The ER's Newest Dad

Well, perhaps once, and hadn’t he lived to regret that mistake?

* * *

“Forget McDreamy and McSteamy. If that man were a television doctor, he’d be McHottie.” Cindy fanned her busty chest to emphasize her point.

Brielle ignored her friend’s antics, as she’d grown accustomed to doing since McHottie’s arrival earlier that week. If only her friend knew what evils lurked beneath Ross’s beautiful façade she wouldn’t constantly harp on about his royal hotness.

No, he hadn’t been evil, she admitted. He’d just... No, she wasn’t going to let her mind go to the past. Not again.

“Too bad he only has eyes for you,” Cindy continued, unfazed by Brielle’s lack of response. “Because I wouldn’t mind feeling the heat.”

Brielle fought to keep from looking up from the computer monitor where she was entering a patient’s latest assessment data. She would not react to Cindy’s comment. She couldn’t. Her friend would have her shoved into a supply closet with Ross and bar the door. Cindy was constantly trying to get her to date, to splurge on life’s niceties, as she called the opposite sex. Brielle had other priorities.

“Take now, for instance,” Cindy said with a hint of amusement in her voice.

Brielle wasn’t going to look up. She wasn’t. Ross seemed to have eyes for her a lot these days, but she didn’t care. She didn’t.

“Here I am practically having hot flushes over those sultry blue eyes and that chiseled body, and does he even notice?” Her friend sighed dramatically. “No, he just keeps looking at you as if you’re a fascinating puzzle he has to solve, as if you’re a dessert he has to taste, as if—”

“You can have him,” Brielle interrupted before Cindy could elaborate further, before her face could grow any hotter.

“Because?”

They’d been friends too long for Brielle not to know exactly what her friend’s expression looked like without having to glance her way. Cindy’s brow was arched high in question and a smile toyed on her lips.

Wasn’t that the thing she’d loved most about Bean’s Creek? That no one knew Ross other than Samantha and Vann? That she’d been able to move home without anyone feeling sorry for her because the man who’d been her world had abandoned her when she’d needed him most? Granted, he hadn’t known the full sto

ry, but she had tried to tell him more than once and he’d refused to listen.

“He’s not my type.”

“Honey,” her friend scoffed with another wave of her hand, “that man is every straight woman’s type.”

Brielle hit the “enter” key, then leaned back in her chair. “Not mine.”

“Because?” Cindy persisted.

Been there, done that, have the scars and the kid to prove it.

“He just isn’t.”

A short silence followed and when Cindy spoke her tone was softer, more serious. “Because he reminds you of Justice’s dad?”

Hello. Had Cindy read her mind? Brielle’s gaze jerked up.

She shouldn’t have looked. Really, she shouldn’t have. Yet her gaze had instantly gone to Cindy. A very curious Cindy, who was watching her way too closely. No wonder. She probably looked like a deer caught in headlight beams. Maybe her friend really had read her mind. Or maybe she’d just thought she was talking in her head and really she’d mumbled her sarcastic remark out loud? No, she knew she hadn’t.

“Why would you ask that?” Had her voice squeaked? Had the racket her mouth had emitted even been actual words or pleas to not push?

“I am your best friend,” Cindy reminded her, sounding slightly offended. “Plus, I’m not blind. Dr. Lane’s eyes are a fantastic blue, just like Justice’s.”

“Lots of people have blue eyes.” She did her best to look bored with the conversation, to look as if she thought Cindy was crazy.

Cindy was crazy if she thought Brielle was going to have this conversation while entering patient data at the emergency room nurses’ station. Especially when Ross could step up at any time.

“True.” Cindy shrugged. “I just thought—”

“Quit thinking.”