Читать книгу Prescription: Baby - Jule Mcbride - Страница 8

DOCTOR FORD Freeland Carrington.

Seeing him outside the operating room could turn her face as red as her hair and her knees to water. If he passed her in a hallway or politely held open a door, cold sweat would break out above her lips, and if he should ever kiss her—outside her wickedest dreams—pediatric nurse Katie Topper feared her iron-clad constitution would give way and she’d drop into a dead faint like the Texas Southern belles she loved to hate.

For two years, she’d wanted Ford Carrington. She damn well respected him, too, but now she’d stooped to lusting after him while he was performing surgery. This was even worse than letting her mind stray to him during the Sunday services she sometimes attended with her papa, where Reverend Kenneth would work himself into a full lather, preaching hellfire and brimstone.

Hellfire Katie knew about of course. Her papa lovingly joked that more than the usual quota coursed through her Irish blood. It was probably why she couldn’t keep her mind off Ford. Not that she wasn’t doing her job. She’d arrived in the OR before the others this evening, double-checking the monitors and insuring the supply drawers were stocked.

“I’m ready to finish closing now, Katie.”

Ford’s warm voice—all melting Southern molasses mixed with Northern prep school polish—made her gut tighten. “Ready, Dr. Carrington,” she said.

Momentarily lifting gloved hands smudged with blood, Ford scrutinized the monitors before he took a needle from Katie, leaned down and began stitching the patient, this time closing skin, not internal tissue. “Great work, everybody,” he commended. “Looks like this baby’s going to make it. Those monitors stable, Jerry?”

“Yeah,” said a technician.

Just as another tech lowered the easy-listening country music Ford always played while he operated, he glanced up. “I appreciate your rounding up those size four clamps for me, Carrot Top. I needed them.”

Katie’s heartbeat quickened at the use of her nickname, and she braced herself against the unwanted feelings. “No problem,” she managed to say, the end of the sentence slowing into a gait that was pure east Texas. “Dr. Nelson always grabs more of those clamps than he has a right to for OR seven. Anyway, I’m just glad this baby’s going to make it.”

Ford chuckled. “As slow as you talk, Katie, this boy’ll be full-grown and winning rodeos before any of us leave the OR.”

That got a good-natured laugh.

Katie arched a sparse red eyebrow. “Making fun of my drawl, Dr. Carrington?” He always did.

He wore a green surgical mask, and she could tell he was smiling by the way his dark brown eyes crinkled at the corners. “Is that a challenge I hear? Haven’t you learned not to mess with me yet?”

“Rule number one,” she returned. “Never make fun of how us Texans talk, Dr. Carrington. Those are fighting words.”

“Fighting words? You think you’d win?”

“I know.”

He chuckled. “So, you’re a fighter, huh?”

“Sure am,” she replied, still reminding herself that Ford Carrington didn’t even know she existed outside the OR. She also knew nonmedical professionals might look askance at their casual banter and black humor, but joking relieved tension. Ford teased liberally, and Katie was the target since she could dish it out as well as take it. The repartee meant nothing special, but coming from Ford, it made her heart stutter.

Luckily, she was leaving Austin for a training program in Houston tomorrow, and she wouldn’t see Ford for three months. Surely the separation would cure her hopelessly juvenile crush. “I’ve got two brothers, Dr. Carrington,” she prompted, narrowing her green eyes wickedly, “so I didn’t have much choice but to learn to fight, and fight good.”

“Don’t forget, I was raised in Texas, too. I might be tougher than I look.”

Sometimes she kicked herself for rising to the bait—after all, he was Maitland Maternity’s chief pediatric surgeon—but somehow, she could never stop herself. “Your Texas and my Texas are two different places,” she informed him.

“That so, Carrot Top?” She watched as he surveyed his work, calmly drawing the needle through flesh. “What’s my Texas?”

“Neiman Marcus, thoroughbred horses and studio-produced country music.”

Only his narrowed eyes hinted at the focus he brought to his task. Unfailingly alert, they were steely and chocolate brown, flecked with gold. “And your Texas, Katie?”

“Getting grub at Pok-E-Jo’s Smokehouse after a trail ride.” Despite how the man set her teeth on edge without even trying, she chuckled. “If you ever want to hear real country music, Dr. Carrington, you just let me know.”

“What’s this fake country music you think I listen to?”

“Oh, you know. k.d. lang. Tanya Tucker. Dolly Parton.”

He raised a lazy jet eyebrow. “What’s wrong with Dolly?”

“Old Dolly’s okay,” Katie conceded. “Just not new Dolly.”

“Keep it up, Katie, and I’ll start thinking you’re a snob.”

Behind her mask, Katie’s jaw dropped. “Me?”

“Yes, you.”

“You’re the socialite, Dr. Carrington.”

“You’ve got me there.”

Smiling, Katie glanced at the patient. The three-week-old boy on the table was named Jesse, and he hadn’t had a fighting chance before this operation. Even now, it was hard to believe he’d pull through. His slight five pounds could easily be cradled in Katie’s hand, and the rise and fall of the tiny, too-pale chest made her think of the delicate balance of nature in the woods she loved. Looking at the sickly child and feeling her heart pull, she thought of the tops of dandelions right before they blew away, and the fragile wings of birds, and the threads of spiderwebs. Life was so precious, and sometimes so unfairly fleeting.

Five pounds. Jesse was tiny, and yet for his mama, who was right outside the operating room, he meant the entire world. That was why, moments ago, Katie had sent a message to her, letting her know that an infected incision from a previous GI surgery had been cleaned and successfully resutured.

Katie could barely imagine the woman’s stress, and yet, as many tragedies as Katie had witnessed at Maitland Maternity, she’d seen far more miracles. Glancing up, she found herself staring into eyes that made her melt. Gently, Ford probed, “You still with us, Carrot Top?”

“Sure thing.” But as Ford fell to work once more, she felt strangely unsettled, as if he’d read her innermost thoughts. Deep down, she’d been wondering if she’d ever have her own little bundle of joy, her own miracle. She wanted a baby she wouldn’t have to leave in the hospital nursery at the end of the day. She wanted to be the woman waiting at the curb with a newborn in her lap and a balloon tied to the arm of a wheelchair, while the man she loved brought around the car, anxious to take his family home.

Stepping slightly back from the table, Katie held her gloved hands turned upward. “Tell me when you need me again.”

“Thanks, Katie.”

She watched his hands, noting their size and the long, slender, mesmerizing fingers. His eyes had grown piercing in their intensity. What little of his skin was visible—mostly high, chiseled cheekbones—was tanned the color of pecans, and through the transparent hairnet that covered a high, patrician forehead, Katie could see touchably thick, raven hair through which she’d often imagined running her fingers. When dressed in street clothes, without his scrubs, he looked more like a model than a doctor.

Stop it! How many times had she gazed too long into Ford Carrington’s arresting midnight eyes while he closed a patient?

Too many.

That was why leaving Austin tomorrow was imperative. Surely, after spending three months in Houston, she’d forget about him. But so far, no matter how she fought it, he always wended his way into her thoughts. While grooming her horse, riding the mower at her papa’s farm, or running to the feed store, she’d recall some moment, like a picture frozen in time: Dr. Carrington slipping from the doctors’ lounge; Dr. Carrington shooting her a smile as he opened a door.

With any luck, she’d meet a man in Houston.

Already, she’d sublet her apartment, and tonight she was staying with her papa and brothers at the farm, where she still kept her horse. Houston was close enough that she could visit on weekends, but she would do her best not to. She needed the time away. Her bags were packed, her car was gassed up, and she’d convinced herself that three months without Ford would cure her of this pointless obsession.

They were night and day, after all. He was old money, and she was backwoods farm stock and proud of it. His family had come to America on the May-flower, and pedigree was still so important to the Carringtons that Ford’s mother, Yvonne, had chartered an Austin branch of the Texas Genealogical Society; his father, David, oversaw Austin’s largest charity, the Carrington Foundation, which made bequests in the millions each January to health-related causes.

Society women were Ford’s usual companions, and it was rumored around the hospital that he’d probably propose to Blane Gilcrest, a tall, svelte, willowy woman with straight blond hair, breasts as discreetly small as a runway model’s and slender manicured fingers that she kept ringed with sparkling diamonds.

Not only was Ford practically engaged, he was seven years Katie’s senior, her co-worker and mentor. Still, during tense moments in the OR, Katie knew she’d witnessed what Blane never had—the determination Ford brought to bear when saving a child’s life.

Ford had to win against death.

What was the source of his feverish, formidable drive? she wondered. What secrets made him want suffering children to live at any cost? Why did he work so relentlessly?

Of all the surgeons at Maitland Maternity, he was the most competent, dedicated and controlled, and Katie had often seen his tough-minded tenacity win him the hearts of terrified parents, like Jesse’s mama. Ever since she’d first locked eyes with him over the operating table, Katie had fallen hard.

“That’s a wrap, folks,” said Ford. Once he was finished, he turned, preparing to wheel out a cart of instruments.

“You don’t need to get that cart,” Katie protested. “It’s my job.”

“You think I’m afraid of a little dirty work?”

“You should be. Someone might mistake you for a nurse and make you change bedpans or worse.”

“Lord knows—” Ford’s dark eyes lighted on hers, sparkling in a way that seemed less than professional “—I’d swoon if I saw a bedpan. Drop into a dead faint. Now, c’mon, Carrot Top. Can you get the door for me, before you clean up our patient?”

“With pleasure. Are you going to talk to his mama?”

Ford nodded. “I’m on my way.”

It was always wonderful when you could bring good news from the OR, Katie thought, wedging open the door with her hip. Simultaneously freezing and burning as Ford brushed past her, she caught a whiff of clean, male scent, noticeable among the antiseptic smells to which Katie would never become accustomed. Unexpectedly, Ford leaned closer, and she instinctively veered back, her startled eyes widening in question.

“When you’re done—” his low-voiced drawl sent a shiver through her “—come over to my place, Katie. Before you leave for Houston, there are some…things I need to discuss with you.”

“Things?”

“My address is on your desk.”

She knew exactly where he lived. The house—a huge old rambling place of white-painted brick with red shutters and crisp ivy growing on trellises—was on a showy, seven-acre spread at the end of a private road. The lifestyles section of the newspaper ran articles anytime his decorator, Nan Rowe, redid so much as a bathroom. Katie’s knees weakened. “Come over? But why? What—”

“Looking forward to it,” Ford murmured.

Losing her usual professional composure, she half lurched after him. “Wait a minute. Ford—I mean, uh, Dr. Carrington—what things do you want to discuss?”

His tall, loose body merely glided over the threshold.

She stared at his back, fighting a rush of annoyance as her eyes dropped from his broad shoulders to a tight butt and long legs. Did he have any idea how much he tortured her? Or how presumptuous it was to think she’d drop everything and rush right over to his house? Not that she wouldn’t go, she supposed. But what if she’d had plans?

But you don’t, do you, Katie?

Exhaling a beleaguered sigh, she headed for the baby. Oh, maybe Ford’s interested in the training program in Houston, she suddenly thought. Yes, that’s it. Maybe he wants to recommend it to other nurses. Or to discuss her working with Cecil Nelson’s surgical team upon her return from Houston. Yes, Ford’s invitation—command, she mentally corrected, bristling again—was nothing personal. She and Ford Carrington lived worlds apart.

But what if it was personal, Katie? a voice niggled. Face it, she was leaving town tomorrow. And three months from now, when she returned, she’d be transferred to Dr. Nelson’s team where her expertise was needed more. If Ford did happen to be interested in something personal…

“Hey there, Jesse,” she whispered, determined to discourage her unlikely fantasies. Her expression gentled as she stripped away the protective covering around the baby’s legs. “Let’s clean you up and make you presentable for your mama. She’s so proud of you. We all are. You did good, kid.”

Katie’s eyes stung as she gazed down at the baby. For the next while, no less than if she’d been Jesse’s mama, her whole world was taken up with the small, defenseless boy on the table who needed her—and the immensely satisfying knowledge that Ford Carrington had fixed things so he’d be just fine.

SECONDS AFTER FORD opened the front door, he’d realized Katie wanted to make love with him. He’d gotten home in time to change from scrubs into slacks and a lightweight knit shirt, and he’d dimmed the house lights and put on music before meeting Katie at the door with an uncorked bottle of burgundy and two full glasses.

“Welcome, Carrot Top,” he’d said.

Looking a little lost on the wide porch, she’d shoved both hands into the back pockets of the skin-tight jeans she wore with cowboy boots and a University of Texas T-shirt that hugged her breasts. “Hey, Dr. Carrington,” she’d returned, her deep, throaty drawl sounding as soft as velvet on the warm fall night.

Hungry, his eyes had dropped over the petite, curvy frame he rarely saw outside of scrubs. Because of where she stood, fireflies on the lawn appeared to alight in her short, tight, fiery red curls. A tiny diamond chip earring flashed from the top of her ear, where, he’d decided, the piercing had to hurt. Hospital greens definitely didn’t do her justice.

“Come on in,” he’d said.

Always the tease, she’d cocked her head, as if considering. “I’m unchaperoned tonight,” she’d warned.

He’d glanced at her beat-up car. “True. But you did drive all the way over from the hospital.”

A beatific smile had suddenly brightened her face, making the freckles scattered across her cheeks and small, straight nose jump and wiggle as she stepped across the threshold. “Don’t mind if I do.”

As they’d entered the dimly lit foyer, her uptilted emerald eyes had turned unmistakably smoky, and Ford suddenly realized the dark house, seductive music and heady wine had set the scene for seduction. Just as he saw stark desire spark in her eyes, the lights snapped on, illuminating a room decorated with balloons and streamers—and he found himself wishing he had invited Katie here to seduce her. Surprised that she might really be game for something outside the OR, Ford had mulled the possibility over as hospital staff jumped from behind furniture, shouting, “Surprise! We’ll miss you, Katie! Hurry back from Houston!”

Disappointment had filled her eyes, then relief, then something that looked like sadness—but hell if Ford understood any of it. He’d been sure his teasing in the OR meant nothing to her. After work, she always vanished, almost as if she was avoiding him. He’d figured she had a hot, heavy romance. Any woman with green eyes as striking as hers probably would.

Maybe not, though. Now that the party was over and the guests had gone home, Ford was glad Katie had stayed and he could have her to himself. He leaned casually against the kitchen counter, his gaze traveling from Katie, who’d insisted on loading the dishwasher, to the living room, where party horns and paper plates still littered the tabletops. She looked up from the dishwasher. “I like those pictures you showed me in the hallway.”

He glanced toward the sketches and daguerreotypes. His favorites were of Lance Carrington, who’d moved the Carrington family westward to Texas in a covered wagon, and of the Freeland branch of the family, who had gotten waylaid in what was now Kentucky. He shot her a smile. “And you thought we Carringtons were snobs.”

Katie quit sorting silverware long enough to snort derisively. “Everybody in your family, including the guys on the Mayflower, were doctors.”

“True.” Chuckling, Ford rested both elbows comfortably on the counter. “But two hundred years ago, that meant selling potions from the backs of wagons and accidentally leeching people to death. Doctoring wasn’t exactly a reputable profession.”

When she shook her head as if to say he was impossible, light from the overhead tracks caught in her hair, turning the curls a beautiful burnished orange. His lips parted, but before he could say she possessed the most gorgeous hair in Texas, she drawled, “Are you sure you don’t mind me staying to do this?”

Mind? The second Katie Topper had stepped into his foyer, he’d decided he wanted her to stay all night. “I always get post-party blues,” he assured her.

Reaching into the sink, she lifted out dessert plates. “Incorrect response, Doctor. You’re supposed to say you like my company.”

“What,” he teased. “Fishing for compliments?”

She mock-scowled. “Maybe. What are you grinning at, anyway?”

The corners of his lips twisted into a flirtatiously devious smile. Each time she leaned to load the dishes, he got an eyeful of the best-looking backside in Austin. “Just looking at you. Scrubs and hairnets don’t do you justice.”

“And they supposedly enhance your appearance?”

He looked hurt. “They don’t?”

“No. And if I’d known you were hosting a party in my honor,” she added, shooting him an arch glance, “I would have dressed better.”

“It doesn’t get any better than this.” His eyes drifted over the faded denim hugging her hips. “Personally, I like tight jeans on a woman.”

“If you said you liked them on men, I’d start to wonder.”

“Hmm. Want to turn around? Model for me?”

Smirking, she swatted her very tempting-looking rear end. “Oh, kiss my round Irish behind, Ford Carrington,” she said grumpily.

“What?” Laughing, he poured himself another glass of wine and swirled it in the globe. “Be honest now. Didn’t you think I asked you here to seduce you, Katie? Just for a second?”

A breathless moment passed. Recovering, she shot him a game look. “Oh, you know how we nurses are when it comes to doctors. We always hope.”

He lifted his gaze, pinning hers over the rim of the glass. “Are you hoping tonight?”

“Keep dreaming,” she lightly volleyed in reply.

“You’re asking me to dream? I’ll take that as encouragement,” Ford assured, knowing she had no idea how their banter was affecting him. “There’s plenty of time left for dreaming, isn’t there, since the night’s still young?”

Her green eyes were assessing. “Is it?”

It damn well was, and the silence that fell like a dropping curtain lasted full seconds too long. They saw each other almost daily and had teased each other mercilessly, but now they were alone in his big, empty house, with an open bottle of wine between them. After tonight she’d be gone for three months, too, plenty of time for a one-night stand to blow over.

She kept her tone deceptively conversational. “Not so young,” she said, nodding toward the picture window above the sink. “See? There’s already a full moon out there.”

Her slow, thick accent curled into his blood, making him smile once more. In comparison, his accent was gone, educated out of him by the swanky Northeastern prep schools where his parents had sent him, and which he’d hated. She’d been right in the OR, he thought, watching her. Her Texas and his were two different places. She was a farm girl, born and bred, and even now, she talked like one. Still toying with the wine in his glass, watching the red liquid splash the sides, he drawled, “Sometimes a full moon makes all the difference in the world to a woman. Is it that way with you, Katie?”

“Only because I’m afraid of what you’ll turn into.”

He chuckled. “Hard to tell. A werewolf or vampire.”

“Oh, no,” she said darkly. “Definitely something worse.”

“Definitely.” Further relaxing against the counter, he wished he shared this kind of easy repartee with his crowd, instead of long, drawn-out evenings at fund-raisers, talking about stock portfolios. Breathing in the wine, he then savored the taste and immediately wished he was tasting something warmer, headier…Katie. “I’ll miss you,” he found himself saying, his voice catching throatily, becoming unexpectedly hoarse. “You’re the best nurse we’ve got. And when you come back, Cecil Nelson’s going to get hold of you.”

As she tossed her head, her magical curls caught the light again. She laughed off the compliment. “No pun?”

Ford’s eyes lingered, roving over her hair, and he took another drink of the liquor to soothe the dryness of his throat. “Pun?”

“Nelson. Getting hold of. Nelson’s a wrestling hold.”

Leave it to Katie to get the best of him in conversation. “No pun.” And he was getting impatient with the fun and games. “When are you going to start calling me Ford, Katie?”

She grinned. “Never.”

“Damn, you can be irritating,” he countered with another playful smile. “C’mon, quit doing the dishes. I told you earlier, I’ve got a maid coming tomorrow. Have a glass of wine with me. I invited you over for your going-away party, not to clean.”

Giving in, Katie dusted her hands with a dishcloth, and when her eyes found his again, she sobered. “The party was nice. Thanks…Ford.”

He liked hearing her say his first name. He liked feeling those hot, searing emerald eyes on him, too. They were so sharp, so heartbreakingly green, and from working with Katie, he knew they never missed a detail. Usually, he didn’t, either. How had he overlooked the soft, female intent that she was trying so hard to hide?

“I read the recommendation letter you sent to Houston,” she added. “Thanks for that, too, Ford.”

He’d said she was the best nurse he’d ever worked with. “It’s the truth.” She was wonderful. Everybody loved her. “So many people wanted to give you a send-off that only my place was big enough for the party.”

She glanced around. “It is big.”

He couldn’t stop the low, suggestive and very ungentlemanly chuckle. “Size put you off?”

She sent him a droll glance. “Now, why would the size of a house put me off?”

Laughing, he shrugged. “I’ve got mixed feelings about the place myself. It was a family house, belonged to my grandfather.”

The previous innuendo had brushed color across her cheeks. “The one who started the Carrington Foundation?”

The one relative that Ford felt had truly loved him. “Yeah.”

Absently threading fingers through her hair, making him long to touch the springy, coiled strands, she shot another appraising look around the stainless steel kitchen. “Too big for one person,” she said decisively.

“I have a lot of servants,” he said defensively, though it wasn’t really true.

She rolled her eyes. “Don’t you get scared at night?”

His eyes locked on hers again. “Offering your company?”

“I never need company,” she returned easily. “Too much Irish in my blood. I don’t scare.”

No, she didn’t. He’d never met a nurse who was able to take so much pressure. She always hung in with him, even when it seemed too late to save a patient. Other nurses might tell him to give up, but not Katie…never Katie.

Another awkward silence fell, and the clink of glass sounded overly loud as he lifted the bottle and poured her some wine. “You’ve been drinking sodas all night, and I want you to try this. It’s from a California vineyard owned by a friend of mine.” She looked impressed, and while he wanted to impress her, he didn’t like the distance it created or how put off she seemed by his money.

“Maybe too rich for my blood,” she joked, still nervously running fingers through her curls. “Sure you don’t have any Ripple? Night Train?”

“I’m getting no appreciation here. Most women think money’s my best quality, Katie.”

She surveyed him a long moment, a brief sadness touching her eyes as if she were sorry for that, then another quick smile twitched at the corners of her mouth. “Do I look like most women?”

He shook his head, his gaze slowly drifting from hair that was like curly red ribbons to her milky, angular freckled face. “No. You’re one of a kind.”

Chuckling softly, she nodded toward the wine. “Okay, Dr. Carrington. You talked me into it.”

“What?” he volleyed dryly. “Have you decided to stay and love me for something other than my money?”

She grinned. “Don’t push your luck.”

Her decision to stay awhile did crazy things to his pulse, and with blood dancing through his limbs, he said, “Care to take another walk down to the stables while you sip your wine?”

“No, but I enjoyed going earlier.”

She leaned beside him at the counter, he felt as if bands of steel were tightening around his chest. He could smell soap and skin, and beneath that, something that was pure Katie. He watched as she gazed through the picture window. Earlier, he’d let two mares and a gelding out of their stalls so she could watch them run, and now the gelding bucked, playing under the moonlight. Watching the horses, she seemed to be in rapture.

“That was the nicest walk I’ve had for a while, Katie.”

“Hard to mess up a moonlight stroll,” she said, glancing from the horses and sending him a sweet sideways smile. “Mostly we gossiped.”

Maitland Maternity’s latest scandals had made for plenty of talk. The place hadn’t been sane since the day the twenty-fifth anniversary bash was to be announced. Just before the Maitlands met the press, an unidentified baby boy, now called Cody, was found outside the hospital.

“I love gossip,” Ford confessed, sipping, then lightly licking wine from his lips.

“Me, too,” she said, the faint color on her face spreading downward to the smooth, unmarred skin of her neck, where he could tell her pulse was vying with his for beating too fast. Her breath suddenly caught, and the faint, involuntary sound made Ford’s groin tighten, then flex.

“I love your horses,” she murmured.

Love. Hearing the word on her lips, he flicked his gaze down the pale column of her neck again, remembering how she’d gently rubbed noses and scratched between ears until she’d found the special spot where each horse liked to be touched. There was something so genuine about Katie, so caring and unpretentious that she’d stolen his breath. He edged closer. “I can tell you like them.”

“They’re beautiful, Ford.”

When she glanced up, he could swear the clear emerald slits of her eyes held invitation. At least, Ford hoped he wasn’t misreading the situation. Risking it, he murmured, “You’re beautiful, Katie.” Very slowly, his eyes fixed intently on hers, he pushed aside his wineglass.

He could see her fingers tremble as she pushed her glass away, too. When her hand stilled, resting on the base, he knew she wasn’t steadying the glass but herself. Her voice held a tremor. “Maybe I’d better go home now, Dr. Carrington.”

“Ford,” he corrected huskily, catching her hand. “And I know you don’t want to leave, Katie.” With the words, his chest squeezed out the rest of his breath. “Stay. Let me give you the proper send-off.”

Seeing her gemstone eyes smolder with want, he threaded their fingers, bringing her hand to his chest. His response was amazing. He shuddered, and as his nipple beaded beneath her fingertips, he could barely process what was happening. Why hadn’t he guessed that, outside the OR, Katie Topper’s touch would shoot through him like wild volts of electricity? Why hadn’t he guessed she’d feel the same?

Katie sounded shaky. “Proper send-off?”

“Okay,” he admitted. “Not so proper.” No, what he had in mind wasn’t proper at all. Gently cupping her neck, he tilted back her head and glided his fingers into the flaming red curls he’d longed to touch all night. “Your hair’s soft as silk, Katie,” he murmured, rubbing strands between his fingertips. Bending, he released a shuddering sigh and pressed an unbroken strand of wet kisses from her ear to her collarbone, the sugar-salt flavor of her skin making his pulse fracture.

She melted. There was no other word for it. He felt the limbs of her petite body loosen and stretch and felt heat rise from her as if she were a burning taper. Groaning, he wrapped an arm tightly around her back, his groin thickening, becoming almost painful. “I’ve been fighting this all night,” he confessed, gasping as her hipbone ground against him. Ever so slowly, he stroked the space behind her ear with his tongue.

“We work together, Ford,” she whispered. “We’re two completely different people….”

“Did you hear me asking for a lifetime, Katie?” Ford half coaxed, half chided, his palms traveling down her back, molding the firm backside snuggled beneath tight jeans, while his five o’clock shadow roughened the creamy skin of her neck. “This is good old-fashioned lust,” he assured hoarsely, “nothing more.” Attempting to ignore how her denials prickled his male vanity, demanding he claim her, he kissed her velvet skin, deciding that days from now, when she was in Houston, she’d remember every minute of what he was about to do to her. “I’m too old for you, Katie,” he repeated, desire making the words sound strained. “And I’m someone you work with. I’ve got a whole other lifestyle. But I’m a confirmed bachelor, too. At thirty-six, I know exactly what I want.”

Breathless, Katie whispered, “You do, Ford?”

“Yeah.” Releasing a low moan, he kissed his way up her neck, along her jaw, around her chin. “Yeah. I know exactly what I want. You, Katie.” His mouth covered hers, and as he registered the soft pliancy of her wanting lips, an unforgettable aching claimed him. Her taste—all dark wine and mint toothpaste and pent-up longing—sent luscious shivers rippling through him. Harder, his hungry mouth swooped and crushed. No, he wouldn’t rest until Katie Topper was naked and beneath him.

Already, he was imagining lifting off her T-shirt, pushing back her bra, freeing her breasts. Already, as he deeply, silkily thrust his tongue between her lips, he was admitting this woman could probably make him lose his mind. Beneath her shirt, the tips of her breasts had pebbled. When he became aware of the roughened nubs brushing his chest, a streak of lightning shot to his groin. “One night.” Sharply, he pulled in a breath of her. “I don’t want anything more than that, Katie.”

“No,” she agreed raggedly. “I don’t, either.”

Leaning back just a fraction, he swept a ravenous gaze from her well-kissed, wine-red lips to the red mark he’d left on her perfect neck. Further down, seeing the tight buds he intended to taste showing through her top, he thought he’d explode. Tightening his fingers through hers, he hoarsely said, “Come with me.”

“Where?”

“To my bed, Katie.”