Back in the Bachelor's Arms. Victoria Pade

didn’t ask why she was here and you didn’t even know she planned to stay at the house until you saw her go in?”

      “Yeah, I know, those were probably things I should have gotten into. But I didn’t. I wasn’t in the mood.” Plus none of it had occurred to him until he’d seen her go into the house across the street because at the hospital he’d been so wrapped up in old resentments and anger that he hadn’t been able to think about anything except what touching her had done to him….

      “How’s she look?” Luke asked then as if he’d read Reid’s mind.

      “Freaking fantastic,” Reid blurted out before he even realized he was going to admit it.

      It made Luke laugh but only barely before he caught himself. “What did you expect if you ever saw her again? That she would’ve grown warts?”

      “Warts are no more than she deserved,” Reid muttered, hating that the simple question about how Chloe looked put her image right back into his head again after he’d fought numerous times through the night to get it out.

      Damn her, anyway, for not having warts. For looking even better in full view than she had through the gap in the privacy curtain. For that gleaming black hair that waved around her alabaster skin like a picture frame. For those take-a-second-glance features that made her cute and striking and amazingly beautiful depending on her expression. For those straight white teeth and that smile—that smile that had shown itself only nervously last night—that was still bright enough to light a dark room. For those eyes that were the color of freshly washed summer blueberries. For that tight, compact little body on that barely five-foot-two-inch frame and those smallish breasts that had been the first ones he’d ever felt….

      Just damn her, anyway, for haunting him!

      “Okay, so she looks good,” Luke said then. “Was she as unfriendly to you as you were to her?”

      “No. I was the only jerk in the room. She was fine. Not thrilled with me being her doctor, but what else can you expect?”

      “So she was nice enough and you were still a jerk?”

      “Yep.”

      Luke shrugged. “Well, she does have some of that coming. I just wish it had come after the closing instead of before we get there. She didn’t give you any idea why she’s here?”

      “I don’t think it’s for old times’ sake,” Reid snapped.

      “What do we do now? Call Betty, have her go over and talk to Chloe? Smooth whatever feathers you might have ruffled?”

      Reid already knew what he had to do. As a doctor and as a man. So he was prepared for that question and shook his head.

      “I’ll wait for a decent hour and then I’m going to have to go myself. I need to make sure she’s still okay from the accident. I’ll apologize for not having my party face on last night, and maybe that’ll smooth any ruffled feathers.”

      Luke didn’t jump at that solution. Instead his concerns now were obviously for Reid.

      “Can you do that? Are you sure you want to?”

      “I think I have to,” Reid admitted quietly. “For the sake of the sale, the renters and myself. I didn’t like me much last night.”

      Luke nodded as if he understood. “It couldn’t have been easy for you to see her again. I know you had doubts about whether or not you wanted to live across the street from the Carmichaels’ old place fourteen months ago, and more doubts now about buying their old place. I know that I had to twist your arm to even get you in that door again when it came on the market.”

      “No, it wasn’t easy to see Chloe again. Especially when I didn’t expect it and wasn’t prepared,” Reid acknowledged at least that much of what his brother had said. “But she’s here, we’re all tied up with the house and the sale and her as a result, and I’ll do what I have to. Besides, like I said, I’d better make sure she’s okay health-wise and that I didn’t miss something in the exam last night.”

      “You’re sure? I mean, I know I took off work last week to play carpenter but I might be able to arrange something for this week, too, if you just can’t face her.”

      Reid shook his head. “Last week was vacation-with-pay. If you took off this week, too, you’d have to do it on your own dime and I know you can’t afford that. Especially now, with this new mortgage hanging over our heads. Plus there’s my substitute coming in from Billings who would have to be compensated for his time and trouble and the trip here even if I have him turn around and go back. And I’m really not so spineless that I can’t face an old girlfriend.”

      “I never said you were spineless. I don’t know if I could be anything but a bastard to Chloe Carmichael if I were in your shoes. And she was more than just an old girlfriend to you.”

      “Still, I’ll do what needs to be done to get to the closing on the house. I’ll make sure I’m not in line for a malpractice suit, and then hopefully whatever Chloe came to Northbridge for won’t keep her here long. With any luck she’ll get the hell out of town before we know it, and I won’t ever have to see her again for the rest of my life—that’s the incentive.”

      Luke didn’t seem convinced. “And you don’t have any feelings for her?”

      “Only bad ones,” Reid said without hesitation.

      And he counted as bad feelings the stirring he’d felt when he’d touched her and the fact that the revised mental picture of her had somehow etched itself indelibly on his brain.

      Because in no way were they things he wanted to experience.

      Chloe was not operating at top speed Monday morning. Car accident. Encountering Reid Walker. Having even a cursory physical exam performed by him. Finding when the nurse drove her home that Reid lived directly across the street. Having to clean the upstairs bathroom before she could use it. Needing to turn the mattress on the double bed in her room before covering it with two mattress pads, clean sheets, blanket and pillows she’d brought with her in order to be comfortable using things that had been the domain of college students for many years. And then having images of Reid climbing into that bed with her. All together it hadn’t made for a restful night’s sleep. Or for a relaxing lounge in bed when she’d awakened.

      No, she was up by 7:20 a.m. to discover that her entire body was very stiff—no doubt a side effect of the accident.

      The stiffness eased when she moved around though. And she did that because it had been so late when she’d arrived that she hadn’t explored all that was going on in the house. And she wanted to.

      The living room was nearly finished being painted. There was a roll of new carpeting against a wall, waiting to be laid. Drapes had disappeared. The furniture her parents had left so the place could be considered furnished was gone. And only a single pole lamp with a bare bulb stood in one corner to provide some light after dark.

      Luckily the new locks were merely near the front door and hadn’t yet been installed or she wouldn’t have been able to get in.

      The first-floor bathroom had a new sink and toilet installed and had also been painted, as had the two bedrooms upstairs, where the carpeting had been removed and the hardwood floors refinished.

      The kitchen was apparently next—and last—on the agenda once the living room was completed because there were tarps, rolls of masking tape and cans of paint waiting. Boxes of ceramic tile were also stacked in the corner to replace the linoleum and the backsplash, and the refrigerator was stocked with nothing but beer and soda.

      And everywhere there were remnants of construction and cleanup that had apparently been left for the end with foam coffee cups, soda cans and beer bottles set here and there and forgotten.

      Like finding Reid Walker to be her emergency room doctor, the house was not what Chloe had expected, and once she knew what was underway, she called her Realtor.

      Betty.