His Private Nurse (6 page)

“Sounds to me like you do most of the taking care of.”

“Yeah,” she admitted, “seems that way to me, too, which is part of the reason I'm here.”

“Part of the reason?”

She shrugged. “The timing was right.”

He felt a spurt of disappointment. The timing was right. Why did that rankle? What had he expected her to say, that she couldn't resist his darling blue eyes, that she was determined to hang around until he was healthy enough for her to jump his bones?

Meeting his gaze in the mirror, she asked, “Ready for something to eat?”

“Absolutely.”

“Want to sit at the table by the bedroom window while I get together some food?”

“Okay.”

She wheeled him into the bedroom and parked the chair at the small table where he sometimes sat to read the paper of an evening. She handed him the magazine she'd been reading, one of his architectural publications, and said, “I won't be a minute.” She looked to the console mounted in the wall beside the bed and asked, “Think you can get to the intercom if you need me?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“I've asked Dale to get you a cowbell and a pair of crutches.”

“A cowbell?” The crutches he could understand, but a cowbell?

“You could keep it with you,” she said, “and if you need me but couldn't get to the intercom, all you'd have to do is ring. I figured it would have to be a pretty big bell or I wouldn't hear it in this big house.”

Wryly, he shook his head. So he was to be belled like a rank bull. She didn't know how appropriate the metaphor was. In this case, however, the bull was hobbled. “So long as I don't have to eat hay,” he joked.

“I think we can do a little better than that,” she said, swinging away.

Ten minutes later he stared down into a bowl of soup ringed with crackers. “I don't suppose this is the first course?”

“That hungry?”

“I was hoping for a steak about two-inches thick, maybe a baked potato, loaded.” He peered into the pale-amber liquid in his cup and added, “And coffee, strong, black coffee.”

She put her hands on her hips and said in a very kindergarten-teacherish way, “Tell you what. If you'll eat your soup and drink your tea, I'll pan sear that ham steak you've got in the fridge, and bring that up.”

He picked up his spoon, loaded it and said dryly, “Just get it up here by the time I've finished the soup or I'm liable to start on the napkin next.”

She turned on her heel, noting aloud, “Patient has a hearty appetite.”

“Mmm-hmm.” He swallowed the warm soup. It was pretty good, actually, not the canned variety. The cup he eyed with more trepidation. Halfway through the soup,
however, he decided to give it a try. Lifting the cup, he sniffed. Didn't smell like any tea he'd ever had, but it wasn't unpleasant, a touch of cinnamon, perhaps. Cautiously he sipped and tasted something very fruity under-laid with honey. Not bad. He sipped a little more and went back to the soup, polishing it off in just a few bites. The crackers went the same way, and when Merrily returned with the ham steak and the teapot, his cup was empty, too.

Smiling, she plopped the steak down in front of him, fork and knife crossed atop the plate. As she refilled his cup, she asked, “Feeling okay?”

“Pretty good actually,” he said, picking up the fork. A moment later he realized that his clumsy left hand and a simple fork weren't going to get the ham sliced. Merrily picked up the knife and waited. He stabbed the fork into the ham steak, holding it in place, and she quickly sawed off several bites for him. Impatiently he forked the first into his mouth. “Mmm.” After gobbling down the rest, he planted the fork in the steak again. Merrily immediately cut the remaining steak into small pieces. A few minutes later, he laid his fork across his empty plate, drained his cup and sat back with a sigh. “Ahhh.”

“How are you feeling now?”

“Excellent. Full and relaxed.”

She smiled and began stacking the dishes. “This may not be the best time to ask, then, but what would you like for dinner?”

“Hmm.” He thought it over, trying to remember what he had in the pantry. Finally he shrugged. “Surprise me.”

“How's Chinese?”

He lifted both brows, impressed. “Great.”

She straightened, her hands going to her waist. “Have a favorite dish?”

He decided to test her expertise. “Pressed duck?”

Her smile turned cagey. “I'll let Dale know.”

He felt his brow furrow before he could derail the reaction. “Dale?”

“Mmm-hmm. He'll be paying off on a debt.” She tapped the rim of his cup, asking, “How did you like it, by the way?”

Confused, he waved his hand. “Fine. What is it, by the way?”

“A piece of cake,” she replied smugly.

“I beg your pardon?”

She chuckled. “Actually, it's herbal tea.”

“Herbal tea!”

“And the reason you're feeling so mellow right now.” He couldn't keep the shock off his face. “Don't worry,” she went on cheerfully. “I checked to be sure there would be no interactions with your medications.”

That had never occurred to him. “I don't drink herbal tea. I mean, I didn't drink herbal tea before this.”

“I know. Dale told me.”

Realization dawned. “And you bet him that you could get me to.”

She just smiled. “Sure you still want Chinese?”

He wanted to feel used and manipulated, but he couldn't. She'd hadn't tricked or nagged him into drinking the tea. She'd just left the damned cup next to his plate and let him decide for himself whether he liked it or not—and he had, did, like it. He laughed. “Tell him to use Chung Pao's Garden. It's not the best pressed duck in town, but it's the most expensive.”

She laughed. “Actually, we didn't really say when the loser would have to pay up, so for tonight you may have to settle for the chicken I've got thawing.”

“Only one?” he joked.

“I'll see if I can't find
something
to go with it,” she promised. “Meanwhile, if you'd like some more tea…”

“No, thanks. I'm mellow enough.”

“Fine. I'll just take care of these, then.” She picked up the dishes and turned away.

Suddenly he decided to get back a little bit of his own. “You know,” he said affably, “it's almost worth falling down a flight of stairs to have herbal tea served to me by such a beautiful woman.”

She bobbled the dishes and several hit the floor, bouncing harmlessly on the carpet. Gasping, she dropped to her knees to gather them up again. Royce bit his lip to keep from laughing, but then she stretched, reaching for a spoon, and the pull of denim across her neat little rear end hit him in the groin. No longer feeling quite so mellow, he averted his gaze, but it crept back again a moment later as she rose to her feet, the tray balanced carefully in her hands.

“Sorry,” she muttered, hurrying from the room.

He felt rather like a heel, considering that he was the one who ought to apologize. She was just too easy to bait, his sweet little nurse, and too good at what she did—and too easy to like, too easy to need. If he wasn't careful, he'd never again become as self-sufficient as he'd once been. Determined that would not be the case, he decided it was time to begin ordering his world again. He had done it before under much more egregious circumstances. Falling down a flight of stairs was nothing compared to losing custody of his children.

The first order of business was to bring as much normalcy back to his situation as possible. Looking down at his bare chest, he decided that the most obvious course was to dress himself. With some difficulty he turned the wheelchair from the table and maneuvered it across the
room. It took a while to find an old T-shirt and get the scissors from the cabinet in the bath, but by the time Merrily returned, he had the shirt laid out on the bed and was trying to work the scissors with his left hand in order to cut out the right sleeve.

“Can I do that?” she asked, and he tossed down the scissors with disgust. So much for taking charge of his life again.

Quickly, expertly, she cut away the right sleeve and enlarged the armhole. Then she handed the T-shirt to him and sat down on the side of the bed, leaning back slightly, her upper body weight supported on her stiffened arms. Smiling to himself, he fumbled with the shirt until he could slip the newly cut hole over his cast, then he shoved his left arm through the intact sleeve and wrestled the thing over his head. The satisfaction was worth the effort.

Merrily sat up straight, asking, “Ready for a nap?”

He grimaced at the bed and confessed, “I'm tired, okay? But what I'm most tired of is lying in bed.”

Instantly she suggested, “How about the recliner in the den?”

He closed his eyes. “Yes, please, Nurse Gage. Bless you, Nurse Gage.”

She skipped behind his chair and started it moving. “Oh, don't thank me yet. Wait until I've beaten you at gin rummy.”

“Gin rummy?”

“Can you think of anything else you'd rather we do?”

He could, but thankfully he wasn't up to it. “What makes you think you can beat me at gin rummy or anything else?”

“Wanna bet on it?”

He grinned. Stupid he was not. “No, thanks.”

“Good answer.”

Laughing, he sat back and enjoyed the ride.

“I
think we can manage with this,” Merrily said, waving the long, narrow box of plastic wrap, “at least until the shower sock I've ordered arrives, but since you can't get your cast or right leg wet, we'll have to settle for half a shower.”

“Half a shower,” he echoed uncertainly, the lines bracketing his mouth and shadows darkening his eyes telling her that he was tired, despite having napped again before dinner, which had consisted of roasted chicken, rice pilaf and bean salad, Dale having pleaded inconvenience. She was content to allow him to set a date for paying his debt.

“Unless you'd rather have that sponge bath, after all,” she suggested hopefully to Royce.

He made a face that perfectly expressed his feelings on that subject, even if his previous objections had not. “So how do we go about this half shower?”

“Well, I've been thinking about it, and it seems to me that since the ledge around the tub is so wide, you can sit on the inside corner of it with your back against the wall. We'll prop up your right leg on the edge to keep it dry and you can balance yourself by placing your left foot inside the tub. I'll soap you and use the sprayer from the tub to rinse you off.”

“I'll soap me,” he insisted, “and you can hand me the sprayer. Otherwise you'll have to get in the tub.”

“I don't mind. I'll just roll up my pants and shuck my shoes so I can stand in the water. We only need a couple of inches.”

“Fine,” he snapped, “but I think I can wash my own body.”

“Okay,” she replied carefully, going down on her knees to begin wrapping his right leg with plastic, “whatever you say.”

She knew that he was grouchy because he didn't feel well, and she didn't take it personally. Instead, she concentrated on mummifying his right leg, bulky stabilizer and all, in plastic wrap from his kitchen. At the top of the plastic “sock” she fastened an elasticized hair band with a metal clasp, after carefully testing it to be certain it wouldn't cut off his circulation. It would never survive a real shower, but it was the best she could do under the circumstances. Rising, she wrapped the remaining plastic around the top of his shoulder and under his arm to get the edge of the hard cast there.

“We'll have to be careful with the sprayer,” she advised. “These plaster casts are just too sensitive to water.”

“Maybe we can keep the plaster dry, but you're gonna get wet,” he warned.

“I won't dissolve.”

“Of course not. You're too damned stubborn for it,” he muttered.

“Maybe,” she said lightly. “Let's get these clothes off you. Can you manage the shirt?”

“I can, but if you think I'm going to sit around naked in front of you, think again.”

Merrily struggled with both a smile and a blush. “You can drape a towel across your lap.”

He sighed. “Yeah, okay.”

She went for a stack of towels while he struggled out of the mutilated T-shirt. When she returned, the shirt lay over the arm of the wheelchair. “If you'll stand, I'll wrap this bath towel around your waist and we'll get those shorts off.” He struggled to a standing position, and she wrapped the towel around his waist. Reaching beneath the towel, he tugged and shoved the shorts down. Finally the garment dropped to the floor. While he held the bath towel in place, she spread a hand towel on the edge of the tub, instructing him to sit down upon it and use it to facilitate his slide around to the corner.

“Without losing
this
towel?” he said doubtfully, indicating the towel around his waist.

“Just turn it around.”

He shifted the towel and sat down. Carefully he scooted around the edge of the tub to the corner, keeping his right leg up and a hold on the towel now draped across his waist. When she saw that he was comfortable and secure in this position, she turned on the water and, while it ran, removed her shoes and rolled up her pant legs. Sitting on the outside edge of the tub, she put her feet into the water and chose a bar of soap from the stainless steel wire dish fixed to the side of the tub.

“This okay?”

“Whatever,” he mumbled.

Working quickly, she soaped a washcloth, then diverted the water flow to the built-in sprayer with its long, coiled hose. Leaning forward, she adjusted the water stream to a trickle, then she handed him the washcloth and used the sprayer to carefully wet him down. He began scrubbing everything he could reach, above and beneath the towel, while she tried to look elsewhere, anywhere but at the broad expanse of his smooth, muscular, tanned chest.

“The last time I bathed with a beautiful woman,” he commented wryly, “it was a lot more fun.”

She dropped the sprayer and water shot up in an arc, drenching her. Grabbing it, she shut if off again, her face burning, while he laughed.

“Told you that you'd get wet.”

“My fault,” she said quickly, wiping her face.

“You've got to stop that.”

She looked up. “What?”

“Getting flustered every time I compliment you.”

Her gaze dropped away of its own volition. “Did you compliment me?” she asked nonchalantly, trying her best not to sound as breathless as she felt.

“I did, and ignoring it won't make it go away, you know.”

“I know. I…I mean, thank you…for the compliment.”

“You're welcome.” He handed back the washcloth, adding tiredly, “I think that's the best I can do for now.”

She started soaping the cloth again. “I'll take care of your leg.”

“Just rinse me off,” he ordered, obviously too tired to manage it himself.

“If you say so.” She rinsed the cloth, dampened it with fresh water and rose to her feet, stepping closer to him in order to remove the soap from his right side. He'd been careful not to touch the cast on his shoulder, and she was
just as careful. Finding it difficult to reach the back of his shoulder, she shifted to one side. Her foot slipped slightly on the bottom of the tub.

“You're going to fall,” he warned, lifting his left hand to her waist. She gulped as the damp heat of his hand pervaded the fabric of her shirt.

“So long as I don't fall on you,” she muttered.

“Oh, I don't know. I think I might enjoy it,” he teased, voice husky.

Gulping, she ignored that and turned to retrieve the sprayer, he kept his hand on her so that it rode across her abdomen and back again as she faced him once more. For the life of her, she could not breathe. It was as if he'd poured scalding heat into her lower body and it now rose up into her chest. She fumbled with the sprayer, adjusting the output, as she leaned forward so she could rinse his back. Straightening again, she began rinsing the soap from his torso. Her gaze strayed down to the now tented towel across his lap, and she dropped the sprayer, yelping as water hit her in the chin.

“Get out of the tub before you break your neck!” he barked, releasing her in order to grab the sprayer.

She didn't have to be told twice, scrambling out of the tub while he angrily rinsed beneath the towel. With trembling fingers, she dried off as best she could and released the drain in the tub. Royce shut off the sprayer and thrust it at her. She hung it up and turned off the water supply.

“Towel,” he ordered, holding out his hand, and she passed him a fresh, dry bath towel. He rubbed at his face and hair while she used a hand towel to dab at water spots on the plastic shielding his cast and stabilizer.

“I'll get you another pair of shorts. Don't you move until I get back.”

“Fine.”

She returned a few moments later to find that he had exchanged the wet towel across his lap for the dry one. They performed the procedure that had moved him into the corner of the tub in reverse. As he rose from the outside edge of the tub, balancing his weight with his good hand on her shoulder, she reached around him to secure the towel at his waist and preserve his modesty. He suggested that she slide the opening of the towel around to the side so he could get a hand on it himself, and she complied, but as he grappled with the towel, awareness sharpened and the room heated. Finally he got a hold, and she straightened, her arm about his waist to steady him.

Suddenly she was looking up into his much too handsome face. His blue eyes held hers for a moment, then dropped to her mouth. For an eternity she held her breath, every other concern suspended as she waited expectantly for his mouth to cover hers. Then he sucked in a deep breath, and sanity rushed back, bringing embarrassment. Realizing that he was trembling, she quickly eased him into the wheelchair.

“You can put these on later,” she said, striving for her best nurse's voice as she swept up the shorts and dropped them into his lap. “Let's just get you into the bedroom.”

“Fine by me,” he gasped as she released the band around the thigh of his injured leg and began unwrapping the plastic.

“I'll straighten up here after I've gotten you into bed,” she told him, tossing aside the big ball of crumpled plastic food wrap and moving around to the back of his chair.

“Don't worry about it,” he said wearily. “Mercedes comes tomorrow to clean the house.”

“She won't be cleaning up after me,” Merrily told him, pushing the chair into the bedroom. He didn't argue with her.

“I don't even want to think about what I'm going to smell like when this cast comes off,” he grumbled.

“I'll put a clothespin on your nose and stand by with a spray can of deodorant,” she teased.

He chuckled tiredly. “Ever ready with the ingenious solution.”

“Part of the job.”

“No, that's just you,” he said lightly.

She parked the chair next to the bed and set the brake. Then she folded back the covers, swept the bed with her hand and straightened the sheets. He handed her the shorts, saying, “Let's just leave these close by where I can reach them later. I think for now I'll just slide over into the bed and trust you not to peek beneath the sheets.” The shorts slid right out of her hands and landed on his right foot. He just shook his head. “It was a joke.”

“I know,” Merrily replied lightly, bending to snatch up the shorts. As she tossed them onto the bedside table, she hoped he wouldn't notice the color burning in her cheeks.

Sitting forward on the edge of the chair, his good hand clasping the towel at his waist, he said almost apologetically, “I'm going to need your help for this.”

“That's what I'm here for.” Bending, she placed both arms around him. He pushed up, and she helped him turn his back to the bed and sit down. She stooped to lift his injured leg as he lay back then folded the covers up over him. “Okay?”

“No,” he said. “I've been a bear today, and you've been the soul of patience.”

“That sometimes happens when you don't feel well.”

“It's more than that.”

“I understand,” she said. “You're worried about your children.”

“Very much,” he confirmed, but then he reached up with his left hand and captured her ponytail, pulling her closer. His blue eyes were clouded with pain and exhaustion, but beneath that burned something more. “The more immediate problem, however, is you, sweet nurse,” he told her softly. “You're a huge temptation. You know that don't you?”

Her eyebrows shot up. “T-temptation?”

“A huge temptation,” he reiterated. “We're both lucky I'm too incapacitated to do anything about it.” Releasing her, he rubbed his thumb lightly across her lips before abruptly dropping his hand. “How about some of that tea of yours?” he asked, shifting his gaze. “I could use a little extra relaxation at the moment.”

“I…yes.” She leaped to her feet and whirled away, her heart tripping like a jackhammer—and almost went sprawling over the wheelchair. She heard a choking sound, knew that he was trying not to laugh at her clumsiness and fled, barely keeping herself from breaking into a run. When she returned several minutes later, he was sound asleep. She drank the tea herself in her own room and tried not to think what it might be like if her too handsome patient should one day yield to temptation.

 

Her patient was finally on the mend, which meant that Merrily had to find new ways to entertain him. Card games quickly palled, so they worked several crosswords together and even played a board game fetched from his daughter's room.

Part pink confection and part teenybopper, that room spoke volumes to her about the daughter he so obviously loved. Comic books shared shelf space with coloring books, dolls with stereo equipment and the latest “boy group” CDs. The few articles of clothing that hung in the
closet ranged from designer label blue jeans to pajamas bearing the likenesses of cartoon characters. A little girl poised on the edge of adolescence, Tammy Lawler seemed caught in that awkward space between child and preteen, torn between two selves. How much of it was the natural result of growing up and how much had to do with the divorce of her parents? Merrily wondered if Tammy knew how much her father fretted over not being able to see her. Surely if she did, she would come to him. Poor kid, and poor Royce. He obviously agonized over the distance between them, though that was no reason to try to take the children from the mother—unless, of course, all that Dale had said was true.

After the board game, which he won, they watched a movie on cable, one Royce had seen and thought she would enjoy, which she did. They were still sitting in the den when Dale showed up with some books and another package of herbal tea. He stacked the books on the end table near the spot where Merrily sat on the couch. The packet of tea he tossed into Royce's lap with a mock scowl.

“Traitor.”

Royce grinned. “Hey, I'm just a poor, helpless soul weakened by suffering.”

“Yeah, right. About as helpless as a snake without rattlers.” The rangy lawyer turned a woebegone look on Merrily, saying, “Don't let him charm you, kid. He's still got his fangs.”