Zach cleared his throat. It was time to get the elephant on its way. ‘Look, about the other night when I—’
‘It’s fine.’ She gave him another little twisted smile. ‘Really. It was just a kiss.’
‘I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong idea about me.’ He pushed a hand through his hair. ‘Contrary to what you might think, I’m not the sort of guy to feel up a woman as soon as he gets her alone.’
Her gaze slipped away from his. ‘It was probably my fault.’
He frowned down at her. ‘How was it your fault? I made the first move.’
‘I kissed you back.’ She bit her lower lip momentarily. ‘Rather enthusiastically, if I recall.’
He did recall.
He could recall every thrilling moment of that kiss.
The trouble was he wanted to repeat it. But a relationship with Izzy would be distracting, to say the least. He had to concentrate on getting his dad as independent as he could before he spared a thought to what he wanted. He hadn’t been that good at balancing the demands of a relationship and work in the past. It would be even worse now with his dad’s needs front and centre. He couldn’t spread himself any thinner than he was already doing.
His ex had always been on at him to give more of himself but he hadn’t felt comfortable with that level of emotional intimacy. He had loved Naomi...or at least he thought he had. Sometimes he wondered if he’d just loved being part of a couple. That was a large part of the reason he’d agreed to her moving in with him. Having someone there to share the sofa with while he zoned out the harrowing demands of the day in front of the television or over a meal he hadn’t had to cook.
He sounded like a chauvinist, but after living alone with his dad for all those years he’d snapped up Naomi’s willingness to take over the kitchen. Asking her to marry him had been the logical next step. Her refusal to move to the country with him after his father’s accident had been not so much devastating as disappointing. He was disappointed in himself. Why had he thought she would follow him wherever life took him? She had her own career. It was unfair of him to demand her to drop everything and come with him. And living in the dry, dusty Outback on a sheep property with a partially disabled and disgruntled father-in-law was a big ask.
Zach blinked himself out of the past. ‘Do you want to eat outside? There’s a nice breeze coming in from the south. Dad and I often eat out there when a southerly is due.’
‘Lovely. Can I help bring anything out?’
He handed her a pair of salad servers and a bottle of dressing.
Her fingers brushed against his as she took the bottle from him and a lightning-fast sensation went straight to his groin. He felt the stirring of his blood; the movement of primal instinctive flesh that wanted something he had denied it for too long.
Her eyes met his, wide, doe-like, the pupils enlarged. Her tongue—the tongue he had intimately stroked and sucked and teased—darted out over her lips in a nervous sweeping action. He caught a whiff of her fragrance, wisteria this time instead of gardenias, but just as alluring.
But then the moment passed.
She seemed to mentally gather herself, and with another one of those short on-off smiles she turned in the direction of the veranda, her ponytail swinging behind her.
Zach looked down at Popeye, who was looking up at him with a quizzical expression in those black button eyes. ‘Easy for you. You’ve had the chop. I have to suffer the hard way. No pun intended.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
IZZY PUT THE salad servers and the dressing on the glass-topped white cane table then turned and looked at the view from the veranda. The paddocks stretched far into the distance where she could see a line of trees where the creek snaked in a sinuous curve along the boundary of the property. The air was warm with that hint of eucalyptus she was coming to love. It was such a distinctive smell, sharp and cleansing. The setting sun had painted the sky a dusky pink, signalling another fine day for tomorrow, and a flock of kookaburras sounded in the trees by the creek, their raucous call fracturing the still evening air like the laughter of a gang of madmen.
She turned when she heard the firm tread of Zach’s footsteps on the floorboards of the veranda. Popeye was following faithfully, his bright little eyes twinkling in the twilight. Zach looked utterly gorgeous dressed casually in blue denim jeans and a light blue cotton shirt that was rolled up to his forearms. The colour of his shirt intensified the blue rim in his grey eyes and the deep tan of his skin.
Her stomach gave a little flutter when he sent her a quick smile. He was so devastatingly attractive when he lost that grim look. The line of his jaw was still firm, he was too masculine for it ever to be described as anything but determined, but his mouth was sensual and sensitive rather than severe, as she had earlier thought.
Her mouth tingled in memory of how those lips had felt against hers. She remembered every moment of that heart-stopping kiss. It was imprinted on her memory like an indelible brand. She wondered if she would spend the rest of her life recalling it, measuring any subsequent kisses by its standard.
He had deftly changed the subject when she had stumblingly tried to explain her actions of the other night. He had given an apology of sorts for kissing her, but he hadn’t said he wasn’t going to do it again. She was not by any means a vain person but she was woman enough to know when a man showed an interest in her. He might be able to keep his expression masked and his emotions under lock and key but she had still sensed it.
She had felt it in his touch.
She had tasted it in his kiss.
She sensed it now as he handed her the glass of wine she had left behind. His eyes held hers for a little longer than they needed to, something passing in the exchange that was unspoken but no less real. She tried to avoid touching his fingers this time. It was increasingly difficult to disguise the way she reacted to him. Would any other man stir her senses quite the way he did? Her body seemed to have a mind of its own when he came near. It was like stepping inside the pull of a powerful magnet. She felt the tug in her flesh, the entire surface of her skin stretching, swelling to get closer to him.
‘Thanks.’ She took a careful sip of wine. ‘Mmm...lovely. Is that a local one?’
He showed her the label. ‘It’s from a boutique vineyard a couple of hundred kilometres away. I went to boarding school with the guy who owns it.’
‘How old were you when you went to boarding school?’
‘Eleven.’ He swirled the wine in his glass, watching as it splashed around the sides with an almost fierce concentration. ‘It was the year after my mother left.’ He raised the glass and took a mouthful, the strong column of his throat moving as he swallowed deeply.
‘Were you dreadfully homesick?’
He glanced at her briefly before looking back out over the paddocks that were bathed in a pinkish hue instead of their tired brown. ‘Not for long.’
Izzy suspected he had taught himself not to feel anything rather than suffer the pain of separation. Homesickness—like love—would be another emotion he had barred from his repertoire. His iron-strong reserve had come about the hard way—a lifetime of suppressing feelings he didn’t want to own. She pictured him as an eleven-year-old, probably tall for his age, broad shouldered, whipcord lean and tanned, and yet inside just a little boy who had desperately missed his mother.
She pushed herself away from the veranda rail where she had been leaning her hip. ‘I went to boarding school when I was eight. I cried buckets.’
‘Eight is very young.’ His voice had a gravelly sound to it and his gaze looked serious and concerned, as if he too was picturing her as a child—that small, inconsolable little pigtailed girl with her collection of Barbie dolls in a little pink suitcase.
‘Yes...but somehow I got through it. I haven’t got any sisters so the company of the other girls was a bonus.’ Or it was when I met Hannah.
‘Any brothers?’
Izzy felt that painful stab to her heart again. It didn’t m
atter how many years went past, it was always the same. She found the question so confronting. It was like asking a first-time mother who had just lost her baby if she was still a mother. ‘Not any more...’ She swallowed to clear the lump in her throat. ‘My brother Jamie died five years ago of sarcoma. He was diagnosed when he was fourteen. He was in remission for twelve years and then it came back.’
‘I’m sorry.’ The deep gravitas in his voice was strangely soothing.
‘He wasn’t diagnosed early enough.’ She gripped the rails of the veranda so tightly the wood creaked beneath her hands. ‘He would’ve had a better chance if he’d gone to a doctor earlier but he was at boarding school and didn’t tell anyone about his symptoms until he came home for the holidays.’ She loosened her grip and turned back to look at him. ‘I think that’s what tortures me most. The thought that he might’ve been saved.’
His eyes held hers in a silent hold that communicated a depth of understanding she hadn’t thought him capable of on first meeting him. His quiet calm was a counterpoint to her inner rage at the cruel punch the fist of fate had given to her family and from which they had never recovered.
‘Are your parents still together?’
‘Yes, but they probably shouldn’t be.’ Izzy saw the slight questioning lift of his brow and continued. ‘My father’s had numerous affairs over the years. Even before Jamie’s death. In fact, I think it started soon after Jamie was diagnosed. Mum’s always clung to her comfortable life and would never do or say anything to jeopardise it, which is probably why she doesn’t understand why I ended things with Richard.’
‘Why did you break it off with him?’
Izzy looked into his blue-rimmed eyes and wondered if he was one of that increasingly rare breed of men who would take his marriage vows seriously, remaining faithful, loyal and devoted over a lifetime. ‘I know this probably sounds ridiculously idealistic, romantic even, but I’ve always wanted to feel the sort of love that stops you in your tracks. The sort that won’t go stale or become boring. The sort of love you just know is your one and only chance at happiness. The sort of love you would give everything up for. I didn’t feel that for Richard. It wasn’t fair to him to go on any longer pretending I did.’
His top lip lifted in a cynical manner. ‘So in amongst all those medical textbooks and journals you’ve managed to sneak in a few romance novels, have you?’
Izzy could have chosen to be offended by his mockery but instead she gave a guilty laugh. ‘One or two.’ She toyed with the stem of her glass. ‘My friend Hannah thinks I’m a bit of a romance tragic.’
‘What did she send you in that package? A stack of sentimental books?’
‘If only.’ She laughed again to cover her embarrassment. Just as well it was dark enough for him not to see her blush.
‘What, then?’
‘Please don’t make me tell you.’
‘Come on.’ His smile was back and it was just as spine-melting as before. ‘You’ve really got my attention now.’
And you’ve got mine. ‘Promise not to laugh?’
‘Promise.’
She let out a breath in a rush. ‘A blow-up doll. A male one. I’ve called him Max.’
He threw his head back and laughed. He had a nice-sounding laugh, rich and deep and genuine, not booming and raucous like Richard’s when he’d had one too many red wines.
Izzy gave him a mock glare. ‘You promised not to laugh!’
‘Sorry.’ He didn’t look sorry. His lips were still twitching and his eyes twinkled with amusement.
‘Hannah thought a stand-in boyfriend would stop me from being lonely. I think I already told you she has a weird sense of humour.’
‘Are you going to take him with you when you move on?’
‘I’m not sure the Sawyers will appreciate him as part of the furniture.’
‘Where do you head after here?’ The question was casual. Polite interest. Nothing more.
‘Brisbane,’ Izzy said. ‘I’ve got a job lined up in a busy GP clinic. After that I have a stint in Darwin. The locum agency is pretty flexible. There’s always somewhere needing a doctor, especially out in the bush. That’s why I took this post. The guy they had lined up had to pull out at the last minute due to a family crisis. I was happy to step in. I’m enjoying it. Everyone’s been lovely.’
Zach absently rubbed the toe of his booted foot against one of the uneven floorboards. ‘Everyone, apart from my father.’
‘I haven’t given up on him.’
The silence hummed as their gazes meshed again.
Izzy’s breath hitched on something, like a silk sleeve catching on a prickly bush. She moistened her lips as his gaze lowered to her mouth, her stomach feeling as if a tiny fist had reached through her clothes and clutched at her insides.
Male to female attraction was almost palpable in the air. She could feel it moving through the atmosphere like sonic waves. It spoke to her flesh, calling all the pores of her skin to lift up in a soft carpet of goose-bumps, each hair on her head to stand up and tingle at the roots. A hot wire fizzed in her core, sparking a wave of restless energy unlike anything she had ever felt before. It moved through her body, making her as aware of her erogenous zones as if he had reached out and kissed and caressed each one in turn. Her neck, just below her ears, her décolletage, her breasts, the base of her spine, the backs of her knees, her inner thighs...
His eyes moved from her gaze to her mouth and back again. He seemed to be fighting an internal battle. She could see it being played out on his tightly composed features. Temptation and common sense were waging a war and it seemed he hadn’t yet decided whose team he was going to side with.
‘Are you still in love with your ex?’ It was a question Izzy couldn’t stop herself asking. Was a little shocked she had.
The night orchestra beyond the veranda filled the silence for several bars. The percussion section of insects. A chorus of frogs. A lonely solo from a stone curlew.
Izzy found herself holding her breath, hoping he wasn’t still in love with his ex-fiancée. Why? She couldn’t answer. Didn’t want to answer. Wasn’t ready to answer.
‘No.’ The word was final. Decisive. It was as if a line had been drawn in his head and he wasn’t going back over it.
‘But you were hurt when she ended things?’
He gave her a look she couldn’t quite read. ‘How did your ex take it when you broke things off?’
‘Remarkably well.’
One of his brows lifted. ‘Oh?’
‘He found a replacement within a matter of days.’ Izzy looked at the contents of her glass rather than meet his gaze. ‘Don’t get me wrong...I didn’t want him to be inconsolable or anything, but it was a slap in the face when he found someone so completely the opposite of me and so quickly.’
‘Why did you accept his proposal in the first place?’ Was that a hint of censure in his tone?
Izzy thought back to the elaborate proposal Richard had set up. A very public proposal that had made her feel hemmed in and claustrophobic. She hadn’t had the courage to turn him down and make him lose face in front of all of her friends and colleagues. The banner across the front of the hospital with Will You Marry Me, Izzy? emblazoned on it had come has a complete and utter shock to her on arriving at work. She could still see Richard down on bended knee, with the Remington heirloom engagement ring taken out of his family’s bank vault especially for the occasion, his face beaming with pride and enthusiasm.
No had been on her tongue but hadn’t made it past her embarrassed smile. She’d told herself it was the right thing to do. They’d known each other for years. They’d drifted into casual dating and then into a physical relationship. He had been one of Jamie’s close friends and had stuck by him during every gruelling bout of chemo. Her parents adored him. He was part of the family. It was her way of staying connected with her lost brother. ‘Lots of reasons.’
‘But not love.’
‘No.’ Izzy let out a breath that felt li
ke she had been holding it inside her chest for years. ‘That’s why I came out here, as far away from home as possible. I want to know who I am without Richard or my parents telling me what to do and how and when I should do it. My parents have expectations for me. I guess all parents do, but I’ve got my own life to live. They thought I was wasting my time going to medical school when I have enough money behind me to never have to work. But I want to make a difference in people’s lives. I want to be the one who saves someone’s brother for them, you know?’
Zach’s gaze was steady on hers, his voice low and husky. ‘I do know.’
Izzy bit her lip. Had she told him too much? Revealed too much? She put her glass down. ‘Sorry. Two sips of wine and I’m spilling all my secret desires.’ She gave a mental cringe at her choice of words. ‘Maybe I should just leave before I embarrass you as well as myself.’
Zach blocked her escape by placing a hand on her arm. ‘What do you think would happen if we followed through on this?’
Her skin sizzled where his hand lay on her arm. She could feel the graze of the rough callus on his fingers, reminding her he was a man in every sense of the word. ‘Um...I’m not sure what you mean. Follow through on what?’
His eyes searched hers for a lengthy moment. ‘So that’s the way you’re going to play it. Ignore it. Pretend it’s not there.’ He gave a little laugh that sounded very deep and very sexy. ‘That could work.’
Izzy pressed her lips together, trying to summon up some willpower. Where had it gone? Had she left it behind in England? It certainly wasn’t here with her now. ‘I think it’s for the best, don’t you?’
Flirting with the Socialite Doc (Mills & Boon Medical) Page 7
