Been there, done that, have the scars and the kid to prove it.
“He just isn’t.”
A short silence followed and when Cindy spoke her tone was softer, more serious. “Because he reminds you of Justice’s dad?”
Hello. Had Cindy read her mind? Brielle’s gaze jerked up.
She shouldn’t have looked. Really, she shouldn’t have. Yet her gaze had instantly gone to Cindy. A very curious Cindy, who was watching her way too closely. No wonder. She probably looked like a deer caught in headlight beams. Maybe her friend really had read her mind. Or maybe she’d just thought she was talking in her head and really she’d mumbled her sarcastic remark out loud? No, she knew she hadn’t.
“Why would you ask that?” Had her voice squeaked? Had the racket her mouth had emitted even been actual words or pleas to not push?
“I am your best friend,” Cindy reminded her, sounding slightly offended. “Plus, I’m not blind. Dr. Lane’s eyes are a fantastic blue, just like Justice’s.”
“Lots of people have blue eyes.” She did her best to look bored with the conversation, to look as if she thought Cindy was crazy.
Cindy was crazy if she thought Brielle was going to have this conversation while entering patient data at the emergency room nurses’ station. Especially when Ross could step up at any time.
“True.” Cindy shrugged. “I just thought—”
“Quit thinking.”
Cindy’s brow rose, and she shook her head. “Oh, yeah, comments like that one from my way-too-serious, too logical, always-overthinks-things friend doesn’t raise questions in my mind. Not at all.”
Was that how her friend saw her? Fine. She’d earned the right to be logical and serious. Brielle winced. She had to get her act together. To quit being so jumpy where Ross was concerned. Three months. Less than three months now. She could keep her cool for that long. Then he’d be gone and hopefully never come near her again.
That gave her pause.
Never see Ross again?
Not that she’d thought she ever would. Not after he’d told her he didn’t want anything to do with her ever again, that she was holding him back, and he planned to get on with his life. Without her.
And he had. All too quickly he’d moved on.
Yet, here he was, back in her life, creating emotional havoc.
Just as Cindy was, waiting for an explanation. Any moment her friend would start with the hands-on-hips foot-tapping.
“Look,” Brielle said slowly, hoping to put off the interrogation, “the man annoys me and isn’t someone I’d be interested in. Let’s just leave it at that. Please.”
Cindy considered her a moment, then shrugged. “Okay, for now, but only because your annoyance factor is about to skyrocket anyway.”
Brielle took a deep breath, turned slightly to see Ross headed their way. Great. Her annoyance factor shot into orbit.
“Hey, Brielle, can I talk to you a moment?”
One one thousand. Two one thousand. Three one thousand. If she counted to infinity it wouldn’t calm her Ross-ified nerves.
She could do this. She could be calm, professional. He meant nothing to her. Nothing but a pesky fly she’d like to swat away.
Swat.
“Obviously, you can.”
Perhaps she shouldn’t be so snappy with a physician who was her superior, but she couldn’t help herself. Not so close on the heels of Cindy’s question about Justice.
Her son’s eyes were the exact shade of blue of Ross’s. He had the same strong chin and facial structure. Made expressions that were so similar to Ross’s that at times Brielle’s breath caught and memories pierced her heart.
Justice looked a great deal as Ross must have looked at a similar age. Except that her son had arrived into the world two months early and was small for his age. She couldn’t imagine six-foot-two-inch Ross ever having been anything but big.
“I’m going to go clean Bay One,” Cindy told no one in particular as she fanned her hand over her chest one last time and grinned at Brielle while mouthing, “Hot.”
When they were alone at the nurses’ station, Ross sighed. “Is this how it’s going to be the entire time I’m here?”
“This?” She pretended to have no clue what he referred to.
“You hating me.”
“I don’t hate you.” She didn’t, did she? She just wanted him to go away without disrupting her life further, without disrupting Justice’s life. No way would she let Ross hurt their son the way he’d hurt her.
“Good to know.”
“Don’t let the knowledge go to your head,” she advised, not wanting to encourage him in any way as keeping an emotional distance was difficult enough already. “I may not hate you, but I don’t like you.”
Not looking one bit nonplussed, he grinned. “Let me take you to dinner tonight so we can work on that. Once upon a time there were a lot of things you liked about me. Let me remind you.”
An invisible hand jerked at Brielle’s throat, choking the breath from her. No sound would come out so she shook her head.
“Why not?”
Did he really not know?
“Should I give you a thesis on the reasons? Or just the top-ten list?” she snapped, her voice freeing itself from the mute clutches of shock.
“No,” he said, leaning against the nurses’ station and crossing his legs at the ankles in a casual pose, too casual really. “What you should do is say yes.”
“No.”
“Brielle.”
“Don’t Brielle me, Dr. Lane. There is no reason why I should say yes. No reason why I ever would. This is a wasted conversation because there’s no point to us going to dinner. Ever.”
“Sure there is.” There was an undercurrent to his voice that caused her head to jerk up, for her eyes to study him closely. He looked casual, relaxed, but there was a steely, determined set to his jaw.
Did he know? Had he somehow learned of Justice? Had she been wrong to believe he didn’t have a clue? Really, why else would he be there?
“What reason would that be? Because I sure can’t think of a single one.” It wasn’t as if he’d woken up one morning and thought, Hey I miss Brielle Winton. Wonder what she’s been up to. Maybe I should move hundreds of miles away for a few months so I can find out. Right. But, then, why else would he have chosen to work here?
Unless he’d discovered her five-year-old secret.
“Because I like you,” he answered without hesitation, as if his reasons were logical and she shouldn’t have had to ask.
Her heart pounded in her chest and she grabbed hold of the edge of the nurses’ station, grounding herself. “You don’t even know me.”
“Sure I do.” He sounded so self-confident, so cocky that she wanted to scream with frustration. Did he think her life had just stood still since he’d walked away? That she had been in limbo, waiting for him to come back to pick up where they’d left off?
“You may have known me better than anyone once upon a time, but not any more. Five years changes a person. I’ve changed.”
His gaze skimmed over her, dragging slowly across each of her facial features, lower till he reached where the nurses’-station hid her body. “Not that much.