Sizzling Nights with Dr. Off-Limits

“I’m going to check on Cassie.”

“I’ll be there when I’ve finished my chart notes on Jenny.”

“Take your time.” Maybe she’d be finished and not have to see him again.

* * *

“Are you going to go out with Dr. Cain tonight, since you and Richard are history?” Did Meghan have listening devices hidden in the patient rooms or what?

“No, I’m not going out with Dr. Cain. We had our auction date. Tonight, I’m going to stay home and cook.”

Meghan wrinkled her nose. “You’re crazy, you know.”

“I enjoy cooking.”

“You could go to the movies with Amy and me.”

“No, thank you. I’m cooking because I want to.”

To keep her mind occupied she’d enrolled in cooking lessons not long after her divorce was final. Yes, she’d burned more than a few meals prior to figuring out what she was doing wrong, but she had learned. Excelled even. Cooking had been great therapy. Mainly, she’d discovered, as long as she didn’t get lost daydreaming about Lucas, her meals had turned out decent. Decent had gone to good. Something she’d detested had gone to something she enjoyed and found therapeutic. As time passed, she’d quit dreaming about Lucas altogether.

Emily left the nurses’ station and checked on her patients. Lucas stopped her just outside Jenny’s room.

“Are you really going to cook your dinner tonight?”

He sounded so incredulous that she winced. Okay, so she hadn’t been able to cook when they got married. That wasn’t a sin. There had been lots of things she could do. She’d just grown up in a house where the majority of meals had been takeout and she’d never mastered much more in the kitchen than use of a microwave.

“I can cook.” She glared at him, hoping no one was in the hospital hallway to see them, but afraid to look around to check. “I’m not a stagnant person, you know.”

“I didn’t think you were.”

“Then you shouldn’t sound so surprised that I’ve learned to do things I couldn’t do so well a few years ago.”

“You always were a quick learner.” He didn’t say more, didn’t say to what he referred. He didn’t have to.

Emily’s brain went there anyway.

Or maybe it wasn’t her brain, but her body.

Her body seemed unable to not go there when Lucas was near.

“Prove it.”

“Prove what?” she asked, not following him.

“That you can cook.”

“I know what you’re trying to do. You’re just trying to get me to invite you to dinner.”

“You’re right. That is what I’m trying to do. What are we having?”

“Chopped liver,” she said without thought, hating that he was once again keeping pace beside her.

“Chopped liver?”

She almost let a laugh escape from her lips. Almost.

“Oh, yeah.” She knew he didn’t like liver, that he hated it. “Plus broccoli.”