Midnight Hour (8 page)

Mercy caught him staring as she turned around. Fortunately, she remembered her game plan before she uttered one word about rudeness. That would have blown everything. If she wanted to convince Nick that pursuing her was a bad idea, first she had to convince him that she’d been ogled by better men than he and enjoyed it! She had to persuade him he’d bitten off more than he could chew. Midnight Mercy
had to give Dr. Devereaux a case of performance anxiety so severe that he’d settle down and behave himself for the duration of their work on fund-raising.

Squaring her shoulders and trusting Sophie’s instincts, she let a smile turn up the corners of her mouth. When she took a deep, slow breath and released it, Nick’s eyes fell right where they were supposed to fall. They widened the tiniest fraction of an inch, and Mercy began to enjoy herself.

“I hope I didn’t keep you waiting?” she asked, warming to her role and entwining her arm with his as they walked toward the cafeteria. Nick gave her a wary look, but said nothing as she continued, “I had an appointment at the station that ran late.”

“I wasn’t waiting,” Nick confessed. He felt the firm round swell of her breast press into his arm as she swayed against him while they walked. Her blouse and chemise were so thin that the contact felt like flesh on flesh. “I got tied up with a patient.”

“Ooh, tied up! That sounds like my kind of fun,” Mercy purred, elated when she felt the muscles beneath her fingers tense. Encouraged by his instant reaction, she pressed on, “Whom do I call to get an appointment?”

Nick restrained the impulse to pull out his penlight and check her eyes for signs of substance abuse. Nothing else explained the transformation from reluctant girl-next-door to blatant seductress. The Mercy he’d met last weekend might not sweet-talk, but
this
one had just handed him an erotic image on a silver platter. If this woman had answered Mercy’s door, Nick knew he’d have kissed her without hesitation. Kissed her and probably more.

“Midnight Mercy doesn’t need an appointment,” he assured her, wondering how far she intended to push this conversation. “All you have to do is say the word. I’ve memorized the Boy Scout book of knots, but I should warn you, Mercy. All my affairs are strictly BYOSS.”

“Hmm. Affair. I like the sound of that.” Disengaging her arm, Mercy entered the cafeteria and reached for a green plastic food tray. “Now what is BYOSS?”

“Bring your own silk stockings.”

The tray almost slipped out of Mercy’s fingers, but she managed to slide it onto the metal support. And Sophie was worried about shocking Nick? Worried about shocking a man who seemed perfectly comfortable standing in the middle of the hospital cafeteria, having a conversation about tying up his lovers with silk stockings? Although she was beginning to doubt her game plan, Mercy let her voice drop a bit and gave him her best provocative look. “Got a favorite color?”

“Darlin’, if I have a choice, I prefer black, but I’ve got no objections to any color stockings you put on … as long as I get to peel ’em off. Real slow.”

Mercy couldn’t shake the picture forming in her mind. As clearly as if she were recalling an actual event, Mercy could feel his hands as they slipped beneath her skirt to toy with the edge of her stocking. She could feel his fingers as they grasped the garter and he released the clasp with one flip of his thumb.

The thought made her weak in the knees and heated her cheeks. This brilliant idea of hers was backfiring. Forcing herself to keep moving, she tossed
her hair over her shoulder and stretched to reach the buckets of silverware behind the trays.

Nick knew he’d won their little sexual skirmish by the way she flushed and got busy. The idea of stripping Mercy had his own blood rushing around, too, but while Mercy’s blood had gone to her cheeks, his had traveled south. Watching her skirt rise several inches as she reached for utensils didn’t help Nick’s state of arousal. He couldn’t remember being this hard for a woman he’d never kissed.

Every moment in her company added to his conviction that Mercy kept an incredibly sensual nature under lock and key. He began to wonder if she was afraid to give in to lust unless she was acting a part, a part like Midnight Mercy. She could vamp to her heart’s content and never have to deliver, since most men would be shaking in their boots at the thought of making love to an experienced woman who might expect them to tie her up.

Stunned, Nick slid his own tray onto the cafeteria counter and realized why Mercy had called and asked for a lunch date. She actually thought she could scare him off with this sex-hungry act of hers! As far as he was concerned, she could try all she wanted. It wasn’t gonna happen. “So,
chère
, are we on for Saturday night?”

To give her hands something to do besides shake, Mercy reached for a bowl of strawberries and peaches in a rich red sauce. “Why don’t I check my schedule and get back to you?”

The late-lunch crowd began to line up behind them, so Nick simply said, “Why don’t you check your supply of stockings, and I’ll get back to you?”

“Whatever.” Mercy shrugged as though she didn’t care, although she was edgy as hell on the inside.
Damnation!
Sophie had made intimidating men sound so easy. Nick didn’t look the least bit scared. In fact, the plan was backfiring so badly that she was the one with performance anxiety. Trying to shake the feeling that she was in over her head, Mercy concentrated on filling her tray.

Nick followed Mercy to a corner booth. “Good choice. A quiet spot for a cozy chat is just what I had in mind.”

Before Mercy could reply, a mountainous orderly approached her, shyly asking her to sign a crumpled Dodgers baseball hat that he pulled out of his back pocket. Mercy smiled to put the big man at ease and chatted briefly about the team’s pennant chances before she signed the autograph. When the orderly had gone, she echoed Nick’s comment from the elevator. “I think you can forget your cozy chat. When I’m dressed like this, you gotta expect me to sign a few autographs.”

“I don’t mind. I like watching you smile at people. But it also makes me wonder if you like being a celebrity.”

“Who wouldn’t?” she asked, implying his ridiculous question didn’t deserve an answer. “So many men. So little time.”

“Oh, I don’t know who wouldn’t like being a celebrity.” Nick flipped a napkin across his lap and added, “Unless it was maybe someone who lives in a small sleepy town an hour’s drive from Louisville?”

“Don’t tell me you haven’t already figured out why I bought a hundred-year-old house in Haunt,
Kentucky?” Mercy’s blue eyes twinkled at him, reminding him that beneath the sexy-bombshell routine, she was still a very real woman who didn’t take herself too seriously. Even when she was trying to scare a man off.

“I’m sure you want everyone to think it’s for publicity.”

“Of course it’s a colossal public-relations ploy! One of the people at the station suggested it a couple of years ago when I said I was ready to take the plunge and become a home owner. I’m only at the station a couple of days a week, so what could be more perfect for a horror-show queen than a spooky house in Haunt, Kentucky?”

“Then how come nobody knows that’s where you live?”

“I like it that way,” Mercy answered honestly, and poked a piece of fried okra with her fork. “When I got to know the people, I decided I didn’t want the place turned into a zoo every Halloween by the publicity people.”

With sudden certainty, Nick knew that the little town with the catchy name had become Mercy’s haven. The need for privacy was a concept that he understood all too well. He also knew the trap privacy could become. Little by little he had forgotten how much he needed people until the silence in his life began keeping him up at night, forcing him to get away from Louisiana and away from the memories of the family he’d lost.

As they ate he thought about Mercy’s privacy and wondered who she was trying to keep away. Couldn’t be the fans. She wasn’t the least upset with the orderly
for interrupting their lunch. And it couldn’t be her neighbors. Sophie and Joan obviously didn’t feel any need to keep their distance. That left family and men. Neither was a subject on which Mercy had volunteered any details.

“I believe you like your privacy so much you’re hidin’ out in Haunt,” he said finally. “Can’t be that many eligible men living there, and my guess is that your parents don’t get down too often. I didn’t realize you were a coward,
chère
.”

Mercy’s mouth fell open. “I am not hiding out! And why are we dissecting my life again? I thought we’d already done that once.”

“And it was such fun, I thought I’d do it again.”

“Let’s not.”

“Coward,” Nick accused as he speared a piece of roast beef.

Sitting back, Mercy realized that she’d totally abandoned the sexy I-can-handle-anything posture. Nick did that to her. He made her forget to “act” and made her react to him instead. Being called a coward stung her more than she wanted to admit. Maybe because in the past she had accused herself of being an emotional coward whenever she stepped away from relationships that showed promise. After growing up in the war zone of her parents’ lives, she just couldn’t bring herself to believe in forever.

They ate in silence for a few minutes until Mercy finally asked, “Do you dissect all the women you meet? I mean, does this charming routine of yours actually work on women?”

“It’s worked on you. You called me for lunch.”

“I called about the fund-raiser,” she snapped. “Not
just to see you. I wanted to tour the emergency room and get a feel for what you need to do here!”

“You got my permission to feel anything you want,” he offered as he pushed his plate away and hooked an arm over the top of the booth. His eyes dropped to the shadow of cleavage exposed by the sheer material and the low-cut piece of lingerie beneath it. “You always dress this way for charity work?”

“I thought this was why you wanted me!”

“That’s exactly why I want you.”

“I meant for the fund-raiser!”

“I did too.”

“You did not!” Mercy’s frustration showed in her voice and the way she wadded up her napkin.

“There you go again, darlin’. Mistaking everything I say.”

“The only mistake I made was in thinking you had enough sense to back off like all the other insecure men Sophie’s tried to fix me up with!”

“Mercy, I don’t back down from a challenge, especially when it’s obvious my opponent is running a bluff.” He reached across the table and dragged his thumb across her bottom lip, rubbing away the red stain of strawberry sauce. Deliberately, Nick paused to suck the pad of his thumb and then said, “I was born with a deck of cards in one hand and a pair of dice in the other. I’m a Cajun,
chère
. Gamblin’ is a way of life. I could shuffle a deck and play cutthroat bourré before I could read and write.”

Mercy barely heard a word he said after he stroked her lip. With an effort, she resisted the temptation to run her tongue along the path his thumb had taken. She knew she should be angry, but she wasn’t sure at
whom: Herself for misjudging her ability to intimidate the man, or Nick for allowing her to make a fool of herself with this charade. Letting go of her anger, she asked, “When did you figure it out?”

Before he answered, he leaned back, a section of his black hair falling against his forehead. “Right about the time I realized the idea of my peeling stockings off your incredible legs was as exciting to you as it was to me.”

“I wasn’t excited. I was …” Mercy didn’t bother to finish the sentence. Telling Nick that her face flushed because she was “hot” was not going to help her case.

“Oh, you were excited all right. I don’t think a bad girl on the prowl would go up in flames at the thought of being stripped. And you went up in flames,
ma jolie fille
.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“My pretty girl?”

“Whatever it means, don’t call me that. Or
chère
. Or darlin’. I’m not interested, Nick. All I want to do is get this fund-raiser planned and get back to fixing up my house.”

“Before it falls down around your ears?”

She ignored him. “Before I make a really big mistake and listen to my hormones.”

As he scooped up their tickets Nick asked, “And what’s wrong with listening to your hormones?”

“Because it would be asking for trouble.” Mercy slid out of the booth, brushing aside Nick’s offer of help.

Nick let her go, stopping long enough to pay the check, and then joined her at the elevator. “I’ve
been called a lot of things,
chère
, but never trouble.”

“Can we drop this?” Mercy asked. “Just give me the tour and then let’s go see Sister Agatha about this damn party so I can clear the details with the station.”

“Is that going to be a problem?”

A secret smile hovered on Mercy’s lips. “Not if Dan wants me to consider staying in Louisville instead of taking Pittsburgh’s offer when my contract comes up this fall.”

Nick frowned and let her precede him into the elevator. No wonder she was in such a hurry to get her house in shape. She wanted to be able to sell it quickly if necessary. “You’re thinking about leaving Louisville?”

“Maybe,” was all she’d say. “Pittsburgh is a much bigger television market. Means more exposure.”

Eyeing her outfit with speculation in his gaze, Nick said, “I don’t think you have that much left to expose.”

After Mercy signed autographs for the staff on duty, the tour went quickly. The department was quiet, and the physical layout was limited. As they walked through the unit together she realized that, in his element, Nick was different, all business.

No, she decided, detached was the word she was looking for, as though he disconnected his emotions when he stepped into the ER. She had trouble reconciling the man at her side with the charmer who’d fixed her sink and slept in her chair. Believe it and
get over it, she warned herself. He was a doctor just like her parents, and she should be thankful for the wake-up call.

No matter how much she’d like to believe he was different, he wasn’t. If a patient died, he would wash his hands and go on to the next one. He could probably cut off his feelings as easily as he could take off a coat.