In the Blink of an Eye

Mac halted his grand exit. With his fingertips, he reached out and verified that he had found the door. The worn contours of sculpted oak reassured him. He wasn’t the one disoriented this time.

The clang of metal on metal and the suction pop of the refrigerator door opening behind him indicated she was preparing a meal. He ignored the sudden anticipation that wet his mouth and rumbled in his stomach, and concentrated on her words. “Somebody’s trying to take care of you. At least the glasses would protect your eyes from the light, if not from infection.”

The glasses had been a gift from his youngest brother, Josh. Along with some lame advice about making him look cool, and turning him into a babe magnet.

Such questionable laws of nature no longer applied to him.

“You don’t have to be here, you know.”

The racket behind him stilled, followed by a long, controlled whisper of air. “Yes, I do. For twenty-four hours.”

Twenty-four hours? What was that about?

He heard the rustling noise again. Julia was moving.

Wrapping his fingers around the doorjamb for balance, he tipped his ear toward the intriguing sound. In his mind he pictured a pair of legs, dressed in soft, snug denim, the thighs gently touching with each step.

He closed his eyes unnecessarily and envisioned her as a fifteen-year-old. She’d had a stocky, muscular build, perfect for snagging grounders and blocking base paths. He wondered what she looked like now. If she’d filled out in the right places over the years. If those muscles had turned into curves. If those long legs he heard brushing together were rounded or straight. Or…good God, what the hell was he thinking?

This was a fine time for his intellectual curiosity to rear its head. He wanted to get rid of her, not study her like some unidentified lab specimen.

Then the import behind her odd pronouncement registered through his instinct to analyze and identify. “If you don’t want to be here, then why are you?” he asked.

The pungent odor of gas catching flame told him she had gone back to the stove. “Your mother was worried about you. My mother was worried about me. Their solution was to put the two of us together.”

“They’re not matchmaking, are they?” His older brother Brett had recently married, and Martha Taylor seemed to have developed a fever now to find mates for all her brood. For Mac, her timing couldn’t be worse.

Julia laughed. “Are you kidding? Have you seen me lately?”

Her self-deprecating joke turned full circle in the dead air that followed. He knew the instant that her gaze searched his back in apology. Mac straightened. Six feet, three inches of stiff back ought to finally get rid of her.

“Can’t say as I have.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—” An immediate flurry of activity covered the silence. “I’m fixing an omelette for a late breakfast. It’ll take just a few minutes. Have a seat, the chair is two steps to your left. I’ll get some coffee going, too.”

Hell. Her attempts to distract him from her apology pricked his defenses. He’d rather do battle with her than endure her pity. He already carried enough of his own to choke on.

He ignored the pangs in his stomach and the curiosity of his mind, and tramped back into the living room. He hit the trash can and kicked it aside, not giving a damn about the mess he’d inevitably made.

That enticing whisper of denim followed quickly behind him. “You don’t have to like this,” said Jules. “But we should make the best of it.”

“Fine. You make the best of it. I’m going to my room.”

“Dammit, Mac, be reasonable.” She snatched his sleeve and tugged him around. Half a turn, maybe. Or was it all the way around? He squeezed his eyes shut against the dizzying confusion. As if the complete darkness was somehow more comforting than the shadowy nothingness of his vision.

“You look like hell. You need a shave and clean clothes. This scruffy look never was you.” A second hand grasped his chin and tilted his face to one side. “At least let me bandage your eyes. We can’t risk infection.”

He jerked his chin free of her soft, firm touch. “I can risk anything I damn well please.”

“What about breakfast? I didn’t see any dirty dishes. Have you eaten at all today? What about fresh air? Sunshine? Do you ever get outside?”

The woman was relentless. “Too many damn questions!” He twisted his arm from her grip and swatted the air, clearing the space around him, and hopefully scaring some sense into her. “Just leave me alone.”

Mac headed for the dining room, intending to leave Nurse Jules and her annoying determination behind him. On his second step he banged his shin against the coffee table and let out a stream of curses that would have made his mother grab the soap and wash out his mouth.

He spun around, planning to skirt the table. His knees butted into the sofa. He took a half turn to the right, ignoring a flare of panic, and ran into the overturned trash can.

Just like that internal clock, the compass inside him had gone haywire.

Mac choked back a frisson of fear that erupted within.

Lost in a spinning world. Trapped among the unknown terrors of his own home.

Imprisoned by his handicap.

For a man who had relied on cool, concise thinking his entire life, this continual buffeting of emotion played havoc with his sense of reason. Guilt. Fear. Anger. They were all his enemies now.

And for the first time in his life, he could think of no way to fight back.

Chapter Two

“With a cane you could tap your surroundings and find the way out.” Julia’s calm suggestion made a mockery of Mac’s own common sense.

“Shut up.”

He could control this. He could figure a way out of the maze of his own living room.

The rustle of sound barely registered as he concentrated on getting his bearings. He detected her unique scent, coming from behind him now, an instant before her hand latched onto his.

For an unthinking moment, he folded his fingers around hers, clinging to her sure grip, anchoring himself in the spinning disorientation of darkness. For all his crude words and rude behavior, he was grateful for the un-deserved patience in the gesture.

“This way.”

Her gentle voice beckoned and he followed. He allowed himself to be led a few steps, until he was free of the embarrassing hazards of his own home. He stopped when she stopped, but she tugged on his hand and pulled him forward another step.

His remaining senses buzzed into full alert as she guided his hand to the crook of her elbow. A practical gesture, he supposed. But the skin on the back of his hand and wrist bristled with acute awareness after brushing against the bountiful softness of what had to be a breast. In contrast, her strong shoulder nudged against his chest as she positioned herself to guide him. About chin height, he estimated, judging how she measured up against him. Maybe a shade taller.

The scent he had detected earlier and identified as her own pooled at nose level. It was her hair, he deduced. Her shampoo, to be more precise. Nothing perfumy. Clean, but not antiseptic. Fresh. Sassy. Just like…

Mac snatched his hand away and stepped back, shocked to realize he’d been analyzing Jules in a way that had nothing to do with science, and everything to do with the primal way a man checked out a woman.

As if he had any business checking her out.

As if she’d have any interest in being checked out by a scarred-up waste of a man like him.

“I don’t need you to be my guide dog.” His raspy voice, already ruined by the toxic fire that had destroyed his lab and killed a friend, sounded harsh in the monstrous quiet of the house.

He expected her to pack her things and run. The other nurses had refused to put up with his churlish behavior. He wanted to be alone right now. He needed his solitude.