Caroline Anderson - Assignment - Single Man

She could feel the tension draining out of her body, leaving her limp in his arms. Within minutes she was asleep.

He lay there for ages listening to the even rhythm of her breathing and soaking up her warmth. It felt so good to lie next to her, but he couldn’t stay there, not for the rest of the night—not and retain his sanity.

He eased his arm carefully out from under her neck and tucked the pillow there instead. His thigh was throbbing, his pelvis ached and his lower leg was as heavy as lead. There was no way he was going to get back to sleep, so he went into the kitchen, got a glass of water and shuffled over to the sofa. But all he could think about was how she’d felt snuggled up against his side, and how soft and warm her body had been, and how he wanted to protect her.

That scared the spit out of him.

The right man for Fran?

When nurse Fran Williams reaches a turning point in her life she finds herself being offered work assignments with two very different men—men who will offer Fran more than a job! She doesn’t know it, but they represent her future happiness.

So which is the right man for Fran?

Is it rich, wealthy, energetic Josh Nicholson—injured, impatient but gorgeous hero number one?

Or charming, sensual, tender Dr. Xavier Giraud, the single father who needs a woman to love him and his children?

Or is there more than one Mr. Right?

Find out and explore Fran’s parallel lives with each of these heroes—this month in

Assignment: Single Man, next month in

Assignment: Single Father from Harlequin Romance®.

DOUBLE DESTINY

There is more than one route to happiness.

Like to see Fran’s introduction to Josh Nicholson and Xavier Giraud?

Caroline Anderson’s prequel to this intriguing duet is free to read.

Look for DOUBLE DESTINY at www.eHarlequin.com.

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CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

IT WAS the sexy grin that did it. That and those arresting cobalt blue eyes that seemed to spear right through her.

She’d come out of the back office to Reception to tell Jackie she was going for a second interview with Xavier Giraud, but she didn’t get a chance. Jackie was no longer alone, and the man in there with her was a man she recognised, a man with a sexy, lopsided grin and the most arresting blue eyes she’d ever seen.

Josh looked up at her, and his smile widened in recognition.

‘Well, if it isn’t the bodacious Sister Williams,’ he said, and Fran suppressed a smile.

‘Well, if it isn’t the accident-prone Mr Nicholson. It’s good to see you alive.’

‘Do you two know each other?’ Jackie chipped in, clearly agog, and he chuckled.

‘Let’s just say we met over a red-hot needle a little while ago.’

‘Yes. How is the chest?’ Fran asked him, and he gave a short, humourless laugh.

‘Oh, the chest is fine—it’s healed beautifully. Unfortunately, though, the rest of me is lagging behind a little, hence my visit here. I need a nurse.’

His smile challenged her—almost dared her to take the job.

Why it seemed like a dare she couldn’t imagine, but for some inexplicable reason it did and her heart was beating a tattoo against her ribs. She forced herself to ignore it.

‘Why do you need a nurse?’ she asked, ruthlessly sticking to the point. ‘If you’ve been discharged from hospital…’

‘I’ve discharged myself,’ he said dryly. ‘The consultant didn’t quite seem to see eye to eye with me about that, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.’

Fran kept her expression carefully neutral. ‘You discharged yourself?’

He nodded, the grin kicking up one side of his mouth in a charming, little-boy appeal that had no business affecting her the way it did. She ignored the flutter in her heart—again—and studied him as he sat there in old jogging bottoms and a sweatshirt, one leg stuck out in front of him, his trousers cut up the side to accommodate the paraphernalia of the external fixator.

His right arm—the same side—was in a cast below the elbow, and his hair had been cropped short, perhaps to stitch a scalp wound? It suited him, she thought, sidetracked again by his lazy good looks and those arresting eyes.

Eyes clouded with pain, she realised. His body must have taken a real hammering.

And yet oddly, as mangled as he was, he still exuded power and confidence as well as an undeniable sex appeal. She dragged her mind back into order.

‘So, how long ago exactly did you have this accident?’ she asked, eyeing the cast on his arm and the metalwork protruding through his trouser leg with concern.

‘Twelve days ago.’

Fran blinked. Could it really only have been twelve days? She remembered the news breaking, just as her world was falling apart. He’d been the only bright spot in a hellish week, and when the accident happened it had been all the more shocking because she’d only just treated him. He’d fallen over a cat and landed in a bin bag full of rubbish, cutting his chest. She’d teased him, and then a few days later he’d nearly died.

Was it really only twelve days ago? It seemed forever, but that was her own personal perspective. In terms of this man’s injuries it was probably plenty—unless there was more than his arm and leg involved.

He shrugged, the crooked grin widening. ‘Well, apart from the bruised spleen, the split liver and the right femur which had to be pinned, not a lot really. Well, except for the clot on my brain. They had to make a little borehole to get it out. Oh, and there’s a crack in my pelvis, apparently.’

Fran felt sick. How many young men had she seen like that—and how many of them had lost their tenuous hold on life? Too many, over and over again, day after day, until she thought she’d go mad. She buried the hideous memories and rolled her eyes. ‘You must be out of your mind, discharging yourself,’ she told him flatly.

The grin faded, showing her for the first time just how bad he really felt. His face was etched deeply with lines of pain that added years to his true age, and as he turned his head towards the light a little, she could see the fading greenish-purple remains of some startling bruises round his eyes, shot through with a truly colourful yellow.

‘I was going out of my mind,’ he corrected. ‘What I need now is rest, that’s all, but I’m not so suicidal that I want to go home on my own, and the last thing on God’s earth I need is my mother fluttering around me like a demented hen.’