“It was Dutch, and I may have gotten most of it wrong—” he said, but the screech of automobile brakes behind them made them both turn sharply, just in time to see the dog bounding across the drive between cars, followed closely by a golf cart with the two gardeners in it. The golf cart stopped safely at the curb and an arriving taxi stopped in time, but a departing taxi was accelerating on the other side of the median, and Kate screamed a warning to the dog. Max swerved at the sound of her voice and tried to run to her instead. The taxi hit him.
Kate was out of the car, running, before the taxi driver got out of his vehicle. Mitchell caught up with her and grasped her arm. “Let me take a look first,” he insisted.
“I want to help,” Kate cried frantically, trying to wrench free of his grasp. “Let go of my arm.”
Stunned that she wanted to subject herself to what could be a gory scene, Mitchell let her go and quickened his pace to keep up with her.
When Kate rushed around the front of the taxi, her fear turned into anguish. Max’s still body was lying on its side, his head against the curb, his eyes closed. Kneeling next to him, she felt frantically for a pulse at his throat. She found it and relief flooded through her. “He’s alive,” she said quickly, “but we need help.” Lifting her head, she looked toward the bellmen and gardeners who’d gathered into a group next to the taxi driver and Mitchell. “Call a veterinarian right away,” she told the hotel’s employees.
One bellman looked blankly at the gardeners and then the other bellman. “A veterinarian?” he repeated as Kate began tentatively examining the bleeding cut on Max’s head.
“An animal doctor,” Mitchell clarified impatiently in English, then again in Dutch.
The gardeners were aghast at the suggestion; the bellmen were obstinate. “No, miss, no doctor,” one of them said. “We’ll take care of the dog, you go now and enjoy your evening.” He said something in Dutch to his companions and the group of men moved forward.
Their shadow fell across Kate just as she realized how they were likely to “take care of” a large, destructive, unconscious animal that was an annoying nuisance to adult hotel guests and a terrifying threat in the minds of some of their children. “What do you intend to do?” she asked stubbornly.
“We’re going to drag him off the road now so the cars can get through, and then we’ll take him away.”
“No!” Kate said with an adamant shake of her head. “He shouldn’t be moved. The cars can go around him. He may have spinal injuries or broken bones.” They didn’t care one bit about any of that, she realized, so she appealed urgently to the man she’d promised to take to dinner. “We have to help him!”
Mitchell gazed at her beautiful face and realized she expected him to agree that it was imperative to save the life of a mangy, homeless, mongrel dog. And, suddenly, he did agree—although it was her eyes and not the dog that caused him to come to that conclusion. Inwardly amused by the effect those beseeching green eyes were having on him, Mitchell said solemnly, “I’ll see what I can do.”
The doorman smiled politely as Mitchell approached. “Good evening, Mr. Wyatt.”
Mitchell assumed the doorman would have witnessed the scene in the driveway, so he ignored the greeting, refrained from giving explanations, and tackled the problem: “The dog is badly injured. Where’s the nearest animal doctor?”
“There’s one here on Anguilla, but he will be closed by now.” As proof that it was quite late, he glanced meaningfully at the setting sun.
Having already anticipated that that would be his answer, Mitchell strode past him into the lobby and headed for the front desk, where two couples were waiting to check in and another man was asking for directions. When he was halfway across the lobby, the manager emerged from a side door, saw Mitchell, and rushed forward to greet him. “Mr. Wyatt!” he exclaimed delightedly.
Mitchell reached into his pocket.
“I didn’t realize you’d booked reservations with us,” the manager said, holding out his hand for a handshake. “I’ve been busy with our new assistant manager because he’ll be in charge for the next week. I have to make an emergency trip to the States tomorrow, and he’s quite overwhelmed, I’m afraid.”
Mitchell clasped the manager’s outstretched hand and slipped a $100 bill into his palm. “I’m glad you’re still here tonight, Maurice, because there’s been an automobile accident in the hotel driveway that requires your special attention.”
“Oh, no! Is anyone hurt?”
“Yes.”
“One of our guests?”
“No, one of your stray dogs,” Mitchell said, already striding toward the telephone on the front desk with Maurice rushing along beside him. “I need an ambulance and a physician here immediately.”
“You … you want me to send for an ambulance and a physician because a stray dog has been injured out there?”
In reply, Mitchell picked up the telephone and held the receiver toward the flustered manager. “I want them to come as fast as they possibly can. I’m extremely fond of this particular dog.”
The manager took the receiver, pressed one button on the telephone, and hesitated. “They’ll refuse to treat a dog.”
“Appeal to their humane instincts,” Mitchell said drily as he withdrew cash from his pants pocket and began peeling off large bills to cover whatever inducement the ambulance driver and physician demanded before they’d make the trip.
The manager watched him a moment, then quickly dialed the rest of the ambulance’s phone number.
Mitchell stayed until that call and the one to the physician were both successfully completed; then he left the “inducement money” with the manager to dole out to the recipients.
Kate Donovan was in clear view across the driveway when he emerged from the hotel. The taxi driver had left in his taxi, the bellmen and gardeners had dispersed, and she sat alone on the grass, in the median beside the curb next to the dog, with her legs curled beneath her. Captured in the glow of torchlight, with her red hair a silken mantle across her shoulders and her hand gently stroking the injured dog, she looked ethereal.
She looked up as Mitchell neared, searching his face for a clue as to what he’d accomplished.
“Help is on the way,” he promised, crouching on his heels beside her. “How’s the patient?”
She shifted her attention to the dog as she answered, her fingers gently stroking the animal’s shoulder. “His breathing seems a little stronger and more regular. I can’t feel any broken bones, and his cuts aren’t deep, but he may be hemorrhaging internally. He started to come around a few minutes ago, or at least I thought he did.” She fell silent, and Mitchell said nothing more because he was listening for a particular sound. He heard it very soon—a siren growing louder and louder.
Kate didn’t notice the siren because she felt a slight twitch of muscles beneath her fingertips and suddenly Max opened his eyes. “There you are!” she said joyously. “Stay quiet,” she warned quickly, pressing him down with both hands when he made a feeble effort to roll onto his stomach. “Help is on the way,” she promised him. Without looking up, she asked Mitchell, “What sort of help is coming?”
Her question was almost drowned out by a vehicle roaring up the driveway and screeching to a halt in front of the hotel.
“That sort of help,” Mitchell replied, standing up.
Kate leaned forward and looked around his legs; then she looked up at him in laughing disbelief and unabashed admiration. “You called an ambulance?”
She would have said more, but Mitchell was already striding off toward the ambulance and the dazed dog was getting agitated, thrashing around in a feeble effort to roll to his feet. Soothing Max with her voice and hands, she watched two men jump out of the ambulance while a dark green car came racing up the driveway and lurched to a stop behind them. The car was still rocking when the driver flung open his door and got out, carrying a large black bag.
He was a physician, Kate knew at once, but her delight was douse
d by her fear that the doctor and ambulance drivers would all get back in their vehicles and leave as soon as Mitchell told them who their patient really was. Tensely, she watched Mitchell gesture toward the dog she was holding down.
Kate held her breath.
The doctor turned and started walking toward her. The ambulance drivers rushed to the back of their van and pulled out a stretcher.
Amazement and optimism soared through Kate, and she whispered to the dog, “I think we’re in very good hands, Max.” She was positive of it when the physician crouched down beside her, looked at the nervous, wary dog and opened his black bag. “Our local vet is on vacation, but I phoned a veterinarian friend of mine in St. Maarten before I left, and I brought along some things he recommended. Now then,” he said calmly, “dogs usually like me. Let’s hope this one does, too, because I don’t want to sedate him just yet. Head injuries,” he continued as he slowly reached out toward the dog, “can be—“
A low, throaty snarl began in the dog’s throat and his lips curled back over white fangs.
The physician yanked his hand back. “Wounded animals often attack anyone who comes too close,” he informed Kate; then he reached toward the dog again, this time cautiously, inches at a time. “But this fellow is willing to let you touch him, so he ought to let me do it. He’s actually a little afraid of me … and all that snarling is really just … a bluff.”
“No, I don’t think it—” Kate’s warning was drowned out by the physician’s yelp of pain.
Chapter Seven
“ITHINK THE DOG IS GOING TO BE FINE,” THE PHYSICIAN told Kate and Mitchell as he looked around for his black bag.
The ambulance drivers had left earlier, after settling the dog on the floor near the coffee table in the main room. “He’ll sleep through the night, assuming I gave him the right dosage. Tomorrow, you should take him over to St. Maarten and let a vet there have a look at him and take some X-rays of his skull and shoulder.”
“I can’t thank you enough,” Kate said sincerely, “and I’m terribly sorry about your arm.”
“The bite isn’t extremely deep, but it is rather painful,” he replied stiffly while collecting bandages and antiseptic from the table near the terrace doors. “And of course now there’s the question of rabies to consider.”
Kate stifled a smile that was part anxiety and part mortification. “You did say that whoever you spoke to at the hospital just now told you there hasn’t been a case of rabies reported on the island in years?”
“Yes. However, it’s imperative that you keep that animal with you until you leave. After that, I’ll take care of him. I wish you would let me take him with me now.”
“I want to look after him myself while I’m here,” Kate said. She had a feeling the physician would prefer to euthanize Max to find out immediately if he had rabies, rather than wait out a ten-day quarantine period to see if Max developed symptoms.
“If he shows any symptoms of rabies while he’s with you, I need to know about it immediately so that I can be treated. Agreed?”
“Absolutely,” Kate said, and nodded for emphasis.
“And you understand clearly what those symptoms are?”
“I wrote them down right here,” Kate said, holding up the tablet.
“If this dog were to disappear before ten days from now,” the doctor lectured, “I would have to undergo treatment for rabies, whether he actually has rabies or not.”
Mitchell had heard enough about this highly unlikely eventuality that didn’t need to be addressed unless it became an unlikely reality. The dog had been so weak and disoriented that his bite had barely broken the physician’s skin, but the man had howled in pain and bandaged his arm as if a major artery had been severed. “We understand perfectly,” Mitchell said smoothly, and ushered the physician to the door. “We’ll keep him on a leash when he goes outside,” he added, and swept the door open.
In the doorway, the doctor hesitated, and turned back around. “Do you have a leash?”
“I’ll get one in the morning.”
The man still balked. “You’ll do it first thing in the morning?”
“At the crack of dawn,” Mitchell averred, and, putting his hand lightly on the other man’s elbow, he turned him around and propelled him unceremoniously out the door.
Kate watched that maneuver from the other side of the room, amused and impressed by Mitchell’s blasé sangfroid and his swift efficiency in times of stress. In the few hours she’d known him, she’d criticized him soundly—and unjustly—for the Bloody Mary; dumped a drink on his shirt; reneged on the nice dinner she owed him; and involved him instead in a dramatic canine-rescue effort. He’d handled all of that imperturbably—and very, very graciously. An hour ago she’d imagined he might be a murderer; now she regarded him as a friend and ally.
Kate’s cordial feelings for him were evident in her warm smile as she said, “I still owe you dinner. I could call room service and we could eat out on the terrace, if you like.” Since Evan planned to arrive the next evening, Kate suggested the only other alternative she could offer. “Or would you rather forget about dinner and let me pay for your shirt instead?” She wondered if Mitchell would notice that she’d limited him to only those two choices, but his reaction was so nonchalant that she decided he either didn’t notice or didn’t care.
“Dinner here will be fine,” Mitchell replied. “You owe me a meal,” he added mildly, “and I always collect on debts that are owed to me.” She was obviously expecting a boyfriend to arrive the next day, he realized, or else she’d have offered an explanation for not being able to have dinner with him some other night.
Kate folded her arms loosely across her chest and regarded him with amusement. “Do you really?”
“Always,” he replied, reaching for the Hotel Services folder on the desk.
“Then how much do I owe you for the physician and ambulance?”
“Nothing,” Mitchell said, flipping to the Room Service section of the handbook.
“Didn’t you offer them money so that they’d agree to come out here and treat a dog?”
“I appealed to their humane instincts.”
“I see,” Kate replied, pretending she believed his story. “And is that why they got here so fast, too? I mean, they were here less than ten minutes after you walked into the lobby.”
Mitchell glanced at her from the corner of his eye. She was watching him with a knowing little smile, and he had a sudden, impossibly premature impulse to wrap her in his arms and cover that tantalizing mouth with his. That thought made a smile tug at the corner of his own lips as he shrugged and said, “They got here quickly because it’s a very small island.”
“And also because you promised them a very big tip?”
Trying to ignore the impulse to laugh, Mitchell focused on the menu. “What would you like for dinner?”
Kate named the same delicious meal she’d ordered the night before. “I think I’ll have the sea scallops and a prawn and avocado salad,” she said, bending down to check on the sleeping dog.
“Would you like me to phone room service?” he asked.
“Yes, please,” Kate said over her shoulder. “Order anything you like. Order everything you like,” she joked, imagining the enormous tip he must have given to entice the ambulance drivers and a physician to race at top speed to the rescue of an injured stray dog.
Max’s nose felt warm to her touch, and his breathing was shallow and a little fast, but the physician had told her to expect this. Behind her, she heard Mitchell pick up the telephone receiver, but a moment later he put it back in the cradle with a sharp clack. Puzzled, Kate glanced over her shoulder and saw him standing beside the phone, holding a piece of lined tablet paper in his hand, his dark brows drawn into a scowl.
A sheet of tablet paper … her tablet paper! Her tablet paper with the note she’d written to help the police identify him if she disappeared. “I can explain,” she said, surging to her feet and walking over to him.
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“I’m dying to hear it,” he said coolly, and handed the note to her.
Kate reacted to the chill in his tone with an intensity that startled her. She didn’t want to insult him or make him think badly of her—not now, not when she was so grateful to him and liked him so much. He hadn’t sounded this curt and unfriendly when she blamed him for the Bloody Mary and dumped it on his shirt. Trying to think of the least offensive explanation she could give him, she reread what she’d written on the note.
“I’ve gone out to dinner with a man who says his name is Mitchell Wyatt. I met him this afternoon in the Sandbar when I spilled a Bloody Mary on his shirt. The waiter can give you his description.”
Stalling for time, she laid the offensive note back on the desk. “Tonight,” she began haltingly, “when I wasn’t sure what I should wear to dinner, I decided to call you and ask where we were going.” She paused, nervously rubbing her palms against the sides of her pants.
“Go on,” he said brusquely.
“But when I phoned the hotel operator and asked him to ring your room, he said you weren’t staying here. That made me … well … uneasy. Possibilities started to occur to me that I hadn’t considered earlier, when I believed you were a guest here and agreed to have dinner with you.”
“What possibilities?” he demanded.
Kate wanted to be evasive, but that was impossible with his rapier-blue gaze pinning hers. “There were certain things about you that made me think you might be a—” She almost choked on the word. “—gigolo.”
His scowl deepened. “A what?”
“Please, just try to look at it from my perspective. You were hanging around a very expensive hotel that you’re not staying at, you’re outrageously handsome, you’re incredibly smooth, you’re totally charming, and you’re a very fast worker—within two or three minutes of meeting me, you asked me to take you to dinner.” His expression hadn’t softened a bit, which told Kate two things: He wasn’t flattered by her complimentary remarks about his looks and charm; and he was waiting for an explanation as to why she’d instructed whoever read the note to get a description of him from the waiter.