Double Jeopardy (15 page)

Why couldn’t this man be more like his goofy dog?

“I’d like to go to bed with you, Ben. I find you sexually attractive,” she admitted in the most level and reasonable tone she could muster. “I also find it insulting that you’d assume I’d want more than that. I thought we discussed the fact that we’re both career oriented, that our jobs come ahead of relationships in our lives.” But if that was true, what had upset her so much?

“You’re right. We did discuss that, and I was way out of line bringing it up again.” He hadn’t released his hold on her wrist. “So, are you going to forgive me or not?”

There was both challenge and promise in his green eyes, and for a long moment, Sera debated. The rational part of her brain knew that she ought to climb out of the truck now and run fast and far away from this dangerous man.

But even the fingers lightly holding her wrist made her heart beat faster, and she acknowledged that there wasn’t any decision to make. Her heart had made it already.

“I forgive you,” she said, unable to resist adding in a snippy tone, “just don’t let it happen again.”

“Anybody ever mention you have a temper?" He smiled at her an instant, and then with a suddenness that made her gasp, he dragged her into his arms and kissed her.

CHAPTER TEN

BEN HELD HER CLOSE, cursing himself for the inept way he’d mismanaged things. What the hell had possessed him, blurting out all that ancient history about his marriage and then segueing straight into his damned declaration of independence? He couldn’t remember ever being as clumsy about it as he’d been today. Sera was absolutely justified in being royally ticked off with him.

He hadn’t planned to discuss it with her yet, and certainly not the way it had happened. He’d wanted to know her better, and the barbecue hid seemed a perfect opportunity. The problem was, Sera had a way of getting under his skin, drawing out confidences he ordinarily wouldn’t make. He still wasn’t exactly sure how the disastrous conversation had come about.

Now, with her in his arms, he wanted nothing more than to take her up to her apartment and spend the rest of the evening making passionate love, but he’d blown that possibility.

You idiot, Halsey
.

She ended the embrace, moving away, reaching for the door handle. He put a restraining hand on her arm.

“Wait just a moment. I’ll walk you out. When can I see you again?” He tried to remember what his week was like. He had several meetings he absolutely couldn’t skip. “How about dinner, maybe a show? I’ll check my schedule. We can decide which night.”

She hesitated, and he realized how very much he wanted to go on seeing her. “What about tomorrow night?” He’d just get out of whatever engagements he had.

His heart sank when she shook her head. “This week’s crazy. We’re having to shoot several episodes because some of the actors have other commitments. I’ll probably be working most evenings.”

“Lunch, then.” He’d have Dana postpone a few appointments. “Tuesday?”

Still she hesitated, and he was afraid she was about to refuse. “I'd love that tour of the set you promised me.” That was devious of him, but he wasn’t about to let her walk out of his life.

“Okay, Tuesday.”

Relief flooded through him. Now all he had to do was keep from putting his sandal in his mouth anew.

He walked Sera to the door of her building and kissed her again, lightly.

“See you Tuesday.”

He watched her go inside. She turned and waved at him before she boarded the elevator, and he felt like throwing his arms above his head in a triumphant salute. He’d salvaged the day after all. He was back in the truck before it occurred to him to wonder why it was so necessary that he see her again. There were other women in Vancouver.

But none of them were Sera.

Gemma’s appointment was at 9:15 on Tuesday morning, and she was pleased that Ben seemed to be waiting for her, ushered her into his office himself, instead of having the office nurse do it.

“Gemma, it’s a real pleasure to see you.” He touched her arm and smiled, meeting her eyes. “How have you been?”

There was more to the question than simply a doctor’s concern; she was sure of it. Ben really wanted to know how she was, Gemma Cardano, not just the patient with the wired jaw and the reconstruction. The way he looked at her, the tone of his voice, the expression on his face—all made her feel attractive, womanly, in spite of what the mirror reflected.

So she took the pad and pen he offered and instead of just scribbling “Okay,” she told him how scared she was that the bruising on her temples and cheekbones wouldn’t go away, that the headaches were fewer and further between but the pain in her jaw made tears pour down her cheeks sometimes, that she hated going out because of how people stared.

He listened and then addressed every single concern, calming her fears, erasing her worries one by one.

“Come and sit on this stool. We’ll make sure everything is healing as it should.” He stood so close she could feel the warmth of his body, even faintly smell his aftershave or deodorant, she wasn’t sure which. It reminded her of oranges, and when he asked if her sense of smell was coming back at all, she nodded and scribbled that down, and he tossed back his head and laughed.

“Nice to know it’s working. Not just your sniffer, my deodorant.”

He put a hand on her shoulder as he leaned over her to examine her face. His strong fingers were gentle, sensitive, as he tipped her head back with one finger under her chin and searched her face. Her heart was hammering, and for the first time since the accident, she felt the stirrings of sexual response, and a wave of heat ran through her.

“This looks amazingly good. You’re healing really. fast.” He stroked a finger down the side of her face, tenderly tracing the red line that was all that remained of the gash that had been there. “I doubt we’ll have to do any further work on this. The scar will be nearly invisible. You have great skin, great recuperative ability.”

There was something special, something warm and loving and intimate, in the way he spoke to her, and the memory of his voice lingered long after she left the office.

The timbre of it, the intonation he used when he said her name, echoed again on Wednesday evening as Gemma waited until her parents left for the movie before going into her bedroom and taking out the familiar envelope that had arrived that afternoon. She hadn’t had a chance to really concentrate on the words because Maria had been nearby when the mailman brought it.

Now she impatiently unfolded the single sheet of paper, heart pounding in anticipation:

Gemma,

I lie in an empty bed,

While shadows flow around me,

Your perfume fresh in my nostrils.

The memory of your voice,

Whispering in my inner ear,

Words not spoken.

How will I get from dark to daylight

Without you, Gemma?

She sighed and reread it. The guy had such a way with words. She’d never been much on poetry, couldn’t understand most of it, but these poems were different.

They were about her, written for her, and they touched something deep inside. This was the fourth one; she was getting one almost every day now. The arrival of the mailman had become the focus of her entire life.

She’d hidden the poems in her bureau, in the carved wooden box she’d used to hide her cigarettes when she was twelve, and she still hadn’t told a living soul.

This whole thing was too new, too special, to share with anyone. She’d let Sera in on it when the right time came, but for now she just wanted to keep it private and think about whoever was sending these beautiful love messages to her.

She thought she knew. She was sure she knew. It hadn’t taken much effort to figure it out, either. There was only one man in her life now who was sophisticated, smart and verbal enough to write such things: Ben Halsey.

Her own Dr. Ben. She could see him clearly in her mind’s eye, his caring smile, the attentive and gentle expression in his green eyes. She could hear his voice repeating each word. She understood that as long as she was his patient, of course he couldn’t say anything directly to her, which was why he sent her the poetry, instead.

He was waiting until she was completely healed, until she was no longer his patient, to reveal that he cared about her romantically.

She longed for that moment to arrive. She’d been guzzling down every drop of the horrible stuff Maria blended for her, in the hope that it really would speed up the healing. Now she had a powerful reason to get better fast.

“Gemma, hi, it’s me.” Sera’s tap on the bedroom door startled her. She stuffed the poem into the box with the others and shoved it back in the drawer a bare instant before her sister came in.

“How ya doin’?” Sera gave her a hug and a smile. “We finished a while ago. I thought I’d come over and talk you into going for a walk, it’s so nice outside. How about it?"

Gemma shook her head, and Sera looked exasperated.

“You’ve gotta start getting some exercise or soon you won’t have any muscle tone left. Your skin’ll sag and your thighs will have those ugly ripples.”

So far, Gemma had refused to step foot out the door of her parents’ house except for trips to Ben’s office. She hated the way strangers gawked at her, hated their fascinated, horrified glances that telegraphed
What the hell happened to you
? They’d look away quick, but clearly it was a big effort not to stare. The worst part was knowing that before this had happened to her, she’d done exactly the same thing when she’d encountered someone out of the ordinary. She vowed she’d never do it again. From now on, she’d look, and smile, and say some- thing that made the person at least feel human.

“What d’ya think, Em? About that walk?”

Gemma knew Sera was expecting her to refuse again. It felt good to change her mind and indicate yes and see the surprise on her sister’s face. It felt good to find her shoes and follow Sera out into the soft summer evening.

“This week’s been busy. We’ve been filming extra episodes because Lorelei and Bertram have parts in a movie, and they’ve got to go back to L.A. next week. We’re almost done this series anyway. There’ll likely be only a couple more weeks’ work. But there’re two low budget movies that’ll be shot in and around Vancouver. It’s pretty likely our crew’ll get hired on one or both, Maisie says. It would be nice to have a week or two off between, although that probably won’t happen.”

Gemma knew that Lorelei was the actress who played the lead role in Dinah. Gemma had met her once. She was sort of dumpy, not at all the way she looked on TV.

Gemma envied Sera’s getting to meet movie stars, her knowing what went on behind the cameras, but who’d want to live in L.A.? Vancouver was home, and Gemma planned to stay here forever.

A woman passed them, giving Gemma the look. Gemma ignored her. What did it matter now that people stared? She had someone who cared about her, someone special who wasn’t interested in her just because she was sexy and knew how to have a good time.

“Mama told me Jack comes by to see you a lot. He seems like a real nice guy. She said you guys play poker. You ever tell him Uncle Bernardo taught us all the tricks? Or do you let him win once in a while just to keep him interested?”

A niggle of guilt threatened Gemma’s newfound excitement and happiness, but she shoved it to the back of her mind. After all, she wasn’t promising Jack anything by allowing him to come to the house nearly every night, was she? All she was doing was enabling him to work off his guilt; if he chose to spend his evenings playing cards with her and losing, that was up to him, wasn’t it?

Jack didn’t have much of a social life anyway, as far as she could figure; he’d made it abundantly clear the times she’d gone out with him that he wasn’t interested in partying.

Too bad, because he was kind of sexy, in his own inarticulate way. He was different from the men she usually dated; that was for sure. He was forty-one for starters, a full thirteen years older than she. He drove a vintage Land Rover he’d fixed up himself and he put most of what he earned into materials for a big old house he’d bought and was remodeling.

He was a different sort of guy. Not her sort at all.