The Best Of The Year - Medical Romance

CHAPTER FIVE

THANK GOD THAT she’d just had her period.

It had used to be Candy’s excuse not to have sex, but as she had a lovely long bath and shaved and plucked and buffed her body into suitable Steele shape, she was grateful for that fact.

Yes, her Catholic guilt was hovering there in the background but she told it to please be quiet as she took her Pill.

She still hid them in her handbag. It was a matter of habit and her mother would freak, just completely freak, if she knew that Candy was on it. She’d come off it last year but, given what had happened with Gerry, she had gone back on it. She and Gerry had used condoms but what had happened had been such a surprise that she did not want to take any risks.

She hadn’t gone home after lunch with Steele; instead, she’d dashed to the shops and bought fabulous underwear that she was now tearing the labels off. There was a silver-grey bra that gave her the best cleavage ever and silver panties that made her dimply bottom look fantastic. In fact, she was so impressed with them that Candy had bought a set in purple also.

She’d always felt fat, but she felt curvy now.

I’ll regret it later, she promised her conscience as she looked in the mirror.

Just not yet!

With no idea where they were going Candy decided on a pale shift dress that would look casual with ballet pumps or fab with heels.

It didn’t work with her new bra, though.

Second go.

A grey wraparound dress worked better, though showed a little more cleavage than her parents would consider suitable.

Perfect!

Not big on make-up, Candy put on some mascara and a slick of lipstick and when there was a knock at the door she was nervous, but nicely so.

‘You’re no help,’ Candy said as she let him in and he handed her a bottle of wine. Steele was wearing black jeans and a black shirt. He looked incredibly handsome and had that air about him that meant he was suitably dressed for any venue.

‘Meaning?’ Steele asked.

‘I was trying to decide whether to wear flats or heels given that I don’t know where we’re going.’

‘We’re going to the movies,’ Steele said. ‘I figured it might be nice if you’re tired—though we shan’t be making out in the back row. I like watching a film properly.’

‘What are we going to see?’ she asked. The movies was possibly the nicest place he could take her if they had to go out. It would be nice to turn her brain off for a couple of hours.

‘Two choices,’ he said. ‘One is very dark, apparently funny in part. One is very sad … See what mood you’re in.’

‘I don’t mind,’ she said as she led him through her lounge and put the wine down on the bench of a very small kitchen.

‘So this is what all the arguments with your parents were about?’ Steele said, looking around the living room of her small but cosy flat. The front door opened to the living room. Off that was a small kitchen and to the side a hall that led to the bathroom and bedroom. ‘It’s nice.’

‘I love it,’ Candy said. ‘It’s a ten-minute walk to the Underground, a five-minute walk to my favourite Indian restaurant.

‘We can eat before or after …’ Steele said.

The thought of Indian before sounded too good to pass up, but then other senses were calling, the attraction wafting between them as potent as any delicious aroma from food.

Candy knew she was eons behind him sexually. She wanted to have slept with him, in part to have jumped that hurdle without knocking it over, in part just to dive onto the track …

And Candy usually hated even the thought of sport, but, oh, he was handsome.

And he was here.

‘Do you want a glass of wine?’ she offered, even though he’d brought it, but Steele shook his head.

‘Not for me,’ he said. ‘I’m driving. You have one, though …’ He went to open the bottle he’d brought but she stopped him.

‘Not for me.’ Candy shook her head. ‘I don’t really drink and anyway I’m on early tomorrow. I’ll just get my shoes.’

She went to her bedroom and put on flats but as she came out Steele frowned.

‘What happened to the heels?’

‘For the movies?’

‘For me.’

She smiled and went and put on said heels, with Steele watching her from the doorway.

He made her shiver. If Gerry had stood watching her she’d have found it invasive, but with Steele she just wanted to strip off her dress, pull back the covers on the bed and climb in.

She could feel his eyes on her calf muscles and then on her bum and she turned and it was nice to feel provocative. It was something she had never felt before. He made her feel like this.

And he made her want to kiss him.

It was as simple as that, as natural as breathing to stand in the doorway of her bedroom and wrap her hands behind his neck and share a kiss for no other reason than they both wanted to. She didn’t feel naïve or inexperienced with him. There wasn’t enough space in her mind for those sorts of thoughts because it was filled instead with pleasurable ones as they got back to where they’d been on the street in record time.

Steele’s hand did move higher than the base of her rib cage this time. He was stroking the underside of her breast as they kissed, and her nipples hardened and ached for his fingers to attend to them. She had one hand at the back of his head, just to feel his silky hair, not for pressure for there was plenty of that from Steele, and she had the other on his bum. His buttocks were taut and she checked again. Yes, they were still taut and it was that hand that demanded he press into her.

His moan to her mouth as he did so, his hand at the tie of her dress, told Candy there was no way they would be making the movie.

It was evening, not even semi-dark, and that was seriously uncharted territory for her. End-of-evening sex was all she was used to.

But this wasn’t, oh, okay, then, it had been a week after all. This was, let me get this shirt open and this zipper down because I need you to take me now.

Her dress was open, his shirt too, and his fingers were at the back of her bra, ready to undo it, and Candy could barely breathe at the thought of their naked chests pressed together and his hot hands roaming her. She’d never had sex standing, never considered it, because she wasn’t the tall, leggy version that a good Candy should be. She was a shorter, chunkier one, who any second now was going to scale Steele’s body with the grace of a feline. It was that essential, that natural, that …

‘Ignore it …’ Steele said as there was a loud rap on the door.

‘No …’ She could barely breathe now but for a different reason. It was her father’s very loud knock and she froze for a second.

‘It’s my parents.’

‘Just ignore it,’ he said again.

‘They’ll let themselves in.’

That her parents had a key came a close second to a bucket of water—actually, it beat the bucket of water because Steele was dressing her and himself with his hands as Candy stood there.

Then he chose to concentrate solely on her for now.

He did up her dress, a little loosely, and wiped off some lipstick and wished the flush on her cheeks would fade by the time she got to the front door. She looked as if she’d just come, or had just been about to. Her nipples were like the dials on his washing machine. Even her lips were swollen.

‘Breathe,’ Steele said.

‘If they find you here …’ Candy shivered as he knelt down and changed her heels to flats as there was another knock on the door.

‘Will they have us married?’

‘You have no idea.’

‘Where do you want me?’ Steele smiled.

‘On my bed.’

‘That’s what I like to hear,’ Steele said, then stopped joking. ‘Are they likely to come in here?’

‘I hope not.’ Candy let out a breath. ‘Probably not.’

‘Relax,’ he said as she closed the bedroom door on him and went to greet her parents. He checked under her bed and he could possibly fit there but first he smiled as he saw the scissors and labels from her brand-new underwear.

She was seriously gorgeous, Steele thought as he did up his shirt and wiped lipstick off. He was unused to thinking seriously anything about his dates yet she was so lovely, so focused on fighting for her independence and living her life and yet so kind.

Actually, right now, as Candy opened the front door all she was was stressed!

There were her parents buckling under the weight of jars filled with home-made tomato sauce.

‘I said I’d pick them up next week,’ she said.

‘Why are you all dressed up?’ her mother asked, instantly accusing.

‘Because I’m just about to go out,’

‘You need to wear a top under that dress!’ Her mother warned.

They walked through and put the jars of tomato sauce on the bench and Candy got out the coffee machine. There was no such thing as her parents coming over and them not having a coffee, though her father’s eyes lit up like a Christmas tree when he saw the bottle of wine on the bench and Candy poured him a glass.

‘Where are you going tonight?’ her father asked.

‘To the movies with a friend.’

‘What friend?’ her mother checked.

‘Kelly.’ Candy glanced at the clock. ‘Ma, I really do need to get going soon.’

‘We’ve barely seen you these last few weeks.’

They chatted in Italian for twenty minutes or so. Candy had promised herself that the next time she saw them she’d tell them about her trip to Hawaii, but with Steele hiding in the bedroom she chose not to. It was not a conversation that would take twenty minutes—it would be an entire evening of tears and threats and shouting.

Her dad’s wineglass was empty, her mum’s coffee was gone and though they looked settled in for the evening and her father would no doubt love another glass of wine, Candy stood. ‘I’m already late for Kelly,’ she said. ‘I really am going to have to get ready.’

She felt guilty kicking them out, and then cross that she’d had to. Couldn’t they simply ring before they dropped around?

They’d be offended if she asked them to.

Talk about kill the mood, she thought once they had gone and she headed to her bedroom. Steele was lying on her bed, his legs crossed and reading her book.

‘I’m so sorry about that,’ she said.

‘Why?’ Steele shrugged. ‘Your parents dropped around. It’s no big deal.’ He smiled at her as she came and sat on the bed beside him. ‘I understand, though, that it would be a big deal if they found me here.’

‘Thanks.’ Candy smiled.

‘Do they drop around a lot?’

‘They do,’ she said. ‘They don’t drive and, as a sweetener, when I moved out I said I was only moving nearby, which was a big mistake.’ She let out a long sigh. ‘Another one. I seem to be making rather a lot of them lately. Have I made us late for the movies?’

‘I haven’t even got the tickets,’ he said. ‘I didn’t know if you’d like the idea.’

‘I do,’ Candy said, ‘I haven’t been in ages.’

‘I go all the time,’ he said. ‘Well, not all the time, but I guess going to the movies, for me, is like reading a book is to you. I usually go on my own,’ Steele said. It had surprised him that he’d considered taking Candy along. He really did prefer his own company when watching a film.

‘How come you go alone?’ she asked, gently poking him in the ribs as he lay there. ‘Don’t you have any friends?’

‘I have a lot of friends but not any I’d want to go to the movies with. You should try going by yourself,’ he said. ‘I loathe trying to concentrate while getting the What the hell did you bring me to this for? vibe coming from my right or left.’

Candy started to laugh. ‘I get that with my friend Kelly.’ She told him about the time she’d suggested to Kelly that they see what Candy had thought was a romance and he laughed as she described Kelly’s reaction as she’d sat beside her, watching someone being tied to the bed.

‘She said I was never allowed to choose the movie again,’ Candy said, and then she looked down and saw that her hands were now on his chest and fiddling with his buttons and that his hands were playing with her hair. It was as if their bodies were having a little conversation of their own as they carried on talking.

His hand pressed the back of her head a little and she started to kiss him. Her heart was still hammering a bit from her parents’ unexpected visit, and a long, slow kiss did nothing to calm it down, but slowly the turmoil of the sudden invasion by her family was fading.

His shirt was open again and beneath her hands were lovely flat nipples that she could not stop stroking, and her dress was open again and how she wished she had a front-opening bra, because she did not want to move her hands from his skin to get naked.

Steele peeled off her dress as she sat over him.

Till this point, till this evening, she had always felt that brief moment of judgment as she undressed. She felt only adoration now; she didn’t even try to define what was going on in her head as her dress slid off. She did not care what he thought, safe in the knowledge he thought only good things.

He did think only good things. More used to slenderness, he adored her generous curves and her ripe breasts spilling as he undid her bra, but more giddying and satisfying was the mutual eagerness, as if they had somehow known this was where they were leading.

‘I’ve got something I ought to tell you …’ Steele said, pulling back.

‘What?’ she breathed. ‘What do you have to tell me?’

He smiled at the dart of concern in her eyes.

‘I’m not sleeping with you till I hear about your name.’ His hand stroked one generous breast. ‘Tell me,’ Steele said.

‘No.’

He pulled her onto him and then flipped her onto her back and she lay looking up at him, aching for his kiss. She had already kicked off her ballet pumps. All she had on were her panties and it was he who looked down at her now.

‘I’m never going to tell you,’ Candy said.

He stood and picked up his shirt.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Get dressed.

‘That’s bribery.’

‘Yep.’

Well, two could play at that game. ‘Fine,’ she said, half-heartedly sitting up, putting her legs over the bed and reaching for her clothes. ‘Let’s go and get something to eat …’

She picked up her bra and Steele took it from her hands.

He placed it beneath her breasts and did it up at the back and while he did so she could feel his breath on her shoulder and she was more than a little aware of his erection through his trousers. He took one of her breasts and gently stuffed it into the fabric but his hand stayed in there, stroking her, teasing her, and she sat still as his lips started to nuzzle the other one, licking and sucking at her nipple, stretching it with his lips as her hands moved to his head and urged him for more contact. But then he stopped. She looked down as he went to tuck her wet, very aroused breast back into her bra, and she decided he was cruel, so cruel that she knew if she didn’t relent they would be sitting eating a curry or watching a movie about half an hour from now.

‘Okay.’ Her voice was all husky and she didn’t really recognise it as hers. She cleared her throat, but it still sounded the same.

‘As you know, my parents are Italian,’ Candy said, and her head was on his shoulder as he unhooked her bra again.

‘Okay.’

‘Strict,’ she said. His hands were now on her hips and she lifted her bottom to allow for him to take her panties down.

‘Go on,’ Steele said, which was contrary to his words because he was kneeling with his mouth on hers as she spoke.

‘And they chose the most beautiful name that means pure and innocent …’ she said, and she felt the stretch of his lips on hers as he smiled as she told him what she had sworn she wouldn’t. ‘And then when I hit my teenage years I noticed that people started to snicker and …’

‘What is it?’ Steele asked.

‘What’s the medical term for thrush?’

He pulled back and smiled. ‘Candida.’

‘Which is why I became Candy. Sadly, not to my parents. They still insist on calling me by my full name.’

‘Were you teased?’ he said to her mouth as his hand parted her thighs and his fingers slipped inside her.

Mercilessly.

‘Poor baby …’ Steele said.

‘Oh …’ Candy moaned, her thighs quivering.

He felt her thighs clamp around his hand and her head rest on his shoulder and there was that blissful choice whether to feel her come now or dive in for the pleasure.

Greed won.

He removed his hand and she let out a small sob of frustration combined with bliss as he stood and she sat naked, a breath away from him as he slid down his zipper and undressed. He handed her a condom and she shook her head.

‘You do it.’

‘You.’

Okay, she was bad at this part, except his erection was at her cheeks and she was licking her lips as she undid the foil. She had never seen something so lovely, so fierce, so tempting, and the quicker she did this and the quicker she came were very good incentives to get it on.

She played for a moment, loving the feel of him naked in her hands, teasing him with hot breaths to the head, cupping him in her hand.

‘Candy.’

His voice was deeper, if at all possible, impatient and deliciously stern, and she would have loved to find out what might happen if she teased him further, dragged this out a little longer. Instead, she briefly looked up at chocolate-brown eyes that made her feel as sexy as hell.

‘Put it on,’ he said.

She did as she was told, unravelling it along his lovely thick length and deliberately taking her time, loving the sound of his sharp breathing and then the impatient way he pushed her hands away when the job was done.

He pushed her shoulder lightly and it was like dominoes falling, because she toppled back on the bed and he lifted her legs abruptly for daring to keep him waiting. She was compliant, wonderfully so. Talk about boys to men, Candy thought as he seared inside her and then she wrapped her legs around him. It was like comparing apples to oranges. He knew exactly what to do as he moved deep inside her. His erection was so strong and fierce that each thrust took her to a place she had never been before.

‘I’m going to come,’ she said almost in apology, watching, feeling, arching to the bliss of him searing inside.

‘I think that’s the point,’ he said, trying to hold on, revelling in the tight grip of her muscles and the tension of her as she came. It was so deep, so heavy, so intense that Candy briefly wondered if she’d even had an orgasm before.

He kept making love to her through it. She wanted to catch her breath, but then she didn’t, for she loved the feel of him taking her as she came. Then she lost her head a little, stopped thinking about anything other than a very small bedroom and a whole lot of pleasure. Steele was looking down at her and then he stilled and she sobbed in pleasure as he started thrusting faster and released into her. To not come again would have proved impossible, to feel his tension release, to see this beautiful man above her and feel him come deep inside shot her into orbit again, her hand pushing at his chest, at the delicious hurt of a sensitive orgasm.

No regrets, never, she swore as, still inside, he collapsed onto her and they breathed their way back to consciousness.

He lay there, inhaling the scent of her hair, feeling her legs loosen and lower to the floor, and he knew this was different. Never had he been more perfectly matched in the bedroom. Her inexperience counted more than she knew for she melded to him, moulded to him. It was all he could do not to gather her things and carry her home.

And then normal service returned to his brain and he kissed her instead of saying the thoughts in his mind.

They ate at her favourite takeaway. A Formica table and cheap plates yet they fell on their food like savages, rather aware that sustenance might be needed later in this night, and then they headed for the movies.

‘Sad or dark?’ Steele offered.

‘Dark,’ Candy said.

They went to the blackest, grimmest, yet funniest film. He did watch it intently, yet the only reason he couldn’t concentrate fully wasn’t the What the hell did you bring me here for? vibe.

It was the I really have to touch you vibe that was coming from him.

‘Stop it,’ Candy said as his hand moved up her warm thigh and his mouth went for her neck. ‘Concentrate.’

Futile words.

They were like teenagers, and that had been a long time ago for Steele and never for Candy. Those years she’d been keeping Franco at arm’s length, not dropping her popcorn on the floor and necking.

‘I’m going to have to come and see this alone.’

‘So am I.’ She smiled and got back to kissing him.

This was heading for morning, Steele knew.

This was heading to tomorrow evening and tomorrow night and the next morning too.

He had this vision of her parents arriving on the doorstep as her legs were behind her ears.

‘Come back to mine tonight,’ he said between kisses.

‘Yes, please,’ she agreed.

They weren’t ready to be apart any time soon.

CHAPTER SIX

‘HOW ARE YOU, Miss Anderson?’ Steele asked the following Monday morning as he did his rounds.

‘Macey.’

‘How are you feeling, Macey?’

‘A bit better.’

‘That’s very nice to hear,’ he said as he examined her.

‘How was your weekend?’ Macey asked him.

‘It was very nice,’ he said, and she gave a soft smile.

He and Candy had been with each other for a week now. It had been the most intense week of either of their lives. Every available moment they had was spent together. Perhaps, aware how limited their time was, they were determined to make every moment count and were completely into each other. They were both exhausted but in the nicest of ways—between work and sex and eating, and dancing and drives at night just so Candy could find out what it was like to do it in a car, they were sleep deprived and loving it.

‘Is Candy on this morning?’ Macey asked, oh, so casually.

Steele answered a beat too late. ‘I’m not sure what nurses are working this morning.’

‘Well, I hope that she is. I haven’t seen her for a few days.’

‘I think she works in Emergency as well,’ Steele said. ‘From memory.’

‘Does that mean that I won’t get to see her again?’ Macey fretted, or rather pretended to fret.

Steele knew when he was being played and he didn’t mind a bit; he liked it that Macey was starting to notice things that were going on around her. ‘I think Candy might be on duty later in the week.’