LITMIR.BIZ

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on the chair next to her. ‘Allow me,’ he said as he picked up some gauze and dabbed at the wound.

      Mia didn’t protest—she was making a hash of it anyway. His touch was gentle as he coaxed the dried blood from the cut and she shivered. His fingers were dark against her paler skin and long.

      Her father had long fingers. A pianist’s hands. He was tall too, like Luca. He’d told her he was her prince and she was his princess and they’d be together for ever.

      And then he’d left.

      She squeezed her eyes shut. Stop it. Stop it.

      Luca watched her. It was the first time he’d spent any length of time in her company and he was curious. He’d already noticed on their brief acquaintance she was a good-looking woman with a cute mouth and a sassy swagger.

      But up close she was really quite exquisite.

      Her face was long, as were her eyelashes. A frown appeared between her brows and her lips parted. She looked in pain.

      ‘Am I hurting you?’ he murmured.

      Mia’s eyes fluttered open. How had he got that close? She could see the individual whiskers making up the smooth blue-black of his jaw and just make out the black pupil in the middle of his bottomless brown eyes. His hair, as dark as his eyes, was thick with a slight wave that brushed his forehead and the tops of his ears.

      And his mouth. The full curve to that bottom lip was wicked.

      His fingers stroked gently over her skin as he cleaned the wound and it reminded her it had been a while since a man had touched her.

      She lowered her gaze to the column of his throat. ‘No.’

      Luca was captivated by the slide show of emotions in her large blue eyes as magnificent and as transparent as a stained-glass window. The husky timbre of her voice wove between the bands of steel around his heart. ‘Are you okay?’

      Mia nodded, keeping her gaze firmly fixed on his throat. The long tanned column of his neck was also shaded in blue-black smoothness. She remembered how she’d loved the sandpaper roughness of her father’s neck as he’d cuddled her close to read to her at night.

      Damn it! She gripped the back of the chair hard. ‘I’m fine.’

      ‘You’ve been through an ordeal tonight. That knife came very close to—’

      ‘I said I’m fine,’ Mia interrupted, raising her face to scowl at him. ‘Just clean the damn wound.’

      CHAPTER TWO

      LUCA paused in his ministrations for a moment, the blue of her eyes frosty now. He’d only known her for a few short weeks and while he’d been impressed with her empathy for patients and her good rapport with her colleagues he’d also sensed she was a woman who preferred to keep herself pretty much to herself.

      But she’d always been polite about it.

       Something was definitely eating at Mia McKenzie tonight.

      He shifted his attention back to the wound.

      ‘It’s borderline,’ he mused, looking at the clean ten-centimetre laceration. ‘It’s deeper laterally, could probably do with a couple of sutures there.’

      Mia nodded to the pile of medical supplies on the table. ‘Steri-strips there somewhere.’

      ‘Sutures would be better.’

      ‘Steri-strips will be fine.’

      ‘The scarring will be worse if we use steri-strips.’

      Mia shrugged. ‘I don’t care about a scar.’

      Luca looked at her for a moment then fished around for the strips. ‘Most women would,’ he murmured when he located them. He doubted he’d ever been with a single woman who didn’t obsess over the slightest blemish.

      ‘I’m not most women.’

      Luca chuckled. ‘Yes. I think you are right.’

      Mia sat still as he opened the packet and secured the wound edges together, applying firm tension through each sticky strip. Then he applied an adhesive dressing over the top. She watched as he absently brushed the pad of his thumb back and forth over the dressing as if he were a parent, rubbing a boo-boo better.

      Just like her father had done.

      ‘You look like you’ve got a lot on your mind,’ he murmured.

      Unfortunately, he was right. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her father since Stan’s episode. It had probably been the first time ever she’d been confronted with how emotionally untenable it had been for him to stay.

      ‘It’s busy,’ she said brusquely, rising from the chair and clearing away the detritus from her dressing and tossing it in the bin. ‘We can’t just skulk in here all night.’

      ‘The team have got it covered. And you’re not going back out there until you’ve had a break. Try and get some sleep.’ She opened her mouth to protest and he stood. ‘That’s an order.’

      Great! What in the hell was she going to do alone in here with a bunch of unwanted memories that wouldn’t quit? Things she just wanted to forget.

      ‘What if a bus crash comes in?’

      Luca grinned. ‘I’ll come and wake you.’

      Mia felt the grin right down to her toes. It twinkled in his eyes and gave the devil a whole new degree of wicked.

      The fact that she noticed his twinkling eyes rankled. ‘Are you flirting with me?’ she demanded, crossing her arms.

      Luca chuckled. She didn’t beat around the bush. ‘Would it be a bad thing if I was?’

      ‘Yes,’ she said. Something told her he wouldn’t be an easy man to walk away from. Not disposable, like the others. ‘Stop it. I have no desire to become a notch on what I understand is your very crowded bedpost.’

      Luca regarded her for a moment. In her top and jeans, arms crossed, a frown knitting her brows, she looked quite fierce. But Luca knew women. He knew them well.

       And Mia McKenzie was definitely protesting too much.

      His gaze slipped to her mouth. ‘Are you sure?’

      Mia felt her lips tingle beneath his heated stare and felt her resistance ebb. Now, he was something that could make her forget for a little while.

      Luca grinned, pleased to have discomforted her. ‘Goodnight, Mia. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.’

      By four a.m. Luca was ready to head home. The craziness had settled and things were quiet—for now anyway.

      He’d checked on the MVA from earlier—the laparotomy had found a perforated bowel. Stan had been admitted to the psych unit on a ninety-six-hour hold. The baby was settled into the special care nursery for overnight monitoring.

      And his paperwork was up to date.

      Just one last thing to do—check on Mia.

      He hesitated, his hand on the doorknob of the on-call room. Prickly little Mia probably wouldn’t appreciate being checked up on.

      Her prim I have no desire to become a notch on what I understand is your very crowded bedpost, had played on his mind ever since she’d uttered it.

      She obviously disapproved.

      What the hell was wrong with indulging in a little flirtation here and there? Spending an enjoyable few hours with a woman who was fully aware that one night was all he was interested in?

      He was always open and honest about his intentions. And he never made the mistake of giving false hope by going back for seconds. He knew his limitations where relationships were concerned—had

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