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‘Of course I’m not a nurse!’
‘Just when your father said you were a great little nurse I thought…’
‘I’ve got brothers—I can stick on a plaster. I’m not Florence Nightingale…!’
‘True. Nobody with an ounce of caring in their body could stand there watching me struggle like this.’ He stood there, one arm inserted in his shirt, wondering what to do next.
‘If that was a hint, you’re really pushing it!’ she growled. ‘What if someone asks me to do something…nursey?’ she worried hoarsely.
‘Is that likely?’ he drawled, managing to project the distinct impression he found her complaints slightly hysterical.
It occurred to Darcy that they were drifting away from the real cause of her simmering anger. ‘Don’t try and change the subject,’ she growled.
One slanted dark brow quirked. ‘Which was…?’
‘I’m not your wife!’
‘This is true,’ he conceded with an expression that suggested he was mightily relieved about this. ‘I didn’t think you’d mind—it’s not like I’m actually asking you to marry me or anything drastic.’
‘For your information, I’ve been proposed to several times!’ she felt goaded into unwisely boasting.
‘Congratulations,’ he drawled, looking amused.
Darcy’s cheeks were burning with humiliation as she discovered a major flaw in his manipulations. ‘What were you going to do if I’d driven straight off?’
‘I knew you wouldn’t do that,’ he stated confidently.
‘How could you possibly…?’
‘You’d be eaten up by guilt if you did. You’re deeply into doing the right thing.’ He made it sound like a flaw in her character. ‘Be a sport, Darcy,’ he cajoled.
‘I’m not lying for you.’
He sighed. ‘Just don’t say you’re not, that’s all I’m asking. It’s no skin off your nose. Walk out of here with me and then you’ll never have to see me again.’
Darcy’s shoulders slumped in defeat. ‘I must be mad…’
A wolfish grin split his lean, dark face. ‘Good girl,’ he approved.
Further comments were made impossible by the arrival of the nurse who’d directed Darcy here originally.
‘I’ve come to suture your head wound,’ the young man explained.
Darcy took the opportunity to excuse herself. ‘I’ll wait outside.’ Halfway through the curtain, she paused. ‘Are you going to give him a local anaesthetic?’ she asked the young nurse.
He looked confused. ‘Well, yes,’ he admitted.
‘Pity!’ Darcy declared maliciously.
The sound of husky laughter followed her down the corridor.
CHAPTER THREE (#ud852a80d-a343-5eee-9512-0f0e7d751d2d)
‘GOODBYE, Mrs Erskine…Mr Erskine,’ the young receptionist gushed breathily as she left them with obvious reluctance at the swing-doors.
Darcy gave a sigh of relief as the doors swung shut. The red carpet was about the only thing that had been missing and, given enough time, she had the impression the smitten young woman would have produced that too. At least she could drop the wifey act now.
‘What are we?’ Darcy grouched, intensely relieved to be out of the place and out of her role. ‘Visiting royalty? Do you always have this effect on people?’
‘What effect is that?’
Darcy raised a sceptical brow. ‘Like you didn’t notice!’ she hooted. ‘The woman was deferential, bordering on obsequious.’
Despite the enigmatic smile she received in reply, Darcy got the impression he was even less pleased than she was by the VIP treatment.
The rain had stopped, but it had started to freeze, making the pavement underfoot lethally slippery. Darcy moved cautiously past the men who were gritting the entrance to the hospital, smiling in a distracted way at them as she passed. The gravel was crunchy underfoot as they passed the tall, twinkly Christmas tree, and a layer of sparkling frost added to the festive look in a way that expensive ornaments never could.
She only just stopped herself mentioning how much she loved the smell of pine to the wet blanket beside her.
‘Where are we parked?’
Even though she hadn’t forgotten the tall, commanding presence at her side—chance would be a fine thing—she started when he spoke. It made her realise how uptight and wound up the whole play-acting thing in the hospital had made her. Her fellow conspirator, on the other hand, had seemed almost to relish his role, or maybe it was her discomfort he enjoyed…? Considering the glimpses she’d had of his warped sense of humour, the latter seemed the most likely explanation.
‘We…?’ She lifted her eyes to his face, but not for long—for some reason she felt oddly reluctant to maintain contact.
Like a silly, lust-struck teenager afraid to look the unattainable object of her fantasies in the eyes! Self-disgust curled in her belly. Grow up, Darcy!
By the time she had sternly told herself to stop acting so wet, he had paused under the blue-white beam of an overhead light and was making a careful minor adjustment to the jacket draped over his broad shoulders. His head was bent forward at an angle; she couldn’t see his face, just the strong curve of his jaw and the sharp angle of his cheekbones, but even these sketchy details were enough to proclaim him as something pretty special to look at indeed.
‘Are you going to abandon me…?’ He contemplated his abandonment with what seemed to her unnatural composure.
‘That was my plan, yes.’ She could see the flaw in this plan even before he came over all pathetic and helpless.
‘No wallet, no money or plastic. See for yourself.’ He opened his jacket, inviting her to disprove his claim.
No way—she’d been there, done that and felt her hormones riot! She was not conscious of placing her tightly clenched hands firmly behind her back.
‘There’s no need to act like an endangered species; I believe you,’ she told him gruffly. Her sigh of defeat had a long-suffering sound to it. ‘Do I look like a soft touch?’ she wondered, wearily running a harassed hand through her dampish curls.
Dark head on one side, he regarded her in a considering fashion. To add insult to injury, it took him bare moments to come to a decision.
‘Actually, yes, you do.’ She also looked extremely young, still full of youthful ideals, a soft target for unscrupulous operators—a student home for the holiday possibly…?
His own innocence and youth seemed a long way off at that moment. It seemed an opportune time, given the direction of his wayward thoughts, to remind himself how far removed she was from the females who temporarily lent a bit of variety to his solitary existence— Reece wasn’t looking for anything other than temporary.
His candour made Darcy’s face darken in annoyance.
‘And you’re the type to take advantage,’ she accused rattily.
Taken advantage of by Reece Erskine—now, there was a thought! She was too busy being angry, flustered and ashamed of her thoughts to notice that a new expression had filtered into his eyes.
Soft… His mind seemed determined to explore this avenue and there was no lack of appropriate material to feed his interest—soft lips, soft curves. The compulsive nature of his speculation had none of the objectivity Reece took for granted in sexual matters.
Don’t go there, he urged himself, repressing the sudden strong inclination to lean closer to all that softness, smell the flowery scent that enveloped her small person.
Darcy set off purposefully, reluctant to invite ridicule by admitting she’d forgotten where she’d left the car. She was too damned spooked at the prospect of being enclosed in a small space with him once more to think straight or accept defeat graciously. She heard his soft but firm footsteps shadowing her.
‘You said I’d never have to see you again,’ she reminded him crankily.
‘I’m a great believer in telling people what they want to hear if that gets the job done.’
‘Lying, you mean.’
Reece winced. ‘I wouldn’t have put it that way.’
‘That I never doubted!’
Despite the fact she wasn’t making any allowances for his delicate condition, his long long legs seemed to be having no problem keeping up with the cracking pace she was setting—pity!
‘I’m not exactly thrilled to find myself obliged to beg a lift either,’ he rasped huskily.
Of all the ungrateful rats! Darcy came to an abrupt halt and turned her wrathful gaze upon the tall figure who had almost collided with her.
‘That makes two of us!’ she retorted sharply.
Their eyes met.
It was at that moment Darcy felt it—it was a tense excitement so thick the air quivered with it, so thick her limbs were all but immobilised by it.
It didn’t seem to be a one-sided situation. His burning eyes kept moving back to her parted lips as though they were being dragged there against his will. She felt as if she was being drawn in by that raw expression in his hungry eyes. The tightness in her chest finally found release in a fractured sigh.
The compulsion to reach up and press her lips to his was so strong her head spun. Would they be cold, warm…firm…? Wondering sent delicious little shivers skating along her spine.
She wouldn’t do it, of course, because she wasn’t the sort of girl who gave in to lustful base instincts…all the same, thinking about it—and she discovered her embarrassingly lurid imagination had a mind of its own—made her body temperature soar despite the sub-zero temperature around them. Her dry-throated excitement mounted with dizzying rapidity as her knees began to literally shake.
Seconds probably carried on ticking relentlessly away in the few moments after speculative green eyes had met startled blue—but Darcy was unaware of the passing time as they stood stock-still in a silence broken only by the distant wail of an ambulance.
No good will come of this, a sensible voice, to which she paid no heed, forecast in her head.
Reece felt his breath perceptibly quicken. Her mouth was just sensationally lush. The uneven sound of her breath catching in the back of her throat was driving him slightly crazy. He watched as her clenched fingers unfurled and she began to reach out…he thought about them touching his face…his hair…his…!
With a mumbled expletive he took a step backwards. ‘Darcy…!’
It was a verbal warning, the sort an adult gave a reckless child about to indulge in dangerous exploration.
Mortified, Darcy let her extended hand fall away, and she stood there feeling stupid and confused by what had just occurred—whatever that was… He had wanted to kiss her too—hadn’t he…? It hadn’t been a figment of her over-heated imagination, had it?
The uncertainty only lasted a split-second; she hadn’t imagined anything—it had been real. She thrust her softly rounded chin forward defiantly. As unlikely as it seemed, Reece Erskine had wanted to kiss her just as much as she’d wanted to kiss him! She raised her eyes stubbornly to his stony face and her heart sank—only he didn’t now!
So he had gone off the idea; she was damned if she was going to let him make her feel ashamed!
‘Darcy what?’ She sniffed angrily. ‘Darcy, don’t kiss me…?’ she suggested shrilly.
She watched his eyes widen as she gave an appalled gasp—I can’t believe I said that!
‘Were you going to?’
I asked for that, didn’t I? What was she supposed to say…? Given a little bit of encouragement, probably…?
Darcy served up a withering look. ‘What a tactless thing to ask,’ she observed, resorting to disgust to disguise the extent of her dismay.
Spontaneous and asking for trouble would have been closer to the mark in his estimation. No wonder the brother wanted to keep her at home—if she was his sister he’d never let her out of his sight!
For the first time Darcy noticed the lines of strain around his sensual mouth—as if not kissing her hadn’t been the easy option…then why…? A horrifying possibility occurred to her. ‘Are you married?’
Unprepared for the tense, accusing query, Reece blinked, his jaw tightening. ‘That’s not relevant.’
Her mouth hardened with contempt; that meant he was. Not again! She didn’t know who she despised the most at that moment—him or herself. ‘To me it is!’ she choked bitterly.
Reece gave an exasperated sigh; he could cope with a lot of things but he discovered—rather to his surprise—that being looked at as if he was some sort of moral derelict by those big blue eyes was not one of them.
‘If it matters so much to you, I was, but I’m not now.’ He saw her slender hunched-up shoulders slump in relief. ‘Though why it should be so important to you I don’t understand…’
And Darcy wasn’t about to explain. Having an affair with a married man—even if she hadn’t known he was at the time—was not the sort of thing she felt like sharing.
‘I’d introduce the subject of morals if I thought you’d understand.’
‘I don’t see where morals come into it,’ he drawled. ‘You didn’t do anything…’
‘If I had…would you have…?’ Cheeks flaming, she struck her forehead with the palm of her hand. ‘Oh, God!’ she wailed. ‘Me and my mouth…!’ How to take an embarrassing situation and make it ten times worse in one easy-to-follow lesson!
His eyes automatically moved to the object of her contempt. The muscles in his strong throat worked overtime.
‘Yes, I’d have kissed you back,’ he admitted throatily. The words seemed drawn from him against his will.
Her eyes widened. ‘You would…?’ She saw his lips twitch at the incredulity in her voice. ‘I knew that.’ A puzzled frown crinkled her smooth brow. ‘Then why didn’t you…?’
Reece’s bark of rueful laughter brought her back to her senses—and not before time. He stared at her flushed face for a couple of moments before replying.
‘You don’t kiss married men; I don’t kiss girls young enough to be my…kid sister.’
It was the very last explanation Darcy had expected to hear. ‘How quaint that you’ve got principles.’
‘It comes as as much of a shock to me as it does to you,’ he assured her drily. ‘It’s getting cold out here.’ He spoke abruptly now, as if the humour of the situation was wearing thin. ‘If you really can’t stomach the idea of giving me a lift back I should be able to make alternative arrangements.’
Darcy touched his arm; he didn’t flinch but his rigidity didn’t suggest relaxed and carefree—was it possible he was not entirely immune to the contact? This not unflattering possibility was heady stuff.
‘How old exactly do you think I am?’ Repressing a smug smile, she worked her way towards her grand finale.
