The Forbidden Marriage

“Why don’t you ask her for dinner on Sunday?”

“Does this mean you’ve already invited Mike Francis?” He’d fired the question at her so fast she was stunned. Graham had warned her.

“Of course not. When I’m on duty I don’t mix business with pleasure.”

“Just after hours,” came the baiting rejoinder.

“I’d rather not talk about Mike if you don’t mind.”

“He’s not the right man for you, Michelle.”

She’d already found that out on her own, but not for the same reasons Zak judged him. Maybe it was better he didn’t know she was about to end it with Mike. For her own self-preservation the pretense of a love interest could help act as a buffer against Zak’s devastating charisma.

She fought for a steadying breath. “What I was trying to say is, you must know Graham and Sherilyn would love to meet anyone important to you.”

“When that day comes, they’ll know all about it. How long was Mike Francis laid up with his broken leg?”

They were back to Mike again.

“After he was released from the hospital, two months.”

“I understand his townhouse borders the golf course.”

“Yes.”

“To look out the window every day and know he couldn’t work on his putting, which needs a lot of help by the way, must have been tough on him.”

“It was.”

“But not too tough with you there to see to his every need.”

His innuendo sent warmth to her cheeks.

“Between therapy sessions he watched videos of his game to see where he could improve.”

“Is that what he told you,” came the mocking reply. “No doubt it fed his ego for you to sit for hours admiring him.”

Michelle blinked. Zak really didn’t like him. How could he possibly swallow all the lies fed by the media? Why did he care?

“Nursing Mike taught me about the game of golf. I never understood it or had an interest in it before.”

“And now you do.”

“Yes. Not to play, but to watch. It takes incredible skill and tenacity.”

After a pause, “Did you know his wife left him because he’d had a string of affairs?”

Michelle might not be in love with Mike, but she cared enough about him to disabuse Zak of that myth.

“It’s the other way around. He divorced his wife when he found out she’d had an affair. She wants him back. I know because she came to the townhouse several times to try to talk to him. When he refused to see her, she broke down and talked to me, hoping I would intervene.”

A strange sound escaped Zak’s throat. “The truth probably lies somewhere in-between both their explanations.”

She’d thought the same thing. “I’m sure you’re right.”

“Are you prepared to be the new focus of the press?” he demanded. “If you can’t see the way they’ll exploit the nurse turns lover scenario, I can.”

Michelle had thought about it. Zak’s blunt way of putting things only underlined her own misgivings in that department. However if she’d been in love with Mike, she wouldn’t have let fear of the intrusion of the press stop her from being with him.

“How’s the nausea?” she interjected on purpose. “Would you like me to stop somewhere and get you a drink?”

“I can see I’ve touched a nerve,” he murmured. “The answer to both questions is, my stomach seems to have settled down and I don’t require anything more than to be back in my own home with my favorite nurse.”

She smiled. “Sounds like the name of an old radio show. And now folks, stay tuned to My Favorite Nurse. I’m old enough to qualify.”

He let out a chuckle that was quickly followed by a groan. “Somebody lied,” he said. “It takes more muscles to laugh.”

“Except that laughter has other medicinal qualities to cure what ails you.”

“I happen to agree. Now tell me where in the hell you ever got the idea that you were old.”

“When you reach the venerable age of thirty-five, you won’t have to ask that question. Fortunately for you, that time is many years away yet.”

“If anyone were listening to us, they’d assume you were talking to a child. Don’t you know once a person reaches adulthood, age becomes a relative thing? You’re feeling old inside because you’ve been nursing patients nonstop since college.”

This line of conversation was starting to make her uncomfortable.

“You didn’t even take time off from your work after you got married,” he persisted. “When your husband became ill, you nursed him with everything you had in you, then lost yourself in the care of other patients. It’s time for a change, Michelle.”

“You mean I should find another way to earn my living after you no longer require my services?” she teased to hide her increasing turmoil.

“I’m talking a complete break from any kind of work.” He sounded so serious, she was astounded.

“I’d go mad from boredom.”

“Good, if that’s what it would take to shake you out of your octogenarian mind set.”

She pressed on the accelerator. “Anything else you want to get off your chest before we reach the Coast Highway?”

“I’ve only scratched the surface, but the rest can keep for later. We’ve got weeks ahead of us.”

The reminder that they’d be alone together for the next month sent tremors through her body. Michelle couldn’t explain her own overpowering awareness of him unless it was the fact that he’d been in the background of her life since Graham had met Sherilyn.

Once he’d decided to marry her, he sold the family home he and Michelle had grown up in. Being a protective brother, he found another house with a separate apartment for Michelle so they could still remain close.

Having lost their parents in a tour bus crash while on vacation in Mexico, both of them had known the agony of loss and felt compassion for Zak whose early childhood had been traumatic for him, especially when he’d only had three years with his adoptive parents before they’d also been killed in a car accident.

Though Michelle had been a sophomore in high school at the time of Graham’s marriage, she’d found time to spend with Zak and be his friend. To Sherilyn and Graham’s delight, even when she’d started nursing school and had a day off, she’d drive him to the beach at Oceanside or Carlsbad where they’d surf.

He was a natural and picked it up in no time.

Sometimes she’d take other boys in the neighborhood his age with them, but he inevitably sought her company. It was no hardship. They got along as if they’d been friends in another life.

When she thought about it, they must have explored every beach city between Laguna and Del Mar. He’d always loved the ocean at Carlsbad the most.

It hadn’t surprised her to learn he’d decided to settle there upon his graduation from college. However it took Graham and Sherilyn some getting used to because they were crazy about him and would have preferred he live in the same city.

Sherilyn Sadler had been a first-grade teacher in Riverside when she’d married Graham Robbins. After her parents’ death, she’d sold their modest home and moved to an apartment with Zak who was six at the time. For the next three years she tried to be mother and father to her little brother.

The money didn’t last long and she finally got a teaching job. Then she happened to meet Graham Robbins at a party of a mutual friend. They fell deeply in love and married. With the loss of both sets of parents, the two of them determined to give Zak and Michelle the best home they could.

But it was another difficult transition period for Zak who’d lost his ability to trust.

All this came out when as a teenager, Zak confided his innermost thoughts to Michelle on their many outings.

He was bewildered by confused memories of being shifted to different foster parents, and couldn’t understand how his birthparents could have abandoned their own flesh and blood.

Neither could Michelle. All she could do was listen.

In the listening, a bond was formed.

It went deep.

Maybe deeper than she’d realized to have survived the last decade when she’d rarely seen him or talked to him. Zak had been busy establishing his career, and she’d immersed herself in nursing both before and after losing her pediatrician husband, Rob.

Whatever the explanation for the impact Zak had made on her yesterday morning, he was no longer that angry, hurt, yet remarkable teen trying to understand his life.

Over time, with the help of Sherilyn and Graham’s love, he’d managed to heal to a great degree and was already making an impressive mark in the world.

Zak would never know how much Michelle respected him. She knew several guys in their late twenties who’d never outgrown high school and still didn’t have a thought for the future.

Right now she’d give anything for Zak’s birthparents to see what kind of man he’d become in spite of his upbringing. But that kind of thinking didn’t get you anywhere.

As Rob had said many times, and he’d seen it all in his ten years of practice before he became ill, “Thank God for the resilience of a child’s spirit.”

Zak had been endowed with that resilience.

“We’re near the ocean now,” the subject of her thoughts broke the silence. He’d come awake from his catnap.

“The beach has always been my favorite place, too. If I lived here, I’d feel like I was on a permanent vacation. That balmy air. There’s nothing like it.”

She could taste it, smell it. The fog hadn’t burned off yet. Maybe it wouldn’t, but it didn’t matter.

Unbelievably, she hadn’t seen the Pacific in almost four years. Not since she and Rob, who had just begun to show signs of his illness, had come with the family for a barbecue Zak had arranged. He’d been renting an apartment then, building a business from scratch.

Her world had changed so drastically since that time…

“Tell me where to go.” She’d stopped at a light.

“Drive south for two blocks, then turn right and follow the road down to the end. You’ll see a private alley on the left. My garage is number 2.”

In a few minutes she’d found the alley in question. In reality it was a cul-de-sac.

Sherilyn had shown her photos of the condos Zak’s company had been hired to renovate several years ago before they were listed on the market. Twenty stacked beachfront apartments had been converted into ten privately owned luxury condos, finished in a white cubicle style reminiscent of the Mediterranean.

Zak’s earnings on the project served as a down payment on one of the two ground floor condos, making his dream of living on the ocean come true. Already she could tell the pictures hadn’t done justice to the reality.

She came to a stop in front of his garage.

“If you’ll reach behind me and open my suitcase, you’ll see the remote on top of my robe with my wallet,” Zak murmured.

Like a fool, instead of getting out and walking around to the back door, she undid her seatbelt and turned to feel for his case with her right hand. Not quite able to undo the lock, she stretched a little more and finally accomplished her objective.

Once her hand closed over the remote, she brought it forward. But in the process her body brushed against his shoulder. The contact sent liquid fire through every particle of her being.

In that instant their eyes met.

Between black lashes, his resembled hot green coals.

Without permission her heart began to hammer. Her palms started to ache.

Before she lost complete control, she sat back in her seat and pressed the button on the remote. When the door lifted, she drove in next to his white truck with Sadler Construction printed on the side.

Her hands were still shaking when he took the remote and pushed the button again. The garage door enclosed them.

“I’ve been looking forward to this for a long time, Michelle. Welcome to my home.”

CHAPTER THREE

“THERE,” Michelle said from behind Zak as she fit the eighteen-inch-deep plastic wrap around his chest. It ran underneath his arms to fasten in back with Velcro.

“Your bandages will stay perfectly dry. Now into the stall. Don’t worry about your sweats. After I’ve washed your hair, step out of them and finish your shower. When you’re through, slip on the new pair of pajamas Sherilyn packed for you. I’ve put the bottoms next to the towel on the rack right behind me.”

The water was already running. It needed to be the right temperature so he wouldn’t react and jar that area of his chest which was healing.

She opened the stall door and helped him to sit on the little stepladder she’d set in place. Though she was five feet six, there was no way she could wash his hair with him standing up.

When his head was thoroughly wet she shut off the water and poured shampoo on his crown. Then she began a vigorous massage of his scalp. His vibrant black hair swirled around her fingertips.

He made a deep sound of pleasure. “That feels so good I don’t ever want you to stop.”

Michelle grinned. She knew how good it felt. “You’re going to be a new man when you get out. Now, before I turn on the water and leave you, I’m going to wash your underarms with shampoo. Don’t lift your arms! Just let me slide my fingers beneath them like this.”

Another moan of pleasure escaped. “That feels even better than getting my hair washed. Did you do these services for Mike?”

On cue her face went warm. “I do whatever I can for all my patients.” But I’ve never had one like you, Zak Sadler.

“No wonder you’re in demand,” he muttered. “My kingdom for a nurse.”

Already she could tell his spirits were improving.

“I’m turning the water back on. Let me rinse your head and underarms, then I’ll leave. However I won’t go any farther than your bedroom in case you need help. Call to me when you’re ready and I’ll remove the plastic wrapper.”

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