Tempted by Her Italian Surgeon (19 page)

Snuggling her face into his fur, she got some comfort from a warm, beating heart under her fingers and the purr that sounded, indeed, like a drill. So what if it was all cupboard love? She was under absolutely no pretences with the cat. Shame she couldn't say the same about her own love life.

And there it was again. That feeling of panic. It wasn't love. It had been one night, the only thing
they could ever share. She knew that, they both did. It would be ludicrous to want otherwise.

Plopping Hugo back on the floor, she turned to the fridge. ‘Hold on, buster. Here's some food—'

Whoa. A magnet with a pretty terrible amateurish painting of Scarborough beach held a handwritten note on the fridge door:

Ivy

Joey is sick. I have gone back to London in a hurry. I will phone you.

Matteo x

She was disappointed at how much her heart soared at those few words. At the hope she imbued into the one tiny letter at the end of the note. What was wrong with her? Instead of worrying about that poor boy, she'd been buoyed by the thought that Matteo had not run away but had left because of an emergency. She'd never been like this before—living in hope of a word, a caress. Been desperate for a man's touch, a kiss. It was infusing everything she did. Infecting her thoughts. Making her feel anxious and excitable.

So being here helping her mum to recuperate had come at the right time. It meant she didn't have to face Matteo right now, she could hunker down and get on top of her wayward emotions,
work out a way of avoiding him when she got back, and then she'd back to her normal self.

Talking of which… Ivy glanced at the oven clock. Damn. She was late.

* * *

Two hours later she bundled her mum—and Richard, which was a strange turn of events, but, really, not so surprising after all—out of the taxi and back into the house. ‘Okay, sit down, Mum, and…er…Richard.'

‘Thank you, Ivy. Shoo. Shoo.' Richard pushed Hugo roughly from the sofa, sat down and got a hiss in return. ‘Oh, and, please, you can call me—'

‘Right. Okay…so…'
Please, don't do that
you can call me dad
routine.
She'd been through too many dads all in all. And they had all turned out like her real one—absent. Picking up Hugo, she gave him a conciliatory stroke. ‘I'll pop the kettle on, make a pot of tea and start on lunch.'

Angela gave her a weary smile that was irritated or exasperated or something that Ivy couldn't put her finger on. But was all too familiar. ‘That's very kind of you, darling, especially when I know how much you need to be getting back to your important job. Are you packed yet? What time's the train? Should we call you a taxi?'

What? Train? Taxi? ‘I was going to stay a few
days, make sure you're okay. You know, like we agreed.'
Mum and daughter time
. ‘I want to make sure you're okay.'
That we're okay.

‘Oh, don't worry about that. Richard said he'd cook me dinner tonight, and he's going to pop in every day to check up on me.' Her mother reached out and gave Richard's hand a squeeze, and then left her hand there, tight in his fist, and they looked comfortable and settled—how had they done that in such a short space of time? How had they given themselves up to this, whatever it was. For as long as it lasted. ‘Every day, he says. So I'll be fine. Don't feel like you have to stay on my account. We'll be just fine.'

‘Oh. Of course, yes, I see.' Ivy didn't know what else to say as she turned away. But she could see very clearly that she wasn't any use now. Richard was going to fill the hole in her mother's life, Ivy could go back to her job, to her other life in London with no need to worry. Except she'd so wanted to fix things with her mum now she was here.

But she didn't want to do it with an audience, and she knew it would need a lot more than the few precious minutes they had right now—and with a mother who had a focus on that and not on another potential husband.

It was yet another example of her mum's erratic
behaviour. Her short attention span where Ivy was concerned. And, yes, it hurt.

Damn it, don't cry.
She squeezed her eyelids shut and forced back any sign of distress. Maybe leaving was for the best.

She looked back over at her mum and had to admit she did look happy and relaxed, and the best she'd been since her heart scare. Ivy caught a smattering of her conversation with Richard. ‘Stay right there,' he was saying in a quietly calm voice. ‘I'll get a cushion for you. Wait…wait… I want to make sure you're comfortable.'

The man was certainly attentive, even if he didn't appear to like cats. And who was she to deprive her mum of some happiness? If she'd been suffering from depression for all those years and now she wasn't—if this man made her happy and this was what Angela wanted, then she had to let it go. Regardless of her own misgivings.

‘I don't know,' her mother replied, looking up at her new man with a sort of adoration as he plumped a cushion and fussed around her. ‘You and your fussing ways, you'll drive me crazy.'

‘You'll get used to it. See that my way is best.' Richard gave her mum a smile and Ivy's heart lurched.

You drive me crazy.

They were only words. But she'd used them
to Matteo and he'd used them right back. And it was the sentiment, it was the same—you drive me crazy, but that's okay. What's a bit of madness between friends? Losing sanity. It was two people becoming a little less of who they were for the sake of someone else. It was Ivy becoming Angela.

Her hand went to her mouth. Oh, my goodness. Of all the things she'd dreaded. She couldn't let that happen.

But it was too late, Ivy
was
different. He had made her different, he'd made her yearn for more. For more in her life than just work. Which was impossible. Just downright impossible, if she was going to be true to her herself and her years of promises and grit.

If she went back to London tonight she would have to face Matteo again too soon and she didn't know what she would say, or how to act, or how to be the same person she'd been before. Before she'd ever met him.

Truth was, she wasn't sure of anything any more. Of where she fitted in her own life, or in other people's. Fighting back the sting of more tears, she walked into the kitchen. At that same moment her phone rang. She pulled it out of her pocket, unable to see the number for the teary blur, which she scrubbed away as quickly as it arrived.

There was absolutely no point in getting emotional about any of this. She just needed to compartmentalise her feelings and move on, like she always did. ‘Hello?'

‘Ivy?'

Matteo. She swallowed back the lump in her throat and disregarded the accompanying jittery heart rate at the sound of his voice. She would not show him any reason to feel sorry for her, she would not let him know her feelings. She infused her voice with cheeriness. ‘Hello! How's Joey?'

‘Good, you saw the note. He's a lot better now. He had a ureteral obstruction, which didn't resolve with a nephrostomy. I operated early this morning.'

‘Er…English, Matteo?' Cradling the phone between her ear and her shoulder, she filled the kettle, plonked two teabags into a teapot and tried very hard to act normally.

‘I had to take him back to Theatre to unblock a blockage. What is wrong?'

‘Nothing. Nothing at all.'

‘But your voice isn't right. You are upset?' He knew the timbre of her voice? He knew her so well he could tell when she was upset, without words? He knew her too well. She'd let him in too—she'd let him in and she was going to get hurt. Because that's what happened if she let her
guard down. There was a pause she didn't know how to fill. Then he was back again.

‘Are you cross because I left? I'm sorry I had to leave so quickly and so early. I didn't want to wake you.' Another pause, then his voice was more serious. ‘I need to talk to you.'

Uh-huh. She knew exactly what was coming, but she couldn't do a heart-to-heart, not without understanding what the heck was going on in her head and why her body had become a quivering mess. Why she desperately needed to feel his arms around her when it was the opposite of what she should be needing.

But something had to be said, surely? They'd moved further into something last night. Something tangible and deep and frighteningly wonderful. And so very, very dangerous. A line had been crossed and it couldn't be ignored.

But it could be delayed. Until she'd got a better grip on herself. ‘Another time, Matteo. I'm busy… I have too much to do.'

‘That is what I mean.'

‘Sorry? You're not making sense.'

‘I saw the boss today at the hospital. Pinkney. I told him your dilemma and he agreed to a week of compassionate leave. You can stay with your mum and work can wait. I fixed it for you.' He had a smile in his voice and she imagined that wonderful mouth curving upwards, the light
in his eyes. And felt a stab of pain in her solar plexus.

You drive me crazy.

And he did. And that was the problem. He drove her wild with desire, he drove her to the edge, he drove her to want things she couldn't have. To dream impossible things. And now he was trying to fix her messed-up life. And it would be so easy to let him do it—so easy, and yet the hardest thing in the world. Because she could not let go of her grip on her life.

‘But, you see…I don't want you to do that. I don't need you to fix things for me, I can manage quite well on my own. I don't need you. I don't need anyone.' It was harsh. And it was everything she needed to believe and feel again but didn't, but if she kept on saying it he'd get the message and she wouldn't have to face him. Or this. Or herself.

‘I thought that was what you wanted. I was trying to help.' She could hear the building anger in his voice. And, yes, he'd been kind, as always, and thought he was doing the right thing. But, as it turned out, she hadn't needed him to. Once again she was surplus to Angela's requirements.

‘Thank you. But I won't be needing it. Please, don't interfere in things like that again. Not my work. Thank you.'

‘Hey! Stop right there. Do not talk to me as if
I am just a colleague, as if there is nothing between us. Ivy, we need to talk.'

‘I'm not sure there's anything to say.'

His voice was louder, harsher. ‘And I think there is. I think that what happened last night meant something. Did it mean nothing to you?'

She could lie, but he'd know. He
knew
her. He knew what had passed between them last night, the startling honesty and the wonder—that wasn't something she could deny. It had been too profound, too…too
much
—and it had shocked them both. She lowered her voice, the truth of her words like glass shards in her gut. ‘Yes. Yes. It meant something.'

‘So explain to me what is happening here, because I'm confused. You're distant and different from the woman I know. Damn it, Ivy, tell me the truth.'

I'm saying that you mean too much to me. That I have to let you go.
‘I'm sorry, really. I do have to go.' Her heart twisted keenly, making her inhale. But her lungs wouldn't work. She forced the words through a closed throat. ‘Goodbye, Matteo.'

It was for the best. It was. And one day she'd thank herself for it.

Without waiting another moment, she flicked the phone off and went up to her room to pack. It was time to go home.

Wherever the hell that was. But it wasn't here. And it wasn't in Matteo's arms.

* * *

Round three. Part one.

Matteo circumvented the tasteless coffee table and surreptitiously drank out of his clandestine cup as he mingled with the waiting group. The only saving grace was that Ivy wouldn't be here to tempt him, to confuse him. To drive him mad all over again.

In fact, it was very useful that he'd had to leave in the night to come and see Joey, before he'd had a chance to do anything even more foolish than make love to a woman who was destined to trample all over his heart. She'd proved that enough when she'd answered his attempts at intimacy with silence. Refuted his well-intentioned intervention into her work life—which, for the record, he'd thought was the right thing to do.

But that would never happen again, not if it generated such a response. He could feel his blood pressure rising at the memory of her sharp words and the swiftly ended phone call. The reminder that relationships brought about all kinds of problems that he was better not having.

He took a seat in the front row, glared at the clock. Willed the day to be over so he could get the big fat tick on his attendance sheet and eventually put this whole exercise behind him. Then
he wouldn't have any more unreturned calls to Ivy Leigh. Along with the whole bunch of questions and no answers.

The door swung open and her assistant walked in, handed out the day's schedule. And—

In walked Ivy.

Matteo's head pounded. That blood pressure was rising at an alarming rate. Why was she not in York?

‘Good morning, everyone.' She was all business and no eye contact. Well, no eye contact with him at any rate. ‘Welcome to the third day in our social media course. Today we are going to expand on branding and why it is important in this technological age to capitalise on it. I'm going to give a few pointers about how we do this as a company, and how you can help…'

He didn't want to help. He wanted it to be over. He wanted to be alone with her. He wanted her. That was the startling, raw, naked truth of it. And at the same time he knew that wanting a woman who did not want him back was the first step to madness.

Two hours later they were split into more infuriating groups to discuss brand statements. Ivy walked over, her limp undiminished—in fact, worse than usual. He put it down to the bicycle accident. She looked tired and frazzled and distant. To stop himself from spending too much
time just looking at her, at the proud, straight back, the curve of a breast he knew was lush and sweet, the unintentionally honest green eyes, he started to give his ideas to the group. ‘Brand statements… Okay. We help children. We save lives. I know…we save children's lives…er… Children first? Kids first…?
Aargh
. This is pointless. I'm a doctor, not a marketing person. I instinctively know what the brand is, I live the damned thing every day—why do I have to come up with a statement?'