Tempted By The Single Mum / Heart Surgeon's Second Chance

‘Absolutely. I’m insanely curious. I’ve walked past this house so many times on our way to the beach, and I’ve always wanted to know what it was like inside because it’s so unusual and it fascinates me. Can we?’

‘Sure. We can take our drinks with us. It won’t take long to look at it and it’ll probably be a dreadful anti-climax.’ He headed into the kitchen and glanced back at her. ‘Are you OK with white wine or do you want something else?’

‘White’s fine. Thanks. Wow, it’s a good-sized kitchen.’

‘Good-sized everything, really. The bedrooms aren’t huge, but they’re big enough and there are four of them, so if either of my sisters wants a seaside holiday I can accommodate them and their families, so it sort of makes sense even though it’s just me. Come and see. We’ll do the bedroom wing first, then go up to the sitting room.’

‘Wing? That sounds very grand.’

He chuckled. ‘No. It’s not grand at all, it’s pretty basic, really. Very simple, but that suits me. I’m a simple man.’

There was nothing simple about him, she thought as she followed him. A single man who had no ties and responsibilities, buying a family-sized house so his sisters could come for a seaside holiday with their children? A dog who’d belonged to his late brother and had been pining for him, so he’d adopted it? And yet he’d left them all to move to Yoxburgh. Why?

He led her through a little dogleg and down the narrow hall that ran away from the front of the house, opening doors and gesturing as he went.

‘So the bedrooms are on this side, all overlooking the garden, and the service rooms like the bathrooms and utility room are across the corridor because they don’t need a view. It’s not fancy but it seems to work.’

‘I’m sure it does,’ she said, peering into the first bedroom. It was long and narrow, with a window at the far end, but she couldn’t see a lot more than that. ‘You’ve got a lot of boxes.’ Surely more than one man could need in a lifetime.

He glanced at them and nodded. ‘Yes. I have. My life’s been in boxes since Rachel left and we sold the house.’

‘Rachel’s your wife, I assume?’

‘My ex-wife. Yes. She—uh—she walked.’

Like David...

‘So, anyway, some of the boxes are from that, and my parents packed up all Samuel’s stuff and had no idea what to do with it, so I’ve got all that here, too. Heaven knows what I’ll do with it all, but it seemed wrong to throw his life away and I’m not short of space. I guess I’ll sort it sometime.’

She turned to look at him keenly, concerned, and he looked away as if he didn’t want her reading him.

‘You think about him a lot, don’t you?’ she said softly, and he gave a little huff of laughter but didn’t answer, just led her back out of the room and down the corridor, pushing the doors open so she could see the other rooms. The next two were the same as the first, and then he pushed open the last door and stood back.

‘This is mine. It’s bigger than the others, obviously, and it’s got a dressing room and en suite, and a door to the garden, which is nice.’

She looked around, taking in the space, the simple lines of the furniture, the bed made up with crisp white linen without a single mucky handprint on it, and sighed. ‘Oh, I’m so jealous of all your space,’ she said with a wry laugh, and turned back to him, catching a glimpse of something curiously like guilt.

Why on earth would he feel guilty?

‘Seen enough?’ he asked, and turned and walked away anyway, because he’d suddenly seen it with her eyes and he wished he’d never shown it to her, because although it was never going to be anything that special, this house would be ideal for her and her children, unlike the one she’d got, for which she’d had had such grand plans until her husband had walked.

He wondered why, but it didn’t seem right to ask and he didn’t want to bring it up because once they started on that conversation there was a world of stuff on his side that she might want to know, and he really, really didn’t want to talk about it.

‘Come on, let’s go and put the fish in the oven—are you OK with teriyaki salmon parcels and rice?’

‘Oh, no, it sounds awful,’ she said, but her eyes were giving her away so he stifled a laugh and went back to the kitchen and put the fish in the oven, then topped up their glasses and led her up to the sitting room.

‘Oh, this is a lovely room! I love the sloping ceiling—it brings in so much light! And what a fabulous sunset! Look at it!’

‘I know. I could sit and watch the sky changing all day long.’ He lifted down a dish of nuts and raisins from the bookcase, and offered it to her. ‘Just keep Rufus out of them because of the raisins.’

‘Would he steal food?’

He looked down at Rufus, sitting at her feet and begging shamelessly, and laughed.

‘What do you think?’

The food was wonderful. Simple, fresh, perfectly cooked and utterly delicious.

Rather like her host. Well, not simple. There was nothing simple about Nick Cooper, as she’d already thought, but now, after spending the last hour or so with him, lingering over their dinner, she’d seen more of that other side of him. There was a whole world of stuff going on behind his eyes, and she had no idea who or what had hurt him most, but he’d certainly been affected badly by his brother’s death.

Survivor guilt? Maybe. Or maybe just plain grief.

They were back in the sitting room, with her curled up in the corner of a sofa, him sprawled on an adjacent one at right angles and a box of after-dinner mints between them, and she turned her head and searched his eyes in the lamp light.

‘Tell me about your brother,’ she said softly.

He looked away, his body utterly still, and she wished she hadn’t asked, but it was too late now and maybe he needed to talk.

‘What do you want to know?’

‘Not the medical stuff. The other stuff. What was he like, what could he do, what was your role?’

He met her eyes again. ‘My role?’

She nodded, searching his eyes, but they weren’t giving anything away. ‘Every family with a disabled child has altered priorities. It’s inevitable. I guess you found that.’

He held her eyes, and for a fleeting second the shutters opened and she saw raw pain and regret, then he looked away again.

‘Yeah, I guess you could say that. So, my role.’ He shrugged. ‘I was his brother. You know the song “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother”? It’s not that simple. He was a lead weight in my life, but he was also an anchor, someone to listen, someone who loved me unconditionally.’

‘Could he communicate?’

‘Oh, yes. He could talk, sort of. I could understand him, and we used to have fun before he got too ill. It was OK when we were kids, it was just normal for me, what life was, but then when I was twelve and he was eleven, my mother got accidentally pregnant with twins. And everything changed.’

‘Everything?’

He nodded. ‘My father gave up his job and started working from home, so he could be there to support my mother, and more and more of Samuel’s care fell on me. Obviously I was going to school and so was he, when he was well enough. He went to a special school and they’d come and pick him up in their adapted minibus, but in the evenings and at weekends and in the holidays, more and more it was me hanging out with him so Mum could be with the girls and Dad could work. And we stopped going out, really, because Samuel was getting heavier and it was harder to move four kids with the wheelchair, too, and it was a special chair, a bit reclined, so getting a vehicle that would take us all was impossibly hard. I think it just got too difficult, to be honest, so we stopped doing it.’

‘So your family life revolved around your home and your brother?’

He nodded. ‘Yes. Totally. And because my father needed to earn a living it ended up with me being asked to look after the girls or Samuel, so Mum could do the other stuff. I was nearly seventeen by then, wanted my own life, and the girls were five and wanted to do things I hated, so I was spending my life either shut in a room with Sam while I did my homework or revision, or hanging out in playgrounds and supervising the girls in the garden and trying to keep them out of trouble, and all I got from them was, “You’re not our daddy, you can’t tell us what to do.” So I decided it was my turn.’

She frowned at that, because there was something in his voice that made her blood run cold. ‘Your turn?’

He swallowed. ‘Yeah. For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to ride my bike off the garage roof.’

She felt her eyes widen. ‘What? How? Why?’

His chuckle held a world of pain. ‘To get attention? I knew I’d hurt myself, but I was past caring. It was the summer holidays, I was sick of being used, and our garden was on a slope, with the garage cut into the bank. It stuck up about three feet at the back, so I found a plank, propped it up against the back wall to make a ramp, rode my bike down the hill, up the plank, straight across the garage roof and onto the drive.’ He gave her a slightly twisted little grin and put another mint chocolate in his mouth. ‘Needless to say it didn’t end well.’

She felt sick. ‘What happened?’

‘My left pedal broke as I landed, so I trashed my ankle, crashed down onto the crossbar and shattered my pelvis.’ He paused for a moment, then added with a wry smile, ‘There was a bit of other collateral damage in the area, too.’

Her eyes widened. ‘Collateral damage?’

His smile was wry and hid a world of pain. ‘Let’s just say that’s why Rachel and I never had children—well, one of the reasons.’

Good grief. She could only imagine what he might have done, and none of it was good. ‘Did you pass out?’

He laughed again, that hollow chuckle she was getting used to, and shook his head. ‘Sadly not, not for a single second. Well, not until the paramedics arrived and straightened out my ankle. That wasn’t fun. None of it was fun, to be fair, and my parents were distraught, my sisters were in floods of tears, I could hear Samuel calling because he’d realised something was going on, and I just felt sick. That could have been pain, of course, but whatever. I had their attention, at least.’

‘And did it help you?’

That laugh again. ‘No. No, of course not, not in any way. Well, it did, eventually, I suppose. I realised a little better what Samuel went through on a daily basis if nothing else. There’s nothing like being a teenage boy and having someone else wipe your—well, whatever, independence with personal care is something I now prize very highly.’

‘I bet you do. Poor you.’

‘Poor me? I was an idiot. It was a stupid thing to do, and I got exactly what I deserved. My parents, though, didn’t deserve any of it, and all it did was stress and upset them even more, so on top of the resentment was a whole world of guilt. I pulled myself together after that, once I got out of hospital, and so did they a bit, in that they’d ask me how I felt about doing things to help out, and I learned to tell them. It was a revelation for all of us.’

She frowned at that. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘I’d never complained. Anything they asked me to do, I just did it, and the resentment got bigger and bigger until I couldn’t cope with it.’

‘Hence the crazy stunt?’

‘Hence the crazy stunt. My father called me an idiot, and he was absolutely spot-on. I’ll live with the consequences of it for ever. That’s what happens with self-inflicted life-changing injuries. You get the rest of your life to remind yourself you were an idiot—and if that comes over as self-pitying, it’s not meant to. I know it was my fault, I’ve accepted that, and I’ve come to terms with the consequences and learned to live with it.’

She wasn’t convinced. ‘How long were you in hospital? You must have had some horrendous damage,’ she said contemplating the extensive microsurgery he must have had.

‘Weeks. I don’t know how many. I missed the start of the autumn term, I know that. Plenty of time to feel sorry for myself while I was having all sorts of surgery on my most personal places,’ he said with a slightly awkward laugh.

And yet he’d been married, so... ‘You must have had a good surgeon,’ she said, and he nodded.

‘Yeah, I did. An excellent surgeon, but even he couldn’t rescue me entirely. You could say I discovered the concept of self-preservation the hard way.’

Her mind pictured a young man on the brink of adulthood facing weeks or months of rehabilitation and the news that his life would be changed for ever just because of a foolish stunt that had gone horribly wrong. ‘That’s a tough lesson to learn,’ she said, watching the laughter fading from his face.

‘It was, but it could have been a lot worse. My surgeon’s one of the reasons I went into medicine. I contemplated a career in urology for a bit.’

‘And then you went into general practice.’

‘Yes. Because it offers variety and a more flexible career path, and I wanted to be there for Samuel. I owed it to him, and to my parents, and I could be closer to them that way. And I’m OK. Well, apart from the kids, but I’ve come to terms with that. I thought Rachel had, too, but she left me when Samuel was getting worse and I was on call to my parents more and more often, because she’d met someone else.’

‘She left you then? When you really needed support? Nick, that’s awful!’

‘It happens, though. Your husband left you when you were pregnant.’

‘Yes, well, we won’t talk about him,’ she said, dismissing him and picking up another chocolate. ‘So, did Rachel have children with this new man?’

‘Yes. She was pregnant when she left me, and of course there was no way it could be mine, not without IVF.’

‘IVF? So that’s still an option?’

‘Yeah. There was a chance they could aspirate some viable sperm cells from the undamaged tissue if we’d really wanted to try for children, but it meant IVF with all the drugs and stuff, so it wouldn’t be easy and there were no guarantees, and she wasn’t interested in doing that. She’d had a friend who’d had a horrendous experience, and it freaked her out so she wouldn’t consider it.’

‘And that’s the only way?’

‘Oh, yes. The tubes were shredded beyond repair, so I am well and truly firing blanks.’

Her brain was still processing what he’d told her when she opened her mouth.

‘So I guess that means it all still works otherwise?’ she asked without thinking, and he started to laugh as she felt her face burn up. She buried it in her hands and met his eyes over her fingertips. ‘I can’t believe I said that. Oh, I’m so sorry—’

He shook his head slowly, his eyes laughing. ‘Oh, no, don’t be, it’s worth it just to see your face. And, yes, it does all still work, thank you for your concern.’

He grinned, his eyes alight with mischief now. ‘My mother found that out. She came into the bathroom and caught me doing what teenage boys do a lot, and she went pink, said, “Well, that answers that question,” and shut the door behind her. I thought I was going to die of embarrassment, and I didn’t leave the bathroom for well over an hour.’

She bit her lip, but the laugh wouldn’t stay inside and they ended up in stitches.

‘Sorry. I know it isn’t really funny, but...’

‘It sort of is. Didn’t feel it at the time, but I can laugh about it now.’

‘So. you must have been very lucky—either that or the surgeon was particularly brilliant. I can’t believe you got away with it. That’s amazing.’

‘It is. Want to check it out?’

She met his eyes, startled, and for a breathless moment neither of them said anything, but then he grinned and leant back with another chocolate, and she saw the twinkle in his eyes.

‘I think I’ll pass, if that’s OK,’ she said with a smile, but her heart was pounding and all she could see was that crisp white linen at the far end of the house and she wanted him like she’d never wanted anyone before.

Why had he said that?

Just when it was all going well and everything seemed fine and comfortable between them, he went and messed it up.

That weird thing with his heart again, and although he’d only been joking, he kind of hadn’t been. Not really.

Not that he’d have expected her to say yes, but he certainly wouldn’t have turned her down. He’d probably put her off with all the gory stuff.

He swung his legs off the sofa and got to his feet. ‘I’m sure I’ll get over it. Fancy another coffee?’

She shook her head and stood up, still looking a little flustered. ‘No, I—I ought to go home. Things to do.’

‘At eleven o’clock on a Friday night?’

She looked at her watch, more for something to do than to tell the time, he thought, and then looked back up at him.

‘Nick, I...’ She let out a shaky breath and walked past him down the stairs and stopped at the door. ‘I need to go.’

He followed her down and stopped an arm’s length away from her, just for safety’s sake, and met her eyes. They were filled with all sorts of things he couldn’t begin to analyse, but rejection wasn’t one of them.

‘You don’t, not if you don’t want to. I wasn’t hitting on you, Ellie, but I’d be more than happy if you wanted to stay. Truly.’

Their eyes locked, and for what felt like hours but was probably only seconds, neither of them breathed. And then she took a tiny step towards him, then another one.

‘It’s really not a good idea,’ she said, her voice thready, her breath soft against his face.

‘No, it probably isn’t.’ He lifted a hand and stroked his knuckles down her cheek, then turned his hand and dragged his thumb slowly over her dry lips. She flicked her tongue out to moisten them, and his breath hitched in his throat and he swallowed.

‘Stay with me, Ellie,’ he said gruffly, and with a broken little sigh she stepped into his arms and lifted her face up to his.

CHAPTER FOUR

HIS STRONG HANDS cradled her face gently as his head came down to meet hers, his mouth warm and supple.

His touch was delicate, but it seemed to reach every nerve cell in her body. She felt the tender caress of his fingertips against her cheeks, the heat of his tongue as he stroked her lips, tracing the tiny gap between them, and she parted them and felt his breath fill her mouth before his tongue claimed it.

He tasted of coffee and chocolate with a hint of mint, and his kiss was sure and slow, searching, tempting. She heard a tiny sound—hers?—and he let go of her face and eased her body up against his, letting out a low groan as they came into contact from top to toe.

‘You feel so good,’ he whispered, rocking his hips against hers, and she squeezed her legs together to soothe the raging need as one hand slid round and cradled her breast, the other pressing her closer, lifting her hard against him so she felt the unmistakable jut of his erection against her body.

‘OK, you didn’t lie,’ she said breathlessly, to defuse the tension, and she felt the soft huff of his laughter in her mouth.

‘I think it probably needs a more thorough examination,’ he murmured, and the smile in his voice made her laugh.

‘Oh, definitely, but maybe standing by a glass door with the light on isn’t the best place for it,’ she mumbled, and he laughed again and eased away from her, his eyes oddly intense as the smile faded and the heat ramped up again.

‘Come to bed,’ he murmured, and she nodded and watched him swallow, the tension like a tight cord between them as he took her hand and led her down the corridor to his bedroom. He closed the door and turned back the covers, but he didn’t put on the light. He didn’t need to, because the room was flooded with moonlight, slanting across the floor and highlighting every plane of his face, leaving his eyes in shadow.

He held out his hand and led her to the bed, then cupped her face again in gentle fingers that weren’t quite steady.

‘I want you so much,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ve wanted to touch you, to hold you, since you let rip at me in Reception.’

‘I have no idea why, I was horribly rude,’ she said, feeling another wash of shame about the way she’d behaved, but he just smiled, and as he tipped his head on one side there was a twinkle in his eyes that could have been the moonlight, but she didn’t think so.

‘You were, but you were outrageously beautiful with it.’ His fingers traced her face, the touch making her nerve endings dance as his hands moved slowly lower, his fingers finding the hem of her top and sliding up under it.

She sucked in her breath, pulling her post-baby tummy in, and she saw him frown as he stroked the skin with his warm hand.

‘Why are you doing that? Relax. You’re beautiful, Ellie.’

‘I’m flabby.’

‘No. You’ve had three children. Be proud of your body and what it’s achieved. It’s amazing. Such a gift. Don’t ever feel ashamed of that.’

And just like that, he took away her worries, the niggle of fear that he wouldn’t want her when he’d seen her, and freed her to be herself.

‘I think you’re wearing too much,’ she said to him, suddenly braver, and he laughed again and took a step back.

‘I think we’re both wearing too much,’ he said with a smile, and pulled his sweater over his head, hooked his thumbs in his waistband and shucked off his jeans and underwear in one.

‘Better?’ he asked, and she just stared at him, at the fit, honed body that clearly wanted hers, the strong, straight legs, the board-flat abs, the deep chest and powerful shoulders, and felt another wave of doubt.

‘Hey,’ he murmured, a little frown pleating his brow again, and he stepped closer again and touched her face. ‘Do you want me to close the curtains?’

She shook her head. ‘No. I’m just being a coward.’

‘Then let me help you,’ he said quietly, and took hold of the hem of her top and lifted it up and over her head, dropping it on the floor with his clothes. He undid the button on her jeans and tugged them down inch by inch, his mouth tracing down over her ribs, her stomach—sucked in again—and then pausing.

‘Lacy knickers,’ he said with a smile, and left them there while he stripped off her jeans, impatient now. ‘Lift up,’ he instructed, and eased them off one foot at a time, then straightened and pulled her up against him. ‘That’s better,’ he murmured, and his mouth found hers again in a gentle kiss.

Except it wasn’t gentle, not for long. She felt his fractured sigh in her mouth and gave a tiny whimper in response, and that was enough. With a ragged groan he cradled the back of her head with one hand, hauled her hard up against him and plundered her mouth, his tongue delving, searching, duelling with hers as they rocked against each other, their bodies striving for more.

‘I need you,’ he breathed, the air shuddering from his body, and she felt her legs turn to jelly.

‘I need you, too,’ she told him, and then they were on the bed in a tangle of arms and legs and desperate, seeking hands, their mouths locked together as their bodies found each other. Her underwear was gone, his hands on every inch of her, so clever, so knowing.

‘Now, Nick, please...’

She gasped as he entered her, caught his groan in her mouth and they stilled, letting sensation wash over them.

‘Ah, that feels so good,’ he said after the longest moment, and then he kissed her again and started to move. She met him thrust for thrust, her body arching into his, touching him everywhere she could reach while his hands sought out all her sweet spots as if he knew her better than she knew herself.