and she gave in. There was no point making an issue out of it, was there?
It took them a bare five minutes to drive to her home. She had bought the cottage when she had moved to Dalverston and had spent a lot of time and effort restoring it over the last few years. She had always loved the cottage’s quirkiness and its sense of history, not to mention its location, backing onto the river. However, she had to admit that the sight of the darkened windows made her heart sink a little as they drew up outside.
Normally it didn’t bother her that she lived on her own. She’d had Ross while she was still in her teens, getting pregnant the first time she had slept with her boyfriend. Ross’s father had been just a year older than her, far too young to want to accept responsibility for the child he had fathered.
With her parents’ help, Rachel had brought Ross up, working hard to give them both a good life. Getting through medical school had taken a huge amount of determination with a young child to care for but she had succeeded and it had got easier as Ross had grown older. However, one thing she had never factored into her busy life was time for a proper relationship.
She’d had a couple of affairs over the years, and still dated occasionally, but that was all. Although the few men she had been involved with had appeared perfect on paper, she had never been tempted to commit to a long-term relationship with any of them. Quite frankly, she hadn’t had any inclination to fall in love with all its attendant pitfalls, especially not after her first disastrous experience. She had been perfectly happy with her life the way it was…
Or so she had thought.
Rachel’s breath caught as the doubts slid into her mind. She had everything she had ever dreamed of having, a job she loved, a son she adored, a comfortable home, so what on earth could be missing? Surely she didn’t wish that she had someone to come home to, someone who would be waiting for her with a smile and a hug?
‘Here we are, then. Want me to come in with you and check everything’s all right?’
Matt’s voice mingled with her thoughts and Rachel had the craziest urge to shout, Yes, please! Please come in with me. Please stay and talk to me, share this evening and maybe share other evenings with me too, but she managed to stop herself in time. If she took the first step down that route, who knew where she would end up? The thought scared her.
‘No, it’s fine,’ she said, hoping he couldn’t hear the panic in her voice.
‘Sure?’ He stared at the darkened windows and frowned. ‘I don’t like to think of you going into an empty house on your own.’
‘I’ll be fine,’ Rachel said firmly, as much for her own benefit as his. She grasped the doorhandle, ready to get out of the car, then stopped when he suddenly leant across the seat and kissed her gently on the cheek. His lips were cool from the night air and she shivered when she felt them brush her skin, hastily blanking out the thought of how good it would feel if he kissed her properly on the mouth.
‘Take care, Rachel. It’s been a tough day for all of us. If you need someone to talk to, you know where I am.’
‘I…um…thank you.’
Rachel scrambled out of the car and almost ran up the path to the front door. Her hands were shaking so hard that it took her a moment to fit the key into the lock. Stepping into the tiny vestibule, she switched on the porch light then turned and waved. Matt gave a toot on his horn and drove away, his taillights rapidly disappearing into the darkness, but it was several minutes before she closed the door and went inside.
She stood there in the hall, deliberately drinking in the peace and quiet of her home in the hope that it would calm her, but for some reason the magic didn’t work that night. Instead of peace all she felt was loneliness, instead of soothing quiet, emptiness, and she bit her lip. She had thought she was happy with her lot but all of a sudden she was aware of all that she lacked. She may have a fulfilling job, good friends, a son she adored, but she needed more.
She needed someone to love her and hold her in the night. Someone she could love and hold onto too, but was it too late for that? She was forty-six years old and it seemed crazy to be wishing for more than she had, more than might be good for her. Did she really want to risk falling in love at this point in her life, always supposing she met someone to fall in love with. Suitable men weren’t exactly thick on the ground.
A picture of Matt suddenly appeared in her mind’s eye and she frowned. If she did fall in love, it would have to be with someone like Matt, someone she trusted and respected, someone she found attractive too. But where could she hope to find anyone like Matt? He was a one-off. Special. There wasn’t another man like Matt in the whole wide world.
A tiny sigh escaped her as she went into the sitting room and turned on the lamps, filling the house with light. There was no point even thinking about falling in love with Matt when there was little likelihood of him reciprocating her feelings. The only woman Matt had ever loved was his late wife and she certainly couldn’t compete with her.
‘I’m sorry, Matt, but I’ve had to add a couple of extra patients onto your list. Rachel asked me if I’d try to make some cuts to Ross’s list and it was the only way I could fit everyone in.’
‘That’s fine, Carol, don’t worry about it. We’ll just have to pull together until everything settles down.’
Matt smiled at the practice manager, hoping he hadn’t visibly reacted at the mention of Rachel’s name. It was Monday morning and he had just arrived at the surgery. He had planned on getting there early that day but as luck would have it, he’d had a phone call from the Ambulance Control centre as he’d been about to leave home. By the time he had dealt with that, the traffic had built up in the town centre and he’d had the devil of a job getting through it. Now he had barely five minutes to spare before his first appointment.
‘Oh, good, there you are, Matt. What happened? Did you oversleep?’
Matt turned when he heard Rachel’s voice, trying to quell the tremor that ran through him when he saw her standing behind him. She was wearing what she normally wore for work—a tailored suit with a white blouse and low-heeled shoes. Today her suit was cherryred, a colour that shouldn’t have worked with her glorious chestnut hair, yet it did. The richness of the hue highlighted her porcelain-fine complexion and made her large brown eyes look darker than ever. She had chosen a slightly deeper shade of lipstick to complement it and the colour emphasised the fullness of her mouth.
Matt felt his stomach lurch as his gaze lingered on her luscious lips. He still didn’t understand what was going on. For almost six years, six extremely comfortable years too, he had viewed Rachel as a colleague and a friend, but he could no longer think of her solely that way. Far too many times over the weekend he had found his thoughts returning to her and they had been thoughts he had never entertained before. The memory of them made him inwardly squirm and he hurried to reply. Rachel would run a mile if she discovered that he had been fantasising about her sharing his bed!
‘Sorry I’m so late. Someone fromAmbulance Control phoned as I was about to leave home.’ He picked up the bundle of notes Carol had prepared for him and headed to his consulting room, talking to Rachel over his shoulder because it seemed wiser than doing so face to face. At least this way he wouldn’t start fantasising about her gorgeous mouth again. ‘That’s what delayed me.’
‘Did they want to know about what happened on Saturday?’
Rachel followed him along the corridor, quickening her pace to keep up with him. At a smidgen over five feet three, she was a lot
