The Greek Children's Doctor (Westerling)

Catching sight of her pink dress draped carelessly over the back of a chair, she gave a whimper of mortification.

How had it got there? She had absolutely no recollection of getting undressed. Realising that she was wearing a white silk shirt that she’d never seen before in her life, her stomach flipped.

What exactly had happened the night before?

She remembered arriving at the auction and being given a drink of orange juice by Bev.

And she definitely remembered fireworks.

‘Yiayia says that if a man and a woman spend a night together they have to get married,’ the girl said firmly, and the man said something sharp in a language that Libby assumed was Greek before switching to English.

‘Go and get ready for school,’ he ordered, ‘and wash that muck off your face. They’ll refuse to have you back if you look like that.’

‘That’s why I did it,’ the girl said moodily, and he sighed, the long-suffering sigh of a man stretched to the limits of his patience.

‘You know you have to go back.’ His voice was firm but held a note of sympathy. ‘Just until we sort this out. I’m interviewing housekeepers next week.’

Adrienne looked at him. ‘If you got married you wouldn’t need to employ a housekeeper. It’s time you settled down with a decent woman, not someone like—’

‘Adrienne!’ This time the man’s voice was icy cold. ‘That’s enough. Go and wash your face.’

The girl’s slim shoulders sagged. ‘But—’

‘Now!’

The commanding tone evidently worked because Adrienne subsided and left the room with a last curious look at Libby.

There was a long silence and Libby felt her colour rise.

Feeling that someone ought to say something, she put her coffee down and pushed her tangled blonde curls out of her eyes. ‘Er…about last night…’

Not having a clue what had actually taken place the previous night, she left the statement hanging, hoping that he’d be enough of a gentleman to say something reassuring, but he merely looked at her quizzically and waited for her to finish.

Libby sighed. He was obviously one of those enviable people who used silence as a weapon, whereas she, unfortunately, had never mastered the art.

‘Look.’ Deciding that directness was the best approach, she took a deep breath. ‘Did you spike my drink last night?’

He lifted a dark eyebrow. ‘You think I need to render a woman senseless in order to persuade her to come home with me?’

No, she didn’t think that.

He was the embodiment of most women’s fantasies.

She flushed and concluded from his amused expression that he obviously wasn’t the one responsible for her pounding headache.

‘I’m sorry, it’s just that someone must have but I really don’t remember that much—except the fireworks. They were great. What did—?’ She broke off and cleared her throat nervously. ‘Well, obviously you brought me back here, which was very kind of you, but did we—? I mean, I don’t remember if we actually—You see, I don’t do that sort of thing usually, but I suppose I must have been a bit upset last night and…’

Totally disconcerted by his continued silence, she gave a groan and hid her head under the covers.

Why didn’t he say something?

And what exactly had they done?

She was never, ever going out again.

It was just too embarrassing.

Finally she felt the bed shift under his weight and the covers were firmly pulled away from her.