by Diana Palmer
“If you don’t want to be propositioned, don’t make passes at me,” she returned with mock hauteur and twinkling eyes. “Now, I’m going home.”
“The Coltrains said I could bring you along.”
She wanted to go with him, but she forced herself to shake her head nonchalantly. “Thanks all the same.” She hesitated. “Thanks for…being concerned about me, too. I’ll deep-six the perfume. And next time I’ll be careful what I put on. Good night.”
He wondered why she’d refused to go to dinner with him. But he smiled casually and opened the door for her, and then walked her to her car after he’d locked up. He stood there watching her drive away, aware that she was grinding gears like mad. He wondered if he was losing his mind. She was only his receptionist.
Chapter 3
The Coltrains noticed a difference in Drew, and it wasn’t because he was grieving. He seemed oddly thoughtful, and when Jeb mentioned Kitty, his hand jumped, as if just the sound of her name startled him.
Jeb and Lou were much too cagey to come right out and ask questions. They kept the conversation on work right through the main course. But over dessert, they probed a little.
“How’s your receptionist working out, now that you’ve had her around for almost a year?”
“She’s doing fine,” Drew said without looking up from his cheesecake. “At least, as long as she stays away from perfumes with a woodsy tone,” he added thoughtfully, and described the asthma that had surfaced with the wearing of her new perfume.
“A lot of our patients don’t connect perfume with asthma attacks or severe headaches,” Lou mused, smiling. “It isn’t something you consciously think about.”
“She’ll think about it now,” he reflected.
“Do she and Nurse Turner get along well?” Lou probed.
He chuckled. “They conspire,” he murmured. “Tonight they drew straws to see who got to leave first. Kitty lost the draw.” He sighed and shook his head. “I’d been pure hell to get along with all day, but she didn’t say a word.”
“What did she do?” Jeb asked curiously.
“She put both her hands straight up over her head and I burst out laughing.”
“She’s a doll,” Jeb chuckled. “I remember her as a little girl, trotting along behind her dad when they went to the store together. He had her marching like a proper soldier. I felt sorry for her. He was badly wounded in Vietnam, you know, and had to take a discharge that he didn’t want. They offered him a job at the Pentagon, but he was too proud to take it. So he stayed here in town, reliving past glories and making his wife and daughter suffer for his losses.”
“He didn’t hurt her?” Drew asked before he took time to think what he was saying.
“Not at all,” Jeb assured him. “He wasn’t a cruel man, but he was domineering and demanding. Kitty never had boyfriends. Nobody got past the old man, even when she graduated from high school and started taking those business courses. He intimidated the young men.”
“I’ll bet he did,” Drew mused, thinking privately that he’d have given the old buzzard a run for his money. He moved his cheesecake around on the plate. “She must have had at least one steady boyfriend,” he said probingly.
“Nope,” Jeb returned. “No chance of that. The old man went down with a stroke the year she enrolled in business college. She had to nurse him and work to supplement his government pension.” He shook his head. “In between, she spent a lot of time in the emergency room with what she thought was coughing fits until they diagnosed her as asthmatic. It took a while to get her medicines set to contain them, too. It’s better now, but she has fits when the grasses start blooming.”
“I’ll keep a close check on her,” Drew promised.
“She could use one,” Jeb replied grimly. “Kitty’s had no fun at all. That’s why I suggested that you might bring her along tonight,” he added with a rueful grin. “I wasn’t trying to matchmake. She works for you and I like her, that’s all.”
“I’m sorry,” Drew said, and genuinely was, now. “If I’d realized that…”
“We know better than to try to pair you off with anyone,” Lou affirmed, smiling. “Least of all, Kitty.”
He frowned slightly. “Why do you say that?” he murmured curiously.
“Well, she’s not your type, is she?” Lou asked, averting her eyes to the table. “She’s unsophisticated and unworldly. She’d rather tend her garden than go to a cocktail party, and she doesn’t have a clue how to dress properly.”
He wondered for a minute if Lou was making digs at his receptionist, but he realized almost at once that she wasn’t. She seemed to genuinely like Kitty.
“She’ll never get a boyfriend, the way she looks,” Lou continued sadly. “Drew, couldn’t you do something, point her to right sort of clothes, get her to a hairdresser? Guy Fenton is still interested in her, but she’s just not the sort of girl a man wants to show off. You know what I mean?”
“You mean that she doesn’t dress like a young and attractive woman looking for a soul mate,” he translated.
“That’s exactly what I mean.”
“Why don’t you take her in hand?” he asked Lou.
“How would I go about it, without making her look stupid?” she asked honestly. “She doesn’t really know me.”
“She only works for me,” Drew replied.
“But she looks up to you. You know, sort of as a father figure.” She looked down so that her eyes wouldn’t reflect her delight at the way that remark made Drew tauten and look irritated.
“I’m not old enough to be her father,” he said shortly.
Coltrain cleared his throat to choke back helpless laughter. “Lou didn’t mean it that way. But she does look up to you. What would it hurt to help her change her image? Married receptionists never quit their jobs.”
“She can do better than Guy Fenton,” he said, remembering vividly how Fenton had already treated her. “As I recall, she dressed up for him, and he ditched her in the middle of a date.”
“Her idea of dressing up is a new shirtwaist dress,” Lou muttered. “And she never lets that hair down.”
Drew tried not to think about all that hair. He had frequent longings to start tearing pins out of it, just to see how it looked when it was loose.
“She needs someone besides Guy Fenton,” Jeb remarked coolly. “Guy keeps dark secrets, and he drinks too much. But there are plenty of eligible men in town. Matt Caldwell, for instance.”
Matt was rugged and outlandish, but he was also single and well-to-do. Drew didn’t like the idea of him. He didn’t like the idea of any man, actually. And because he didn’t, he agreed to Lou’s proposal. He wasn’t going to get involved with Kitty. Getting her involved with another man was the ideal way to protect himself.
“Jeb and I are on the orphanage committee here in town,” Lou reminded him, “and we’re hosting a Summer Charity Ball to raise money to build a new wing onto the orphanage. I’d like you to come. You could bring Kitty—and then I can introduce her to the eligible men.”
Drew frowned.
“All you have to do is bring her, Drew,” Lou persisted, “not propose to her. You can have her meet you there if you don’t want to be seen with her.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, I don’t mind asking her,” he grumbled.
“Good,” Lou replied, smiling at him. “And if you can get her refurbished in time, there’s no telling what might happen.”
“Matt likes her—” Jeb put his two cents worth in “—and they’ve got a lot in common.”
“Was he afraid of her father?” Drew asked curiously.
“Not at all,” Jeb mused, grinning so that his freckles stood out. “In fact, they came to blows over Operation Desert Storm—Matt’s reserve unit was called up during it, you know. He laid the colonel out in the middle of the local McDonald’s and poured a milkshake over him. I don’t think the colonel ever got over it.”
Drew chuckled. “What did Kitty say?”
&
nbsp; “Nothing. She didn’t dare. But you used to be able to just say the word ‘milkshake’ to her, and she’d collapse laughing.”
Drew found the idea amusing. He’d have to try that one day. He toyed with his fork. “All right, I’ll take her to the ball. When is it?”
She told him. “And it’s formal. Very formal.”
“I’ll wear a dinner jacket,” he said reluctantly. “I guess Kitty can come up with a dress.”
“Help her find one,” Lou suggested. “And you might point her toward the cosmetic counter and a hairstylist and contact lenses. She’d be pretty if she worked at it.”
He waited until she came to work the following Monday, and when Nurse Turner went out to lunch, he asked Kitty to come into his office.
She’d spent an uneasy weekend remembering what they’d done together and her lack of sleep was evident in the dark circles under her eyes. She noticed that he looked tired as well, but considering how hard he worked, she couldn’t attribute it to anything other than his job. She didn’t know that he’d spent his share of sleepless nights trying to decide how to put the experience out of his mind.
“Are you still sweet on Guy Fenton?” he asked bluntly.
She didn’t ask why he was probing into her private life. She moved restlessly in the chair. “I used to like him. I still do. But I don’t want to go out with him anymore.”
“I don’t blame you. How about Matt Caldwell, then?”
“Matt doesn’t know me from a peanut,” she informed him. “He and my father never got along at all.”
“Neither do he and I from time to time, but he’s coming to the Summer Charity Ball at the country club and I thought you might like to go with me,” he added, not looking at her.
She looked at the wall and wondered if she was having delusions. Perhaps that glass of wine she’d consumed with her dinner Saturday night had had a delayed reaction…
“Could you repeat that?” she asked. “I think I may be in the midst of a drunken stupor.”
“On what, coffee?” he asked, diverted.
“I had a glass of wine Saturday night,” she volunteered.
His mouth curled up. “Did I drive you to drink?” he chided, and then felt guilty when she blushed. “Never mind. I asked you to go to the Summer Charity Ball with me. Lou’s hosting it with Jeb, and they’re inviting all the single men and women in town, including Matt and Guy.” He glanced at his hands. “The Coltrains particularly wanted you to come.”
Kitty studied his face uncertainly. He sounded as if he hated the idea of asking her at all, and she knew without being told that it was the Coltrains who’d put him up to this. Funny how disappointing that was, although she couldn’t deny that she knew how he still felt about his late wife. She must have been temporarily out of her mind to think that he’d asked her for his own sake; or to allow herself to build one kiss into a future.
“I don’t really think I want to…” she began politely.
He looked up, his dark eyes so intent that they stopped her protest before she could get it out of her mouth. “I want you to come,” he said deliberately.
Of course he didn’t. But her stubborn refusal irritated him. She was young and sweet and she had a lot to offer. Matt or Guy would be lucky to have such a woman find them attractive. She deserved a little happiness.
She misunderstood his determination, and she smiled warmly. “Really?” she asked breathlessly.
He turned away from that bright-eyed surprise. “Sure.”
“Well, I guess I could.”
“You’ll need a dress,” he continued, toying with a sheet of paper on the desk. “Something pretty and formal.”
“I’ll…I’ll have to buy one,” she faltered.
“And you could have your hair done.”
She touched the bun defensively. “Cut it?”
“No!” He caught himself before he sounded even more of a fool. “I meant, you could have it put in one of those complicated styles. Cut it?” He looked absolutely shocked. “It would be a crime to cut hair like that.” His eyes reluctantly slid over it, confined as usual in a huge bun behind her nape. “It must fall all the way to your waist when it’s down.”
She smiled self-consciously. “A little farther than that,” she confided. “I don’t ever wear it down anymore.”
“Why?”
She shrugged. “My father said I looked like ‘Alice in Wonderland.’”
“Bull,” he muttered.
“Anyway, it gets in my way when I’m working.”
“You could braid it,” he suggested.
She laughed. “I can’t do it myself.”
He had to bite his tongue to keep from offering to help. For a long time now, he’d wondered how Kitty’s hair would look when it was loosened. It was a lovely dark shade of brown. She had just a faintly olive complexion and those soft green eyes dominated her delicate oval face. Despite the glasses she insisted on wearing instead of contact lenses, she was very attractive. Her figure was as good as any he’d ever seen. If only she took advantage of her assets and didn’t downplay them so drastically. On the other hand, that might be a good thing. He could see himself trying to diagnose and treat illnesses with Kitty running around the office looking like a nymph.
“Never mind,” he murmured. “Do what you like with it. But get a pretty dress to wear.”
“Which one of them are you planning to throw me at?” she asked.
He straightened. “I beg your pardon?”
“Who’s being sacrificed for me, Guy or Matt?” she persisted. “I gather that you and the Coltrains are determined to save me from spinsterhood?”
His face grew stern. “I thought, as they do, that you deserved a little fun. We aren’t throwing you at anyone. We only want to…improve you.”
“I see.”
“Like hell you see!” he burst out, irritated by his own thoughts as well as her resistance to having people remodel her for her own good. “You can’t see anything! You dress like a bag lady, you screw your hair up into those god-awful buns, you walk around in a permanent daze and then you probably wonder why men never come on to you!”
She wasn’t just shocked; she was downright hurt. She hadn’t thought he had such a low opinion of her. Apparently nothing about her appealed to him at all. She wasn’t sure if he was genuinely trying to help her find a man, or if he had plans to marry her off so that he could get her out of his office for good.
She lowered her eyes to the floor, hiding rage and shock. “I didn’t realize I had so little to offer.”
“It isn’t that,” he grumbled. “You have plenty to offer, that’s why I hate to see you waste it! You’re very attractive, but you could be a lot more appealing if you just worked at it. Your father isn’t around to chase away prospective suitors anymore, Kitty.
You don’t have to downplay your looks. It’s all right to dress up and make the most of your assets.”
She sighed angrily. “Okay,” she said tightly. “I’ll just do that little thing.”
Her eyes sparkled like emeralds in a pale face. He hated what he’d said to her, but if it woke her up to the possibilities, it was for the best.
“Get something dark green,” he said out of the blue. “Tight in the waist and low-cut. It will do wonders for those eyes. They’re incredible,” he added softly. “Like living emeralds.”
Her heart jumped. “I beg your pardon?”
He cleared his throat and glanced quickly at his watch. “I have a meeting with the hospital board of directors in thirty minutes,” he said abruptly. “We’re going to try to convince them to hire a full-time physician for the emergency room so that the rest of us can have a little peace after hours.”
“Good luck,” she said, and meant it, because she knew how hard the local doctors had to work to keep that emergency room going.
“We’ll need it. Indigent care is killing the budget.”
“A lot of people can’t get insurance,” she reminded him, glad to be
off the subject of her own physical shortcomings. “And some people can’t afford it.”
He agreed. “It’s a sad world in some ways, isn’t it, Kitty?” he murmured. “Money shouldn’t be the determining factor in a life or death situation. It isn’t, here in Jacobsville, despite the budget. But hospitals can’t operate on goodwill and hope.”
“I know that.” She shrugged. “I guess it’s more complicated than it seems to a layperson.”
He nodded. “It’s complicated even to the professionals.”
She moved toward her desk.
“What about the ball?” he asked curtly. “Are you going with me?”
She didn’t look at him, but at her computer. “I’ll go,” she said, but without real enthusiasm. She knew, even if he wasn’t admitting it, that he was only taking her so that she could be offered up to Guy and Matt. It hurt her as nothing had in recent years. That, too, was disturbing.
“Good,” he said. He couldn’t think of anything else to say, so he went back to get his jacket and soon afterward, he left the office.
Kitty went shopping all by herself. Thinking that he’d made suggestions and shouldn’t push his luck by offering to accompany her, Drew never said another word about the dress or the hairstyling.
She went all the way to Houston, in the end, to look for a dress, leaving very early on Saturday morning in her little car. The drive was nice, even though it was drizzling rain. Tree colors were so varied and pretty, hazes of green, hundreds of shades of it, in the trees that grew along streams and near houses in the distance. There were calves in the pastures, too, because it was that time of year as well. In summer, everything seemed to come alive on the earth. She thought about a young man’s fancy turning to thoughts of love and laughed out loud. Drew was neither young nor interested in her, so she’d do well to ignore these strange feelings he engendered in her. Despite his collusion with the Coltrains, she had to remember that he wasn’t interested in dolling her up for himself. He only wanted to sacrifice her to Guy or Matt.
Well, she thought, she might as well let him. If he thought she had potential, perhaps she did. All her life, she’d deferred to her father as far as the opposite sex was concerned. It hadn’t ever occurred to her how alone her father was or how much he depended on her at home. Perhaps the thought of losing her was really terrifying to him and he had too much pride to admit it. That would explain his reluctance to let her get involved with men, or to think of marriage. He seemed very self-reliant and domineering, but underneath, he had many insecurities, all of which had grown much worse with the death of her mother.