preoccupied. Just doing my job,” she defended.
“Yeah.” Her friend glanced to where the two men were still talking. “If your job is to watch Dr. Hot Stuff.”
“Not my day to keep an eye on him.” Cindy deliberately turned her back to the doors. “No matter how many times I see you do your thing, it never fails to amaze me. You were pretty awesome just now.”
“Thanks.” Harlow slid a glance over her shoulder at the isolette surrounded by state-of-the-art equipment. “He’s not out of the woods yet. I hope he’s a fighter like the doc said.”
“Me, too. The gladiator.” She smiled.
“The staff usually gives the preemies nicknames,” Harlow explained, echoing what Nathan had already told her. “Something inspirational to live up to.”
“Live being the operative word. It surprised me coming from Nathan—” She stopped when the other woman gave her a funny look.
“Since when do you call him by his first name?”
“Oh, that—”
“Yeah, that.”
Cindy glanced over her shoulder where he still stood in the hall. “We sat at the same table at the fundraiser last night.”
“And?”
“The glue on your shoe didn’t hold up.”
“Later with the shoes news.” Harlow’s green eyes snapped with impatience. “When did you start calling Dr. Charming Nathan?”
“Last night. When he asked me to.”
“Why?” Her friend added, “Did he ask you to, I mean?”
“Probably because he didn’t know who I was.”
“I need more information than that.”
Cindy gripped the long handle of her dusting device. “He sat next to me, bought me a drink and said I looked familiar, but he couldn’t place me.”
“He didn’t recognize you?” Surprise jumped into Harlow’s eyes.
“Not even when I made him guess.”
“You didn’t,” her friend scoffed.
“I did.” Cindy had her reasons and it had seemed like a good idea at the time.
“Hot damn,” Harlow said. “I can’t wait to tell Whitney and Mary Frances that we literally transformed you into a mystery woman. That’s so cool.”
“Not really. When I saw him this morning, he figured it out.”
When he smelled her perfume. That memory made her stomach do a funny little shimmy and she told herself it was only because something that sensitive was out of character for Nathan Steele.
“Was he mad?”
It would have been easier if he had been. Then giving him a hard time would have been justified and not just turned her into a roaring witch.
“No. He took it well. Even apologized to me for overreacting and yelling at me in here yesterday. Then he asked for my phone number again,” Cindy explained.
The other woman’s jaw dropped. “Again?”
“I refused to give it to him when he asked me last night. After he caught up with me. And he only did because your shoe broke.”
“He chased you?” Harlow folded her arms over her chest. “This gets better and better.”
“It was time for me to go.”
“Apparently he didn’t agree.”
“That’s just because my identity was still in question and that intrigued him,” Cindy said. “Sort of like when a superhero assumes an alter ego. It’s the whole don’t-I-know-her-from-somewhere? thing.”
“Then what was his excuse for asking again today?”
“He’s one of those guys who can’t take no for an answer.”
“And why should he? Women in this hospital are taking numbers in the line to snap him up.” Warning slid into her friend’s eyes. “Let him call. You don’t have to commit to anything. And I wouldn’t if I were you.”
“Preaching to the choir, H,” Cindy said. “I don’t have time for the games.”
Just then Nathan walked back into the unit to check on the baby.
“Gotta go,” Harlow said.
Cindy turned away and finished her job in the NICU, then slipped out the door. Her clean cart was against the wall in the hall. She was still putting away her cleaning supplies when she heard the doors behind her whisper open. It could have been anyone, but not just anyone made the hair at her nape prickle. Only Nathan did that and the development was recent. And, annoyingly enough, recurring.
“Cindy—”
She turned around. “Did I forget to do something in the unit?”
“No. I just—” He ran his fingers through his hair. “I saw you talking to Harlow.”
“She’s my friend. One of the fairy godmothers, actually.”
“Good to know her talents are more than just being one of the best respiratory techs here at Mercy Medical.”
“Speaking of that,” she said. “I was watching just now, when you were working on the gladiator.”
“Don’t ask me where that came from,” he said sheepishly. The look was too darn cute.
“Okay. But I wanted to ask something else.” Anything to take the edge off his appeal. She met his gaze and said, “What did you mean when you said ‘surf’ him?”
“Surfactin. It’s a medication.”
“Yeah. I was pretty sure you weren’t talking about ocean waves. What does it do?”
“Makes the lungs more flexible. If they’re stiff, air can’t be pushed in and out,” he explained. “One of the problems in neonates is that their lungs are immature. The medication helps them function better until they fully develop.”
“I see.”
“Good. Now I’ve got one for you.”
“One what?”
“Question. Turnabout is fair play.” He leaned a broad shoulder against the wall.
If the inquiry was about how a guy could look so sexy dressed in utilitarian scrubs, she had no answer. On every possible level it was just wrong for him to be so yummy in shapeless cotton
