My One and Only(31)

The bomb appeared to be defused. “That makes sense, I guess,” Carrie mumbled. “Thanks for the reassurance, Dr. Mitchner.”

Feeling as if she’d just lied to a child, Haleigh felt the familiar mantle of guilt settle heavily on her shoulders. She prayed the waitress would forget about her drink.

“Where’s my dance partner?” Spencer barked as he wrapped his arms around his fiancée. “I came here to dance, woman. It’s time to get your pretty little butt on the floor.”

“I second that,” Caleb said, then corrected himself. “About my woman’s butt, of course.”

Lorelei rolled her eyes as Spencer pulled her toward the twirling dancers. As if unable to resist, Caleb planted a hot kiss on his wife before all but carrying her to the floor. A task easily accomplished considering his impressive bulk and her diminutive size.

“What do you say?” Cooper asked, nodding after the others. “You up for a spin or two?”

Panic assailed her. If memory served, done correctly dancing could be as arousing as a good bout of foreplay. Haleigh could not handle this much temptation in one night. “I’m not sure I remember how,” she said.

“Come on,” Carrie encouraged. “It’s good for straitlaced doctors to experience new social situations and to interact with people other than their patients.”

The gleam in the woman’s eye took Haleigh by surprise. “I wasn’t born yesterday,” the younger woman said. “But I do appreciate your efforts. Now do yourself a favor and give Cooper a dance.”

Green eyes met hers and Haleigh knew she couldn’t turn him down. At least there was no liquor on the dance floor. She could smell an amaretto sour nearby and the scent was making her mouth water.

“I might step on you,” she said.

“So long as I don’t step on you we should be all right.”

Slipping her hand into his, Haleigh followed Cooper to the floor with a mixture of anxiety and anticipation. Without hesitating, he squeezed between a pair of dancers and had her shuffling backward in a Texas two-step without missing a beat. Running on instinct, Haleigh fit her body against his as her left hand slid up his neck to nestle in the dark curls that tickled his collar. When Cooper pressed her right hand over his heart, she couldn’t help but notice the kick in his pulse.

By the time they made a full turn around the floor, Haleigh stopped worrying about her footwork and focused on the man holding her tight. Despite the fact that Haleigh was far from perfect, Cooper still liked her. Thank goodness someone did.





Chapter 10

Cooper had died and gone to heaven. And if Haleigh didn’t stop playing with his hair she was going to find herself horizontal by the end of the song. Not that he’d mind the change in position, but the other dancers might take issue with a couple compromising their dance floor.

“What brought you out tonight?” he asked. Certain she’d been on the verge of making a break for it when he’d reached her near the bar, he’d half expected her to make some excuse even after he’d caught her.

“Lorelei invited me.”

“Hal,” he said, lifting her face with one finger beneath her chin. “You’ve been back in town for six months and never stepped foot through those doors.” As she bit the inside of her cheek, he said, “I saw your face before I called your name. Why don’t you tell me what’s chasing you.”

“It’s annoying when you do that,” she huffed. If looks could kill, she’d have offed him right there. “I had dinner with my mother tonight. Does that answer your question?”

Haleigh’s mother had branded herself the all-American mom, and to most of the town, that’s exactly who she was. But Cooper knew better.

“So things are still the same on that front?”

Based on the conversations he’d overheard through the wall between his and Abby’s bedrooms back in the day, Mrs. Mitchner treated Haleigh like a disease instead of a daughter. Nothing Haleigh ever did had been good enough, which Cooper never understood. She’d been a model child. Even graduating top in their class hadn’t softened the woman.

“I don’t know why I bother. Tonight was just another reminder that I’ll never measure up.”

“Hey,” he said, unsettled by the defeat in her voice. “You more than measure up. If she can’t see that, it’s her loss.”

Glancing away, she said, “I don’t want to talk about my mother. Let’s pick a new topic.”

Cooper dodged a spinning couple and moved himself and Haleigh closer to the floor’s edge. Delicate fingers massaged his scalp, making it difficult to breathe, let alone carry on a conversation.