Crossing The Line

Dante’s fingers lingered at her hair. “No secrets at all, water nymph? Nothing you want to get off your chest? Nothing to confess?”

She could scarcely think. The heat from his body, the fragrance of his captivatingly masculine cologne mixed with the musky scent of damp forest rattled her brain.

“Nothing.”

“I don’t believe you,” he said, his hot, laser-sharp gaze puncturing hers. “A smart woman like you, who knows how to keep other people’s secrets, is bound to have a few secrets of her own.”

Her nipples tightened to hard buds underneath her scrub top. She was glad for her lab coat buttoned up over her clothes. Still, in this rain…

She stifled the urge to look down and see if her arousal was visible through her scrubs. But she didn’t want to turn his attention in that direction, so she simply tried her best to look cool and calm.

“Spoken like a man who’s dying to reveal a few skeletons from his closet,” she countered.

He took his fingers from her hair, but he did not lower his hand. Rather, he stroked the back of one finger along the line of her jaw.

His touch was like fire. She swallowed, forced herself not to shudder.

“A fringe of raindrops,” he explained. “On your chin.”

Elle sucked in her breath, stepped back away from him, away from his exploring fingers that sent heated lightning shooting straight to her womb. He was looking at her with the most compelling expression on his face. She watched his eyes drift to the tell-tale throbbing of her pulse at the juncture of her throat and collarbone.

What was with this guy?

A soft noise from the undergrowth drew their attention to the ground.

That’s when Elle saw what she’d come into the forest searching for—a fawn with wide, terrified eyes.

Her nurturing instincts vanquished any weak-kneed fantasies she might be having about the man beside her. Heedless of the mud, she knelt on the carpet of pine needles and dead leaves and reached out to the baby.

The fawn trembled at her touch, unable to run, even to stand on its wobbly little legs.

“That’s your secret?” Dante sounded strangely relieved.

All business now, Elle looked up at him. This baby needed her. She had no time for sexy thoughts. “Hand me one of those bottles, will you?”

Dante leaned over to retrieve the bottle as Elle gathered the fawn into her arms and tucked it in the crook of her left elbow. He straightened and turned to hand her the formula. His forearm brushed lightly against her shoulder. She caught a closer glimpse of the steely set of his jaw where the hint of a five o’clock shadow had started to sprout. A whiff of his woodsy cologne set her heart pumping. Oh boy, this wasn’t good. Not good at all.

Forget about him.

Resolutely, she focused her attention on the fawn squirming in her arms. Gently she placed the bottle’s nipple on the baby’s lower lip. She bent it slightly to express a squirt of milk.

The fawn tentatively flicked out its tongue. Once it tasted the milk, the baby made greedy sucking noises and it was easy for Elle to slip the nipple into its hungry little mouth.

“How did you know the fawn was here?” Dante asked, crouching beside her, his deep voice as comforting as hot chocolate on a cold winter day.

“I’ve been watching a pregnant doe from the back window of the E.D.,” she said. “Every morning she crosses over from the farms to the road and heads down to the river. Two days ago, she didn’t cross. Then yesterday, when she went down to the water, I noticed she wasn’t pregnant any longer. Then this morning…” She let her words trail off and took a deep breath to keep the tears from her voice. “After the disaster drill, we had a motor vehicle collision victim come into the E.D. for stitches. The driver hit a doe in the road and rolled his SUV. I just knew…”

Elle pressed her lips together. A tear slid down her cheek. Ah dammit, she was crying. Why was she crying? She was an E.D. nurse. She’d seen a lot worse things than a dead deer. She blinked and sniffled back the tears.

Dante clamped a hand on her forearm and squeezed gently. “It’s okay to feel tender-hearted over an orphaned baby.”

Just like that, he got her.

Mark would have told her she was being ridiculous. Mark, the same man who’d kept promising her they’d start a family next year, then the next and the next, until finally he left her for a much younger woman who clearly did not have a ticking biological clock.

The fawn wriggled in her arms. It made a soft bleating noise of complaint. What was she doing wrong? The baby chewed the nipple. Milk squirted every which way. Elle was having trouble holding the animal—the rambunctious youngster was stronger than it looked. The fawn kicked at her with its rowdy little hooves, butted the bottle with its head. The formula flew from her hands and landed in the bushes.

“Oh fiddlecakes,” she said, and reached for a second bottle.

“Fiddlecakes?” He sounded amused. “I thought the term was fiddlesticks.”

“Something my grandmother used to say. I spent a lot of time with her growing up. Both my parents did shiftwork.”

“Medical?”

“Cops.”

An odd expression she couldn’t read crossed Dante’s face. Then he surprised her by plunking down beside her on the ground. “Give him here.”

“What are you doing?”

“Let me hold him and you can hold the bottle.”

“You’re going to get mud on your suit.”

“I don’t care.”

“Really?” That surprised her. Mark would rather have his teeth pulled than sit on the ground in one of his tailored suits.

“It’s just clothing.”

That didn’t sound like any surgeon she knew. This guy was a horse of a different color. Elle cocked her head to study him. “Why are you getting involved?”

“Just give him to me,” Dante said, clearly not someone who liked explaining himself.

“How do you know it’s a him?”

“I had a good view of his backside while you had him tucked under your arm.” Dante took the fawn from her and held him in his lap with a firm grip.

His hand grazed hers.

The breath knotted tight in Elle’s chest, unable to find a way out. Hand tingling, she ducked her head and got up to retrieve the second bottle.

Together they sat side by side on the muddy forest floor, raindrops dotting their skin as they nourished an orphaned baby buck.

Her estimation of Dante Nash shot up a notch. She could tell he was a good doctor by the considerate way he held the deer. Gentle but firm. It was the kind of touch that would make any patient feel safe in his hands. She slanted a sideways glance at his face and discovered he was looking at her.

Their eyes met.

He winked.

A hot flush of sexual excitement raced through her. To Elle there was nothing sexier than a nurturing man. Quickly she dropped her gaze. No, no, she didn’t want this feeling. She did not want to like him. To want him. She’d just come out of a miserable divorce. This wasn’t the time for a relationship, and he, as one of her ex-husband’s friends, was not someone she should choose.

“You’re going to have to take him to the animal rescue center,” Dante said.

“I know.” Elle stroked the baby’s fur.

“Yet you’re getting attached anyway.”

She shrugged. “A fault of mine. Getting attached when I shouldn’t.”

“It’s not a fault. Just means you care.”

“Yeah well, it makes for a frequently broken heart.”

A long silence stretched between them, interrupted only by the sounds of the baby deer suckling. He finished one bottle and Elle started the famished youngster on another.

“Why’d you marry Mark?” he asked.

“What?” His question caught her off guard. She raised her head, stared at him again. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t get offended,” Dante said. “It’s just that you’re not Mark’s usual type.”

“No?” Of course not, Elle thought. Cassandra was Mark’s usual type—blond, beautiful and busty. Elle stared down at her own average-sized 34B bosom.

“You’re too smart for him.”

“You don’t even know me. How can you say that?”

“You have lively eyes.”

Elle snorted, but his words brought a heated rush of pleasure to her cheeks.

“Let me guess, you put Mark through medical school. Worked a full-time job, paid the bills and helped him with his homework.”

Dante was so right it hurt. “You know what?” Elle said. “That’s none of your business.”

“Touché,” Dante said. “He’s through.”

“Who? Mark?”

“No, the fawn.”

Indeed, the baby had sucked the bottle dry. Feeling an odd strangeness she couldn’t quite identify, Elle got to her feet and swiped at the mud on the knees of her scrubs. “My lunch hour is over. They’ll be wondering where I am.”

Dante stood up, the fawn cradled in his arms. “What are we going to do with him?”

Elle reached out for the baby. “I’ll call my sister-in-law. She’s interning for the vet at the end of the road. She’ll know who to call about disposing of the fawn’s mother and what to do about this little guy.”

Dante transferred the deer to her arms, their fingers brushing again in the process. Suddenly her heart was in her throat and she had no excuse for it.

“So tell me,” she said. “Did you satisfy your curiosity? Or are you still bored?”

He lowered his eyelids and gave her a sultry look. He raked his gaze over the length of her body, then went back to stare at her lips. He looked like a man whose appetite had just been whetted.

Then he said in low, provocative voice, “Not by a long shot.”

The baby kicked and she almost dropped him. Elle tightened her grip on the fawn and told her silly heart to stop beating so fast. The look Dante was giving her meant absolutely nothing.

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