“What?”
“Intimidating.”
His eyes widened and she could tell the term took him aback.
“Which could explain why your patients save their questions for someone else,” she added. “Maybe they think you don’t have time for minor issues or questions. I’ve had doctors like that in the past. They just seemed so busy and so distracted that I hesitated to bother them with questions or complaints.”
He shook his head, obviously bothered by her comments. “I hope you’re wrong about that. I’ve certainly never tried to intimidate anyone.”
She rested a hand reassuringly on his arm. “I’m sure you haven’t. You just seem so confident and knowledgeable. Those are hardly criticisms.”
He didn’t look particularly reassured. “Those same two words have been used to describe my father. I’ve spent my entire adult life trying not to turn into him.”
She patted his forearm. With a slight laugh, she said, “It’s common enough for a man to want to distinguish himself from his dad—just as many women vow never to turn into their mothers. Doesn’t mean we don’t love them—we just want to establish our own personalities.”
He shook his head. “You haven’t met my father, so you can’t quite understand—but trust me, my dad goes to great lengths to intimidate people with his superior intelligence. I’m not trying to establish my independence by trying to act differently. I’m trying to treat other people with more respect than he does.”
The more she heard about James’s father, the more she suspected she wouldn’t like him. She was beginning to understand James a little better, though there were still many facets of him that were a mystery to her—all of them fascinating.
“Then you’ve succeeded,” she said loyally. “You have always been respectful of me and
of my family, which is why we all like you so much.”
It occurred to her that she was still clutching his bare arm beneath the rolled-up sleeve of his shirt. The warmth of his skin penetrated her palm, heating her blood. She felt a muscle flex beneath her hand, as if he, too, had suddenly become aware of the contact.
He covered her hand with his other hand, giving her fingers a little squeeze. “I like you, too,” he said, his voice suddenly sounding a half octave deeper.
Her heart stuttered over a couple of beats. Like, he had said. He liked her. A perfectly innocuous and friendly statement, certainly nothing that should make her pulse leap this way. Hadn’t she just told him that she liked him, too? It was ridiculous for her to feel this schoolgirl breathlessness over such an innocent comment.
And yet there was nothing innocent about the gleam in his eyes when they lowered slowly from her own, pausing to study her mouth as if memorizing the contours. As if he were mentally replaying the one brief kiss they had shared. At least, that was what she was doing. She could almost taste him again now—which only fueled her hunger for another sample.
She wasn’t sure which of them leaned forward first. Maybe the movement was simultaneous. Their lips met with no hesitation on either part, no fumbling or surprise.
Somehow her arms were around his neck. Somehow his were around her back. And she was draped half across his lap, feeling the warmth of him surrounding her, the strength of him against her. Feeling his body’s reaction to the embrace, which only intensified her own.
Maybe James had a little trouble expressing himself in words. Maybe he’d been trained too well during his childhood to keep his deepest emotions hidden. But he was certainly communicating very clearly now. She had no trouble at all determining what he wanted. Probably because she wanted the same thing.
She drew her head back a couple of inches to study his face when the kiss ended. He met her gaze openly, making no effort to hide his desire, nor his willingness to leave the next step up to her.
She should send him on his way. They’d known each other only a month—not exactly a long time. They had already implicitly agreed the relationship wouldn’t be a lasting one. In only two weeks, he’d be leaving town for two months, after which, who knew if she would ever see him again?
“You still make me nervous, James,” she said on a slight sigh.
“But in a good way,” she added when his brows drew into a frown. “Mostly.”
His beautiful, skilled mouth twitched. “And you still confuse the hell out of me. In a good way. Mostly.”
She could resist flattery. Persuasion. Even pleading. But she found James’s gentle teasing downright irresistible.
She simply had to taste that little smile again. She planted her mouth against his, winding her fingers in the thick, dark hair at the back of his head. James responded instantly, his lips parting to deepen the kiss, stealing any coherent thought from her mind. A shift of his weight, and she lay half-beneath him on the thick-cushioned sofa. A throw pillow tumbled unheeded to the floor—she swept another out of the way as she snuggled into him.
Their legs tangled as their mouths met, separated, met again, tongues dueling, exploring. James’s hand was hot against her stomach beneath her white top. She arched into him, filling his palm with her aching breast, feeling his fingers moving over the thin covering of her white cotton bra. For only a moment, she wished she were wearing something a little more exotic beneath her plain work uniform, but James seemed pleased enough with what he saw when he swept her top over her head.
His mouth sought out the pounding pulse in her neck and at the base of her throat, then slid lower to send her pulse rate soaring even higher. She gasped at the first feel of his tongue and teeth against her sensitized breast, but her hands urged him not to stop the exquisite torment.
He lifted his head and his eyes were enchantingly glazed. She loved knowing she was the reason for that dazed and unfocused look. “Um—maybe I should…?”
“You should stay,” she murmured, stroking his cheek with one unsteady hand. “Let’s go to my room.”