The Renegade (The Moorehouse Legacy #3)(56)

“Cass? It’s Libby, may I come in?”

“Sure, let me get out of the tub.”

Except her body wanted to stay right where it was so negotiating her way free of the bath was a project. As she drew on a terry-cloth bathrobe, she couldn’t wait to get back in.

Walking through her room, she had a wonderful feeling of dislocation, as if she were floating, a buoy in calm water.

“Hi, Libby,” she murmured as she opened the door.

“I just wanted—” The woman frowned. “Are you okay? You look awfully pale.”

“I feel fine.” Cass swayed, that gentle, billowing sensation surging throughout her body. “I feel…lovely.”

Then she fainted.

*

Alex and Spike left the nursing home together, and both of them were quiet as they got into the Honda. Actually, neither of them had said much since they’d left the shop about an hour before.

“You want to get something to eat?” Spike asked.

“Sure.”

“Silver Diner?”

“Yeah.” Alex stretched his arms, feeling the burn in his pecs. “I could use a blue-plate special or two after that workout we had this morning. You were a hard driver.”

Spike shrugged and started the car. “No more than you were.”

“Or Mad.”

“Yeah, she’s, ah, strong.” Spike eased the Honda out of their parking spot. “How long is she staying?”

“She’s left.”

Spike’s head jerked, as if he’d wanted to flip the thing around and had fought the impulse. “When?”

“After we finished this morning.”

“Oh. Cool.”

They were on the other side of town, closing in on the diner, when the man cleared his throat.

“Can I ask you something about her?”

Alex looked over. “Yeah, sure.”

“Is it true that she’s some kind of heiress or something? I mean, that’s what Gray said.”

“Val-U-Mart Supermarkets.”

Spike whistled under his breath. “Wow.”

“She’s really down-to-earth, though. Viper notwithstanding.” Alex frowned. God, Spike was so tense, he was about to snap the steering wheel right off the damn drive shaft. “Hey, buddy, what—”

“Listen, Lex, about heading to Blue Mountain Lake. I’d like to drive you. You free tomorrow?”

Nice evasive maneuver, Alex thought. And since he didn’t appreciate it when people crawled up into his business, he let the subject stay changed.

Even though where their conversation had landed was an awkward spot for him. He wasn’t sure why he’d even put the idea of the trip out there. He knew he wasn’t going to end up building boats, for God’s sake. He’d promised Mad he was coming back. He wanted to come back.

He was about to tell Spike to forget it when his neck started tingling. He reached up and rubbed the damn thing.

What the hell, he thought. It didn’t hurt to just go up and talk to the guys. Conversation didn’t mean anything.

He glanced at Spike. “Tomorrow’s good for me. Thanks.”

His cell phone went off.

When he shut the thing, his hands were shaking. “Cassandra passed out. Take us to Doc John’s. Right now.”

*

As Cass sat on an exam table in a flimsy little cotton gown, she felt as though she was in good hands. Doc John was in his fifties and looked like the kind of person you’d want to have on the other end of a stethoscope. He was as calm and steady as a mountain. About the size of one, too, with his woodsman’s build. His clinic was housed in an old Victorian, and Cass was pretty sure she was being examined in what had once been a sitting parlor.

He smiled as he wrote down her weight and temperature.

“Is there any chance you could be pregnant?” he asked.

The question shocked her. “Uh, no.”

“Have you been intimate with anyone lately?” Evidently, the blush that hit her face answered his question. “Maybe I’ll just take some blood so we can rule it out, okay? I’ll also check some other things. Thyroid and liver functions, iron levels, that kind of stuff.”

“Fine with me. But I’m telling you, I’m not pregnant. My husband and I tried for years.”

“Did you ever get a fertility assessment done?”

“No need to. He fathered two children with his first wife. It was me.”

Doc John made a noncommittal noise and motioned across the room. “Have a seat in that chair, if you don’t mind. I’m going to draw the sample myself.”

When he was finished taking the blood, he wrote her name on a label and wrapped it around the tube.

There was a commotion outside, voices rising sharply.

Doc John ignored the noise. “So here’s what I think. You’re exhausted. You haven’t been eating enough. And you overdid it with the hot water in the tub, which was why you passed out. How’s that for a diagnosis?”

She smiled a little. “Nothing that I hadn’t guessed.”

“Then I’m really going to knock your socks off with my prescription. Go home. Take some time off. Sleep until you can’t stand to have your eyes closed for a moment longer and then stay in bed for another day. I’ll send the blood out. Results will be back in forty-eight hours. Sound good to you?”