Surprise Twins for the Surgeon

‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

‘Because maybe it’s time you weren’t.’

Here we go again.

Only weeks before he’d left for Dubrovnik Harry and his wife had given him a speech about living alone and not finding a partner. They’d gone on and on about how he was becoming more solitary by the day. How he was turning into a serious surgeon twenty-four-seven, never letting up for fun. ‘I already read that memo. It doesn’t pertain to me.’

Just like that, an image of Alesha lying on the bed half covered in a sheet sprang into his head and he couldn’t breathe. There was so much to like about her. So much to remember. To want to revisit. He could be in trouble here.

‘Here, get this into you.’ A cold, moist bottle was forced between his fingers. ‘You look like you could do with something more powerful than cold H2O.’

Thanks, Harry.

Kristof lifted the bottle to his lips and drank deep of the cool, refreshing beer. Which did nothing to banish that picture from the front of his skull. She was so beautiful, so tantalising. And broken in some way.

Don’t forget that. That’s what will keep you away, if you choose to step back into her world for another week of passion. She was broken, he had been: they’d never make it work. If he even wanted to, which he didn’t.

‘Want to tell me something?’ Persistence was Harry’s middle name. Sometimes it was even his first name.

‘I ate squid at the charity dinner.’ Sitting beside Alesha, feeling at ease with all the socialite types for the first time, not feeling as though his father was breathing over his shoulder to make sure he did everything correctly so as to impress everyone. She’d been relaxed, despite telling him she wasn’t used to rubbing shoulders with the wealthy. She’d charmed everyone seated at their table with her accent and her ability to laugh at herself. ‘And drank champagne.’

Now that was a mistake. Harry was going to pick up on it straight away.

Yep. ‘You weren’t doing that alone.’

‘I shared the bottle with the whole table.’ He had, and ordered another so that Alesha didn’t run out of her favourite drink. Though she’d been circumspect, barely touching her glass. He’d picked that was because she didn’t want to do something like come on to him again in front of his mother’s guests. Because while she hadn’t come on to him again all evening, she’d sure responded when he’d turned the tables and kissed her.

The ringing of Harry’s phone cut across his thoughts and brought him back to reality. ‘You’d better get that.’

Alesha wasn’t real? Wasn’t warm and friendly and gorgeous?

Sure she was, but she didn’t belong in this picture of him at work with his mate talking the breeze.

‘Hi, Scallywag. How was it at the pool?’ Harry’s eyes were soft and dewy as he spoke to one of his daughters. ‘You swam how far? That’s amazing, you clever clogs.’

This picture of sitting with Harry having a beer just got complicated. Harry had pulled on his father cape, while he still sat here as the surgeon frantically denying Alesha access to his brain—and her ignoring him. He shoved to his feet. ‘Time I headed home.’ To his pristine apartment where everything stayed in the place he put it until he wanted it again. No shoes with six-inch heels lying around. No discarded clothing leading a trail to his bedroom. Paradise. Or so he used to think. When had that changed? Prior to or post Alesha? Or somewhere in the middle?

Harry looked up and flapped a hand at him. ‘See you tomorrow,’ he mouthed before returning his full attention to his daughter.

Tomorrow and the surgical list that’d keep him busy and focused, and in a zone he understood and needed.

Not a place where a certain woman interrupted his thoughts.

Not in his office while his mate sank into the love of his children excitedly talking to him and asking when he was coming home for dinner because they were starving. Yep, he’d heard all that, and just had to get away. It was too much.

It was not the lifestyle he endeavoured to get.

It was the one he’d dreamed of having if only Cally hadn’t walked all over his love in hobnailed boots.

CHAPTER SEVEN

‘HOLD THIS FOR ME, will you?’ A doctor held out a saline bag to Alesha.

‘Sure.’ She took it and waited patiently while the young woman inserted a needle into the back of their little patient’s hand to give the boy much-needed fluid after a severe bout of vomiting that had left him dehydrated.

On the other side of the bed the boy’s father watched, his face ashen, and his eyes bleak with worry. ‘I hope it wasn’t the chicken he ate for lunch that’s made him so sick. He started throwing up not long after and hasn’t stopped since.’

It could very likely be food poisoning. Undercooked chicken was always risky. ‘Was the chicken bought from a takeout place, or home-cooked?’

‘I was cooking it last night for dinner when my mother phoned to ask us to go round for a meal. I turned the element off and left the pan with the lid on to cool down, and put it in the fridge when we got home.’

The doctor looked up. ‘How late was that?’

The man winced as though he was about to get told off. ‘About one in the morning.’

The temperature had been unusually high yesterday. ‘You wouldn’t have had air-conditioning running while you were out, would you?’ Alesha asked and got a nod from the doctor.

‘If only I had it.’ The father reached for his lad’s hand, wound his much larger one around it. ‘Sorry, Charlie. Your dad’s such a fool.’

Alesha felt for him. ‘Don’t say that. You made a mistake, but that doesn’t make you a fool. It’s just that chicken has to be cooked right through, no pinkness at all.’

‘I’m still learning to cook since my wife died. She was a champ in the kitchen, could make the dullest of foods tasty. I’ve got a long way to go to be half as good.’ The poor guy had more than enough to deal with without beating himself up over his cooking skills.

‘Sounds like you’re trying and that’s what counts.’

The doctor had the needle in and was attaching the tubing to it that led from the bag Alesha held. ‘I think your boy is going to be fine once we get some liquid into him as well as all those nutrients that come with it.’

Alesha took a quick glance at her watch. The day couldn’t go any slower if it tried. She hung the bag from the steel frame and smoothed the damp curls off Charlie’s forehead. ‘There you go. You’ll be chasing your football before you know it.’

‘I’m going to run some blood tests,’ the doctor said.

‘I’ll get the kit.’ Alesha slipped around the curtain and walked the length of the children’s ward to the storeroom.

‘How’s it going?’ Cherry asked as they passed in the hall.

After five weeks Alesha already loved this job, and had been hoping the nurse she was covering for really didn’t want to return at the end of her maternity leave. Though today that idea felt tiring. ‘I’m looking forward to knocking off.’ Half an hour to go and she’d be able to give into the exhaustion dragging at her. Never had she felt so debilitated by it. She was sounding geriatric. ‘Can’t wait to get home and put my feet up.’ And try not to think about Kristof. Why had one week of fun together come to mean so much? It had been two months since they’d said goodbye in Dubrovnik. She should’ve moved on by now, not be thinking about him at all hours of the day and night. Just because he’d inadvertently made her see she needed to be strong and not let just any guy in close didn’t give him the right to take over her thoughts and emotions.

‘You really wore yourself out in Dubrovnik, didn’t you?’

Oh, yes. That heady week with Kristof used up a lot of energy. Add in all the walking around the city she did every night after finishing work at the home. Staying on in Dubrovnik had turned out to be the right decision. Working full

time with those children had made her believe she could actually settle down somewhere and become a part of a community, get a permanent job instead of taking slots all over the show. To make herself a home where she might finally integrate herself and become a part of the local picture. As much as she loved travelling it had palled in the light of what she’d done with those sad and needy children. So much she’d stayed on right up to the day before she was due to report here. And now... Well, now everything was about to change in a way she’d never foreseen.

Cherry had turned to follow her to the storeroom. ‘Want to go to the pub tonight for a game of pool and a beer or two?’

‘I’ve got to see someone tonight.’ But a game of pool was tempting. It’d be an easy option with no conflict, no arguments or disappointments, no professional façade glaring at her. And wouldn’t solve a thing.

Her stomach clenched, sent a wave of nausea roaring up her throat. She held her breath, willed her body to behave. What was a bit of tiredness anyway?

But at seven that night, when Alesha finally found the address she needed and no one answered the bell she jabbed, her body all but dropped to the step. Tightening her spine, she turned and walked back the way she’d come to the bar she’d seen on the way in. The barman smirked when she ordered a cup of tea. Too bad. It was written on the blackboard.

At eight she tried the bell again with the same result. This time she couldn’t fight the sagging of her knees and hit the step hard. Shuffling around, she made her butt as comfortable as possible on the concrete and clasped her knees to her chest, and waited. And waited.

‘Alesha?’ It was a soft question. Or was it a dream?