With a soft smile, she eased forward. “How was your first full day back to work?”
“Everyone asked about you,” he told her. “They all wanted to know when you were coming back. I told them I wasn’t sure.”
Callie sighed. “Why didn’t you just tell them the truth? I’m not coming back.”
“You might. The only person stopping you is you.”
She motioned to her face. “No, this is stopping me.”
“A scar?” he asked. “You would be so surprised at how many people will be glad to see you and that you’re healing. Please, at least try to come back for one day a week and we’ll go from there.”
Callie glanced out to the waterfall trickling into the pool. “I’m not sure, Noah. I don’t even want to go out to the grocery store, much less work in an office full of beautiful people.”
Noah took her hand, pulled her to her feet as he stood. Her book fell to the stone patio.
“Wait,” she told him before he could pull her away. “I’m not saying that to anger you, really I’m not. I just don’t want you to think me working in your office is a long-term thing or something I’ll be comfortable doing. Even if I did come back for one day a week, I still wouldn’t be staying there.”
He admired her—how could he no
t? But he was so damn tired of her thinking her beauty was superficial.
“I want to take you somewhere.”
She started to protest, but he held up his other hand. “I promise no one will see you, but even if they did, they’d think you were beautiful just like I do. You don’t even need to change.”
She slid into her flip-flops and followed him through the house and to the garage.
“But aren’t you tired?” she asked as they got into the car.
“Not too tired for this.”
Somehow they’d arrived at a deeper emotional relationship than just colleagues or friends. He didn’t know where it would lead, but it was past time she learned a bit more about him, about why he was so adamant that she realize beauty was from within and there was so much more to life.
He hit the freeway and blended into the thick traffic, all the while hoping he didn’t infringe on some unspoken code of plastic-surgeon ethics.
Callie wasn’t going to believe his platitudes just because he kept preaching them. She needed a visual and he planned to give her just that.
“Where are we going?”
He threw her a sideways glance and a smile. “I knew you couldn’t just sit back and enjoy the ride.”
“Well, you’re right. So, where are we going?” she repeated.
“We’re going to a place that will remind us both of how something good can come out of a bad situation.”
Callie sighed and leaned against the door. “I’d rather be home.”
The word caused a tightening in his stomach that caught him off guard. By home, she meant his house, not her apartment.
He didn’t comment, didn’t really know what to say, but he was glad she was comfortable and felt as if she could call that her home.
But she’d still never been in the bedroom that he’d shared with Malinda.
He pulled into a familiar subdivision and found the place he was looking for.
“Here we are,” he told her as he shut off the car. “Come on in.”
Callie looked at the stone-and-brick home that was obviously fairly new and beyond gorgeous. Then she jerked her gaze back to his.