Page 11 of Close Pursuit

Must be nice. She had two skin colors: porcelain white and lobster red. The latter was achievable either by excess sun exposure or the ever popular, ‘See who can make Katie blush the worst’ game.

She guessed he was around thirty. Although his eyes sometimes looked like he’d lived a lot longer. What was his story? What had he done between medical school and his recent residency in obstetrics? What were his likes and dislikes? Did he have any hobbies?

During a lull between patients, she stared idly at him, speculating about his life when his eyes opened without warning His gray gaze drilled into her like a laser.

“Is there a problem?” he rasped. His voice was husky with sleep and so sexy her toes curled in her hiking boots.

“Nope,” she answered cheerfully to hide her embarrassment at being caught staring at him. She hastily opened her tablet reader and turned it on.

“You were looking at me.”

She had no chance of lying her way out it, so she took the direct route. “I wasn’t aware that’s a crime.”

He lifted his arms out of his sleeping bag and linked his fingers behind his head. His naked arms. The upper reaches of his bare chest peeked out of the nylon shell. A sprinkling of dark hair was visible on it. And muscles. Lots more than she’d expected. She revised her opinion of him from lean to deceptively muscular. He must wear a tuxedo like a god.

“You’re staring again,” he announced.

“And it’s rude of you to point it out,” she retorted. “Ladies are allowed to look.”

“Are gentlemen allowed, also?”

If she didn’t know better, she’d say he was flirting. Would wonders never cease?

She fanned the tiny flame carefully. “It’sexpectedthat guys will check us out. Why else would we girls go to so much trouble to look so good?”

“I haven’t gotten the impression you’re a big primper.”

“That’s because there’s no power outlet for my blow dryer and lighted make-up mirror and the wind makes my eyes water too much to keep on even a little mascara.”

“You packed a blow dryer?” He had the bad grace to burst into laughter.

She scowled at his amusement. “Hey, I brought power converters. When I was told primitive camping, I thought they meant a Holiday Inn instead of a Marriott. Nobody told me electricity doesn’t exist out here. I was under the impression there would be, oh, I don’t know, walls and roofs.”

“You don’t need to primp. You’re fine the way you are,” he replied.

A compliment out of the good doctor? Wow. “Apology accepted,” she replied magnanimously.

He blinked, startled, as if he hadn’t meant it that way. The man might be god-level hot, and he might be a genius, but he had alotto learn about women.

She walked over to the door to look outside, “So, does your Spidey sense say we’re going to get a lot of business tonight?”

“No. We’ll get the night off.”

She turned in surprise—whoops. He was just pulling jeans over sports trunks. Okay, then. The deceptively muscular thing extended to his legs and tush, too. She silently dubbed him Gluteus Aleximus.

He glanced up, caught her staring, and broke into a grin so hot her eyelashes singed. “Like what you see?”

“Umm…uhh…sure,” she managed to get out.

His grin widened.

He’d embarrassed her on purpose. Oh, two could play that game. She hadn’t grown up with a houseful of brothers for nothing. She could give as well as she got when it came to practical jokes.

While she pondered revenge, she busied scrambling eggs someone had brought them over the propane stove. She and Alex were frequently paid in bread, jugs of yak milk, and these over-sized eggs she hadn’t had the courage to ask the source of. Geese, maybe? Or something weirder?

In her world, every egg came from a chicken, and she was sticking with that mental image. She’d tried to explain to the local women that Doctors Unlimited was paying the two of them, but that didn’t stop their patients from showing gratitude with small gifts.

“So, Doc. Why do you think there won’t be any babies, tonight?” she asked.

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