The Colors of Love (4 page)

The cat stepped closer warily, and Alex wondered if Jamila's voice had the same effect on Sara's cat as it did on him.

Whether it was the voice or the tuna, Squiggles stepped close enough that Jamila was able to sweep him into her arms. As she stood, Alex saw her do something to her shirt to wrap a loose fold around the cat.

So she wasn't hard-hearted, but she wasn't exactly a responsible adult either. Stumbling around in a back alley in the rain, looking for a kitten with a can of tuna because a child was worried about it. Alex figured she was somewhere in her mid-twenties, but she hadn't the sense to carry an umbrella in the rain, or to pack a flashlight in her car.

She was soaking wet. Cold, too—she must be.

"Come on," he said, reaching for her. "We've got to get you out of this rain."

When she laughed, the cat must have been as startled as Alex was, because it twisted in her arms and leapt for freedom. Alex dropped the umbrella and grabbed, caught a paw, and felt claws dig into the back of his hand. Then his arms got tangled with Jamila's and he felt the softness of a woman's breast as he reached for the cat again and missed.

He heard Jamila gasp, felt her begin to fall, and grabbed hard, his flashlight tumbling to the ground where its beam shone an ineffectual streak along the gravel.

"Are you all right? Jamila?"

She was tall, lean and soft all at once, encased in wet, clinging clothes. He felt the damp, the woman, and unbelievably, a squirming cat caught between them.

"I—Yes." Her voice was breathless. "We'd better get—the cat will..."

"Into the car. Have you got a solid hold on him?"

"I think—there, yes. I've got him."

He released her, stepping back, realized with a shock that he didn't want to let her go. "My car," he said, deliberately busying himself with picking up the flashlight, retrieving his umbrella. He sheltered her with the umbrella, though she was so wet now he didn't suppose it could make any difference. "We'll take my car."

He grasped her elbow and shone the light ahead for her. He felt her head twist as she looked at him, forced himself not to turn
his
head. How the hell could her provocative scent rise to his nostrils with rain pelting down all around them?

"I think my sister can take the cat," he said, although it must have been four in the morning by now, a hell of a time to go pounding on anyone's door.

"I'll take him," she said. "It's my responsibility. I'll look after him."

As they rounded the corner of the building, the streetlights took over the job of Alex's flashlight and he switched it off. "Have you got litter? Cat food?"

"I'll stop at a convenience store." She gestured toward an elderly hatchback. "Here's my car."

He wondered about the brakes, the battery, the tires. Any woman who didn't think to bring an umbrella out onto the street wasn't likely to worry about maintenance schedules, although perhaps she had a husband who did that for her, or a lover.

"You can't drive that."

"Of course I can." She shifted the cat, reaching into a pocket he hadn't realized was concealed in the soaking folds of her shirt. He couldn't see colors under these lights, but knew the red of her lips must be almost purple. He was certain he could see her body trembling with cold.

"You can't hold the cat and drive at the same time. Some cats panic in a moving car. It's not safe to drive with an uncontrolled cat freaking out all over your car. My car's down here. I'll take you to my place, get you dry—"

"My place. I live just across the Ballard Bridge."

"You're wet. You need to get dry, get some hot liquid inside you, or you'll—"

"I'm not a child." She sounded tense, or perhaps tired, but she followed him to his car. "You're obviously used to managing people, Dr. Kent, but I'm not accustomed to being managed anymore."

Anymore.
He wondered about that as he unlocked the passenger door of his BMW. Then he searched through his trunk, hoping for a forgotten blanket to put over her shoulders. He couldn't find one, and knew it probably wouldn't help much anyway. She needed to get those wet clothes off. He stowed the umbrella in the backseat, slid into the driver's seat, and started the car.

"We'll have heat in a minute," he said.

The cat in her arms began to meow plaintively. "Easy, Squiggles," she murmured. "I'll have you home in five minutes, then I'll wrap you in a big towel and get you dry."

She was the one who needed a big towel, thought Alex as he pulled out of the parking space. Unfortunately, his imagination immediately provided a vivid visual and tactile image of wrapping a naked Jamila in a giant, absorbent towel, then gently rubbing and stroking her soft flesh through the towel until she was completely dry. Until she breathed his name with desire as he—

"Darn," she muttered. "I left the tuna in the alley. Can you drive around?"

"What?" Bloody hell! He had to stop this. She was soaking wet, her passionate hair hanging in dripping ringlets around her face, her green eyes a dark mystery in the muted light from his dash, and for once he couldn't seem to smell the scent that had stirred him so easily earlier. So why the hell couldn't he stop thinking about touching her?

"It'll take only a minute," she said. "Just around the corner."

The car was a mistake. Alone in the car with her, it was worse, far worse. He pulled a U-turn in the empty intersection and headed for the Ballard Bridge, telling himself grimly that he should have used his cell phone to call a taxi for her. He should have—

"You missed the turn! The tuna. I don't want to litter the alley. We'll have to drive over to Twenty-eighth Avenue now and loop back."

"You're going home."

"We can't leave it there. I don't want to litter the—"

"We're not stopping." He heard the fury in his voice and deliberately calmed himself. What was it about this woman that seemed to erode his sanity? "You're cold. You're wet. You need to get dry." He needed to get her out of his car, into her own home and behind a locked door.

"But I—"

"For—Let's try this conversation without the argument. Who used to manage you, Jamila?"

"Jamie. Everyone calls me Jamie."

For some incomprehensible reason, Alex felt an insane urge to stop his car and shake her. It must be chemistry, basic incompatibility. She certainly wasn't his type, but some sadistic trick of nature made her stir his hormones although she was everything he didn't want in his life—impulsive, careless, undependable.

Alex made certain he always knew what he wanted, and exactly how he intended to get it. When it came to women, he preferred his relationships slow and calm, giving him plenty of time to evaluate. But tonight, with this woman—

"Dr. Kent?"

He swallowed hard and fought off the image of his name,
Alex,
breathed from her lips in passion.

"What?" His voice came out as a growl where he'd meant it to be neutral, detached. This had to stop.
He
had to stop it. He was a mature man, not a randy teenager. He had years of discipline and control, and he could damned well manage one temporary, insane reaction to one inappropriate woman.

Think of Diana, he ordered himself but her image wouldn't come. He softened his voice, offering, "I'll go back and pick up the empty tin later."

"Thanks." She shifted, somehow snuggling deeper into the seat.

He should have offered her his jacket for warmth, hadn't thought of it. Too busy imagining her naked, he thought grimly. That made him the sort of man the nurses complained about over coffee in the hospital cafeteria, and it made less than no sense. He'd been seeing Diana for weeks, was drifting toward an intimate relationship.

He needed more than a rest. A vacation, maybe a month in the sun, somewhere he'd never been before. Tahiti, or Paris.

Jamila said, "The officer who took my statement said you planned to talk to the social worker about Sara."

"If that were so, it would be confidential information."

Just ahead on the right, he saw an all-night convenience store. If he didn't stop to get litter and cat food now, he'd end up getting it afterward, then bringing it back to her. She'd be wet from her shower, or perhaps from a hot bath. She would open the door wearing something colorful around her nude body, a thin robe with splashes of color, tied with its lapels crossed to leave the beginning of her cleavage visible to stir his imagination.

Christ! His imagination was doing fine without help! He swung the wheel and stopped his BMW outside the front door of Harry's 24-Hour Mini-Mart.

"Cat food," he said.

"I'll get it."

"No. Stay with the cat."

The kitten in her arms lifted his head and let out a plaintive meow, and she said, "I'll give you money. My purse—Oh, damn! It's in my car."

"Don't worry about it," he said, keeping his voice deliberately cold, reminding himself they were strangers, thrown together for an hour because of a child's worry about a stray kitten. "It's my donation to Sara's stray waif cause."

She smiled, but he didn't return it. He opened the door and slid out, then he shrugged out of his jacket.

"Take this," he said. "Wrap it around yourself."

Then he escaped into the convenience store.

* * *

Jamie's shirt clung to her shoulders and back damply, and every few seconds a bead of rainwater trickled from her scalp, down her neck and under her collar. She hadn't minded the rain when she was busy looking for the kitten, had told Dr. Kent the truth when she said she liked it. Rain created such interesting shadows. Painting rain was always an interesting challenge, creating motion on canvas, nature freshening the world with falling water, the mystery of everything that could be concealed or muted by falling rain.

Now, sitting in his car, she felt cold despite the warm air blasting from his heater. Under the wet folds of her clothing, her skin twitched with a discomfort his jacket wasn't going to help unless she stripped off first. If she put it on, the fabric would compress her wet shirt against her body and she'd soak the inside of his jacket.

She folded the jacket and placed it on the seat beside her. Squiggles had subsided again, might even be sleeping. Through the car window, she saw Dr. Kent inside the store, his white shirt showing wet spots from the rain as he talked with the man behind the counter. The man laughed, and the doctor smiled as he turned away. Then he was through the door, striding to the car carrying a plastic grocery bag.

When he opened the back door of the car to put the bag in, Squiggles leapt for freedom, digging a sharp claw into Jamie's forearm as she clutched the squirming cat.

Dr. Kent slammed the back door, then opened the front and slid into the driver's seat.

"Thanks for the jacket," she said, "but with my clothes so wet, I don't think—I'll have a hot bath when I get home."

His eyes flicked to her face, a hard glance filled with something deeply uncomfortable. She felt her face flush and swallowed a mouthful of dryness.

"You could wrap the cat in my jacket. I see you're having a struggle with him."

"We're almost at my place."

Mercifully, he looked away and started the car. Then, moments later, they crossed the Ballard Bridge and she was giving him instructions to her house. He followed the twists and turns she directed him through, then pulled the car up at the small, low, one-story house crowded between a waterfront warehouse and a shipyard.

"Thank you," she said, gripping Squiggles more tightly before she reached to open the door. "I'll visit Sara in the morning, and—"

But he'd already opened his door and was stepping around the front of the car, his umbrella open over his head. He caught the door as she opened it, so that she stood up into the shelter of his umbrella.

"I'm already soaking wet, I don't need—"

"Forget visiting the hospital. I'll tell Sara the cat's been found, that he's safe." Before she realized what was happening, he had grasped her elbow and steered her toward her front door. "I'll call you and let you know when I've made arrangements for the kitten, then I'll come pick him up."

She opened her mouth to speak, couldn't find words for a brief second, then managed,
"I'm
looking after the cat. Squiggles is staying with me. Sara can visit. She can—"

"You'll tire of them both."

"You think I'll throw the cat out?"

"I think you're feeling guilty because you hit a little girl with your car."

"Well, of course I am, anyone would. I want to help Sara, to—"

"You want to appease your uncomfortable guilt, but after a day or two Sara and her cat will become a chore. She doesn't need you in her life, making promises you don't mean, then disappearing."

"What gives you the right to—"

"Give me your keys. Let's get that door open before Squiggles escapes, then I'll go back and get your purse out of your car."

"I don't need you to get my purse. It's perfectly safe, locked in my trunk."

"Stop arguing."

"Stop trying to manage me," she snapped. He reached for her keys and she jerked her hand back. "I don't know where you get off with this patronizing attitude, but you're way out of line. I'll be going in to see Sara, and I don't need help with either the cat or my purse."

As she jammed her keys into the lock, the seemingly acquiescent Squiggles suddenly jerked into motion and fought for freedom. Jamie grabbed for the cat, missed, and grabbed again as he leapt for the ground. Then, somehow, Squiggles was twisting and squirming in Dr. Kent's hands, the open umbrella rolling on its spokes on the ground. Jamie saw the doctor shift and grab the cat by the scruff of the neck.

"Get the door open," he ordered.

She twisted the key in her lock and opened the door. As it swung open, he pushed her inside and stepped in with her, then slammed the door behind him.

"I don't—"

"Shut up. He scratched you."

"It's nothing."

"You'd better clean it, get some antiseptic on it. Where's your bathroom?"

She felt weird, rattled, as if something inside were urging her to scream... or to run. "Look, I'm fine. I'll wash the scratch. I'll put tea tree oil on it."