.

her hands were clutched together, pressed against her belly. A protective posture. Remembered from her pregnancy all those years ago? His own stomach muscles squeezed against each other.

      She’d known Phil was going to call him in here.

      “Dr. Blacke was going to help originally, but since he can’t be here, I thought Dr. McPherson might agree to take his place, since your specialties tie together in some areas. I’ve been trying to coax her into it. She thinks you might object for some reason. You don’t. Correct?”

      He waited for Kady to offer up some other kind of excuse, but she just sat there like a stone. It was up to him to derail this train.

      “No objections, but I’m sure Dr. McPherson didn’t come here expecting to practice medicine.”

      Phil’s glance went from him to Kady. “Can we count on you to help a sister hospital train up a new generation of doctors?”

      Leave it to the department head to make it almost impossible to refuse. It was a weapon the man used well.

      “Well... Of course. If you think it would help.”

      The hesitation was obvious. But he knew Phil well enough to know that he would purposely ignore it. And there was no way he could signal her without his boss seeing it.

      And Phil wasn’t asking anything out of the ordinary. He and Dr. Blacke normally did a kind of back and forth dialogue with medical students.

      “Yes, it would help Dr. Stevenson out immensely.”

      Of course it would.

      Tucker was barely able to suppress the eye-roll he felt coming on. He covered it by asking, “Any idea who will take Gordy’s place during his treatment?”

      “Not yet. We’re still looking for his replacement.” He glanced at Kady, a speculative smile curving his lips. “You wouldn’t consider transferring to our neck of the woods, would you?”

      Kady’s hands uncurled and her thumb went to the back of her ring finger and scrubbed at it. Trying to remove any reminders of what was once there? She’d mailed the rings back to him. He still had them somewhere. Why, he had no idea.

      “No, I’m sorry. I’m getting ready to—” Her voice came to an abrupt stop, along with her thumb, before starting up again. “I have a lot going on in Atlanta right now. And my family is there.”

      Kady’s grandparents. They were good people who’d raised her after her parents had been killed in a car accident. He respected them. And Kady loved them like crazy. He’d left for New York almost immediately after they’d separated.

      He hadn’t talked to them about the split. He probably should have faced her grandfather and tried to explain. But what explanation was there, really? He and Kady disagreed on a fundamental part of their life together. She wanted more children. He didn’t. Had taken steps to make sure that option was never on the table with Kady, or any another woman.

      His and Kady’s wants and needs had landed them in opposite corners of the ring, and neither of them was willing to come to the middle.

      Middle? There was no middle. One of them would have had to give in completely. He couldn’t ask that of Kady. Whispers of guilt surrounded his heart and mind, his teeth clamping tightly to ward them off. She deserved to have kids if that’s what she wanted. He just...couldn’t. A divorce had seemed better than forcing her to live a life she didn’t want. Maybe she already had another child. The thought of that made his jaw lock tight. She wasn’t married again, judging from the lack of a ring on that finger she’d been worrying a moment earlier.

      Phil nodded. “We’ll just have to take whatever you’re willing to give while you’re here, then. Since Dr. Stevenson is fine with you pairing up, then we’re good?”

      One side of Tucker’s mouth twitched to the side at the way Phil had worded that. He and Kady used to do a whole lot of pairing up—in a completely different sense. There was no way he or Kady were going to admit to that, though, so it looked like they were both stuck. Unless they told Phil they were divorced—from each other—they were going to have a hard time explaining why they couldn’t work together.

      “I’m happy to help, of course.”

      Those words were soft. Unsure. Not like the Kady he knew who took the bull by the horns and wrestled it to the ground. Then again, she’d lived through a lot of heartache since their youthful days when they’d been carefree and crazy in love.

      “Good. I’ll leave you two to work on coordinating your schedules. I appreciate you giving us some of your time, Dr. McPherson. If you go down to HR, they can reimburse you for your hours. Not as much as you’d get for practicing medicine, but we do have a small budget for consultants.”

      “It’s okay. I’m taking Dr. Blacke’s place at the conference anyway. If it will help patients in the future, then it’s for a good cause.”

      “We at Wilson-Ross thank you.”

      It wasn’t like Phil to stand on formalities. Or to suggest that a visiting doctor transfer to his department on a permanent basis. He took a closer look at the man as a tinge of something dark and ugly rose up inside him. He didn’t see any overt interest, but Phil was divorced too, and Kady was a beautiful woman.

      Even if the man was interested, there was nothing he could do about it. Nothing he would do about it. His ring was no longer on her finger. She could do as she pleased.

      And if Phil pleased her?

      Give it a rest, idiot!

      Maybe interpreting Phil’s words as a dismissal, his ex climbed to her feet and reached to shake Phil’s hand. Her blouse rode up, exposing a sliver of her back in the process.

      His fingers curled into his palms.

      Damn.

      How he’d loved to explore each ridge and hollow of her spine, his index finger slowly working its way from her neck all the way down the vertebral column, whispering the names and numbers of each in her ear. By the time he’d reached the bottom, she’d been shaking with need.

      So had he.

      Sex between them had always been volcanic. Greedy and generous. Two words not normally associated with each other, but that described their lovemaking perfectly.

      “Thanks for the opportunity,” she murmured.

      The opportunity to spend more of her time with her ex? Of course not. That was just his feverish brain lusting after what it couldn’t have. What it shouldn’t have.

      Which was why he’d had to let her go two years ago. His body had never listened to his head where she was concerned. If he’d stayed, he would have ended up making them both miserable. He’d seen it in her face. Heard it in her voice.

      He waited for her to leave the room, then threw a nod to Phil and followed her out. He fell into step beside her. “You don’t have to do this, you know. If you said no, Phil would have to understand.”

      “And what would we tell him exactly?”

      “We’d think of something.”

      She sighed. “I think it’s already been decided. Besides, I want to do it.”

      “Why?” He was genuinely curious. The last thing they should do was spend any more time than necessary together. Hadn’t he already proven that a minute ago? Or maybe she wasn’t still as affected by him as he was by her.

      “I don’t know exactly. It’s an exciting chance to see how things are done at the main campus of Wilson-Ross.”

      “Trust me. It’s the same as Wilson-Ross in Atlanta.”

      “Maybe, but we follow protocols set by New York. You see the first new wave of treatments.”

      He nodded. “You could get that by meeting with the folks in Maternal-Fetal. I could set up a face to face