Judith Mcwilliams - Dr. Charming

“You okay?” he asked when she didn’t move.

No, she wasn’t okay, she thought frantically. She was fast losing her entire sense of perspective, and she didn’t have a clue as to what to do about it.

“Did that fool Jim really upset you that much?” Nick asked, and Gina felt her stomach twist at his concerned tone.

“No, I… I…” I always sound like the village idiot around sexy men, she thought in dismay.

“Are you well enough to drive?”

Gina took a deep breath and forced herself to step away from him.

“I’m fine,” she blurted out, and then could have screamed in frustration when she realized that she’d just blown a great chance. If she’d claimed to have been too upset to drive, he might have offered to buy her a coffee while she calmed down.

“Is that blue Ford yours?” He pointed to a car parked a little down from the restaurant.

“No.” Gina shook her head. “I have a brown Camry. It’s parked…” She broke off as she realized that her car wasn’t where she’d left it.

Frowning, she looked up and down the street. She was positive she’d parked in front of the restaurant. She turned and checked the other side of the street. There were no Toyotas of any make.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “I left my car right there.”

Nick watched as she pointed to the vacant spot behind the Ford, momentarily distracted by her slender fingers with their shortly cut, clear-varnished nails. He hated long, luridly colored nails.

“I know I left it there,” she repeated as if the very strength of her words could make her car reappear.

“Either you’re mistaken about where you left it or someone took it.” Nick stated the obvious.

“Thank you, Sherlock Holmes!” she snapped, fear and frustration swamping her awe of him.

“Everybody hates the messenger!” Nick gave a long-suffering sigh.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to snap,” she muttered. “But everything I own is in that car. It can’t have been stolen. I mean, this is rural Massachusetts, for heaven’s sake!”

“You think big cities have a monopoly on crime?” he asked dryly when he really wanted to ask why she was traveling around the countryside with everything she owned. Didn’t she have a home? And a man who cared enough to keep her there?

“I know crime is everywhere,” she said. “But knowing it’s out there doesn’t mean I expected it to find me. I was only gone long enough to eat dinner. And I locked it.” Her voice rose despairingly.

Nick’s experienced ear caught the first sign of hysteria in her voice, and he hastily moved to head it off.

“You’ll need to report it.” He gave her a simple task to handle.

“To whom?” Gina looked vaguely around the deserted street as if she expected a policeman to materialize out of the pavement.

“Amos Mygold is the sum total of our law enforcement. This time of night he’s probably at home.”

Gina swayed slightly as she suddenly remembered that all her traveler’s checks were in the car’s glove compartment.

Nick instinctively reached for her, steadying her against his chest.

The feel of his hard body pressing against her from thigh to chest held her growing panic at bay. This close to him, she found it impossible to focus on anything as mundane as being stranded in a strange town, filled with even stranger inhabitants—if Jim was any sample—with very little money.

“It isn’t that bad.” Nick’s deep voice flowed comfortingly over her.

“That’s what you think,” she muttered into the thick wool of his sweater. “All my traveler’s checks were in the car.”

“All of them?”

“Yes.” Gina forced herself to step out of the comfort of his arms. She was a competent adult, she reminded herself. She could handle this. “I didn’t want to risk losing them if someone snatched my purse.”

“Well, that part of your plan worked,” he said dryly, and Gina gave a muffled gurgle of laughter.

Nick felt a flare of interest at the intriguing sound. She was such an odd combination. Her appearance suggested a poised, sophisticated woman, but her reactions seemed much more vulnerable. He found the combination fascinating.

“You can get the traveler’s checks reissued,” he said. “All you need to do is call the company with the serial numbers…” He stopped at her pained expression.

“You do have the serial numbers, don’t you?”

“Of course I do. I even separated them from the checks the way the bank said to. It’s just that I put the numbers in my suitcase in case someone stole my purse.”

“Where do you live that you’re always worried about your purse being stolen?” Nick asked.

“At the moment in my car,” she said with a despairing look at the empty space where it had been parked.

“Which means you are now homeless,” he said, regretting the words the minute he saw her face pale.

“Quite.” Gina straightened her spine and tried to sound more purposeful than she felt. She’d wanted to stand on her own two feet, and this was her chance. So why wasn’t she feeling more elated at the opportunity?

“Your car is insured?”

“Oh, yes. I’ll call the insurance company first thing in the morning.” She tried not to think about where she was going to spend the night and how she was going to get there. Did towns this size have rental car offices? she wondered. At least she still had her credit card in her purse so she wasn’t exactly penniless. And there was the legacy from her father. She’d call the lawyer who’d handled her father’s estate first thing in the morning and ask him to wire some money to her.

“Is there anyone you want to call?” Nick probed.

“No,” Gina said shortly, having no intention of telling him why. The story of her life to date made her sound like a fool. But then, maybe she was, she thought glumly. First her mother had used her love to manipulate her, and then some thief had stolen her car. She wasn’t exactly batting a thousand.

Nick digested the uncompromising negative, wondering what she was running from. The frustrated pain in her voice certainly suggested something.

“It’s going to take a while for you to get things straightened out,” Nick said slowly as an idea burst fullblown into his mind, the brilliance of it momentarily stunning him. “In the meantime, I think we could be of use to each other. You’ll need a place to stay, and I could use a temporary housekeeper.”

He gestured with his cast. “With my right hand out of commission, I can’t do much, and what little I can do with my left, I do slowly and badly. Not only that, but I’ve had enough of Bill’s chili to last me a lifetime. Being my temporary housekeeper would give you a place to stay until you sort things out, and would give me a clean house and a few meals,” he said, hoping his explanation sounded credible.

He hadn’t hired a housekeeper already because he hadn’t wanted a stranger intruding on his privacy, but the thought of Gina sharing his house filled him with anticipation.

Gina swallowed against the sudden spurt of excitement that short-circuited her breathing. Surely he couldn’t be offering her a job? At his house? Just the two of them? Alone together?

“Have you done any housekeeping?” he asked her.

“If you mean as a job, no. But I can certainly clean and cook,” she said absently, her mind busily considering his unexpected offer.

She knew full well she should refuse. Prudence demanded it. She might be monstrously attracted to this man, but she didn’t know him well enough to share a house with him.

But the people in the bar did. She remembered how someone in the back had greeted him by name and what the waitress had said about having known Nick all his life. If he had had any unsavory tendencies, surely his neighbors would know about them and react to him accordingly. Secrets were impossible to keep in a small town, weren’t they?