The Dating Game. Sandra Field

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      CHAPTER THREE

      JULIE FERRIS was on Teal’s mind again the following Friday when he and Dr Deirdre Reid entered the banquet hall in the hotel. He found himself searching the crowd for a crown of gleaming blonde hair, and didn’t know whether he was disappointed or relieved when he couldn’t find the tall, strikingly beautiful woman who was the mother of his son’s best friend. His companion said something to him, then tugged at the sleeve of his tuxedo. ‘Who are you looking for?’

      ‘It’s always interesting to see how many people I know at affairs like this,’ he said vaguely. ‘Do you have any idea where we’re sitting?’

      ‘At the head table—I told you I’m the president of the local association,’ Deirdre said briskly, and began threading her way through the throng of people.

      Grinning to himself, not at all surprised that they were at the head table, Teal followed. One reason he’d accepted Deirdre’s invitation was because he didn’t think there was any danger she’d fall in love with him; Deirdre Reid’s emotions were very much under control. If indeed she had any. There were times when her acerbic sense of humor made him wonder. But she was good company, intelligent and well-informed politically.

      He was introduced to a great many medical pundits on the way to the head table, where the meal was interjected with speeches, all fortunately brief, some very witty. But it was not until the dancing began in the next room that he saw the woman he had subconsciously been searching for all evening.

      Julie Ferris. She was jiving with a tall, strikingly good-looking young man. She danced as if there were no tomorrow, every movement imbued with grace, joyous in a way that made his throat close. Her unselfconscious pleasure seemed to embody something he had lost—if indeed he had ever had it. He said, without having thought out the question at all, ‘Who’s the tall guy with the red hair?’

      Deirdre followed his gaze. With a malicious smile she said, ‘The youngest and most brilliant specialist on staff—neurosurgery—and the worst womanizer. Why do you ask?’

      ‘I know the woman he’s with.’

      Deirdre said dismissively, ‘He’ll be bedding her before the night’s out, I’m sure. She’s rather pretty, isn’t she? Shall we dance?’

      So Julie Ferris liked sex. As much as the women who chased him. She just had a different man in mind; he, Teal, had not turned her on. Turning his back on her, he whirled Deirdre in a circle and began to dance.

      The band was excellent and the wine had flowed freely during the meal. The crowd ebbed and flowed, the laughter ever louder, the colors of the women’s dresses as bright as summer flowers, but not, Teal thought sardonically, as innocent. Smoothly he traversed the dance-floor, Deirdre following his every move with a clockwork precision. The waltz ended. Julie and her partner were standing not ten feet away from them, the neurosurgeon’s hand placed familiarly low on her hip. Teal said clearly, ‘Hello, Julie.’

      Her head swung round. ‘Teal...I noticed you were here,’ she said, and removed the doctor’s hand.

      ‘I’d like you to meet Dr Deirdre Reid,’ Teal said. ‘Julie Ferris, Deirdre...her son and mine are friends.’

      ‘Dr Reid and I have already met,’ Julie said coolly, her smile perfunctory.

      ‘Ferris?’ Deirdre repeated with equal coolness. ‘Oh, of course, Men’s Surgical. I didn’t recognize you out of uniform; all nurses look alike to me.’ She smiled up at Julie’s partner. ‘Hello, Nick, how are you? Teal Carruthers...Dr Nicholas Lytton.’

      The young neurosurgeon had very pale blue eyes, and Teal disliked him on sight. As the band struck up a slow foxtrot, he said, ‘Dance with me, Julie?’

      The twin patches of scarlet in her cheeks matched her outfit—a silk dinner-suit with a flounced neckline and glittering buttons; her hair was upswept on her crown, elaborate gold earrings swaying from her lobes. ‘Thank you,’ she said, and moved into his arms.

      While the color in her cheeks could have stemmed from Deirdre’s rudeness, Teal thought that СКАЧАТЬ