by Amy Andrews
‘She’s also,’ Genevieve continued, unaware of Miranda’s complete turmoil, ‘the best anaesthetic nurse you’ll ever meet.’
Married.
He was married.
She’d slept with a married man.
Her throat constricted. Nausea threatened.
Edna folded her arms across her ample bosom. ‘Flattery will get you everywhere, Dr Cowan.’
And then she laughed her giant honking laugh, yanking Miranda out of her escalating panic just in time to hear her own introduction.
‘And this is Miranda Dean,’ Genevieve said. ‘She’s new to our team here at Benny’s and I believe this is her first day on anaesthetic rotation?’
Miranda looked at the floor, wishing it would swallow her whole, desperate to disappear into thin air. She wanted to go. To run. To run and not stop. To never have to face Patrick and what they’d done.
What she’d done.
Patrick frowned at the familiar name as his gaze swung towards the other occupant of the room, who seemed to be finding the floor utterly fascinating. Miranda Dean?
His Miranda Dean?
The woman he’d thought about every day, dreamed about every night for the last six months?
Surely not?
‘Miranda?’
He watched as the woman slowly raised her head to look at him. Smoky green eyes peered out from a familiar heart-shaped face and he smiled as his body took a walk down memory lane, reacting to her presence on a purely primitive level.
She didn’t smile back.
‘Patrick,’ she acknowledged through stiff lips, every letter sticking in her toast-dry throat.
‘You two know each other?’ Genevieve asked.
Patrick felt his gut tighten at Miranda’s less-than-enthusiastic welcome. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘We met at the medical symposium in September.’
‘Excellent.’ Edna beamed. ‘It’s always nice to see a familiar face when you’re new.’
Patrick wasn’t sure Miranda agreed. Why on earth did she look so mortified? He knew what had happened between them had been out of character for her but there was no need to look so guilty about it.
They were both adults, for crying out loud.
‘Listen, Miranda, Patrick, do you mind if I snaffle Edna while I’ve got her?’ Geneveive asked. She turned to Edna. ‘I need to make some changes to tomorrow’s theatre five list.’
Edna nodded. ‘Sure. Come to the office.’ She looked at Miranda. ‘I shouldn’t be too long.’
Neither of them waited for approval from Miranda and Patrick and within seconds they were alone.
Patrick frowned at her as Miranda continued to look at him like he’d given her a particularly nasty disease. ‘I gather you’re not too thrilled to see me?’ he started tentatively.
Miranda snorted, galled at his calmness. ‘You could say that.’
Okay...she was obviously annoyed about something. ‘Look, if you’re worried I’ll...talk about what happened with us, there’s really no need. I don’t kiss and tell.’
Miranda folded her arms across her chest. ‘How very magnanimous of you.’
Patrick’s extremities almost contracted frostbite from the ice in her tone. ‘I’m sorry.’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t understand. Did you expect me to call you?’
That hadn’t been the impression he’d been left with that morning. True, they hadn’t had the talk but there’d been something about their goodbye that had been final.
Sure, in another time and place, if his circumstances had been different, he’d have followed up but they’d both lived in different cities and had had obligations to their families.
He’d been pretty sure she’d known it too.
‘I expected you to not be married!’ she snarled.
For a second or two Patrick was very confused then he looked down at his wedding ring.
Damn it! He was so unused to wearing it he’d forgotten he’d put it back on.
‘Oh, no.’ He shook his head emphatically. ‘No, no, no. This is not what it looks like,’ he hastened to assure her.
Miranda was so angry she could barely see straight. He’d lied to her. To get her into bed. She’d specifically asked him the question and he’d denied it. And like some stupid young affection-starved fool she’d believed him. ‘So you aren’t married?’ she demanded.
Patrick sighed. ‘Well...technically I am, but—’
‘Oh, God,’ Miranda wailed, shutting her eyes, hoping she could block him and what had happened out. It had been the most amazing night of her life and now it had been totally sullied by his lies. ‘I don’t believe this.’
‘Look,’ Patrick said, taking a step towards her as she opened her eyes.
Miranda stabbed her finger in the air towards him. ‘Stay right there,’ she hissed. ‘Do not come any closer.’
Patrick stopped, holding his hands up in surrender. He was pleased that the daggers in her eyes were purely metaphorical because she looked like she could do damage with a sharp pointy weapon right about now. ‘Let me explain.’
Miranda laughed at his audacity. ‘Oh, okay, fine.’ She folded her arms again. ‘Go ahead. Explain to me how you’re married but not really and how it doesn’t make you and me lying, cheating, despicable human beings?’
Patrick heard the tap, tap, tap of her clog against the hard floor. Saw the determined little tilt to her chin. God, he couldn’t go into it all here. It was a life he still found difficult to believe he was living. ‘Not here, Miranda. It’s...complicated.’
Miranda nodded. She knew all about complicated relationships. Growing up an illegitimate child of the other woman, she was intimately acquainted with complicated.
‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘the married ones always say that.’
Patrick frowned. What on earth did that mean? ‘Why don’t we get coffee or lunch together today? I can explain, Miranda.’
Miranda shook her head. It didn’t matter. What was done was done. And having lunch, coffee or any contact with this man simply wasn’t on the table.
Thankfully Edna and Geneveive bustled back through the door and she was spared from any further conversation.
* * *
Miranda rushed to the school later that afternoon. Flexibility of hours at St Benny’s had been one of the draw cards, along with its closeness to home, but it was unavoidable that Lola was going to need to use the after-school care facilities from time to time—her grandmother already did too much without adding to her burden of care. Luckily Lola was a social little girl who made friends easily.
Today, though, not even thoughts of her daughter could elicit a smile as she went over and over her conversation with Patrick, her head thumping a little harder each time. Thankfully she’d seen very little of him for the remainder of the shift and then only at a distance. Twice it had looked like he was going to approach her and she wasn’t too proud to admit she’d deliberately walked in the other direction.
A squall of emotions had taken up residence in her belly and she didn’t want him near her until she’d thought them through.
It was hard to get her head around the startling implications of his beringed presence and its impact on her sense of self. Dressed in pink scrubs, he had indeed looked like the sex god he’d been declared but having grown up the casualty of infidelity Miranda hadn’t allowed his devastating sexual attraction to be a factor.
She’d formed very early opinions of the sanctity of marriage that she had staunchly lived by. Married men were simply off limits.
No exceptions.
No grey areas.
And yet she’d slept with one. The mere thought kicked up the squall in her stomach another notch.
Sure, he’d said he could explain and she had no doubt there was some tale of woe about being separ
ated, about how his wife didn’t understand him or how they had an open marriage.
She was sure there was some easy patter about the technicality of his marriage.
But she didn’t want to hear any of it.
What they’d done had been unforgiveable. What he’d done had been unforgiveable. And after eight hours of stewing over it she was even more annoyed now than she had been initially. White-hot anger boiled in her belly.
Add to that disgust, abhorrence and humiliation and she had a headache the size of Australia banging away at her frontal lobe.
Frankly, she couldn’t wait to go home and have a shower and wash away the guilt and the stain of her transgression. She’d spent six months fantasising about that night, living every deliciously sexy moment over and over, and he’d dashed it all in one day.
She felt dirty. She felt used.
She felt like a fool.
All she wanted to do was get home, have that shower and hug her daughter hard.
* * *
Lola gave her one of those big, girly, whole-face grins as she walked into the centre and Miranda felt her headache ease a little. Her heart did its usual squeeze in her chest.
Being a teen mum had been hard and it would never have been a choice she’d have made for herself voluntarily, but her little blonde-ringletted baby girl was simply the best thing that had ever happened to her. Lola filled her heart with joy every day and Miranda couldn’t even begin to imagine life without her daughter.
Lola ran across the room in her usual excitable way and threw herself at Miranda’s body. ‘Mummmmmy!’
Miranda laughed as she clutched her daughter close, kissing her beautiful curls. It was hard to believe that an insane teenage coupling born from rebellion and disaffection had resulted in the perfect little person in front of her. Sleeping with a transient surfer dude only a couple of years older than herself had been a three-week moment of madness but his DNA could not be faulted.
‘Come on, darling,’ Miranda said, crouching down and accepting an enthusiastic kiss. ‘Get your bag. Let’s go home.’
‘Can my new best friend in the whole world come too? For a tea party? We could have Nan’s cupcakes and drink Earl Grey just like real ladies.’
Miranda gave an inward groan as her headache thumped in earnest. The very last thing she wanted to do now was to entertain another child. ‘I’d need her mummy’s permission, Lols. Let’s do it another day, okay? Maybe at the weekend? I’ll get her number from the phone tree.’
Lola clasped her hands together as if she was an orphan asking for more food. ‘Oh, no, Mummy, pleeeeeease? I love her. I love her. I told her she could come.’
Miranda smiled despite her tiredness and felt her little girl’s passionate entreaty worm its way under her skin. ‘Lols...’
Lola shifted from foot to foot and clapped. ‘I’ll go and get her.’
Miranda stood and sagged in resignation. Any other day she’d have brushed off Lola’s sneaky big-eyed plea with a firm ‘Not today’ but life had battered her a little too much these last eight hours and children could always spot a weakness.
She turned to ask the teacher for the list of parent phone numbers. She seriously doubted the other mother would say yes—she certainly wouldn’t let Lola go to a place she wasn’t familiar with and to people she didn’t know—but maybe they could set something up for the weekend.
The very last person she expected to see walking through the front door was Patrick.
For a moment she forgot he was a lying, cheating sneak who had put her in a morally untenable position and just rode the surge of undiluted lust that brushed her skin in a crimson flush. Memories of his kiss, of his heat, of his hardness flooded in and muscles deep inside her tightened in recognition.
God, she wanted him again. Wanted to drag him into the little room where she knew they kept the supplies, strip his clothes off and do him against the wall.
This was what happened when a grown woman lived her life like a nun. Inappropriate thoughts about men who did not deserve them!
He gave her a surprised look and her heart thundered as he approached, even his grim smile with that sinful chin cleft seemed somehow devilishly sexy.
‘Are you following me?’ she demanded. It seemed irrational but the thumping in her head wasn’t exactly allowing for clear thought processes. She didn’t know what he was doing here but she certainly didn’t want to exchange pleasantries with the man.
Or listen to his excuses.
Patrick blinked at her aggressive tone. He knew he had some explaining to do but he was too tired for female histrionics. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
Miranda folded her arms across her chest. ‘I told you I did not want to talk to you about...our...stuff and I don’t appreciate you trying to push the issue.’
‘Look, Miranda.’ He ruffled his hair. ‘I’m just here to pick up Ruby, that’s all.’
It took a few seconds for Miranda to get the import of his words, distracted as she was by the ruffled sexiness of his hair. She frowned but was interrupted by a ‘Mummy’ and a yank on her jeans. She looked down blankly, pleased for the respite from his weary brown eyes that tugged in places they had no right to be tugging.
Her blonde curly-haired moppet blinked up at her, one skinny arm slung around the neck of a cute little redhead with rosy cheeks and her father’s eyes.
‘This is Ruby,’ she announced. ‘My new bestest friend for ever. She has a lipth. Please, Mummy, please can she come over for cupcakes?’
‘Pleath, Daddy,’ the little redhead added. ‘Pleeeeeath.’
Patrick smiled down at his daughter. Ruby tended to be on the quiet side and it was unusual for her to make such a fast friend so it eased his conscience over the move. He looked at Miranda and shrugged. ‘I’m okay with it if you are.’
Miranda felt cornered. She was absolutely, one hundred per cent not okay with it. But she’d have to choose her words carefully in front of little ears. Somehow ‘I’d rather stick a red-hot poker in my eye than have a low-down cheating skunk in my house’ didn’t seem appropriate with their audience.
‘Pleeeeeath,’ Ruby begged, looking up at Miranda. Her two front teeth were missing, something that no doubt exacerbated the lisp.
‘It would give us a good chance to talk,’ Patrick murmured close to her ear.
‘Pleeeeeease, Mummy.’
Miranda took in all three, each in their own way desperate for something from her, and knew when she was defeated. ‘Okay,’ she acquiesced. ‘But only for a short visit. I’ve got a bit of a headache and tomorrow will be another long day.’
‘Yaaaay!’ Two little girls squealed and jumped up and down, hugging each other, strands of blonde and red hair intertwining.
‘Yay,’ said Patrick.
But his voice was lower, edgier, sexier and slid into places he’d already been and shouldn’t have.
Miranda shivered.
* * *
Twenty minutes later the knock on her front door heralded Patrick and Ruby’s arrival and Miranda felt the squall inside intensify. The two tablets she’d taken for her headache had started to work but the thump returned with a vengeance as Lola squealed and raced to answer the door.
Miranda looked around her small two-bedroom residence feeling suddenly inadequate. She’d been living above her grandmother’s garage since before Lola’s birth and although she’d made it into a nice cosy home, it wasn’t where she wanted to spend the rest of her life.
Patrick probably lived in a mansion. On the river. With a city view. What would he make of this?
Lola and Ruby ran past her into Lola’s bedroom in a blur of blonde and red and left her alone with Patrick standing in the doorway in his business shirt and trousers looking tired and sexy and rumpled, just like he had that night six months ago. Her he
art fluttered madly.
‘Hi.’ He smiled.
Miranda wanted to smile at him too. Say hi back as she walked straight into his arms and gave in to the passion that still burned deep inside despite her animosity. He looked so at home in her doorway it was scary.
She took a breath. ‘Come in,’ she said. It felt stiff and awkward but that was too bad. ‘Would you like a coffee?’
‘Sure.’
Patrick pushed off the doorframe. She looked tired and wary and he couldn’t blame her but her jeans clung and her T-shirt stretched nicely across breasts he’d dreamed about a little too much, and he was right back there in that hotel room with her.
He followed her across the lounge into the open-plan kitchen, leaning his butt against a bench as she busied herself. ‘You’ve cut your hair,’ he said.
Miranda, hyper-aware of him standing behind her, absently touched her nape where her pixie cut now feathered. ‘Yes,’ she said, her hands shaking as she poured hot water into mugs.
She supposed he had some fancy Italian coffee machine that made double-shot decaf lattes. All she had was instant and an electric jug.
‘Mummy, can we have cupcakes now?’
Miranda turned, pleased for the interruption. She nodded at her daughter and Patrick’s, looking all Shirley Temple and little orphan Annie. ‘It’s all set. Help yourselves.’ Lola clapped excitedly. ‘But remember, it’s polite to serve your guest first.’
Lola nodded. ‘Come on, Ruby—Mummy and I made a tea party!’
‘Come on, Daddy,’ Ruby said, tugging on his hand as Lola pulled her towards the table.
He shrugged at Miranda. ‘Sorry.’
‘It’s fine. Go and join them. I’ll bring your coffee.’
Miranda wrapped her hands around a mug and thanked the universe for the breathing space. She’d felt his gaze on her neck like a caress and could almost feel his lips brushing there too.
She pulled herself together and fixed the coffees, lecturing herself about the inappropriateness of her thoughts. By the time she walked on spaghetti legs to the exquisitely set table she felt more in control.