Flirting with the Society Doctor / When One Night Isn't Enough (27 page)

“What a mess.” He ran his fingers through his hair, leaned back against the wall, and let out a breath. “I can’t
believe this. I saw the pills. I never would have done it otherwise.”

Of course not, because she was good for sex and nothing more. Don’t want to risk any long-term attachments with someone like Ali. “Calm down, Dr. P. I’m not pregnant. But thanks for letting me know how you feel about the subject.”

“I’m sorry. It’s just—”

“Don’t worry,” she cut him off. “I don’t want to be pregnant with your spawn any more than you want someone like me to be the mother of your child.”

“Stop it, Ali. That’s not what I meant. You’d make a great mother. I see how good you are with the kids who come in. They love you. I spend my life on the road. I’m a drifter. The last thing I need is the hassle of having to worry about a baby.”

Although she couldn’t be certain, she’d bet a weeks’ wages her father had once spewed something along those lines to her mother.

“No worries, Dr. P.” Ali stood up, using the table for support, her legs a bit shaky. “No baby. No hassles.” She straightened and walked to the door. “Don’t give it another thought.” Because she wouldn’t. At least, not for another two weeks.

W
HAT
was it with women? Jared wondered two days later. You do one thing to tick them off and they turn on you. First his mother, then his wife and now Ali.

Okay. To be fair, in Ali’s case he’d done a few things: put the kibosh on her plans to marry Michael; made use of her lovely body when, even though she’d begged him to, he shouldn’t have and hadn’t handled concern over a feared pregnancy in a manner befitting a gentleman.

But still. He did not like the silent treatment, second only to withholding sex in a woman’s manipulation-of-man arsenal.

Even worse, forced to interact with him at work, because she was and always would be a consummate professional, Ali called him
Doctor.
Not Dr. Padget. Not Dr. P. Just Doctor. A nondescript, completely impersonal term for any physician in a profession of thousands. Doctor.

“Yes, Doctor.”

“No, Doctor.”

“I’ll get to it as soon as I can, Doctor.” “I put Mr. Smith’s lab results on his chart, Doctor.” “If you’d move out of the way, Doctor, I’m happy to do that for you.”

He would rather she came at him with a bat, yelled and screamed, let her anger loose, wreaked havoc. Instead she
held it in, seethed, upped the tension between them. Not in a good way. At least if she blew up he’d get the chance to defend himself. To apologize. He’d acted like an irresponsible, low-class punk. He was the one who’d shown up at the bar unprepared, who, after seeing birth-control pills in her medicine cabinet, had made the assumption she was protected.

Yes. A baby right now would be a major inconvenience. But he was an educated, successful professional more than capable of supporting a child if it had come to that. So why his overreaction? Why lash out at Ali, when he was as much to blame as she?

Because, with time, he realized he didn’t want his parental role reduced to his name on a check. He wanted to be a full-participation parent like his father, involved in his child’s life, teaching him, encouraging him, loving him, every single day. And how could he do that when his job involved so much travel he’d be away more than he’d be home? When he wasn’t married to his child’s mother, couldn’t marry her, didn’t
want
to be married, not to anyone?

But these were his problems, not Ali’s. At the very least, he owed her an apology.

So here he stood, on the cement step outside the Madrin Falls Senior Center, about to enter Wednesday-night bingo. The one activity Ali had refused to give up while dating Michael. Bingo with her gramps.

Jared pulled open the front door. Let the groveling begin.

“I’m looking for Allison Forshay,” he asked the first senior he saw. “Do you know if she’s here?”

The elderly man pointed to a crowd of people in the back of the room and said, “As soon as she’s done we’ll get started.”

Done doing what? Jared wondered as he walked over to where the man directed him.

“Yes, I’m sure, Sally. One twenty-four over seventy-two is very good,” he heard Ali say. “Let me write it down in your blood-pressure journal.”

Jared walked around the table to see Ali, dressed in blue jeans and a soft purple sweater, removing a blood-pressure cuff from a white-haired woman’s arm. “Come on, Les. You’re next.” The woman stood and the man behind her handed Ali a small notebook, rolled up the sleeve of his button-down shirt and sat.

Ali gave Les a warm, genuine I-care-about-you smile. Just once Jared would like to be on the receiving end of one.

Tonight was not to be the night. When she noticed him her eyes narrowed and her lips formed a grim line. If her eye sockets had had the ability to vaporize, he’d have been reduced to a puff of mist. “What are you doing here, Dr.

Padget?”

At least he got a Padget with his Doctor, a step in the right direction. “I heard bingo at the senior center’s where the town’s most beautiful women can be found.” A few women giggled, Ali not among them. “Since I’m here, is there anything I can do to help you? They’re waiting for you to finish up before they start.”

Ali looked torn, like she’d rather tighten the cuff in her hand around his neck than accept his offer. If there weren’t so many witnesses, he had no doubt which one she’d choose. She glanced at her watch. Jared raised his eyes to the clock on the wall behind her. Six-forty. According to the sign out front, bingo started at seven.

“Who’s waiting for help with their medications?” Ali turned and asked the group.

Two women and one man raised their hands.

“Step over here.” Ali motioned to the half of the long table he stood behind. “This is Dr. Padget, a colleague of mine at the hospital. He’ll be happy to help you.” She turned to him. “Won’t you, Dr. Padget?”

“Yes, I will, Nurse Forshay.” He slipped out of his jacket and placed it on the back of a plastic chair, eager to do whatever it took to get on her good side.

For the next thirty minutes Jared answered medical questions, battled child-resistant caps and dispensed pills and capsules into the small plastic compartments of weekly medication organizers. At the same time, out of the corner of his eye, he managed to watch Ali, too. She knew each senior by name, greeted most of them with a hug, some were lucky recipients of a kiss on the cheek. Jared liked affectionate women, had enjoyed frequent touches, quick kisses and holding hands. Until Cici had soiled each sweet gesture by using them to con him into thinking she’d loved him. The woman was incapable of love.

He shook off the memory of his wife. She’d done enough damage, he wouldn’t let her infringe on his time with Ali.

“On some days that woman takes seventeen pills. It’s no wonder she can’t keep them straight,” Jared said to Ali, who sat next to him copying the side effects of one of the woman’s new medications in large print on a full-sized sheet of paper.

“She lives alone and has no family in the area,” Ali said, looking genuinely concerned. “I’ve been sorting her meds every Wednesday for years.”

The reason Ali had refused to give up Wednesday night bingo. Dozens of people depended on her to be there. “Do you do this through the Health Department?”

“No. I do it because it needs to be done.”

So her caring and compassion didn’t shut off the minute
she left the hospital, as she’d implied. Deep down, he’d known that. Ali was the antithesis of Cici, which made her all the more appealing.

“Helping others is not without perks,” Ali said with a half smile. “What’d she give you?”

Jared looked in the plastic grocery bag his last senior pushed into his hand when she’d thanked him. “An apple fast approaching rotten and a pack of chewing gum with one stick missing.”

“I worry about Emma’s finances.” She sighed. “I signed her up for Meals on Wheels so at least I know she has one good meal a day, and I cook for her when I can.”

She also delivered chicken soup to colleagues who were sick, and sometimes, when the weather was cold and gloomy, brought in a crockpot of delicious chili or a hearty soup for the E.R. staff.

Jared reached into his pocket. “I also got a business card for a free haircut at Bill’s Barbershop.”

“I’d think twice before using it.” Ali rubbed the back of her neck while she tilted her head from side to side. “Bill’s got a bit of palsy in his upper extremities, which is why he comes to me for help pouring his meds.”

Jared promptly ripped the card down the middle.

She yawned and took a sip of ginger ale from the can beside her.

“You feeling okay? Your stomach still bothering you?” he asked.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she snapped. Like what?

“I had dinner at the Chinese buffet restaurant, which I hate but Gramps loves, and the greasy food sat heavy in my stomach.”

“Okay.” He ducked his head and held up his hands to ward off her attack. “Just trying to make conversation.”

She looked down at her arm and picked a white string off her sweater. “After your tirade on Monday I didn’t want you thinking …”

That she was pregnant. “I’m sorry. I acted like a fool. I.” Overreacted. Am an ass. Deserve to be beaten.

Someone called out, “Bingo!” The crowd mumbled. The caller confirmed the numbers.

“Can we go somewhere?” Jared asked, desperate for a few minutes alone with her away from the hospital. “Maybe get a cup of coffee?” At the mention of coffee Ali brought her hand up to her mouth and swallowed hard. “How about hot chocolate? Or ginger ale?” He’d drink anything, go anywhere, to get her to agree.

She thought about his invitation, all too long if you asked him, before eyeing him askance and asking, “Why?”

“Because you’re the reason I accepted another assignment at Madrin Memorial when I make it a policy to never return to the same hospital twice in one year. You don’t answer my phone calls and I can’t seem to find ten minutes to speak with you alone unless you’re anchored in place. I’d like to take advantage of this brief window of harmony between us for a serious conversation. Who knows if I’ll ever get another opportunity?”

After telling Gramps she was going to talk to Dr. P. in the meeting room down the hall, and instructing him to come find her if she wasn’t back in ten minutes, Ali sat down in one of the fabric-upholstered chairs surrounding an oval table and looked at the man beside her.

In his red thermal shirt, the three top buttons left open, khaki pants and workboots, he looked casually comfortable, laid-back, an all-around nice-guy type, nothing like the confident professional from work or the dark and dangerous man from the bar. Tonight he’d been so nice to
Gramps and his friends, her friends, answering their questions freely, seeming happy to be among them. Michael had had no interest in accompanying her to bingo, a fact he’d made clear on numerous occasions while reminding her of the inherent risk of liability in offering medical services outside work.

Dr. Padget fit right in and didn’t appear the least bit concerned.

“Before you start,” Ali said, “I’d like to thank you for your help out there and apologize for my behavior the night before you left town. As you know, it was the anniversary of my mother’s death and, while that’s no excuse, I am not in the habit of accosting men in bars and forcing myself on them.”

He turned to face her, his expression serious. “You didn’t force me into doing anything I didn’t want to do.”

“Whew.” Ali wiped pretend sweat from her forehead. “Good to know.” She shifted in her seat and looked him in the eye. “Is there anything else I should apologize for before you get started?” She fought the urge to look away.

He smiled. “It took a few weeks for the scratch marks on my back to heal.”

Ali dropped her head into her hands and groaned. She’d scarred the man.

He tugged on a finger. “I’m kidding.” She let out a breath. “Oh, thank God.” “Not about the scratch marks but that you need to apologize for them. I liked seeing them in the mirror. They made me think of you. I was kind of sad when they faded.”

She waited for him to crack a joke, ask her to make new ones. He didn’t. Instead he cleared his throat and reached into his back pocket. Taking out a piece of gum, he popped it into his mouth, something she’d seen him do dozens of
times, right before a serious talk to deliver bad news to a patient’s significant other and/or family. Uh-oh.

“On the bench by the river and in the staff lounge at work on Monday, you made comments implying I think you don’t deserve the love of a good man, and I wouldn’t want someone like you to be the mother of my child,” he said. “Ali, neither statement is true.”

At least he’d had the decency to leave off her tramp reference. “Okay. Good.” This was a little more personal than she’d like to get. “You feel better now that you got that off your chest?” She tried to stand. He stopped her with a hand to her arm.

“You gave me ten minutes. Now sit down and listen to what I have to say.”

“Tsk. Tsk. Tsk.” Ali looked down at the hand holding her. “Using your superior strength to try to intimidate me, Dr. P.? Shame on you.” She didn’t want to discuss this. She knew who she was, what she was, knew what he thought of her, didn’t need to hear words of condemnation come out of his mouth.

“Please.” He released her. “Sit down. I’m not finished.”

The hint of begging in his tone prompted her to do as instructed.

“You are a caring person,” he said. “You treat each one of your patients like family. You go out of your way to make them comfortable, to ease their fears. When you find the right man, someone who appreciates you for you so you don’t feel you have to change for him, I have no doubt you’re going to make the lucky guy a wonderful wife. You’ll have a pack of happy, well-cared-for children, and your house will be the one where all the neighborhood kids congregate.”

Tears filled her eyes. It’s what she wanted more than anything. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

He handed her a tissue. “Would you believe I’m a nice guy?”

When he wanted something. She dabbed at the corner of each eye. “Is this a new tack to get me into bed? Because I’ve been there, done that, Dr. P. Shouldn’t you be initiating a new chase, pursuing a new conquest? If you put forth a little effort, I’m sure you can find a female who’ll actually welcome your advances.” It was hard to get the words out because even though she didn’t want him bothering her anymore, she hated the thought of seeing him with another woman.