by Amy Andrews
‘I said when do you want to start?’
Nat’s brain grappled with the simple sentence, her annoyance growing. Oh, for crying out aloud, it was just a chest! No reason to lose her mind. Every man had one. Rob had had one. Except, of course, she’d never felt this inexplicable primal swell of lust at the mere sight of Rob. Not even in the beginning.
‘Soon. A few minutes.’ She pushed away from the bench, the need to get the hell away from him becoming imperative. ‘And for God’s sake,’ she snapped, annoyed at him. And herself. ‘Put a shirt on.’
Alessandro stared after her as she stormed out, pleased she and her damn bows were out of sight. Even if his
erection wasn’t.
Fifteen minutes later they were all sitting on their haunches in Julian’s stark room with one of the two boxes marked Child in front of them. Alessandro took a deep breath before taking a Stanley knife to the packing tape.
Nat could see he was nervous. Hell, so was she. After all, Alessandro could be right—what if this whole thing backfired and Julian couldn’t handle the memories? What if it upset him too much? If he became inconsolable? But she knew, deep down, that whatever the emotional fallout, father and son needed this.
His biceps drew her gaze, bunching and moving beneath his sleeves as he opened the flaps. She shut her eyes against the temptation—obviously a shirt made little difference to her wandering gaze.
Alessandro opened the box and there, on top, sat Julian’s old rabbit.
‘George!’ Julian snatched up the rather forlorn-looking creature that had obviously seen better days and gave it an enthusiastic hug. ‘I missed you, George!’
Watching the reunion, Alessandro felt utterly dreadful. Julian could have had George weeks ago. He hadn’t even been aware that the toy had been packed. Or even noticed that Julian had been without him until Nat had prompted him that day at the créche.
What kind of a father did that make him?
He glanced at Nat and she smiled at him and nodded. ‘What else have we got in here?’ she prompted.
Julian clung to his rabbit and peered into the box expectantly. They pulled out clothes and toys and books and colourful wall hangings and an exquisite mobile of stars and moons. They were made of brightly coloured glass that formed a whirlpool of colour when the pieces twirled.
‘This is beautiful,’ Nat gasped as Alessandro lifted it from the box. She could tell it was hand-made, the craftsmanship patently obvious.
‘Nonna gave it to me.’
Alessandro looked at his son as Julian reached out and pushed one of the stars with a finger. He smiled. ‘That’s right.’
His mother had brought it in Murano when she’d been visiting relatives in Venice. He remembered how Julian would lie on his back for ages as a baby in his cot and watch the constellations swing above him in a kaleidoscope of colour.
Julian looked at his father and clutched George tighter. ‘Can you hang it above my bed like in London?’
Alessandro expelled a breath he hadn’t even realised he’d been holding. It was probably the first time Julian had directly addressed him for anything remotely personal. He nodded. ‘Of course.’
They spent a couple of hours putting things to rights in Julian’s room, hanging and placing, father and son interacting properly for the first time. And when they’d finished, the room was hardly recognisable. It actually looked like a child lived in it instead of a robot.
There was one thing left in the box and Nat reached for it. It was a box of fish food. She held it up and raised her eyebrows at Alessandro. Julian looked at it and held out his hand for it.
He turned to his father. ‘It’s Gilbert and Sullivan’s food.’
Alessandro looked at the tin. He had bought the fish for Julian’s third birthday. Julian had thought he was Superman. Camilla, however, had not been impressed. She certainly hadn’t mourned their passing.
‘You had fish?’ she addressed Julian.
Julian nodded. ‘Daddy bought them for my birthday. But they got sick and died.’
‘Ah.’ Poor kid. His mother had died, his fish had died and he’d had to leave his cat behind. She waited for tears or withdrawal but he seemed quite matter-of-fact. She glanced at Alessandro. He seemed more affected, the ghost of a smile she’d glimpsed a moment ago gone.
Alessandro’s heart thudded in his chest as he contemplated taking the next step forward. ‘I can buy you some more,’ he offered tentatively.
Julian’s face lit up. ‘Really?’
‘Really.’
Nat felt a lump lodge in her throat at the fragile connection that was being built in just two hours between father and son. Sure, there was a long way to go but it was a start. Alessandro glanced at her and smiled. Actually smiled.
And despite her resolve to keep some distance from him, she grinned back like an idiot.
A couple of days later Nat was working triage when her friend Paige walked through the doors, cradling her listless-looking three-year-old daughter McKenzie. The child looked pale, her limbs mottled.
Paige had been through the wringer in the last few years. McKenzie, a twin, had been born at twenty-seven weeks. She and her twin sister, Daisy, had been very frail and while McKenzie had defied the odds, Daisy had died after a four-month, uphill battle.
It had been a devastating time, compounded by her husband leaving shortly after and McKenzie’s chronic health issues. Paige looked tired and pinched around the mouth, her brow furrowed. A far cry from the vibrant woman she’d known back in Perth.
Nat didn’t know how she kept going. Not only did she care for her high-needs daughter but she also had to work part time as Arnie, her ratfink ex, refused to pay for anything more than he absolutely had to.
‘Paige, what’s wrong?’ she asked.
‘It’s McKenzie. I think she’s got another chest infection.’
Nat heard the tremor in her friend’s voice and ushered her into the privacy of the small triage room. Paige looked as if she was at breaking point and Nat knew her friend, who was running on pride alone, would hate to break down in front of an emergency room full of strangers.
Paige sat in a chair, hugging McKenzie close. She turned beseeching eyes on Nat. ‘She’s due to have her operation next week, Nat.’ She rocked slightly, choking on a sob. ‘It took me eighteen months to get her off oxygen and two years to get her to ten kilos and we’ve had to postpone it three times. Not again, please not again.’
Nat gave Paige’s shoulder a squeeze. ‘Hey, one step at a time, okay? Let’s get her seen to first, huh? I’ll just take her temp.’
Paige looked at Nat as she placed the digital thermometer under an unprotesting McKenzie’s arm. She gave her friend a watery smile. ‘Sorry. Of course. It’s just I don’t know if I can take much more of this. Thank God for Mum and Dad or I would have gone mad years ago.’
Nat laughed. Paige’s parents had been a terrific support after Arnie had abandoned their daughter. ‘You’re doing fine, Paige. Just fine.’
The thermometer beeped, confirming an alarmingly high temp. ‘When did you last give her something for her fever?’ Nat asked gently.
‘Just before I got in the car,’ Paige said.
Nat placed a stethoscope in her ears and listened to McKenzie’s chest. It sounded like a symphony orchestra conducted by a tone-deaf conductor inside her chest—wheezing, squeaking and crackling away. She slipped a saturation probe onto McKenzie’s toe and the number only read 90 per cent. Paige looked at Nat and worried her bottom lip with her teeth.
‘Come on. Come through and I’ll get Alessandro to look at her.’
Paige stood. ‘I hear he’s excellent.’
Nat nodded, avoiding her friend’s gaze. ‘The very best.’
Nat set Paige up in a cubicle and placed a set of nasal prongs on McKenzie’s face. The child, well used to the plastic in her nose and too sick to care, didn’t protest. Nat used a low-flow meter to set the oxygen at a trickle. She smiled at Paige, her heart going
out to her utterly exhausted friend. ‘I’ll be right back.’
Nat found Alessandro in the cubicle they used for eye patients. It was set up with a special microscope for highpowered viewing of the eye. She’d triaged Bill Groper fifteen minutes ago after a workplace accident had seen boiling fat splashed into his eye.
Alessandro was leaning forward in his chair, his feet flat on the floor, his legs wide apart to accommodate the low table the microscope rested on. He was staring into the eyepieces, examining his patient’s eyes. Bill sat opposite, his chin on the plate, looking in from the other side.
She noticed immediately how the position emphasised the broad expanse of Alessandro’s back and how it tapered down to narrow hips. One strong leg, bent at the knee, was positioned slightly out to the side and the dark fabric of his trousers pulled across his thigh, outlining the slab of muscle she knew, from living in close proximity, defined his upper leg.
She waited for him to finish, knowing that Paige needed time to pull herself together and McKenzie’s condition would benefit from the supplemental oxygen.
‘You certainly did a good job of it, Bill,’ Alessandro murmured. ‘Bull’s-eye on your cornea.’ He pulled away from the eyepieces. He noticed a figure in his peripheral vision and felt his abdominals contract. He didn’t have to turn his head to know it was Nat. His body seemed to have a sixth sense when she was around.
‘Never do anything by halves, Doc.’
Nat felt a similar awareness and sensed rather than saw his momentary eyelid flicker, which told her he knew she was there. It was probably imperceptible to most, but after a few days of cohabitation and an almost electric awareness of him, she was coming to know all his cues—both obvious and subtle.
Alessandro continued with his patient. ‘It’s not too bad, though, only superficial by the look of it. Some antibiotic eyedrops should work like a charm.’
Nat lounged against the doorframe and waited. She was used to him ignoring her now anyway. It was a policy they’d both adopted. And as far as it went, it wasn’t such a bad idea. There was an attraction there. He knew it. She knew it. It hummed between them like a palpable force, like powerful magnets irresistibly drawn to each other.
But acknowledging it out loud was just plain dumb when neither of them was going to do anything about it. So they were polite. They addressed each other when required and worked together with utter professionalism. In short they carried on as if nothing had ever happened.
Like he’d never licked Napolitano sauce off her chest.
Alessandro stood and Nat spoke. ‘Excuse me, Dr Lombardi. I have a patient you need to see.’
Alessandro looked at her fully then and gave her a brief nod before turning back to his patient. He held out his hand and shook Bill’s. ‘I’ll send someone in with some drops for you.’
Nat stepped back from the doorway as Alessandro headed towards her. She could see tension in his shoulders as the looseness with which he’d shaken Bill’s hand disappeared and his face drew back into grim lines.
‘Three-year-old ex-twenty-seven-weeker. Twin one. Twin two died at four months of age.’
She fell into step beside him, ignoring the lurch of her cells, and launched into the standard summary she’d give any doctor she was handing over to. Here at St Auburn’s she was a nursing professional and she would be professional if it killed her. Even if she did want to find the nearest vacant room and tear all his clothes off.
‘Chronic neonatal lung disease, oxygen dependent for first two years of life, recurrent chest infections, failure to thrive. I think she’s brewing another infection. Febrile. Sats ninety on room air. Bilateral chest crackles. Listless. Cool peripherally and mottled.’
Alessandro nodded as they walked. ‘What was her birth weight?’
Nat struggled to keep up with Alessandro’s stride, which seemed to lengthen with each footfall. ‘Twelve hundred grams.’
‘How many days ventilated.’
‘Twenty.’ The answers to his spitfire questions were well known to her but his emotionless firing of them was irritating.
‘Which cube?’
‘Eleven,’ she said as they drew level with the central nurses’ station.
Alessandro nodded. He could smell that flower-garden scent he was becoming so familiar with and, as usual, he had the craziest urge to bury his face in her neck. It didn’t seem to matter how fast he walked, he couldn’t outrun it. ‘Chart?’
She handed the thick file to him but kept hold of it. Alessandro frowned at her. ‘Problemo?’
‘Paige is that friend of mine I told you about in the lift that day. She lost a baby, her husband walked out and she’s dealing with McKenzie’s fragile health. McKenzie’s implant operation has been postponed three times in the last year and she’s supposed to go in next week for it and that probably won’t happen now so Paige is…a little emotional at the moment. Just…I don’t know…’ She looked at his grim face. ‘Smile or something.’
He clenched his jaw and, ignoring her jibe, cut straight to the chase. ‘Implant?’
‘Sorry,’ Nat dismissed, letting go of the chart as she realised she’d left out a vital part of patient history. ‘Cochlear implant. McKenzie’s profoundly deaf.’
Alessandro looked down at the bulging chart and then back at her. ‘Are you coming?’
He didn’t wait for an answer and Nat followed him in. The harsh screech of the curtain as he snapped it back didn’t bode well and she castigated herself for irritating him just prior to seeing Paige.
Alessandro’s gaze encompassed the mother and listless diminutive little girl, hearing aids firmly in place. He gave Paige a gentle smile. She looked utterly exhausted. She looked like he’d felt for the last year and he felt an instant surge of empathy. ‘Hello, I’m Alessandro,’ he said, and signed it too.
Nat’s eyes bugged, as did Paige’s. ‘Oh. You sign?’ she exclaimed.
Alessandro gave a self-deprecating shrug. He had learned the English sign language when he’d moved to London which he believed was similar to what they used here. ‘In a fashion.’ He smiled. ‘I have an aunt in Italy, who’s profoundly deaf. I spent a lot of time there as a kid. She was like a second mother to me. My cousin Val, her son, is a renowned cochlear implant surgeon in London.’
He signed as he spoke without giving it conscious thought. Not that McKenzie cared or could probably even understand his mixture of sign language but it was second nature to him when he was in the company of a deaf person.
Nat shook her head, marvelling at the change in Alessandro when he was with a patient. He was great with McKenzie, getting her X-rayed, admitting her for intravenous antibiotics when the films revealed bilateral consolidation and quickly and efficiently placing a drip.
He was especially good with Paige, chatting about signlanguage differences and asking her about the scheduled operation. He was like a different man.
Involved. Animated. Connected.
Now, if he could just be more like that at home she could walk out of their lives in a couple of months knowing it had all been worth it.
Even if it meant having to go to bed every night with a fire in her belly and a buzz in her blood that wouldn’t quit.
Chapter Six
ON FRIDAY Nat was sitting on the quiet mat at créche with Julian and another boy, Henry. She was trying to encourage a friendship between them. Henry was a nice kid who had been trying to engage Julian for a little while now with not much success.
It wasn’t that Julian didn’t like Henry—she could tell he did. But he still shied away from other kids, preferring to keep to himself or follow her around. Julian was more than happy to play and talk with Henry as long as she was there as well.
Henry had brought in some photos of his family holiday to New Zealand and they were going through them. There was a beautiful shot of Henry and his mother. He was sitting in her lap, facing the camera. She had her arms crossed across his front, pulling his back in tight to her chest. They were looking at
each other, she looking down, Henry looking up and laughing. A massive mountain gave the background some perspective.
Julian took the photo reverently, being careful to only touch the corner as he’d been taught. ‘Is that your mummy?’
Julian didn’t take his eyes off the photo and the look on his face was heart-breaking. It suddenly struck Nat that there were no photos of Julian’s mother anywhere. She’d been so distracted by the starkness of the neverending white, so snow blind, she hadn’t even thought about that.
Goodness, her mother had practically set up a shrine to her father after he’d gone. Despite the fact that he’d deserted them. But she’d been determined to maintain contact, to keep his memory fresh for Nat’s sake.
Pity her father hadn’t tried as hard.
But there wasn’t even a framed picture for Julian to put on his beside table. No family portraits hung on the wall. Come to think of it, not even Alessandro had pictures of the wife he so obviously mourned. Not in his office or his bedroom. It was almost as if she never existed at all.
Was it too painful for him to even look at her? Was his grief still that profound?
And why did the thought depress her so much?
She made up her mind to ask Alessandro about it tonight after Julian went to bed. It seemed to have become her role to ask the hard questions. To be the bad guy. It certainly hadn’t taken her long to realise that as much as Alessandro wanted to reach his son he was still floundering and relied heavily on her to facilitate it. They both did. She was like the buffer between them, the referee, and her ruling was final.
Alessandro seemed more than happy for her to take up where his wife had left off. Be some kind of substitute mother to Julian. And she knew that was about his grief more than shirking his duties, that he’d been knocked sideways and was groping in the dark. But she wasn’t living with them so Alessandro could hide from his son, to maintain his emotional distance.
