“Tory! Get!”

• 14 •

Winds of Fortune

Laughing, Tory shrugged out of her lab coat and tossed it onto the high backed leather chair behind her overfl owing desk. “I’m gone.”

Just as Tory stepped out into the hall, their receptionist rushed in from the waiting area and skidded to a halt beside her. Lithe and handsome, Randy’s blond hair was uncharacteristically mussed and his big blue eyes were overly bright.

“Sorry,” he said breathlessly, looking from Tory to Nita and back again, “but Deo Camara just brought Joey Torres in, and he’s bleeding all over the waiting room. Sally’s putting them in the procedure room.”

“What happened?” Tory inquired sharply, turning back into her offi ce for her lab coat. If Randy was ruffl ed it must be serious, because he could simultaneously handle fi ve emergency calls, three hysterical mothers, and a recalcitrant insurance rep without breaking a sweat.

“Deo said something about a saw.”

“Thanks, Randy,” Nita said calmly. “Why don’t you get the waiting room cleaned up and let the other patients know there might be a little bit of a wait.”

“Okay, right.” As quickly as he had appeared, Randy was gone.

“I’ve got this, Tory,” Nita said.

Tory drew up short, one arm in and one out of her lab coat. Nita was a board-certifi ed emergency room physician. She was trained to handle anything that might come through the door. Rationally, Tory knew that. Still, it was hard to leave. She had hired on temporary help before, but Nita was the fi rst physician she had contracted for a possible long-term association. The only partner she had ever considered had been KT O’Bannon, the woman she had once considered the love of her life. But KT had left her with a broken heart and broken dreams.

Then Reese Conlon had come along and mended her heart, but until now she’d never really considered sharing her professional life with anyone else.

“You might need an assistant,” Tory pointed out.

“If it’s that bad, the repair will need to be done in the OR and we’ll transport him to Hyannis. Otherwise, Sally can help me. Now I’d better get in there—and you have a party to go to.”

Nita disappeared down the hallway. Tory could either follow her, making a clear statement that she didn’t trust her to handle the problem alone, or she could go home where the people who loved her were waiting.

• 15 •

RADCLY fFE

She hung her lab coat on a hook behind her door, and with one last glance down the hall toward the patient rooms, she left.

❖

Nita pushed through the door into the procedure room and stopped short at the incongruous sound of laughter. Their clinic nurse, Sally, stood at the counter on the far side of the room setting up an instrument tray. Two young men in khaki work clothes and dusty boots, one seated on the stretcher and the other leaning against it, faced away from the door toward the petite blond nurse. Apparently no one heard her enter because the revelry continued.

“We need to make sure this gets fi xed up right,” remarked the deeply tanned, curly haired Adonis who nudged the shoulder of a similarly handsome man whose right hand was wrapped in a bloody towel. “Otherwise, Joey’s sex life is going straight down the toi—”

“Oh I don’t know,” Sally laughed as she laid out gloves and irrigation solution, “it doesn’t look like any of Joey’s critical equipment is in danger.”

“That’s just the problem, he needs that hand to take care of his main business,” the Adonis smirked.

“Come on, Deo,” Joey said, “I’m in pain here.” He glanced over his buddy’s shoulder and, spying Nita, instantly looked chagrined.

“Besides, there’s a lady present.”

“Oh, well, excuse me,” Sally said archly, rolling the metal instrument stand up to the table. “Now you two decide to get some manners?” She waved to Nita. “We’re all ready for you.”

“Thanks.” Nita crossed the room briskly. “I’m Dr. Burgoyne.

What happened?”

“Joey here picked a fi ght with a table saw and lost,” the uninjured member of the pair replied, turning in Nita’s direction. Deep-set eyes so dark they verged on black did a slow survey of Nita’s face, fl ickered lower for an instant, then returned to lock on Nita’s. “Well, hello.”

Nita blinked, bombarded by a series of quicksilver images—wide, sensuous mouth; midnight curls tumbling onto a broad forehead; thick, almost straight black brows; and skin, she realized—not tanned—but a rich natural bronze. An Adonis, no doubt. But very much not a man. For one second Nita completely lost focus and everything else

• 16 •

Winds of Fortune

in the room receded from her consciousness except her awareness of this woman. How she hadn’t realized immediately that Adonis was a woman, despite the nondescript work clothes, she couldn’t imagine.

Even partially turned away, her sharply-carved profi le was just a little bit too exquisite to be male, despite its strength. And not even the well-developed shoulders and thighs could diminish the undeniably feminine nature of her body. The subtle swell of her breasts, the narrow waist, the slight curve of hip all screamed woman. Beautiful woman.

Nita felt her skin warming as the woman continued to stare at her with a mixture of amusement and frank appreciation. Nita knew the look. Not just beautiful, beautiful and arrogant. This one knew she was gorgeous and no doubt knew the effect she had on women. Women and men, probably. She was looking at Nita as if she expected Nita to melt.

Nita mentally shook herself—that wasn’t going to happen. Not now, not ever again.

“Perhaps the patient would like to fi ll me in,” Nita said, dragging her gaze away from the dark hypnotic eyes. She knew she sounded irritated. She was irritated. And disturbed. Irritated at herself for even noticing how striking the woman was, and defi nitely disturbed for being intrigued—if only for an instant—by the admiring look in the woman’s eyes. Being stirred by any woman’s attraction was something she had thought she’d expunged from her mind and body, but apparently she’d been wrong.

“If you could step back, please,” Nita said, “I need to see to your friend.”

“By all means,” Deo said with a slightly mocking tone and a sweep of her arm, “be my guest.”

Deo Camara wasn’t surprised by the doctor’s initial consternation.

She was used to that. Strangers often took her for a guy, especially in her work clothes, or confused her with one of her many cousins.

The anger that had quickly surged in the piercing, raw umber eyes was unexpected, though. What was even more unanticipated was that the doctor’s antagonism bothered her. She didn’t know the woman, so why should it matter what she thought? Annoyed at being off-balance, she shrugged and shifted a few inches, folding her arms across her chest and rocking back on her heels.

“Thank you,” Nita said dryly, edging around the stranger when she failed to make room. Apparently she was as rude as she was good-

• 17 •

RADCLY fFE

looking. She smiled at the patient. “Hi. Joey is it?”

“Yeah. Uh, yes ma’am.” He dropped his eyes and blushed.

“I’m going to need to examine your hand. Why don’t you lie down.” She looked to Sally. “Gloves?”

“Here you go.” Sally handed Nita a package of sterile gloves and then pulled on her own pair. “I’ve got a basin and sterile saline when you’re ready.”

Nita glanced over her shoulder at Deo, who still stood so close Nita could smell a faint mixture of salt air and sawdust clinging to her.

For some reason that struck her as more alluring than a fi ne perfume.

Nonplussed at the thought, she said edgily, “This will probably take awhile. You might want to have a seat out front.”

“I’m staying.”

“As you wish.”

Once Joey was settled comfortably with his arm extended on a narrow arm board canted out from the table, Nita removed the bloody towel from his right hand. As she worked, she was disconcertingly aware of Deo’s presence just behind her. She could almost feel the heat coming off her body.

“Would you step back just a little,” Nita said without turning, frustrated that her concentration was affected by a stranger this way.

“Sure thing.”

Nita didn’t hear her move, and she could still sense her nearness.

This is ridiculous. Determined to banish the exasperating distraction from her consciousness, Nita focused on Joey and immediately her discomfort abated.

“This might be just a bit uncomfortable,” she said, gently supporting his wrist in her palm.

“It’s okay, Doc,” Joey said, his eyes fi xed trustingly on her face.

The bleeding had slowed to a trickle, but his small fi nger drooped and angled unnaturally. Nita noted an irregular laceration through the layer of caked-on blood. Saw blade. Another laceration slashed across the mid-portion of his ring fi nger. She carefully repositioned his hand on a sterile towel.

“Sally, go ahead and soak his whole hand in quarter strength Betadiene for ten minutes and then irrigate the lacerations. In the meantime, give him a tetanus shot, a gram of Zinacef, and set up for an X-ray.” She patted Joey’s shoulder. “You’ve cut a tendon or two and

• 18 •

Winds of Fortune

nicked a nerve. Nothing we can’t fi x. I’ll be back in a few minutes and we’ll get started.”

Pushing back from the table, Nita stripped off her gloves. She tossed them aside and quickly left the room, still strangely disquieted by her reaction to her patient’s friend. She didn’t get derailed by the attention of a beautiful woman. Not anymore.

“Hey!”

Nita turned and saw that the woman was following her down the hall. Her long strides were forceful, more power than grace, and her physical presence combined with her natural beauty made an eye-catching package. Despite her appreciation, Nita carefully kept her expression fl at. “Can I help you?”