Two Doctors and A Baby. Brenda Harlen

know what to say to that. He was right—for more than three years, she had dodged him and the uncomfortable feelings he stirred inside of her. And as soon as she got through this dinner tonight, she would go back to dodging him again.

      It was the only way to ensure that the red-hot attraction didn’t lead to her getting burned.

      * * *

      Justin immediately recognized the address that Avery had given him because it was on the opposite side of Memorial Park from his own place. He knew their dinner wasn’t technically a date, but he picked up flowers for her, anyway, and had the bouquet in hand when he buzzed her apartment at precisely seven o’clock—just as she rushed in through the front door.

      “I’m sorry,” she said. “I got caught up at the clinic so I’m running a little bit behind schedule.”

      “That’s okay,” he said.

      She fumbled with her keys. “Why don’t you come back in half an hour?” she suggested. “By that time, I should have everything well under way for dinner.”

      “Because I’m here now and I can help,” he told her.

      “I invited you to eat dinner not make dinner,” she pointed out, clearly unhappy that he wasn’t going away and letting her control the timetable.

      “I don’t mind.” He followed her into the elevator, where she stabbed a finger at the button for the fifth floor.

      It was a corner unit of the U-shaped building, with a view of the tennis courts and pool. The interior was exquisitely—and he suspected professionally—decorated, with comfortable furniture in neutral colors, framed generic prints on the walls and a bookcase filled with medical texts. They were no personal touches in the room. No magazines or candles or decorative vases or bowls.

      She went directly into the kitchen and, when he followed, he saw that the galley-style cooking area was equally pristine—the cupboards were white with simple steel handles. The white quartz countertops were bare of clutter except for a single-serve coffeemaker. The deep stainless steel sink was literally spotless, without even a spoon or a cloth in sight.

      “Can I get you something to drink?” she asked.

      “What are you having?”

      “Water.” She opened a cupboard to take out a glass and filled it with ice then water from the dispenser in the door of the refrigerator.

      “That works for me,” he said.

      She turned to hand him the first glass—and nearly dumped the contents all over him when she discovered that he was directly behind her.

      Thankfully, he caught it before it tipped too far. “Relax, Avery.”

      She managed a strangled laugh as she filled a second for herself, drinking down half of it before setting it aside.

      “We can go out if you’re not comfortable with me being here.”

      “It’s not you—or not specifically you,” she amended. “It’s just that I’m not used to other people being in my space.”

      “Apparently,” he noted, offering her the bouquet.

      “Oh.” She looked at the bright blooms as if she wasn’t quite sure what to do with them.

      “They probably want some water, too,” he told her.

      “Of course,” she agreed, moving to the cupboard above the fridge to pull down a clear glass vase.

      She seemed more comfortable when she was doing something, and she kept her attention focused resolutely on the task while she filled the container with water, trimmed the stems of the flowers, then arranged them in the vase.

      “These are really beautiful,” she said. “Thank you.”

      “You’re welcome.”

      She carried the vase to the dining room and set it in the middle of the table. When she returned to the kitchen, she pulled a plastic container—neatly labeled and dated—out of the fridge, then dumped the contents into a glass bowl. He glanced over her shoulder at the thick red sauce with chunks of sausage and peppers, onions, mushrooms and tomatoes.

      “That looks really good,” he said.

      “I don’t always feel like cooking when I get home from work, so a couple of times a month I go on a cooking binge where I make all kinds of things that I can throw into containers in the freezer for quick meals later on.”

      “What do you make besides pasta sauce?” he asked.

      She bent to retrieve a large pot from the cupboard beside the stove, then filled it from the tap and set it on the back burner. “Enchiladas, jambalaya, chicken and broccoli—”

      He must have instinctively cringed at that, because she laughed, the unexpected outburst of humor surprising both of them and easing some of the tension.

      “You don’t like broccoli?” she guessed.

      “Much to my mother’s everlasting chagrin,” he admitted.

      “That’s too bad, because my chicken and broccoli casserole is delicious.”

      “Well, it’s been my experience that the right company makes any meal taste better, so it’s possible I could change my mind if you wanted to make it for me sometime.”

      She smiled at that. “Let’s see if we get through this meal before making any other plans.”

      He sipped his water as she went back to the fridge and retrieved various items for a salad. She washed the head of lettuce under the tap, then spread the leaves out on a towel to dry. It was apparent that she had a system and she lined up her ingredients and utensils on the counter as if they were surgical instruments.

      “I know how to chop and dice,” he told her.

      She glanced up. “What?”

      “I’m offering to help make the salad.”

      “Oh. Thanks, but it’s not really a two-person job.”

      And he could tell that the idea of letting someone else help—and mess with her system—made her twitchy.

      “You’re right,” he agreed. “So why don’t you let me handle it while you go do whatever you usually do when you get home from work and don’t have someone waiting in your lobby?”

      She hesitated a minute before admitting, “I was hoping for a quick shower.”

      “So go take a shower,” he suggested.

      “I will,” she decided. “After I get this finished—”

      He took her by the shoulders and turned her away from the counter. “Go take your shower—I’ll take care of this.”

      She still looked skeptical. “Are you sure you don’t mind?”

      “Of course, I don’t mind. But if you’d rather I forget about the lettuce and come wash your back—”

      “I can wash my back,” she interjected. “You handle the salad.”

      As he tore up the leaves, he tried not to think about Avery down the hall in the bathroom, stripping out of her clothes. As he chopped up celery and peppers, he ordered himself not to envision the spray from the shower pouring over her sexy, naked body. As he sliced cucumber and tomato, he didn’t let himself imagine any soapy lather sliding over her breasts, her hips, her thighs.

      But damn, all the not thinking, envisioning and imagining made him hot and achy. He shoved the finished salad back into the refrigerator and put the cutting board and utensils in the dishwasher. He could still hear the water running in the bathroom, and the mental images he refused to allow continued to tease at his mind.

      Desperate for a distraction from his prurient fantasies, he decided to give himself a quick tour of her apartment.