Colin got the definite impression that if he so wanted, he could order her up with no problem.
His tie wasn’t the only item of clothing that suddenly felt tight.
The other waitress strode away toward the back of the restaurant. Colin looked around Lucky to watch the other woman strike up a conversation with a man he guessed was the manager or the owner.
“We’ll order now,” he said, thinking the less interaction with Lucky the better.
“Are you in some sort of trouble?” he asked after he and Will had made their choices.
Lucky glanced back to where the manager was staring at her while the waitress pointed in her direction.
She smiled as she accepted their menus. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
She walked away. As soon as she was out of earshot, Will pulled at his own collar. “Did the temperature just get a little hotter in here or is it my imagination?”
Colin grimaced as he straightened his silverware. “It’s your imagination.”
“Well, I certainly hope so because I’m guessing she’s a patient of yours. And you don’t want to be taking any chances right now. Not with everything that’s hanging in the balance.” His gaze trailed back to Lucky. “That’s one hot number, though. I don’t know what I would do if a patient of her caliber came on to me the way she’s coming on to you. A package like that has a way of making you forget about medical degrees. Pass her on to one of your colleagues quick, mate.”
Colin had considered and discarded the option earlier. To pass her on to one of his partners wouldn’t look good. And right now he couldn’t afford even a hint of impropriety. “So why did you pass Miss Clayborn onto your partner?” he could hear himself being asked during a legal deposition. What would he say? “I wanted to screw her so bad my balls ached, that’s why.”
The sound of raised voices caught his attention. He looked over to where Lucky was facing off with the manager, the other waitress standing nearby with her arms crossed under her impressive chest. Colin couldn’t make out what was being said, but given the man’s stern expression he didn’t think it was good.
And when Lucky took off her apron and then peeled off her T-shirt and draped both over the manager’s head, he knew he’d guessed correctly.
There were hoots and hollers as Lucky strode, as casual as you please, toward the kitchen where she disappeared behind the doors.
“Whoa,” Will said, his eyes wide. “Something tells me I won’t be getting that ale any time soon.”
Colin watched as Lucky came back out of the kitchen wearing the same tank she’d had on earlier. She ignored the manager as she walked through the place then out the front door.
He started to push from the table.
Will caught his arm, his expression stern. “I wouldn’t if I were you, Col.”
Colin considered him. “I know. But you’re not me.”
And then he went out after Lucky.
3
IT WAS raining.
Figured. Lucky kept her chin high and her shoulders back. It was raining in her professional life, so why shouldn’t it be in reality?
She squelched a groan. She’d really needed that job. Aside from the good tips, the flexibility had allowed her to work around her morning job at the pancake house within walking distance of the bar. And considering that the pancake house didn’t have an item on the menu that cost more than five dollars and ninety cents, her tips were minimal, by no means enough to live on.
And she’d thrown the job away for a man….
She tripped over her own feet, missing a puddle by millimeters. Had she ever done something so spontaneously irresponsible before? Not when it came to the opposite sex. Sure, she might like to shake things up a bit wherever she was, and she didn’t take well to leering bosses, but a few unwanted stares at her breasts had never been enough for her to walk away from a well-paying job. And in this case, she had not only walked away from it, she’d gone to Colin’s table knowing full well she’d be fired.
Of course, at the time it had seemed more than worth the unguarded expression on his face when he’d looked up to see her.
Now? Well, now she wondered which errant hormones had made her act so impulsively and how she might go about getting them back under control.
Sure, the shrink was thigh-quiveringly sexy. But no man was sexier than a good night’s worth of tips. Not when she had bills to pay.
She opened the door of her twenty-five-year-old Chevy and slid onto the well-maintained leather driver’s seat, breathing in the scent of old car and raspberry air freshener as she fished her keys from her purse. The ping of rain against the roof was the only sound…even after she turned the ignition key.
Not even a sputter, a whine or a crank from the old vehicle. Nothing.
Lucky tried starting the car again with the same results.
She rested her forehead against the cracked leather steering wheel and closed her eyes. Great. Just what she needed considering she’d just lost her main source of income.
There was a light tap on her window. She leaned back to stare at the blurry image through the rain-spattered glass. Was that…
Colin.
“Are you all right?” she read his lips rather than heard the muffled words.
Lucky blinked at him. Was the doc really standing out in the rain with no protection, his hands tucked into his slacks pockets as he bent to look inside her car? Yes, he was. And in that one moment everything that had transpired in the past ten minutes had been worth it.
She yanked open the door and climbed out of the car to stand in front of him. He straightened, seeming to squint at her in the gloomy light.
“What was that you said?” she asked.
“I asked if you were all right.”
Lucky twisted her lips, giving his tall, lean body a full once-over before returning her gaze to his eyes. “Considering I just got fired five minutes ago, my car won’t start, and the lack of an umbrella has made my tank top transparent? I’m just peachy.”
His gaze dropped down to her breasts. Lucky didn’t have to look. It didn’t take a physics professor to know that white cotton and steady rain made her look like a wet T-shirt contestant.
Only she was unprepared for the warm shiver that slaked through her at Colin’s slow perusal.
She rounded him to stand at the front of her car. After sliding her fingers in between the grill slats, she tugged on the release then braced herself as she hauled open the old car’s hood.
“You wouldn’t happen to know anything about cars, would you, Dr. McKenna?” she asked.
He came to stand next to her, staring at the grease-covered engine. “I know enough.”
“And would any of that knowledge help me out with what’s happening now?”
He looked at her, his mind appearing to be on everything but the status of her car. “It’s my guess your battery’s dead.”
He walked to the driver’s door, opened it, then pushed in the button that turned off the headlights. When she’d gotten into her car, Lucky hadn’t even been aware they were on. Then again, why would she? If the headlights had drained her sorry excuse for a battery, then there wouldn’t be any juice left to illuminate them now, would there?
Great.
Colin closed the door then reached to close the hood.
Lucky turned to face him. The fact that they stood