Sizzling (7 page)

* * *

LORI WALKED INTO the kitchen and found Sandy already
there.
"You're early," she said.
Sandy poured
herself a cup of coffee. "I know what it's like to be tired
after a long day. Of course,
I'm
just waking up."
Sandy
smiled at her and Lori realized she'd really started to like the
other nurse. Lori considered the fact that she didn't hold Sandy's
full-blown beauty against her a sign of a mature character.
Sandy
waved the coffeepot at Lori who shook her head. "Not if I want
to sleep tonight."
"I know. I get hyped up on coffee
and then I don't fall asleep until nine or ten in the morning. My
body clock is totally screwed up. Speaking of screwed, did you see
those twins on CNN?"
Lori shook her head. "What
twins?"
"Bimbos. Former centerfolds. It was awful.
They've written some stupid self-help book so us lesser mortals can
learn to be as sexy as them. Can you imagine?"
Lori
didn't know what to say. If tall, busty, gorgeous Sandy considered
herself a lesser mortal, what did that make Lori? A mutant?
"They
were on CNN talking about their book?"
"Uh-huh. That
part was bad enough, but then the stupid reporter brought up Reid. Of
course they had to dump on him and say he was lousy in bed."
Sandy
pressed her lips together. "It's that damn newspaper article.
Kristie and I were talking about it a couple of nights ago. The thing
is, it's so unfair." She smiled, as if remembering something
amazing. "I had absolutely no complaints about my close
encounter with Reid and neither did Kristie. It was everything we
wanted it to be."
She sighed. "Of course I was a fan
and, I confess, just a little slutty at my interview. I threw myself
at him. Not that he said no."
Lori couldn't think. Her
mind went totally blank, which was probably for the best. Otherwise
she might have exploded.
"You slept with him during your
interview for this job?"
Sandy nodded. "Kristie,
too. It was fun. That big desk in his office at the sports bar. Yum.
I…" She stopped and stared at Lori. "Are you
okay?"
No, she wasn't okay. She was furious. Not with
Reid, but with herself. For being stupid enough to think he was a
real person. He wasn't. He was just a shallow, disgusting pretend
human being.
"I'm fine," she said from between
clenched teeth.
Sandy grimaced. "Oh, God. I just put my
foot in it, didn't I? I thought you'd slept with him, too."
"No,"
Lori said grimly. "I didn't."
Apparently she could
form a club of women who hadn't slept with Reid Buchanan. It would
have a membership of one.

CHAPTER
SIX

LORI WORKED HER WAY through Gloria's morning exercises and did
her best to disconnect from the usual complaints.
"That
hurts," Gloria said. "Stop immediately."
"We're
not working the side your broken hip is on," Lori reminded her.
"We need to keep you flexible."
"As I'm
unlikely to join the Seattle ballet anytime soon, this level of
flexibility is not required."
"Flexibility will help
with your stability. When your hip heals, you'll still be worried
about falling. That will make you cautious. Knowing you're flexible
and can bend in all sorts of directions will help with your
confidence."
Gloria grunted and cooperated with the
stretching for a few more seconds, then pushed Lori away.
"That's
enough," she snapped. "I'm not paying you to torture
me."
Lori hadn't slept well the night before. She had no
one to blame but herself, which she hated. In truth she'd lain in
bed, seething about Sandy's casual confession.
Lori had been
offended on so many levels, but somewhere around four in the morning,
she'd finally admitted, if only to herself, that her real pain came
from the fact that Reid had never wanted her that way and he never
would.
None of which was Gloria's fault, but it did mean her
level of patience was lower than usual.
"You're paying me
to help get you better," Lori said. "That's what I'm
doing."
Gloria frowned at her. "The key is that I'm
paying you. I expect professional behavior, not sadistic enjoyment of
my pain."
Lori gasped at the unfairness of the
accusation. "Excuse me? What sadistic enjoyment? I go out of my
way every single day to make your life more comfortable. Who got you
to order the movies you're enjoying? Who ran out in the rain to get
you Cookies and Cream ice cream two days ago when you had a craving?
Who keeps your room bright, changes the flowers, gets you books and
magazines and gives a damn about you getting back on your feet?"
"I
have told you not to swear around me. I won't tolerate it. If you're
going to persist in that kind of behavior, I'll fire you."
"That
threat is getting old."
"So is your
incompetence."
Maybe it was the lack of sleep. Maybe it
was the fact that Reid wanted every woman on the planet but her.
Maybe it was that she'd reached her threshold. Whatever the reason,
she finally snapped.
"I've had it," she told Gloria,
her voice low. "I have busted my ass for you. Yes, I said ass.
Live with it. When I took this job, everyone told me you were a total
bitch and impossible to deal with. But I didn't believe them. The
staff at the rehab facility warned me about you, said you were awful
and ungrateful, but I didn't listen. I defended you over and over
again. Imagine how I feel now that I find out they were telling the
truth. You're all the things they said. It's no wonder your
grandchildren avoid you. I sure wouldn't be here if I wasn't getting
paid a whole lot of money. So here's the question. What on earth is
wrong with you? Why do you act like this?"
Lori had never
spoken that way to a patient before, although if anyone deserved it,
Gloria did. Still, she braced herself for the scathing tirade that
would end her time in this house.
But Gloria didn't say
anything. Instead the old woman stared at her for several seconds,
then stunned Lori by bursting into tears.
Lori stared at her
for a couple of seconds, not sure if she should move closer or run
for cover. But there was something broken and sad about Gloria's
tears. Something that made her move next to the bed, and then gently,
carefully, sit on the mattress.
She reached for the older
woman and slowly put her arms around her. Gloria clung to her, still
crying, her body shaking.
"I d-didn't mean for this to
happen," Gloria said between sobs. "I don't know what
h-happened. I was always difficult and demanding, but now I'm
horrible. I hear the things I say and I can't believe that's me
talking. I never meant to become so awful. Something happened. This
isn't me and it's not my fault. Nobody loves me. No one has ever
loved me. I'm alone and I'm going to die alone."
Lori
sucked in a breath. She felt like slime for having attacked Gloria,
yet she sensed this might be an important moment in the old woman's
life. She suspected that Gloria didn't allow herself much emotional
vulnerability or weakness, so how best to handle the
opportunity?
She considered several possibilities, then
decided to go for the truth. She waited until the tears subsided, sat
up, handed Gloria a box of tissues, then cleared her throat.
"You're
right," she said clearly, refusing to be sucked in by the still
flowing tears. "You are going to die alone."
Gloria's
eyes widened. "It's not true," she whispered.
"It
is true," Lori told her. "Look at how you act. Who would
want to care about you? You're dismissive of people's feelings. You
don't seem to ever do anything nice. You're mean and self-centered."
She lowered her voice and touched the other woman's arm. "But
you can change."
Gloria shook her head. "I can't. I
don't know how."
"You can and you do know how. You
don't want to— there's a difference. You're many things, but
you're not stupid. You remember what it's like to be human."
Her
patient stared at her. "No, I don't. Besides, what's the point?
You're saying I should be nice to people. To care about them. But
then they just take advantage of me. Besides, there are so many
idiots in the world."
"There's an attitude designed
to make you friends."
"I don't want
friends."
"Really? Then what was the water works
about? Come on, no one wants to be totally isolated. Everyone wants a
sense of belonging. You're old— you'll be dead soon. Don't you
want to be missed?"
Gloria opened her mouth, then closed
it. "I will not be dead soon."
"You will if you
don't get off your bony ass and focus on getting better."
Lori
braced herself for the screaming, or at the very least another threat
of firing. Instead tears filled Gloria's eyes again.
"I
don't want to die alone," she whispered. "I don't want them
to hate me. I want them to love me."
Lori hugged her
again. "I know you do. The best way to get love is to act
loving."
Gloria didn't answer. Instead she held on tight
for a long time before leaning back against her pillows. She wiped
her face, then said, "According to you, I shouldn't worry about
being taken advantage of. I won't be around long enough to
mind."
"That wasn't exactly what I meant, but if it
works for you, go for it."
"Do you really think I
can change?"
"If you want your life to be different.
It's entirely up to you. You have the power to do whatever you want.
Does this really matter? Do you want your grandchildren to love you
and miss you when you're gone?"
The old woman nodded
slowly. "Yes," she whispered. "I do."

* * *

AN HOUR LATER Gloria was sleeping and Lori escaped to the
living room to regroup. She felt as if she'd been run over by a
train.
Had she done the right thing, pushing Gloria? Would the
emotional upset impact the healing process? But if Gloria did manage
to change enough to reconnect with her family, wasn't that a good
thing?
Lori stood in front of the massive window that
overlooked the city and Puget Sound beyond. It was a rare clear day,
with the sky a color of blue that God grants only after weeks of
rain.
Maybe she'd been talking to herself as well as Gloria,
she thought, not sure she wanted to see the truth but unable to avoid
it. Maybe she needed to be a little less bitchy with her own family.
Not that she was bitchy with Madeline, but there was always that
damned ambivalence lurking in the background, not to mention all the
issues she had with her mother. Maybe she should—
"There
you are," Reid said as he walked into the room. "I've been
looking all over for you. We have to talk."
She turned
slowly and looked at him. He was still one of the most handsome men
she'd ever seen. Not perfect, but appealing on so many levels. She
wanted to lean into his body and feel his heat. She wanted his arms
around her, flesh on flesh, touching, reaching. She wanted to give
herself up to him in a version of surrender that left her
breathless.
On the heels of the longing came a fierce anger,
both at herself for her weakness and at the man who caused it. He was
easy enough to blame— especially considering what she'd so
recently learned about him. In the land of Reid, the hits kept on
coming.
"I don't know what to do," he said, moving
close and staring into her eyes. "You have to help me. I'm
totally screwed. Remember those kids, the ones I was supposed to send
to their state finals? The ones who didn't have a return ticket?"
He
didn't bother waiting for her to answer. "I called their coach.
I wanted to make it right. Seth had sent a check and I thought things
were fine. But the bastard only sent a thousand dollars. Some family
got their car repossessed because of me and my manager only sent a
thousand dollars?"
He ran his hand through his hair and
stalked to the window. "How did this happen? How did everything
get so messed up? You know what the guy said to me? The coach? I
offered to send everyone to Disney World, you know, to make up for
it. And he blew me off. He said they couldn't afford my brand of
charity."
He turned back to her, looking genuinely
confused. "It's me," he said. "Doesn't that
matter?"
Something inside of her snapped. She actually
felt it go and heard the popping sound.
"You are exactly
like your grandmother," she began, aware of Gloria sleeping and
keeping her voice low. "You are totally self-absorbed and
selfish. I had thought, and let me tell you how stupid I feel about
that now, that there was a person inside of you. I thought you might
actually have some small crumb of decency. But you don't. You're
nothing but a sex-starved, useless jerk. You're taking up space that
should go to someone who actually matters."
She curled
her hands into fists and fought the need to beat some sense into him.
As if she could actually hit hard enough to make him notice.
"Start
taking responsibility," she told him, her voice thick with anger
and contempt. "You keep blaming your manager, but ultimately,
you're responsible. So take the damn responsibility. Show up, do the
right thing. It's really not that hard. Oh, wait, you'd have to stop
being the center of the universe. That
will
be tough."
He
stared at her. "What's got up your butt?"
"Oh,
right. It has to be me, right? I'm a hysterical female. Oooh, maybe I
have my period. There's a great excuse. But I'm going to say it
anyway. Fire your damn manager. He's making you look like an ass. You
do that well enough on your own— you don't need to pay someone
to help with the process. You're supposed to be some hotshot baseball
player. Well, with that comes responsibility. Stop letting down
little kids. Be a grown-up."
"Why are you so mad at
me?"
"Because you could be so much and you're not. I
hate wasted potential."
He continued to watch her,
looking confused, as if even he knew that couldn't possibly generate
that much energy. "What's the real problem?"
"This
isn't real enough for you? Look at your life. There are Internet
photos of you having sex. Reporters are chasing you down to talk
about how lousy you are in bed. You're being mocked on CNN. Do you
sense a pattern here? You can't even hire nurses for your sick
grandmother without getting laid. You slept with Sandy and Kristie.
During their interviews. People don't do that. It's tacky. It's
wrong. Honest to God, I'm not surprised to read that you're bad in
bed. Being good in bed would mean thinking about someone other than
yourself."