John Lincoln, one of the pediatricians employed by the hospital working the obstetric hall, waved from the nursery hallway as she passed. A few seconds later she heard her name called and turned to find John was following her, with another man dressed in the hospital’s light blue scrubs beside him.
Lana stopped and stared at the two men even as she shook her head in denial. There was no way this could be happening to her.
“Hey, Lana,” John said as he approached. “This is Dr. Trent Montgomery. He’s taken the locum tenen position we’ve had open since Dr. Lee left.”
“We’ve met,” Lana said as she turned toward Trent. “What are you doing here?”
“As John just told you, Ms. Sanders, I’ve accepted a temporary job with the pediatric department,” Trent said. “I’m looking forward to the two of us working together.”
Work with the person who was trying to take Maggie away from her? No way was that going to happen.
“But why? Why are you here?” Lana asked.
John looked at Lana, then back at Trent with a frown. “I take it you two know each other?” John asked.
“We’ve met.” Lana said as she moved to one side of the hall to let a nurse pushing a patient in a wheelchair pass.
She noticed the look the nurse gave this new doctor in town. Yeah, she hated to admit it, but he was something to look at. Even with his high-dollar suit and cowboy boots gone he looked good. The pastel color of the cotton scrubs should have dimmed some of that masculine power that he threw off, but instead it seemed to amplify the hardness of the body they covered.
There would be a swarm of women circling around him as if he was roadkill as soon as they got a good look at him. And she would just leave them to it. Because no matter how good he looked she didn’t want him anywhere near her and Maggie. Why was he doing this to her? Her life was stressful enough without him in her hospital, where she would be running into him all the time.
Crossing her arms, she leaned against the wall. There was no way she was going to let him know how rattled he made her. She didn’t care how sexy he looked standing there, she was going to let him know exactly how she felt about this ploy of his. Because that had to be what this was—just one more way to intimidate her into giving up Maggie.
But it wouldn’t work, she was tougher than that. She would not let him get to her. There was too much at stake here. She had too much to lose to let a hard-bodied, hard-headed man get the best of her. She’d play his game if that was what it took to beat him.
“I’ll catch up with you in the lounge,” Trent said to John.
Lana waited till John was out of hearing range before asking the question that was burning her tongue. “What do you think you’re doing here, Dr. Montgomery?” she asked. “Why aren’t you back in Houston?”
Lana watched him take in her knowledge of that piece of information. Yeah, she’d done a little online stalking and it had paid off.
She’d found out that he worked in one of the largest women and children’s hospitals in Houston as a pediatrician, for Pete’s sake. Why he worked as a doctor at all, when he came from a family loaded with oil money, she didn’t understand.
After seeing several pictures of him at different social affairs, all with a different beautiful woman on his arm, she had thought her heart would stop when she’d found an article that listed him as one of Houston’s most eligible bachelors and had seen what was listed as his estimated net worth.
After that she had read everything the internet had on him, looking for something—anything—to use against him. But she hadn’t found anything, and with every article her fear of losing Maggie had increased.
And apparently all the while she had been checking him out, he had been checking her out too. Because even if he had a good reason for leaving the hospital in Houston, the fact that he’d shown up at the hospital where she practiced out of all the hospitals in Miami meant he’d done his research. Or paid someone else to do it.
Wasn’t that what the rich did? Hired someone else to do all the dirty work for them? There were no coincidences with men like Trent Montgomery. No, he had an agenda in coming here, and she would find out what it was one way or the other.
“After my lawyer informed me that the courts would look favorably on me being within their district, I took leave from my job in Houston. Also, it made sense that it would be easier to work with you as far as visitation goes if I was living in the area. A temporary position opened up here, so I inquired and was offered the position.”
As if the pediatric department was going to turn down a qualified pediatrician who had graduated from Emory and done a residency in neonatology when they were so short on staff.
“Besides, Miami is a beautiful city,” he said as he moved closer, leaning in toward her as a group of staff members came down the hall. “Who wouldn’t want to live here?”
She knew better than to let his look of innocence fool her, and she certainly wasn’t going to let the fact that his body was now only inches away affect her.
“What did you tell the interviewers?” she continued, as she tried to ignore her speeding heartbeat. She hadn’t discussed her court appearance with anyone at work—had just told those who’d asked that there had been a small delay in the paperwork at the court.
“I told them I had an interest in the position due to some business I had here in Miami,” Trent said as he moved back a few inches. “I don’t see why the hospital should have any concern for our private affairs.”
Realizing she had been holding her breath, Lana let her lungs expand fully. The racing of her heart let her know she was allowing this man to get to her, and that wasn’t acceptable. She would have to stop letting him intimidate her.
“And I’m supposed to believe that you just happened to end up at the same hospital where I work?”
Trent shrugged a shoulder, then gave her a smile that set her teeth on edge. This was a man who not only knew he was charming, but also knew how to use it to his advantage.
“That’s what I thought,” Lana said as she moved once more to let one of the unit nurses pass.
The fact that it was the same brunette nurse who had walked by earlier didn’t surprise her. Word had clearly already gotten out that there was a new male doctor on the unit, and the fact that he was sexy as hell meant that he would be getting even more attention than usual.
Soon the fact that she knew the new doc would come to the attention of the staff. And that was something that she didn’t want to deal with right now.
* * *
Trent watched Lana as she stomped off, then stopped to pull a ringing phone from her pocket and answer it. He’d known she’d be angry when she found out he’d obtained a job at the hospital she worked at, and he couldn’t blame her. What had surprised him was his reaction to her anger. The woman was as feisty as a wild filly, and reluctantly he had to admit that he’d found it entertaining and even a little arousing to watch her spit and sputter as she reached her boiling point with him.
And that was the strangest thing. Normally the sight of a woman’s anger sent him running in the opposite direction. He’d seen enough of his mother’s tantrums with his father to know he didn’t want any part of that in his life. But this woman’s anger was different. It was hot and furious, but at the same time it was controlled and non-threatening.
And she was sure something to see when her green eyes started to spark lightning strikes at him.
The woman would have his head if she knew that while she’d been doing all that ranting and raving he’d been thinking about how cute she was, trying to intimidate him with her five and a half feet against his six-feet-two-inch self.
The insistent screech of the beeper