Heiress's Baby Scandal

“Guess he still ain’t been by.” Tyler sighed, making the sound long and as drawn out as his speech, as if every sound that came from his mouth had to stretch the span of his home state of Texas. “Can’t help but feel bad for the guy. Losing his wife that way and afraid that he’ll lose this li’l sweetheart, too.”

Her tongue still not cooperating, Eleanor nodded.

“I’m glad she got assigned to you, Eleanor. She got lucky and got the best.” Without looking up, he brushed his finger gently across where the baby still clung to Eleanor’s finger.

Sparks shot up her arm and her breath caught in her throat.

She’d been so engrossed in the man beside her, in his unexpected compliment, she’d completely forgotten she was still touching the baby until his skin made contact with hers.

Wow.

Just wow.

Thinking she had finally prised her tongue loose, she turned to try to say something witty, but just as she opened her mouth, he flashed that half-crooked grin of his. At someone walking up beside them.

Someone else female.

Because he was Dr. Tyler Donaldson and that’s what he did best.

With every single female in the NICU except for dumpy, boring, mute, too-curvy Eleanor Aston.

Where was the black dress she’d brought with her that morning?

Panic raced through Eleanor as she stared at the contents of her staff locker.

It had been ransacked.

In the place of her gym bag, the black dress that she’d neatly hung that morning and the pair of black flats she’d planned to quickly change into was a note in familiar handwriting.

A note that made smoke billow from her ears.

You’re gonna look so hot, sis. You can thank me later. B.

Thank her? Ha. She was going to strangle her sister. How had Brooke gotten into the doctors’ lounge? Gotten into her locked locker? Not that her sister had been there herself. No way would Brooke risk being seen or photographed with her face red, swollen and peeling.

Yet her sister had wiped her out.

Even her purse was gone.

There were three items in the locker other than the note. The red dress and stilettos that her sister had so thoughtfully sent over and a square white box that covered almost the entire bottom of the locker.

Dare she even open the lid to see what lay inside?

She glanced at her watch, knew she was running out of time and snatched the lid off to stare at the items inside.

Underwear. Eleanor wrinkled her nose. Leave it to her sister to know that if you were going to wear an itty-bitty dress you had to have itty-bitty underwear to go with it.

Plus, a red clutch purse that matched her dress and shoes and a too-big, too-flamboyant hair clip meant more for adornment than to actually be useful.

And makeup. Lots of makeup.

Acid gurgling in her stomach, Eleanor shook her head. This was her place of employment, the hospital where she worked.

Okay, she’d jump in the shower and pray that when she was clean, her belongings would be back.

They weren’t.

“What’s wrong?” Scarlet asked, doing a mad makeover dash of her own to get changed for the ribbon-cutting.