Tell Me a Story (3 page)

Flynn left her to the puzzle and went to the front door. His mouth was still curved in a smile. Sometimes it took a child to put things into clear perspective. He unbuttoned his shirt. As soon as he picked up the paper, he was going to spend at least an hour under steaming hot water.

He stepped into the hall just as the elevator slid to a halt. Since he wasn't expecting any visitors, there was only one person it could be—his neighbor. His smile took on a wicked edge.

Ann Perry had lived in the apartment across from him. for two years. She was young, attractive, single, and she sternly disapproved of him. She made that clear every time their paths happened to cross. She was a doctor at a local hospital, and the fact that he was sometimes arriving home just as she was going to work obviously offended her sensibilities.

It was unkind, but he could never quite resist the urge to reinforce her image of him as a worthless, womanizing playboy. When those green eyes looked at him as if expecting him to sprout horns and a tail, it brought out a particularly wicked streak. He stopped short of throwing an orgy just to confirm her opinions, but he doubted that she needed any additional proof of his worthlessness.

He turned toward the elevator and leaned one shoulder against the doorjamb. He knew exactly the picture he presented. It was four o'clock in the afternoon. He was unshaven. His hair was tousled. His feet were bare. His shirt was unbuttoned to the waist and his belt was unbuckled. He looked the very picture of worthless masculinity. It was perfect.

The elevator doors slid open, and Flynn felt a twinge of guilt. In the instant before she saw him, she looked tired. There was a vulnerable droop to her shoulders that made him want to offer her a place to rest her head. But it was only a momentary illusion. The moment her eyes fell on him, her shoulders stiffened into a military stance and her eyes turned a frosty shade of green.

Flynn slumped against the wall, letting his eyes trail insolently over her, from the tips of her neat black pumps—the heels a sensible two inches—over the gray suit—still crisp after a day spent at the hospital—to fine-boned features set in rigid disapproval and finally stopped on fiery red hair pulled into a smooth chignon.

When she'd first moved in, he'd had more than one fantasy about seeing that hair spread across his pillow, but it hadn't taken long for the message to come across that the fire in her hair didn't melt the ice in her eyes.

"Ms. Perry. Home from a day of saving lives?"

She tilted her head, her shoulders absolutely rigid as she stepped out of the elevator. "Mr. McCallister. Home from a night of drinking?"

She stalked to her door, stopping to pick up her mail and the newspaper. Flynn admired the line of her back. She really was a very attractive woman. If she'd just show some signs of humanity, he'd be able to resist the urge to live down to her opinion of him. He allowed himself a mental sigh of regret as she opened her door. Oh well, a dedicated doctor probably wasn't his style, anyway.

Right now the only female he had to worry about was about three feet tall and made a deadly cup of coffee.

Ann was aware of Flynn McCallister's eyes following her every move. Hands that were solid as a rock holding a needle suddenly felt remarkably quivery gathering up her mail. He didn't say anything more, but he didn't have to. Just his presence was enough to unnerve her.

She fumbled with the key before getting it in the lock. The door opened and she stepped into the haven of her home. She resisted the urge to slam the door. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of knowing he disturbed her. The door closed with a quiet snick, enclosing her in the safety of her apartment and shutting him out.

"Ridiculous. You're acting like a child." Only there was nothing childlike about the feelings Flynn McCallister stirred.

The muttered reprimand didn't make her feel any less relieved, but it did bring her housemate running. She saw him coming across the living room and quickly droppedher mail and the paper on the hall table, emptying her arms. She was just in time. Three feet away, he launched himself into the air. Ann braced herself against the impact as seventeen pounds of gray fur landed in her arms.

It was Oscar's preferred method of greeting. It had been cute when he was a kitten. If he got any bigger,

it was going to become life threatening, but Ann didn't have the heart to discourage him. It was nice to have someone excited about seeing her at the end of the day. She carried the huge tomcat into the kitchen and set him on the floor. He jumped up on a stool and sat down to watch her make a snack. It was a ritual they carried out every afternoon. Oscar never begged for scraps, but if Ann happened to be fixing something he particularly liked, he was not above an occasional moan of hunger. He was judicious in his use of this technique. But roast beef was well worth the effort.

"Moocher." Ann chose a pink slice of beef and cut it into Oscar-size bites. He waited politely until she'd set the saucer on the floor before launching himself toward the treat. The meat was gone before Ann had finished making her sandwich, and Oscar returned to his stool to keep her company while she ate.

She set the plate down and then poured herself a glass of milk. Before she sat down to enjoy her snack, she slipped off her jacket and unbuttoned the first three buttons of her blouse. Her shoes had been abandoned on the way to the kitchen. She sat down but didn't reach for the sandwich. For just a moment she savored the stillness of the apartment. It wasn't that the hospital was noisy, but it was filled with such self-conscious quiet that there were times when she would have welcomed some healthy noise.

"I saw McCallister in the hall. He looked like he'd been up all night. Again. It's a good thing he doesn't try to hold down a job. It might interfere with his love life."

Oscar looked up from the paw he was washing and murmured sympathetically. He was familiar with the problem of McCallister. Ann smiled at the car and took a healthy bite of her sandwich. Oscar was a great audience. He always agreed with her.

She chewed slowly, her eyes focused on nothing in particular. What was it about Flynn McCallister that never failed to irritate her? When she'd first moved in, she'd been prepared to be a cordial neighbor. Her father had pointed out that the McCallister family was wealthy and old power. Ann wasn't terribly interested in her neighbor's antecedents as long as he was quiet and didn't expect to borrow a cup of sugar at two-thirty in the morning.

At least that's what she thought before she'd met Flynn McCallister. He seemed to fit her simple criteria for neighborly behavior. He didn't throw wild parties. He was always polite. He'd never asked to borrow a cup of sugar at any time of day or night. In fact, they didn't run into each other very often. Sometimes it was a week or more between sightings.

Considering how little she saw of him, he took up an inordinate amount of room in her thoughts. Most of it hostile. It was the way he looked at her. Every time they met, those electric blue eyes seemed to strip her naked. And it wasn't just her clothes he was seeing through. It was as if he could see right through to her soul. Not that she had anything to hide, Ann told herself. It was just that she didn't like feeling naked in front of a total stranger.

And it didn't help at all to know that it was deliberate. He knew exactly what he was doing. He enjoyed flustering her. It annoyed Ann that he could read her so easily, and it annoyed her even more that she couldn't control her reaction to him. She was a doctor. People's lives rested in her hands every day. Control was essential in her work, and it carried over into her private life. With nothing but a look and a quirk of an eyebrow, Flynn McCallister managed to weaken that control, and she resented it.

It was resentment that made her feel so flushed and breathless when he looked at her. It was simple curiosity that made her wonder what it would feel like when he kissed someone. Not her, of course. She had no desire to kiss a man who couldn't even hold a job. It was just that he'd probably kissed a lot of women and she'd never been kissed by an expert. It was natural that she was curious.

"But we know where curiosity gets you, don't we, Oscar? Look what happened to the cat." Oscar blinked at her and then hopped down off the stool and trotted into the living room. "Oh dear. Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned it."

His tail disappeared around the corner with an indignant flip and Ann giggled. It was a girlish sound that would have surprised a lot of people who thought they knew her. Her colleagues at work had never heard Dr. Perry giggle. It was rare for her to bestow so much as a smile on anyone but a patient.

Despite the fiery warmth of her hair, she had a reputation for being icy cold. She did her work with a slightly feverish dedication that earned her respect, but she kept too much distance between herself and her colleagues to earn anything more than respect.

When Ann took time to think about it, she told herself she preferred it that way. She didn't really have time for all the foolish machinations that seemed to go along with friendships. Her work was too important to her. It filled her life quite nicely. If there were times when she saw two nurses laughing together and felt a little wistful, it was only when she was tired.

The phone rang, startling her out of her thoughts, and she jumped. It rang again, but she didn't move immediately. It would be her father. He would want a progress report. How did she tell him that a medical career wasn't like being a corporate executive where every day she could report some deal closed, some new advance toward a vice presidency? The triumphs of helping a patient didn't interest him in the least. He wanted to know where her career was going. He thought she was progressing too slowly.

The phone rang again, and she got to her feet. If she didn't answer it now, he would only call again later. Besides, it was wonderful that he was so interested in her career. It showed that he loved her.

Twenty minutes later she put down the phone, feeling more drained than when she'd left the hospital. Why couldn't she make him understand that medicine was usually a day-to-day grind with occasional advances? You didn't start out as a medical student and work your way to head of staff in ten days or less. Why couldn't he be proud of what she had accomplished instead of demanding to know why she hadn't done more? She suppressed the question before it had a chance to take root. He was proud of her. He just didn't know how to show it. He wasn't a demonstrative man, that's all.

She wandered back to the kitchen table and picked up her half-eaten sandwich. The food didn't look as good as it had a few minutes ago. She wrapped the sandwich in plastic wrap and rinsed out her milk glass. She was just tired. That's why her father's call was upsetting. That's why Flynn McCallister had seemed particularly dangerous.

She'd planned to go out and do some shopping, but maybe it would be a good idea to take a long hot bath and spend the evening with a book. She could use the time to unwind. She had the next two days off, and a relaxing evening at home would be a nice way to start her small vacation.

She left the kitchen and headed toward her bedroom, but she was sidetracked by Oscar who was sprawled flat on his back in the middle of the living-room floor. She stopped to scratch his ample tummy, and he took it as an invitation to play, wrapping his paws around her arm and chewing on her hand. His teeth sank gently into her fingers, careful not to bite too hard, and Ann responded by twisting her hand back and forth.

The sudden pounding on the door interrupted the playful wrestling match. Ann jumped, jerking her hand away from the cat so suddenly that she inflicted a scratch on her arm when his claws sprang out in automatic reaction to the sudden noise. Oscar rolled to his feet and streaked for the safety of the bedroom.

Ann stood up, staring at the door warily. No one had rung up from the lobby. Her father had just called her from the other side of town, and he was the only person she'd given the elevator code to. Of course, there was no telling how many people McCallister had handed out the code to. Maybe it was a friend of his who was too drunk to realize he had the wrong door. The pounding started again. She would direct whoever it was to the correct apartment and then she'd make it a point to complain to the management company. McCallister couldn't just go around giving out security codes.

She grasped the doorknob, full of righteous indignation. This time he'd gone too far. It was one thing for him to be out at all hours of the day and night, and it was none of her business how many bimbos he brought home with him, but this was a matter of her own personal safety. She couldn't have him giving privileged information to all and sundry.

She yanked the door open, ready to give whoever it was her iciest look—the one that had been known to cow junior nurses at a glance. She'd make it clear that she didn't approve of his intrusion on her time. Her lips parted to deliver a scathing put-down, but not a word emerged. Instead of the inebriated sot she'd expected to see, she was nose to nose with a masculine chest. Broad, muscled and matted with hair. She knew it was matted with hair because it was bared to her gaze. In fact, there was not a stitch of clothing in sight. Her eyes dropped automatically to find that the only apparel her visitor was wearing was a towel—a rather small one—knotted carelessly around his hips. Her eyes jerked upward, and she took an automatic step backward.

The last thing she'd expected to find on her doorstep was Flynn McCallister, clad in nothing but a towel and a panicked expression.