‘Very demure. Very sexy.’
‘It’s not meant to be sexy,’ she said, her eyes widening. ‘It’s meant to be respectable!’
‘It’s perfectly respectable.’
She gave up, not entirely reassured, but her time and her options were dwindling by the minute. ‘Good. Can I go now? I’ve got to get my jeans dry somehow so I can pack them in the morning. Apparently we’re leaving at six and I don’t finish work till five tomorrow, so I’ve got to wash my hair and pack tonight—all except for the things still in the washing machine. Oh, why aren’t I better organised? I really wanted my nice cream jumper but it won’t be dry, it takes ages.’
‘I’ve got a jumper you can borrow,’ Amy said, rummaging in her chest of drawers and pulling out a couple of clingy little scraps.
‘It’s only just April! I meant a jumper, Amy, not a second skin!’
‘You’ll be fine. Here. Take them anyway, they’ll suit you. You can always wear your coat if you’re cold.’
‘In the house?’
‘They’re bound to have heating, you’ll be fine. Go on, scoot. You’ve got things to do and you need a good night’s sleep or you’ll have bags under your eyes.’
Not a chance, she thought. There was no way she’d sleep. She was getting ridiculously excited, and when she walked onto the ward the next morning Andrew was there, lounging against the nursing station and chatting to Lucas’s parents. He looked up and met her eyes and smiled, and her heart turned over in her chest.
Ridiculously excited, she told herself, trying not to grin like an idiot, and she went to find the staff nurse to do handover and made a futile attempt to ignore his presence.
Andrew watched her turn away and busy herself, and resisted the temptation to cut the conversation short. Despite their encouragement and constant support of Lucas, his parents were naturally worried about their son, and he took the time to reassure them yet again before he gave in to the need to speak to Libby.
She was at the nurses’ station in the middle, talking to the staff nurse who’d been on since seven, and as he excused himself and crossed over to her she looked up, her smile lighting up her face and warming him like sunshine. He propped his arms on the counter and smiled back at her, glad it was between them because he was having trouble resisting the unexpected urge to drag her into his arms and kiss her.
Not a good move. He cleared his throat slightly.
‘Hi, there.’
‘Hi. How’s things?’ she asked, her voice music to his ears. ‘I hear Jacob’s improving. How did you get on with Michael?’
‘OK. It was absolutely straightforward. He can go home today once the physio’s got him up on crutches. I’ll see him in the fracture clinic next week for follow-up, but he should be fine. He was lucky.’
‘He was an idiot,’ she reminded him drily, and he chuckled.
‘True. And Jacob’s looking good, considering, so I should be able to get away reasonably promptly tonight. Are you all set?’ he added softly as the staff nurse turned away to answer the phone.
‘I am. All packed and ready. I washed my hair last night so I should be OK for six. Well, except that I haven’t got your mother a birthday present yet.’
‘You don’t have to do that! Just give her a card. She’ll be overwhelmed with presents and it’s the last thing she’d expect.’
‘Sure?’
‘I’m sure. Anyway, we need to head off as soon as we can. Will you have time to get ready?’
‘I should. Do you want me to change before we go, then, or are we changing there?’
‘Change before we go,’ he advised, trying not to sniff for the scent of apples in her hair. ‘The place’ll be in chaos and it’ll be easier. Tell me your address and I’ll pick you up as soon after six as I can get to you.’
‘Fourteen Elm Grove,’ she said. ‘It’s off Wood Farm Drive, but it’s sort of buried. I can give you directions.’
‘No, I’ll find it. Postcode?’ he asked, keying the information into his BlackBerry, and she gave him the code. ‘OK. The sat-nav should do it, but you’d better give me your phone number in case it fails. It has been known.’
‘Surely not,’ she said with a teasing smile, and he felt a kick in his gut.
No strings? Who was he kidding?
It was going to be an interesting weekend…
The day was chaos.
After she’d seen Michael and his parents to discuss his discharge, there were several other post-op patients who needed her attention, and of course there was Lucas. He was desperate to show off his new-found skills with the crutches, and as Amy had been up to the ward to equip Michael with his own set and show him how to use them, they were busy competing, the accident clearly not having slowed Michael down at all.
She stopped them before there was another accident, threatened to confiscate the crutches from Lucas, saw Michael off with his paperwork, then had to deal with an IV crisis in a tearful, wriggling three-year-old, and by the time she’d handed over and got away, it was nearly five-thirty. So much for her plans to slip off early!
She raced home, ripped off her uniform and had the quickest shower on record, skimmed the lightest of make-up onto her face, brushed her hair and pulled on her dress as the doorbell rang just after six. She wriggled the zip up and then, grabbing her shoes and evening bag, she ran downstairs and threw open the door, hardly pausing to greet him as she ran back into the living room, hopping on one foot as she put her shoes on on the move.
‘Sorry, I’m on the drag, I couldn’t get away,’ she said breathlessly over her shoulder, then turned and stopped talking, because he was standing there behind her, looking utterly, devastatingly gorgeous in his DJ, the dress shirt with its immaculate black bow-tie blinding white against his skin, his jaw freshly shaved, his hair—damp?
‘Either you have far too much gel in your hair or it’s still wet,’ she pointed out unnecessarily, and he gave a soft grunt of laughter.
‘I showered and changed at the hospital or I wouldn’t be here now,’ he said wryly. ‘I was hoping to get away early, but you know what it’s like. Are you all packed and ready?’
She laughed with him. ‘Sort of. Hang on.’ She rummaged in her case, came up with the perfume and spritzed herself lightly, then threw it back into the case and zipped the lid. ‘Now I’m ready,’ she said with a slightly nervous grin. ‘Will I do, or will I disgrace you?’
She gave a self-conscious twirl, and he ran his eyes over her. ‘No, you won’t disgrace me,’ he said softly with an odd note in his voice. ‘Turn around, your zip’s not quite up.’ And she felt his fingers cool against her heated skin as he pulled the zip up the last half-inch and fastened the hook, then smoothed it with his hand and stepped back.
‘All done,’
