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“That’s...” she searched for the right word “...nice.”
Alexis laughed again. “Nice? Honey, nice has nothing to do with it. Hot. Now, there’s a better description. You’re a lucky girl.”
“You’ve no idea,” she said, thinking of Joss. Which gave her a huge twinge of guilt. Alexis was telling her what a great man Joss’s father was. How could she justify not telling him about their son?
Because memories of her own father snatching her away from her mother caused her insides to clam up with fear?
Trace wasn’t her father. She knew that. But...
“You’re right,” the woman admitted. “I don’t have any idea. Trace and I went out a few times, but I was more interested than he was. Like I said, you’re a lucky girl.”
Alexis confirmed what Trace had said. He hadn’t slept with the beauty-queen doctor. She hadn’t doubted him, but hearing the confirmation made her like Alexis all the more. Made her that much more giddy about Trace’s interest.
“So tell me about you until the next patient comes in for me to see. Or we can send them Trace’s way and continue with our girl talk,” Alexis suggested with a wide smile that flashed her toothpaste-ad teeth again.
Pushing aside the nagging guilt her heart felt over not telling Trace about Joss, and giving in to her brain’s reminder that just that morning she’d heard him say he didn’t want children, Chrissie smiled and began telling Alexis about Chattanooga, her much-loved job at the hospital, her mother, and her friend Savannah.
She was surprised by how much she liked Alexis and that she could easily see herself becoming good friends with the forthright woman had they lived closer.
* * *
What in the world were Chrissie and Alexis laughing so hard at? Trace wondered as he made a quick note on the patient he’d just finished examining. The event wasn’t keeping extensive medical records, but they were documenting each encounter and what was done.
Actually, to see the two women having a friendly conversation at all surprised Trace. So much for Chrissie’s jealousy from yesterday.
Not that she’d had any reason to be jealous. He liked Alexis well enough. She was an intelligent, beautiful woman, but there just hadn’t been any chemistry.
Chemistry wasn’t a problem with Chrissie.
They had so much chemistry they could add new elements to the periodic table.
Another outburst of laughter had him sliding the paper he’d scribbled a few notes on into a manila file that would later be scanned into and stored on a computer.
Leaving his work area, he headed over to Triage. “You two are having way too much fun.”
“Jealous?” Alexis asked, but not in a way he took as flirtatious, more as if she was teasing him because she’d figured out Chrissie majorly got to him.
“Absolutely. What does a man have to do to join in?”
“Just pull up a chair,” Chrissie assured him, gesturing to an empty chair at a nearby table.
Trace didn’t hesitate. He grabbed the chair and moved it to where the two women sat. “Now, tell me what’s so funny, because I need something to make me laugh after that last blistered foot I treated.”
Chrissie grimaced. “She looked like she was miserable when she hobbled in here. Is she going to be all right?”
“Yeah, but she’s not going to be on her feet much for a few days. She’s going to hang out on the sidelines in a chair and encourage the other participants.”
“That’s good,” Chrissie said, her gaze locked with his and dancing with delight.
He smiled. He couldn’t not smile. Which felt so damned good. Not so long ago he couldn’t have brought a smile to his face had someone offered him the world.
Not since the hospital explosion in Yemen when friends had died because he’d not been able to save them.
Not since holding children ravished with starvation and disease while they died and promising himself he’d do all he could to save the next child, to bring medical care, food, supplies, into places where no sane person would venture.
Had he really deep down laughed since Kerry died?
Maybe he’d forgotten how to laugh.
