Angel in Armani (17 page)

*   *   *

It was actually more like fifteen because the girls doing the admin with her were full of curiosity about Lucas. Apparently he was something of a frequent flier here at the heliport and had his own little fan club.

“What were you talking about?” Jenna asked. Of all the girls who worked here, Sara had known Jenna the longest. But she wasn’t exactly a BFF and there was no way Sara was telling her she was going out to dinner with Lucas.

“He was telling me about one of his cases,” Sara lied.

“Oh yeah. He’s a surgeon, right?”

“That’s right.”

Jenna sighed. “A hot rich doctor. And you get to fly him around. Nice work.”

“He’s just another passenger,” Sara said.

Jenna narrowed her eyes. “You have too many hot passengers if you think that man is just another passenger,” she said. Her expression turned curious. “One of Ron Harris’s pilots came through this morning. He said you had a gig flying for the New York Saints. So you get to fly with all three of the guys who bought the team. Is that true?”

No point denying it. “Yes.”

Jenna actually squealed and clapped her hands. “That is so awesome! What are they like? Is Alex Winters as hot as he looks on TV? Dish.”

“It’s great. And no comment,” Sara said with an apologetic smile. Then she signed the paperwork and fled before she could be grilled about anything else.

*   *   *

The restaurant Lucas directed the cab to was in the East Village. A tiny place that he told her served the best Greek food in the city. She was starting to feel like she could eat a horse, so she wasn’t too fussed about the restaurant’s credentials. She just wanted food.

Food would level out her blood sugar and then she wouldn’t feel quite so floaty and silly every time she looked at Lucas, right?

She took a deep breath as the waiter directed them to a table and breathed in the scent of garlic and lamb and spices appreciatively.

Happily, the waiter reappeared with a basket of bread and a platter of dips so that she didn’t start drooling while she waited for food.

She picked up bread, slathered it with the nearest dip, and bit into it.

It tasted divine—smoky and garlicky and decadent—and she closed her eyes for a moment, chewed, swallowed, and then took another bite before she opened them again.

When she did, Lucas was watching her, smiling.

“I like the way you eat,” he said. “It’s very … enthusiastic.”

“I’m hungry.”

“Me, too.” He picked up bread and swished it through the dip. His eyes didn’t leave hers as he took a bite and then licked his finger where the dip had blobbed onto his knuckle.

Sara thought her skin might just catch on fire as she watched his mouth.

Damn it. She made herself look at the menu but she couldn’t concentrate. So she picked the first thing that her eyes settled on and tried to calm down a little. This was just dinner. She pretended to keep studying the menu but the waiter reappeared all too quickly and took their orders before disappearing again. Leaving her alone with Lucas.

Who was smiling at her again.

He looked somewhat like the cat who’d swallowed the canary. Pleased with himself. Which should have been annoying, but it was hard to be annoyed with a man who seemed to be delighted to be having dinner with her.

Still, it was a little unnerving to be under the gaze of those eyes. Small talk, that was what was needed. God. She had no idea what to talk to him about.

Then she remembered baseball.

“So did you make any decisions about the pitchers?” she asked.

“You’re asking me about baseball? I thought you weren’t interested?”

“I’m not.”

“Ah. Then why did you ask?”

“It seemed polite,” she said.

He laughed then. “Are you always this polite?”

“No.”
Only with gorgeous men who make me nervous and could ruin my life
. “But those kids were kind of sweet. So talk to me about them. Anyone having their dreams come true?”

“Why?”

“Because I’m not ready to talk about other things with you yet.”

That made his smile widen. “Do I make you nervous, Sara Charles?”

“A little.”

“I swear, I’m harmless.”

If he thought that, then he really had no idea how hot he was. “I find that very hard to believe.”

“Why?”

She waved a hand toward him. “Just look at you. You’re the kind of guy who leaves a trail of broken hearts in his wake.”

“I’m really not.”

“You want me to believe that women don’t swarm around the good-looking rich doctor?”

He shrugged. “
Swarm
is an overstatement. I’m not a monk, if that’s what you’re asking. But neither am I a…” He trailed off, seemingly searching for the word.

“Womanizing jerk? Cad?”

“Cad?” He grinned again. “Are we in a Regency romance?”

That raised her eyebrows. “What do you know about the Regency?”

“I’ve read
Pride and Prejudice
.”

“You have?” She was impressed. In the army she’d known guys who had her appetite for books but their tastes, on the whole, tended toward thrillers and mysteries and science fiction. She’d never met a guy who’d read Austen. Or one who admitted it, at least.

“High school?”

“English lit in college. It was compulsory. But I liked it.”

“You did?”

“Yes. I even read
Emma
and
Sense and Sensibility
.”

Now she was fascinated despite herself. “Which is your favorite?”

“Probably
Pride and Prejudice
. I like Lizzy. Emma’s naive and Elinor’s a bit stuffy. Lizzy is just trying to be herself and look after her family. What about you? Are you a Darcy fan?”

“I have kind of a soft spot for Knightley, actually.” She was a Darcy fan, actually, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. The perfect rich guy who seemed standoffish and then turned out to be a true gentleman and all-around good guy seemed a little bit too close to the reality at the moment. And she didn’t want Lucas thinking that she wanted a rich guy to ride in and save her.

“Knightley.” He studied her a moment. “Knightley sees Emma’s faults and loves her anyway,” he said. “Isn’t that a bit foolish?”

“No, it’s what love really is, isn’t it? Loving the real person. Knightley saw what Emma could really be.” She shifted in her seat, suddenly wondering if this conversation was revealing too much. “I thought we were talking about your baby pitchers.”

“But you don’t like baseball.”

But I like you
. She didn’t say the words. Because she wasn’t ready to admit it to herself, really, let alone to Lucas. He’d asked her to dinner, true, said he couldn’t forget her, but it could all be a line. He could just want more sex and then he’d ride off into the sunset in his Mercedes or Porsche or whatever ridiculously expensive car it was that he drove.

The waiter appeared with their entrées and Sara waited while he arranged the plates in front of them. The bread and dip had taken the edge off her appetite so she didn’t pick up her fork as he left them alone again. “So. Baseball. I don’t know a lot about it. What I saw in Florida was okay. Maybe I’d like it if I knew more.”

“I think people who like sports tend to know it.”

“I’ve seen
Field of Dreams
,” she offered. “Kevin Costner was hot.”

He laughed again. “As much as my life would be easier if the Saints had a magic baseball park in a field of corn, the reality is a lot more prosaic.”

“Damn, I only took the job for Kevin and James Earl Jones.”

“Sorry to disappoint. But to come back to your original question, no, we haven’t made any final decisions. I like that Sam guy, though. He’s hungry. And good.”

“He’s pretty young. Wouldn’t coming to play for you mean dropping out of college?”

Lucas nodded. “Yes, but that’s the nature of the beast. MLB doesn’t leave a lot of time for things like studying on the side. That’s the problem with dreams, sometimes you have to make sacrifices.”

“Like commuting between New York and Orlando a couple of times a week? How do you do that and do your rich-doctor thing as well?”

“It’s only for a few months.” He speared a chunk of lamb and smiled at her. “And once you get to be good enough to be a rich doctor, there’s a certain amount of flexibility in your schedule.”

“I would have thought it just meant that you were more in demand than ever, if you’re really good,” Sara said.

“Yes, but I can control my workload to some extent.” He frowned, and she got the feeling that he wasn’t as blasé about doing just that as he was making out. She remembered how insistent he’d been on getting back to Manhattan to do his surgery on the figure skater. And how they’d cut the trip short this time. He was juggling things, that much was plain.

Did she want to be one more ball in the air for him?

One more ball that was probably the easiest to drop if push came to shove? It was clear he was a guy who was devoted to his work—both medicine and the Saints. Which didn’t leave much room for romance.

And here she was jumping the gun again. Maybe he just wanted another night or two of sex. Maybe he thought they could burn each other out of their systems or something.

Though he could’ve just knocked on her hotel door back in Orlando if that was the case. But no. He’d waited. Asked her out for dinner. In a helicopter, true, and that made it clear he wasn’t exactly your run-of-the-mill date. Of course, she’d already known that. But rich guys didn’t have to play by normal rules. So maybe it really was just about scratching an itch.

“You’re thinking very hard over there,” Lucas said. He looked down at her plate. “And not eating. Is something wrong?”

“No.” She forked up some lamb hastily, chewed, and swallowed. “It’s great. I’m just…”

“Just wondering what my intentions are?” Lucas asked.

She nodded. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not expecting you to get down on one knee or anything, but this is complicated. So I want to know just how complicated it might be.”

“You like to be in control, don’t you?” He leaned back in his chair a little, lifted his wineglass, and sipped.

“I have a lot on my plate. Things are easier to deal with if I have all the facts.”

“I’m not sure what facts come into play when you’re talking about attraction. Other than the chemistry. I think we’ve already dealt with that part back in Sag Harbor. Our chemistry works just fine.”

“Chemistry is the easy part.” She and Kane had had chemistry. But once the initial heat had died down, there’d been nothing left other than that they were both pilots in the army. No commonality. And Kane had been someone a lot more like her than Lucas Angelo was.

“Why does there have to be a hard part?”

She frowned at him. “Because, like I said. This is complicated. You’re technically my boss. You’re rich. And I’m me. Not rich. Very far from rich.” Their worlds were, well, worlds apart. It was like an Austen novel. Only she was the poor chauffeur and Lucas was the out-of-reach titled object of her affections.

“I don’t care about that,” he said.

“That’s because you don’t have to.”

“No, I don’t. So problem solved. Money isn’t an issue.” Lucas said. He took another mouthful of wine, and she found herself fascinated by the play of muscles in his neck as he swallowed.

Good grief. She was losing it.

“Okay,” Lucas said. “Here are some facts. One. I don’t cheat. If I want to sleep with someone else, then I’d tell you. Two. I don’t want to be complicated. You don’t need complicated. You need easy. You need some fun in your life.”

“My life is fine,” she said.

He shook his head and put down his glass. “I have a mother, a sister-in-law, and about twenty female cousins. Not to mention many aunts and about half a hundred female colleagues. Not one of them has ever used the word
fine
in that tone and actually been fine.”

She scowled at him.

He laughed. “And that expression just proves it. People who are having fun do not scowl like that.”

“I hardly see how your life leaves much time for fun, ether,” Sara said.

“Ah, but you see, I love baseball. Sure, the travel is killer, and turning the Saints around isn’t easy. That doesn’t change the fact that it makes me smile every time I think about owning a baseball team. It’s one of my childhood dreams come true. So it’s fun. And surgery is fun, too.”

“Cutting people up is fun?”

“Fixing people is. Seeing someone walk again or compete again because of me, that’s better than fun. So here’s what I’m proposing. You need some fun. You need something that makes you happy. I can help you with that.”

“Oh, so you’ll sleep with me to make me happy?”

“Well, based on past experience it will make me pretty happy, too. It’s a win–win situation. But I’m not just talking about sex. You’re so busy running around trying to fix everything for everyone and keep control. You need someone who wants to make your life easier for a change.”

“You think you make things easier?”

“I think I can. And we can see what happens from there. So what do you say? Want to give it a whirl? Let me be your … guardian angel.”

“Guardian angel?” Her eyebrows rose. “Trying to earn your wings, Dr. Angelo?”

“You’re the one with wings,” he said. “I just want to … make you smile. Give you some time out.”

Make her smile. Make things easier. Damn. He certainly knew which buttons to push. “I don’t think guardian angels sleep with their … um, what do you call it? Charges?”

“I’m a modern angel,” he said with another smile. “Whatever it takes to make my girl happy.”

“I didn’t think guardian angels were quite so cocky,” she shot back. And she didn’t think they were hot, either. He was much more your basic fallen-angel model, tempting her onto the wrong path. Only it didn’t feel wrong. It felt very, very tempting.

“I’m not cocky, I’m optimistic. After all, you haven’t said yes, yet.”

“And what happens if this all goes wrong?”

“Then I’d hope that I’d behave like any good angel and do the honorable thing. Bow out gracefully.”

Which would be easy for him to do, because if things went wrong between them, it was likely that she’d be the one doing the one-way ticket to hell. She chewed her lip. “I like you, Lucas. You know that, but I can’t lose this job.”