The Nurse Who Saved Christmas (5 page)

She raised her head, stared at him. “Okay, we’re not a couple.” She took a deep breath. “What are we?”

He hesitated, looking torn. “I’m not sure.”

Not the answer she’d hoped to hear. Then again, what had she expected? Feed the man a little fudge and he wouldn’t be able to get enough of her?

She couldn’t deal with his hot-cold attitude. Not and keep her sanity intact. Her heart intact.

“Then maybe you should get sure before we go any further, Dirk.” Her heart banged against her rib cage in protest of her words. She wanted to go further. Lots further. But she wasn’t a fool and wouldn’t pretend to be one, not even for more time with Dirk. Regardless of how she felt, she deserved better than to be at his beck and call, available for comfort sex and Christmas
parties. “I like you. A lot. But I don’t want to end up with a broken heart and if you’re not in this with me, then…” She shrugged. “Well, whatever this is needs to end now.”

He studied her, his fingers splayed against her back, stroking over the material of her dress, possessively, distractingly. “I’d never hurt you, Abby.”

“Not intentionally.” Why were tears pricking her eyes? Why did she feel as if he was going to tell her goodbye? Why did that hurt so much? Technically, tonight was their first date. She would not cry. “But if I’m not careful where you’re concerned, I will end up hurt.”

Her heart protested it was way too late to start thinking about heart protection. She was crazy about Dirk. Way too crazy to walk away unscathed. Hadn’t she fought tears more than once that he’d immediately had regrets about making love to her?

“You’re right.” He took a deep breath and she expected him to let her go, to push her away. Instead, his hands tightened at her waist, as if he wasn’t willing to let go, as if he clung to her for support. “I shouldn’t have asked you here tonight.”

“Why did you?”

“I didn’t want to be here alone.”

Had he only asked because she was convenient? Because he’d known she’d say yes? She bit the inside of her lower lip to hold it steady. He’d not made any grand promises. All he’d done was ask her to attend a Christmas party with him. She’d been the one to attach all sorts of sentimental meaning to his invitation.

Just as she’d attached all sorts of sentimental meaning to their morning together. Lord, she was a fool.

“But mostly because I can’t quit thinking about you.”

A soft moan escaped. That was more along the lines of what she wanted to hear. More along the lines of how she felt about him. Her breath caught, knotting in her throat.

“About making love to you.” He shifted against her, holding her more closely, pressing the length of her body to his. “I want you, Abby. I haven’t stopped wanting you. Seeing you tonight, like this…” his gaze moved over the curve of her neck, her upswept hair “…touching you, I can’t help but want to make love to you even though I know I shouldn’t and you certainly shouldn’t let me. Because regardless of how much I want you, I was serious when I said I don’t do relationships.”

“Why not?” She swallowed the knot, wondering at the raw emotions in his eyes. Emotions she wasn’t positive had only to do with her, emotions he’d rarely bared, if ever.

He shook his head. “Not everyone wants the cozy Christmas fantasy of being part of a couple, Abby. That’s not what I want.”

The pain in his voice overshadowed his words, words she was sure were chosen to alienate her emotionally, revealed so much more than what he said. Did he realize how much he’d just exposed to her? That he’d given her a glimpse inside him? A glimpse that undid any resolve she might have had to walk away.

“What do you want?” She held his gaze, clinging to his shoulders to remain steady on her feet as she prepared to expose her heart. “Because I’m not asking for
some cozy Christmas fantasy. I just want you. So much I forget to breathe when I look at you.”

He inhaled sharply, closed his eyes.

“Oh, Abs,” he whispered against her forehead, sounding tortured and pleased all in the same breath. His jaw flexed. His eyes darkened then closed again. When they opened, possession shone. Possession and something so primal and needy that desire swept through Abby. His eyes asked questions much more potent than any he could speak.

She toyed with the soft hair at his nape, twirling the silky black strands around her finger, wondering if it was bad that she felt just as wrapped around his finger. “Will you take me home now, Dirk?”

He placed his thumb beneath her chin, lifted her face. “I want to leave this monstrosity more than I can say, but are you sure?”

Concern flickered that he was calling what she’d thought a lovely Christmas party a monstrosity, but hormones ruled. That possessive look had her glutes tightening.

“Yes.” She was sure she wanted to give him…everything. More. Needed to give him everything and more.

What the hell was he doing? Dirk wondered for the hundredth time that week.

Little Miss Merry Christmas was getting to him. And not just a little.

He’d been right when he’d told Abby she was beautiful earlier. She was. Absolutely stunning in her party dress.

But not as stunning as she’d been in nothing at all
.

Dirk had been focusing on Abby to get through the party, had hung around the golf conversation just because it had been one of the few conversations going that had had nothing to do with the holidays.

Now, if he wanted to get out of the party without embarrassing himself, he had to keep his mind off Abby, off
that particular morning
, off how he’d lost himself in her body, how he’d felt whole inside for the first time in years. Even now, with her smiling up at him, he could lose himself in everything she was and almost forget the ever-present ache inside him at this time of year.

Her big hazel eyes were striking even without makeup accentuating them. Tonight they looked huge, like luminous stars guiding him to her. Her silky brown hair had been pulled up, but rather than the tighter style she wore for work, lots of strands hung loose, curling in loose tendrils. She wore a bright red dress that demanded attention and had captivated his from the moment she’d opened her front door, smiling at him as if he really was Santa come to fulfill her heart’s every desire.

And those shoes.

He didn’t know how she walked in the spindly red heels, how any woman walked in heels, but he appreciated how they pumped out Abby’s calves, accented the toned lines of her legs. How they made his gaze want to keep traveling up those long lines, to unveil where they met, where he wanted to be. Oh, Abby.

Since his wife’s death, he hadn’t been a saint. He’d tried to ease the ache inside of him, only to realize he wasn’t dating material any more.

But he’d never been as attracted to anyone as he was to Abby.

He knew better than to get involved, knew there could never be a relationship between them. Not one that would go anywhere. He’d suck the goodness right out of her life, weigh her down with his heavy heart. She was right to question him. Given the chance, he would break her heart.

Yet, he’d slept with her, figuratively and literally, after the first night they’d worked together. Sure, he’d backed off after that morning, but only because of how she’d looked at him with hope of a happy-ever-after. That look had had sweat prickling his skin and his heart fluttering in a panicked rhythm. Otherwise he’d have been burning up her sheets for the past two months.

He’d gotten out of her house stat and promised himself he’d keep his distance. So why had he agreed to be her Santa? Why had he asked her to come to this party with him? Sure, the administrator had questioned why he hadn’t been going, but the guy would have gotten over it if he hadn’t attended.

“Dirk?” Abby prompted when he failed to respond to her gutsy invitation to take her home.

He stared down into her blue-green eyes with their golden flecks, his hands around her waist, holding her to him while Christmas music played around them.

She was sweet and wonderful and giving. The more time he spent with her, the more he craved, the more he knew he should stay away. She believed in goodness and in the magic of Christmas. She gave of herself without asking for anything in return. Hadn’t he just told her he didn’t do relationships? Yet here she was, willing to
give what he wanted. The truth was, he didn’t want to go home alone, didn’t want to face the demons of being at this party, just being alive during the holiday season, dredged up from his past, not when being with Abby made him feel better, less alone. She made him forget everything but her.

Just as on the morning they’d fallen into bed together, words weren’t needed.

He was going to take all she’d give, knowing he had nothing to give in return and never would.

Bah, humbug. He really was a Scrooge.

S
TANDING
on her front porch, Abby fumbled twice before inserting the key into her door lock. Her hands shook like crazy.

She was crazy.

Hadn’t Dirk told her he didn’t do relationships? So why had they rushed from the Christmas party like teenagers? She laughed nervously. God, she felt like a teen on her way to a heated make-out session.

“Let me,” he interrupted when, although she’d gotten the key into the lock, the release hadn’t caught properly.

The lock clicked and Abby pushed the door open, practically falling into her foyer and dragging Dirk with her. He pushed the door closed with a resounding snap. The sound echoed through the darkness broken only by her Christmas lights, which cast a magical aura over the foyer and living room thanks to the timers she kept them on.

“Come here,” he growled, pulling her to him, taking her mouth by storm as he worked off her wrap, letting the heavy faux fur fall to the floor.

Yes, Abby thought, this was exactly how she remembered Dirk kissing her. As if she tasted sweeter than
Christmas cookies and he was eager to go on a sugar binge.

He tasted just as sweet. Sweeter. His lips were marauding her mouth, his tongue tangling with hers as his hands slid over her body, touching, caressing,
claiming
.

Abby set about staking some claims of her own. Meeting him kiss for kiss, tangle for tangle. Tactically committing the hard lines of his body to memory, committing everything about him to memory.

“I want you so much.”

She’d noticed. Oh, how she’d noticed!

“I want to savor every touch, every sigh that escapes from your lips.” He nibbled at her throat, at the base of her neck. Hot kisses that scorched her skin, bringing her blood to a boil.

His fingers searched out her zipper, slowly parted the back of her dress as his tongue traced over her carotid pulse, licking at the raging beat on her throat.

When his hand rested on her lower back where the zip ended, he turned his attention to the thin red straps holding up her dress.

Eyes locked with hers in the flickering colors of the Christmas lights, he looped one finger beneath the thin satin and slid the string off her shoulder, letting it dangle against her deltoid. He kissed where the strap had been. A soft, gentle, stomach-knotting kiss that shot an arrow of pleasure straight to the apex of her being. He turned to the other side and repeated the seductive gesture, his lips lingering on her bare shoulder.

“You are so beautiful, Abby. So sweet and perfect.”

“I’m not perfect.” Surely he knew she wasn’t without
her having to tell him. Surely he was just spouting lines. Although why he would when he already had her, she couldn’t fathom. And, oh, how he had her!

He trailed more kisses over her shoulders, light, reverent. “You’re the closest thing this side of heaven.”

Dear Saint Nicholas alive! Did he have any idea what his praise was doing? What his kisses were doing?

Apparently, because he shimmied her dress over her hips to puddle in the floor around her feet.

She stood in her foyer, dressed only in the new red underwear she’d bought to match her dress and her high heels. If not for the blaze in Dirk’s eyes, she might be cold, might be embarrassed. She was neither.

His gaze burned with desire. Deep, hot desire that told her everything. More. Desire that made her warm from the inside out. Hot.

She took his hand in hers. His eyebrow rose in question when she led him into the living room, rather than toward her bedroom. But she didn’t explain herself, sensing that words would ruin the magical atmosphere. Instead, she took the throw blanket off the back of her sofa and tossed it into the floor in front of her fireplace, turned the knob that lit her gas logs, and met his gaze.

Swallowing audibly, he nodded, lay down with her on the blanket, pushing her back and staring down at her in the firelight. Wordlessly, his lips brushed her temples, her cheeks, her eyes, her throat. Slowly, his mouth worked over her skin.

She shifted, grasping at the buttons of his shirt, fumbling to undo them. She ran her hands inside the parted material of his crisp white shirt, loving the feel of his
smooth chest against her fingertips, loving the rapid pounding of his heart beneath her palm.

She’d done that to him, made his heart beat wildly.

Like a snowman caught in a hothouse, Abby melted.

Dirk groaned, and gave up whatever hope he had of going slowly. He’d wanted to kiss every inch of her, to take things slowly, to do things right, instead of the desperate coupling they’d had last time.
Twice
. But where Abby was concerned he obviously could only go one speed. Head-on.

He shucked out of his shirt, groaned again at the feel of her hands rubbing over skin, over his shoulders, down his back. The pleasure Abby found in his body thrilled him, had him aching for more. She craned her neck to kiss his throat, his shoulders, his chest. Frantic, quick kisses that seared his flesh.

“So beautiful,” he repeated, breathing in the spicy scent of her skin.

“If anyone in this room is beautiful, it’s you,” she whispered, pressing a kiss to his clavicle and reaching for his belt at the same time. “Hurry, Dirk.”

If he hurried, everything would be over. Fast. She was driving him crazy. Each and every cell in his body had caught fire and burned with need.

Letting her pull his belt free, Dirk slid over her, pinning her beneath him, loving how she wrapped her arms around him, clinging to him.

“Hurry,” she urged. “I need you.”

Dirk kissed her until he thought he might explode, until their hands locked on to each other’s rather
than continue the frenzied exploration of each other’s bodies.

“I need you, too, Abby.” More than he’d ever imagined possible. Rolling slightly to his side, he reached for his waistband, planning to strip off his pants.

That’s when he heard the sound of cold reality.

His cellphone.

“Don’t answer it,” she moaned, taking over where he’d stopped undoing his zipper. Her fingers brushed against him, and he inhaled sharply.

He wanted to ignore the phone, but he wouldn’t.

“I’m on call.” How he wished he wasn’t. “No one would call me this late unless there was an emergency.”

Abby’s face paled in the glow of the firelight. “Oh, God. I forgot.”

He understood all too well. She made him forget, too.

Going into the foyer, he grabbed his jacket from the floor and removed his phone from the inside pocket. He listened to the caller for about thirty seconds then raked his fingers through his hair. “No problem. I’ll be right there.”

He hung up the phone and met Abby’s soft, concerned gaze. She’d followed him into the foyer, stood next to him, her arms crossed protectively over her gorgeous body.

“It’s okay. I understand,” she said before he spoke. “My phone will likely ring at any moment.”

“Probably.” He went back to the living room, got his shirt, buttoned it with a lot less enthusiasm than he’d removed it, although with just as much haste. “There’s been a gas leak in an apartment high-rise. One death.
Dozens suffering inhalation injuries and respiratory distress. Patients are being diverted to several hospitals.”

Stooping down and providing him with a delectable view of her backside that tempted him to say to hell with everything, Abby plucked up the blanket from the floor. She wrapped it round her shoulders, as if she didn’t want him to see her almost naked body now that they’d been interrupted. “I’ll get changed.”

He started to speak, to tell her to get some rest while she could, that perhaps they’d already called in enough nurses without her. But her phone started ringing from inside her purse.

She gave a shaky laugh. “Wonder who that is?”

While she took the call, Dirk finished dressing, got his coat. A gentleman would wait until she finished her call, but he didn’t. He left.

She already knew he wasn’t a gentleman. Hell, he’d slept with her the day they met and had been about to take advantage of her yet again.

Still wanted to take advantage so badly every cell in his body protested against the interruption.

She’d be wise to stay far, far away.

Perhaps that’s why they’d been interrupted.

To give them both time to think about what they were doing. For Dirk to recall that Abby deserved better than what he’d give. For Abby to recall that she was young and beautiful and not bitter at the world, that she saw the goodness in life, the positive.

Things Dirk had quit doing long ago even if Abby had made him forget that for a short while.

Abby had put in eight hours of nonstop running from one patient to the next. Every bay had been full, with
a rapid rate of turnover as patients were triaged into admission or treated and released.

The day shift would be arriving soon. Thank goodness. Her lower back ached and she felt more tired than she recalled feeling in a long, long time.

Surprised to find there wasn’t another patient waiting, she took advantage of the unexpected reprieve. Just a couple of minutes to disappear into the break room, lean against the wall and close her eyes, then she’d recheck the pneumonia patient in bay five.

“Things are starting to slow down. You should go home and get some rest. You look tired.”

“Dirk.” Abby’s eyes shot open, surprised to see that he’d followed her. Not that she’d really expected otherwise, but he’d been the consummate professional all night. Not once had he let on that there was anything between them other than a doctor-nurse relationship, not once had he let on that had they not been interrupted they’d have made love most of the night.

Not once had he mentioned that when she’d come out of her bedroom, he’d left, breaking her heart into a thousand tiny shards that he’d left her without so much as a word.

“The others can handle the remainder of the shift.” His tone was brusque, paternalistic. “Go home and get some rest, Abby. You look tired.”

“I am tired, but I’ll be fine until the end of shift.” She would. Already, just looking at him, she could feel her energy level rising. Or maybe that was her hurt and anger coming to a head. “Are you coming back to my place?”

He sighed, raked his fingers through his dark hair,
and glanced around the otherwise empty break room. “We need to talk.”

Trying to read his expression, Abby searched his face. “I understand if you’re too tired. It’s just, well, I wanted you to know that if you want to come back, that’s good by me. I could cook us something.”

At least, she could cook him something. The thought of food made her stomach recoil. Or maybe it was the thought that he’d left her and she knew she wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

His jaw worked back and forth. “I’ve been thinking about last night.”

“Me, too,” she admitted unsteadily. She couldn’t quit thinking about last night, how they’d touched.

He grimaced. “Not like that, Abby. I’ve been thinking about what you said at the party about me needing to be sure before we went any further.”

A feeling of impending doom crawled up her spine. Doom that made her stomach pitch so high it could have capsized a tanker.

“And?” she asked, not really wanting to hear his answer. Why was he backpedaling? She’d thought they’d come so far last night. Had everything only been physical? Was she really so naive as to have misread his looks, his touches so drastically?

“You were right to say that.” He didn’t meet her eyes, stared somewhere to her right at the wall. “If we continue on that path, I will hurt you and that’s not what I want. I think we should just be friends.”

“You’re kidding, right?” She could tell by the look on his taut face that he wasn’t.
Friends?
“If your phone hadn’t rung, what we’d have been doing was a lot more
than what just friends do,” she pointed out, not willing to let him backtrack so easily.

“Which means we shouldn’t have been doing what we were about to do. Fate stepped in.”

Chin lifting, Abby’s hands went to her hips. How could he be so dense? “Fate had nothing to do with that gas leak.”

“But fate did rescue you from making a mistake, Abby. I have nothing to offer you beyond friendship. Nothing.”

Did he really believe that? Looking at him, she realized he did, but not because he didn’t want to offer her more, just that he didn’t believe himself capable. What had happened to make him so cynical? To make him see the glass as half-empty? How could she look at him and see so plainly that he had so much more to give? So much more life in him than he saw in himself?

Why was it that when she looked at him she saw a world full of good and amazing things? A world full of Christmas every single day just because he was a part of her life?

She closed her eyes and counted to ten. “Okay, if you want to just be friends, we’ll just be friends.”

She couldn’t make him love her. Couldn’t make him want to take a chance on loving her. She’d spent years living with her great-aunt, doing everything she could to earn the woman’s love. In the end, she’d realized you can’t make someone love you. Either they did or they didn’t.

“I’m glad you understand.” He let out a slow breath, looked relieved that she wasn’t going to make a scene.

Had he expected her to stomp her feet and throw a
fit? Wrong. But neither would she pretend everything was fine, when it wasn’t.

“No.” She shook her head. “I can’t say that I understand, because I don’t. Obviously I misread your feelings for me.”

“Abs—”

“Don’t,” she interrupted, holding up her hand. “Don’t say things you don’t mean in the hope of making this easier. I like you, a lot. You obviously don’t feel the same so, fine, end of story. We’ll be friends.”

So why didn’t she believe he didn’t feel the same? Why did she believe that something else had prompted him to back away? Something that ran so deeply through him he believed he had nothing to offer her but heart-ache? Something that had to do with his dislike of the holidays?

“You deserve better.”

She nodded. “You’re right. I do.”

This time she was the one who left.