Tempted by the Brooding Vet, page 16
‘You won’t believe in me because other men have hurt you and humiliated you. I understand your reluctance to trust, but I will not be punished when I am not to blame. And I also refuse to be used so you can satisfy your curiosity.’
She didn’t understand. ‘My curiosity about what?’
‘Sex,’ he answered harshly. ‘I’m the only man you’ve ever wanted to go further with, aren’t I?’
She nodded slowly, then remembered he couldn’t see her clearly. ‘Yes.’
‘You’ve refused to be intimate with any man—even the one you planned to marry. Yet you’d make love with me here in a stockroom. What makes me so different from your fiancé? From any other man you’ve kept yourself from loving?’
‘I don’t know,’ she lied, not prepared to tell the truth. That the difference was simply that she’d never loved those other men.
Her fingers searched the darkness for his face. She needed to touch him, to reconnect in some small part with the passionate man of a few seconds ago.
Her fingers finally connected with his warm cheek. Reassured by the solidness of his body against her trembling skin, she begged, ‘Please, Alex.’
‘You’re still that little girl, allowing her father to dictate her life.’ Alex touched the side of her head, tapping his fingers against her skull. ‘The man may not be in your life, physically pushing your buttons, but he’s in here. In your mind, controlling each thought and decision you make. You’re a grown woman, yet you’re still living in the past, running away from the chance of a wonderful future. One with happiness and love.’
‘Don’t,’ she pleaded, not wanting to hear more of her failings.
‘Open your heart, Kiki. Otherwise you’re never going to change. Your life will stay stuck in the wasteland of fear. Reach for a richer, better life. You insist I shouldn’t let the past behaviour of my parents continue to affect me. Isn’t it time you did the same?’
He touched her forehead with his own.
‘I want to make love with you, but I won’t watch you roll out of my bed one morning with a final goodbye on your lips. Those same lips I love to kiss. I won’t give you the whole of me and then wait for you to listen once more to that fear you’ve let control you for so long. I won’t give you my commitment and then watch you destroy it. If I ever make love with you it will be when you offer me the same. I deserve nothing less.’
She swallowed, pushing her words out. ‘You say commitment, but it sounds as though you really mean love.’
‘Perhaps I do,’ he said.
Love. Why did it always return to that stupid four-letter word? An emotion she didn’t want to acknowledge or trust?
‘Why is love so important?’
Alex sighed and planted a soft kiss upon her head. When he spoke his voice was heavy and full of regret. ‘I wish you knew the answer.’
The stockroom door suddenly opened, casting bright light over the two of them. Anne stood in the doorway taking in the scene. ‘Stocktaking, Alex?’
‘Settling staff disputes,’ he answered. ‘All over now.’
The finality in his words caused a different fear to shift through Kiki. She reached for him but he pulled away, once again putting space between them.
With a last searching glance at her face Alex walked out of the room, leaving the two women staring after him. The squeak of his shoes on the vinyl floor soon mingled with the normal everyday sounds of the busy practice.
‘God, he’s so infuriating,’ Kiki grumbled, snapping her uniform buttons together.
Anne turned and faced Kiki. ‘It’s the reason we love him, though, isn’t it?’
Kiki didn’t answer. Heartily sick of love and everything it involved. She’d entered the room determined to confront the man with his supposed wrongdoings, and instead he had cruelly exposed her own. He’d urged her to trust in love—an emotion she’d watched destroy her mother’s happiness. If he cared for her, then why did he ask for the one thing she’d sworn she would never be weak enough to give to any man?
* * *
‘You like her, don’t you?’
Alex dropped his keys, his heart somewhere between his mouth and his stomach as he stepped out of the consultation room and into the front reception area. Anne sat behind the desk, a single lamp casting a low intimate light over the writing pad in her hand.
Bending to scoop up the bunch of keys, he said, ‘I thought everyone had already left for the night.’
Anne pushed the pad away and shrugged. ‘Harry has one of his train meetings, and Dee and her Kiwi friends are at the cinema, drooling over some hot actor whose name my tongue struggles to pronounce. So I decided to stay on and write out a couple of condolence letters to the owners of our recently departed clients. Do I get an answer or accept that earlier groping session in the stockroom as evidence?’
Alex wandered over to the desk, his expression serious. ‘Yes, I like her, but it’s not important.’
Anne reached across and flicked him on the forehead. ‘Don’t treat me like a fool, Alex. We’ve been friends too long.’
Leaning his arms on the top, he frowned. ‘I wouldn’t dare. You’re too vicious when you’re annoyed.’
Anne stared at him. ‘Since scrumptious Miss Brown joined us you’ve been acting like a confused man who’s discovered that unfamiliar world commonly named as romance. In all the years we’ve worked together I’ve never known you to take to a woman the way you have Kiki.’
Alex didn’t bother to deny it. The stockroom incident had been a clear sign that something was going on between him and Kiki.
‘No one is like her. She’s unique.’
Anne studied him over the top of her glasses, a pleased tilt to her mouth. ‘I’m glad you realise that. You’re not always so observant.’
He knocked his knuckles against the desktop, unsure what else to say. Kiki fancied his body, and the pleasure he could show her, but her heart was so badly damaged she rejected any opportunity to reach for everything he yearned to give her.
‘I’m not sure it’s going to do any good.’
Removing her glasses, Anne slid them into her blouse pocket. ‘When I first met Harry, after one conversation I knew I was going to marry him. Other than the fact we supported the same football team, he gave me a feeling no other man ever had. You know the one?’
Alex closed his eyes and sighed. ‘The feeling that they complete you. That everything you’d never appreciated was missing from your soul is there in them.’
‘Yes, that’s it. No matter what happens in life, you know they’re next to you, holding your hand, listening. You can face any problem, enjoy any pleasure, if they walk the next step with you.’
‘But what if their past has inflicted too many hurts for them to see there’s a chance to share something special with you? What then?’
Anne didn’t answer, instead, she asked, ‘What’s happened between you? Other than the fact you’ve kissed her in the stockroom—hardly romantic surroundings.’
‘It had its moments,’ Alex said with a grin.
Oh, yes, kissing Kiki had certainly had its good points. And the erotic excitement of searching her feminine form in the dark and travelling over places he had only dreamed of touching definitely came under a plus.
Anne glared at him disapprovingly. ‘I sensed discord between you both earlier.’
‘I made an offer on her godmother’s property but forgot to mention it to her. I didn’t think it was important.’
Anne flicked his forehead for the second time. ‘Honestly—you’re not helping yourself, are you? No wonder she’s peeved with you.’
Alex rubbed his stinging forehead and added wryly, ‘Declining the opportunity to make love to her this afternoon hasn’t helped.’
Anne blinked several times before whistling. ‘Rather crushing for the girl’s ego, Alex. There she has you, all hot and hard, and you go all prim and righteous. Are you saying you haven’t succumbed to the sizzling attraction that leaps between you two? Even though you share the same roof and have plenty of occasions for indulging in a night-time vertical dalliance?’
He rested his head on his arms and groaned. ‘It’s been hard.’
She sniggered. ‘I bet. So what are you going to do?’
He lifted his head. ‘No idea. I’m a foot deep in trouble and constantly being covered with new layers. Every time we seem to be doing okay, something happens to ruin it.’
Her eyes narrowed with suspicion. ‘Why do I get the impression there’s more you’re not confessing?’
Alex frowned, struggling between the urge to get everything out and his typically reserved nature that made it easier to keep things inside.
‘Has Kiki mentioned a school talk?’
Anne nodded. ‘I was manning Reception when Miss Ingle called in. Strange woman... I think it’s a great idea, though.’
Alex took a step back out of Anne’s reach to save his forehead from a third assault. ‘I said no.’
Anne’s eyes narrowed.
Alex recognised the expression and shifted further away from the desk.
‘Why?’
A simple question, yet with so many layers and complexities. How did he make his head nurse understand? He wasn’t sure Kiki had. No one truly did unless they’d stood in the same place and faced similar demons.
‘I hate talking to groups of people. Really hate it.’
‘I hate swede,’ Anne replied. ‘But Harry loves to grow it, so I eat it without complaint to make him happy.’
‘Really?’ he asked, not believing her. Normally when she was unhappy Anne made certain everyone within earshot knew it.
She screwed up her nose and confessed. ‘All right. I may moan a bit. But he informs me that it’s good for me, so I fuss but still eat it.’
‘A school talk is a bit different than eating swede,’ he pointed out.
‘What I mean is sometimes there’s no choice but to do something you hate for someone you care about. On our wedding anniversary Harry always takes me to the beach, whatever the weather. He hates the seaside and has an aversion to sand, but he does it to make me happy. For a few hours I can sit on the sand with the wind coming off the sea and remember my childhood holidays.’
‘Kiki said she understood why I said no.’
‘Good—but don’t you think if you do it it would show her that you can put yourself out? Alex, you can be a little unbendable at times. It can’t be helped because it’s your nature, but if you want to impress the lady you should do something unexpected.’
‘Like the talk?’
Ripping out his teeth or sitting through a lifetime of children’s TV sounded easier.
‘You’d be putting the children’s pleasure before your own discomfort. Showing Kiki how you’re willing to put yourself out for others even when it’s something you hate. That you can be trusted not to let anyone down.’
‘I think I’d rather sit on the beach and eat swede for a year.’
Anne left her seat and rounded the counter. Without a word she wrapped her arms around Alex’s waist and hugged him close. ‘You are the sweetest man I know, but you’re lonely. I used to see it in your eyes and hear it in your voice. But since the day Kiki arrived it’s disappeared. Be brave. Do the talk for her and show the girl how fabulous you are.’
‘She says she doesn’t want to fall in love,’ he said, not sure which of them required that cold reminder or why he was telling Anne.
Kiki hated him right now. His bags probably waited on the lodge’s doorstep.
Anne snorted, stepping back and patting his chest. ‘I think she’s already there. What you must do is demonstrate unmistakably that you feel the same.’
* * *
She loved him.
Kiki scrubbed the thought away and refused to linger on it. But her stubborn mind and the pushy truth refused to stay quiet and she found herself deliberating the notion once more.
She loved sexy Dr Alex Morsi.
She growled under her breath. Fine. So what? It would pass—like her bout of flu or an itchy outbreak of heat rash. She just needed to hold her nerve, suffer the feelings, and wait until her world returned to its regular dull routine. No stupid emotion was going to beat her, especially not l-o-v-e.
‘You lot don’t realise how good your life is,’ she said out loud. ‘Swimming all day and then waddling around, pecking at the grass, waiting to discover a tasty worm or snail to devour. It’s not a hard life—it’s an easy one, uncomplicated by the presence of a man.’
Kiki stared at the ten white-feathered ducks who for the last few minutes mostly ignored her presence and muttered rantings. Since bringing them to Fingle Lodge, they’d settled into a routine, in which she cared for all their needs and engaged in one-sided conversations, while they showed absolutely no interest in her other than when she carried the feed bucket.
Checking the water level in the large blue paddling pool she’d bought from the toy section in the local supermarket, Kiki returned to the rickety wheelbarrow retrieved from the barn for one of the metal buckets filled with clean water.
‘We humans deal with extra things you ducks don’t worry over. Like bills—the money kind, not your kind. And we navigate complicated friendships with irritating men determined to try our patience who set off our tempers like raging bubbles boiling in a saucepan, and then we face the added problem when our stupid, disobedient feelings develop into more than what we want them to.’
At the low metal drinking trough Alex had bought from a farmer friend, along with several bales of straw, Kiki emptied out the dirty water and replaced it with fresh.
She straightened and glanced at a duck attacking a leaf with its orange bill. ‘You just look at a male duck and think, Is he good enough to mate with or not? Well, humans view a man and wonder if there’s any point in developing a friendship. If it’s worth the effort of getting to know him, or if he’ll become annoying and boring after a couple of outings, or worse want more than we want to give.’
Like affection, commitment and love.
Kiki dropped the bucket and folded her arms. Damn it, she loved Alex. Full, heart-thumping, knee-wilting, soul-wrenching love.
It was one thing to suspect it, but something else to finally admit it.
She didn’t want to love Alex. Love hurt and pain always followed it like its obedient servant. Leaving a person vulnerable to another’s wants and desires. It tore you apart and left destruction without a care for the damage when it went wrong.
She’d sworn after her father’s abandonment never to give a man such power over her life again, and for years she’d firmly kept to the decision.
Until she’d met Alex.
Alex wasn’t her father. He wasn’t mean and always searching for something better than what he already had. He cared about people—even if he did try to pretend otherwise. He loved them and he gave them his loyalty without conditions or a time span. He was a good man. A decent man. The kind she’d honestly thought no longer existed.
But he did exist and she loved him—despite doing her best not to. Despite a stubborn part of her wanting to believe differently...
She strolled to the wheelbarrow and grabbed a second metal bucket. At the pool, she slowly topped up the water level to give the ducks plenty to swim and submerge themselves in. Within moments, several ducks jumped in for a mid-morning swim.
Staring at three ducks waddling past, wiggling their rear ends in what Kiki considered an impudent manner, she sighed. ‘Maybe I’ll pack my bags and leave. What reason is there to stay?
If she left today she could visit her godmother in Kent. She brushed away a stupid tear and glared at the scenery. She wanted to live a happy life with a man she liked, not loved. But Alex had cursed her with his kisses. Doomed her to a barren existence with those caresses of his mouth. Cast her into a future of disappointment.
How could any other man surpass him, or stir as much desire within her, now she’d experienced the sweet possibility of what she was missing?
The man insisted on commitment and love. Well, she loved him, but the whole idea terrified her. What if she woke in a few days and found all the love gone—disappeared overnight like an annoying earache? Or what if he changed his mind in a few weeks. What if the attraction fizzled out once they’d made love?
Despite Alex insisting on commitment before they made it into the bedroom, he hadn’t actually admitted to loving her, had he? All his demands—yet what did she get in return?
She didn’t want the man to break her heart. Yes, she might love him, but she didn’t have to do anything about it. She could ignore it and carry on with her life.
She retrieved the buckets and turned to survey the ducks, several of whom had now moved towards the duck house. After a quick count to check for missing ones, she walked towards the gate.
Duck chores done, she left the field, careful to lock the gate behind her. Lifting the wheelbarrow, she headed in the barn’s direction.
But she didn’t want just the memory of two kisses to keep her warm at night. She wanted Alex and his loving arms to do the job. To wake in the morning and see him across the bed, all sleep-ruffled and sexy. To feel the heat of his body radiating across the mattress to warm her on chilly nights, and hear his sexy voice against her skin when he wished her good morning.
His accusation that she was living in the past and letting her father’s rejection mould her choices held a grim grain of truth. Instead of forgetting about the man and leaving him behind, where he deserved to stay, she’d carted him around like a noxious rucksack.
How could she have been so stupid?
Wasn’t it better to try and find Utopia than to give in to the fear and never grow or change? Better to risk the chance of happiness than to endure lonely days without the man who made her smile?
