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Aiden was asrelieved as everyone else when they all finally got up to leave. Trying to have an ordinary conversation with the Millers was like pulling teeth. By the end of the evening, Mitch was glaring at him and Vivian was fidgeting. The moment Mitch announced they were leaving, she’d jumped up.
“Well,” Annie said as Mitch and Vivian walked toward the exit, “that was awkward, wasn’t it? I’m sorry.” Chewing her lip, she glanced at the door where her brother and sister had disappeared. “As I mentioned, Vivian had a bad experience with reporters, and late this afternoon, she received another email from the reporter…” She trailed off. “I shouldn’t say anything more, but that’s why tonight she…”
His aunt patted Annie’s arm. “Don’t worry about it, sweetheart. We’ll see you around.”
“I should probably have warned you before the time not to ask too many questions,” his aunt said while they were driving back to her house. “We’ve become good friends since their arrival, but they seldom talk about their life back in Sacramento. Their parents have passed away, that much they’ve mentioned, but I don’t know how or when.” She chuckled. “It’s driving Carol Bingley crazy. And as you’ve heard, Vivian hates reporters. I also don’t have the answer to that, in case you were wondering.”
Aiden frowned. “I was asking the usual questions one asks when having a conversation; it’s not as if I was interrogating them.”
Smiling, his aunt patted his arm. “You don’t even realize you’re always in reporter mode. You’re always observing, never engaging. You rarely share something of yourself. Maybe if you do that, people would be more comfortable talking about their own lives. Open yourself up to emotions.”
He chuckled. “Open myself up to emotions—you been watching Oprah lately?”
“You forget I know you well. The world is a scary place, and in your line of work, you probably see a lot of sadness and pain. I think that’s why you’ve become a little bit detached from emotions and feelings. And what happened to that poor girl you tried to help has somehow convinced you to keep your distance. I understand, but, sweetie, life is so very short.”
Hours later, fed up with tossing and turning around, Aiden switched on the light in his room again. He wasn’t going to sleep. His aunt’s words kept running through his head. Probably because she was right.
He had indeed stopped becoming involved in other people’s lives a long time ago. Processing heartache and pain, especially when there didn’t seem to be anything he could do to make it go away, had become unbearable. So he’d taught himself to only watch and take notes, never to get involved or try to help.
The last time he’d tried to help someone, she’d ended up in the hospital. He’d thought he was helping her, thought he’d convinced her how bright she was, but the truth was, nothing he’d said or done could’ve stopped Samantha Taylor from trying to take her own life two years ago.
Muttering, he reached for his laptop lying next to his bed and opened it. For a long time, he stared at the screen. He shouldn’t go snooping around in other people’s lives; he knew that better than most other people. So what the hell was he doing?
There was no reason for him to investigate the Millers. None at all. The reporter in him, however, was egging him on. It wasn’t as if he was going to write a story about them; he merely wanted to know what made the lovely Doctor Miller tick.
The search engine opened up, and he entered her name. Doctor Vivian Miller.
*
It was alreadyeleven o’clock on Sunday morning when Vivian finally left her bedroom. She had the day off. Usually, she slept late on the rare occasion she had a day all to herself, but she’d hardly slept last night.
Falling asleep quickly after a long shift was something she’d trained herself to do. But last night, her brain had simply refused to stop working. Between worrying about what the blasted reporter from Sacramento wanted from her and Aiden’s blue eyes, she couldn’t fall asleep no matter how hard she’d tried.
At about five o’clock this morning, she’d finally given up, and since then, she’d been tidying up her room and lecturing herself.
It was easy enough not to respond to the email from the reporter. Not responding to Aiden O’Sullivan was a whole different story.
He bothered her, and she wasn’t quite sure what to do about it. Somehow, he’d managed to invade her thoughts to such an extent her subconscious was keeping her awake, trying to figure out why.
He was ridiculously attractive, yes, but so were many men she’d met in Marietta. Most of the cowboys she saw on a regular basis in the ER were attractive, well-built, openly flirty, and keen to take her out. Some of her colleagues had asked her out, and one or two of Mitch’s colleagues at school had also been obvious they were interested in her. It had been easy to ignore any of their advances.
Aiden O’Sullivan, though, had barely set foot in Marietta, and she was tied up in knots over him ever since she’d found him in the ER. And he hadn’t even flirted with her. There was just something about him pressing all her buttons.
Maybe it was because she hadn’t had sex in… She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been in a man’s arms, let alone had sex—had wanted to have sex. However, since the moment she’d laid eyes on the Irishman, she’d been having X-rated dreams, and her body seemed to go on high alert whenever he was in the vicinity.
So, instead of thinking about the particular shade of his blue eyes, she should remember he was here solely looking for a story. He was in the business of selling newspapers, and to do that, he had to have a story. Reporters, as she’d discovered to her detriment, didn’t really care whether they had all the facts before they published an article, and she definitely didn’t want to be any reporter’s story ever again.
There was a very simple solution to her problem—she had to stay out of his way until after the Valentine’s ball. Then he’d be gone, and life could continue as normal.
Annie was cooking up a storm in the kitchen. She turned her head and smiled when she saw Vivian.
“Finally! I was wondering whether you’re still mad at me and that’s why you haven’t come down for breakfast yet.”
Vivian poured herself some coffee and curled up on one of the chairs. “Why would I be mad at you?”
“You and Mitch were both so rude to Aiden and Janice last night, I was quite ashamed of your behavior.”
“Maybe you should warn us when you decide to invite people to join us for dinner.”
