had grown fearful of a human’s touch. He’d worked for months trying to get the dog to trust him, and by the end of summer, he’d finally managed to win him over. For twelve years Hobo, as Chase’s foster mother had named the mutt, had taken up residence on the Mitchells’ back porch and had been Chase’s staunchest protector.
He hoped he’d be able to win over the pretty doctor just as thoroughly.
“I don’t have an office,” she admitted, then opened the bag and inhaled deeply.
She looked up at him and offered him a smile brighter than anything he’d seen in a very long time. Too long, but he rapidly quashed that stray thought. Unable to stop himself, a satisfied grin tugged his lips in response to the pure pleasure lighting her intriguing eyes.
“Really? You’re the town doc, and you don’t have an office?” Boy, wait until Pelham gets a load of this daily report, Chase thought smugly. He’d have Pelham and the rest of the superior bastards scratching their heads in wonder with the progress he was making after only two hours of initial contact with the subject. They’d think twice about stuffing him behind a desk for the duration.
“It’s a long story,” she said. She set the bag on the blotter protecting the wood grain surface of the desk. A wry grin eased across her sweet-looking mouth. “I wouldn’t want to bore you with the details.” He’d read the files. There wasn’t a single detail about her he didn’t know.
No matter how much he wanted to stay and test the getting-to-know-you waters, he figured he’d better continue to play it smart and put some distance between them. He wanted to build trust, not spook her by coming on too strong.
“Enjoy your lunch,” he said. “And thanks again.” He cut across the reception area to the front door. There really was a faculty meeting scheduled for the coaching staff and he was already at risk of being late. Not quite the kind of first impression he wanted to make, even though he had a good feeling about the kind of impression he was making on the formerly illusive Dr. Destiny Romine.
He paused at the door, his hand on the knob and looked over his shoulder at her. “Oh, and for the record, Doc,” he said, not bothering to contain the cocky grin, “I’m certain there isn’t anything about you that would bore me.”
DEE CRUMPLED THE LAST of the lightly wax-coated paper and tossed it in the white bag. As much as she hated admitting it, her new neighbor’s thoughtful gesture was very much appreciated. How he knew she adored grilled onions on her cheeseburger was as much a mystery as to why, after years of practically ignoring the opposite sex, did he have to be the one to reawaken her dormant feminine senses.
Her insistent feminine senses, she thought.
From the number of charts stacked up on the corner of Netta’s immaculate desk, Dee had a slew of patients to see before the end of the day. A welcome distraction, she decided, from the more intriguing thoughts of her sexy new neighbor that had been battering her senses since she’d found him on her doorstep this morning. His parting shot hadn’t done a thing to help curb the more base thoughts demanding attention, either.
She shoved him from her mind. She had work to do and suspected Lucille was keeping watch over Erma Dalton and the newborn until Dee released them. She certainly didn’t want to perform an exam with something so offensive as onions on her breath.
After quickly perusing the charts and list of patients with scheduled appointments, she made her way into the staff’s private bathroom to brush her teeth then slipped into her white lab coat. Before she could head upstairs to see about discharging mother and child, the telephone rang. The stack of messages Netta had left her hadn’t included one from the County lab. She’d feel much more comfortable about discharging Erma and the baby after getting word that the path report was indeed clear.
She snagged the ringing telephone before the call rolled over to the answering service. “Cole Harbor Clinic.” She grabbed her pen and searched the surface of Netta’s desk for a scrap of paper.
Silence.
“Hello?” Dee frowned and slipped the pen into the pocket of her lab coat. “Is someone there?” she asked.
Nothing…until the distinct sound of a horn shattered the silence. She’d recalled a similar sound, but it only teased the fringes of her memory bank. A foghorn? she wondered, seconds before her heart slammed painfully into her ribs.
She pressed her hand over her exposed ear, shutting out the steady hum of the office machinery, listening as closely and carefully as possible for anything she might recognize—a sound, a voice, another blare of the foghorn. All she heard was the painful thud of her own heart and her blood racing through her veins as her endorphin levels skyrocketed.
Frantically she calculated the weeks since she’d last heard from her brother.
The foghorn sounded again, breaking the silence.
“Hello? Is someone there?” she asked again, unable to squelch the desperation from filtering into her voice. She knew it was Jared. Her pounding heart told her it was her brother.
She spun around to search the days on the big ninety-day calendar hanging on the far wall. It’d been late June, a little over eight weeks since the phone call with no one on the other end had woken her in the dead of night.
“Jared? Oh my God. Are you all right? Let me help—”
The line went dead. Dee let out a string of curses that would have had an entire ship of sailors blushing crimson if they’d heard her. She hung up the phone with a snap and balled her hands into fists. God, she wanted to scream from the frustration of it all.
She made a mental note to mark the day on the small calendar she kept in the drawer of her nightstand. A small red check mark next to the date as a reminder of the last time her brother had let her know he was still alive.
And still running for his life.
“YOU WANT ME TO TEACH WHAT?”
Chase glared when the defensive line coach, Charlie Harrison, snickered. “Senior sex,” Harrison blurted, then slapped his hand on the conference table and guffawed with the rest of the Cougar coaching staff.
Chase carefully set his pen on the table next to the yellow pad he’d been doodling on for the past hour. “No way,” he said, leaning back in the hard plastic chair, shifting his attention to the principal, Aaron Johnson. “Criminal justice and phys ed are all I’m qualified to teach. No way am I taking on a bunch of hormonal teenagers and talking about sex for forty-five minutes every day.”
The principal shot the coaches a look bordering on full-blown irritation. They’d been in the meeting for nearly an hour going over additional assignments. Chase being the new guy had definitely drawn the shortest, dirtiest straw. He knew a raw deal when he saw one and he’d just been dished up one hell of a stinker.
“We prefer Senior Health Issues, Mr. Bracken,” Principal Johnson said. His thick southern accent dripped with impatience that equaled the contempt for the coaching staff in his murky brown eyes. “Budget cutbacks have forced our faculty to double up their classload. It’s unfortunate that it extends to the coaching staff as well, but unless you want to see the football program completely shut down, then might I suggest you—”
“Bone up on sex,” Charlie Harrison interrupted.
“It won’t be so bad, Chase,”
