As You Wish (4 page)

“Just write me a note and leave it in my mailbox.”

She nodded. Maybe she could switch duty nights occasionally. “All right. How often will we…meet?”

“Part of the mystery.” He folded his arms across his powerful chest. “There is one more thing.”

“Yes.”

“Two actually.” He glanced around the room. “I prefer your hair down. When you come to me, I want it down.”

“Of course.” The memory of him telling her to take her hair down stole her breath. Her skin tingled. “What’s the other thing?”

“No taking care of business yourself, Princess. No touching, teasing, tickling, or otherwise helping yourself.” He unfolded his arms and reached for her, pulling her against his hard body. “Do I need to make myself clearer, or would that embarrass you?” His voice dropped to a whisper as if he thought someone might hear him. “Or is that what you want?”

Patricia stared at him. His arms were like bands of steel around her. His heart beat against hers.

He dropped his arms, almost pushing her away. “I thought so.” He turned toward the table, pulling the seedling tray closer. “I’m done with you now.”

Patricia stepped away from him. “Will I get a note from you soon?”

He shrugged. “It’ll be soon enough. I won’t forget if that’s what you’re worried about.”

She walked as far as the door. Her legs felt rubbery. She’d always thought that was a stupid cliché, but apparently it was true. “You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

“Your secret submission fantasies are safe with me.”

Ducking her head, she hurried out of the potting shed. She’d hoped to have a conversation with him.

She’d fantasized about asking him to join her for lunch.

She hadn’t even conceived of having plain vanilla sex with him. And out of the blue, she’d become a submissive. No one became a doctor without discovering some weird stuff about the human animal, but she’d never imagined she might have something weird lurking in her own mind.

Then she’d said the magic word. How many times in her life had she said,
“Anything,”
and never known what it could really mean. She pushed open the front door of the house. Unable to stop herself, she walked down the long hall to stand in the doorway to the formal dining room.

The whole room was done in dark Victorian paneling with red drapes and a huge red-patterned Persian rug covering the oak floor. The carved dark oak table in the center seated fourteen. All fourteen chairs stood sentry around it. The two at the ends were the only ones with arms. The image of Ryan sitting at the head of the table motioning her forward haunted her.

She fled the room before she had to break one of his rules.

* * * *

Ryan hid in the potting shed until Patricia was back at the house. Then he fled to his own house, taking the long way below the crest of the hill, so if she looked out the window she wouldn’t see him knocking off early.

He couldn’t do what he’d planned on doing today anyway. Weeding the patio behind the house would take more than one day, and he didn’t want to be that close to her again this soon or he wouldn’t be giving her a day’s notice before their next session. He’d have her down on the flagstones in one position or another until both of them were exhausted.

When he’d thrown down that particular gauntlet this afternoon, it hadn’t been meant as a challenge. Sure, he’d seen the way her nipples poked out, and since it was at least eighty degrees today, he could assume she wasn’t cold. He’d just wanted to say the crudest thing he could think of. He’d expected to be slapped or fired. Having her obey was the very last thing he’d have imagined. Having her ask for more, well…

Ryan dragged a hand through his hair. Seven years ago when he’d moved up here to take this job, he’d sworn he wouldn’t get involved in that scene again. Wishful thinking about teaching his spoiled boss to beg aside, he’d wanted to keep his solitary job and his solitary habits. After the debacle in Atlanta, he wasn’t interested in tempting fate. Other than the guys at the bar down the road where he had an occasional beer, the mousy checkout girl he flirted with when he got his Sunday paper, and the girl at the law office who’d helped him get the job, he didn’t know anybody in Whitmer, and he liked it that way.

Now he knew his boss a lot better than he’d ever intended.

Dropping onto the recliner in the living room of the caretaker’s cottage, he covered his face with his hands. He’d been so stunned he’d barely scratched the surface of what he wanted to do to her. Ever since she moved back here in June, he’d been watching her. A man would have to be dead not to want to watch Patricia Whitmer. If her generous curves didn’t turn a guy on, one look at her witchy blue eyes and full mouth would. And that was only if you got past the MD at the end of her name and the zeroes on the end of her bank account.

Precious Princess Patricia who thought it was oh so funny to let her friends humiliate him. This didn’t have to turn out like Atlanta. He was older now. He’d been too young then, too emotional. Now he had the best opportunity of his life to have a rich bitch crawling. And behind the wrought iron gates of her own estate yet.

Precious Princess Patricia who had been kind enough to apologize for her friend and who gladly submitted to him. Who would gladly submit to him again. Maybe she wasn’t like the others. Or maybe he was thinking wishfully because he wanted her.

He walked to the desk and rummaged in its depths until he found what he wanted.

The black paper hadn’t suffered from its long exile, and the sealing wax was a little soft in the heat but otherwise fine. The gold pen, however, had dried up. He’d have to make a trip out to replace it. They always liked the special touch of the black-paper summons, and a true master never stinted on the details. He only needed to write a few words.

Chapter Three

The next day, Patricia was starting to feel like herself again by the time she walked up to the nurses’ station to check the file on her first afternoon patient. All night long, she’d been tempted by dreams that left her wanting to break one of Ryan’s rules.

At four, she’d given up any pretense of sleeping and sat beside the drained indoor swimming pool in the basement, wishing it were full of ice cubes, and sipping coffee. So far today she’d managed to not harm or kill any of her patients, mostly because they were all at a watch-and-wait stage. She’d spent lunch with a couple of interns. It had distracted her from thinking about Ryan until one of the interns made the connection between her name and the city’s. Then both of them went tense and formal on her.

It was all downhill after that. All she could think about was the way Ryan had ordered her onto her knees in opposition to the way the rest of the city wanted to set her up on a pedestal. Worse, with the food and the caffeine added to her sexual tension, she had more brainpower to apply to the questions of when Ryan would summon her and what he would do.

And now on top of everything else, there was a huge flower arrangement blocking one entire side of the nurses’ station. If she didn’t figure out a way around it and grab the file she needed in a hurry, someone would get a silver salver to place it on for her.

She reached around the crystal vase to grab the file.

“Oooo, who got roses?” Rita gushed, hurrying to the desk from the other direction. She fished through the flowers for a card while talking to Patricia. “Hi, Trisha. Sorry I skipped out on you yesterday.”

Patricia flashed back to yesterday afternoon in the potting shed. Rita had done her the biggest favor imaginable. Even bigger than helping her survive bio chem. Patricia opened her mouth to thank Rita for leaving early.

Betsy, one of the day nurses, spoke up from behind the desk. “They’re Dr. Whitmer’s.” She looked up. “Oh, Dr. Whitmer. I didn’t see you come up. So who are the flowers from?”

Patricia blushed. If she had thanked Rita for leaving early, Rita would have demanded an explanation, and she’d have wanted more details than Patricia could make up in a spur of the moment lie. The truth was too much for even a best friend’s ears.

“Trish, you dog. You had a date last night, didn’t you? That’s why you were teasing me with the gardener. You needed to get rid of me.” Rita pulled the card out of its tiny cream envelope and held it out. “Must have been a good one. Bruce didn’t send me flowers. Read it. What does it say?”

Patricia took the card. She couldn’t imagine Ryan sending flowers. Besides, he’d promised not to mention anything outside of their meetings.
“You’re the boss and I’m the gardener,”
he’d said.
“Your secret submission fantasies are safe with me.”
She opened the card, hoping she could come up with a convincing lie.

“‘Dearest Patricia,’” she read aloud. “‘I haven’t seen you in over three weeks, and my heart is breaking. Will you consent to have dinner with me Friday evening? Please call me. David.’”

“David? David Hoess?” Rita’s lip curled. “He’s so scaly. And, I ask you, how can a weasel be so scaly?”

“But cute,” Betsy put in.

“Cute but scaly. Don’t go out with him, Trish.” Rita slouched against the desk. “There’s what? A million people in this city and surrounding area? If half of them are women and you eliminate all the married men, you still have a couple hundred-thousand better catches than David Hoess. Hell, there’s a few thousand women who are better catches and are willing if you are.”

Patricia read the card again. David Hoess was the scion of another of the upper-crust families in town. He was two years older than her, and when they were children their parents had joked about how nice it would be if they married. Now he was a high-profile lawyer in Columbus. Twice, he’d driven two hours each way to have dinner with her since she’d come home. She felt no sparks from their encounters, but he must have. And her parents would have been pleased if something developed.

She hoped Ryan wouldn’t want her Friday night. David would want to know why she was canceling. Still, it wouldn’t be polite to tell David no in the hopes Ryan would want her, even if she preferred to spend the evening crawling for Ryan than being worshipped by David.

She tucked the card into her lab coat pocket. “I’ll have to call him.”

“Nothing says you have to go out with him just because he sent flowers,” Rita warned. “Friday and red roses. He’s looking to make a weekend of you.”

Patricia checked her watch as an excuse to avoid looking at Rita. At the moment, she couldn’t think of anything less interesting than being made a weekend of by David Hoess. Even before yesterday with Ryan, she hadn’t been attracted to David, but her parents had liked him, and he was an appropriate choice as a mate. Ambitious, involved, good-looking. David Hoess was a better Whitmer than she was. “I have to see a patient. I’ll see you later.”

Before ducking into the lounge to call, Patricia checked on her patient. The phone rang three times before the sultry-voiced receptionist picked it up. She sounded put out when Patricia gave her name but put the call through to David’s office.

“I’m so happy to hear your voice.”

“I got your flowers.”

“Wonderful. I hope you like them.”

“They’re lovely.” Patricia bit her lip. “Why did you send them to the hospital instead of my house?”

“I wanted to make sure you got them. I never know when you’re home.”

I’ll bet, she thought. “I wanted to call and tell you I’d love to have dinner with you Friday, provided nothing comes up, if you don’t mind the drive.”

“I’d drive all day to be with you. Besides, I have some big news to share with you.”

“Just with me?”

“Well, you first. Everyone will know soon enough.”

“Then I’ll see you Friday. When should I expect you?”

“About six, and wear something pretty for me. I have reservations at Firenzi’s.”

The most expensive restaurant downtown. He would pick the most expensive restaurant right downtown. Why bother going to a better restaurant nobody could see you at when you could go right downtown in the very shadow of the newspaper building? For the same reason you send the flowers to the hospital instead of home. Why impress the caretaker when you can impress the whole hospital staff and any patients who happen to be around? But he needed to do this, and it wasn’t fair to pick on him for it. He wanted to run for office someday, and impressions counted. “I’ll be waiting.”

“Not as eagerly as I will, beautiful.”

Patricia frowned at the phone. “Good-bye, David.”

Rita flopped onto the ratty couch. “You’re gonna do it.”

Rita needed to find something more important to do than check up on other people’s personal lives, like be a doctor maybe. “If you mean go to dinner with David, yes, I am.”

“Let me guess. Firenzi’s, right downtown, right before the game?”

“Game?”

“The Tigers game at the stadium. So the proletariat can see you and say ‘I saw Patricia Whitmer going to dinner with a cute but scaly lawyer when I went to the game. I think his name was Hoess. I’m going to vote for him next time he runs for something because he’s dating The Whitmer.’” Rita snorted. “Maybe he’ll issue a press release letting everyone know precisely when you’ll be there.”

“He’s not that bad.” Patricia forced herself not to bite her lip. She hated it when Rita echoed her thoughts. Coming from Rita, it always sounded so much tawdrier.

“He’s not that good. I heard a rumor he’s being groomed for governor. Maybe he wants you to be his first lady. Wouldn’t that be great for his political career?” Rita sat up. “I’m late for an appointment. I don’t understand why you’re messing around with David Hoess when you have that perfectly yummy gardener hanging around.”

For the rest of the afternoon, Patricia focused on her patients so she wouldn’t have to think about what Rita had said, and so she could get home early in case there was an invitation from Ryan. She parked in the garage, and as she approached the front door, saw a rose sticking out of the mailbox. She lengthened her stride as much as she could without starting to run. It was one of the peach-colored roses from the estate rose garden. Scrolled around the stem was a sheet of black paper sealed with red sealing wax. Patricia traced her finger along the edge of the wax, licking her lips. Her thighs started to tremble in anticipation. She broke the seal.