Her Mr. Right? Page 10
“You’re going to have fun for a change?” she joked.
“About time, don’t you think? You should have some fun, too. Get out more.”
A half hour later, Isobel was still considering her conversation with her father when she stepped off the elevator onto the fourth floor of the hospital. She heard a woman’s strident voice as she walked down the hall and realized the commotion was at Neil’s office door. Mrs. Donaldson, a board member who always held a strong opinion on everything, apparently had her temper up and was pointing her finger at Neil.
Mrs. Donaldson’s overstyled ash-blond hair wobbled with her words. “Everyone in this hospital is walking on eggshells around you. They’re all afraid to tell you what they think. Well, I’m not. These good people don’t deserve the treatment you’re giving them. You’re even asking personal questions. It’s none of your business who Peter Wilder is going to marry, or Ella or David. The Wilders practically built this hospital brick by brick. James was a man of integrity and his children are good doctors.”
Neil’s shoulders were squared and his body tense, his face set on neutral. Isobel knew he was too much of a gentleman to tell the woman what he was thinking. He was too much of a professional to spill his investigation into the hall. But Isobel couldn’t let Neil take venom he didn’t deserve.
Mrs. Donaldson was pointing her finger again. “Your investigation and your methods are unjust.”
Isobel stepped up beside Neil to face Mrs. Donaldson with him. “Mrs. Donaldson, maybe you should think about this more rationally. If something unethical is going on, it should come to light to save Walnut River General…to save James Wilder’s legacy. If there is wrongdoing, we can’t let it destroy the good we do.”
Mrs. Donaldson’s eyes narrowed and now she targeted Isobel. “You, my dear, are a traitor. The rumors are all over this hospital about your after-hours tête-à-têtes with Mr. Kane.”
With that, the woman spun on her heels and headed for the elevator. Several people had come out from their offices and were standing in their doorways listening.
Isobel’s eyes suddenly filled with tears. Were there rumors about her all over the hospital? Was she considered a traitor?
Apparently Neil saw how Mrs. Donaldson’s words had affected her because he took her by the elbow and tugged her into his office. After he shut the door, he took her by the shoulders. “You need to forget what that woman said. Someone who searches for the truth is not a traitor.”
A tear ran down Isobel’s cheek and she just let it.
Neil pulled her into his arms, held her for a moment, his chin resting in her curls. “Isobel,” he murmured.
As she looked up at him, the few inches of space between them seemed to be too much. His eyes told her he’d missed her and he wanted her. She couldn’t deny the missing or the wanting and she lifted her face. He kissed her tears away first and took her lips with a possessiveness that excited her. His tongue didn’t wait for an invitation but plunged into her mouth, seducing her into the same rich passion they’d shared before. She blanked out everything but the feel of his hair under her fingertips, his taste, his strength and his desire. Lost in whatever happened whenever they were together, she jumped when there was a sudden knock on the door.
Neil swore. “I’m scheduled for a session with West MacGregor and Richard Green, the lawyer who’s filling in for the hospital attorney.”
Away from Neil now, letting common sense reign once more, Isobel took a deep breath and pulled herself together fast. She ran a hand through her hair, took a small mirror from her purse and saw the mess her lipstick had become. With a tissue, she eased away the smears as best she could, but she knew she still looked just-kissed.
“Isobel, you’re fine. Everything’s going to be fine.”
How she wished she could believe Neil—but now she felt more like a traitor than she had before…even if there was no basis, even if she was just trying to do what was right.
There was another knock. Neil went to the door and glanced at her. “Ready?”
“As ready as I’m going to be,” she assured him.
As he opened the door, she plastered on a bright smile, murmured, “I’m running late. It’s good to see you again, West,” and then she was practically running down the hall to her office and away from the two men who could probably see she’d been doing more than talking with Neil Kane.
A few hours later, Neil had to admit he was looking for Isobel, not taking a stroll around the hospital to pick up any unusual undercurrents. When he spotted her in a lounge on the second floor talking with a couple, he stopped and observed. He didn’t know who the couple were or what they might be discussing. The woman looked distraught, with tears on her cheeks. The man appeared to be upset, too, but was trying to conceal whatever he was feeling to listen to Isobel. Neil could easily see the compassion on Isobel’s face. She was leaning into the couple, not backing away. There was no partition that she hid behind. He’d witnessed detachment on social workers’ faces, on doctors’ faces, so they didn’t become too involved with whoever they were helping. Not Isobel. She was right there. That was the thing. She was always right there. Whenever he looked at Isobel, he knew he was missing something important in his life, something he’d done without for far too long. She made him dream again, and he didn’t know if that was good or bad.
After a few more minutes she stood, picked up the file folder on the table beside her and left the lounge. She looked startled when she spotted Neil, and glanced at her watch as if she didn’t have much time to talk.
“On your way somewhere?” Neil asked.
“Back to my office for a conference call.”
Two women brushed by them into the lounge.
“We can talk in the elevator.”
“Neil—”
“What? You don’t want to be seen walking to the elevator with me?”
“That’s not it at all. It’s just everything between us is becoming too…too explosive.”
Gazing into her dark-brown eyes, wanting to feel her in his arms again, more than ready to take her to his room at the Inn, he knew exactly what she meant. “Come on. The elevator will contain the fireworks.”
She shook her head as if she couldn’t believe her own stupidity in walking with him and kept pace beside him as he headed for the elevator. Fortunately, he snagged a car that was empty.
As soon as they stepped inside and the doors closed, he assured her, “MacGregor and Green couldn’t see us this morning. That frosted window in the door prevents anyone from looking in.”
“They didn’t have to see us to know what we were doing. One look at my face and hair probably told them everything.”
He turned to her and clasped her arm. “What do you want to do?”
She looked troubled and confused and way too vulnerable. “Maybe we need some breathing space.”
“Together or apart?”
She just rolled her eyes as the bell in the elevator dinged, announcing their floor.
He pressed the button to keep the door closed. “You want me to stay in my office and keep away from yours. All right, I’ll do that. But answer me one question first.”
“What?”
She was obviously expecting something personal and that wasn’t where he was going. “Who do you think the informant is?”
Her eyes went wide. “The informant? I don’t know. I…”
“You said you don’t think it’s one of the Wilders. What’s your gut instinct telling you?”
After she thought about his question, she replied, “The questions you’ve asked me lead me to think the allegations are about overcharges, or in J. D. Sumner’s case, being kept longer than you thought he should be.”
Neil didn’t confirm or deny that.
“If that’s the case, then I think someone in the administrative department is feeding your office the information. I really can’t see other personnel knowing as much about it.”
“You mean someone in the billing
department?”
“Yes, or accounts receivable or even one of the data-entry employees.”
“Thanks for narrowing the field,” he said wryly.
“I have no clue as to who the person is, Neil. But I think only someone who has access to computer files could be giving you the information.”
He nodded, though he didn’t say anything. That was the conclusion he’d come to also. He couldn’t completely rule out a doctor with a gripe, or one who wanted this takeover to happen. But the kind of information his office had received suggested someone other than a doctor. Maybe more than one person. A doctor being helped by someone in an administrative role?
Isobel hit the open door button on the elevator panel.
“Thanks for your help,” Neil told her. “Why don’t you head down the hall ahead of me? I’ll take my time.”
When her gaze met his, he knew what she was thinking. They’d had sex. They’d been as intimate as two people could be. But now they were going to act like strangers because that was easier for her.
And him?
He didn’t want to be a stranger to Isobel Suarez, but he couldn’t offer her what she obviously deserved—romance, whole-hearted commitment and happily ever after.
He couldn’t take his eyes off her as she walked down the hall. He wished he could find the answers he was searching for. He wished he and Isobel could forget the investigation and just live in the moment.
However, he didn’t know if living in the moment was enough for him anymore. Maybe he needed to think about the future, too, and whether or not he wanted to live it alone.
An exhausted Isobel walked into her house that night at seven-thirty and was appalled. Cigar smoke stung her nostrils and her lungs as she stepped into the living room. Windbreakers and sweaters were tossed onto the sofa. The remains of a pizza, leftover hot wings and several soda bottles sat on the coffee table and end table. Paper plates were strewn here and there. Men’s voices sailed to her from the kitchen. When she headed that way, the smoke was even thicker and she coughed.
Her father had told her he was having friends over, but she’d never expected the place would be totaled.
“A couple more hands, Iz, and we’ll be finished.”
“If I’m not home by eight-thirty, my wife will be calling every five minutes,” Mort Thompson grumbled.
“She worries about you since you had your heart attack,” John Suarez insisted.
“She worries too much,” Mort murmured.
The men were playing cards around the kitchen table and snacks were tossed here and there and sat beside cups of soda. The smell of burned popcorn hung in the air.
It was going to take hours to clean the place up.
Finding a smile somewhere, she managed to say, “Enjoy your game.” To her dad, she said in a low voice, “I’ll be down after everyone leaves.”
It was her father’s turn to play a card but he studied her for a moment and asked, “Are you okay?”
“Tired, Dad. Just tired. I’ll take a shower then be back down in a while.”
He gave her another careful once-over and then nodded.
Isobel tried not to think or feel as she undressed, took a terrifically long hot shower and towel-dried her hair. She tried to obliterate from her mind the mess downstairs, the work she’d brought home, the moment she’d walked away from Neil, telling herself staying away from him was the best thing to do.
Was it? Didn’t she need something else in her life, other than working and taking care of her dad? Didn’t she need to be touched and kissed and cared about?
An hour later, dressed in sweats, still wishing she could simply crawl into bed and pull the covers up over her head, she went downstairs and found all the men had left. Her father was transferring snack plates to the kitchen counter, then he attempted to pick up a carrier of soda with his left hand.
When he winced, she hurried over to him. “Dad, you know you have to be careful.”
“I never intended for you to have this much of a mess to come home to.”
The apology almost made Isobel want to cry. “I know you didn’t.”
Turning away so he didn’t see her emotion, she opened the window over the sink, letting the cool night air push the smoke away.
“I know you hate smoke,” he mumbled.
“We’ll get it aired out. I can leave the window open overnight.”
Wearily he sat down at the table, looked around the room again, and then said determinedly, “This is no life for you—taking care of me, cleaning up after me, doing all the chores you should be doing for your own family.”
“You’re my family.”
“Yeah, well, that’s probably another reason why you don’t have your own family. Besides working so much, I mean.”
“Let’s not get into this tonight.”
“We have to get into it sometime, Iz. Why do you think Jacob stays away? He doesn’t want to be saddled with all this.” He waved his good arm over the table—the crumbs, napkins and cigar butts.
“You are not the reason Jacob stays away. As you said before, he’s searching for something.”
“Jacob’s a good boy at heart, but if he were back here, he’d feel responsible for me, too. Miles away, he doesn’t have to worry so much.”
In part, Isobel knew that was probably true.
“I should sell the house and look for a small apartment. That way you could get your own place and get on with your life.”
“You’d hate a small apartment.”
“I’d get used to it. They’re building apartments for seniors on the north side of town. I should go look at them.”
Her dad took joy in walking around his own yard and remembering the rosebushes he’d planted for their mother, smelling the lilacs and remembering when the girls had cut them to take to teachers at school. There was the sandbox Jacob had turned into a home for a turtle and the fence they’d all helped paint when they were teenagers. There were years of memories in every room in the house, too.
“Tell me something, Dad, if you hadn’t hurt your shoulder, would you even be thinking of selling?”
“Probably not.”
“In six weeks, two months, you’ll be better. You can’t make a rash decision you’re going to regret.”
“It might get better, it might not. If it’s not the shoulder, soon it will be something else. I’m getting older, Iz. What I want won’t count for much when I can’t do for myself.”
She went over to him and crouched down beside his chair. “That’s why I want to help you. I’m not here because I have to be. I’m here because I want to be.”
“For my sake, not yours.”
“Have I complained?” she asked.
“No, but then you wouldn’t. That’s who you are.”
“And I know who you are. You want to control your own destiny. I can help you do that.”
He patted her shoulder. “You’re a good daughter, Isobel.” He called her Isobel on important occasions; when she’d learned to ride her first bike, he’d told her, Now, Isobel, you can go where you want to go. When she’d earned her driver’s license, he’d said, Driving is a big responsibility, Isobel, don’t take advantage of it. When she graduated from high school and college, he’d insisted, You’re on your way now, Isobel. The whole world’s in front of you.
She wanted the whole world still to be in front of her dad, too. As he’d aged, it had grown smaller. She wanted to keep it as big as she could for him, as long as she could.
“You should never make an important decision when you’re tired,” she warned him.
“You think something will be different in the morning?”
“I think everything could look different in the morning.” She stood and began stacking the dishes in the sink again.
“What can I do to help?”
She knew her father wanted to feel worthwhile, wanted to take some of the burden away from her. “Can you empty the ashtrays? It will get the smell out of here.”
As Isobel watched her dad move around the kitchen and living room, she knew she’d meant everything she’d said to him—but she had to wonder if her life would ever be her own again.
The next morning, when Neil parked in the staff parking lot at the hospital, he noticed Isobel’s car rumbling in as he locked his car doors. They hadn’t spoken since he’d held the door in the elevator. That seemed like years ago instead of less than twenty-four hours.
The parking space next to his was vacant and although she hesitated a few moments as she drove down the line of slots, she finally turned in beside him. She was wearing a conservative, black two-piece dress today, trimmed in white at the sleeves, lapels and hem. She looked like a million bucks. And she had that unselfconscious style about her that said she didn’t know it.
After she pulled her briefcase from her car, she locked her doors.
He went over to her, not knowing if he should. But there’d be no harm in walking her into the hospital. “Good morning.”
As he approached her, he could see there were circles under her eyes and she looked pale. But she gave him a forced smile and returned, “Good morning.”
He couldn’t keep from asking, “Is everything okay?”
She looked so vulnerable for a moment he wanted to gather her into his arms.
“Nothing you’d want to hear about.” She started walking toward the building, but he clasped her shoulder and tugged her around.
“Don’t make decisions for me, Isobel.”
She sighed. “It’s just…I didn’t sleep well last night. Dad and I had a conversation that bothered me.”
“About?”
When she still hesitated, he squeezed her shoulder. “I like your dad and I think he liked me. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Stop the hands of time,” she answered with a sad smile.
“Is your dad not feeling well?”
“It’s his emotional state I’m worried about. Last night he told me he should sell the house—”
Her words caught and Neil could see how upset she was. He hugged her. He couldn’t help it. At first she was stiff in his arms, but then she seemed to need the contact, too. Finally she looked up at him and, oh, how he wanted to kiss her. But they were standing in the public parking lot and he knew how she’d feel about that after it was over, especially if there were witnesses.