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Beth was still a bit confused. “Are you interested in funding some of the research at the hospital?”
    “Always, but my interest here has more to do with Mack. What did you think of him?”
    “I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking,” Beth responded cautiously.
    “Come, dear,” Destiny said with a hint of amusement in her voice. “From all reports, you’re an exceedingly brilliant doctor. Surely you have some idea of what I’m asking.”
    “Not really,” Beth insisted, not sure she wanted to go down the path Destiny seemed determined to explore.
    “Women have a tendency to fall all over themselves when they first meet Mack,” Destiny said.
    “I don’t doubt that,” Beth said, not that she intended to be one of them. She didn’t have time for a man who took so little seriously. Even as that thought entered her head, she recalled just how seriously Mack had taken Tony’s situation. Maybe he wasn’t as much of a lightweight as she’d assumed, but that still didn’t make him her type.
    Not that she had a type, she amended. Not anymore. Not since she’d discovered that the kind of man she’d always been drawn to, men who loved medicine as much as she did, often had an ego that couldn’t stand the competition from a woman in the same field.
    That was how she’d lost her fiancé. Her team had inadvertently applied for the same research grant Thomas had applied for, and she’d won it. He had not taken the news well. Not only had she lost him, but a month later the grant had been withdrawn because of a vicious rumor he’d deliberately spun about her research methodology. Beth had been crushed by the betrayal, but she’d learned a valuable lesson about not mixing her professional and personal life.
    “But you weren’t impressed by Mack,” Destiny guessed.
    Now there was a minefield, Beth thought. Insulting him to his face was bad enough. Insulting him to his doting aunt, who raised millions for the hospital, was something else. Beth wasn’t the most politically savvy creature on earth, but she knew better than to offend a major donor.
    “Actually I didn’t spend that much time with him,” Beth said truthfully.
    Destiny’s lips twitched as if she were fighting a smile. “Very diplomatic. I like that.”
    “Are you trying to set me up with your nephew?” Beth asked bluntly.
    Destiny’s eyes widened in a totally phony display of innocence. “How could I do that? You and Mack have already met. Either something clicked or it didn’t. I’m sure you know as much about chemistry as I do, perhaps more.”
    Beth chuckled. “Some forms of chemistry, yes. The male-female thing is definitely not my area of expertise.”
    “My nephew might make an excellent teacher,” Destiny suggested slyly.
    “I don’t think so.” Beth grinned at the determined woman. “Does Mack know you’re sneaking around behind his back trying to fix him up?”
    “As I said, how could I fix him up with you since you’ve met? You’re two consenting adults capable of making your own decisions,” Destiny said, as if the thought had never crossed her obviously devious mind.
    “But a little nudge from you wouldn’t be out of the question, would it?” Beth suddenly recalled Mack’s earlier suspicion that she and his aunt knew each other. “He’s on to you, isn’t he? He thinks you deliberately got him over to the hospital today to meet me. Seeing Tony was simply a means to an end.”
    “You called his office,” Destiny reminded her. “He came over there to meet Tony at your request.”
    Beth couldn’t argue with that. “Would you have been as quick to intercede if the request had come from one of my male colleagues?”
    “Of course,” Destiny claimed. “We’re talking about a sick child.”
    Beth wasn’t entirely sure she believed her. Nor, she suspected, would Mack.
    “Look, Ms. Carlton—”
    “Please call me Destiny. I insist.”
    “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, Destiny, or at least