Prejudice Meets Pride (11 page)

The feel of Emma’s hand on his arm pulled Kevin from his thoughts, and he looked up to find her nodding toward the hallway. He followed her out and waited as she closed the door softly behind them.

“I can’t believe they didn’t wake up,” Emma said as she led the way to the front door. “You and Nicole must have really tired them out.”

“She was great with them,” said Kevin, in an attempt to get his mind back where it belonged. Nicole
had
been good with the girls. Although they didn’t like her lemon bars—Kevin had to pacify them with some ice cream—they did seem to like her. Which proved what Kevin had figured all along—she’d be a great mom some day. Really, there were zero red flags when it came to Nicole.

So why had his thoughts constantly strayed from her to another girl the entire night? A girl who raised an entire bouquet of red flags? Granted, Emma wasn’t nearly as far out there as he’d originally thought, but she wasn’t the sophisticated and collected woman he’d always pictured himself with.

“Listen,” Emma said as she opened the front door for him. “I wanted to apologize about earlier—you know, leaving you with Nicole and the girls. I’m not sure what got into me.”

Kevin leaned his shoulder against the jamb and smiled down at her. “Probably the same thing that got into you when you turned the kitchen sprayer on me. I’m thinking you’re part-prankster at heart.”

She bit her lip, trying not to return his smile. “Only part?” Her eyes twinkled up at him.

Kevin studied her for a moment before answering. “You can’t be whole-prankster because you’re too many other things. Mom, driver of clunkers, artist, bad cook—”

“Hey, I am not a bad cook,” she interrupted with a laugh.

“The smell in this room says otherwise.”

“You can’t blame me for that. I didn’t even know a casserole was in the oven—not that I’m blaming Sam or anything. I mean, she did try to tell me. I just wasn’t paying attention. But you can’t go blaming me for—”

Kevin rested his fingers against her mouth, shushing her. “Do you always talk this much?”

She blinked once, then twice before slowly shaking her head. In the darkness of the night, with shadows crossing this way and that, Emma’s usually light eyes were a deep indigo. If Kevin looked hard enough, would he be able to see all the way to her soul? And if so, what would he find? Somehow, he already knew the answer. He’d find a heart as big and warm and good as a giant peach picked from the tree on a warm summer’s day. She might even taste like peaches.

Slowly, he dropped his hand from her mouth, and his gaze rested on her lips. Suddenly, he didn’t care that he was going to be her boss. He wanted to lean closer and kiss her. Pull her against him and feel her soft strength once again. He wanted—

A muffled, tinny song sounded from somewhere, interrupting the moment. When Emma removed her phone from her pocket and the sound grew louder, Kevin’s initial instinct was to grab it from her and turn it off. But a deep breath and a reality check later, he realized that it had actually saved him.

“I need to take this,” said Emma. “It’s my brother.”

Kevin gave her a brief nod before slipping through the door and escaping, leaving Emma to talk to her brother.
Whew, that had been close. Way too close.
What had he been thinking? Besides not being his type at all, Emma would soon be his employee. That fact alone made her unavailable.

Why was he even attracted to her? She was cute, but not beautiful. Too short. Broke. Tied down. Unpredictable. Disorganized. And way too prideful. She was the exact opposite of what Kevin was looking for in a girl. Was this some sort of rebellion on his part—going for the type of girl his parents would never approve of? Or were these feelings genuine—a desperate yearning for something deeper, something flawed, something real?

“Janice, can you meet me in my office when you get a sec?” Kevin asked.

His office manager rolled her chair back and stood, smoothing down her black pencil skirt. “I need to check on something with Steph, and I’ll be right there.”

That was one of the things Kevin liked most about Janice. Not only was she professional, organized, and dependable, but she loved taking a pen to her to-do list and checking things off. She never put anything on the back burner that couldn’t be done today. Every day Kevin spent at the office was another day he thanked his lucky stars she’d answered his ad for an office manager two years before. His practice would be a mess without her.

By the time Kevin returned to his office and had sat down, Janice came in and closed the door. She took a seat opposite him and tapped her pen against her trusty notebook. That was another awesome thing about her. She kept copious notes, and he never needed to say the same thing twice.

“I’d like to talk to you about an employee I’ve recently hired,” Kevin said, not wasting any time. They only had a short break for lunch, and he planned to snatch a bite or two of his sandwich before the next patient showed up.

Her sharp green eyes stared at him through dark framed glasses. “I’m sorry, did you just say—”

Kevin held up his hand. “Just hear me out.”

Janice leaned back in her chair and crossed one leg over the other. Her thin lips pressed together—a sure sign that she wasn’t happy. If there was one drawback to Janice’s on-top-of-it-all personality, it was this. She didn’t care for surprises or change. She liked order. She was a bit of a control freak like that.

Hopefully, the fact that Kevin was the boss would smooth things over.

“Who did you hire, and for what purpose? Or did you forget that we’re fully staffed?”

“No, I didn’t forget. Her name is Emma…” What was it Adelynn had said? Mckay? No. “Mackie,” he finally said. Yes, that was it. Kevin suddenly realized how little he knew about Emma and how curious he was to know more. “She’s in desperate need of a job, so I offered her one.”

“Doing what?”

“I don’t know.” How could something that felt so good and chivalrous at the time now feel like the dumbest move he’d ever made? “Filing, answering phones, data entry, scrubbing the sinks and floors—I really don’t care.”

“The filing is all caught up, we already have two part-time receptionists, someone to deal with insurance, and plenty of dental assistants, not that she’d be qualified to do that. When we do get behind, which is rare, the girls at the front fill in between calls and scheduling. I handle payroll, ordering, the trickier insurance claims, and managerial issues. And as for the sinks and floors—we have a cleaning lady who—”

Kevin held up his hand to stop the barrage. “Okay, okay, I get it.” He wasn’t used to confrontation when it came to Janice. She typically nodded, took notes, made comments, then went about her business. Today, however, she apparently wasn’t going to let the issue drop with a “No problem. I’ll find something for her to do” like Kevin had originally hoped.

He leaned back in his chair and raked his fingers through his hair. “I know we don’t need anyone else on staff at the moment, but this girl could really use a job. Besides that, I’ve already extended the offer, and she’s accepted. She’s coming tomorrow after she drops her girls off for their first day of school.”

Janice’s lips parted, and her jaw lowered an inch. Then it quickly snapped back into a thin line again. An unhappy thin line. “What do you propose I have her do?”

Kevin had no idea. Other than talking over problems with Janice, signing his name to whatever paper or card she thrust his way, and spearheading a weekly staff meeting, Kevin wasn’t involved in the day-to-day process of his practice. He checked the kids’ teeth, read x-rays, and filled cavities. He talked with parents and coaxed kids into opening their mouths. He didn’t have the time to deal with anything else. That’s what he’d hired Janice for.

“There’s got to be something she can do,” Kevin said. “I know you’re here late practically every day. Why don’t you have her take a few things off your hands so you can leave on time with the rest of the staff?”

“I like my workload the way it is and would never trust anyone else to do what I do.”

“Janice, please,” Kevin pleaded. “This girl is basically a single mother. She’s broke and needs a flexible job that will work with her girls’ schedule. It’s only temporary. Once she finds a job more up her alley, she’ll move on.”

“And what kind of job would that be?” The look in Janice’s eyes appeared calculating, as though she was already brainstorming ways to find Emma a different job.

“She wants to be an art teacher.”

The calculating look disappeared, replaced by an expression that said,
You’ve got to be kidding me
. “Great, I’ll have her create coloring books for the kids,” she said dryly.

“Hey, not a bad idea.”

Janice rolled her eyes, not bothering to jot anything down in her notebook. “Fine, whatever. I’ll pull out some files for her to re-file and find some data entry for her to do.”

“Thanks, Janice.”

“Next time, it would be nice if you ran things like this by me first,” she added.

“I will,” he said. “And I apologize for that. If it helps, I promise there will never be a next time.” Kevin couldn’t help but wonder if he really was the boss or if Janice had crept in and taken over that title.

Janice looked down at her lap, and her fingers fiddled with the pen in her hand as though she was nervous about something. Which was strange. Typically, after one of their meetings, she’d be out of her seat and back to work as soon as possible, but she made no move to do so now. Kevin thought back, wondering what had gone unsaid. When he came up with nothing, he finally asked, “Was there something else?”

She nearly jumped at the words, then quickly stood. “No, sorry. I, uh, just—never mind.” She started for the door, then paused with her hand on the handle and turned back. “Actually, I do have a question.”

“Shoot,” said Kevin, eyeing his mini-fridge, where a tuna sandwich called to him behind the closed door.

“Do you like the Broncos?”

“Who doesn’t?”

She smiled. “Someone offered me two tickets for Friday night’s pre-season game. You interested? They’re amazing seats.”

Sandwich forgotten, Kevin bit his lower lip, unsure of how to answer. Was she offering him the two tickets, or was she asking him out? “Interested in what?” he finally said, trying to clarify.

Her cheeks infused with color. “Oh, sorry.” She shrugged. “I just didn’t want to go alone.”

So she was asking him to go with her. As a date? As a friend? As a last-ditch invite because no one else could go, or because she knew that Kevin loved football and figured he’d want to go?

As Kevin waffled, the feeling in the room became awkward and tense. First Emma and now this. Friend, date, regardless of whatever category Kevin fit into, he wasn’t about to make things even more complicated—not even for great seats to a Broncos game.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “But I can’t.”

“Oh, okay. Maybe next time then.” The way she dipped her head and pushed her glasses back in place as she shot from the room told Kevin that he’d embarrassed her, which also told him that her invite was more than just a couldn’t-find-anyone-else-so-I’m-asking-you thing. People didn’t get embarrassed when someone they didn’t care about turned them down.

He leaned back and sighed. This was one complication he could have done without.

Emma drew in a deep breath then yanked hard on the door of Northwest Pediatric Dentistry. Inside, she was greeted with a clean, nondescript waiting room, smells of anesthetic mixed with fluoride, a child crying from somewhere in the back, and a smiling receptionist, who acted as though nothing was wrong.

She approached the desk tentatively. “I’m here to see Kevin—er, I mean, Dr. Grantham.”

The receptionist’s smile faltered briefly as she flicked a glance over her shoulder, toward the source of the same child now yelling, “No, no, no!” “Um, he’s a little tied up at the moment. Do you mind waiting?”

“Of course not.” Emma settled into one of the seats and tapped her heels against the floor. Her fingers fiddled with the straps of her purse as she checked out the waiting room. There was a Lego table in the corner, a bookcase filled with children’s books, and a flat screen TV that played
Monsters, Inc
. Through a massive aquarium on her left, Emma caught a glimpse of a large exam room. Kevin sat in a chair next to the screaming child, with one assistant at his elbow and a frantic-looking woman hovering at the foot of the chair.