the doctor told us Nate had developed the early stages of senility, which often shows up in diabetics, and that was causing him to forget to give himself the injections.”
He ran his hands over his face. This was harder than he’d expected. He suspected he hadn’t really faced his father’s illness before. It was so much easier to hide from it, pretend it was a temporary inconvenience that would eventually go away.
“That’s when I sold my house and moved in here with him so I could monitor him, remind him to take his shots and fix his meals,” he continued, “but there were still the dietary restrictions and the blood tests. Now he’s started wandering off and getting lost. So far I’ve managed to find him without much trouble, but he needs full-time care and I can’t give it to him and still keep my day job, which we need to live on.”
He looked at Brittany and she saw the anguish in his eyes. “I didn’t mean to insult you or imply that you wouldn’t take proper care of him, but I have to be sure the person I hire is reliable, and you’re so young and so beautiful. I can’t believe you’d be content to put up with the irritation a patient in Nate’s condition can cause.”
Her heart melted at the torment in his voice, and without thinking she got up and walked around the desk to stand beside his chair. “Ethan, I’m well qualified to watch over your father and see to it that he gets his medication.”
She put her hand gently on his slumped shoulder. He was only wearing a lightweight shirt, and she could feel the warmth of his bare skin beneath it. “I think he and I would get along really well together. I like him, and he seems to like me.”
She started to lift her hand away, belatedly aware she was taking a liberty she shouldn’t be, but he reached across his chest and held it where it was. She felt his muscles twitch beneath her palm.
“What’s not to like?” he said hoarsely. “When can you start?”
Chapter Two
Brittany shivered as she stood in front of the open door of the closet in her one-room apartment, clad only in a set of the expensive pastel lingerie her mother had bought her. Not that she was cold. She wasn’t. She was having an attack of nerves.
She’d been so confident of her ability as a medical assistant when under the watchful eye of her instructors, but from today on she’d be alone with her patient, with no one to tell her what to do if something unexpected should happen.
Her gaze traveled over the contents of the closet. What would the Thorpes want her to wear? She hadn’t thought to ask them. Some patients still expected nurses to wear white starched uniforms, but those had gone out of style years ago. In the hospital she wore a white lab coat over green scrubs, but in training for home visits she’d usually donned jeans and a T-shirt under the lab coat. Cleaning up after patients at home could get pretty messy at times.
She finally decided on a beige pantsuit that looked professional and was machine-washable, a necessity in her occupation. Since Nate was more in need of supervision than medical attention, she’d been designated his caregiver, so she didn’t think he or Ethan would mind if she dressed casually in her own clothes.
Grabbing two freshly laundered lab coats and her medical kit, she hurried out the door and locked it behind her.
Ethan told himself he wasn’t pacing the floor and that he was just wandering around the house while he waited for his dad’s nurse to arrive. However, it felt like pacing to him. A glance at his watch told him Brittany wasn’t late, rather he was early. It was only eight o’clock, and even with commuting time he didn’t have to leave the house until eight-thirty, but he wanted to go over some things with her before he left.
The chime of the bell a few minutes later sent him striding quickly to the door. He opened it and caught his breath. She was even more lovely than he’d remembered. The tan pantsuit she was wearing was strictly tailored, even masculine in its lines, but there was nothing androgynous in the way she filled it out. Her full breasts thrust gently against the material of the blouse, and the curve of her hips under the slacks was definitely not mannish.
It was a good thing they would meet for only a few minutes each day coming and going. He’d never be able to resist the temptation she was stirring in him if it lasted much longer!
“Professor? Is something the matter?” Her voice broke into his musing, and he realized he’d been standing there staring at her like a starstruck teenager.
He blinked and shook his head. “No, please, come in.”
He moved aside to let her pass him, and got a whiff of the aroma of spring flowers. Delicate and pleasing.
“Where’s your dad?” she asked as she deposited her purse and her medical kit on the table in the foyer.
“He’s not up yet,” Ethan said. “Lately I’ve been having to wake him to give him his shot and his breakfast before I leave to go to the university, but that interrupts his rest. Now that you’ll be coming every morning he can sleep a little longer.”
She smiled. “Fine. I’ll be happy to take over.”
“How about a cup of coffee?” he asked, glancing at his watch even though he knew exactly what time it was. He hoped the gesture would make her think it was a spur-of-the-moment invitation rather than the eagerly thought-out proposal it really was. “I don’t have to leave for a few minutes yet.”
“I’d like that,” Brittany said softly, and walked with him through the kitchen on the left side of the staircase to the small room they called the breakfast room. Ethan had pointed it out to her when he took her on a tour of the house the day he hired her. The sun streaming through the sheer curtains that covered the large windows flooded the area with light and bathed it in an aura of cheerfulness.
There was a round table and four chairs in the middle of the room, and two other chairs in the corners. A chest-high breakfast bar separated the two rooms, and potted tropical plants added shafts of color.
The electric coffeemaker was set up on the bar counter, and Ethan stopped to pour coffee into the mugs while Brittany pulled out a chair and sat down.
“Cream and sugar?” he asked.
“Black,” she told him, and he brought the two cups to the table and sat down beside her.
“I’ve left a list of phone numbers you can call for help if anything should go wrong,” he told her. “Mine at the university is at the top, of course, but there’s also Dad’s doctor, the next-door neighbors on either side of us and, as a last resort, my brother and his wife in New Orleans.”
“Thank you, I’m glad to have those,” she said. “I’m also interested in knowing what his limitations are aside from his occasional confusion. Can I take him out for rides or walks, or maybe a shopping trip?”
“Oh, sure, he loves to get out,” Ethan assured her. “That’s one of the biggest problems I’ve had with him lately. When he’s here alone he goes out and then can’t find his way back home.”
A voice from behind Brittany startled them both. It was Nate’s. “Ethan, you got any idea what time it is? Why didn’t you wake me up? You’re gonna be late….”
Brittany turned in her chair to look at him standing there in his rumpled pajamas,
