Impossible to Resist. Janice Maynard

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СКАЧАТЬ had sworn an oath not to do harm to anyone. If he let her walk out the door, he would be violating everything he held sacred about preserving human life.

      It was more than any altruistic desire to play the hero. He’d seen death too many times. His mother. His fiancée. His childhood friend. Not to mention patients he had lost in med school—never due to any negligence on his part, but loss nevertheless.

      In this instance, there was only one choice to be made, despite the upheaval it would cause in his life. But the danger in agreeing—the emotional and unpredictable side effect—would be his surprising hunger for the delicious Ariel Dane. And that admission raised all sorts of warning flags in his psyche.

      “When would you need me?” he asked, mentally flipping through his calendar.

      “Ten days from now, more or less.”

      “And where will we be staging our tryst? Please don’t tell me that this Oscar-worthy movie is an action flick set in downtown Detroit.”

      His humor eased some of the tension from her narrow shoulders. “Lucky for you, no. We’ll be heading to Antigua. Sun, sand, sangria.”

      “I’m not much of a drinker. Would that be a problem … in terms of image?”

      “Not at all. I rarely drink, either.”

      His skepticism must have shown through.

      Ariel bristled. “I’ve only been legal for a relatively short time. And in all those months, I’ve rarely had more than a single glass of wine at any party or event.”

      He worked to shrug off his preconceptions. She was an actress. A very good one. Playing the wronged innocent would be a piece of cake for her. And Jacob just one more dupe along the way.

      But he wanted to believe her. He did believe her. “If I agreed, how long would we be gone?” The flicker of hope that bloomed in her eyes affected him in ways he didn’t want to admit.

      “The director hopes to wrap in ten weeks and head back to L.A. All the interior shots will be filmed on a sound stage. You’d be free to return to Wolff Mountain then.”

      “What happens if you get sick once you’re back in California?”

      She shrugged. “My mother will be around. And I have a couple of friends I trust. But the truth is, by that point, the director and producer couldn’t afford to fire me. Not with that much of the movie in the can. Their only choice would be to wait for me to get better.”

      “You’ve given this a lot of thought.”

      She waved a hand at the wall behind his desk. “I may not have your credentials, Doc, but I’ve got street smarts in spades. It’s a dog-eat-dog world out there in Tinseltown. I should know. I’ve got the bite marks to prove it.”

      “I’m not committing to anything until we do a complete medical exam. Will you agree to that?”

      “Do I have a choice?”

      The atmosphere in the room was charged. Jacob felt the blood pumping in his veins. “No.” He was blunt. Determined. In some areas he might be led around by his sex, but not this. Not when it came to a patient’s health.

      She paled, her hands twisting in distress. “I’ve already been diagnosed.”

      “Doesn’t matter. I have to make my own assessment. What are you afraid I’ll find?”

      She stilled, her chin lifting and her expression haughty. “I’m not afraid of anything. I just don’t like doctors.”

      “I’m distraught.” He hadn’t expected to find anything funny in their situation, but her sheer cussedness amused him. “This will be painless, I assure you.”

      “Says the man with the needles.”

      He lifted a brow. “Is that the problem? I’ll have to draw blood, you know. But I have a light touch, I swear.”

      She rocked back and forth in her chair, arms clasped around her waist. “I’ve been known to pass out when donating during a Red Cross Drive. It’s embarrassing.”

      “I’ll take care of you.” The words slipped from his lips easily, sounding more like a vow than a simple statement. He cursed inwardly, swallowing hard. “Seriously, Ariel. There’s nothing to worry about.”

      “Will I have to take off my clothes?”

      His entire body went on red alert. Ariel. Naked. Beneath his roof. Perhaps building a clinic in his house had been a stupid idea. Because it sure as hell had never occurred to him that he might one day want to walk a patient down the hall to his bedroom.

      Or better yet, drag her into the hall and take her standing up because he didn’t have the patience to wait.

      Sweat dampened his forehead. His hands, his surgically trained hands, trembled. “No,” he croaked. “That won’t be necessary.”

      “Then let’s get it over with,” she muttered, rising gracefully to her feet with a little bounce that made her seem younger than at any moment so far. She reached for her designer purse.

      “Leave it,” Jacob said. “We won’t be gone long and there’s no one around to bother it.”

      As they stepped into the hallway that connected the clinic to the rest of the house, Jacob glanced toward the window that offered a view of the driveway. “Is someone waiting for you?” he asked. “A driver perhaps?”

      Ariel yawned and stretched, her breasts straining the thin, soft fabric of her dress. “I drove myself. Flew coach. Wore a black wig and fake glasses. Rented a car. I was lucky. No one recognized me.”

      “Or if they did, they had the decency not to bother you.”

      She laughed. “Do you always assume such nice things about the world at large?”

      “People are not all bad.”

      “I’m amazed you can have that attitude after what happened to your family. Isn’t that why you’re holed up here? To isolate yourselves from danger?”

      Jacob sighed, ushering her into an exam room. “My father and uncle brought us to the mountain for that reason initially, but as adults, we’ve all chosen to live here for different motives. My brother Gareth likes the wild remoteness of the land. Kieran has discovered that despite his world travels, no place else feels like home.”

      “And you?”

      “I like being nearby to care for my father and uncle. They’re both getting up in years … Both started families late in life. I keep an eye on them. And the location is perfect for my patients who need privacy.” Not to mention the fact that the world at large was a painful place. Jacob had begun his life as an introvert, and the experiences that had shaped him only served to reinforce that tendency.

      “Who else lives here on the mountain?”

      He fancied she was chattering to distract herself from the upcoming exam, but he indulged her. “I have two brand-new sisters-in-law. And three cousins who СКАЧАТЬ