The Passion of Patrick MacNeill (19 page)

"I don't want a cracker."

"How about this," Kate proposed. "I have clothes here in my locker. Give me five minutes to shower, and we can go out for pizza."

"Yeah!"

"You want pizza?" Patrick repeated.

That faint flush he loved suffused her face. "He likes pizza."

He grinned at her defensive tone. "Pizza it is." He'd never known a woman to get ready in five minutes before—Holly had liked her hair and makeup to be just so—but Kate managed it.

He smiled in approval when she returned to the waiting room, tidy in slacks and blouse, her shiny hair secured in a barrette. "All set?"

A burly doc in gold wire rims bumped through the doors behind her.
"Kate, good job with the old lady.
Did you talk to Ernie about—
"

He checked, shrewd hazel eyes skipping from Patrick to Jack. Instinct had Patrick going on alert, his hands balling in his jacket pockets.

"Excuse me," the doctor said politely. "I didn't know you were busy. Mr. MacNeill, isn't it?"

He knew the guy.
Roberts, that
was it. Patrick nodded. "Dr. Roberts."

"That's all right," Kate said hastily. "Yes, I went over everything. He can page me if there's a problem."

"Wonderful. Well." The physician shifted his weight from foot to foot. "I won't keep you. Going out somewhere?"

"To dinner.
Kate needs a break."

"Ah. Yes." His broad-featured face worked with brief, internal debate before he stuck out his hand. "Have a nice time, then."

"Thanks." Patrick shook, his gaze sliding to Kate. She was wearing her doctor's mask again, and the tension had returned to her shoulders.

He waited until they were at the elevator before he asked. "What the hell was all that about?"

Kate entered the elevator and turned, staring straight ahead at the sliding doors. "I'm not sure. If I had to guess, I'd say
Owen's
not going to report seeing us together to Dr. Swaim."

Jack hovered by the control panel. "Can I push the button?" he asked.

Distracted, Patrick replied, "Yeah, go ahead. Why would he?"

"Which one?"
Jack persisted.

"L. For lobby.
Why should it matter if he sees us together, Kate?"

"It shouldn't It's just Swaim's been touchy about his practice lately. It's like he wants me to take over in surgery, but he doesn't want me taking any of his patients. It's weird."

"Have you talked to him yet?"

"Sort of."

"Is that
yes or no
?"

The doors opened on the lobby, and Kate strode through. Patrick kept up with her easily, one hand outstretched to Jack, trotting in their wake.

"I mentioned my concern, all right? He said I was imagining things, that he was simply a very busy man. But afterwards I noticed he started turning over a lot of the OR procedures to Owen and me."

She bolted out onto the lit sidewalk and whirled to face him. "The man is a surgeon.
The head of the burn unit.
I'm not going to embarrass him by questioning his ability."

"Or risk your job by ticking him off."

"Or risk my job. That's right."

She headed for the staff parking garage.

Patrick caught her arm. "Whoa. Slow down. The car's that way."

"I have my car."

He didn't say anything. He didn't let go of her arm, either. Kate blew out a sharp breath, exhaling bad humor. "Oh, all right. You can drive me back to pick it up later."

He could. Or he could take her home and help her work off that temper in bed. Deciding she wasn't ready to hear that option yet, Patrick led the way silently to the Volvo and unlocked the doors.

"This is going to be fun," Jack announced, bouncing into the back seat.

Patrick glanced from his son's bright face to Kate's guarded one.

Fun
.
Right.

Chapter 12

«
^
»

K
ate stared up through the windshield at the blinking red neon sign.
"Bowling?"
Her disbelief was evident in her voice. "We're not eating dinner at a bowling alley."

"Sure we are." Patrick cut the engine and unfastened his seat belt. "My old DI runs the place.
Makes great burgers.
And Jack can get a slice of pizza."

She relaxed slightly. "But we're not actually going bowling."

He angled himself in his seat to look at her.
"Why not?"

"Well…" She searched for a reasonable objection. She was tired and tense and in no mood to make a fool of herself in front of Patrick Probably-Bowls-Strikes MacNeill. "Can Jack manage a ball, with his hand?"

Patrick grinned. "Jack still uses two hands. And we'll pull bumpers down in the gutters. He'll do fine."

"Great," Kate muttered. "Then I can be out-performed by a four-year-old."

Patrick paused in the act of swinging out of the car. "You can't bowl?"

She glared at him. "My sister can."

Amy could bowl. Amy could bowl and shoot pool and do any number of things that required time and money and friends. Kate had always been too stubborn, too broke and too shy.

"Time you learned, then," Patrick said. His grin broadened, and her heart actually fluttered. "You'll do fine. It'll take your mind off whatever's bothering you. You might even enjoy yourself."

She doubted it. But she let Jack take her hand and tug her through the sliding doors into the well-lit, echoing bowling alley. It smelled of floor wax, disinfectant and old shoes, with an overlay of popcorn and beer. Kate sniffed. Not disagreeable, she decided, after the stench of burns hanging in the hospital's sterile air.

League bowlers with matching shirts and polished bags practiced at one end. A children's birthday party chattered and crashed at the other. Patrick settled Kate at a center lane, while Jack pattered off to find a ball.

He eyed her feet
assessingly
. "You'll need shoes. What do you
take,
an eight?"

"Seven and a half," she replied without thinking.

He went up front to pay their charge, collect their shoes and place their food order. Kate eased back cautiously in her molded plastic chair, her attention captured by the three teenage boys in the next lane. They postured and cracked jokes, plainly showing off for the pretty girl bowling with her family on their other side. They reminded her of Sean. She smiled.

"That's better," Patrick said, setting a burger basket in front of her. Jack scrambled onto the seat beside her. "What are you thinking of?"

"Your brother," she replied, and had the pleasure of seeing his brows snap together in a frown.

"Don't waste your time," he advised.

She tilted her head, seized by an unfamiliar desire to test her own feminine power. "Why? Do you think I'm too old for him?"

Patrick scowled, handing Jack a napkin. He stuck a straw into his soft drink. "No."

Oh, she was enjoying this. "I got the impression he liked me."

"Yeah, he did. He does. But then, our Sean likes most women. He's commitment-shy."

"
Mmm
."
Thoughtfully, she selected a French fry and dipped it in ketchup. "Runs in the family, does it?"

His eyes narrowed dangerously. "Do you want a list of my commitments, Kate?"

Her heart jolted as if she'd just administered herself a shot of
epi
.
Careful.
She'd known what she was getting into when she'd decided to go to bed with Patrick MacNeill. He'd offered her pleasure, not promises.
A shared respite from responsibility, not an added obligation.
If the intimacy of the night had tempted her to think otherwise, she had only to remember the way he'd closed himself up from her presence in his house this morning. She'd been deceived once about a man's intentions. She'd be a fool to delude herself now.

"Not necessary," she said coolly.
"Unless you're trying to convince me to keep score."

Amusement relaxed his face. "You really haven't done this before, have you? It's done electronically."

"Oh. No cheating, then?"

"No cheating."

She wondered if they were still talking about bowling, but didn't have the courage to ask.
"Too bad."

"You'll do fine," he assured her again.

"Daddy pulls down the thingies on the sides," Jack explained, speaking around a slice of pizza.
"To keep the score even."

Not very even, a disgruntled Kate thought in the sixth frame. Her ball bounced off the bumpers, losing force, or glided along the side, never knocking down more than four pins. Jack had his own, two-handed style, rolling the ball from between his legs with surprising effect. His shouts of glee and whispered instruction relieved her embarrassment and made her smile.

But when Patrick played, her mouth went dry. The intensity he brought to their uncompetitive family game was positively indecent. Oh, he wasn't obnoxious about it. He joked, Leaning back at the console, and patted and teased his son, and hunched over, making encouraging noises, when Kate got up to bowl. But when he stood and strode to the bottom of the lane, he drew every female eye, from the pink-haired lady spraying shoes at the counter to the teenage girl playing one lane over.

He walked like a warrior. Beneath his plain knit shirt, his shoulders were broad. His long back rippled with muscle. His concentration as he set the ball tempted every woman to imagine how that powerful attention would feel focused on her.

Kate knew, and the knowledge made her heart beat faster. She clutched her soggy soda cup, trying to steady her heartbeat by analyzing the man's game. It was all a matter of technique, she decided. He had a smooth swing. Good balance.
And a very nice, tight butt.

"Well, now, this is a pleasure."

Kate's face flamed. She turned. A graying black man in a bright purple bowling shirt smiled at her, extending his hand over the counter.

"Jimmy Burke," he said. "I run this place. I've been waiting a long time for Captain MacNeill to bring a lady around."

She wiped her hand hastily on her slacks. His grip was firm and callused, his forearm tattooed. "It's very nice to meet you. But I'm not his—I'm a doctor at the hospital."

The man's eyebrows climbed his high, domed forehead.
"A doctor.
Damn.
Never pictured the captain with a medic."

"Yes, well, I'm sure he feels the same way," she agreed. Patrick's back was to them. He waited politely for the blonde in the next lane to bowl before finishing his own frame. With a wiggle, the teenager released her ball and sashayed to her seat, looking back over her shoulder.

"I can see why you'd be worried about finding him female companionship," Kate observed dryly.

"Oh, he's not like that, ma'am.
Doctor."

"Kate," she insisted, smiling.

He acknowledged her name with a brief nod. "Thank you. Call me Jimmy. Anyway, he
don't
fool around. Patrick MacNeill was just about the most married man I ever knew. The rest of them couldn't wait to get out on liberty and drink and carry on."

She was fascinated and trying not to show it. "And he didn't go?"

The man laughed, displaying perfect white teeth. "Oh, he went. They all went. And being as he was going mustang— He didn't come in from college," he explained at Kate's puzzled look. "Sometimes a likely enlisted man will get tapped as an officer candidate and get a chance at flight school. That's what happened with Patrick. Anyway, maybe he needed liberty more than most."

She leaned forward, trying to absorb this new image of Patrick. "And … he was married, then?"

Jimmy Burke nodded. "About two years, I guess.
To his high-school sweetheart."
She must have kept the pang at her heart from showing in her face, because he continued with his story. "So every time his buddies would go into a bar and start to
pairing
up, like they do, Patrick would look them over, all the ladies, and pick out the ugliest girl there and buy her a drink."

Kate winced. "And I'm supposed to find this reassuring?"

Burke grinned. "Oh, yes. It was strategy," he confided, tapping his graying temple. "One of the reasons he made officer. See, he'd make that girl's night. She'd keep all the other pretty ladies away, and Officer Candidate MacNeill would get back to base without ever being tempted."

Kate pressed her lips together. Was part of her appeal her own inability to tempt Patrick to emotional infidelity? "That's shameless," she said.

"No, it was smart," Patrick interrupted, coming over to sit beside her. She was painfully conscious of his arm, warm and heavy, draped along the back of her chair, touching her shoulders. He reached his other hand to Burke.

"Sir.
How the hell are you?"

"It's Jimmy, now, Captain. I'm not your instructor anymore."

"It's Patrick, now, First Sergeant. I'm not in the Corps anymore."

Kate listened, both attracted by and excluded from this masculine exchange, reminded again how little she really shared of Patrick MacNeill's life. When Jack got up to bowl, she excused herself to watch, leaving the men to their conversation.

The boy danced in excitement. "Spare!" he crowed. "I'm beating you, Dr. Kate!"

Smiling, she tugged on the brim of his baseball cap.
"Showoff."

Patrick unfolded his long body from his chair and came up behind them. "Are you being disrespectful to the lady, buddy?"

"No, sir."
Jack tipped his head back, grinning at his dad. "I'm just beating her."

Kate laughed. "Don't sound so proud of yourself. I stink."

"I don't know," Patrick said. "Maybe you just need a lesson."

She eyed him warily.
"A lesson?"

"
Mmm
.
You're letting your arm cross your body before you release."

He was almost certainly right. And she didn't care, Kate reminded herself. But the hint of criticism raised her competitive hackles. "So?"

"So you want to bring the ball forward straight from the shoulder." He picked up her ten-pound ball like it weighed so many ounces and handed it to her. "Here, let me show you."

She could hardly object with Jack standing there, with Jimmy Burke looking on. But instead of demonstrating, Patrick wrapped his body around hers and guided her hand.

"Bring it back smoothly," he murmured into her ear, while she tried to ignore that his arm was warm and close along hers and his hips cradled her bottom. "That's it. And then forward … like this … and release when the heel of your thumb is pointing at the center pin."

The ball flew from her fingers, gliding almost straight down the wooden lane to crash into the number eight pin.

"Seven!" Jack shouted, bouncing up and down. "That's good, Dr. Kate."

"There," Patrick said, his breath stirring the hair just behind her ear.
"Much better."

Reaction shivered through her. She shrugged away, damning her susceptibility. She didn't want to respond to him on a purely sexual level, not when he kept so much of his mind and his life locked away from her. With a jolt of dismay, she discovered her heart was capable of misleading her more thoroughly than Wade Preston ever had.

"Let me see if I've got it."

Grimly, she retrieved her ball from the conveyor. She could do this. She would do this. She was smart enough to master a simple game. Two steps, the way she'd seen him do it. Back from the shoulder, smoothly. Forward, straight. And with only a kiss from the bumper, Kate bowled her first spare.

She turned with a smile of triumph to meet Patrick's gaze, amusement and a hint of admiration in his blue eyes.

"Yeah, I guess you do," he said.
"And all by yourself, too."

Her chin went up. "Don't mess with me, flyboy. I've had a bad day."

"Tell me about it," he invited quietly.

She opened her mouth to do exactly that before she realized how inappropriate it would be with Jack there and the bowling alley owner listening in. How inappropriate it would be, period. Patrick MacNeill had made it clear from the start he didn't want her problems. He wanted a physical distraction and help with his son.

"I don't think so," she said.

Something—frustration, fatigue, the lick of loneliness—must have colored her voice. She caught the look Patrick exchanged with Burke, leaning over the counter behind them, and was annoyed at her loss of control.

The owner straightened, elaborately breezy. "I'd best go check on lane four. Those league bowlers get mighty thirsty." He shook Patrick's hand again and nodded to Kate.
"Ma'am.
Don't be a stranger."

She forced a smile. "Thank you. It was nice to meet you."