The One in My Heart Read Free

couldn’t.
    It was late. We were alone. And I was already naked beneath the soft, warm robe that smelled faintly of sunshine and freshly mowed grass.
    All this had been true since I stepped into his kitchen. But the possibilities that had only lurked in the depths of my subconscious mind now broke surface and created huge ripples.
    I looked away, finished the last bite of my tiramisu, and asked, “Were you at the hospital when I called about Biscuit?”
    He rolled up his sleeves. “Uh-hmm.”
    His forearms were lean and strong—and since when did I pay attention to a man’s forearms? “Is your hospital in Greenwich?”
    “It’s in the city,” he answered, giving his dishes a quick but expert wash.
    Manhattan, he meant, thirty miles away. I was surprised. “Do you commute every day?”
    “Usually I only come up on weekends, when I’m not on call.”
    “I hope you didn’t have to come all this way for Biscuit.”
    It was fifty minutes by train—one way. Taking care of Biscuit had been a lot of trouble for him.
    I remembered my T-shirt. To err is human was printed on the front. To know the rest, he would have had to turn around and watch me from behind.
    He reached for a pear from the bowl on the island. “I did.”
    My gaze was riveted to his hand, the loose yet secure hold he had on the pear.
    “You didn’t ask your housekeeper to do it?”
    “She was out most of the week. Just came back this afternoon.”
    I looked down at the smudges on my plate—all that remained of my dessert. A hot thrill had zigzagged through me when I’d thought that he’d made the trips because he’d wanted to. But now it seemed he’d done it only because he had to…
    “That’s really nice of you,” I said, trying not to sound as deflated as I felt. “I hope it didn’t interfere with your schedule.”
    He bit into the pear. “I traded an overnight shift with a colleague.”
    His shirt stretched with the movement, revealing a braided cord around his neck, which dipped with the weight of an unseen pendant. It shocked me how badly I wanted to know the shape and material of that pendant. “When do you have to take that overnight shift?”
    “Tomorrow.”
    Tomorrow was Saturday. I turned my spoon over. “Did I ruin your weekend?”
    “Effectively. I was going to sleep for thirty hours straight. Now I’ll have to work for thirty hours straight.”
    “I’m so sorry.”
    He shook his head. “Don’t be. I can’t let a dog starve. Besides, I didn’t help entirely out of altruism—Biscuit was going to be my introduction to this really beautiful woman.”
    I licked the back of my teeth. Finally, an expression of unambiguous interest on his part. But what exactly was the nature of this interest? “Well, introductions are done.”
    “So they are,” he said softly.
    Our gazes held again. The fridge hummed. Rain pounded on the skylight. My breath echoed in my head, all erratic agitation.
    “Would you like some more?” He broke the silence, pointing at the tiramisu dish with the half-eaten pear in his hand.
    “No, thank you. It was delicious, though.”
    He took my spoon and plate to the sink. I stared at his back. The shirt was a perfect fit across his shoulders, hinting at the lean, graceful build underneath.
    “If I understand you correctly, you are the stereotypical workaholic, looking for some no-strings-attached sex.”
    Shit. Did I say that?
    Or should I instead be surprised that it had taken me this long to get to this point, I who had invited myself to his house after midnight on the flimsiest of excuses?
    It was never tiramisu that I wanted, was it?
    He turned around and considered me. The flare of heat on my skin—as if someone had aimed a blowtorch at my throat and cheeks. “I wouldn’t say no-strings-attached literally—sometimes it’s fun to be tied up in bed. But yes, a metric ton of sex is right near the top of my Christmas wish list.”
    He bit into the pear again. The sight of his teeth sinking