Сандра Браун - Adam's Fall

"Too bad, Ace. It's time for your exercises."

Lucretia wedged herself between Lilah and the bed. "Surely you don't expect a man in pain to go through therapy."

"For your information, Miss von whatever, most of my patients are in pain. I help relieve their pain. At least in the long run I do. Now would you please excuse my patient and me. We've got work to do."

"Obviously you've had limited experience in your chosen field and are overzealous in carrying out your responsibilities."

Lilah gritted her teeth. "I'm a professional who has had vast experience, both with patients and with getting around their meddlesome friends and relatives and lovers who might mean well, but who don't know what the hell they're talking about when it comes to physical therapy."

"You boast of being a professional, but your attire and conduct might make one wonder, wouldn't it?"

"And one might find oneself getting packed off to the nearest motel if one doesn't haul one's elegant ass out of my way. Adam," Lilah snapped, "tell her to get lost until after your session."

Wearily he removed the ice bag from his forehead. He gazed back and forth between the women, but his eyes finally lighted on Lilah. "I really don't feel well, Lilah. Couldn't we skip it until after lunch?"

Blood surged through her veins in proportion to her mounting anger. She gave him a look of undiluted contempt, ignored Lucretia's smug expression, and stormed out, rattling every pane of glass in the house when she slammed the door behind her.

Now, sitting in the kitchen waiting for noontime to roll around, she still shook with rage every time she replayed the scene in her head. Pete had to repeat what he'd said several times before he roused her. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"Runch ready."

"Good. I'll go call them."

"That won't be necessary, Miss Mason," Lucretia said from the doorway. "I've come down for a tray. Adam prefers to eat in his room."

"Well, what Adam prefers and what Adam is going to do are two different things," Lilah said tightly as she came to her feet and faced the other woman. "He's been eating his meals downstairs for weeks. He hasn't had a tray taken to him since he learned to get in his wheelchair. He needs the exercise. He needs to be up and moving about on his own. And dammit, he's not going to lie up there and let you spoon-feed him lunch and sympathy."

"Not that I'm questioning your expertise — "

"Like hell you're not!"

" — but Adam seems completely done in. I intend to call Dr Arno this afternoon and ask him what he thinks Adam needs. Pete, why aren't you preparing that tray?"

"Rirah say no."

"Oh, fix the stupid tray," Lilah said angrily and marched past Lucretia out of the room.

"You're sure she understands?"

"Completely." Dr Arno told Lilah over the telephone. "I explained to Miss von Elsinghauer how far Adam had come in the time you've been working with him. I told her that if the current pattern continues, he could be normal or near normal in a matter of weeks, but that it was vital that your program of therapy not be interrupted and that the patient's optimism be kept at a high level."

Lilah's inner tension relaxed for the first time since she had opened the door to the stunningly beautiful Lucretia. "Thanks, Bo. I was about to have a battle royal on my hands here."

"I would bet on you to win any battle you might engage in, Lilah," he said around a chuckle. "If you have any problems, please let me know. But I think we headed off a major crisis."

"Thanks again for backing me up."

As soon as she replaced the telephone receiver, she ran out of her room and into Adam's. But she was brought up short by what she saw.

Lucretia was sitting on the edge of his bed. She had changed clothes since her arrival and was now wearing linen slacks, but there still wasn't a hair out of place and she looked far from Lilah's idea of "casual."

Lucretia had Adam's hand sandwiched between hers. He was laughing up at her. It struck Lilah like a blow dart how devastatingly handsome he was when he was smiling like that. It struck her just as hard how much she had missed him. They'd spent so little time together the last two days. When they had been together, they'd been fighting.

It also hit her like a bolt of lightning that she would very much like to scratch Lucretia von Elsinghauer's eyes out, and not only because of her interference with Adam's therapy.

Lilah was jealous. Of Lucretia.

Oh, hell, she'd fallen in love.

When Lucretia noticed Lilah standing in the doorway, she leaned over and kissed Adam's lips softly. "I'll see you later, darling."

Lilah's hostile gaze followed her as she left the room. When Lilah turned back toward Adam, he, too, was staring at the empty doorway Lucretia had just glided through, only his expression was wistful.

"What'd you do, send out distress signals?" Lilah asked him peevishly.

"What do you mean?"

"Didn't you send for her to come rescue you from my mean clutches?"

With no assistance from her he made it from his bed to his wheelchair. "I don't rely on other people, especially women, to bail me out of bad situations. Lucretia's arrival was a complete surprise to me."

"Does she do that often, just show up uninvited and unexpected?"

"She's an independent woman. She does what she likes." He looked up at her and added pointedly, "And she knows she has an open invitation."

"Better be careful about those open invitations, Cavanaugh. Your Lucretia might put in an appearance sometime and create an awkward scene for you."

"Like what?"

"Like finding another woman in bed with you, dimwit."

"Well," he grunted as he levered himself onto the mat table, "that wasn't even a possibility this time, was it?"

Lilah swung his legs up onto the padded table. "No, it wasn't."

"So what's your gripe?"

"Was I griping?"

"It sounded like griping."

"I don't care if you keep a harem in here to coddle and cuddle you. Just clear out all the broads when it's time for your therapy."

"One broad hardly constitutes a harem."

"One or fifty, during the sessions you're going to work like hell so we can get this over with and I can go home. You start walking, and I'm outta here. In the meantime, as long as Snow White doesn't stand in my way again, we'll get along fine."

"Snow White?"

"Never mind."

"Who am I, the prince?"

"You're Dopey."

"Well, it's easy to see who you are. You're Grumpy."

In character she said, "Your muscles and joints are stiff."

"Ouch! Stop that."

"Not a word about the pain, Cavanaugh. It's your own fault. You brought it on yourself by lying around doing nothing for two days. Now we have to regain the range of motion you'd reached before you decided to become a sluggard."

They had little to say to one another after that. Lilah didn't reduce the amount of his exercises, even though he had lost ground after two days of virtual inactivity.

"You can push harder than that, Adam." They were nearing the end of the session when she broke the silence with that sharp rebuke. Usually they joked their way through the most painful exercises, swapping insults and sexual innuendos. The silence was getting on her nerves. She felt it was necessary to reestablish a little of the camaraderie they had enjoyed before The Kiss, Lucretia's untimely arrival, and her realization that what she felt for Adam was more than professional concern. "I said push."

"I am, dammit." His teeth were already bared and his face was beaded with sweat.

"Harder."

"I can't."

"Yes, you can. Come on." He made a second effort. "Better. Good. A little harder, Adam. Higher."