Their Most Forbidden Fling

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  Hamish Fisher had been in just about every day. Molly had watched on one of his first visits as Lucas had taken him aside and talked to him in his quiet, supportive way. It had been particularly moving to see Tim’s parents hug Hamish by their son’s bedside. There were lots of tears but no harsh words or accusations’so different from her father, who after all this time was still so antagonistic towards Lucas.

  ‘Lucas still thinks there’s a chance with Tim Merrick,’ Jacqui said, following the line of Molly’s gaze. ‘He’s getting a bit of flak from some of his colleagues, though.’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ Molly said, thinking of some of the angry exchanges she’d either witnessed or heard when Lucas had been on the phone. Lucas had given Tim mannitol a couple of times to reduce brain swelling and he had stopped the steroids. This was considered controversial by some as high-dose steroids were commonly used to reduce brain swelling, with mannitol generally only used in the acute situation, straight after the occurrence of an injury. But Lucas was concerned the steroids might suppress Tim’s resistance to infection so he had stopped them and closely monitored intracranial pressure.

  ‘So how are things going between you two?’ Jacqui asked with a twinkling look. ‘Lucas won’t tell me a thing, damn him.’

  ‘Things are fine,’ Molly answered evasively. She didn’t want to talk about her relationship with Lucas. It was precious and private. Their workplace relationship was friendly but professional. She was careful not to overstep the mark in any way. But there were times when she caught his eye and a secret message would pass between them. She would hum with longing all day until she got home. Sometimes she would barely get in the door before he reached for her. Other times he took his time, torturing her with long drawn-out foreplay that had her begging for mercy.

  But not a day went past when she didn’t long that they were indeed like any other young couple starting out together, without the past casting its dark shadow over them. Over the last few days she had found herself thinking wistfully of an engagement ring and a wedding gown. She had even wandered past a high street wedding designer on one of her walks. She had stood for long minutes in the freezing cold, wishing she was like the young bride in there with her mother, excitedly trying on gowns. She had turned away with a sinkhole of sadness inside her stomach. How would she ever be a bride if she couldn’t be with Lucas? She didn’t want anyone else. She couldn’t think of being with anyone else. She was wired to love him and only him.

  ‘Have you thought of staying on?’ Jacqui asked. ‘Your time with us is racing away. It’ll be over before you know it.’

  Tell me about it, Molly thought with a spasm of pain near her heart. ‘I have a job lined up at home,’ she said. ‘It’s at a big city teaching hospital close to where my mother lives. They held the post open for me while I came here. I’d feel bad if I didn’t show up. Anyway, isn’t the person I’m filling in for over here coming back from maternity leave?’

  ‘Yes, but I thought Lucas, being director, might be able to wangle a position for you,’ Jacqui said. ‘It reeks of nepotism but who cares about that?’

  ‘I don’t think Lucas would do anything that wasn’t fair and above board,’ Molly said. ‘Anyway, I wouldn’t want him to.’

  ‘You’re good for him,’ Jacqui said. ‘He still works too damn hard but he seems a lot happier in himself since you’ve been here. I’ve been quite worried about him, to tell you the truth. I’ve never met a more driven doctor. I keep telling him he’ll drive himself into an early grave if he doesn’t let up a bit. He hasn’t taken a holiday in I don’t know how long.’

  ‘I’ve been saying much the same thing,’ Molly said.

  ‘Maybe he’ll take some time off and visit you back in the home country,’ Jacqui said. ‘Nothing like absence to make the heart grow fonder.’

  Molly stretched her mouth in a brief pretence of a smile. ‘Let’s hope so.’

  ‘You love him, don’t you?’ Jacqui’s expression was full of mother-hen concern.

  Molly sighed as she straightened some notes on the desk. ‘I’ll get over it.’

  ‘Will you?’

  Molly looked at the ward clerk’s concerned expression. ‘I’ll have to, won’t I?’ she said. ‘This is just for here and now.’

  ‘But you want the whole package.’ It was a statement, not a question. And it was the truth.

  ‘Don’t most women?’ Molly asked.

  ‘But he’s not talking marriage and babies, is he?’ Jacqui said. ‘He told me point-blank there wasn’t going to be a wedding when I asked him about it the other day. It doesn’t make sense. Why wouldn’t he want to marry you? He’s old school right to his backbone. He’s not one of these playboys who want their cake and eat it too. He doesn’t say much, but anyone can see he’s a family man at heart.’

  Molly looked at the stack of papers on the desk again, absently flicking through the top right-hand corners of the pages with a fingertip. ‘It’s complicated...’

  ‘It’s because of your brother, isn’t it?’ Jacqui said. ‘I’ve been watching him with Tim and that young friend of his Hamish, the one who was driving. That’s why Lucas is so hell bent on keeping Tim alive. He was driving when your brother was killed, wasn’t he?’

  ‘It was an accident,’ Molly said, looking at her again. ‘It wasn’t his fault. A kangaroo jumped out just as he came around the bend. There was nothing he could do. He didn’t see it in time.’

  ‘How sad,’ Jacqui said. ‘I’ve always wondered why he’s so hard on himself. He works harder than any other doctor I know. Poor Lucas. And poor you.’

  ‘It was a long time ago,’ Molly said. ‘I’d prefer it if you kept this to yourself. We’re all trying to move on from it.’

  ‘But you haven’t moved on from it, or at least Lucas hasn’t,’ Jacqui said. ‘But, then, one doesn’t move on from something like that. I guess you just have to learn to live with it.’

  ‘I don’t think Lucas sees it quite that way,’ Molly said. ‘He’s punishing himself. He’s been punishing himself for the last seventeen years. I hate seeing him do that to himself. Matt wouldn’t have wanted him to do that to himself. It’s all such a mess and there’s nothing I can do to fix it.’

  Jacqui gave Molly’s arm a gentle squeeze. ‘Your job is to love him, not to fix him,’ she said. ‘The rest is up to fate or destiny.’

  If only fate and destiny weren’t so damned capricious, Molly thought in despair as she walked back to ICU.

  * * *

  Lucas looked at the most recent scans of Tim Merrick’s brain with Harry Clark, one of the more senior neurologists on staff.

  ‘There’s some activity but not much,’ Harry said. ‘I’ve seen a couple of cases where the patient has recovered after scans like this but it’s not the norm.’ He turned and looked at Lucas with a grim expression. ‘He might not thank you for keeping him alive if he has to spend the rest of his days sitting slumped and drooling in a chair. Nor might his parents if it comes to that.’

  Lucas tried to ignore the prickle of apprehension that had been curdling his stomach for days. Claire Mitchell had been moved to the rehab unit, which was a positive outcome considering how bleak things had looked when she had first been admitted. But she was going to have a very different life from the one she had known before. He had seen many patients and their families just like her struggle with what life had dished up.

  But he didn’t want to see Hamish Fisher go through the living hell he had gone through’was still going through. He wanted a miracle. He wanted it so badly, not just for Tim and his devoted parents. He wanted it for Hamish and he wanted it for himself. Tim might not have the life he’d had before, but he would still be alive. That was all that mattered.

  ‘Wouldn’t most parents want their kid to stay alive, no matter what?’ Lucas asked.

  Harry let out a long br
eath. ‘Some do, some don’t,’ he said. ‘I’ve had parents divided over a child’s treatment. We had a case a few years back, a kid with severe epilepsy. He’d had one too many seizures and suffered oxygen deprivation. He was virtually vegetative. The father wanted to withdraw treatment. He was adamant about it. He didn’t want to see his kid suffer any more. He’d spent fifteen years watching his boy suffer. The mother... Well, I guess that’s what us men will never truly understand’the mother bond. She wanted her boy alive, no matter what state he was in.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘The parents divorced,’ Harry said. ‘The mother looked after that kid on her own for a couple of years and then one night he died in his sleep. I’ve often wondered if the father regretted not being there, helping her.’

  ‘The kid could have lived for another twenty years,’ Lucas pointed out.

  ‘Yes,’ Harry said with gravely. ‘But would he have wanted to?’

  * * *

  Molly was late getting home after sending off the last of the invitations to the dinner dance. Everyone was getting excited about the event. It was the topic of every conversation at the hospital. The exclusivity element had created a furore, which she and Emma had milked for all it was worth. They had kept twenty-five double tickets back and had put them up for bidding on the hospital website.

  The money they were raising was beyond anything they had imagined and it was thrilling to think people were so keen to be involved. Even the caterers had offered their services free of charge, and the string quartet’one of whom was a neurosurgical registrar at the hospital’had also offered to perform without charging a fee.

  Molly couldn’t wait to tell Lucas. She knew he would be pleased that so much money would be raised for the unit. Hospitals had to work so hard to meet their budgets and there was rarely money left over for any extras. With the money she and Emma were raising, new monitoring equipment could be purchased so patients like Emma would benefit in the future.

  Mittens came over to Molly with a plaintive meow as soon as she walked through the front door. She bent down to stroke him and noticed he was wearing a new collar with a tinkling bell attached. ‘My, oh, my, don’t you look smart?’ she said. ‘Has Daddy been spoiling you?’

  Lucas appeared in the doorway of the sitting room. ‘He brought in a bird,’ he said with a brooding glower.

  ‘Oh... What type?’

  ‘What does it matter what type?’ he asked.

  ‘Well,’ she said as she hung up her coat, ‘if it was a nightingale or a cuckoo I would probably be a little upset. But if it was a sparrow or a starling I wouldn’t be as concerned.’

  ‘We need to talk about what you plan to do with him when you leave,’ he said. ‘Are you planning to take him with you?’

  Molly rolled her lips together for a moment. She could sense Lucas was in a tense mood. She wondered if he too was thinking of how quickly her time with him was passing. He hadn’t said anything, but she had sensed the increased urgency in his lovemaking over the last few days. Was he thinking of how much he would miss her when she left? ‘I hadn’t really thought that far ahead...’

  ‘Then you need to,’ he said with a jarring brusqueness. ‘I didn’t sign up for cat ownership. I said I’d babysit him. I’ve done that. That’s all I’m prepared to do.’

  ‘So you’ll kick him out when you kick me out, will you?’

  His brows snapped together. ‘I’m not kicking you out. You’re here for a set time. We’ve both known that from the outset.’

  Molly moved past him with a rolled-eye look. ‘Whatever.’

  ‘We’ve talked about this, Molly,’ he said. ‘You know the terms. I’ve never hidden them from you.’

  She turned to face him. ‘Why are you being so prickly this evening?’ she asked. ‘I came home all excited to tell you stuff about the dinner and you’ve done nothing but bite my head off since I walked through the door. Sometimes I think you don’t really like having me here. I bet you’re secretly counting the days until I leave.’

  A long tense moment passed as his gaze tussled with hers. But then he expelled a breath and lifted a hand to rub the back of his neck. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to rain on your parade.’ He dropped his hand back by his side. ‘Tell me about your exciting news.’

  Molly wasn’t going to be won over that easily. ‘You probably won’t even find it exciting,’ she said with a little pout. ‘It’s not like you really want a bunch of people’most of whom you won’t know’wining and dining and dancing in your precious house. You probably only agreed to it to get me off your back.’

  ‘I’m fine about it,’ he said.

  She gave him a cynical look.

  ‘OK,’ he conceded. ‘It’s not my idea of a fun night at home. But it’s obviously important to you so I’m happy to go along with it.’

  Molly gave him a haughty look and went to move up the stairs, but he stopped her with a hand on her wrist. ‘Do you mind?’ she said. ‘I’m going upstairs to have a shower.’

  His fingers tightened like a handcuff, and his eyes went dark, very dark as they locked on hers. ‘Have one with me,’ he said.

  Molly felt a little shiver roll down her spine like a red-hot firecracker. Sparks of awareness prickled over her skin. Her breasts tightened beneath her clothes. Her legs trembled in anticipation of being thrust apart by his commanding possession. But some little demon of defiance pushed up her chin and ignited her eyes. ‘What if I don’t want to have one with you?’ she said. ‘What if I want to be on my own right now and sulk and brood and be in a rotten mood?’

  He tugged her against him, thigh to thigh, hard male arousal to soft but insistent female need. ‘Then I’ll have to think of ways to convince you,’ he said, and lowered his mouth to the sensitive skin of her neck.

  Molly shivered again as she felt his teeth on her skin. It was a playful bite’the primal tug of an alpha male showing his selected mate that he meant business. She tilted her head as he moved down her neck to her left clavicle, his tongue moving over the tightly stretched skin, licking, laving and teasing. Her breasts tingled behind her bra as she felt his warm breath skate over her décolletage.

  Sensual excitement sent her heart rate soaring as he pushed his hands up under her top to cup her breasts. His mouth sucked on the upper curve of her right breast pushed up by his hands. She snatched in a breath as she felt his teeth graze her flesh. He went lower, taking her lace-covered nipple in his mouth and sucking on it. It made her all the more desperate to feel his lips and tongue on her bare flesh.

  She moved sinuously against him, rolling her hips against the proud jut of his erection, tantalising him with her body, wanting him to be as desperate for her as she was for him.

  And he was.

  He growled against her mouth as he finally covered it with his, thrusting his tongue through her parted lips to mate with hers in a heart-stopping tango. His hands worked at her clothes methodically but no less hastily. Molly did the same with his, but perhaps with a little less consideration for buttons and seams.

  She had only just got him free of his trousers and underwear when he lowered her to the floor. The Persian rug tickled the skin of her back as she felt his weight come down over her. She gasped as he speared her with his body, a deep, bone-melting thrust that made her insides turn to molten lava. It was a frenzied coupling’rough, urgent, desperate and deliciously exciting. Her nerves shrieked in delight, twitching and tensing, contracting and convulsing as each deep thrust drove into her.

  She started to climb to the summit. Up and up she went, her body stretching and stretching to reach that blissful goal. He increased his pace as if he had sensed her need for more friction. And then he brought his fingers into play against the swollen heart of her, tipping her over the edge into a tumultuous sea of mind-blowing sensations.

  It
went on and on, rolling waves coursing through her, each one sending another cataclysmic reaction through her body. She dug her fingers into his back, her teeth sinking into the skin of his shoulder as the riot of sensations shook and shuddered through her until she was finally spent. Still she hung onto him as he reached his own pinnacle of pleasure. She felt it power through her, an explosive release that had him slump against her once it was over.

  Lucas eased himself away and offered her a hand to help her to her feet. ‘About that shower,’ he said. ‘Have I convinced you to share it with me yet?’

  Molly gave him a playful smile, her body still tingling from his passionate lovemaking. ‘I don’t know. What’s in it for me?’

  His eyes ran over her tousled form, leaving a trail of hot longing in their wake. ‘You can’t guess?’

  Her insides fluttered with excitement. ‘You’re in a dangerous mood tonight, Dr Banning,’ she said.

  His mouth tilted upwards in a sexy half-smile, his eyes smouldering like hot coals. ‘You’d better believe it, Dr Drummond,’ he said, and scooped her up in his arms and carried her upstairs.

  Molly was in a dangerous mood herself by the time Lucas had turned on the shower. She stepped into the cubicle with him, pushing against his chest with the flat of her hand until his back was up against the marbled wall of the shower. ‘Stay,’ she said, giving him a sultry look before she slithered down his body.

  He gave a groan as she took him in her mouth. She felt his legs buckle and he thrust out a hand to brace himself as she worked on him. It was the most erotic thing she had ever done. She tasted the essence of him on her tongue as she swirled it over and around the head of his erection. He groaned again and she heard his breathing rate escalate. She felt the tension building in him; she could feel the blood surging through his veins, filling him, extending him to capacity and she drove him on relentlessly.

  He tried to pull her away but she refused to budge. She drew on him, again and again, using the moistness of her mouth to lubricate him. She used her tongue again to tantalise him, to tease him, to take that final plunge. She felt the intimate explosion, felt the warm spill of his release, heard the raggedness of his breathing, felt the sag of his limbs as the pleasure flowed through him.