Animal Attraction(63)

Dell set Jade back down and she backed away from him, attempting a smile. “Morning,” she said, and turned to her workstation. She felt Dell looking down at her but she didn’t meet his gaze.

“Is everything okay?” Mike asked.

“Yes,” Jade said, and felt Dell move off. She let out a low breath and watched him go, then turned and nearly ran smack into Adam.

He picked up the schedule she’d printed out for him, and studied it. “Going to be a long day,” he said.

He wasn’t kidding.

At lunch Jade locked the front door after Dell and Adam left for their usual cholesterol overload. She looked around at the empty place and tried to rub the matching ache between her breasts.

She couldn’t.

She and Dell had spoken several times since their . . . what had it been, a fight? Not exactly. There’d been no raised voices, no slammed doors, no pouting or brooding.

But things were off. He hadn’t laughed when Peanut had announced to a room full of waiting patients that she had a “crush on doc.”

He hadn’t teased her when she’d brought him the lab reports to go over. He hadn’t let his eyes warm when he looked at her. Actually, he hadn’t looked at her.

With a sigh, she put in her earphones, cranked her iPod and turned to the accounting.

Her version of relaxing.

Now that she finally had all the accounts entered, it was sheer joy to balance the numbers out every day, and she watched with great satisfaction as reports ran down her screen.

Pink came on, her voice a gorgeous low, husky rockand-roll rasp. Jade loved Pink. Pink was strong. Invincible. “You’re fucking perfect,” Jade sang along with the song, standing up to put more paper in her printer. Fucking perfect . . .

Dell. Dell was fucking perfect.

She couldn’t help it, then, the song demanded it. She was already standing so her body moved with the music. It was her line dancing teacher’s fault, she used this song sometimes, the PG-rated version, of course. With a little shimmy, Jade whirled and—dammit!—came face-to-face with Dell and Adam.

With a surprised yelp, she yanked out her earplugs and searched for her dignity.

There was none to be found.

“Do you think she was singing to you or me?” Dell asked Adam.

“Me,” Adam said. “You’re nowhere close to fucking perfect.”

Oh God. Jade put her hands to her very hot cheeks.

“You might want to try a dance class,” Bessie said, coming through with her push broom. “You’re stiff as my broom.”

“I’m in a dance class,” Jade said.

“Maybe you should get a refund.”

“I thought she moved pretty good,” Dell said.

Jade would have shot him a shut-up-and-die look, but she was too embarrassed to meet anyone’s gaze directly.

“I could teach you some moves,” Bessie said, planting her broom right in the middle of the room and giving a little hip shaking boogey that had some parts of her jiggling more than others. Since Bessie was five foot two, both vertically and horizontally, she nearly gave herself a black eye, but she looked pleased with herself. “Yeah,” she said. “I still got it. I’d show you my never-fail-to-get-me-some move, but the last time I tried it out for Mr. Southwick, I pulled something in my hindquarters. Had to go to the doctor and everything.”

Dell grinned.

Even Adam was smiling.

Jade sank to her chair and stared at the phone. Why did it never ring when she needed it to? She did her best to look busy. Busy while sweaty and out of breath. She heard footsteps move away from her and she sighed in relief.

They’d left her alone.

“I like your moves,” came Dell’s low voice near her ear, making her jump. He put his hands on the armrests of her chair and whipped her around to face him.

“Everyone should dance on their lunch break.”

She tried to glare at him but he wasn’t laughing at her. His eyes were dark. And warm. “Don’t be mad. Seeing you so comfortable here is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.”

She gave him a push but she might as well have tried to move a brick wall. “You think everything’s sexy.”

He shook his head. “I’m pretty sure it’s just you.”

She hesitated. “Dell, are we okay?”

“You mean because of this morning?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t know. Why did you leave like that, like I was your dirty little secret?”

There was something in his voice now. Same tone, but there was definitely something new. Temper, she realized. He was always so careful to show the world nothing but easygoing and laid-back no matter what the circumstances. For some crazy reason, seeing the extra depth went a long way toward defusing her.