Читать книгу Poetry Man - Melanie Schuster - Страница 13

Chapter 3

Alexis was feeling slightly silly for her distrust, but only a little. She talked to the dispatcher and was fairly sure of two things when she finished. One was that the police knew where she was in case things got weird, and the other was that this Jared VanBuren wasn’t going to do anything to her that would end up on the late news. She was actually feeling grateful to her Samaritan for his insistence on doing a good deed. It had been over ninety minutes since she’d called AAA and a tow truck had yet to materialize, but Jared, bless his heart, had attended to her tire with speed and skill. The rain hadn’t let up and she’d tried to keep him from drowning by holding her snazzy leopard-print Christian Dior umbrella over him as he worked, but he’d refused.

“Look, I can’t get any wetter than I already am, so you just sit in the car until I’m done. Better yet, get in my car so we don’t have to worry about the jack falling or anything.” He guided her to his Range Rover and helped her in, a nice touch considering the circumstances. Alexis had a real thing for a man with nice manners. She appreciated the dry interior of the luxury vehicle as she inspected the SUV. It was very clean and tidy, except for some papers in a folder on the dashboard. Nosy as she was, she was dying to look through them, but she restrained herself. She did wonder what Seven-Seventeen meant, though; she saw the words on the folder and tried to figure out what they signified.

Suddenly all her attention was focused on her car and the man fixing it. Jared let out a yell that scared her half to death and she scrambled from the Range Rover to see what had happened. She was greeted by Jared holding his arm, his very bloody arm.

“Heavenly Father, what happened?”

“The jack slipped when I was taking it off. It’s nothing,” Jared assured her.

Alexis took one look and disagreed vigorously. “That doesn’t look like nothing to me, far from it. I’m taking you to the emergency room.”

Ignoring his protests, she reached into the hatch and came up with a brand-new package of chocolate-brown towels intended for Sanctuary Two. Luckily she’d just gotten a shipment that afternoon. Quick as a cat she wrapped his forearm tightly a few inches above the cut and told him to keep his arm up. It was obvious they couldn’t drive her car because it was blocked by the fallen tree limbs. She wasn’t too sure about driving his gigantic Rover, but a police cruiser showed up just then and the problem was solved. Alexis didn’t have to explain much after the officer saw Jared’s condition and before he could insist it wasn’t necessary, they were all on their way to the nearest emergency room.

Alexis didn’t even blink at going into the E.R. with Jared. She hated hospitals, but he’d gotten injured on her behalf, so she felt as if she owed him. It wasn’t crowded, thank goodness, and the blood that was flowing freely from Jared’s arm had him in an examining room in no time. The nurse who got him situated informed Alexis that she could wait in the lobby but Jared protested.

“Family only, sir. She’ll be right out there in the waiting room.” The nurse was an attractive black woman in her forties and she was polite but professional and firm.

“She’s my fiancée,” Jared said calmly. “She’s the closest thing I’ve got to family and I’d feel much better if she could stay.”

The older woman, whose name tag read Honor Jackson, didn’t blink an eye. “In that case, she’s welcome to stay. Why don’t you take that chair while I get Mr. VanBuren ready for the doctor?”

After Mrs. Jackson situated Jared on the examining table and set up a tray with the instruments needed to suture the wound, she slipped out to fetch the doctor. Alexis had a chance to really look at her “fiancé” and she had to admit that he was a fine specimen of man. He was about six-five with blond hair, high cheekbones, a deep cleft in his chin and deep-set eyes that were a striking shade of blue. No, gray. Or were they green? Whatever color they were, they were mesmerizing. And he had a body that wouldn’t quit, she could see that quite plainly since Mrs. Jackson had helped him remove his shirt so it wouldn’t get cut off when the doctor started working on him. She was rather glad the shirt had come off because he had a spectacular torso; long and lean with smooth perfect muscles. Her eyes were so busy assessing his biceps and his abs that when he spoke it startled her.

“Hope you didn’t mind that fiancée thing. I just wanted company,” he admitted.

His voice was mellow and soothing like cognac on a cold night. To her surprise she wasn’t upset about his ruse. On the contrary, it seemed kind of sweet. Besides, to her mind it was her fault he was injured.

“No, I don’t mind. Of course, I’m going to hold you to it,” she said with a mischievous smile. “I’m expecting a ring before Christmas.”

His eyes widened with mirth and they laughed together. “As you wish. Big or huge?”

“The ring? Gigantic, in case I have to pawn it.”

He had a good sense of humor because he laughed again. They were still laughing when the doctor came in to inspect the wound. His name was Dr. Patil and he was the real down-to-earth type as he proved with his first words.

“That’s nasty. Looks like you nicked an artery in there,” he said as though it was the most normal thing in the world. “Hope you don’t do a lot of manual labor because you’ll need to take it easy for a few days. You’re going to have a lot of stitches.”

Alexis felt her stomach turn over. She really hated hospitals, doctors’ offices, blood, gore and anything close to it. And she’d feel really awful if he had to take sick leave from his job.

Jared just shrugged. “It’s okay. I’m opening a couple restaurants and it’ll be a few weeks before I have to actually do anything in the kitchen. I’ll be fine.”

Dr. Patil was busy cleaning the wound. “So you’re a restaurateur. Is this your first one?”

Jared winced as the doctor gave him a shot to numb the area in preparation for the sutures. “I have six. When these are finished, I’ll have eight, maybe nine because I’m thinking about putting one on Hilton Head.”

He winced again as Dr. Patil put another shot in the same area. “This is the worst part,” the doctor assured him. “In about ten minutes I’m going to stitch you up and you won’t feel a thing. Your fiancée can hold your hand and it’ll be over before you know it.”

As if she didn’t have any control over her movements, Alexis went to his bedside and took his free hand, holding it tightly as though she’d been doing it forever. Jared gave her a wicked wink and kissed the hand that clasped his.

“That’s it, baby. I feel better already.” His hand tightened on hers slightly and he looked at her intently. “God, you’re pretty. You’re absolutely beautiful, I hope you know that.”

Normally Alexis would have jerked away her hand and left the room, but she went along with it and leaned over to kiss him on the cheek. “I’m going to get you back,” she warned him in a whisper.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” he murmured with an even sexier smile.

* * *

In a few hours, Alexis found herself on the receiving end of an inquisition. She was finally at home, facing both her sister and Sherri. Her car was safely home, too, thanks to Alana. She’d listened to her voice mails and had come to the rescue. The fallen tree limbs had been moved so that the car could be driven away, so she arrived at the hospital in time to see Alexis emerging from the emergency room entrance with a tall, gorgeous blond man in a wheelchair. Alana’s calm demeanor didn’t slip a bit, even when the man was referred to as Alexis’s fiancé. She merely raised an eyebrow when Alexis informed her that the man, Jared, was going to need a ride home because he’d been given a painkiller that made it impossible for him to drive.

Sherri had also showed up at that point and after a short discussion, it was decided that Sherri and Alexis would take Jared to his rented loft and that Alana would meet them afterward at Alexis’s house. Alexis was all too keenly aware that Alana was killing herself not to laugh at the situation, especially after Jared grandly informed her that he was looking forward to having her as a sister-in-law. Sherri drove to Jared’s building and it took both her and Alexis to help him to the elevator and into the big, barely furnished loft. It would have been a clean escape for the two women had it not been for Jared’s kamikaze-like move that resulted in Alexis getting a good-night kiss from him.

“You saved my life,” he informed her with a goofy grin. “That means I belong to you now.”

“Jared, tomorrow morning, when the medication wears off, you’re going to have a totally different perspective on this.” Alexis was trying to be pragmatic and logical, but he looked so sweet and charming that it was difficult.

“Nope. I know what I know and I know that you’re mine.” And before she could utter another word, he planted a big, delicious kiss on her surprised lips.

“Jared, you must lay down. Your prescriptions are right next to the bed and I put a big glass of water there for you. If you get dizzy or nauseous, call the E.R. or call me. I left my number there, too,” Sherri said in her most professional doctor voice.

“I just need Alexis’s number. We’re getting married, you know.”

“So I’ve heard,” Sherri said cheerfully.

Alexis had reached her limit. She made her small hand into a gun and pointed the forefinger at her temple, silently mouthing the word BOOM. She took one of Jared’s long arms and Sherri took the other and they walked him over to his bed.

“Go to sleep or the engagement is off. Call me in the morning and I’ll come take you to your car. Where are your pajamas?” She looked around in vain for anything that resembled sleepwear.

“I sleep au naturel. Wanna see?”

“Sherri, what the hell did they give him? Is he ever going to recover or is he just crazy?”

Jared was finally lying across the bed and looked as if he was about to nod off. Sherri was biting her lip to keep the laughter that was building up inside her to a minimum.

“He’ll be fine. Some people just react very strongly to those kinds of meds. We’ll leave the light on for him and you can check on him tomorrow. Now, let’s get out of here and get you home. You got some serious splainin’ to do, sister.”

And that’s how Alexis found herself seated across the table from her sister and her best friend, recreating the evening’s events. They were deriving a great deal of enjoyment from her explanation and Alexis had to admit that it was pretty funny when she told them how it came to be.

“I left the book club and I was thinking about the book we’d discussed when I got a flat. The lightning and thunder didn’t bother me, but that nasty slap-slap-slap noise a flat makes scared the crap out of me. I called AAA, then I tried to call Alana, but I couldn’t get you. So I was ready to wait it out and I was wondering how a sane woman could get hooked up with a vampire and then Jared tapped at my window and I screamed ‘Vampire!’ because that’s the first thing that popped in my head.”

Alana couldn’t hold it in anymore. She started laughing and it didn’t look as if she was going to ever stop. All of the Sharp women looked somewhat alike; slender with perfect cocoa-colored complexions and beautiful teeth. Alana’s hair was longer than Alexis’s. It was shoulder length and she often wore it in a ponytail to keep auto paint, grease and other kinds of soil out of it. She not only owned Custom Creative, she worked there everyday. No one looked less like a mechanic than Alana, but no one was better at her craft.

“You called him a vampire? Oh, that’s too much!”

“He looked like a vamp, thank you very much! He was all wet and his eyes were all funny looking and he’s so pale he glowed in the dark! Yeah, I called him a vampire! We had just been discussing Dead to the World and it hit home, that’s all.”

Sherri had to get her two cents in at that point. “He didn’t look wet and drippy when I met him. He looked a little rumpled, but that man is really handsome! He couldn’t keep his eyes or his hands off you, Alexis. So are you going to date him or what?”

Alana laughed again and the sound was beginning to grate on Alexis’s nerves. “They don’t have to date, they’re engaged, remember? He kept calling her his fiancée and told me he couldn’t wait to be my brother-in-law,” she said with an evil grin.

“I told you, he said that so I could stay in the examining room with him. He wasn’t serious. It was just a little joke between us that got a little out of hand when that pain medicine kicked in. In any case, I’m going to call him in the morning and get him to his car, if necessary, and that’s that.”

Alexis left her seat and began taking off her nasty, bloody clothes right there in the kitchen. “I should send him the bill for dry cleaning this outfit, but he did change my tire so I’m going to let it slide. But no, we won’t be going out. He’s not my type.”

Alana’s phone went off and she answered it as she walked to the living room, leaving Sherri and Alexis alone. “How do you know he’s not your type?”

“I just do, that’s all. He’s not attractive to me,” she said firmly.

“You need to pull out the list and see how many of your desired characteristics match his personality. You might be surprised.”

Alexis ignored her and went to her bathroom to get the robe that was hanging from the hook on the door. “Sherri, I love you and I love my sister but you are both dead wrong about this. Jared VanBuren seems to be a nice man, but he’s not the one. Nope. Now, while you pick up Sydney from wherever you stashed her to come rescue me, I’m going to take a shower. And tell my big sister to go home and read Car and Driver or whatever she does at night. Thanks to both of you but I’ve had a hell of a day.”

Sherri wasn’t that easy to dismiss; she had to have the last word. “After you get out of the shower, make sure you take a look at your list before you decide Jared isn’t the man for you. That’s all I ask, just take a look.”

“Yeah, right, whatever. I’ll get right on it.”