by Sun Chara
To get to the top of his game as a world-renowned neurosurgeon, Peter had to go through grueling training, and also needed to be able to sustain the tempo over time. He had succeeded. Now, he had to turn those same skills into a strategy for his personal life, and get Ellie home. A bit of charm could swing things his way.
But did he even remember what charm was?
“So, I’m wet.” He shrugged. “And you’re cold.” He spotted the gas heater imbedded in the wall. “That thing still not working?”
“I don’t know.” Her eyes never left his face.
He got down on his haunches, fiddled with a knob and it clicked in place. “Gotcha.”
“You’re doing it again.” She strolled over to the sofa and sat, the two baubles still in her hands.
“Taking care of you?”
That’s not what she meant, but he was taking care of her. Since the day she met him, he’d done that. For her family as well. He’d fixed her parents’ ramshackle cottage and paid for medication for her brother. She’d wanted for nothing. Even at the beginning of his career, he’d always made sure she had all the material comforts he could buy. But all she wanted was to spend time with him. Share life with him, not just his bed.
“Why did you come back, Peter?”
“Because I love you.” The heater flared at that moment and nearly drowned out his words.
“You do?”
“No.” He hauled himself up and turned, facing her and being uncharacteristically sarcastic. “I made it up.” He grabbed the sandwich platter and soda can off the counter and strode over and set it on top of her suitcase. “Eat.”
“I’ll eat when I want.” Her face turned mutinous.
“Until then though…” He lifted her into his arms and smothered her with kisses. “You must know that Italian men are noted for their staying power and family tradition.”
She held onto him tightly and her insides upended. She closed her eyes, breathing in his damp musky scent. Felt his strength. Desire flamed, and her heart throbbed.
But she balled her hands into fists behind his back. This is what he’d always done; he’d always been able to trigger a sexual reaction from her – so much that her need for him consumed her. Her mouth went dry, and her nerves twittered. But she had to maintain her ground. She loved him too much…so much that she’d lost her way, and herself.
“They are also noted for taking their women for granted.” She pressed her hands against his chest to sever the connection, but he held her close to his heart. To deflect his raw sexuality sweeping her in, she stiffened her spine and avoided making eye contact with him. But her pulse skipped over her defenses.
“Not true.” He dropped a kiss on the tip of her nose. “We like being good providers but sometimes we can’t be as attentive as the women want.”
“Like me?”
“You wanted me to be attentive, Ellie?”
She wanted to clobber him. “No. I just wanted you for sex.”
“So, that’s it.” He leaned back slightly, his mouth twitching in amusement. “Zombie-like, I drag myself home after twenty hours of work. You bewitch me, entice me to bed and have your way with me.”
She smiled, not seeing it from his point of view, before. “A wife’s right.”
“And a husband’s.” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “Don’t tempt me until you’ve got a full stomach. Eat your sandwich.” He propelled her
down on the couch and, picking up the platter, placed it in her hands.
“I thought you said you could cook.”
“This is just an appetizer,” he said sotto-voce, his words loaded with innuendo.
She chuckled, and gave back as good as she got. “I can’t wait to see
what the main course will be.”
He grinned. “You’ll have to wait it out.” Shedding his coat, he sat beside her on the sofa, chomping his sandwich and glancing her way to ensure she was eating hers.
“So.” He chewed and swallowed. “What are we going to do, you and I?”
CHAPTER SIX
She took a sip of soda and set the can on the floor. She didn’t pretend not to understand. “I don’t know.”
“Answer the question.”
Quirking an eyebrow, she returned the half eaten sandwich to the plate.
He took a last swig of his drink and placed his plate and empty can on the floor next to hers. Then he turned, and he was so close, she glimpsed her reflection in his pupils. “Why did you marry me, Ellie?”
“Oh, Peter don’t you know?”
“You said for the money.”
“That was to annoy the heck out of you.”
“Well, you succeeded.”
He waited.
She made him wait.
He mocked a cough.
“Because I love you, my big Italian.”
“Then, why leave me?” “To shake you from your complacency and give myself time to think.”
“I work like a slave to give you the best in life…give you what you want and you think me complacent?” He stood, paced, and stopped, towering above her.
“You give me everything I want Peter, except the one thing I need most.”
“What’s that?”
“You.”
He shook his head. “Women.”
“Oh?”
“I mean you.”
“What about me?”
“I married you. You’ve got me. Period.”
“I have your name and your status, Peter. You, I catch between flights and research symposiums.”
“What do you want, Ellie? A stay at home husband?”
“Of course, not. Just one who is there long enough to talk with, share with, be with.” She hooked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “Tell my dreams to.”
“I thought you had plenty to do—”
“I did, at first. It was exciting making the rounds as Mrs. Medeci, the doctor’s young bride.” She pulled the scarf from around her neck. “Then, it got wearisome and boring.”
“Boring?” he said, appalled. “You’re not serious?”
She ignored his query.
“And?” he prompted.
She’d felt empty, neglected…but she didn’t voice those thoughts. “I have a brain, Peter. Talents I want to develop. Dreams I want to fulfill.”
“Do they include me?” He picked up the dishes off the floor and set them in the sink.
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“Oh Peter, I don’t know.” She squeezed the woolen scarf in her hands. “I seem to have lost myself in you, your life, your ambitions.”
“You think maybe you could find yourself in me, instead?”
“What do you mean?”
A gust whipped the tree outside, the fierceness abated, but the branches still scraped the windowpane.
And then a light flared in her brain.
If she hadn’t married him, where would she be? Probably running a nine to five job, barely making ends meet and still dreaming of Prince Charming. You dolt! She chastised herself. You not only found the Prince but you caught him … in fact, he worked twenty-four seven to provide for her, ensure she wanted for nothing. What had she done for him? Had she ever wondered how he felt when he stumbled through the front door, too exhausted to talk, to eat, but not too tired to hold her, love her?
“Oh, Peter.” The scarf slithered from her hands onto the floor and she wobbled to her feet, reaching out for him with outstretched hands. “Have I been really naïve?”
“You have.” He took her fingertips, pulled her up against his chest and smiled down at her. “Part of your allure.”
“Then you understand, why I left?”
“No.”
“The demands of being a doctor’s wife and always on show, triggered a personal mutiny of sorts. I thought I’d lost myself, my identity.” She chuckled. “I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but I do think I’m finding myself in you now.”
“Glad to hear it,�
� he whispered so quietly that she barely heard him.
“I’m your wife but I need to be my own person too.”
“You’ve always been your own person, Ellie.”
“For a while, I felt I was drowning in society’s expectations and”—
she took half a step away and fiddled with the button at her collar— “yours.”
“My only expectations were that you were there for me and you were happy.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “I thought you were.”
“I was, I am, I mean .… ”
“Then, you’re not leaving? You’re coming home with me.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“I’m missing something here?”
“Oh!” She swooped up her woolen cap from the couch and hurled it at him. “You’re so pig-headed, you don’t understand, you … you .… ”
He caught the fluffy material and faced her. “Have I been so insensitive to your needs, Ellie?”
She shook her head. “Not insensitive, Peter. Arrogant, demanding, controlling.”
“I have?”
“You have.”
Peter shuttered his eyes, recalling how often he’d stumbled through the door, exhausted and wanting nothing more than to hold her. She’d always been there for him. Had he thought of her, waiting for him in that huge, empty house while minutes ticked by, then hours until he came home? You big buffoon, he thought. He’d imagined she could be satisfied surrounded with pretty baubles and society events. Not his lady. Her makeup went deeper. There was more to her than that. He smiled. That’s why he’d fallen in love with her … married her.
“What’s your dream, baby? Let me make it happen for you.” “To have my husband with me.” She unhooked several buttons from their buttonholes and her coat hung open. “I want us to get to know each other, Peter, to share our lives.”
He pierced her with a look. Maybe he’d missed it again. “You want me to give up my practice, so I can stay home with you?” He guffawed, amazed.
“No.”
“That’s what makes me who I am. The work I do, the beliefs I hold dear.”
“Dearer than your wife, obviously.”
“No. There’s no comparison.”
“Thanks.” She sank back on the sofa and curled in the corner. “Macho Italian.”
He walked over and sat down beside her. “You are the most important thing to me, Ellie. Without you, nothing I do would have much meaning. It’s the sharing I do with you that makes it worthwhile.”
“What are you sharing with me, Peter?”
“Everything.”
“Hardly.” She trailed her fingers down the row of buttons on her coat. “Seems like it’s just wham bam, thank you ma’am nights when you can squeeze me between your tight schedule.”
He looked at her in astonishment.
She nodded.
“Is that what it felt like to you?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I did. By the time I finished my first sentence, you were fast asleep.”
He placed his hands over hers, stopping the bumpy ride of her fingers over the buttons. “What do you want, Ellie?”
“I -I-I.” She withdrew her hands from his warm grasp. “I want to go back to school. Get my degree in fashion design and marketing.”
“And?”
“I want to talk, laugh, be with my husband.”
“And?”
“That’s all for now.”
“Sure?”
She nodded and a wave of golden-brown curls fell over her face, concealing her features.
“That could be arranged.” He extended a finger and flicked a wisp of hair off her brow.
“Silent Night, Holy Night…” the soothing melody enveloped them.
He took her hand in his, his thumb stroking her inner palm, sensitizing her flesh. She drew in a breath, her pulse skittery.
“Nothing about leaving my practice, leaving me,” —he mocked a cough— “divorce?”
She bolted upright. “I would never divorce you, Peter. That would be like cutting out a piece of my heart.”
“Aha! Finally she admits it.”
“You tricked me.” “I did.” He grinned. “And that’s not all.”
She cast him a wary glance.
“How long will it take to finish your degree?”
“Two years.”
“Mmm, rather long to be gone from home, studying late at night” —he scratched the top of his head with his fist— “coming home dog tired and having wham bam thank you buster nights.”
“Oh no, you don’t.” She giggled, catching his train of thought. “There are computer courses I can take from home.”
“So I’ll get the attention I deserve from the wife?”
She giggled. “I’ll see what I can do to accommodate you, doctor.”
Suddenly, wind and rain lashed against the windowpane, rattling hinges, and then a calm infused the elements.
Ellie cuddled into her husband’s warm embrace. He placed a finger beneath her chin and raising it a notch, gazed deep into her eyes. “Time I got you home, my love.”
“First you must satisfy my craving, doctor.”
A puzzled look crossed his face.
The joyous tune of “We wish you a Merry Christmas…” filled the room.
He chuckled and sweeping her up in his arms, strode to the Christmas tree. “Your wish is my command.”
“Ooo, I like the sound of that.” She draped her arms around his neck and pointed to a cherry filled chocolate ornament.
Juggling her in his arms, he reached up, snapped off the edible bauble
and placed it in her palm. “Anything else?”
“Lots ’n lots more.” She met and held his gaze. Then, she took a bite of the chocolate and offered it to him. “Oh, yum.”
He bypassed the proffered ornament, dipped his head, and licked a dab of chocolate from her lip. “Mmm, good.”
“Mmm, yes.” She smiled against his mouth and wrapped her arms tighter around him.
“Ditto that.” He took command, his mouth creating magic on her own and leaving no doubt that Christmas was indeed, a time of miracles.
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First published in Great Britain by HarperImpulse 2013
Copyright © Sun Chara 2013
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Ebook Edition © December 2013
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Digital eFirst: Automatically produced by Atomik ePublisher from Easypress.
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