Free Dr. Daddy by Elizabeth Bevarly Page B

she vowed certainly. She was a tough broad, after all.

Five
    I t was a bad dream, Jonas decided as he stood in his pajama bottoms and robe, framed by his front door. He frowned at the maddeningly cheerful woman who had arrived on his porch. The sun was just coming up over the house across the street, staining with orange and gold the long hair that streamed from beneath her red knit cap, throwing a circle of light around her head that looked incongruously like a halo. Yet he knew Zoey Holland was anything but an angel. The emotions she stirred in him were devilish, to say the least.
    Her parka was open enough that he saw she was wearing a dark burgundy Haddonfield High School sweatshirt over faded jeans, instead of the hospital scrubs she had sported on her arrival a few mornings before. She carried a sack of groceries in one hand and a small canvas weekender bag in the other. Clearly, it wasn’t an errand for Lily Forrest she was running this time. Evidently, this time she had every intention of spending some serious time with him.
    “I’m baaaaaack,” she said with a smile as she nudged past him and into his living room.
    Jonas pushed the door closed and pulled his robe more tightly around himself, securing the belt with an extra knot. Why he should do so was a mystery, since Zoey had never expressed the slightest interest in disrobing him before, and really, should she decide she wanted to do so now, he had no desire to stop her. There was just something about her having come to his house with her own free will that unsettled him. That, accompanied by the fact that she seemed to be in such a good mood, had him thoroughly rattled.
    “Yes, but what are you doing here?” he asked.
    “I’m baby-sitting,” she told him. “Remember? I’m going to be watching Jules for the next two weeks and helping you out with her.”
    “I thought you’d changed your mind about that.”
    She shrugged, clearly unconcerned. “So I changed it back. Besides, you still owe me for the groceries I bought Friday.” She indicated the paper bag in her arms. “I’ll just put it on your tab. Now where can I stow my stuff?”
    “Your...stuff? What stuff?”
    “My pajamas and toiletries and stuff.”
    Jonas was still struggling to comprehend her quick change of heart, and as a result, her intentions didn’t quite register. “You’re moving in?”
    “Only for a couple of days. Until you get some sleep. Then I’ll just come over in the mornings and stay until you get home from work. Eventually, I’ll have to get some sleep, too, you know.”
    “I know, but—”
    “So where can I put my stuff?”
    “Aren’t you working nights for Jeannette? How are you going to manage this?”
    “I got my shifts covered for tonight and tomorrow night.”
    He eyed her suspiciously. “You’re juggling your schedule an awful lot for me.”
    “It’s not for you,” she reminded him.
    Jonas nodded, feeling more tired than he’d ever felt in his life. “That’s right. How could I forget? You’re only doing this for Juliana.”
    “Right. So where can I stow my stuff?”
    He lifted his hand to his forehead, as if by doing so he could keep his thoughts from spilling out of his brain. “Hold on for a minute,” he said. “Let me just get my bearings here. You’re still willing to give me a hand with Juliana?”
    “Sure.”
    “Even after I propositioned you?”
    Zoey arched her brows in mock censure. “Oh, but you didn’t proposition me, remember? At least, you said you didn’t.”
    “Okay, even after I allegedly propositioned you?”
    “I’m sure that was all just a misunderstanding,” she said indulgently. “Wasn’t it?”
    Jonas tamped down the urge to yank her into his arms and kiss her senseless to illustrate just how perfectly she had understood his intentions of the other night. Instead he only sighed and nodded. “Yeah,” he finally said. “You completely misunderstood.”
    She smiled, clearly comprehending just what a big