His Private Nurse (9 page)

For nearly a month now, the two of them had teasingly wrangled over the payoff of their silly bet, and finally he
had agreed to do things her way. When he'd called that day to let her know that he'd be bringing over dinner, Merrily had been surprised but pleased. She hoped that it would appease her troubled employer. All along, she'd suspected that Dale had insisted she go out with him mostly in order to irritate Royce. It was a devilish little game the two men played, needling one another good-naturedly, and Merrily found that she played it rather well herself, but not now, not lately.

“Well, you held out long enough,” she said, trying to sound lighthearted.

“It's not Pao's,” he informed her, “but the duck's better. In fact, it's the best pressed duck in town. Trust me on this.”

“That's wonderful,” she replied, not quite able to muster the enthusiasm warranted. Hoping that he hadn't noticed, she took the bags from him and carried them down the hall to the kitchen. “Smells good.”

He followed right on her heels. “What's wrong?”

A false smile rose automatically to her face. She aimed it over her shoulder at him. “Nothing. Why?”

Dale lifted a hand to the back of his neck. “Oh, I don't know. Royce tried to bite my head off over the phone earlier today, and now I'm getting the feeling that I've brought food to a wake.”

“Don't be silly,” she retorted, right off the top of her head. “Who would bring Chinese food to a wake?”

“Besides the Chinese, you mean?”

“Oh.” She placed the bags on the counter. “Of course.”

Dale rocked back on his heels. “So it's a lead balloon evening, is it? Every joke going down without a single ‘ha'? Every clever quip falling flat? And I spent all afternoon polishing my repartee.”

She gave up the determined smile and turned. “I'm sorry.”

“Sorry about what?” Royce asked sharply, hobbling into the room on his crutches.

Dale whirled around. “Hey! You're on your feet, er, foot.”

His shoulder brushing the wall, Royce moved with painful slowness to the breakfast table where they'd started taking their meals at his insistence. “That,” he grunted, “is obvious.”

“Still in an upbeat mood, I see,” Dale muttered, stepping forward to pull out a chair.

Hopping on one foot, Royce positioned himself in front of the chair and sat. He paired the crutches and leaned them against the table next to him. “What's going on?” he asked after getting his breath back.

“Just paying off a debt,” Dale replied lightly. “I brought enough for three, by the way.”

Merrily took that as her cue to begin putting out the meal. She brought down tumblers from the cupboard and filled them with iced tea, set them on a tray and carried them to the table while Dale questioned Royce about how he was feeling and got terse responses.

“Sit down, Dale,” she invited softly, but he shook his head.

“No, here, let me help.”

“I can manage,” she insisted, but he was already on his way to the counter for the food. She acquired plates, napkins, knives and forks and returned to the table.

“I
can
use chopsticks,” Royce snapped when she laid the fork down in front of him.

“With your left hand?” she queried softly.

For a long moment he simply stared at the fork, then he shook his head and muttered, “Sorry.”

“No big deal,” she replied, allowing Dale to pull out a chair for her. He passed her a worried look, which she answered with a slight lift of one shoulder.

A tense meal ensued. Dale did his best to keep up a steady stream of light banter, and Merrily did her best to keep up with him, but it was a real effort and not terribly effective. Finally Royce dropped his fork, pinned Dale with a fulminating look and demanded, “What's going on? Why are you really here?”

Dale sighed, laid aside his chopsticks, folded his arms against the edge of the table and said, “I spoke to the nanny today.”

Royce sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “She wouldn't let you talk to the kids, though, would she?”

Dale looked him squarely in the eye. “I didn't call her, Royce. She called me. Out of concern.”

Royce sat back in his chair as if preparing himself for the worst. Instinctively Merrily reached across the table to clasp his hand. “What's happened?”

Dale licked his lips. “Tammy was sent home from a friend's house last night sobbing uncontrollably.”

“Ah, God.” Royce laid his head back and turned his palm up beneath Merrily's hand, squeezing hard. “What was it about?”

Dale shook his head. “She was supposed to spend the night. Her friend's mom said that they were giggling and playing earlier in the evening but after she put them to bed, she heard Tammy crying. Apparently Tammy wouldn't or couldn't tell the woman what was wrong, so she took Tammy home.”

When Royce lifted his head again, tears stood in his eyes. “I've got to see her. I've just got to. She needs me.”

Dale clamped his jaw, and Merrily knew that worse was
coming. “I think even the nanny would agree with that now.”

“That nanny,” Royce went on urgently, “has always been Pamela's creature. You know that. She must be terribly concerned to call you.”

“Yes, she is,” Dale gritted out, “because Pamela slapped Tammy.”

“Slapped her!” Merrily exclaimed. Royce just stared in horror as his friend quickly went on.

“According to the nanny, Pamela shook Tammy, shouted at her to stop crying, then slapped her and sent her to her room.”

Royce yanked free of Merrily's hand and brought his fist crashing down on the table, rattling the silverware and making the plates jump. “Damn her! Damn that witch to hell! If I could get my hands on her now, I'd wring her neck! How dare she? How dare she!” His voice broke at the end, and he looked away, whispering, “We have to do something.”

“The nanny has agreed to give me a formal statement,” Dale said. “She assures me that Tammy's okay for the moment, and she's coming into my office tomorrow morning right after she drops the kids off at school.”

“School's started!” Royce exclaimed. Anguish twisted his face. “How could I have forgotten that? I wasn't there for their first day of school this year.”

“I didn't want to remind you,” Dale said helplessly.

“You couldn't have gone anyway,” Merrily reminded him gently.

“But I should have remembered!” Royce insisted.

“Listen to me,” Dale said, his voice suddenly quite stern. “I'm taking the nanny's statement to the judge. Those kids will be here by the weekend. I swear. By the weekend.”

Royce gulped air and nodded. “Th-thanks.”

“It's not enough to get them away from her, Royce,” Dale went on in a more subdued tone, “but it's enough to get them here for visitation. It's another log on the fire, buddy, and before long Pamela's going to find her skirts are burning.”

Royce nodded again. “Sure. Okay. Great. But I can't relax until I see them. I just can't.” He pushed his plate away and reached for the crutches.

“No,” Merrily said, rising. “Let me get the chair. I don't want you up for a while. The last thing you need at this point is another fall.”

Sighing, he let his hand fall to his lap. “Whatever. I am feeling pretty beat at the moment.”

Merrily hurried to get the chair. Then together she and Dale pushed Royce into his room. He struggled out of his shirt, collapsed onto the bed and waved them both away, rolling heavily onto his side with his back to them.

“I just want to sleep,” he said. “Finish your dinner and let me be.”

“Do you need something for pain?” Merrily asked.

“Will you just leave me alone!”

His anguish reached out to her, but Dale caught her by the arm as she stepped toward the bed and silently shook his head. Merrily considered for a moment and knew that he was right. What Royce needed most now was a moment to lick his wounds. Nodding, she allowed Dale to lead her from the room.

“I'm worried about him,” Dale said softly once they had closed the bedroom door behind him. “What did the doctor say at his last checkup?”

“Physically he's doing fine,” Merrily assured him, “following the doctor's instructions to the letter, but he's frustrated and worried about his children.”

“I don't blame him,” Dale muttered gravely.

They walked quietly side by side down the hall until Merrily asked, “What do you think is wrong with his little girl?”

Dale slid a sharp, wary glance in her direction. “I'm not sure.”

“Do you think she saw her mother push her father down the stairs?”

Dale looked away. “Frankly, I don't know what else to think.”

“Poor little girl,” Merrily said. “To actually see her mother push her father down a flight of stairs. What torment she must feel.” She glanced over her shoulder at Royce's bedroom door. “As much as her father, I'd say.”

“Yes,” Dale agreed softly, “as much as her father.”

Merrily shook her head and stepped down into the entry hall. “Why would Pamela do something like that?”

Dale sighed and stepped down beside her. “I couldn't begin to decipher the workings of that woman's mind.”

They moved toward the breakfast room. “Doesn't she know how much he still loves her?”

Dale stopped dead in his tracks at that. “Loves her? Pamela? Where on earth did you get that ridiculous notion?”

“He as much as told me,” Merrily insisted, “not that he had to. It's pretty obvious.”

Dale's mouth dropped open. Slowly he began to shake his head. “No. Uh-uh. I can't imagine what Royce might have said to give you that perverse notion, but believe me, you've got it all wrong. Even before he walked in on her with another man she had effectively destroyed his feelings for her with her absurd demands and emotional outbursts.”

Merrily stared at him, feeling as if everything had
shifted slightly. “But he said…I don't remember exactly, something about never being free of her.”

“Because she won't let go of him!” Dale said insistently. “Merrily, you have no idea what that crazy woman is capable of. It's as if she holds him responsible for every moment of unhappiness she's experienced since she met him, even though she can't seem to be happy no matter what the circumstances.”

“But just the other day I heard him on the phone begging her to come over here.”

“And bring the kids, no doubt. She's made his life a living hell, especially in relation to his kids. She uses them to punish him. I'm telling you, she's dangerous, and one day we are going to prove it. Then Royce, by God, is going to have his kids safe at home again for good. But I'm not sure he believes that anymore. I'm not sure he can, after what he's been through. He'll do anything for those kids, even beg Pamela to let him see them. Do you blame him?”

Merrily bowed her head. If what Dale had said was true, if Pamela really had pushed Royce down those stairs—and Merrily had come to believe that she had, for no other explanation made sense—then it was understandable that Royce would feel helpless in the face of what must be Pamela's obsession. It wasn't that he didn't want to be rid of his ex-wife, but that he felt he could not be.

Suddenly she saw everything in a different light, the inexplicable pull between them, those intensely sweet moments when he yielded to it only to push her away again. He was trying to protect her, just as he was trying, yearning, to protect his children. Silly man. Silly, wonderful man.

“No,” she whispered, smiling inside, “I don't blame him.”

R
oyce shifted to the left. Restless and edgy, he stared upward into the dark, trying to imagine the stars scattered across the sky like so much flotsam in an ink-black river. He saw instead his daughter's pale, horrified face and his son's small, confused one. With the vision came a whole host of worries, none of which he could alleviate. Helplessly he shifted to the right again and tried to blank his mind.

He had slept more comfortably since the large, hard cast that had encased his shoulder and right arm had been reduced to a smaller, L-shaped one that covered his right arm from palm to mid-biceps. His pain had receded to mere aches and the occasional sharp stab when he did something he shouldn't. But for the worry that constantly plagued his mind and the unwanted desire that left him languishing between gentle delight and sad regret, he
might have found a certain contentment—enough, at least, to sleep. Not, however, this night.

Tonight he could not shut off his mind. If he turned his thoughts from his children, they invariably landed on Merrily and what he could not have with her. In his desperation, he wished mightily for a cup of her infernal herbal tea, anything to bring respite from the fears and regrets and desires that consumed his peace of mind and destroyed any possibility of rest.

Merrily would smile with satisfaction if she knew. No doubt she would even rise from her own bed and hurry to the boil the water if he asked her. Then again, perhaps not. In a hopeless effort to maintain some distance between them, he'd been barely civil to the woman, and it was killing him. The way he wanted her shocked him. Not acting on that desire was the most difficult thing he'd ever done. He felt her with every breath he took, there, just out of reach, that delicious little bow of her mouth begging for his kisses. With a groan he squeezed his eyes shut and resolutely turned his thoughts away from Merrily Gage.

The faces of his children once more rose before his mind's eye. Was Tammy crying again tonight? How confused Cory must be! Dear God, when was he going to see them, talk to them, hold them again? It felt like forever since the last time they'd been together, since that last awful night. The reel of memory started to play again, but rather than relive those memories, he sat up and took stock.

Okay. Waking Merrily was out. He would not disturb her rest. On the other hand, he was a mature, reasonable adult, and he wasn't, after all, a complete invalid. Surely he could get himself down to the kitchen and make a simple cup of tea. The wheelchair seemed risky, given the
downward slope of his converted hallway, and he wasn't at all sure he could get himself back up those ramps with only his left arm for leverage. The crutches would require a great deal of effort, but he could rest along the way, enjoy his tea in the kitchen, and hopefully be worn-out enough by the time he got back, to finally sleep. The crutches it was.

After switching on the lamp, he stood on his one good foot and hopped around the bedside table to the crutches propped against it. He steadied himself by leaning his newly mended shoulder against the wall while he got the crutch under his good arm. The second crutch provided nothing more than balance, really, because he still couldn't put his weight on that shoulder, but as he attempted to maneuver the thing under his bad arm, he knocked the lampshade over, breaking the bulb to which it was clamped and plunging the room into darkness once more. Cursing under his breath, he attempted to make a ninety-degree turn away from the broken glass, only to stumble against the poorly positioned right crutch, lose his balance and fall heavily onto his bad side.

Such pain streaked through his shoulder and leg that he cried out. Snapping his mouth shut, he rolled onto his back and tried to catch his breath, but one of the crutches lay beneath him and made a most uncomfortable bed. Angry at himself and in pain, he made a sound somewhere between a growl and a groan. Just before he began the laborious process of getting himself up and back to the bed, the overhead light came on, momentarily blinding him. In a heartbeat Merrily was on her knees beside him, pulling the crutch free of his weight.

“I didn't want to wake you,” he murmured apologetically.

Ignoring that, she dropped the crutch on the floor beside him and asked, “Where are you hurt?”

“I'm all right,” he snapped, thoroughly chagrined by this patent failure, but she began running her hands over his body, anyway. No recriminations, no scolds, just concern.

“Does this hurt?” she asked, flexing the toes of his right foot with her hand.

“No.” He sat up, legs splayed straight out and got his first good look at her. Legs and feet bare, long hair flowing down, she crouched beside him in a pale-yellow, oversize T-shirt of some sort. Her position pulled the fabric of the nightshirt tight across her nicely rounded backside. Royce gulped, looked away and managed to mutter, “Watch for glass. I broke the lightbulb.”

She swept her hair back with one hand, lifting it away from her face. “I noticed. It's okay. Looks like most of the pieces are on this side of the table. Just let me unplug the lamp, and I'll help you up so I can vacuum the floor.”

“I can get up by myself,” he grumbled, grabbing the crutch with his left hand and planting it.

She just raised a brow and went to unplug the bedside lamp. When she returned, he had managed to pull himself up onto his left knee. With his right leg extended awkwardly, he really had no way to get himself up any higher. Crouching beside him once more, she gently removed the crutch from his grasp and laid it aside before wrapping her arm around his waist and lifting his arm around her shoulders. “I'm going to give you a little lift so you can get your foot beneath you. Then we'll push up together and pivot toward the bed. Okay?”

“Yeah, okay,” he conceded with a sigh.

She lifted with both her legs, and he got his left foot
flat onto the floor by performing a kind of squatting hop. “Ready?”

He nodded, trying not to think how good she felt against him. “Let's go.”

She pushed up to her full height, dragging him up with her. He helped as much as he could. Luckily, nothing hurt any more than usual. After steadying himself, he began moving toward the bed, hopping on one foot with her creeping along beside him. The bed seemed farther away than he'd realized, and suddenly feeling none too strong, he made a vain attempt to speed up. The next thing he knew, he was pitching forward and taking her down with him. Thankfully they landed partially on the bed.

“Damn!”

“My fault,” she gasped. “I got in your way.”

He didn't argue the point as they both struggled to right themselves, managing only to twist their bodies into a tangled heap with him halfway on top of her, his left knee between her thighs. He froze as she wrestled her own arm from beneath her, rolling her breasts against his chest in the process, and just that quickly he went hard as stone, so hard that he couldn't breathe, couldn't move, couldn't think beyond the need standing rigid against his belly and trapped between them. He knew the exact moment she became aware of that need, for her gaze snapped up and locked to his.

Nose to nose, they stared into each other's eyes, fighting the one thing that must come next. Finally he gave in to it. Tilting his head, he put his mouth to hers, and she melted. Conversely, the unruly ridge of his desire stiffened and swelled against the jut of her hip bone, and he found that he possessed neither the energy nor the resolve to discipline it. His lips blended with hers so seamlessly that the very rightness of it filled him with equal measures
of wonder and dismay; neither compelled him to draw back.

Moaning softly, she lifted her arms about his neck, and he took advantage of the parting of her mouth to slip his tongue past her teeth. His left hand slid over her right hip and down her thigh, finding smooth flesh almost immediately. The big T-shirt had rucked up nearly to her hips. His fingers found the hem, slipped beneath it and moved upward again, skimming over the scrap of nylon that was her panties. Heart slamming in his chest, tongue exploring the moist, sweet cavern of her mouth, he stroked the silky skin of her abdomen, then pushed higher.

To his frustration, the same garment which allowed such easy access below now blocked his path upward, having twisted and pulled tight just below her breasts. He thought his heart would break if he could not palm those ripe mounds as he had so often fantasized, but as he began an urgent retreat, she suddenly sat up, breaking the kiss and toppling him over onto his back.

Thwarted, he made a sound of disappointment and closed his eyes, breathing heavily. The next instant something soft and light plopped onto his chest. Puzzled, he caught it up in his left hand and lifted his head to look at it. In the same moment that he realized he was holding her nightshirt, he swiveled his head sideways. The sight that greeted him nearly knocked out his eyeballs. There on her knees beside him, she sat back on her heels, naked except for tiny, pink bikinis. Her long, golden brown hair flowed down like warm, living silk. Her small, perfect breasts lifted with every breath, rose-tipped and just plump enough to fill his hands. The trim nip of her waist and flat belly, the delicate indentation of her navel, the smooth, slender length of her thighs, yards and yards of
pale, creamy skin, all called to him in the most primal of ways.

He tried to say something—he wasn't sure what—but the sound gurgled in his throat, lost in the swamp of desire. Slowly, gracefully, she leaned forward, reached across him and laid her body against his. Sensations knifed through him from every direction, jolting his eyes closed, convulsing his hand so that he lost the T-shirt. He wrapped his arms around her, despite the cast on his right, and held on.

How could he have forgotten what it was like to hold a naked woman against his body? Then again, had anyone else ever felt like this? He tried to think of someone, anyone, with whom to compare her, but they were all gone, those other women he had known. She might as well have been the first.

For a long moment they merely lay there together, then she rose above him, straddling his hips. He opened his eyes and found her face hovering there just above his. How endearingly beautiful she was, with luminous eyes and a luscious mouth. And, oh, that hair! Gold and bronze, it draped and flowed around them, a silken curtain that puddled against his skin. He lifted his right hand and tangled his fingertips in it, while sliding his left over her body, feeling the subtle dips and curves, the cool smoothness of her skin.

She parked her hands above his shoulders and rocked forward on her knees, lowering her eager mouth to his. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her down onto him. Emotion assailed him: bone-melting delight, gut-wrenching need, deep-as-the-earth gratitude and more. So much more. When she slipped her tongue into his mouth, he went a little crazy, rising up beneath her, cupping her neat rump in his palm as he thrust his pelvis.

It was not enough. His erection throbbed against her belly, making his head spin. Unbidden, a moan he hardly even realized he'd made rolled up out of his chest, an inarticulate plea for more, and instantly she recoiled, pushing up onto her hands and knees once more, concern clouding her loving eyes.

“Did I hurt you?”

Hurt him?
Hurt him?
Hell, yes. “But in the most wonderful way,” he told her huskily. It was the wrong thing to say.

She scrambled off of him. “Where?”

For a moment he thought she was joking, but then he realized that she really didn't have any idea what she was doing. He looked at that lithe, tantalizing body and that sweet, innocent face and knew that he would be her first—and that he could
not
be her first. Rolling onto his side, away from her, he tried to pummel his emotions into rational thought.

“Royce? Are you all right?”

“I'm…yeah, but it's time for you to go back to your room now.”

She neither moved nor spoke for several seconds. Then she eased closer to him. “I don't want to go back to my room.”

He sat up abruptly. “But I want you to,” he declared harshly, not trusting himself to look at her. He felt the bed move and knew that she was scrambling into the gown.

“I…I don't understand.”

He heard the tears in her voice and fisted his hand in his lap to keep from reaching out to stop her. “I just forgot for a moment why this is such a bad idea. Now, please, just go.”

She fairly flew off the bed. He heard an all-too-familiar
thump
accompanied by a sharp crack, but even as he swung around, pivoting on his hip, she was slamming the door behind her. He stared at that second broken lamp. This time the neck of the lightbulb had broken off entirely, leaving the still-whole bulb in the wire bracket of the lampshade, which lay at a tilt on the edge of the bed. He smiled, but it contained no joy, no amusement. Heart-sick, he rolled onto his stomach, pulled himself across the bed and unplugged the lamp's electrical cord.

For a very long time he stayed just that way, sprawled on the bed on his stomach, the overhead light showing him clearly what a selfish bastard he was to have ever let himself touch her.

Perhaps he would send her away, he thought desperately. Surely that would be best. Her brothers would certainly be glad to have her back home, and he might rest easier knowing that she was not right there in the next room. He tried to imagine how he might manage without her and, to his dismay, simply could not, though one day he was bound to lose her. As soon as this stabilizer came off his leg, he would have no reason to keep her. Aw, God. His children. Merrily. How much more could he bear to lose?

 

They sat at the breakfast room table, avoiding each other's eyes over a meal that neither of them wanted, until Royce put aside his fork, lifted his hand to his forehead and said, “I'll understand if you want to leave.”

Merrily didn't have to ask why, where or for how long. Although these were almost the first words he'd spoken to her this morning, she knew that he was speaking obliquely of what had happened between them the night before. All she could think about, on the other hand, was what
hadn't
happened. The embarrassment she felt over
throwing herself at a man who didn't want her made every moment in his presence an agony, but she still had a job to do.