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Anna kept her arms wrapped around her body even after that first touch of Luke’s lips.
She’d needed to keep hold of herself in those seconds leading up to that kiss. Feeling the way his fingers splayed and claimed control of her head and her chin. Sensing the intent of this being far more significant than the last time they’d kissed.
She’d kept her eyes open as she watched his face dipping to meet hers. So slowly. And she’d held herself even more tightly with her own arms then because she’d been sure she was falling.
Desire had sucked her into some kind of vortex and she was spinning wildly. Totally out of control.
And then his lips had touched hers and moved over her mouth. Questing. Claiming. Giving. Demanding her involvement and response.
Sensations rippled through Anna and unlocked the awful tension that had been building from the moment she’d touched Jamie’s small, cold heart. Her skin tingled and seemed to melt and then her muscles gave up conscious control. Her arms let go of her own body and, instead, moved to hold Luke’s. She could feel the strength of his muscles and the steady thump of his heart and all the time his mouth was doing such amazing things to hers. Her bones were melting now. He could just scoop her into his arms and lay her down on the floor of this office and she’d willingly—
Luke pulled away and for a dazed moment all Anna could think of was holding on more tightly. Pulling him back.
‘Phone’s ringing,’ he said gently.
‘Oh.’ Anna put her hand to her mouth and took in a shaky breath. ‘I—I’d better answer it, hadn’t I?’
Luke was smiling at her.
Really smiling. His eyes were crinkled and the corners of his mouth had disappeared into those deep furrows beneath his cheeks.
‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘I think you had.’
She actually stumbled moving towards her desk. Heaven only knew what the intensive care consultant on the other end of the line thought of her initial stammered response but the content of the call was more than enough to bring her back to the present and reality. She put the phone down a moment later.
‘Jamie’s breathing on his own,’ she told Luke. ‘He squeezed his mum’s hand.’
To her horror, Anna felt tears gather in her eyes. She never cried. She most certainly never cried in front of a male colleague.
But Luke didn’t seem to mind. He reached out and pulled her into his arms. Not to kiss her this time but simply to hold her. For long enough to be more than a celebratory hug. Long enough for Anna to know that he understood exactly how she was feeling. Long enough for her to take several deep breaths and get her brain working properly again.
‘If we get up there soon, we might see him wake up and then we’ll get an idea of what kind of neurological impairment he might be left with.’
An hour later they were part of the group around Jamie’s bed in the intensive care unit as the young boy’s eyes flickered open. His father and older brother were there now, too, but it was his mother who was closest. The first person Jamie saw.
He blinked a few times. Opened his mouth and moved his lips but his brow furrowed as though he couldn’t find a way to make his mouth do what he wanted it to do. He stared blankly at the woman leaning so close to him, with tears running down her face.
Everybody present was holding their breath.
Luke and Anna were standing side by side. So closely their shoulders were pressed together. Unseen by anyone else in the cubicle, Luke’s hand moved just enough for his fingers to tangle with Anna’s.
Jamie tried again.
‘Mum?’ The word was croaky but clear. ‘What’s the matter?’
Anna felt her hand gripped so tightly it was painful but all she moved was her head. Just far enough to meet Luke’s gaze.
To see the triumph at the back of his eyes.
He let go of her hand before anyone could notice but that didn’t break the link. It was still there in his gaze. A connection that had taken them way beyond being merely colleagues.
He would come home with her tonight. Or she would go home with him. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t even a decision that needed to be discussed because it had already been made. Back in her office. Or maybe well before that but neither of them had taken that step forward.
Now they had taken that step and they both knew there was no going back.
CHAPTER EIGHT (#u0fd9fa9e-8b67-504f-afb7-a274a4ec0db3)
CRASH stayed at the farm up the road from Anna’s cottage.
‘He often does,’ she assured Luke. ‘That way I don’t disturb the Turners by collecting him if I have to work late. June loves him to bits. She would have kept him except that Doug put his foot down.’
She was talking quickly, Luke noticed, as the glow of realising she had kept the name he’d suggested for her puppy wore off. Was she nervous? Unsure she was making the right choice here, a passenger in his car as they drove away from St Piran’s hospital that evening?
He was feeling a bit uptight himself. Sex in an army camp was a lot easier than this. You got attracted or desperate for distraction and a tent or somewhere private was never far enough away to allow for second thoughts. No awkwardness. No pressure. No strings afterwards.
This was different.
There was danger here. For the peace of mind he was struggling to achieve. For the relationship with an important colleague that could get damaged. And for Anna … because she might get hurt. She might want something that he couldn’t give her.
Like commitment.
Curious that the prospect of hurting Anna outweighed the more personal ramifications this step could represent. He wanted to protect her. To turn his vehicle round and take her back to the hospital. Let Anna drive home to her small cottage. Alone.
Luke flicked a sideways glance at his passenger as he turned onto the road that led to his beachside house. She’d pulled out whatever it was she used to restrain her hair and it tumbled to her shoulders. Her hands were clasped in her lap and she was still wearing her power-dressing clothes.
Not for long, though. Luke found he had to lick suddenly dry lips. There was still time, he told himself. He could turn round. Tell her that he’d changed his mind and maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all, given how closely they needed to keep working together.
But Anna seemed to sense that quick glance and she turned her head as well. Her eyes seemed huge in a pale face as they drove under a streetlamp. Her lips were parted a little and maybe she was experiencing the same kind of dry mouth he was because she mirrored his own action and licked her lips. The action rendered Luke helpless to act on any good intentions. Almost ashamed of himself, he cleared his throat and it came out in a kind of growl.
Anna sighed, assuming the sound was related to the conversation she was using to fill the awkward journey.
‘I know, I was crazy to take on a puppy with the kind of hours I have to work but when I am at home he’s wonderful company.’
Oh, God … was she lonely?
The urge to protect this woman from being hurt morphed into something very different. He might not be able to offer commitment or any kind of a future but he could step, temporarily at least, into that void in her life and give her some companionship. The kind of closeness that would make her feel like she wasn’t alone in the world. That someone cared enough to give her pleasure.
That someone cared at all.
She wasn’t the only one here who needed that.
Anna was pleased that Luke didn’t draw the curtains in the bedroom he led her into. His house was almost on a beach. Not one of the rocky, dangerous coves that dotted this coast but a sandy stretch with enough width for smooth waves. The kind of gem tucked amongst the rocky ones that surfers loved to try and keep secret. She could see it because it was a clear, cold night and there was enough moonlight to not only show her the view but to mean that harsh electric lighting was unnecessary inside. That pleased her, too.
She had already declined an offer for any food or drink. That could come later. Or not. They were there for one reason and that was to continue the kiss that had begun in her office. To finish what had been started.
Standing here was different, however. Anna was too nervous to look at the bed so she stood in front of the big window that had the view of the beach and stared out. Luke came to stand very close behind her. His hands brushed her arms. A slow stroke from her elbows to her shoulders and back again and there his hands lingered.
‘Are you sure about this, Anna?’ he asked quietly. ‘It’s OK if you want to change your mind.’
She turned and it was suddenly very easy. As though his body warmth was an irresistible magnet. Her breast brushed his hand as she moved and the sensation blitzed any final nerves.
‘I don’t want to change my mind,’ she said softly. ‘Do you?’
By way of response, Luke bent his head and his lips touched hers. The chill of the evening outside was coming through the uncovered glass beside them and the pale light of the moon offered no pretence of warmth, but Anna had never felt heat like this.
Scorching her lips as Luke claimed her mouth. Trickling over her body with the touch of his hands as he undid the buttons of her blouse and undressed her. Building inside as she watched him strip and stand there, bathed in moonlight. Tall and lean and powerful. Magnificently male.
She wanted him to catch her in his arms and throw her onto the bed but, instead, he came to stand in front of her. Skin to skin. Her breasts pressed into the hardness of his chest and she could feel his arousal against her belly. He wanted her. As much as she wanted him. His arms came around her then and their lips met. In a kind of slow dance, moving as one person, they somehow made their way from the window to the bed and then they were lying together. A tangle of limbs and passionate kisses and a consuming need that brooked no delay other than Luke fishing in a bedside drawer for protection.
The few seconds of watching him was like being suspended in time and space for Anna. The piercing anticipation had to be the most delicious sensation she had ever experienced and she clung to it, knowing that it would end very soon. Wanting it to end so that she could feel Luke inside her. Touching parts of her body that had never felt so hollow. Reaching places that weren’t even physical.
She just knew he would be able to touch her soul.
Passion so intense had to explode and burn out in a dramatic climax and if that had been the end of it, it would have been incredibly satisfying on a physical level. Even better was that Luke smiled at Anna when they finally caught their breath.
‘Now we can really get to know each other,’ he promised.
And they did. A slow exploration of each other’s bodies. A shaping of muscles on Anna’s part with a compliment on how fit he must be. A tracing of Anna’s breast with a single finger that ran across the flatness of her stomach to her belly button.
‘You are beautiful,’ Luke told her.
She found the scars on Luke’s leg and he tried to move her hand but she resisted.
‘They’re part of you, Luke,’ she said gently. ‘Don’t hide. Please.’
He went very still as she touched the misshapen muscle of his thigh and the lumpy ridges of the scars.
‘Ugly, isn’t it?’ he ground out finally.
‘No. They tell me that you have courage. That you’re different.’ Anna propped herself up on one elbow to look down at Luke. Even in this half-light she could see the shadows in his eyes that were part of the scars she had just been touching. What she could feel on his leg was nothing compared to the scars that had to be still hidden.
‘Special,’ she added in a whisper, leaning down to kiss him. She tried to put what she couldn’t put into words into that kiss. To tell him that she accepted him for who he was. With scars. That she had courage too. That she could be trusted.
They made love again and this time it was slow and sweet and, in its wake, Anna fell asleep in Luke’s arms, drifting off in a cloud of utter contentment. Of promise. Of a hope so compelling it was safer to go to sleep than contemplate the notion that it might be unjustified.
She woke some time later to find herself alone in a strange bed. She lay there, listening, but the house had that peculiar kind of silence that told her she was alone within these walls. Turning her head, she caught the glow of a digital, bedside clock. It was 3 a.m. Where on earth was Luke?
Taking the rumpled sheet with her to wrap around her body, Anna climbed from the bed. Instinct took her straight to the window and she stared out, the way she had when she’d first entered this room. For a long minute it was too dark to see anything. Then the moon emerged from thick cloud and she saw him. On the beach.
Running.
How could he be doing that? Not just because it was the middle of the night and it had to be well below zero out there, but how hard would it have to be to do that, in soft sand, on a leg that was damaged enough to make him limp at a fast walking pace or put him in noticeable pain when he had to stand for any length of time?
He was more driven than Anna had suspected and it was disturbing. Maybe he wasn’t driving himself towards something. Maybe he was trying to run away.
He came back to the bed a while later, warm and fresh from a hot shower, and when he reached for Anna, she was happy to sacrifice further sleep to make love yet again. This time, however, there was an edge that hadn’t been there before. Concern for Luke. The knowledge that she was with a deeply troubled man.
When daylight broke, Luke was absent from the bed again but Anna knew where to look. He wasn’t running on the beach this time. She could see the dark shape striding into the surf. Diving into a breaking wave further out and then surfacing to swim, with a strong, steady stroke, parallel to the sand.
She had showered and dressed by the time Luke returned to the house. She saw him coming up the path in his wetsuit, carrying dripping flippers in one hand. His face registered surprise.
‘You’re not going to stay for breakfast?’
‘I’d better not. I need to collect Crash and I’ve got a huge list of things I want to get done on my day off. If I can finish the painting and get the windowsills sanded and varnished, I can put my bedroom back together properly tonight.’
‘Shall I come over after work and give you a hand?’
Anna hesitated. She could decline the offer and send a signal that she wanted to slow down whatever was happening between them. If she accepted, it would take them to a new level. The start of a relationship instead of a one-night stand.
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