Patient Nurse Read Online Free Page A

feel him watching her while she slid the cakes onto a china plate and placed the cookie sheet into the stainless-steel sink for washing.
    â€œIsadora doesn’t like to cook,” he murmured.
    â€œI imagine you won’t mind having someone else do it,” she replied uncomfortably. She hated having him even this close, she was so afraid of giving herself away. “Anyway, Isadora’s much too pretty to waste time on domestic chores.”
    â€œAre you jealous of her,” he’d asked, “because she’s pretty and you aren’t?”
    The mocking tone of the question had brought her pale gray eyes up flashing. She almost never talked back, but he seemed to bring out latent temper in her that she hadn’t realized she possessed.
    She remembered standing up straight, glaring at him from a face flushed with heat and temper, her dark blond hair hanging in limp ringlets from the bun atop her head. “Thank you so much for reminding me of the qualities I lack. I don’t suppose it would occur to you that I’m capable of looking in a mirror?”
    His eyes had sparkled, for the first time, at her. His eyelids had come down over that glitter and he’d stared at her until her unruly heart had gone crazy in her chest.
    â€œSo you’re not quite a doormat, then?” he’d prompted.
    â€œNo, no soy,” she replied in the perfect Spanish she’d been taught in school, “y usted, señor, no es ningún caballero.”
    His eyebrows had gone up with her assertion that hewas no gentleman. “Que sorpresa eres,” he murmured, making her flush again with the intimacy of the familiar tense—only used between close friends or relatives—when she’d used the formal. What a surprise you are! he’d said.
    â€œWhy, because I can speak Spanish?” she asked in English.
    He smiled, for once without sarcasm. “Isadora can’t. Not yet, at least. I intend to teach her the most necessary words. Of course, those aren’t used in public.”
    Â 
    From a distance of years, she looked back with faint curiosity at the way he’d taunted her with his feelings for Isadora. It had been that way from the beginning. It grew much worse as the couple celebrated their first anniversary.
    Noreen hadn’t ever been sure why she was invited to the party. She hadn’t planned to go, either, but Ramon had sent a car for her.
    Hal and Mary Kensington welcomed her enthusiastically in front of their guests, and then ignored her. Isadora seemed furious to see her there and had pulled her to one side during Ramon’s brief absence, with curling fingers whose nails had almost broken the surface of her skin.
    â€œWhat are you doing here?” she’d demanded furiously. “I didn’t invite you to my anniversary celebration!”
    â€œRamon insisted,” Noreen said through her teeth. “He sent a car.”
    The other woman’s delicate blond brows arched. “I see,” she murmured. She dropped her cousin’s arm abruptly. “He’s getting even,” she added with a harshlaugh. “Just because I had Larry over to dinner while he was away operating in New York.” She shifted abruptly. “Well, he’s never home, what does he expect me to do, sit on my hands?” Her eyes ran over Noreen angrily. “Don’t imagine that he sees stars when he looks at you, sweetie,” she continued hotly. “He only made you come so that he could make me jealous.”
    Noreen had caught her breath. “But, that’s crazy,” she’d said, choking. “For heaven’s sake, Isadora, he doesn’t even like me! He cuts at me all the time!”
    The other woman’s deep blue eyes had narrowed. “You don’t understand at all, do you?” she’d asked absently. “You’re such a child, Norie.”
    â€œUnderstand what?”
    Ramon had come into the kitchen