Sleeping with the Playboy (5 page)

She gazed directly at him, incredulous. “You don't give up, do you?”

“Nope.”

Eric Clapton's “Layla” started to play in the other room, its sexy rhythm lightening the tension-filled silence. Donovan watched Jocelyn lean against the wrought iron back of the bar stool. Her lips were glossy from the cherry sauce.

What he wouldn't give to taste the flavor of those sweet, sticky lips….

His body began to react tumultuously to the image of his mouth on hers, so he swerved his thoughts back around to what he and Jocelyn had been talking about a few seconds ago. He'd asked her a question and she hadn't answered it.

He waited.

And waited.

She poked a chicken ball and swirled it around in the red sauce. “All right, if you must know, I used to be involved with a doctor, years ago. Only he wasn't a doctor at the time. He was in medical school.”

“What, the guy was a jerk, so all doctors are jerks? Or you're not over him, and I remind you of it?”

“No, it's neither of those things.”

“What is it then?”

Lord, talking to her was like getting blood from a stone.

She took a drink. “We lived together when he was going through school, and I supported both of us while I put off going to the police academy. Then, as soon as he graduated, he dumped me and went off to marry a rich debutante, and basically changed his whole identity. He bought a Mercedes Benz, started going to the opera and ballet, when he was never into that sort of thing with me. We used to go to hockey games and sports pubs where the draft was cheap. I guess the worst part was that he'd been seeing this woman while he was still with me. He lied to me and left me with all the debt I'd incurred to support us while he was in school, and never looked back. I met him once a couple of years ago in a bookstore, and he was with his wife. He never even
acknowledged me. They treated me like I was dirt under their shoes—in another class far below them.”

“So that's why you disapprove of me? You think that just because I own a penthouse and go to the opera occasionally, I'm a stuffed shirt?”

He hoped she realized how mistaken she was. He didn't grow up with this wealth. He had come into it later when he would have given anything to trade it for what he had lost. God, he'd trade all of it today and live like a pauper, if it would mean he could erase the tragedy from his childhood, and see and touch the parents he never really knew. Even just for an instant.

He swallowed over the aching sense of loss that still lived deep inside him—the fleeting, vague memories, like little fragments of a dream: his mother's loving smile, his father's boisterous laughter as he swung Donovan around in circles. If only he could remember more…

He brushed the grief aside, like he'd learned to do years and years ago, and brought himself back to the present.

“It's not just that.” Jocelyn gestured around the room with a hand. “Tom became a doctor to have this very thing. For the prestige. It had nothing to do with wanting to help people. This kind of lifestyle was more important to him than any person ever could be.”

“I see, and because I'm a successful doctor and live alone and have women leaving messages on my answering machine, I don't care about people, either?”

She shrugged.

“You really don't know much about me, Jocelyn. You realize that, don't you?”

Nodding, she seemed to agree. He was glad. Maybe he'd give her the whole story sometime.

“I said I was sorry before,” she replied. “Old habits and values die hard, that's all.”

Donovan gazed at her face while she fiddled with her food. She'd barely eaten half of what was on her plate.

“Look,” he said, “I didn't mean to put you on the spot or make you feel bad or anything.”

“I don't feel bad.”

He lightened his tone, smiling. “Yes, you do.”

Thank goodness she smiled, too. She picked up her fortune cookie, wrapped in plastic, and hurled it across the corner of the island to hit him in the chest. “I don't.”

Donovan laughed. “Okay, okay.” He looked at the cookie in his hand. “Is this yours or mine? I don't want to mess with fate and get the wrong fortune.”

She picked up the other one. “It's yours. I want this one.”

They both opened their packets. “What does yours say?” he asked.

“It says, ‘You are a deep, complex individual.' What about yours?”

“Hmm. Let me see.” He broke the cookie and unfurled the little piece of paper. “Wow. It says, ‘You're going to get lucky tonight.' What do you think it means by that?”

Her face lit up like a baseball park at night. “Let me see that!” She grabbed it out of his hands. “It
does not say that you big jerk! It says ‘You like to fix things.'”

She handed it back to him, then rose to clean away the dishes and put the leftovers in the fridge. “Nice try though.”

Donovan watched her from behind. Unfortunately, not nice enough.

H
e was a brilliant heart surgeon, Jocelyn learned from just about everyone she talked to about Donovan at the hospital. The best around. Nice man, too, they all said, including the nurses, who didn't seem to imply that he ever tried to make moves on them, which was somewhat surprising to Jocelyn, considering how many moves he'd tried to make on her the past couple of days.

The thought sent a shiver dancing down her spine, as she sat in Donovan's waiting room reading a magazine and remembering all the times he'd given her “that look.”

It was like he thought she was hot stuff….

Another shiver went down her spine, close on the trail of the first one.

She couldn't deny that she enjoyed those looks from him. It was flattering, especially because she'd
never imagined herself as “hot.” She wore plain suits and flat shoes to work, sensible cotton underwear. She had a conservative shoulder-length hair cut, and she was definitely
not
a flirt. In fact, she made a conscious effort
not
to give off signals—at least the kind that alerted hungry male hormones to a potential meal. She didn't spread her scent around. Consequently, she was dull. Downright dull.

In her defense, being dull came with the job. She didn't go places with her principals to be a part of their social lives. She wanted to blend in, to be polite and generally not speak unless spoken to, and where possible be invisible. In addition to that, she had to be paranoid all the time and keep an attitude that no one was to be trusted, which didn't exactly make her Miss Charisma at social functions.

Hence—she was dull.

Jocelyn lowered her magazine, feeling suddenly dissatisfied. Throughout her life, it seemed like she'd always made a conscious effort to be dull, whether it was in the way she dressed or the way she talked.

Why? Was it because she'd grown up being pushed to act cute in front of the neighbors and wear fancy dresses with lace, her hair in shiny curls? Was it because that was the only time anyone seemed to approve of her—when her appearance was perfect or noteworthy—and this was some sort of rebellion against that kind of shallow thinking?

She continued to flip through the fashion magazine, looking at all the skinny, glamorous models with big hair and small boobs.
Blah.
She didn't want to compare herself to them. She'd spent her whole life reminding herself that it was what was on the inside that mattered….

She shut the magazine and tossed it onto the table in front of her chair, thinking more about Donovan and the way he flirted with her.

How long had it been since she'd had a date with a man? she wondered. Ages. Sure, she went out with her professional colleagues for a beer occasionally, and they were mostly men, but those weren't dates. They all treated her like one of the guys.

It was the female signal thing.

She wouldn't know how to send one out if her life depended on it.

Not that it did.

Yet, Donovan was responding to something….

The door to his office opened, and a middle-aged woman walked out. Donovan, wearing a cotton shirt and jeans and sneakers beneath his lab coat, followed her out. She stopped at the reception desk to speak to the nurse, and was laughing at something Donovan was saying to her.

Carrying his clipboard, he turned away from her and said, “Enjoy yourself at the golf tournament, Marion.”

He was certainly charming, and very caring with his patients. He seemed less and less like Tom every day. No wonder everyone liked him.

He passed through the waiting room and glanced down at Jocelyn—who sat in a chair like the other patients—and winked at her.

Heat licked all the way down to her toes and back up again. She forced herself to smile politely and open up another magazine, but God! He was so gorgeous! She couldn't breathe. She didn't have a clue what she was even looking at. Ads? Articles? Little green men?

Jocelyn cleared her throat and tried to calm her clanging heart, but she couldn't. She discreetly glanced around the quiet room, wondering if anyone else could hear it. Apparently not.

She watched Donovan invite the next patient in—an elderly gentleman with a walker.

“George, how are we doing today?” Donovan said to the man, just before he closed the door behind him.

Jocelyn continued to flip idly through her magazine, repeating to herself over and over in her head: He's your client, you idiot. Your client, your client, your client.

 

Contrary to Donovan's usual routine of taking the El to work and back, they started taking his car, as Jocelyn didn't feel it was safe to walk to the train at the same time each day, nor to stand in the crowded compartment, where anyone could pull a knife without warning and be gone just as fast.

In the parking lot after work, she conducted her usual vehicle search before allowing Donovan to get in. She began by checking the small pieces of tape she routinely affixed at inconspicuous spots along the door, hood and trunk openings, to detect if the vehicle had been tampered with during the day. Then she proceeded with a detailed search of the interior and exterior of the car, looking for trip wires, stripped screws, leaking fluids and such. Donovan waited nearby, watching.

She gave the vehicle a clean bill of health and got in. Donovan got behind the wheel and they headed home.

“How about dinner and the theater tonight?” he
asked her, shifting gears and gaining speed out on the road.

The question caught her off guard. Principals didn't usually ask her to dinner with them—not phrased like that anyway.

He gave her a perceptive, sidelong glance, taking his eyes off the road only for a brief second. “Sorry. What I should have said is, ‘I'm going to eat out tonight and take in a play. I'll need you to work late.'”

Jocelyn smiled, appreciating his courteous rephrasing of the invitation. “Yes, sir.”

“I'd like to go to an upscale place for dinner, so if you're going to fit in, you won't be able to wear that.”

She glanced down at her suit. “Uh, I don't really have anything with me that's—”

“We'll get something for you on the way home.” He turned down a street in the opposite direction from where he lived.

“Really, you don't have to buy me clothes,” Jocelyn said. “We can stop by my apartment and I can pick something up.”

“You live on the other side of town. This'll be much quicker. I know a great spot.”

She reluctantly agreed, and they drove down a narrow, tree-lined street. Donovan pulled up in front of an exclusive ladies' boutique on the bottom floor of a late-Victorian mansion, and turned off the car. “What are you…a size five?”

“Seven, actually,” she replied awkwardly.

“Great. Let's go.”

He led the way in, and bells chimed over the door as they entered. An older lady with her hair in a bun,
wearing a pale yellow silk suit and pearls, approached. “Dr. Knight, what a pleasure. What can I help you with today?”

They know him here?

“Actually, Doris, you can help my friend. We're going to La Perla tonight.”

“Lovely.” She turned her warm gaze on Jocelyn, who felt more than a little out of place in this high-end clothing shop. It was not a place she would ever set foot in on her own.

“I have some stunning gowns over here that would look wonderful on you,” Doris said. She gestured for Jocelyn to follow. Donovan followed, too. Doris picked a gold, sequined dress off a brass rack. “What about this?”

Jocelyn glanced down at the tag. The dress cost nine hundred and fifty dollars. Good God. “Uh, that might be a little too…”

“Too flashy?” Doris said. “I understand. What about this?” The smiling woman moved to another rack and presented a deep crimson off-the-shoulder dress. It was twelve hundred dollars.

Jocelyn touched her index finger to her lips. “That, I think, is…um…”

“Not the right color?”

Not the right price!
“Yes, exactly.”

“Okay, I think I know exactly what you're looking for.” Doris moved to the corner of the boutique and found a black, sleeveless, curve-hugging dress with a train. “Perfect for La Perla.”

“Perfect for Jocelyn,” Donovan said, moving past her and touching the delicate fabric.

Jocelyn didn't dare look at the price tag on that
one. The odd thing was, Donovan didn't look at it, either.

She shook her head in utter disbelief.
The rich.

Feeling more than a little uncomfortable with all this, Jocelyn looped her arm through Donovan's and gently pulled him away from Doris. “Could I have a word with you?” she whispered politely.

“Sure.” They moved behind a mannequin dressed in a sailing outfit.

“This is too much,” Jocelyn whispered. “I can't let you buy me a dress here.”

“Why not?” he asked innocently.

“Because it's too expensive. I couldn't possibly accept a gift like this.”

“It's not
that
expensive. Not relatively.”

“Relative to what?”

“To…to other shops. Really, twelve hundred's not that much for a dress like that.”

“What, twelve
thousand
would be more in line with what you'd call expensive?”

“Well, yeah.”

She felt the difference between them like a deep chasm at that moment. Twelve hundred dollars was pocket change to him.

“And how do you know about prices of dresses anyway?” she asked, still whispering. “And how does Doris know your name? Do you often come here to buy clothes for your lady friends? The ones who leave messages on your answering machine? The ones you never call back?”

He raised his eyebrows, looking amused. “You sound jealous.”

“I am
not
jealous. I just find it odd that the clerk here knows you by name and—”

“What about this one?” Doris said, appearing unexpectedly behind Jocelyn, who felt her face color.

“I liked the other one better,” Donovan said.

Doris went away, and he took a step closer to Jocelyn to whisper in her ear. “Why don't you just try it on? I really want to see you in it.”

His hot, moist breath sent goose bumps tingling down her body. Oh, where was her iron hormonal resistance mechanism when she needed it?

“Why?” she asked. “This isn't a date we're going on. I'm just there for your security. You don't need to dress me up in something I guarantee I'll never wear again.”

“You said yourself that you need to blend in. This is appropriate for where we're going.”

Jocelyn gazed at his imploring expression for a long time, then remembered one of the strict rules of her profession:
It's not my job
should never be thought or spoken.

It was her duty to always ensure that her principal felt secure and comfortable, whether that meant raising an umbrella over his head if it started to rain, or making sure that his luggage didn't get lost on a flight across the country. In this case, if seeing her dressed to “fit in” with the clientele at the restaurant would make her principal feel more at ease, then she had to do as she was asked.

With a deep sigh of defeat, she raised her hands in the air. “All right, I'll try it on.”

“Thank you,” he whispered close to her ear, causing another torrent of goose bumps to tickle all over her skin.

Doris led her into an enormous wallpapered change room with a small mahogany table and lamp
inside, as well as a brocade settee. There were three pairs of patent leather shoes on a low shelf, for the customers to use.

Lord, this was not her life.

She tried on the floor-length gown, slipped the heels on her feet, then turned to look at herself in the mirror.

Good God.
Her heart almost skipped a beat. It had to be someone else's reflection she was looking at. The dress hugged all her curves—curves she wasn't even aware she possessed—and made her look sophisticated and radiant, like a movie star on the red carpet.
Like a woman.

A knock sounded at the dressing room door. “How are you doing?” Doris asked. “Can I get you anything?”

Feeling uncertain and turning around carefully—for she wasn't used to walking in high-heeled shoes—Jocelyn slowly grasped the crystal knob and stepped out. She tried to ignore how uncomfortable and ridiculous she felt.

Doris smiled and nodded. “That's the one.”

Jocelyn, who had kept her head down since she'd opened the door, finally looked up. Donovan's lazy gaze was moving slowly up and down the length of her body.

Her heart held still, waiting for what he would say, while she chided herself for letting it matter. She shouldn't care what she looked like in his eyes. In fact, she should hate the fact that he wanted to dress her up like her father used to do. She wasn't a doll or an ornament.

Yet, another part of her felt oddly liberated seeing herself this way. All through her life she had resisted
her natural urges to wear something pretty, to feel soft and feminine, because she didn't want to be valued for that. She wanted to be valued for something deeper.

Contemplatively, Donovan tilted his head to the side and stared into her eyes. “Yes, this is definitely the one.”

 

The restaurant was small, intimate and very romantic.

Located in the low-ceilinged basement of an old stone mansion in a quiet part of town, it was dimly lit with flickering candles and staffed with soft-spoken waiters in tuxedos. White-clothed tables—set with sparkling crystal wineglasses and shiny silver utensils—were spaced apart in little alcoves or surrounded by creeping ivy plants to provide privacy. It was the perfect place for a discreet affair.

Jocelyn had called ahead to arrange for cooperation regarding Donovan's security, and had ascertained that this would be a low-risk detail, judging by the floor plan the manager had faxed over to her. Still, she kept her gun strapped to her ankle and looked around the restaurant with discerning eyes as they were led to their table in the back corner.