Not Planning on You (5 page)

Suzy felt her heart skip a beat as Gray walked in the door. Here she was lying in a hospital bed in complete disarray, and he looked like he’d just stepped off the pages of GQ Magazine. She felt a little better since changing out of the horrid hospital gown but there was only so much leopard skin could do. Her hair was a mess, her make-up was gone, and she was pretty sure she even smelled. She looked like she’d been rode hard and put up wet.

Suzy cleared her throat and tried to come up with one of her usual smart comments. The fact that it wasn’t coming naturally was out of character. It must be the damn drugs. “Hey slick, sorry about the date disaster and all.”

“Couldn’t be helped, Suzanna. You might want to check into some more sensible shoes though before our next date,” Gray said.

“Yeah, right, I don’t do sensible, you should know that by now,” Suzy sniffed.

Gray walked over and picked her small hand up from the top of the hospital sheet and rubbed his thumb slowly back and forth over the sensitive nerves of her palm. He locked his gaze with hers and lowered his voice to a sexy timber, “Oh, I know you Suzanna, better than you know yourself.”

Beth shifted in place awkwardly, clearly uncomfortable with the tension in the room. “Um…Sis, I’m heading home now. Are you sure you don’t want me to call mom and dad?”

Tearing her gaze from Gray’s, Suzy warned, “You better not unless you want me to send them your way next.”

Beth held up her hands in surrender and said, “Ok, ok, but we might actually need their help. How are you going to get to the second-floor of your condo on crutches, and I also live on the second floor.”

“Beth don’t worry about it; Suzy will stay with me,” assured Gray.

“The hell I will,” shouted Suzy. The sudden movement jarred her injured ribs, and pain flooded through her.

Gray saw Suzy’s face pale and pressed the call button for a nurse. He rubbed her arm in a soothing pattern and said, “Baby, calm down. We can talk about all this later.”

A nurse came in and soon Suzy was floating again. As she was drifting away, she wondered when she’d started allowing Gray to call her ‘baby’ and had he always smelled
sooo
good.

Gray watched Suzy’s eyes grow heavy and soon the fight left her body. It was going to be a battle to convince her to move in with him until she was recovered. If he had his way, she’d be living with him permanently. This kicked things into overdrive a bit on the house front. He knew Suzy would use the excuse that he was living in the penthouse of Danvers to avoid moving in with him. He planned to take care of that in the morning. If there was one thing having money had taught him, things that usually took weeks could be accomplished in days or hours. He’d call a realtor tonight and look at homes first thing in the morning.

Gray noticed Beth fidgeting, clearly uneasy over being in the room with him. Beth was a stunning woman, but obviously not comfortable taking center stage. Suzy not only took it; she owned it. Giving her a smile, Gray said, “Beth, I’ll see that Suzy is taken care of when she’s released, you don’t have to worry about anything in that regard. I’d like to ask a question, though, why is Suzy so against contacting your parents? I’d think they would want to know about her accident.”

Giving him a shy smile, Beth said, “Our parents are a little…different. Actually, they’re a lot different. I get along ok because I don’t rock the boat, but Suzy has battled with them for all of our lives. They’re both professors, quite brilliant really. They live, eat and breathe higher education. Our mother is a history professor and our father a biology professor. I caved to pressure a bit, which is one of the reasons I’m a teacher. Suzy rebelled from early on, and they clashed at every turn. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure they love us in their own way, but they aren’t warm, nurturing people. If they came here now, they would spend the entire visit lecturing Suzy about her job, her clothes and how her lifestyle caused her injury.”

As if realizing that she’d been talking to a near stranger, Beth’s face flushed a pink shade. “Thank you for telling me, Beth, I appreciate the honesty. I’ll in turn be honest with you. I’m crazy about your sister and have been for quite a while.  I realize that it will take some time for her to be able to trust again after the emotional damage that Jeff inflected on her, but I’m not going anywhere.

Beth appeared to study him for a moment as if testing the sincerity of his words. Finally, she seemed to come to some decision, and he could see her face softening. “Gray, I believe you. My sister comes across as fearless and unbreakable but that’s just a façade. Don’t get me wrong, I fully believe that she could conquer the world if she wanted to; very little stops her. She can, however, be hurt. Jeff did a real number on her, and I watched her fall to pieces over it. She got up and brushed herself off but
make
no mistake, inside she’s still torn apart. I know she has feelings for you too even though she has tried to fight it. With an affectionate smile, Beth added, “She can never hide anything from me.  Don’t let my quiet demeanor fool you though, if you hurt my sister you will have two Denton sisters after you and that, my friend, would not be pleasant.”

Wow, Gray could see the family resemblance now. Beth practically glowed as she laid down the law to him. Gone was the quiet, shy person and in her place was a lioness protecting her cub. Even though she was calling him to the carpet, he couldn’t help being impressed.

“Beth, I know this sounds a bit cliché, but I only have the best of intentions where your sister is concerned. You have nothing to be concerned about. I intend to find a house that Suzy will be comfortable in while she recovers, and she’ll have everything she needs. If you would feel better living with us, I’d be more than happy to have you.”

The spark seemed to leave Beth as fast as it had come, and she returned to her former quiet manner. “Thank you Gray, but I’ll be fine. I will be over daily to help, though, and I’ll be here tomorrow morning to help you um….finalize your plans with her.”

Gray laughed as he read the underlying message in her expression, ‘good luck with that.’ “Thanks Beth. I plan to go look at houses early in the morning so if you could be here it would be great. We don’t want to leave your sister alone to inflict damage unto the nursing staff, do we? Also, please call me Gray. As she leaned over the bed to give her sister one last kiss before leaving, he stood, prepared to escort Beth to her car.

“Beth, I’ll see you out. Suzy would have my head if I let you walk to your car in a dark and probably deserted parking lot.”

He could see the protests forming on her lips. Beth obviously wasn’t comfortable yet in his company. He opened the door and held it for her to precede him out. She was quiet as they walked down the hall to the bank of elevators. Gray decided to break the ice and asked her about her job.

“Well, I’m actually supposed to start working for Suzy tomorrow, but that doesn’t look great right now. You do realize that she isn’t going to stay at home while she’s recovering don’t you? I’d give her maybe two days max before you are carting her to the office. It’s not going to be pretty, but my sister isn’t an idle person. In fact, she’ll probably be the patient of your nightmares,” Beth chuckled.

Gray laughed along with her knowing she spoke the truth. “We will cross that bridge when we have to, Beth, and thanks for the warning.”

Soon they were in the parking garage, and Beth was walking towards a bright red convertible VW. Gray was a bit surprised. Like her sister, there appeared to be more layers to Beth than he’d originally thought.

Beth turned to say goodnight to Gray. As she was getting in the car, she asked, “Your brother, he is just visiting, right?”

Gray stifled a groan at her question. Dear lord, please don’t let anything happen between Beth and Nick. Suzy would kill Nick and then move on to kill him. His baby brother was a love ‘
em
and leave ‘
em
type of guy. He was so charming that women seemed to love him even as he was showing them the door. Somehow he didn’t think the Denton sisters would feel that affection for Nick should he do the same to Beth.

He pondered lying to her, and then knew that if she was going to work with Suzy, she’d be seeing Nick around the office. “Actually, Beth we are both moving here. Jason wants us at headquarters now, especially with Claire having the baby soon. Jason plans to take time away to spend with his family, and I’d like for him to be able to have that.”

Beth felt her heart drop. She’d just met Nick tonight, why did she care whether he was coming or going? Now Gray probably thought she had a big crush on him as well. The way Nick stared at her made her self-conscious. She felt like the old Beth again, wondering if her clothes made her look big, was her dress clinging to her hips. Nick was drop-dead gorgeous and she was Beth, frumpy former fat girl with nothing to offer a man like that. She noticed Gray studying her, almost as if reading her mind. “Goodnight Gray, I’ll see you in the morning.”

Gray watched Beth buckle herself in the car and with a quick wave, she was gone. He walked back into the hospital and made a mental note to have a serious talk with his brother in the morning. Better to stop trouble now before it came calling later.

Suzy woke feeling as if her bladder was going to explode. She looked around the darkened room in confusion. Where the hell was she? When she tried to sit up in the bed, pain stabbed through her. She stifled a scream as she noticed a dark head lying on the side of her bed. Suddenly, it all came back to her, and she knew who was sleeping at her bedside.
Gray, always Gray.
She couldn’t escape him any longer. He’d haunted her every waking moment for months and now here he was in the flesh. Fate was cruel mistress. Instead of a night of hot sex as planned, she’d fallen down a flight of steps like some klutz. Apparently, Claire was rubbing off on her. Her friend had at least one accident a day, which Suzy always found rather amusing; now the shoe was on the other foot.

“I can practically hear your mind racing from here.”

Suzy snorted. Did he always have to sound so sexy? Just once couldn’t he have a squeak in his voice or something? That deep, sexy rumble made her want to start panting. “It’s not my mind racing babe; it’s my bladder. If you could step out for a moment, while I go to the bathroom that would be great.”

Gray flipped on the bedside light and she blinked like an owl, trying to adjust to the sudden brilliance. He walked over to the bedside and started lowering the side bar of the bed. “What’re you doing?”

“Well unless you want to pole vault out of bed, I’m going to help you.” When Gray had the side lowered, he leaned down and started sliding his hands under her hips.

Suzy stiffened in shock, sputtering, “What do you think you’re doing, slick?”

“Relax princess; I’m not attacking your beautiful body; I’m carrying you to the bathroom.” Then lowering his voice, Gray, murmured, “When I want your body, you will know it, I promise.”