by Sarah Morgan
* * *
By the time she arrived home, she’d made up her mind that Alessandro was going to be staying at the hospital so what was the point of changing for dinner? Still seething about the sheer front of the feline Katya, she stepped into the shower, wondering how Alessandro had dealt with her.
Were they together at this precise moment?
Was he giving her personal instruction?
Still simmering, Christy wrapped herself in a large towel and padded into the bedroom, only to find him standing there holding a huge bunch of red roses.
She stared. ‘What are those for?’
‘They’re for you.’
‘Me?’ He was giving her flowers? Alessandro never gave her flowers. It just wasn’t something he thought to do. So why was he thinking of it now?
Her heart plummeted and she wondered again just what sort of help he’d been giving the seductive Katya. ‘Feeling guilty about something, Alessandro?’ Her frosty tone brought a wary look to his eyes.
He muttered something under his breath in Spanish and she glared at him.
‘You never bring me flowers.’
‘An omission which I’m trying to rectify,’ he announced in a tone that reflected no small degree of exasperation and bemusement. ‘You wanted me to be more romantic, gatita.’
She clutched at the towel, her hair trailing over her shoulders like flames. ‘You think it’s romantic to see my husband flirting under my nose?’
His eyes narrowed. ‘When was I flirting?’
‘You really need to ask?’ She flung her head back and her eyes sparked. ‘She’s all over you like a rash.’
‘Who is?’
‘Katya.’ Christy hated her waspish tone and Alessandro lifted an eyebrow.
‘Are you accusing me of having an affair with Katya?’ His slow, masculine drawl was laced with amusement and she glared at the flowers and then at him, furious that he dared to laugh at her!
‘Why is that funny?’
‘She works for me, it is my job to train her,’ Alessandro said smoothly, and Christy clenched her fists.
‘And you have to be in close physical contact to achieve that objective?’ She knew she was behaving childishly but she just couldn’t help it.
‘You are being ridiculous.’
‘Am I?’ Christy tilted her head in challenge. ‘Last night you punched Jake.’
‘That was entirely different,’ Alessandro growled, the amusement in his eyes vanishing in a flash. ‘He was kissing you.’
‘And Katya was rubbing herself against you like a cat.’ She broke off and Alessandro sucked in a breath, his gaze suddenly thoughtful.
‘And you minded about that,’ he said softly, ‘so that’s good, is it not?’
‘Why would that possibly be good?’
‘Jealousy shows that feeling exists.’
Did it? Did he still have feelings for her? Or were his feelings all linked with his traditional, Mediterranean man’s view of family?
‘You didn’t think it was such a good thing last night when you split Jake’s lip,’ she pointed out, and Alessandro gave a wry smile.
‘Good point. OK.’ He gave a shrug of his broad shoulders that reflected his Latin heritage. ‘So we both admit we are hot-tempered and foolish and then you put my flowers in water and we go out to dinner.’ His sudden unexpected smile was so sexy and charismatic that she felt her stomach flip.
It had always been the same, she reflected weakly. One moment he was all seething, masculine volatility and the next all indolent, simmering sexuality.
‘Are you trying to talk me round?’
‘Perhaps.’ His voice was a lazy drawl as he slipped a firm hand round the back of her neck and trailed his fingers slowly through her hair. ‘Or perhaps we have done enough talking for one evening, querida. What do you think?’
She couldn’t think at all with him looking down at her with that slightly teasing, sexy gleam in his dark eyes.
‘I—We—’ She didn’t finish her sentence because he brought his mouth down on hers with passionate force, drugging her with the intensity of his kiss. She felt the strength in her knees dissolve and clutched at his broad shoulders for support.
And then he lifted his head, his gaze slumberous as he studied her face. ‘On second thoughts, let’s go out to dinner.’
She stared at him dizzily, her vision slightly hazy. ‘Sorry?’
‘If we stay here, I will seduce you,’ he declared without a trace of apology, ‘and then you might accuse me of being possessive or not being interested in you as a person. I hate the thought that Jake knows more about you than I do so I’m going to take you out and you are going to tell me everything.’
She almost laughed. It was typical of Alessandro to try and command a conversation. But at least he was trying. ‘All right,’ she said softly, basking in the masculine appreciation she saw in his eyes. ‘Let’s go out and I’ll tell you everything.’
* * *
He took her to a tiny restaurant by the side of the lake and they sat at a secluded table festively decorated with bunches of holly.
Alessandro picked up a menu and ordered and then looked at her with a wary expression on his handsome face. ‘Why are you looking at me like that?’
‘Do you realise that you never let me order my own food?’ ‘All right.’ He leaned back in his chair and gave a shrug. ‘What would you have ordered?’ ‘Smoked salmon and duck.’
He gave an arrogant smile. ‘So—I ordered you smoked salmon and duck. That makes me a genius, no?’ ‘It makes you controlling, Alessandro.’ He frowned. ‘It means I know you well.’ ‘It means you don’t even give me the choice.’ He let out a long breath and reached for his wine. ‘OK.’ Suddenly his Spanish accent sounded very pronounced. ‘So from now on, you want to order your own food. No problem.’
She hesitated. ‘It’s not just my food, Alessandro, it’s everything. I want to know that you care about my opinion. About me as a person.’
‘Of course I care about you as a person.’
‘And yet you didn’t want me to work in A and E.’
‘I was wrong in that,’ he conceded. ‘You have proved that you are still an excellent A and E nurse. Obviously you should be working in that area, not wasting your talents as a practice nurse. We will sort out a contract that allows you to be home for the children and work in the department.’
‘You’re doing it again!’ She stared at him in exasperation. ‘You’re telling me what I should do. Try asking me, Alessandro. Try asking me what I want. Believe it or not, I have an opinion, too.’
He muttered something in Spanish and sat back as their first course arrived. ‘All right.’ He paused while the waiter placed the plates in front of him and then gave her a smile. ‘I am asking you what you want. Tell me.’
‘I want to make my own choices,’ she said softly. ‘I want to decide what’s right for me as well as for the family. Yes, I want to be there for the children, of course I do. If anything, it’s even more important now they’re getting older and they have homework to do and friends to play with, but I can easily combine that with work and the mountain rescue team.’
Alessandro picked up his fork. ‘I want to know why you find Jake easy to talk to and not me.’ A strange expression flickered in his dark eyes. ‘Am I that intimidating?’
‘Not to me,’ she said quietly, ‘but you’re very self-confident and sure of yourself. And sometimes your confidence drives everything else along in its path. You’re very strong and you make decisions for people.’
He studied her through narrowed eyes. ‘But I have always been the same, I think.’
She gave a soft smile. ‘Yes, you have.’
‘You remember the first time we met?’
Colour flooded into her cheeks. ‘I’m not likely to forget.’
‘You were talking to Jake in the students’ bar,’ Alessandro said softly, ‘and I took one look at you and knew then that you were going to be mine.’
‘You grabbed me by the hand and dragged me across the road to that little restaurant—’
‘And then you came back to my place,’ Alessandro said in a deep, sexy drawl. ‘And we didn’t get out of bed for three days.’
Her colour deepened. ‘I got pregnant that weekend.’
‘And I was so pleased,’ Alessandro confessed with a complete lack of remorse. ‘It gave me a reason to marry you without having to suffer a long engagement.’
She stared down at the simple gold band on the finger of her left hand. At the time, getting engaged hadn’t seemed to matter. She’d been swept away by the force of his passion and the intensity of her love for him.
And that love had deepened over the years as she’d discovered what an amazing man he was.
But how had he felt about her? Had the novelty worn off? ‘All the women were after you.’
‘But I wanted only you.’
And how about now? she wanted to ask. How about now? Had he grown bored with the person she was? But she didn’t want to risk spoiling a nice evening by hearing something she didn’t want to hear and he was so obviously trying hard to listen to and understand her that she didn’t want to threaten the atmosphere.
‘It is true I am a strong person and that characteristic isn’t helped by the job I do,’ Alessandro confessed, disarmingly honest. ‘In A and E, I don’t operate by consensus. I am not going to stand there with an injured patient and ask everyone for an opinion on the correct treatment protocol. I am used to making snap decisions.’
And those snap decisions saved lives on a daily basis, Christy knew that. He was an incredibly skilled and talented doctor and his decisiveness and confidence was an important contributing factor in his success.
‘When people have a tricky patient, they always want you there,’ she said quietly, knowing that it was true. ‘You never panic.’
‘Panicking helps no one.’ Alessandro reached for a bread roll. ‘And confidence is important to everyone.’
Christy knew that to be true also. It was important to have someone competent in control. ‘If I had an accident, there’s no one I’d rather leading the trauma team,’ she said quietly, and he frowned.
‘You are not going to have an accident, but thank you for the compliment. But I have to learn to be less controlling with you, I can see that, and I will try.’
* * *
And he did.
Over the next few days he asked her opinion on everything and listened carefully, and Christy saw a whole new side to him.
Surely he couldn’t be making this much effort just for the children, she thought to herself. Surely his behaviour was an indication that he still had feelings for her?
The only physical contact they’d had had been the passionate sex they’d shared the night of the Snow Ball. And that hadn’t counted, she told herself miserably, because he’d been provoked.
Why was he still not touching her?
Alessandro had such a high sex drive that never before in their marriage had she found herself in the position of having to initiate sex, but now she was starting to wonder whether she should go down that route.
But what if he rejected her?
She bit back a hysterical giggle as she prepared the children’s lunch and got ready to take them to her mother’s for an afternoon of Christmas shopping. It must be awful being a man, she decided. They faced rejection every time they went near a woman.
She was just pouring coffee into mugs when Alessandro strode into the room, talking into his phone.
She could tell from his responses that he was talking to Sean about a rescue, and when he snapped the phone shut she looked at him expectantly.
‘Trouble?’
‘A party of teenagers were climbing in the gully and it avalanched.’
Christy winced. She knew how dangerous that climb could be because she’d done it herself plenty of times when she’d been younger.
‘How much do we know?’
Alessandro was already hauling equipment out of the utility room where it had been drying. ‘Two of them were above it and managed to get to the top and raise the alarm. The third is stuck on a ledge.’
‘So we’d do best to approach from the south-east ridge and then we’ll be above him. It’s just the best abseil,’ Christy breathed, and Alessandro scowled at her.
‘I always hated you doing that climb.’
She grinned. ‘It was fun.’
‘It was dangerous. And you have two children to think of now.’
Her smile faded. It was true, of course, and she would never take unnecessary risks. But at the same time she wished that sometimes he could think about her, rather than the children.
‘So are we the advance party?’
Alessandro nodded. ‘Yes, but it’s going to take a large team to get him down if he’s badly injured.’
Christy glanced out of the window. ‘At least the weather looks pretty good. Should be able to fly a helicopter in this.’
Katy danced into the room. ‘When are we going to Grandma’s?’
‘Right now.’ Alessandro grabbed the rest of the equipment and strode out of the kitchen, with Christy and the children hurrying close behind.
They dropped the children and then Alessandro drove out of town towards the road that would allow them to take the fastest route to the gully.
The sun glistened on the snow and Christy frowned. ‘Not a great day to climb that particular route,’ she murmured, casting her mind back to her own experiences. ‘The snow gets very soft if the sun is out.’
‘They’re fortunate that only one of them is injured,’ Alessandro growled as he swung the car into the lay-by and switched off the engine. Jake and Sean walked towards them.
‘We’ve got four hours before dark,’ Sean said, his expression grim as he stared up the path they needed to take. ‘Let’s shift.’
They walked fast and reached the top of the gully within an hour and half.
Alessandro immediately abseiled down the gully to assess the state of the injured boy, careful not to dislodge rocks as he went.
Below them, at the foot of the gully, Christy could see the deep, tumbled snow that had avalanched off the steep face.
‘They were lucky,’ she said to Jake, who was now beside her and delving into his pack for the ropes he was carrying. ‘They could have been buried under that.’
She watched as Alessandro attached the boy to his rope and saw him reach for his radio. Then he spoke to Sean, passing on details of his injuries.
‘We’re going to need to lower him to the bottom of the gully on a stretcher.’
Jake rolled his eyes and Christy grinned.
It was the most equipment-intensive rescue that they performed and immediately she started to identify safe anchor points that could be used to secure ropes.
While Alessandro gave first aid to the casualty and tried to ward off hypothermia, Christy and Jake set up the lowering belay for the stretcher and handlers.
‘This is going to be fun,’ Jake muttered, as he found another anchor point and then rigged the stretcher for a vertical lower. ‘Which mad fools are going to volunteer to act as barrow boys?’
The stretcher would be held by a static rope at both ends and helped down by two ‘barrow boys’ who were responsible for abseiling down alongside the stretcher to control the descent.
Each rope was secured to the crag by five equalised anchor points, and by the time the team had finished preparing, ropes were criss-crossing the crag.
It took another hour of intensive teamwork to lower the casualty safely to the bottom and move him out of reach of further avalanches.
While all three teenagers were protected in a bivvy tent, Alessandro did a more detailed survey of the injured boy and Sean communicated with the helicopter.
Fifteen minutes later they heard the familiar clack-clack and the helicopter came up the valley towards them. The helicopter dropped an orange smoke bomb to give an indication of wind speed and dir
ection and everyone made sure that everything was securely anchored down.
First Alessandro was winched into the helicopter, ready to receive the patient. Then the winch man was lifted with the stretcher across his waist, a high line preventing the stretcher from spinning round in the wind. Christy watched from the ground as the stretcher drew level with the open door and the winch operator helped ease the stretcher into the helicopter.
Then they jettisoned the high line and soared down the valley towards the hospital.
‘Which leaves us to get ourselves off this hill in darkness and freezing cold,’ Jake muttered. ‘Why does Alessandro always manage to hitch a lift?’
‘Because he’s a brilliant A and E doctor,’ Christy said as she started collecting equipment and preparing for their descent.
Jake looked at her. ‘Hero-worship?’
She gave a wry smile as she pushed a rope into her rucksack. ‘Possibly. But I think it’s love, unfortunately.’
‘Why unfortunately?’
‘I don’t know.’ Christy heaved her pack onto her back. ‘I suppose because I still don’t really know where I stand with him.’
‘Have you tried blunt conversation?’
She looked at him. ‘I suppose I’m afraid to do that,’ she said honestly. ‘Afraid I might push him into saying something I don’t want to hear.’
Like ‘I don’t really love you any more but I’m willing to make an effort because of the children’.
Jake glanced up at the lethal gully. ‘You just went up there without batting an eyelid and now you’re expecting me to believe that you’re afraid of having a conversation with your husband?’
‘That’s me.’ Christy scuffed at the snow with the toe of her boot. ‘Miss Coward.’
‘Hardly.’ Jake waited as the team picked up the last of the equipment and then they all started their descent into the valley.
CHAPTER NINE
CHRISTY collected the children from her mother’s and they were sparkly eyed, thoroughly over-excited and weighed down with various bags and rolls of wrapping paper.
‘When Santa came down the chimney,’ Ben sang loudly, and Katy grimaced.
‘Don’t sing. I’ll give you all my pocket money if you stop singing. It’s gross. If Father Christmas hears you he’ll take a detour because the noise is so terrible.’
