I worked at there was always a struggle for NICU cots and equipment. It is going to be really nice working somewhere that’s so cutting-edge.’ He looked at Isla—she was seriously stunning and was looking right into his eyes. The attraction between them had been instant and was completely undeniable. Alessi dated, flirted and enjoyed women with absolute ease. ‘I’m looking forward to the weekend, too, though.’
‘That’s right, you’re going away with your girlfriend …’
‘No,’ Alessi said. ‘We broke up.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Isla said, which was the right response.
‘I’m not,’ Alessi said, which was the wrong response for Isla.
She was terribly aware how unguarded she had been tonight. Perhaps safe in the knowledge that he was seeing someone.
She looked into his black eyes and then her gaze flicked down and she watched as his lips stretched into a slow, lazy smile.
His mouth was seductive and he hadn’t yet kissed her but she knew that soon he would.
As his lips first grazed hers Isla’s nerves actually started to dissolve like a cube of sugar being dipped into warm coffee—it was sweet, it was pleasurable, it was actually sublime. Such a gentle, skilled kiss, so different from the forced ones with Rupert. It felt like soft butterflies were tickling her lips and Isla realised that her mouth was moving naturally with his.
Alessi’s hands were on her hips, she could feel his warm hands through her denim shorts and she wanted more pressure, wanted more of something that she didn’t know how to define, she simply didn’t want it to end. But as the kiss naturally deepened, her eyes snapped open and she pulled back. Her first taste of tongue was shocking enough, but that she was kissing a man in the street was for Isla more terrifying.
He thought her easy, Isla was sure, panic building within her about where this might lead. She almost was easy with him because for the first time in her life she now knew how a kiss could lead straight to bed.
She had many weapons of self-defence in her armoury but she leapt straight for the big one and shot Alessi a look of absolute distaste.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ she snapped, even if she had been a very willing participant. ‘I was just trying to be friendly …’
Alessi quickly realised that he had been right to be cautious about her.
He knew the looks she was giving him well.
Very well!
She didn’t actually say the words—do you know who I am? Though Isla’s expression most certainly did. It was a snobby, derisive look, it was a get-your-hands-off-me-you-poor-Greek-boy look.
‘My mistake,’ Alessi shrugged. ‘Goodnight, Isla.’
He promptly walked off—he wasn’t going to hang around to be trampled on.
Her loss.
Alessi knew she’d enjoyed the kiss as much as he had and that her mouth, her body had invited more. He simply knew.
Isla had enjoyed their kiss.
As she climbed into a taxi she was scalding with embarrassment but there was another feeling, too—despite the appalling ending to tonight her lips were still warm from Alessi’s and her body felt a little bit alive for the very first time, a touch awoken to what had seemed impossible before.
As she let herself into her flat, a gorgeous penthouse with a view of Melbourne that rivalled that of the Rooftop Bar, she smiled at Isabel.
‘Sorry I didn’t get there,’ Isabel said. ‘Did you have a good night?’
Isla, still flushed from his kiss, still a little shaken inside, nodded.
It had, in fact, been the best Valentine’s night of her life.
Not that Alessi could ever know.
NEW YEAR’S DAY.
Isla saw the sign for the turn-off to Melbourne International Airport and carried on with her conversation as if she and Isabel were popping out for breakfast.
They were both trying to ignore the fact that Isabel was heading to live in England for a year and so, instead of talking about that, they chatted about Rupert. He was back in Melbourne for a week and the supposed news had broken that he’d had a fling with one of the actresses in his latest film. Not even Isabel knew that Isla’s relationship with Rupert was a ruse.
‘You’re truly not upset?’ Isabel checked, and Isla, who wore her mask well, just laughed as she turned off the freeway.
‘What, I’m supposed to be upset because reports say that he got off with some actress in America a few weeks ago?’ Isla shook her head. ‘It doesn’t bother me. I couldn’t care less what they say in some magazine.’
‘You’re so much tougher than I am,’ Isabel sighed. ‘I simply can’t imagine how I would feel if …’ Her voice trailed off.
The conversation they had perhaps been trying to avoid was getting closer and closer and neither wanted to face it.
Isla knew what Isabel had been about to say.
She couldn’t stand to hear about Sean if he was with someone else.
Sean Anderson, an obstetrician, had been working at the Victoria since November and was the reason they were at the airport now. Sean was the reason that Isabel had accepted a professional exchange with Darcie Green and was heading for Cambridge, just to escape the re-emergence of her childhood sweetheart into her life.
The large multistorey car park at the airport had never made Isla feel sick before but it did today.
They unloaded Isabel’s cases from the boot, found a trolley and then headed to the elevator. Once inside Isla pressed the button for the departure floor and forced a smile at her sister as they stood in the lift.
‘If Darcie’s flight gets in on time you might have time to see her,’ Isla said, and Isabel nodded.
‘She sounds really nice from her emails. Well, I hope she is, for your sake, given that she’s going to be sharing the flat with you.’
Isla had never lived alone and so, with her older sister heading overseas and as their flat was so huge, it had seemed the perfect idea at the time. Now, though, Isla wasn’t so sure. Isabel was going away to sort her heart out and Isla was going to do the same. She really wanted things to be different this year, she wanted to finally start getting on with her life, and that meant dating. That meant letting her guard down and dropping Rupert and, despite being terrified, Isla was also determined to bring on a necessary change.
Not tonight, though!
Tonight there were drinks to greet Darcie at the Rooftop Bar and Alessi would be there.
It
