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“Hush, Foof!” the woman called. “You’re not supposed to bother the patients.”
“She’s not a patient, Susan.” Marc clasped the woman about the shoulders and guided her into the room. “She’s my temporary assistant. I found her tonight.” He indicated Mimi with a gesture. “Susan Merit, Miss…Baptiste.”
Mimi felt a twinge at the obvious fact that he couldn’t recall her first name. It was odd, though, that the twinge had begun some time before he’d spoken her name. Surely the fact that he had a wife didn’t bother her. She didn’t even like the aggravating sourpuss.
When she realized Marc and Susan had neared, she belatedly held out a hand. “It’s Mimi. Mimi Baptiste. Nice to meet you.”
Susan took her hand and squeezed, then glanced askance at Marc. “I know it’s hard to find help, sweetie, but bashing women over the head is just a little illegal.”
He grinned at Susan, and Mimi was struck by the sight. His smile transformed his features, making his good looks devastating. She swallowed hard. Maybe it was lucky the doctor was basically a grouch. Maybe he’d learned the hard way that he had to be a grouch, at least with female patients. Mimi decided his smiles were almost too stimulating to cope with, even fully clothed. What sort of chaos might one of those rakish grins cause if flashed during a physical exam?
“Very funny, Susan.” He squeezed the woman’s shoulder affectionately before dropping his arm to his side.
The dog jumped up on Mimi, yapping, clearly begging to be picked up. Tiny and pure white, the animal was probably a poodle but without the traditional cut.
“Down, Foof,” Marc commanded. “Time for dinner.” The ball of fuzz dropped its forepaws to the floor, danced around in a circle, then dashed into the kitchen.
Marc turned to the auburn-haired woman. “How’s Kyle?”
Susan smiled, a bright blush spreading across her cheeks. “He’s the sweetest little boy on earth.” She reached up and touched Marc’s cheek. “Thank you for that darling baby.” She cleared her throat, as though fighting emotion. Her smile trembled, then brightened and became teasing. “Come on up and see us, sometime.”
He winked. “It’s a date.”
Susan turned to Mimi. “Don’t let this ogre work you too hard. And don’t let him forget to eat, okay?” She wrapped her arms about his waist and gave him a displeased look. “You’re too thin.”
Marc’s laughter was rich, filling the room with an unexpected warmth. “Will the nagging never end?”
She pecked his cheek. “Okay, okay, I’m going. Foo Foo was a delight as usual, but I’m afraid once Kyle is old enough to toddle around, he’s going to steal that dog away from you. She’s pretty fond of him already. Thinks he’s her baby.”
“If Kyle takes Foof away, you have to grant me visitation rights,” he kidded.
“Ha!” Susan countered. “Like you’d take time to visit.” She disengaged herself from Marc. When she met Mimi’s gaze again, her smile dimmed. “If Marc didn’t bash you, then how did you hurt your head?”
Mimi felt peculiarly impish. “Oh, but he did!” She shot him a taunting look. “It was a clear case of piracy on the high seas. First he rammed me to disable my boat, then he kidnapped me. It was horrible.”
Marc’s smile became a trifle jaundiced. “Two funny women in the same room. I’m blessed.”
Susan gave him a look. “In all the time I’ve known you, Marc, I’ve never suspected you had this buccaneering streak.”
“Well, I’ve witnessed his dark side,” Mimi said before Marc could do more than open his mouth. “To add insult to injury, he insists I work for him for three whole weeks to pay for repairing the damage to both boats!”
Susan squinted at Marc. “You fiend.” She stepped away from him and placed her hands on her hips. “Under that wholesome doctor’s facade I find out you’re into assault, kidnapping and blackmail.”
Marc’s glance went from Susan to Mimi then back to Susan. “You’ve found me out. I’m a regular Renaissance felon.” His grin was teasing and aimed at Susan, but it had an effect on Mimi and she didn’t like it one bit. This doctor had none of the attributes she wanted in a man. Well, maybe a few of the basics—like brains and looks and great teeth—but not the important ones.
“Dr. Blackbeard, huh?” Susan laughed. “I’m sorry, Marc, but I don’t believe it. Not from our incorruptible Dr. Merit.” Facing Mimi, she said, “Did he tell you why his last nurse left?”
Mimi shook her head. She’d assumed it was because his growling attitude left a lot to be desired.
“Let’s not—”
“Because,” Susan cut in over Marc’s objection, “he wouldn’t play nursie-doctor games with her—if you get my meaning.”
Startled by the sexual innuendo, Mimi glanced at Marc. Though his face showed a deep summer tan, his features still managed to go a shade darker. “Thanks, Suze,” he muttered. “I might have forgotten to mention that.”
Susan’s grin was playful as she touched Mimi’s hand. “He’s an uncompromising goody-goody, but we love him anyway.”
Mimi cast the doctor a curious look. The flush beneath his tan exhibited a captivating hint of vulnerability. He might be a bear, but he was cute when he was embarrassed. Plainly his wife didn’t have any doubts about his fidelity if she felt comfortable teasing him about the women who would be his lovers, if only he’d slip off his white charger.
“Go away, Suze,” he grumbled. “I think I hear the baby calling you.”
She laughed. “I love you, too, sweetie.” Glancing at her watch, she added, “It is time for Kyle’s bedtime bottle, but if you can hear him, you have better ears than Foof!” Giving Marc another fond pat on the cheek, she turned to Mimi. “We live up on the hill, so I hope I’ll see you a lot. There aren’t many women on the island, so I’m starved for girl talk.” She turned away. “Assuming Cap’n Bligh gives you any time off.”
“I’m not holding my breath,” Mimi called after her, deciding the doctor used the cottage as an office and lived up the hill. Funny, she’d gotten the impression it was his home.
Susan’s light laugh echoed in the room as the front door closed with a quiet click. Suddenly, Mimi found herself facing an unsmiling grouch, again. “I’ll show you your room.” He indicated the kitchen. “It’s back there.”
“Aye, aye, Cap’n.” She struck a jaunty salute. “Lead the way, sir.”
His expression stern, he headed into the kitchen. “Let me know where your things are. I’ll have them delivered here tomorrow.”
She’d been crashing on the sofa of a friend of an acquaintance, an elderly widow who rescued stray cats. The idea of sleeping without six or eight furry bodies curled on top of her seemed like quite a luxury. “Okay,” she murmured, passing the fluff ball as it munched pellets from a bowl in the corner. “I’ll write down the address.”
“Fine.” Adjacent to the back entrance, they rounded a corner into a short hallway. “This is where you’ll sleep.” He opened a door and flipped on a light, revealing a small, plainly furnished room. The place had a quaint, old-fashioned quality and looked clean enough to eat off any surface. “The bath is on your right at the end of the hall. And this…” he touched the knob on a door neighboring her own, “…is my room.”
She went stock still and spun to confront him. “Your room?”
His expression closed further. Apparently her question had come out more horrified than he was accustomed to hearing when describing the living arrangements. “This is my house, Miss Baptiste. I thought you understood that.”
She experienced a rush of panic and didn’t have a clue why. “But—but don’t you live on the hill?”
“No.” He leaned against his door. “I did once, but this is my home now.”
His marital status was none of Mimi’s business, but she was surprised by the revelation. He and Susan seemed so—so friendly. She shrugged. “That’s too bad.”
“It is?”
She had looked away, trying to get a grip on what she was feeling. “So you’re separated?”
“What?”
“From your wife and baby.” She met his gaze, somehow unable to do otherwise.
He crossed his arms before him. “My wife and baby?”
“Do you have a hearing problem, doc?” She waved toward the living room. “Susan—Mrs. Merit, that is—and your baby, Kyle. They live on the hill, but you live here?” She frowned in thought. The doctor was a handsome brute. No woman would reject him because of his looks. He could be extremely ill-tempered, but he’d been charming with Susan. No doubt he was trying to get back into her good graces after some transgression. “Was it the long hours, or too many amorous nurses—or what—that split you up?” She wondered at herself for feeling the need to know.
He watched her with a curious expression. “Excuse me?”
How could a man be a doctor and be this dense? She heaved an exasperated sigh. “Why don’t you and Susan live together?”
“Why don’t…?” His lips quirked. “Oh.”
“Oh?” How annoying—what kind of answer was oh? “Are you telling me it’s none of my business?” she asked, well aware that it wasn’t. She supposed, growing up in the wild, both her parents and her environment unique to say the least, she hadn’t become as proficient in the subtleties of tact as those who’d grown up in more conventional situations. Sometimes she asked outlandish questions. People were free to answer them or not. Surprisingly, many did.
“You’re right. It isn’t your business, Miss Baptiste,” he said. “However, it’s no secret why Susan and I aren’t living together, so you’d find out soon enough, anyway.”
She waited, watching his eyes. They had a powerful pull, and right now, they also contained a suspicious twinkle.
“It’s just a guess,” he said, “but I don’t think her husband would approve.”
“Her hus—” Mimi was confused. “But I thought she was Mrs. Merit?”
“She is,” he said, matter-of-factly. “She’s Mrs. Jake Merit, my sister-in-law.”
Mimi was totally bewildered now. Even somewhat horrified. “Then why did she thank you for the baby?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth she regretted it. “No! No!” She threw up her arms, gesturing in the negative. “Never mind. Some things I don’t want to be my business.”
His lips twisted wryly. “Not enough things, apparently.” Pushing away from the wall, he added, “But for the sake of your shocked sensibilities, Susan thanked me because I was instrumental in the adoption of their baby.”
Mimi’s lips opened in a silent gasp. She felt stupid. No, she felt more than stupid. She had an overwhelming urge to sew her lips together. “Makes sense,” she murmured.
“I’ll sleep better knowing you think so.” His sarcasm stung, and she winced as he turned toward the kitchen. “About dinner,” he said. “What do you feel like?”
“An idiot,” she mumbled.
He passed her, heading around the corner. Mimi couldn’t be sure, but she had a sneaky suspicion he was fighting a grin. The bum. He hadn’t been dense or hard of hearing! He’d enjoyed watching her jump to the wrong conclusion. He thought it was hilarious that she’d made a perfect fool of herself. Obviously life on the island was so boring he had to get his kicks flustering people.
She took several restorative breaths before she worked up the nerve to follow him. When she entered the kitchen, he was placing a pot on the stove. “How about spaghetti?” he asked, without turning.
“Well…” She’d lost her appetite, but humiliated or not she supposed she should eat.
He shifted to glance at her, his brows knitting. “Don’t tell me it’s not enough of an adventure, that you’d rather go out and bring down a wildebeest with your bare hands.” He turned away. “It’s late, I’m tired and we’re a little low on wildebeests at the moment, so it’s spaghetti or nothing.”
Her humiliation mutated into aggravation. “I didn’t say anything, doc. Spaghetti’s fine.” She headed to the stove and yanked the pot from him. “Go gnaw on a table leg. I’ll call you when it’s ready.”
She eyed him with high irritation as his expression went from annoyed to perplexed then finally to weary. “I’m sorry, Miss Baptiste.” He shook his head. “It’s been a long day.”
She felt a weird urge to smooth the shiny hank of hair off his creased brow, but she kept her hands clamped firmly on the pot handle. Okay, so she got a little fluttery and feminine around him. She wasn’t dead, just not interested in going all gooey over a man who wasn’t a globe-trotter, like her. Letting herself get lost in a pair of brown eyes was foolish, only leading to grief when it was time to move on. With a rankled clearing of her throat, she escaped to the sink. “Yeah, well I’ve been eating bon bons all day, doc, so I’m fresh as a daisy. Except for the gaping head wound, of course. Now go!”
She turned on the water, but her senses remained riveted on the doctor. She didn’t want her senses riveted there, but they insisted on it. That was another annoying quality about Dr. Marc Merit. He was impossible to ignore, snarling or smiling—or even standing completely still behind her back.
She couldn’t see him, didn’t hear him, so she assumed he hadn’t moved. When she turned off the water, she heard the sound of the refrigerator door opening. Glancing around she saw Marc remove a package of hamburger. “What are you doing?” she asked, deciding the man didn’t take orders at all well.
He made brief eye contact, then walked to the stove. “Tomorrow, being Sunday, is a day off unless there’s an emergency. You’ll have time to get settled in and acquainted with the island.” He opened a low cabinet door beside the stove and drew out a frying pan. “Tonight, I’ll leave a T-shirt and some socks in the bathroom for you to put on after your bath.”
She was surprised by his offer, then realized she probably looked pretty straggly. “Thanks.” Lugging the pot to the stove, she placed it on a burner and turned on the gas.
Marc dumped the meat into the saucepan and began to break it up with a cooking fork. The tension between them was almost palpable. Mimi didn’t know when she’d been more aware of a man—or more disturbed by one. She was as unhappy about being stuck on an island with him as she was miserable about missing the Java trek.
If she forced herself to look at the situation objectively, this whole mess wasn’t the doctor’s fault. It was hers. She tended to go off half-cocked, and not think things through. Borrowing the boat from somebody she hardly knew then sailing it into a fog bank had been two of those half-cocked notions that were coming back to bite her. Hard. “Look, doc…” she made herself face him. Maybe she owed him an apology. Maybe? an annoying little voice scoffed.
He didn’t glance her way, but kept breaking up the meat as it started to sizzle.
“Marc?” she said, almost too quietly to hear. Apologizing wasn’t her strongest suit.
He stopped and glanced her way, a brow going up in question.
She shrugged, feeling rotten. She was tired too, and she had a splitting headache, but right was right. “I’m sorry about your boat.” Breaking eye contact, she tugged the fork from his hand. “You’re paying a lot of money to repair that cat, and I’ve said I’d work off the debt. So let me fix dinner.”
He was big and solid, he smelled nice and he was too close for her peace of mind. If it weren’t for his grouchiness and his “country doctor” lifestyle, he could easily be mistaken for the man she dreamed would one day come into her life. The man who would be to her what her dad had been to her mother. “Please?” she asked, miffed at herself for wasting even a second on silly romantic daydreams about Dr. Dutiful Of Sunnybrook Farm. “Just go.”
His eyes narrowed for a heartbeat, then he shook his head. “No, Miss Baptiste. After working hours you’re off the clock.”
“That’s ridiculous!” She nudged him with her hip. “Go! Shower! Nap! Punch holes in a wall! Do whatever it is you do to relax, and let me start paying for my keep!” She nudged him harder. “Move it!”
“Cut it out,” he barked. “I’m not some elephant stuck in a bog.”
She cast him a challenging glance. “Are you sure about that, Doc?”
Restless and on edge, Marc rolled to his back. What in Hades was his problem? He was exhausted. His day began at five o’clock. It was now two in the morning, and all he could do was lie there and stare at the ceiling. Why couldn’t he sleep? Usually he was unconscious before his head hit the pillow. Until tonight, he’d never realized Foo Foo snored.
He glanced at the tiny dog, curled in her bed. He watched her fuzzy little chest, highlighted by moonlight from the nearby window, expand with several doggie inhales. The sound she made was like a buzz saw grinding through bricks.
He closed his eyes and tried to ignore the roar. He knew a tiny animal like Foo Foo couldn’t possibly make the kind of noise his brain insisted he was hearing. It was anatomically impossible. She’d have to be the size of a moose to be that loud. If he made himself face facts, it wasn’t the snoring that was keeping him awake. It was the battering ram of a woman, Mimi Baptiste, who preyed on his mind.
The instant he’d spotted her on that blasted catamaran something had gotten screwed up in his head. His heart had swelled and his gut had sizzled. He’d never experienced any phenomenon like it, and the feeling alarmed him.
He’d come back to Merit Island because he’d decided doctoring in a big city wasn’t for him. He missed home and friends and the laid-back lifestyle he’d grown up with. He’d never had any urge to run the family emerald corporation and was glad Jake had taken over. Yet, Merit Island was a different matter. He’d tried to make a life somewhere else, but after a few years he’d come to realize this was where he was happiest; where he wanted to make his home.
He’d been fond of old Doc Fleet, and from the time he was twelve he’d gone on rounds with the physician whenever possible, getting to know folks on the surrounding islands. They’d become like an extended family to him. So when Doc Fleet and his wife retired to Montana to be closer to their grandchildren, Marc came back to settle down. His plan was to find a wife somewhere on one of the neighboring islets and build a family. Most of his friends were married with kids by now. At thirty-four, it was time he was too.
A doctor needed stability, both in his own character and in his home life. Mimi Baptiste was anything but stable. She was a will-o’-the-wisp, a pretty bird capriciously lingering for a time in his backyard. He dared not become enamored of her, for her nature was to fly away.
It annoyed him mightily that something inside him found her intriguing. It disturbed him that he’d felt more like a man than a doctor when he’d touched her hair, smelled the light scent of her skin. And it irked him almost beyond bearing that he was attracted to her free spirit and her sassy mouth. The impertinent way she called him doc and had prodded him bodily away from his own stove galled him—but just as strongly fostered a hunger to taste the passion she put into every word, look and gesture. He wanted to feel it, drink it in, make it a part of himself.
She was exasperating and exhilarating, bothersome and bewitching. And she was not the woman for him! Whatever quirky, wayward part of his psyche found her appealing had to be stomped out of existence. He promised himself to fight the attraction. Not get involved. Fending off Ursula and her kind was easy. It was bad business getting involved with employees. But the decision to remain indifferent to Mimi was harder fought. His body reacted wildly to her, giving no heed to the dictates of his brain.
He wanted this woman. He was afraid he might even fall for her if he didn’t watch himself. And knowing the history of Merit men, they didn’t fall lightly or lose a love without grievous personal consequence. His father, George, had never been the same after their mother died. And Jake? Well, he’d suffered the tortures of the damned for years and years over his lost Tatiana before Susan came along—Jake’s “little freckle-faced angel” as he lovingly called his wife of two years.
Yes, Marc wanted a wife. He’d come home to find one. But not Mimi Baptiste. Not the hot-headed vagabond who would sooner be backpacking through a jungle with strangers and setting her own broken bones than making a home in some fixed location. Get your mind off her, Merit, and go to sleep!
Another long, rasping wheeze from Foo Foo’s basket broke the quiet. Frustrated and annoyed with himself for his stubborn preoccupation with such an inappropriate little spitfire, he rolled out of bed and padded to the door. Stepping into the hallway, he slammed bodily into someone.
The skulking night prowler mashed against him wasn’t very tall, and in certain strategic areas, felt shockingly soft. Marc hoped like hell it was a burglar.
CHAPTER THREE
MIMI couldn’t see very well in the dimness of the hallway, but her sense of touch revved into high gear. If she knew anything about anything, she knew she’d just smashed into a very solid male. Her lips, her breasts, her—well, most of her body—recorded varying anatomical sections of his masculinity with equal measures of shock and gusto. A muffled curse somewhere above her head told her the doctor-in-residence was simply ecstatic about their late-night encounter.
