Free Dr. Dad by Judith Arnold Page B

for a minute?” he asked.
    â€œSure. Hang on.” She strode out of the kitchen to find Lindsey lying on her back on the floor stroking MacKenzie, who sat happily on her belly. As soon as Susannah entered the room, Lindsey bolted upright, depositing MacKenzie onto the rug. Lindsey looked embarrassed, although there was no reason for her to be. She wasn’t the first human being MacKenzie had wrapped around his paw, and she wouldn’t be the last.
    â€œYour dad wants to speak to you,” Susannah said, handing the phone to Lindsey.
    â€œOh—okay.” Lindsey pressed the phone to her ear, her wide eyes fixed on Susannah. “Yeah?” she said into the phone. “Dad?”
    Susannah lifted one of the framed prints she’d been planning to hang on the living-room wall, not so much because she cared about the print but because she wanted to assure Lindsey she wasn’t eavesdropping. “Just some math,” Lindsey said. “I can do it tonight…. No, I promise I won’t forget to do it. I know you’re meeting with Ms. Hathaway. Your plan, Dr. Dad, not mine.” She ran her free hand through her hair, which had gotten matted from lying on the rug. “No, I won’t stay too long. I won’t be a pest…. I know, Dad.” She rolled her eyes. “Okay. Here’s Susannah.” She handed the phone back to Susannah, making a great show of looking exasperated.
    Susannah gave her what she hoped was a placating smile and returned to the kitchen alone. “I told her not to stay at your house all afternoon,” he said.
    â€œI don’t mind.”
    â€œI do.” He half sighed, half laughed. “If she starts getting on your nerves, send her home.”
    â€œShe won’t get on my nerves,” Susannah assured him.
    â€œYou don’t know her the way I do. And I’d hate to destroy a good neighborly relationship over the fact that my daughter can be a pain in the butt when she wants.”
    Was that what he envisioned for them? A good neighborly relationship? She supposed that would be appropriate.
    But did a good neighborly relationship include her having outlined a plotline for an episode of Mercy Hospital that revolved around a charismatic pediatrician with soulful eyes and a heart-melting smile? Did it include her sprawling out in bed, imagining what that doctor’s hands would feel like twining through her hairor caressing the underside of her chin, what that doctor’s mouth would feel like on hers?
    Surely that wasn’t what Toby had had in mind when he’d mentioned good neighborly relationships. And if Susannah was wise, she’d be satisfied with what he did have in mind. If she didn’t want to get hurt again, if she didn’t want to get caught up in other people’s agendas, if she wanted simply to live a normal life as an anonymous human being in a quiet, peaceful community, she would be wise to keep things neighborly with Toby and everyone else she met in Arlington.
    â€œI know more about pain-in-the-butts than most people learn in a lifetime,” she told him. “Don’t worry about Lindsey and me.”
    â€œI always worry about Lindsey. She’s my daughter,” he said simply. “And I’ll worry about you because—” he paused as if giving his statement great thought “—you’ve got a generous heart.”
    That sounded more than neighborly. Even after she hung up the phone and went off to find Lindsey, his words resonated inside her. No one had ever told her she had a generous heart before.
    She liked the sound of it. She liked even more that Toby Cole had been the one to say it.
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    C RUISING SLOWLY down the street to his house, he spotted Lindsey and Susannah sitting on Susannah’s porch steps. Susannah’s cat sat in Lindsey’s lap, and she was stroking the creature and talking to Susannah. She must have heard his car, because she looked