LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

      ‘Is that the reason you left—is there an ex-Mr Freya back home...’

      ‘No!’ She laughed. ‘I’ve never been married, but I did break up with someone earlier in the year. It really didn’t have anything to do with my decision to leave, though.’

      ‘Are you sure?’ Richard frowned through disbelieving eyes.

      She was very guarded and, although they were chatting easily, he sensed she was being prudent in her responses.

      For once he wanted to dig for the truth from a woman.

      ‘Well, it might have had some influence on it,’ she admitted reluctantly. ‘There’s nothing much worse than going into a pub or a restaurant and knowing there’s a pretty good chance that your ex will be there. It was a bit messy, I guess.’

      ‘Who ended it?’

      ‘Me,’ Freya said. ‘We’d been together for ages and I just...’ She didn’t want to talk about Alison’s baby and the pregnancy that had gone wrong. But it had been that which had heralded the end for her and Malcolm. ‘I was going through a bit of a tough time and he didn’t help matters...’ She gave a thin smile. ‘And so, before even the very curl of his hair started to irk me, I ended it. I guess he wasn’t the love of my life.’

      ‘There’s no such thing,’ Richard declared. ‘Work is the only love of my life and I intend to remain faithful to that.’

      ‘How do you do it?’ Freya asked. ‘I know how wrung out I feel after an emergency, and yet you deal with them each day.’

      ‘It’s my oxygen,’ Richard said. ‘There’s nothing I’d rather be doing. Although,’ he admitted, ‘I don’t want to end up like my father. There has to be a balance. I go away a lot on my days off —try to get well away from the hospital.’ He gave a tight smile. ‘I have some choices that need to be made.’

      ‘Such as...?’

      He gave a small shake of his head that told her not to go there. And when she didn’t push for more information Richard could have reached over and kissed her there and then.

      He didn’t, of course, but the thought was there as their eyes locked.

      Freya felt the heat spread over her cheeks as their eyes held, and yet she did not tear her gaze away.

      God, he was good, Freya thought, for he turned her on without so much as a touch.

      And despite her insistence that tonight was about nothing more than seeing a film, she was now heeding Stella’s warnings.

      It had been lust at first sight, she knew.

      And she would not be acting on it.

      Freya wasn’t like that. One boyfriend at the end of school and throughout her nursing training. A gap of two years and then Malcolm.

      A fling with a sexy anaesthetist was so not something Freya would do. And it would be a fling, for he’d warned her—was warning her right now—that everything she’d heard about him was true.

      So she reached for her water and tried to think of something to say as she peeled her mind away from sex.

      Because that was all it would be.

      Sex.

      Ah, but it would be sex with him.

      ‘So your mother’s engaged?’ Freya asked. ‘Again?’

      He knew she was changing the subject.

      Although they were speaking about his family, their minds had just been on sex. He wanted to feel her hair...he wanted to delve into those mixed message eyes.

      She almost scalded him with a look, and behind the walls she’d put up there lurked desire.

      And he liked her odd sullen moments, interspersed by the brightness of her smile.

      But, no, this was not what she needed.

      He might have a well-deserved reputation, but he wasn’t an utter bastard.

      Freya was by her own admission a little lonely, a touch overwhelmed, and he would not be meddling with that pretty head.

      So, back to her question. He had to think for a moment what it was. Ah, yes, the many loves of his mother’s life.

      ‘My mother is about to enter into her fourth marriage. My father isn’t quite so bad. He’s only been married and divorced twice. I doubt he’ll be taking that step again.’ He gave a tight smile. ‘Thank God! It really is hard coming up with a new speech each time.’

      ‘Her fourth!’

      He nodded. ‘She left us when I was fifteen, and I’m now thirty-three, so it’s not quite as bad as it sounds.’ He saw her wide eyes. ‘Well, maybe it is. My mother is high-end drama and she just wasn’t cut out to be the wife of a country GP. She loathed it. And since she broke up with my father—’

      He went quiet, for the first time since they had met. And then...

      ‘Freya?’ he said.

      ‘Yes?’

      ‘We’ve missed the film.’

      ‘Oh!’

      She looked around the restaurant and noticed the other diners were thinning out, and then she glanced at her phone. It was coming up for eleven.

      ‘Do you want dessert or coffee?’ he offered.

      ‘No, no...’ She shook her head.

      He walked her to the Underground station and there, she assumed, they would go their separate ways.

      ‘I’ll see you home,’ he said, when she told him where it was.

      ‘It’s only four stops,’ Freya protested—but not too much. She still wasn’t quite used to the Tube, and she did feel a bit nervous at night. It would be nice to have company.

      Or rather it would be nice to have his company.

      ‘We’re here,’ Freya said as they arrived at her flat.

      ‘Well, I’m sorry you didn’t get to see your film.’

      Freya wasn’t sorry.

      ‘It’s fine,’ she said, toying with whether or not to ask him in and deciding that it would be foolish at best. There was a kiss in the air—she could feel it—and as she looked up at him she wondered how that gorgeous unshaven jaw would feel pressed hard against hers.

      ‘Well, another time, then,’ Richard said, resisting the urge to kiss her against the wall.

      She wanted a friend, he reminded himself. No more than that.

      ‘Thanks for a nice night. It was good to...’ She gave a shrug. ‘Well, it was nice not to be talking about babies.’

      ‘All work and no play?’ Richard said.

      ‘Something like that.’

      She took out her key and he watched as she put it into the lock. That was the difference with Freya—she didn’t stand there awaiting his kiss. She didn’t seem to want the complication of them either.

      And yet there was want.

      It was a sultry summer night that deserved to end in bed, but Richard was behaving himself.

      ‘Night, Freya.’

      ‘Night, Richard.’

      She walked inside, closed the door behind her and leant against it, taking a long breath in.

      Had there been a double-lock she would have turned it. Instead she made do with the security chain.

      But only to keep herself in.

      There was a kiss

Скачать книгу