches, he pushed himself upright and moved to the door. His own image reflected back at him from the wide expanse of window glass. The elegant room glowed softly behind him. It was the open portion that had his attention. Through it he could see the wavering illumination of the pool lights, the dark silhouettes of shrubs and trees—and Alex, slender and graceful in the casual calf-skimming dress she'd worn earlier that evening, moving from the pool to walk toward him.

  Her expression held bated concern as she approached. Her soft smile when she drew to a halt only magnified it.

  "I saw the light on," she explained, crossing her arms against the evening chill. Clouds had rolled in with the evening, turning the air damp. "On the patio, I mean. Tonight seemed a little hectic," she said, as if offering him an excuse for his preoccupation when they'd arrived at the house. "I thought maybe you'd come out to do what you'd tried to do before."

  He knew exactly what she was talking about. The last time they'd met on the patio he'd been trying to relax. But, even then, he'd been trying to escape.

  "Maybe I was," he muttered, torn between wanting her there and wishing she'd go away. His glance skimmed her bare arms. She'd obviously come after him as soon as she'd done whatever she'd had to do with Tyler. She hadn't even bothered to grab a sweater.

  Touched by that, he stepped back when he saw her shiver.

  "Come on in. It's cold out there."

  Alex shivered again as she stepped past him, as much from nerves as from the cool night air. The bleakness she'd sensed in Chase lurked beneath the mantle of control he'd slipped over himself even before he'd seen her. But she was more aware of his big body behind her when she turned to roll the door closed. As the glass slid into place, she saw his reflection towering behind her, his tall, powerful physique dwarfing her completely.

  Their eyes met in the mirrorlike glass, his jaw tightening. But when she turned, he was already swinging his crutches around and moving away.

  "It was a little crazy," he admitted, speaking of the chaos she'd mentioned a moment ago. "I'd never been to a place like that before."

  "A place that noisy?" she ventured.

  "A place for families." Muscles bunched and shifted tensely beneath his shirt. "I never realized it could be like that."

  "Like what?"

  "The kids. The parents." Even though he'd stopped, his knuckles were white as he fisted the crutch grips. "They were really having a good time."

  He stood at the foot of the bed with its oyster brocade comforter and carved Italian headboard. The double doors beyond the dresser that led to the hall were closed. The way he glanced toward them made her think he wouldn't mind if she just kept going right on through them.

  Because she'd moved with him, she could now see what he'd been looking at a while ago. She even recognized the pictures. The people in them anyway. Except for the baby. The photos were of the Malones, various combinations of Ryan and Tanner
with their parents and an infant. The baby would have to be Chase. But, as she, Ronni and Kelly had noted, there'd been no photographs of him in Ryan's album. Anyone looking through it wouldn't even have known he'd existed.

  An edge entered his tone when he saw what had her attention. "The investigator said those were apparently offered to Elena and Walter when they adopted me. They were in the file of the attorney who handled the adoption. They only took the ones of me alone."

  "I see," Alex murmured, gathering the pictures to look at them. The photos she'd seen a while ago had been of his family up to when Ryan was about three years old. Those she held were of the boys with a pretty, radiant young woman holding a baby a few months old. Another with the boys piling leaves on a handsome, grinning man seated by that same dark-haired baby propped up in a wheelbarrow. "It's no wonder you got so quiet when you were looking at the album."

  The pictures had been lifted from their places just as he'd been plucked by Fate from the loving family depicted in them. But it was what he'd said about the gathering tonight that hinted at why he was having such a hard time with these pictures now.

  Seeing his little nieces and nephews with their parents, he was truly beginning to understand what it was he had missed.

  "They're just pictures," he muttered, trying to dismiss their import.

  "They're part of your past."

  He made a sound that was half resignation, half derision. "My past is a joke. Things were lousy for my brothers, but at least they weren't living a lie. They knew who they were and where they'd come from. I spent nearly half my life trying to figure out why I couldn't make the people I thought were my parents care about me."

  Bitterness sliced through a paper-thin layer of composure. "I was nothing but a possession for my mother and less than that for the man I thought was my father. I tried everything I could to earn his acceptance. But no matter what I did, it was never enough. I was never good enough," he grated, jamming his chest with his finger. "But then I couldn't ever be because I wasn't really his son. So don't talk to me about my 'past.'"

  He stood for a moment, big, angry, his impossibly blue eyes boring into hers. Clearly displeased with himself for losing control, or with her for having tested it, he lifted the tips of his crutches and started to turn away.

  She reached for him, catching his arm. "Chase. Please." She could practically hear his defenses slamming into place. Not good enough, he'd said. As if there was some flaw in him, some fault of his own that had made it impossible for the people who'd raised him to care. "I'm sorry. I know tonight was hard for you. I wanted to help. Not make it worse."

  "I'm not one of your charity cases," he insisted, bricking up his emotional wall before she had it crumbling completely. "I can handle this myself."

  Alex stepped back, crossing her arms so quickly there was no way he could have missed the protectiveness of the position. She knew tonight had been a strain. She knew he'd been pushing himself. She understood that his physical condition was still less than optimum, no matter how badly he wanted to believe otherwise.

  The rationale did nothing to relieve the rejection that stung like a slap.

  "I'm sorry I bothered you," she murmured, and started for the door.

  She'd taken two steps when she heard him swear. She'd made it the width of the king-size bed when she heard him moving behind her.

  "Wait. Please," he added, making her think the oath had been directed more at himself than at her.

  She felt his hand touch her shoulder. Glancing around, she saw him draw back to grab his crutch. It wasn't worth having him break his neck to get her to stop, even though she wasn't as adverse to the thought as a physician probably should be.

  "You didn't deserve that." He had no business striking out at her. She was the only one who understood what he was trying to cope with, who knew how badly he was handling everything. That was probably why he got as defensive with her as he did. She knew him too well. Saw all his flaws. Yet, she seemed to suffer him anyway.

  "Don't go," he asked, cursing the hurt he'd put in her eyes. Cursing himself for having put it there. He lifted his hand to her face, more relieved than he wanted to admit when she didn't pull away. "You said it yourself. It was a rough night. But I have no business taking it out on you."

  His apology disarmed her. With her arms locked over the achy knot in her stomach, Alex watched the shadows move through his face. She'd bumped an emotional bruise and he'd lashed out in pain. That pain was still visible even as he slipped his fingers along her jaw and let his hand trail away.

  He'd asked her not to leave. As he leaned on his crutches to catch her by the shoulders and slowly pull her into his arms, she all but forgot why she'd been about to go.

  He needed to be held. She realized that the moment she slipped her arms around his waist and felt his arms tighten around her. She felt him draw a ragged breath, his hard chest expanding against her breasts. Some of the strain seemed to leave his body when that breath slowly shuddered out and he buried his face in the side of her neck.

  Her hand came up to cup the back of his head, her need to offer comfort as great as his need to seek it. He was so solitary in so many ways. Yet, he'd let himself reach for her. That alone told her how badly he needed her arms. And that alone kept her right where she was when, long moments later, the tension shifting through him changed quality and she felt his lips graze the skin of her neck.

  The sensation began as a feeling of softness, a little thread of warmth that turned to a trail of heat as he nuzzled a path from the curve of her shoulder to the sensitive spot behind her ear. His fingers slipped through her hair and he tugged her head back so he could carry that debilitating caress to the hollow of her throat. Her pulse fluttered there as he worked his way up to settle his mouth over hers.

  It had never occurred to her to move away. The arm at her back tightened as he turned with her in his arms, his crutches falling with soft thuds against the carpet as he sank to the edge of the bed. Caught between his legs, her hands settled on his shoulders and he skimmed his kiss to her chin, her throat, the soft swells of her breasts. She felt his breath, hot and moist through the thin cotton of her dress as he nuzzled first one tightening bud, then the other.

  She was sure he felt the tremors he shot through her. His hands spanned her waist, tightening as if he knew he needed to hold her upright. She whispered his name, the sound part sigh, part plea. But not until he felt her knees sag against the mattress did he tip back his head.

  His eyes glittered like blue diamonds on her face.

  "Have you ever seduced a man before, Alex?"

  Her heart was already pounding. The intent in his expression nearly made it stop. She thought she whispered, "No." She knew she shook her head.

  "Do you want me to show you how?"

  In the back of her mind, sanity warned that she would regret giving her heart to this man. With his hands moving over her hips, his thumbs dipping low on her stomach and her pulse clamoring in her ears, she barely heard that faint voice of caution. It was too late for warnings anyway. She was already in love with him. He made her feel more alive than she had in a very long time. And she needed that as badly right now as he needed her.

  He'd told her she'd have to take the lead. "Please," she whispered.

  In the low, golden glow from the lamp she saw his features go taut. The gleam in his eyes turned feral. "You'll have to be on top."

  She swallowed, the thought of straddling his hard body jolting her to her core. "I know."

  Watching her closely, he lifted her hands from his shoulders and moved them to the front of his shirt.

  "Then, the first thing you have to do," he said, his voice dropping to a husky rasp as he guided her fingers to his buttons, "is get rid of this."

  Her hands were trembling. She didn't realize that until he let them go. He made no move to help her. He just sat on the edge of the brocade-covered bed, his glance drifting to her mouth when she took a breath and began slipping buttons t
hrough holes. When she reached his belt and the waistband of his jeans, he leaned back a little for her to tug out his shirttail.

  The taut muscles of his shoulders felt hard as stone when she slipped her hand under the crisp white fabric and drew it down his arms. His skin gleamed like hammered bronze in the soft light.

  She knew how beautifully his chest was formed, how the muscles of his flat stomach rippled, how the swirl of dark hair arrowed beneath his belt. There was just something about knowing she was free to touch him that made her knees feel even weaker than they had moments ago.

  "Now," he said, catching her wrist as the shirt hit the floor. Reaching for her other hand, he drew them both up to his face. "You kiss me."

  His fingers slid from hers to circle her waist once more. With the heat of his hands searing into her, the faint rasp of his nighttime beard sensitizing her fingers, she leaned forward and hesitantly lowered her head.

  She felt him open to her the instant her lips touched his, but he waited until the first tentative touch of her tongue before he let his tangle with hers. Even then, he let her take the lead. He tasted hot and faintly of mint and she found herself growing bolder, leaning closer as her fingers threaded through the softness of his hair.

  In the quiet of the room, she heard a faint rasp as he moved his hand down her back, opening the zipper of her dress. When she lifted her head a moment later, he slipped the loose garment from her shoulders.

  "Drop your arms," he urged, and let the dress drop to a puddle at her feet.

  The instant the fabric had fallen, her hand crossed her chest. Frowning at the automatic way she'd attempted to cover herself, he snagged her by the hips. The forward motion forced her hands to his shoulders to keep herself from losing her balance.