With a Little Help (13 page)

Troy reached for more pita bread. “Hey, this woman's really important to you, isn't she? When do I get to meet her?”

There was no way around it. “She'll be at the house when you drop me home.”

The other man's eyes widened. “She's living with you?”

“Not in the way you think.” Nate explained about the asbestos problem.

Troy looked unconvinced. “There are lots of ways to help without setting up house together.”

“We haven't set up house, damn it. For the time being, Emma's my live-in cook.”

His friend only smiled.

Nate was glad when Troy switched his attention to the meal. Emma wasn't important to Nate and she didn't want to be. Fine by him. He didn't need the complication, either. Nor was he thrilled to have his friends discussing his love life behind his back. Not that Emma was part of his love life.

In an attempt to stop his thoughts going round in circles, he drained his wineglass, intercepting a look from Troy. “Now what?”

“Nothing. I was thinking this
mohammara
is excellent. Does your Emma cook Lebanese food?”

“She can cook anything she sets her mind to,” Nate said, then realized he'd missed the key part of the question. “And she isn't my Emma.”

A waiter brought more pita bread and a dish of slow-cooked fava beans known as
fool,
richer and meatier than the fruit-based European dish of the same name. But Nate's appetite had vanished. He wished there were some way to get out of Troy driving him home. He could imagine the other man's response if he tried. Nate might as well announce his engagement to Emma.

Now there was an image he didn't need. After his disastrous near-engagement to Pamela, he should
have learned his lesson. Pam had been turned off by his lifestyle quickly enough. Emma was already antidoctor, so there was even less chance of anything happening between them.

Putting his ring on her finger made no sense. Yet the notion persisted. The only explanation must be his injured state. If his wrist wasn't so tender after the X-ray and Amy's examination this morning, he wouldn't be so vulnerable. Since he'd cut back on the painkillers, what he needed was another glass of the excellent red.

“Easy on that stuff,” Troy cautioned, watching him refill his glass.

“Why? I'm not driving.”

“Emma might not be happy if I have to carry you home.”

“You won't.” Nate took a defiant swallow, then asked himself what he was defying.

Troy toyed with his water glass. “If she does have a hold on you, is it really so bad? And don't tell me she doesn't. I've never seen you this uptight over any woman.”

Slowly Nate lowered the glass. “Okay, Emma's attractive and sexy as hell. But she's not looking for a relationship any more than I am.”

“You're thirty-five. You don't want a wife and family?”

“I didn't say that. I said she's not the one.”

“So the attraction's all on your side?”

“Yes.” As soon as he spoke, Nate saw the trap. “She hates doctors.”

Troy grinned. “How about racing drivers?”

“I won't always have this sling,” Nate grumbled.

“Spoken like a man who's got it bad.” Troy leaned closer. “You know what your trouble is?”

Nate kept a tight rein on his temper. “I'm sure you're going to tell me.”

Troy nodded. “You became a doctor so you could fix the world. This woman has a problem you're afraid you can't fix, so you're going to back off.”

“How the hell do I fix a lifelong dislike of the medical profession?”

“By showing her you aren't all alike. And making her want you as much as you want her.”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Painfully. Look, when I started to race, a more experienced driver told me you can't set records with your foot on the brake. It's time you took your foot off the brake, too. Either that, or pull into the pit and let the better man lap you.”

In spite of himself, Nate's mouth twitched. “Go to hell, Troy.”

His friend laughed. “Right behind you, buddy.”

 

E
MMA TOLD HERSELF SHE WASN'T
listening for Nate's return. Mixing the sticky dough to make rum and raisin brownies was a good way to work off her
frustration at being exiled from her business, not to distract her because she was worried about him.

She packed the mixture into a catering-size baking pan and placed it in the oven then looked around the kitchen. She'd cooked a roast vegetable frittata for dinner. The spicy chicken salad, savory tartlets,
arancini
balls and fancy cupcakes for tomorrow's job were done. Where the devil was Nate?

The brownies were cooling and she was cleaning the kitchen by the time she heard a car pull into the driveway. Glancing outside, she gave a low whistle at the sight of the gleaming red Ferrari. A dark-haired man climbed from the driver's seat, giving an impression of strength and purpose. He looked familiar, she thought, watching him walk around to the passenger side and help Nate out of the low-slung vehicle.

Joanna reached the front door before her. “Do you need any help, Nate?” she asked.

“I'm fine, thanks. Did Emma get settled in?”

Emma stepped out from behind the housekeeper. “Hours ago.” Hearing the disapproval in her voice, she added, “Joanna told me you were having the second X-ray, so I went ahead and moved into the housekeeper's suite. I hope that's all right.”

“It's what we agreed, isn't it?” Was it her imagination or did he walk up the steps less steadily than usual? Her heart flip-flopped. She moved aside to let him come in, aware of being appraised by the dark-haired man who'd brought Nate home.

He offered her his hand. “I'm Troy Lawler. You must be Emma. Good to meet you.”

His grip was like iron. Then it came to her where she'd seen him before. On the winner's podium. He was a famous racing driver. “Pleased to meet you, too.”

“Is Nate…” She was almost afraid to ask.

“He's fine. We had a rather long lunch.”

Nate had been drinking? She would have been angry with herself for caring about him if she hadn't been so relieved that he was otherwise all right. “Then the X-ray came out clear?”

“As a whistle.”

“Thank God,” she said, almost to herself.

“Some coffee might be a good idea,” Troy suggested.

Glad of something useful to do, she headed for the kitchen, hearing Nate and Troy talking as they went into the den.

Joanna joined her in the kitchen. “Did Troy just say Nate's wrist isn't fractured?”

Emma busied herself with the coffee machine. “The X-ray came out clear.”

“Just as well. If he stays away from the hospital for much longer, I might have to hurt him myself.”

But the shaky smile she shot Emma told its own story. The housekeeper had been worried about Nate, too. Too? Okay, so it was natural to be concerned about a friend. That didn't mean anything else was
going on. “How does Troy like his coffee?” she asked.

“Black, strong, three sugars,” Joanna supplied.

“Three?”

“He says he needs the energy.”

To Emma, the racing driver looked like a bundle of barely leashed energy as it was. Maybe it was the caffeine.

“Now we know it's good news, I can head home for the day,” Joanna said.

When the housekeeper had gone, Emma made the coffee along with Nate's macchiato, and carried them to the den.

Nate sat on the couch, his feet planted wide apart. Troy was perched on the arm of a chair. Both thanked her when she delivered the coffee, but as she turned to go, Nate said, “You're not the hired help, Emma. Why don't you join us?”

“Yes, join us, Emma,” Troy echoed.

“I'll get myself some tea.”

She was back in minutes with a cup of herbal tea. The only place she could put her cup within reach on the coffee table was beside Nate. Awareness of him shot through her as she settled into a corner of the sofa. “I've followed your career for years,” she told Troy.

“And?”

Not sure what he expected, she added, “I don't know how you manage to go so fast.”

“Sometimes too fast,” she heard Nate mutter.

Troy pointedly ignored the gibe. “Have you ever been trackside during a race?” She shook her head. “If you ever want to, I'll arrange a VIP pass for you when I'm racing.”

“Thanks, it might be fun, after seeing you on television.”

He gave a theatrical sigh. “Story of my life. All the beautiful women are watching me at home.”

She seriously doubted he was short of female company, not looking the way he did and with a profession most women regarded as a turn-on. There was no doubt he was an attractive man, but he wasn't… Nate.

“What did Dr. Lester say about your arm?” she asked to divert her thoughts.

“She says I'll live. No sign of an occult fracture.”

“That's good news, isn't it?” He didn't sound as pleased as she would have expected.

He nursed his coffee. “Depends.”

“Aren't you keen to get back to work?”

“Of course. But I won't have full use of my hand for two or three more weeks.”

What was going on here? Was it the wine talking? She couldn't believe he actually wanted more time to himself. Up to now, she'd thought he was chafing at the bit to return to performing surgery, but it sounded more like he enjoyed having an excuse to stay home.
If she hadn't known better, she'd think he wanted to be with her. She stood. “I'd better get back to the kitchen. Will you be staying for dinner, Troy?”

“Yes,” he said.

At the same moment, Nate said, “No.”

The racing driver shrugged. “Looks like I'm outvoted.”

Nate nodded. “Thanks for the ride home. Don't slam the door on your way out.”

A
FTER THE OTHER MAN LEFT,
Emma's look went to Nate. “Wasn't that a bit harsh?”

“I've had a god-awful day. I'm in pain. And yes, it probably was. Troy can cope, so don't waste your concern on him.”

“I'm not. I'm more worried about what's got into you. You've been in pain for days and it hasn't turned you into such a bear. How much did you have to drink at lunch?”

“Three glasses of red wine. Clinical symptoms—mild euphoria, decreased inhibitions, diminution of judgment and control, mild sensory-motor impairment.”

“And rudeness to your friends, evidently. Maybe you need to lie down.”

He angled a smile at her. “Is that an invitation?”

Her breath caught, but she snapped back, “In your dreams.”

“How did you know?” He got up from the couch and came nearer, his breath becoming a soft wind on her face. Her heart pounded. She should go back to the sanctuary of the housekeeper's suite. But her
feet stayed stubbornly glued to the carpet, and she didn't resist when Nate's good arm came around her, pulling her closer.

She'd never had much patience with intoxicated men, but this,
this
was different. She sensed the wine was his excuse for something he'd wanted to do all along.

His apparent unsteadiness didn't apply to his hold on her, she noticed. His grip was unyielding, his mouth barely inches above hers. When he kissed her, the intensity shook her. Like touching a live wire, she felt the impact all the way to the soles of her feet. Could she possibly look as dazed as she felt?

Evidently she could. When he drew his mouth away, his look seared her, the hunger in his gaze shocking and thrilling her. “Emma.”

The whispered sound of her name should have brought her to her senses. Instead she felt herself going under and couldn't manage to fight the sensation. Rising onto her toes, she claimed his mouth, winding her arm around his neck to seal the kiss. Wildfire raged through her, pooling as heat deep inside.

He'd kissed her before but not with such demand. Her heartbeat triple-timed. Her breathing clogged. Speech froze. She simply took.

 

H
E WAS ON FIRE.
N
ATE KNEW
he should stop before he frightened her off. Yet she didn't seem scared. She
wound around him like strands of DNA, all eagerness, all softness. She made his body react in ways he wouldn't be able to control for much longer.

Blaming Troy was a cop-out. The jealousy gripping Nate was his alone. All Troy had done by his presence was make Nate face the truth. He didn't want a future with Emma, but he didn't want any other man having her, either. Seeing Troy flirting with her with his talk of trackside passes to watch him race had made Nate mad enough to do bodily harm.

So much for his Hippocratic oath.

Nor could he blame the wine for taking the edge off his caution. Around Emma, caution was history anyway. Despite all the reasons this wasn't a good idea, he wanted her. Wanted his fingers in her hair and her body molded against him. Wanted to lose himself in her. Where were two good hands when he needed them?

When she'd asked if he wanted to get back to work, he'd actually had to think about the answer. For as long as he could remember, he'd lived to perform surgery. But until now he'd never had anyone at home worth spending time with. Now there was Emma. And nowhere else he'd rather be.

The novelty rocked him, making him deepen the kiss. He heard her sharp intake of breath and felt her responses shimmy through her. When his
tongue flicked over her lips, she parted them and he plunged.

She tasted of herbal tea, home-baked bread and woman. And sex. Hell. He lifted his head. There was no getting around his growing need to do more than kiss her. He wanted to touch her everywhere, lose himself inside her.

When she dropped her head back, he let his mouth roam greedily over the expanse of her throat and down to where the open buttons of her shirt revealed a tempting cleavage. As he explored, her breath caught and he felt her fingers scrape over his hair.

Needing more, he freed his arm from the sling and rested his splinted wrist against her nape while he slid his good hand inside her shirt, over tantalizing wisps of lace, until his fingers found their target. He kneaded and caressed, her lushness, her softness making his blood sing.

He was about to sweep her into his arms and carry her to the bed to continue where he'd left off yesterday, but stopped. He couldn't carry her anywhere.

Desire warred with a frustration so deep it felt like pain.

 

E
MMA STARED AT HIM.
“W
HY DID
you stop?”

He indicated the splint. “I'm not much good to you like this.”

“You were doing fine.”

“That was only a kiss.”

There was nothing
only
about what he'd done to her. A kiss was the meeting of lips, the mingling of breath. His kiss was sex on a stick. “Didn't you say you could improvise?”

His dark look fired her blood. “You remember that?”

“Some things you don't forget.” Her eyes gleamed. “Unless it was all talk.”

A low protest started in his throat. “Who are you calling all talk?”

She lifted her palm to his cheek. “If the shoe fits…”

Turning his head, he nipped the fleshy heel of her hand. She dragged in a breath as raw need poured through her.

Through him, too, she saw. “Do you know what you do to me, Emma?”

“Rile you, resist you, second-guess you.”

“All the above, but mainly drive me crazy.” Desire glittered in his eyes. “I've never walked away from a challenge yet.”

Is that what she was? Did she want to be loved by him as some unbeatable foe? What would be left once he'd claimed her? They'd be as far apart as ever. How could she live with the everyday, after he'd shown her paradise?

His lips roved over her face. “You're thinking again.”

“I need to. Just…give me a moment.” Almost impossible with her mind in such turmoil.

“If you have doubts…”

She pressed a finger to his lips, silencing him. “Not about this.”

He nibbled the sensitive pads, eliciting another gasp. “Then what?”

“Us.”

“I'm not asking for promises, Emma.”

Nor was he offering any. But nobody said anything about mindless, showstopping sex. Could that work for her? Maybe it was the only thing that could.

“Yes,” she said, her breath rushing out.

He didn't waste any more time on words, but used his good hand to push her shirt off her shoulders. She removed her bra and he bent to kiss her breasts. Burning with need, she eased her pants down her hips to pool on the floor.

His fingers feathered down her spine, eliciting a wave of tremors, then hooked inside the waist of her panties until he was cupping her behind, dragging her against his erection and making the blood thrum in her ears.

“I'll need help with my shirt,” he said, his voice thickening.

Her hands shook as she undid the buttons and rested her palms against his chest. She fumbled with his belt buckle until she worked out the secret, then laughed.

“What's so funny?” he demanded.

“Is this what it's like for a man when he has to deal with a bra?”

He swatted her rear playfully. “Leading question. Let's see how you do with the zipper.”

“You think I'm not up for the challenge?” Flicking her tongue to the corner of her mouth, she unzipped him and he kicked his pants aside. A scattering of hair teased her skin as, with calculated slowness, she helped him ease his shorts off, hearing him groan.

Desire ripped through her as he pulled her backward with him. He landed on the wide leather sofa with Emma on top. She saw his look of alarm. “Did I hurt your arm?”

As they fell he'd braced his splinted wrist along the sofa back. “My arm isn't the problem. If you keep moving, we won't get to second base.”

A sense of power rushed through her. Deliberately she sat up, her knees on either side of his hips, and trailed her hands down his flanks as far as she could reach. He bucked, swore, steadied.

“You told me to improvise,” she said primly.

“I didn't say you could kill me.”

Her need for him was close to killing her. Passion drugged her, the power to excite him thrilled her. He was hers to command, but she was also his. Did he know? His dark gaze betrayed little, but the tension she felt in his muscles was more revealing. She leaned forward and kissed him.

It wasn't a kiss so much as a full-blown battering of her senses. At last he dragged his mouth away and moved lower to taste her breasts, insatiable, questing.

When he groped next to the sofa for his pants, she thought for a panicky moment he might be getting dressed, and everything in her screamed in denial. But he took a square of foil out of his wallet. “Before you say anything, this has been here for a while.”

He wanted her to know this wasn't a habit, she thought, exultant that he felt the need to tell her.

Using his teeth, he ripped the foil open and handed the packet to her. Again, power thrilled through her as she wriggled down his thighs to sheathe him.

His back arched. “Now, Emma.”

All instinct, she lifted herself to take him into her. But nothing prepared her for the onslaught of sensation as he drove deep inside her, sending her senses whirling.

 

U
SED TO BEING THE ONE IN
control, Nate had to fight the urge to roll Emma over to finish what they'd started, but his wrist couldn't take the strain. He wasn't sure the rest of him could, either. She was driving him crazy, every touch sending his pulses into the stratosphere and his heart into an unsafe rhythm. But with her, he didn't want safety. He wanted, needed, to possess her. Now.

Her cry as he moved inside her almost made him
pause until he saw the wild-eyed pleasure in her expression. Her gaze went unfocused and she began to move with him, riding the peaks and valleys of desire like a surfer on a tumultuous ocean.

Slowly, slowly, he cautioned himself. Might as well have tried to hold back a raging tiger with his bare hands. With an effort, he made himself ease back and look at the sheer beauty of her poised over him, her lushness open to him like the fulfillment of a dream.

Her hair had come loose and flowed to her shoulders, over his hand like silk. He fisted his fingers through the mass, hearing her make a quiet sound of pleasure that echoed deep within him.

“Yes, Nate, yes.”

The plea shattered his fragile control and he began to move again, began to share everything he was with her, taking everything she was in return.

The waves took them higher, roaring in his ears as he carried her with him, until, with a cry wrenched from deep inside, he brought them both crashing down. Panting, she lay across his chest, her skin sleek with heat. But he wasn't done yet.

Sliding his hand between them, he heard her catch her breath, then saw her eyes widen as his fingers went to work. The touch that could massage life back into a still heart worked its own kind of magic. He felt her heart drumming against his chest as the waves took her again, lifting her until she crested the last
breaker on a mindless cry before collapsing into his embrace.

His eyelids drooped but he kept hold of her, not ready to abandon a closeness he'd never known he needed before Emma. No promises, he'd said. Who was he fooling? Her, he hoped. Certainly not himself.

He wanted and needed her, not only in his bed, but in his life. If she had the slightest clue, she'd be out of here in a heartbeat. And if he had any sense, he'd let her go.

This, whatever it was between them, was a one-way ticket to impossible. He couldn't give up medicine any more than he could willingly stop breathing. Like his mother, Emma wasn't prepared to be married to a doctor and he couldn't blame her. He'd seen how his mother suffered. How could he do that to a woman he…liked as much as Emma?

Why wasn't there some middle ground?

“Nate?”

Her soft voice punctured his thoughts. He found himself stroking her hair as she lay across his chest. “What?”

“This changes everything, doesn't it?”

With an effort, he made his tone light. “We don't want it to, do we?”

Her sigh whispered against him. “No.”

She sounded about as convinced as he felt. He almost made the mistake of asking if she'd changed
her mind about them, about a future together. Then realized the gentle purr he could hear was her. She had drifted off to sleep.

That was supposed to be his act. Yet he didn't feel sleepy. Sex as hard, fast and satisfying as this usually put him out like a light. Instead, his mind reeled. Careful not to disturb her, he pulled the throw from the back of the sofa over them both, angling his splinted wrist against his body. She moved slightly, her hair spilling over his hand, more soothing than any medication.

He looked down at her, wondering what the hell he was going to do about her.

 

T
HE INSISTENT RING TONE
of Blondie's “Eat to the Beat” dragged Emma out of a delicious dream where she was entwined with a naked man, his arm clamped around her. Struggling to surface, she realized she was entwined…with Nate, and he was fast asleep. The memory of last night flooded back in mind-splintering detail.

Before her cell phone could wake him, she levered herself off the couch—and him. She grabbed his shirt, draping it around her as she located the phone in the kitchen.

It was Sophie and she sounded miserable. “I can't come to work today, Em. I have the migraine from hell.”

“What time is it?”

“Just after six. Did I wake you?”

Through the open door of the den, Emma could see Nate on the sofa, the throw rug barely covering his magnificent body. She gulped air, remembering how his hardness had felt against her softness. “It's time I was awake.” Joanna would be arriving at eight. The thought of how she might have found them made heat surge into Emma's face. “I'm sorry you're not well.”