The M.D. Courts His Nurse Read Online Free PDF Page A

examination room.
    â€œOh, I’m just building castles in the air,” Hazel confessed as she rolled up the sleeve of her blouse. “And even populating them.”
    â€œHmm,” was Rebecca’s only comment. Anger still distracted her.
    She checked Hazel’s blood pressure and heart rate and recorded them on the chart in her clipboard. Next she took her temperature, then weighed her on the same old but reliable triple-beam scale Doc Winthrop had used for decades.
    â€œHazel,” she remarked, impressed as usual, “you never vary by an ounce, do you?”
    â€œWouldn’t know,” Hazel admitted. “We McCallums never kept a scale around. What for? Your horse is the only one needs to worry about your weight.”
    A moment later John Saville appeared in the doorway, trim and handsome in gray slacks and a light-blue dressshirt with a navy rep tie, loosened but not sloppy. Rebecca handed him the clipboard and then stepped out, closing the door behind her and never once meeting his eyes.
    â€œHow’ve you been doing, Hazel?” he greeted her, friendly but somewhat distracted in his manner—just as Rebecca had been.
    They’ve been at each other’s throats, all right, the matriarch mused. No good romance should have bland beginnings.
    â€œFeisty as ever,” she assured him, “thanks to my talented young surgeon.”
    John pinched the creases of his trousers and tugged them up a fraction, taking over Rebecca’s still-warm chair.
    Before he could ask her anything else, Hazel demanded, “What year’s your Alfa? I’m guessing it’s a ’27?”
    His face changed immediately, the stern features softening, and enthusiasm lifted his tone. “Hey, you’re pretty close. Nineteen twenty-five Gran Sport 1750,” he boasted like a proud papa. “It’s a classic and then some. That model won every road race of its day. She’s got a super-charged motor, all original. Even today I can push her up close to ninety-five.”
    â€œA 1925, huh?” Hazel winked at him. “Made the same year I was born.”
    He glanced briefly at her chart, then smiled. “Yeah, right. And both of you appear to be in excellent running order,” he remarked, holding those intensely blue eyes steady on her—more curious than suspicious, she decided. “I see you take only one medication?”
    She nodded. “Nitroglycerin tablets. I only take them occasionally for mild angina pain.”
    â€œBut didn’t you mention to Miss O’Reilly—”
    Her laugh cut him off. “Is it too hard to say Rebecca?”
    â€œâ€”to Rebecca that you had some questions about your diet since the surgery? Has there been some problem?”
    â€œYou know, I recall that I did mention something like that,” she confessed, “but here’s a better question just popped into my head—have you ever watched a cat sitting beside a gopher hole?”
    The crease between his eyebrows deepened in a surprised frown. “Can’t say that I have. I was a military brat, lived all over the world. Including near gopher holes. Don’t remember any cats sitting beside them, though.”
    â€œWell, come on out to my place sometime, I’ve got cats and gopher holes,” she assured him. “It’s well worth watching. You’ll soon learn that the cat’s patience is surpassed only by one thing—its confidence that the wait is worth it.”
    He met her sparkling gaze for at least five seconds, and he suddenly realized, full force, that he was in the company of an extraordinarily perceptive person.
    â€œThere’s a lesson for me in that, right?”
    Indeed there was, but Hazel knew she had to give the good doctor his medicine in doses. He wouldn’t admit it yet because he was still in the throes of denial. But he was “gone” on Rebecca, all right. Or not yet gone, she corrected