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* * *
Dante swung the door of his office closed a little harder than he meant to, knocking a jacket off the hooks on the door. He left it. Max usually spent his evenings on the floor, which suited Dante—it meant he could have solitude in the office they shared whenever Dante wanted.
Lise wasn’t there. She hadn’t waited, and he’d been so certain she would. Worse, as much as he’d fiddled with her phone earlier tonight, he hadn’t gotten her number.
He couldn’t remember the last time he’d so misjudged someone. He’d given her exactly what she’d wanted, but she’d left anyway.
Had she left when Jefferson had finally decided to come groveling—something he felt confident he’d accomplished for her? He could check security tapes, but it didn’t really matter. Her decision. He was just angry about effectively being stood up by a woman who wanted him.
The phone in his pocket buzzed, interrupting one of his favorite pastimes—analyzing others—and he fished it out before flinging himself on the leather sofa he occasionally napped on between sets.
This wasn’t the emergency ringtone from his answering service or the hospital. He didn’t have to answer it right now—it could wait until tomorrow, or later.
One rule governed his time at the club: don’t violate the sanctuary. Don’t bring the outside in, don’t take the inside out. Lise’s appearance tonight had completely obliterated his rule.
Turning the screen up, he read a text from the latest Valentino wife—Cassie, married to his twin—with a request for a consult tomorrow at Seaside. His day off, but he never turned down those requests and texted back to confirm.
Lise being there had felt like a violation until he’d been completely turned on by her. But even as the thought came, he knew Lise wasn’t the reason he’d answered the text—she didn’t have his number either.
Over the past few months he’d watched all his brothers marry and start families. That was why he’d answered. Why he’d even opened the text after seeing who it was from. They all had bigger lives, which to him meant the possibility more things could go wrong and need fixing. Fixing problems was his primary role in the family.
Wives and kids meant more people to take care of. His circle had expanded from three to seven, with eight and nine still gestating. That kind of serious growth demanded more of his attention—even within the sanctuary.
He must be crazy even thinking about trying to increase those numbers further by finding a wife of his own. Not that he had the first clue as to how to go about it.
Another text came in before he could even drop the phone on the sofa, ripping a sigh from him. He stared at the polished black gadget in his hand for a full minute before he flipped it over and read the next message.
Santiago—middle brother—and his wife Saoirse requested he come to dinner tomorrow.
That one he didn’t have it in him to answer right now. Newlyweds. He was surrounded by newlyweds, and he heard from them all far more regularly than he had before they’d all coupled off. Had they organized efforts to take care of him? Because that was how he felt—irritatingly taken care of, the absolute last thing he needed. It would continue until he married. The last Valentino bachelor must be looked after...
The trauma they’d faced in childhood brought that compulsion out in all of them, maybe most in him, but his care had done the job—they were still together enough for him to feel overly tended.
In their shoes, Dante would’ve been doing the math—he’d never brought a woman to meet them, or dated one woman for any length of time. He’d never given it much thought until they’d all married off, and now he became aware of how he stuck out as single. But marriage was normal, expected. And keeping up appearances was always important.
Dropping the phone on the sofa, he laid his head back and closed his eyes, focusing on the between-sets music that got feet on the dance floor. That had gotten him and Lise on the dance floor.
Someone would knock if he fell asleep before the last set. Or if he lost track of time, fantasizing about stripping Lise of that hot dress.
He just wished he knew her better, knew whether her self-esteem would’ve let her leave with the man who’d stood her up and insulted her when he’d come groveling.
Jefferson had been easy. Lise, apparently, wasn’t as easy to figure out.
Now, what if he wanted to torture her for standing him up, make her regret and come groveling...
* * *
Monday morning, Dante stood at the scrub bay, looking over the team getting things ready for the morning’s surgery.
Lise wasn’t there.
He tilted his head to catch sight of the clock, his jaw tightening enough that he had to open his mouth to relieve it. Walking out at the club he could forgive. But being late for surgery?
“Carrasco. Dónde está Bradshaw?” The words flew out before he’d even fully realized his irritation. She was never late. What had changed? Just the kiss? Had she gone on another blind date then overslept in her last hurrah?
“Spanish today, Dr. Valentino?” She tilted her head, but answered, “I’ve not seen her.”
Spanish. At work. First time for everything.
It surprised him, but he couldn’t even pretend to himself that his irritation was all about her being late. He switched to English—control was important. “Has anyone heard from Bradshaw? She wouldn’t no-show.”
“I can call HR and scheduling, see if she’s called in,” Carrasco said.
Although she’d already scrubbed in to prep, and picking up a phone would mean she would have to scrub in again, Dante said, “Do it.”
A moment later, she was in the scrub bay, dialing.
Again Thursday’s question came: had Lise left with Jefferson?
That was four days ago. If she’d gotten into trouble that long ago...
He fumbled the scrub brush and it fell into the sink. Containing a sigh, he grabbed a new one and started over.
Carrasco spoke with someone, heard her confirm that Lise hadn’t called in.
“Not with HR,” she confirmed, and dialed another number.
He didn’t want another surgical nurse for this procedure. Lise was the best. He wanted Lise. Carrasco technically was also a surgical nurse, but he had Lise for today, it was on the schedule.
“I’m here!”
The sound of Lise’s voice had him turning from the sink, relief tinging his irritation so that he didn’t quite know how to feel, which of course ticked him off. “Couldn’t get out of bed this morning, Bradshaw?”
He took in her appearance, and he felt his neck heat. The too-big scrub top she always wore had been replaced by one with a different cut—one that wrapped over her chest like that dress had done.
She’d made the gray scrubs sexy.
“Nothing so restful as that.” She rushed around the small bay, getting what she’d need to start scrubbing. “I know I’m a little later than usual, but we’re still a good fifteen minutes from the start of the surgery...”
Dante didn’t want excuses. He also didn’t want to cause a scene at the hospital, even if she threw him off balance yet again. He wanted Old Lise, not the one who knocked him so hard she had him wondering if maybe he was the mark here.
She stepped to the open bay beside him and began the process of cleaning her hands.
Hair covered by scrub cap—how he always saw her. No makeup—but no lower face cover yet. He’d like the chance to look at her clean-faced—or grill her for an excuse. But it would have to wait.
If she hadn’t wanted to face him after their brief time at The Inferno, he’d put that straight to her. No reason they couldn’t be professional. It had been a little kissing, not as much as he admittedly still wanted, but they’d survive.
He exited the bay, leaving the nurses to finish scrubbing in. Another tech gowned and gloved him, and he took a moment to make sure everything was as he wanted before the patient arrived.
“Are you going to report in about your date last week?” another member of the team asked as soon as Lise stepped into the OR proper.
“No. It’s really not the time for that. If you want a report, I will be happy to make one after surgery.”
Voice tight. Posture stiff. Happy? Yeah, right. No way could he misread that reaction.
He just didn’t know whether it was Jefferson or their dancing making her unhappy now.
If the date had shown up he hadn’t made a better impression on her. Unless it was their dalliance making her unhappy.
What the devil was wrong with him? He’d never had this much trouble reading someone. At least, not since those early days on the cons that had almost gotten him arrested in his youth. Repetition had improved how well he could read between the lines, except when it came to Lise.
The door opened and in rolled the trolley with his patient on it, a woman in her thirties who had three children.
That was what he needed to focus on, doing well by this patient and her family. Never be the one who broke a family.
He always learned what he could about his patients so he could keep in mind what was riding on successful surgery. He took a moment to check with her, make sure she understood what the neuro-endoscopy entailed, and to reassure her again that he’d do his best. Things he always did for his patients, even those who didn’t have children at home or in the waiting room—or, as had been the case with him, waiting in the chapel, praying it all would go all right.
His gentle encouraging words delivered, he nodded to the anesthetist. The sooner their patient was unconscious, the sooner she’d stop worrying. And, he hoped, the sooner he’d have out the Rathke cleft cyst growing behind her pituitary gland.
One more tally removed from the ledger where he kept memories of his old ways, and he hoped to eventually get out of the red.
* * *
No sooner had Dante left the surgical suite than Sandy Carrasco repeated her earlier demand.
“Tell us how the date went.”
Lise had avoided thinking about the date all weekend, and that had included preparing what she was going to say when inevitably asked.
“Oh, just great, I guess.” Messing with rude people was a bad habit she’d apparently picked up from Dante.
When Sandy laughed, Lise went with it.
“I got a brand-new dress for the evening. Jefferson and I had spoken briefly on the phone a few days before and confirmed where we’d meet in texts—deciding on a club he liked. Since I never go to clubs, I got the new red dress. I arrived, went in on my own as he wasn’t waiting for me outside. Drank a mojito. Danced.”
“He was inside, waiting?”
“Oh, no. He wasn’t there, either. I amused myself. Mojitos. Dancing. Talking with a handsome musician.” Not. Dante. Don’t mention Dante. Then she laid out being stood up, the Large Woman nonsense, and that he’d tried to come after she’d sent him a picture of her red dress.
Confrontation wasn’t usually her thing, though it sometimes came with being truthful and direct about things—or when humiliated and inebriated. But sometimes, like right now, it came in handy.
Before Sandy could do anything but look embarrassed, Lise—having already discarded her surgical gown—gestured to the new well-fitted scrub top and her relatively flat tummy and waist.
“I’m not tiny. But I’m pretty sure Large doesn’t describe me. I tend to wear a ten in scrub bottoms and, of course, a higher size when I require a cut that accommodates disproportionate breasts. And before you get any ideas, I’m still counting that as my third date, so that’s only...”
She paused then and revulsion for the whole experience changed her mind. “Whoever was in charge of picking Bachelors Four and Five should cancel now. I’m done. Be disapproving all you like, but my plans don’t hinge on whether or not my coworkers approve of my decisions. And now, I apparently need to go be yelled at by Dr. Valentino. Please excuse me.”
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_a9efad36-b4c6-5217-844b-602e2054b84e)
THE DOOR TO the office Dante used when staffing the neurosurgery unit swung open. He looked up just as he flipped off his phone, and caught Lise closing the door behind her.
Brows pushed together, mouth actually turning down at the corners in a frown, posture stiff, hands balled into fists... She was either very angry or very worried.
Something other than unflappably calm for the first time ever in his presence at Buena Vista, but she’d also embraced another first—at least as far as he was concerned: No scrub cap. The silky blond locks he’d spent the weekend remembering the feel of on his hand had been braided around her head like a crown. She didn’t keep her hair just tucked up beneath those caps. Still nice.
But not what he should be focusing on.
She stepped in front of the chairs opposite the desk, appeared to think better of it, and moved around until she stood behind them again and dropped her hands onto the seatback.
Rather than question her, he let her get around to it. She knew why he’d summoned her.
When words again failed to come, she stepped around to the front again, but this time sat.
“Do you have a cat?” he asked, unable to help himself.
“Because I’m unmarried and twenty-nine? How many cats am I supposed to have at this point?”
“You just walked all the way around that chair about one and a half times before you sat down. My guess was either cat or a musical-chairs aficionado.”
“You’re funny today.” Yet she neither looked nor sounded amused.
“I was funny on Thursday too. You should’ve stuck around to find out.”
“If you said anything funny on Thursday, it would’ve been in some kind of Spanish purr and I wouldn’t have understood it anyway.”
Quiet Lise had been once more replaced by a snarky copy. She was there to entertain him, it seemed. But he had a plan for this meeting, so he moved past the cat conversation.
“Are you all right? You looked anxious when you came in. Afraid I was going to yell at you for your tardiness?”
“A little. And I just told off Sandy and called off the remaining fix-ups. Told them I didn’t need their approval to live my life. It was really...I don’t know, either empowered or rude. Maybe both.”
“Sometimes you have to be rude to get things done,” Dante murmured, leaning back in the other chair as he tried to decide how to handle this.
“You didn’t need to be rude to get things done.”
Her phone.
“I didn’t know you well enough to trust you.”
Getting off track.
“You’ve worked with me for two years.”
“And yet I barely know you.”
Rarely did he ever do anything in his adult life without having a plan for how it should work out. That was how he’d gotten through the time after his parents’ murders, through college and medical school, fellowships, even to securing a placement at his preferred hospital. His career path still had an ongoing plan. He had plans for the club, and a great manager to make those plans happen. The only goal he was flying blind with was on how to go about finding a wife with his particular marital complications.
It was time he had his own family. And he had to marry if he was to have a happy family.
