by Beverly Bird
Cait sighed and went outside to mollify her landlady. She might be a changed woman, but the idea of annoying Mrs. Brody with a rumbling sports car troubled her. She was not about to leave this apartment on anything but her own terms.
Six
Sam drove into the employees’ area on Monday morning and found himself parked smack-dab next to Cait’s little blue teacup on wheels. He realized it when he got out of his own car, and he glared at it as though it had run over his toes.
First, he thought, she’d acted as though nothing they had done in that basement room had made any difference to her whatsoever. Then she’d gotten all flushed and rattled in the storage room when he’d talked about it, so he’d decided that it really had affected her, after all. Yesterday she’d sent him from her door as cool and calm as you please. He couldn’t figure her out. Never, not once, had Sam met a woman who was able to so completely stymie him this way.
He had to remedy this situation. He left her car and stalked toward the hospital entrance. Halfway there, the answer occurred to him.
He wanted to stop in midstride and shout, “Eureka!” Instead, he kept going, grinning now, instead of frowning. Returning to the storage room hadn’t gotten her off his mind, and as far as Sam was concerned, Doc Cross should just keep treating childhood hang-ups because he was seriously shaky in the area of post traumatic stress disorder. Therefore, Sam thought, it was time to take matters into his own hands.
Just as Nancy had once said, the single thing that had always managed to take the bloom off the rose for him with any woman was sustained proximity. As a general rule, familiarity bred contempt. Or, at least, it bred disinterest. Therefore, what he needed to get Cait off his mind was…well, more of her.
“Consider yourself about to be seduced, you pretty little nurse,” he muttered aloud as he went inside.
He arrived on the pediatrics floor at exactly eight o’clock and found no sign of her. He stopped at the nurses’ station. Angelina Moffit was at the computer station there.
“Where’s Nurse Matthews?” he asked her.
The woman ignored him.
“Excuse me,” Sam tried again.
Angelina looked up. “I’m sorry. Did you say something?”
“I’m looking for Nurse Matthews,” he repeated. Then he realized that he could no longer tell what color Angelina’s eyes were because they were covered with frost.
She yawned, then she turned to the other side of the semicircular desk, giving him her back. “Hey, Kenny,” she said. “Can I help you with something?”
Sam looked that way. Estrada! The intern. Now he understood what was happening here.
Estrada had moved right in on Kimberlie Leon when Sam had found himself out of sorts at the party the other night. That had been after little Nurse I’m-Not-Interested-Maybe-I-Am-No-I’m-Not-After-All had fled the ball without so much as leaving him a slipper to go on. Estrada was obviously the hospital’s new bachelor of the hour, Sam realized.
He decided he’d concentrate on getting his ground back in that quarter later. Just as soon as he found Cait.
He turned away from the nurses’ station and nearly plowed into Tabitha Monroe.
“Sam,” she said. “I need five minutes of your time.”
“Sure. Right after rounds.” He stepped around her.
“Couldn’t we squeeze it in now?” she asked.
“There’s something I have to do first.” He took two more steps, then stopped and looked back at her. Cait was at least somewhat cozy with the hospital administrator. Or so rumor had it. With Cait it was hard to be sure. “Have you seen Nurse Matthews?” he asked her.
Something happened to Tabitha’s expression. She looked startled, then smug. “Actually, I just left her in the cafeteria.”
“What’s she doing in the cafeteria? Her shift starts—” he looked at his watch “—five minutes ago.”
“She came in early to check on a girl who got admitted last night. A domestic-violence situation.”
“Oh, man.” Sam grimaced. He hated those.
“One of the police detectives—Molly Gates—notified her,” Tabitha explained. “The girl’s the sister of a boy we treated several months ago—he was a victim of those crooked cops, that ‘Lion’s Den’ thing. Apparently Detective Gates has a soft spot for the family, and she wanted someone she trusted to look in on the child.”
Bobby Jansen. Sam remembered. “His sister’s here now? What happened?”
Tabitha looked miserable. “A run-in with her mother’s boyfriend. Anyway, Cait’s been with Beatty since early this morning and she just ran downstairs for a cup of tea before her shift officially starts.”
“Thanks.” Sam strode down the hallway toward the elevator.
Tea? What kind of woman drank tea? he thought. The kind who drove microscopic, sensible cars, he answered himself. The kind who could dance with a glass of champagne in her hand. The kind with big, blue, innocent eyes that told a whole lot of different stories, depending on the day and her mood.
Sam put the Jansen girl out of his mind for the time being. First, there was a certain nurse he needed to get out of his system.
He found her in the cafeteria, just as Tabitha had said. She was cleaning up her table as though the Board of Health was expected to pour into the room at any given moment. She wiped it down with her napkin, then she folded that into little quarters before she dropped it into the trash bin. This, Sam thought, was the woman who had always irritated the hell out of him.
When she glanced up, he saw something happen to her eyes. They went wide, and he swore he saw heat there before they thinned. She crossed to him resolutely.
“I’m on my way upstairs now,” she said when she reached him.
“No hurry.” He crossed his arms over his chest, going for the casual and laid-back look. Like a friend, he thought—and one-time lover—instead of a coworker.
“What’s this?” she asked suspiciously.
“What’s what?”
“This.” She mimicked his stance.
Sam dropped his arms. “It’s nothing. I just wanted to talk to you.”
“You could have caught me upstairs in two minutes.” When he hesitated, she sighed. “Sam, my reasons for wanting a transfer are still personal.”
“‘Sam,”’ he repeated, leaning a little closer to her. “You know, you do have a way of saying that.”
He saw something pink touch her neck before she stepped back quickly. “Well, you won’t have to listen to it much longer.”
“Cait, I really don’t want to lose you.”
She took another step in retreat. “You never had me.”
He lowered his voice. “I did. Once. And I liked it.”
This time heat definitely flared in her eyes. But just as quickly, it was gone again. “That—as well as our professional relationship—is over now,” she said. She started to move around him.
Sam had to sidestep fast to block her way. “I have an idea. Let me take you out for dinner tonight and we can discuss this transfer business in more detail.”
“Dinner?” Her voice sounded like a squeak.
“Two people in a restaurant sharing wine and good food and conversation,” he clarified.
“Ask Dr. Leon.” She tried to bolt past him. He moved again.
“Dr. Leon and I no longer have unfinished business.”
“Then excuse me for a moment while I call in the drum-and-bugle corps.”
She was doing it again, he thought. She was being sarcastic. He had to fight hard not to laugh. “On the other hand,” he said, “you and I do.”
“Not really. My transfer goes through on Wednesday.” She inched to her left, still trying to get around him. “I just found out this morning. Elizabeth Halverson in neonatal is willing to trade positions with me. You’ll like her.”
“Not as much as I like you.”
Cait stumbled. “Stop this! Stop it right now!”
“I will if you’ll agree to have dinner with me
and talk this over.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Why would you want to keep me? Since I’ve been back you’ve jumped on every little move I’ve made.”
“Trust me, it’s had nothing to do with your work ethic.”
Wrong words, he thought immediately. He saw her stiffen.
“Don’t you dare let one affect the other!” she said hotly. “What happened between us in that room was a mistake. We both admitted it. I want to move on now. If you dare use it to influence my career—”
“I didn’t say that!” he almost shouted, exasperated.
She sniffed. “You implied it.”
“The hell I did!”
“You mentioned my work ethic.”
“I like your work ethic. That’s what I said.” How had she turned this all around?
“Okay, then.”
Sam frowned. “Okay?”
“That’s what I said. Okay. Can I go now?”
“What about dinner?”
“I’m sure Dr. Leon will enjoy it very much.”
She was, he realized, talking circles around him. “I just told you, it’s over with her.”
“Then find a new trophy, Sam. But it’s not going to be me.” This time she managed to duck past him.
Sam gaped after her as one of the cafeteria workers came to pull the plastic bag out of the trash bin near where they had been standing. “Uh-oh,” the woman said. “What was that all about? It sounded like a lovers’ spat. Is she your girlfriend?”
It was kind of a personal question for a stranger to be asking, Sam thought. He looked at the woman and tried to figure out if he knew her. She had short brown hair and murky blue eyes, the kind of hue that resulted when someone with dark eyes tried to lighten them with tinted lenses. She was slightly overweight, but her uniform was still too large as though she was trying to camouflage unwanted swells and curves. It was Sam’s firm opinion that women often went overboard in trying to correct what they saw as weaknesses, and that was a shame.
“She’s not my girlfriend,” he said absently. “She’s my, uh…” He trailed off. His mind went blank for a moment. “Nemesis.”
“Well, good for her,” said a familiar voice behind him.
Sam jerked around. “Nancy.”
“Interesting scene,” she said, looking past him at the door Cait had escaped through.
“That wasn’t a scene.”
“You know, you’re starting to sound like a man who’s seriously in denial.”
Sam scowled darkly as he looked at the door again, too.
“I especially liked the part where she imitated you.” Nancy crossed her arms over her chest the way Cait had. “Whoever would have guessed the little mouse had it in her?”
“She’s not a mouse.” He heard the edge to his voice and winced. Where had that come from?
“Are you actually sticking up for her?” Nancy asked.
Sam let out a rough breath. “I don’t think she needs it.”
“Me, neither,” Nancy said, sweeping past him. Then she paused and turned back, poking a finger into his chest. “You, my dear, have finally met your match.”
When she was gone, Sam stood for a long time rubbing a hand against the sore spot she’d left. Nancy’s fingernails had always been dangerous.
His match? Five foot two inches of starch? “I’m getting her out of my system, damn it.” Or he would have been well on his way, he thought, if she’d just agreed to have dinner with him.
Now what was he supposed to do?
By the time she returned to the cafeteria at lunch-time, Cait was reasonably sure it was going to be the longest day of her life. Her nerves felt like the most fragile porcelain. If Sam had been rude and antagonistic toward her before, today he was going out of his way to be chivalrous. She knew what he was up to, of course. He was trying to get her to change her mind about the transfer. Which still made no sense, she thought desperately. He ought to be glad that she was so effectively putting the whole business of what had happened between them behind her.
That was what he’d said he wanted.
Cait wasn’t sure which was worse—his charm or his irritation. She felt as though she was on an emotional roller coaster. His kindness, his jokes, made something melt inside her.
She nibbled halfway through an egg-salad sandwich before she realized that her stomach was a little off again. She pushed her plate away and started to get up for another cup of tea when Nancy Walters dropped into the chair across from her, groaning a little.
“One thing I liked about living off Sam’s alimony,” the woman said, “was that I didn’t have to wear heels.” She toed off one of her shoes and rubbed her instep. “My feet are killing me.”
Cait felt anger spike in her. She had the insane urge to tell the woman that she ought to go confide in someone who cared. Instead, she sank back into her chair. “Then why did you get a job?” she asked politely.
Nancy sighed. “Sheer boredom. Plus, I thought I’d get out a little and meet a man on my own terms rather than suffer the blind dates my father lines up for me these days. He’s determined to see me married again.” She shrugged. “I’m only here part time.”
“That’s nice.” Cait nodded stiffly.
“You’re annoyed with me, aren’t you?”
“Of course not.” Then Cait hesitated. Whether it was PTSD or hormones, she really was tired of being nice all the time. The fact remained that it had gotten her nowhere. “Yes,” she amended.
Nancy looked startled, then she laughed. “Fair enough. But you have no cause. I didn’t tell Sam anything.”
“Except where I live.”
“No, I didn’t.”
Cait shrugged and stood again. “It doesn’t matter. I have to get back to work.”
“He does seem pretty upset about losing you, though,” Nancy said as though Cait hadn’t spoken.
“He’ll get over it.” Cait picked up her plate. Her stomach no longer even felt up to tea.
“All I’m saying is that I probably know him better than any other woman on earth,” Nancy continued. “If you want a sounding board, I’m available.”
Cait looked at her quickly. “So you can run to him with every word I say?”
The woman held up one hand in a pledge. “I won’t. Scout’s honor. But something clearly very personal is going on between you two.”
“No, it’s not!” Cait heard her voice rise before she got a grip on herself. “Thanks for your concern, but I’m fine.”
She left Nancy and went to scrape her plate into the trash can, then took it back to the counter. She had one more thing to do on her lunch break: make an appointment with an obstetrician in Laredo. She had a whole pocketful of change for the toll call. She’d already decided that while she was in the city, she would put out a few job applications and look at apartments.
“Is everything all right?” asked the woman behind the counter as she took her plate.
Cait focused on her. Her thoughts were miles away on a new city where she really would be utterly alone. She’d miss Tabitha, she realized with a pang.
And Sam. But she couldn’t think about Sam.
“You look upset,” the woman observed.
Cait shook her head. “I’m not.” Then she hesitated. “Do I know you?”
“Only from in here. I’m Holly Sinclair.”
“Oh. Well, nice to meet you.” Cait turned away.
“I noticed you arguing with Dr. Walters earlier this morning,” Holly said.
Cait glanced back at her. “I work with him. We were just having a disagreement about a patient.” She heard the lie slide from her tongue as effortlessly as so many others had lately and she cringed inwardly. What was happening to her? But her shame wasn’t enough to topple her disquiet over all these people suddenly poking into her business.
She shuddered visibly and hurried out of the cafeteria. The sooner she made a clean break from this place, the better.
Well, the woman thought, that hadn’t been very en
lightening. She watched Cait flee the cafeteria for the second time that day and glanced at her watch.
It was just past noon. The nurse would be on duty for a while yet. That left her time.
“If at first you don’t succeed,” the woman murmured aloud, “try again. None of this would be necessary if she wasn’t such an unfriendly little snob.”
She gave Cait a decent head start, then followed her out of the cafeteria. It was time for Plan B. She headed up the hallway and slipped into the personnel office—it was deserted because everyone was on break. She went to the big, blue metal filing cabinet that held the records of every employee in the hospital. She had, of course, taken a leisurely stroll through many of them before.
She found the one for Caitlyn Matthews and checked for her address and her schedule. A copy of her transfer request was in there, as well, and the woman smiled at that. Cait Matthews might just solve the problem herself when that transfer went through. But she still wanted to know what had sent her flying out of the ball the other night.
Cait worked the eight-to-four shift. The woman had known that, of course, but she needed to make absolutely sure. She put the file back and sauntered out again, returning to the cafeteria.
Her adrenaline built consistently over the next couple of hours. By two o’clock, it was something alive in her blood, hot and sweet, singing. She left the hospital and drove to Cait’s address on Euclid Street.
At first she was startled. The home there was large and white, somewhat ramshackle but pretty. The drive and walkway were lined with an incredible snarl of flowers in so many colors it hurt the eyes. Nurse Perfect obviously had some money stashed away to be able to afford this, she thought, and that only made her hate her more.
Then she noticed that the driveway led back to a garage, and that there were curtains on the windows of the second floor there. Cait probably lived back there. That made more sense, the woman thought, but it was a complication. Someone obviously lived in the house in the front and they might even be home, might notice her approaching the apartment in the back. She could always pretend to be a friend of Cait’s, but still, it would raise a few eyebrows when she had to break into the place….