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with the option to make it longer, okay?”
“Sweet.”
“Now will you have the scampi?”
Against her will a laugh escaped her lips. “Sure, why not?” He guided her back into the restaurant. “It isn’t every day a girl gets a proposition she can’t refuse, plus a shrimp dinner.”
He ran his hand over his short hair. “Yeah, well, it didn’t come out the way I’d practiced.”
She sputtered another laugh. “You practiced that?”
“Like I said...” He pulled out the chair so she could sit back down.
It did her heart good to see a grown man and skilled orthopedic surgeon, department head like John Griffin fumble and stumble over his words and actions because of her. Maybe she and the baby did mean something to him. Don’t let yourself go there. He’s got a lot of proving to do first.
She sat down and took another sip of water. There was only one way to find out if the man cared about her or not, and under these challenging and unusual circumstances she’d made a snap decision to find out.
By moving in for a week.
* * *
Saturday afternoon, John helped Polly move out of her tiny rented room and managed to fit everything in the trunk and back seat of his car. She’d decided to bring everything so she wouldn’t have to keep running back to the old place for this or that as the need arose. Besides, there wasn’t that much and why leave anything for Mrs. Goldman to snoop through while she was gone?
When she assessed all her worldly belongings, it made her heart feel a little heavier in her chest. The only precious item was a small cherry-wood jewelry box that had belonged to her mother. In it was a delicate gold locket with an enameled cover. It was heart shaped and opened to her mother’s picture on one side and Polly’s on the other. Thinking about her single cherished item from twenty-one years ago made her wonder what object John still treasured from Lisa.
Back at the apartment, she would set the boundaries right off—she intended to stay in his guest room rather than share his bed. Until he could move on from his past, there was no point in trying for a real relationship with John. It kind of hurt her feelings when he didn’t put up a fight about their sleeping arrangements, but she let those thoughts pass.
For a reputed grumpy old department head, John had been polite and helpful the whole weekend, and she began to see the balloon-twisting, cast-signing side of him. The man all the kids on the orthopedic ward adored. He made coffee in the morning and breakfast after that. Before she could offer to make lunch, he beat her to it. Being in his home, he was more relaxed and extremely considerate about making her feel welcome. If only the rest of the staff could see through his shield, but children seemed to have that special gift of looking into the true heart of a person. As for her, she was happy for the new glimpse of him.
On Sunday afternoon John took her on a walking tour of his neighborhood, which was another way of making her feel welcome. Delighted to find a yarn shop, she talked him into letting her go inside. Not in the least bit interested, he waited outside, chatting with a neighbor he’d run into, and she made her purchase quickly, embarrassed to let him see what she’d bought. It was silly, she knew, but she hadn’t knitted in a long time and, well, she was pregnant! She kept the items in a brown bag and his lack of interest made it easy to drop the subject so on they walked through the amazing and upscale neighbourhood of Sutton Place.
They ended the tour on a bench at a small park overlooking the East River. How different this part of town was from the Lower East Side. From a money standpoint, John lived a charmed life, but she knew the whole story—he was alone and hurting. Terribly alone. Even though it seemed he was the one with all the advantages, she knew she could bring something sorely missing into his life. Maybe, with this pregnancy, she could help him experience joy again.
As she stared at the Queensboro Bridge arching across the river, she hoped for any tiny miracle that could open John’s heart again. If an unexpected pregnancy was what it would take to shake some life back into him, so be it.
Deep in thought, she jumped when he took her hand. “What do you say we head for home?”
Home? Did she really and finally have a home?
“I thought I’d make pasta for dinner tonight.”
So far he’d cooked all the meals. “Why don’t you let me cook tonight?”
“Let me take care of you.”
Polly couldn’t let herself dream too much. All the years she’d never let herself get too comfortable wherever she was staying had trained her to take nothing for granted. If she got swept up in this little fantasy of having a home, it would hurt that much more when reality kicked in, and in her life reality always stepped in.
“Besides, you’re my guest. It’s my job to make you feel at home.”
So she was just a guest. She really needed to keep that in mind. She may as well let him wait on her, and while he made the spaghetti sauce she’d start her knitting project.
By Monday, Polly didn’t know how the hospital radar had picked it up so fast but she’d noticed odd glances and hushed conversations that stopped abruptly whenever she got near. It wasn’t in her nature to be paranoid, but she was beginning to wonder if someone had been spying on her and John over the weekend.
During lunch, while eating another carefully prepared meal by John, she cornered Darren and grilled him. “Is something going on I don’t know about?”
“I think I should be asking you that,” he said, taking a huge bite of an Italian lunchmeat sandwich.
“What’s everyone whispering about?” She decided to continue to play dumb.
“We’re all wondering exactly when you and Dr. Griffin found the time to become a couple. That’s all.”
“We’re not a couple.”
“You’re not. A couple.”
She thinned her lips and shook her head.
“Who made that lunch for you?” He used his sandwich to point at her wholewheat bread, sliced chicken with avocado and sprouts sandwich.
She thought about lying but that wasn’t in her nature. “John—I mean Dr. Griffin did.” She didn’t want to come clean until she cleared it with John.
“And who’d you walk into work with this morning?
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