“On your desk at the office,” Angie replied, calmly shaking down the thermometer. “There’s nothing in it that needs your attention before Monday, at the earliest.”
“Dammit, I—mmph.” He closed his mouth by instinct when she pushed the thermometer into it. Glaring at her, he removed it. “You didn’t bring the report on the San Juan deal, either.”
“No, I didn’t. That’s been taken care of.” She took the thermometer from his hand and replaced it in his mouth.
He pulled it out again. “Taken care of by whom?”
“By me. And if you don’t keep that thermometer in your mouth, I’m going to be forced to take your temperature in a considerably less dignified manner,” she threatened, frustration temporarily overcoming the composed discretion she’d so carefully cultivated during the past months as his assistant. She’d sounded very much like the old Angie just then, she realized with a mental wince, waiting fatalistically for Rhys to fire her on the spot.
She was surprised when he did nothing more than stare at her hard for a long, taut moment and then slowly place the thermometer back in his mouth. She had enough sense not to express satisfaction that he’d followed her order.
“I’ll get you something cold to drink,” she muttered, avoiding his eyes as she turned to leave the room. “You’re supposed to drink plenty of liquids when you have the flu.”
Rhys’s kitchen had the look of a room that was equipped strictly for convenience, used no more than absolutely necessary. His refrigerator contained canned soft drinks—he seemed to have an unexpected taste for fruit-flavored sodas such as orange, grape and strawberry—a jug of orange juice, a gallon of milk, a half-dozen eggs, butter and blackberry jam. That was it. She poured him a large glass of orange juice, deciding she’d ask if he was hungry before trying to make breakfast from his limited supplies.
The thermometer was still in his mouth, apparently forgotten, when she walked back into his bedroom. Rhys was absorbed in the material she’d brought from the office. She set the juice on the nightstand and reached for the thermometer. “I need a pen,” he announced the moment his mouth was free.
“Just a moment,” she replied absently, squinting at the tiny numbers on the side of the thermometer and wishing he had one of the newer, digital models. Finally lining up the mercury, she frowned as she read the temperature. “Your temperature is one hundred and three degrees.”
He barely flicked her a glance. “I’ll take some aspirin. Where’s that pen?”
She sighed, handed him two aspirin and the juice and rummaged in her purse for a pen. “Are you sure you don’t want me to call your doctor?” she asked, handing it to him.
His answer was a grunt. She assumed it was a negative one. “Then how about something to eat? I could make you an egg and some toast.”
“Not hungry.” He coughed again.
“Do you have any cough medicine?”
“No.”
“I’ll go the nearest pharmacy and get you some. Your chest will get sore if you keep coughing that hard. Do you need anything else while I’m out?”
“The Perkins file,” he answered promptly.
She picked up her purse and turned without responding to that. “I’ll be back soon.”
He caught her wrist before she could step away, surprising her into immobility. His skin burned against hers, and she had to remind herself that it was only because of his fever. She looked up to find him smiling very faintly at her, causing another jolt of awareness to ripple through her. “Thanks,” he said quietly.
She managed not to gulp. “You’re welcome, Mr. Wakefield.” She added the formal address deliberately, to remind herself—and possibly him—that their relationship was strictly a professional one.
He released her and she moved toward the doorway. She paused again when he spoke her name. “Ms. St. Clair.”
“Yes, sir?”
The smile was gone, though his gray eyes held a gleam that was hard to interpret. “A word of advice. Never make threats unless you’re fully prepared to carry them out.”
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She’d wondered whether he’d mention her threat with the thermometer. She intended only to nod and walk away, but her tongue was being very recalcitrant that day. “I never do, Mr. Wakefield,” she said with cool precision.
And then she made her escape, amazed at her own temerity.
3
RETURNING FROM her quick shopping trip, Angie placed the grocery items in the kitchen, found a spoon and headed back upstairs with the cough medicine the pharmacist had recommended. Her eyes on the empty bed, she stopped in the doorway to Rhys’s room. Where was he?
A cough from the door to the bathroom drew her attention there. Wearing nothing but a pair of white briefs, Rhys stood braced with one arm against the doorjamb, looking at the bed as if there were an arduous obstacle course between it and him. Angie had already seen his chest and arms, but now she was able to examine the rest of him. Powerful legs lightly covered with dark hair, lean hips, flat stomach. The white briefs stood out in glaring relief against his tanned skin, clinging revealingly to the quite impressive rest of him. She found herself incongruously wondering how old he was, if her guess of forty was even close. Though his hair was silver and his eyes and mouth bracketed by fine, deep lines, he had the body of a man ten years younger than her estimate.