‘I can understand that, but, Kate, I could have lost you, but I didn’t. You’re here with me, now, and that, at the end, is the only thing that matters. That you’re alive and well.’
‘And then there’s the competition,’ she went on, ignoring him. ‘I’m not Annabel,’ she said, pointing out the obvious. ‘Or any one of the other glamorous women you’ve been seen with.’
He sighed and shifted to the chair beside her, lifting her hand and pressing it to his cheek. ‘I know you’re not Annabel,’ he said gently. ‘You don’t have to live up to her, Kate. I loved her, just not the way I’ve always loved you. You were always my soul mate. You were the one I should have been with all this time. She was a lovely girl, and she turned into a kind, sensitive and generous woman; as a mother, I couldn’t fault her. As a wife, she was perfect. We were good friends in many ways, but there was no great passion there, no desperate yearning. And as for the other women—there’s only really been one since Annabel, and she has no expectations. I’ve seen her from time to time. Her name’s Louise. We’ve had dinner, gone to the cinema.’
‘Made love?’
‘I’m not a monk, Kate. Neither am I promiscuous. The others have just been passing distractions, but I haven’t slept with them. And I’m not going to beat you up about Rob.’
‘What makes you think I slept with him?’
He shook his head and gave a wry smile. ‘I saw you. I came to see you, last summer. I wanted to talk to you, and I pulled up outside. And Rob was kissing you, in the kitchen, right in front of the window. And then you walked away, and a light came on upstairs, and you shut the bedroom curtains. It wasn’t rocket science, Kate.’
She felt sick. ‘Nick, you weren’t meant to see that.’
‘Of course not. But you’re adults, so why not? After all, we weren’t going anywhere, were we, at the time, and he’s a good guy. So—why not? It’s what people do. I know that. And I can understand it, but it’s all very well in theory, but in practice, I realised I was jealous.’
‘Because even though you didn’t want me, you didn’t want anyone else to?’
‘But I did want you. I just didn’t know how to ask. I went to see Louise, after I drove away that night. I thought—what was sauce for the goose, I suppose. But, well, let’s just say I think I was a bit of a disappointment to her. I couldn’t get you out of my head, couldn’t stop seeing you kissing him, and I didn’t want to be with her. I didn’t want to be with anyone if I couldn’t be with you, and obviously I couldn’t. So I went home, picked up a bottle of Scotch from the kitchen, walked down to the beach and drank half of it. I haven’t seen her since.’
‘So who was the woman at Ben and Lucy’s barbecue last summer?’ she asked.
‘An old friend from London. She’s divorced, she was down here on holiday, and she was lonely.’
Kate smiled indulgently. ‘I think she was probably more than lonely, the way she was looking at you.’
He shrugged. ‘I’m a good-looking guy—what can I say?’ he murmured, and she laughed, as he’d meant her to. But then his smile faded, and he lifted his hand and touched her cheek. ‘She was nothing, Kate. Nothing happened with her, I promise. I can’t dismiss Annabel, she was my wife, the mother of three of my children, a very important person in our lives, and I loved her. But there truly has been no one else who matters at all, no one who’s ever claimed my heart or made me want to behave like an irrational teenager or a romantic fool. No one else who’s been such a good friend to me no matter how badly I’ve behaved. No one else that I’ve loved the way I love you. The way I’ve always loved you.’
‘Oh, Nick. What happened to us?’ she asked softly, and he stood up slowly and drew her to her feet.
‘I don’t know. I just know that now we seem to have a chance, and I want to take that chance with you, Kate. Let me try again,’ he murmured softly. ‘I know I don’t deserve it, but give me a chance to prove that I can be a good husband and father. We’re stuck with each other for good now, anyway, as Jem’s parents—why not do it properly? There’s so much at stake here now—so much that’s infinitely precious that I really don’t think I can bear to lose.’
Her mouth dropped open slightly, and she stared at him in confusion. ‘Are you—? Did I imagine it, or did you just ask me to marry you?’
He felt emotion choke him, and swallowed. ‘I’m not sure. I think I might have done, but not just because of Jem. I can be a father to him whatever, if I get the chance, and that’s down to him. And if he hates me, if he wants me out of his life…’
‘He doesn’t. He won’t.’
‘Then give me a chance, Kate. Let’s wind back the clock and start again, only as adults with hopefully a bit more judgement and common sense and compassion. See if we can make it work this time.’
She studied him doubtfully. ‘Do you think we can do that?’
‘I think we can try.’
‘Maybe.’
‘Is that a maybe maybe, or a definite maybe?’ he asked, sure his smile didn’t reach his eyes because her answer was so important to him.
‘I think that’s a definite maybe,’ she said, her smile slow, and he felt the tension drain out of him. And then ratchet up again another gear. He lifted his hand and grazed his knuckles gently against her cheek.
‘I want to make love to you,’ he murmured, ‘but I want you to be sure that you’re ready for this, because if you’re going to change your mind, I’d rather you did it now.’
She gave a quiet sigh. ‘The only thing that would change my mind is Jem, and he seems to love you. He’s always been very fond of you, and now, knowing you’re his father just seems to be strengthening that bond. So, no, I’m not going to change my mind, Nick. But I am still scared.’
He drew her into his arms and cradled her against his heart. ‘Don’t be scared, my love. I’ll take care of you. I’ll always take care of you.’
He let her go, then took her hand and led her slowly and carefully up the stairs to his room, closing the door behind them just in case Bruno decided to follow them, but he was lying on a rug chasing rabbits in his sleep, and she didn’t think he’d worry.
‘Do you want the lights off?’ he asked, and she swallowed.
She had to do this. She had to be brave enough to show herself to him, to open up all her physical and emotional scars to him and trust him to heal them. But the lights…
‘How about the bathroom light? We could leave the door open,’ he suggested, and she nodded, ridiculously nervous now.
He turned back the bed, stripped off his clothes down to his boxers—jersey boxers that fitted snugly over his firm, muscular buttocks and thighs and did heart-stopping things in other areas—and then held out his hand to her.
She went to his side, and he stared down at her, his eyes sombre. ‘Are you sure, Kate?’ he said softly. ‘We’ve had years to talk this up in our heads, and I don’t want to disappoint you.’
‘You won’t disappoint me.’ She knew he wouldn’t. She didn’t know how, she just knew. She went up on tiptoe and brushed her lips against his, then dropped back onto her heels and waited.
He unbuttoned the silky blouse she’d put on, the sheer fabric sliding against her skin as he loosened it and slipped it over her shoulders. He laid it carefully on the chair, then his fingers found the zip on her trousers and slid it down, the faint noise loud in the breathless silence. The button was next, and then they joined the blouse on the chair and he stood back and looked at her, standing there in her underwear.
‘You’re still a really beautiful woman, Kate,’ he said softly. ‘Come here. I need you.’
He held out his hand, and she put hers in it and went into his arms, closing the gap between them slowly, so that when their bodies touched, it was like coming home.
She rested her head on his shoulder, and he slid his arms round her waist and held her gently against his body, so she could feel the beating of his heart, the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed, the warmth of his
skin, and as she lifted her head, his came down and his lips found hers, meshing and melding in a gentle dance that was filled with promise.
She knew he wanted her. She also knew he’d wait for her, give her time for her fears to fade, and it gave her the confidence to step back out of his arms and take off the last of her clothes, so she was standing in front of him naked.
And then she waited.
Her trust was unbearably touching.
He felt his eyes fill with tears, and because he knew she wanted him to, he made himself look down, to study the scar on her left breast, the fine line that ran round underneath it in the crease, the hollow left by the surgery that had saved her life. The skin was a little discoloured from the radiotherapy, but that would fade with time. And it was very neat. The doctor in him admired the surgery. The man wanted her, more than he’d ever wanted any other woman in his life, and if it killed him, he was going to do her justice now.
Her courage humbled him, and he gave her an unsteady smile. ‘I feel a little overdressed,’ he said gruffly, and skimmed off his boxers, tossing them aside and standing in front of her, wondering how he measured up to Rob and hating himself for caring about something so trivial. Well, at least she could see that he wasn’t in the least put off by her appearance. In fact, if she kept him waiting much longer…
‘Nick?’
He met her eyes.
‘Make love to me.’
He lifted her carefully onto the bed, tutting at the faint bruising on her right foot, touching his lips gently to the little stain. He could imagine her feet trapped in the footwell, knew that if the fuel tank had blown, she would have died.
Don’t think about that, he told himself, and moved up, skimming past her thighs, not allowing himself to linger till he reached her waist, then trailing his tongue slowly around her navel, dipping into it, teasing her till she trembled.
Then he moved higher, his hand cupping her left breast, pressing a gentle, healing kiss to the scar. She shuddered a little, and he moved on, his lips sipping and tasting the other breast, reluctant to miss a single inch of her. She moaned and arched up, her body image issues forgotten now, need taking over, the need that had haunted them both for so very many years. The purely sensual need that their one tragic night had never addressed.
He moved up until his face was level with hers, and kissed her as he’d always wanted to kiss her, long and slow and deep—heavy, drugging kisses that cranked up the heat and made his body burn for her.
And hers for him. She plucked at him, her fingers restless, her breathing light and rapid, almost hyperventilating. ‘Nick, please…now,’ she begged, and doing what he’d failed to do before, taking the time to protect her, he moved over her and thrust slowly, lingeringly home.
She gasped, her body bucking beneath his, and he locked his mouth to hers, plundering it as he drove into her again and again and again, until at last he could hold it no more and he let himself go, joining her in the long freefall into ecstasy.
The next few days were blissful.
The weather was gorgeous, and when they weren’t in the hospital visiting Jem, they were at the barn, sitting under a little ornamental tree in the courtyard garden with the dog at their feet and drinking coffee or sipping wine, and every now and then he’d cook them something wonderful.
And his hidden talent for waiting on her was turning into an art form. He ran errands for her, spoiled her rotten, massaged her neck when it ached and then, when she was boneless and utterly relaxed, he’d make love to her.
They were slow, lazy days, days in which they all recovered from what had been a gruelling ordeal, and gradually they relaxed into a quiet, orderly routine.
He went back to work in the mornings, coming home to cook them lunch before driving to the hospital to visit Jem. He’d settled really well in the new ward, made friends, watched the ducklings grow and gradually, bit by bit, he was getting back on his feet.
Jess Carmichael had been to see him, and he was less angry with his parents, more accepting now that there had been valid reasons why his parentage had been kept from him. ‘She’s a wonderful person,’ Kate said. ‘I don’t know how I would have coped last year without her. She’s a miracle.’
She wasn’t the only miracle. Lucy had formed a wonderfully close attachment to Jem, and on a day when Nick was there alone because he’d treated Kate to a pamper break, she brought the children in to see him.
‘Hey, you’ve got the monsters,’ Jem said with a grin, and Lucy chuckled.
‘Annabel, say hello to Uncle Jem,’ she said, letting go of her daughter’s hand, and his eyes widened.
‘Wow—I really am an uncle, aren’t I? That’s weird—awesome! Hi, Annabel.’
‘We bringed you grapes,’ Annabel said, handing him the bag shyly.
‘That’s because Grandad ate the last lot,’ Lucy pointed out with a firm look at her father, and he rolled his eyes.
‘Naughty G’andad!’ Annabel said, and stared at them longingly.
Jem gave her some, and she settled down on the floor by the window and ate the grapes and counted the ducklings, while Lucy hung onto the baby and tried to keep him out of mischief.
‘I can’t believe he’s a year old,’ she said.
‘I can’t believe I’m a grandfather,’ Nick said drily.
Lucy grinned. ‘Oh, I can. Look at the grey hairs, Dad! But I can’t believe Annabel’s nearly two and a half. It seems like five minutes. Joshy, no! You can’t have the grapes.’
‘Gape!’ he yelled, his little fist working, and lunged for them, slipping out of Lucy’s grasp and cracking his head on the edge of the clipboard hanging on the end of the bed.
‘Oh, I don’t believe it!’ Lucy wailed, lifting him up and hugging him while Nick looked at the little gash on the screaming toddler’s temple.
‘He’ll live, but it needs gluing,’ Nick said, pressing a clean tissue to the cut and holding it there.
‘Oh, well, at least it’s into the hairline,’ she said with a sigh. ‘Come on, Annabel, we’re going to have to take him to see Daddy. Joshy’s got a little cut.’
‘Leave her here, she’ll be fine with me,’ Nick said, and she smiled gratefully and hurried along the corridor and out of the ward, Josh’s screams fading as she took him further away.
‘Joshy’s screaming,’ Annabel said matter-of-factly. ‘He always screams.’
‘He’s a little boy. They get in trouble a lot, but he’ll be fine,’ Nick said with a reassuring smile, and sat down on the floor with his granddaughter and watched the ducklings.
‘Oh, Megan, brilliant—are you busy?’
She wasn’t, but she didn’t want to hang around in A and E any longer than she had to. She’d managed to avoid Josh O’Hara so far, but she could hardly refuse to help Ben Carter. She stepped into the cubicle and smiled at the woman. Lucy. She’d seen her on Paeds, visiting Jem, and knew she was Ben’s wife. ‘Well—no, not really. What’s the matter?’
‘This is our son,’ he said. ‘He’s managed to cut his head, and we could do with a hand to hold onto him while I glue it, but he’s like an eel and the nurses are all busy.’
‘I can do eels,’ she said, conjuring up a smile, and she took him from Lucy, steeling herself against the warm, sturdy little body writhing against her.
‘Shh, shh,’ his mother said, holding his hands and kissing them and blowing raspberries on them, and Megan sat down and held the child’s head firmly against her shoulder while Ben glued the little laceration.
‘Did you make that kid scream loud enough?’ a lazy, sexy voice asked as he finished, and Megan felt her blood run hot and cold.
Ben lifted his head and laughed. ‘Yes, thank you for your concern. This is my son—Josh, say hello to mini-Josh. We even gave him your name, so don’t be too rude about him. I take it you’ve met Megan Phillips, our paeds registrar?’
Met her? Oh, yes, he’d met her. And seeing her there, comforting the wriggling, unhappy baby, sent a shaft of pain
right through him, stealing his breath away.
Megan looked up at him, a desperate pleading in her eyes, but she needn’t have bothered. He was in no hurry to have the past dragged out for public consumption.
‘We met the other day up on Paeds,’ he said, being deliberately noncommittal, and to his relief his pager went off and he was able to walk away.
Away from Megan and the child, but not his memories…
Nick got back to the barn to find Kate there, home after her spa day relaxed, sleepy and looking utterly irresistible.
So he didn’t even try. ‘Good day?’ he asked, snuggling up to her on the sofa, and she turned into his arms and kissed him.
‘Lovely. I’ve been spoiled to bits. Thank you.’
‘My pleasure.’ He nuzzled her neck. ‘You smell nice. Do you smell nice all over?’
‘I don’t know. You probably ought to check.’
She did, he discovered, although he got blissfully distracted and forgot what he was supposed to be looking for, and it was almost an hour later before he remembered about little Josh’s accident.
He told Kate, lying lazily beside her on the big bed with the view of the sea in the distance and wondering when he was going to wake up and find it was all a dream.
‘Poor little mite. You ought to ring and find out how he is.’ She trailed her hand over his chest and propped herself up, looking down at him with a slightly bemused smile.
‘What?’
‘I find it really hard to believe I’m sleeping with a grandfather,’ she teased, and he closed his eyes and groaned as she slid her hand down his ribs and kept going.
‘I was a very early starter,’ he reminded her, and caught her hand. ‘Stop. I have to phone Lucy.’
‘Mmm. You do. And then we need to go to the hospital. I haven’t seen Jem all day, and I miss him.’
She handed him his mobile, and he rang Lucy.
St Piran's: The Wedding of The Year / St Piran's: Rescuing Pregnant Cinderella Page 16
