My One and Only (Ardent Springs Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

thought that greeting romantic? Sadly, he’d picked her up in a bar with that line. A bar she never should have been in considering her proclivities. But sadly, she couldn’t even use being drunk as an excuse for talking to the arrogant doctor, since she’d been nursing nothing more than a glass of water that night.
    “What do you want, Marcus?”
    “Try not to sound so happy to hear my voice.”
    “It’s after midnight,” she pointed out. As if she’d been sleeping like a normal person would be.
    “Oh, that’s right. I forgot about the time difference. It’s barely after ten out here on the coast.”
    He didn’t forget. He was too stuck in his own world to consider that the rest of the planet didn’t operate on his schedule.
    “Why are you calling?” she asked.
    “Because I miss you, baby.”
    Of all the . . .
    “I’m not your baby anymore, Marcus. Remember? Staying with me would have meant wasting your skill and talent in a backwoods town. Or did you forget that, too?”
    Not that Haleigh was bitter or anything.
    “I was mad,” he defended. “You sprung that move on me without any warning.” Music blared in the background and then faded. “You weren’t even willing to talk about it.” The music blared again, this time accompanied by a car horn. The man was standing outside a nightclub on the streets of LA claiming to miss her. Jerk.
    “You always knew I intended to move back home once my residency was over. And I reminded you of the fact the night you proposed.”
    In a muted tone, he replied, “I thought you’d change your mind. I mean, this is Los Angeles we’re talking about.”
    “What’s the matter, Marcus? Are the women out there not as susceptible as the ones in Memphis? I suppose plastic surgeons are a dime a dozen in celebrity-land.”
    “You’re deflecting because you know you were in the wrong,” he said, using the psychobabble that drove her nuts. “We should have decided where to move together.”
    The man never listened.
    “This is my home, Marcus. If you’d have loved me, you would have made it work.”
    “I’m a thirty-five-year-old plastic surgeon on the rise. Moving to Archer Springs would have meant taking a step back in my career.”
    “It’s Ardent, Marcus. Ardent Springs.” What had she ever seen in this self-centered man-child? “But there’s no point in arguing. You’re in LA. I’m here. We both got what we wanted.”
    “I wanted you and LA,” he whined. “I can’t believe you can be so callous about this.”
    No matter what Haleigh said, the petulant child on the other end of the line was never going to see things any differently than he wanted to. Which meant getting angry would get her nowhere.
    “I’m not being callous. I’m being realistic. We ended as friends who want two very different things.” Pressing the button she knew would get his attention, she added, “Better now than after the wedding. California is a community property state, after all.” No one came between Marcus and his money. “You need to move on with your life.”
    Marcus’s voice dropped. “Is that what you’re doing? Have you already found someone else?”
    Cooper’s green eyes flashed to mind. “No,” she said more emphatically than necessary. “I’m not interested in finding someone else right now.”
    “So you do miss me.”
    Saints alive, the man’s ego knew no bounds.
    “Goodnight, Marcus,” she said. “It’s late and I have to work tomorrow. I suggest you go back into whatever club you were in and buy a pretty girl a drink.”
    “Drinks out here are expensive,” she heard him say before she ended the call. Haleigh rolled her eyes as she tossed the phone back on the nightstand. Flopping onto her back, she stared at the ceiling, pondering her long-standing pattern of dating self-centered, shallow men. The habit went all the way back to high school. You’d think after David had dumped her, leaving her to deal with the pregnancy by herself, she’d