Alison Roberts - Midwives On-Call

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning I am going to go and say my goodbyes,’ Alessi said. His fingers were at the tie of her halter neck and she had an urge for him to unknot it, to be naked against him, to give in to the kiss that they both craved.

As the song ended, so, too, did their dance and Alessi gave her a brief smile of thanks before walking off.

To the world it might have looked like a duty dance, but for Isla it had been pure pleasure. She joined her father and tried to carry on a conversation with a prominent couple as her heart hammered and her mind whirred as to what to do. She saw Flick leaving with Tristan but this time Isla could only smile with the realisation that she had reprimanded Alessi just a few weeks ago for the very same thing—a doctor seeing one of her students.

She had been jealous, Isla could see it so clearly now.

Her phone buzzed and she glanced at it.

There was no message from Alessi, just his address.

‘Heading off already?’ Charles frowned. ‘It’s a bit soon.’

Isla looked at her father. She always did the right thing by her parents, by her sister, by Rupert, by her staff, her patients, by everyone but herself.

It was far from too soon.

Putting herself first was way overdue, in fact.

Isla left without another word.

ALESSI STEPPED INTO his apartment and swapped the crystal of his award for the crystal of a brandy glass.

He sent a text and wondered.

Would she come?

And if she did, then what would tomorrow bring?

He had spent close to a year wondering about Isla. Disliking her, yet wanting her. A whole year of trying to fathom what went on behind that cool facade.

No one had ever got into his head-space more and yet, rarely for Alessi, he did wonder about the consequences of tonight. He didn’t want to be shut down by Isla again, yet a part of him knew it was inevitable. Rare were the glimpses of the true Isla and he found himself craving them. From the first unguarded night to the smile when she had walked out from speaking with Blake and Christine, or sitting on a birthing ball with her teenage mums-to-be.

It was a case of one step forward and a hundred steps back with Isla and, despite the promise of their dance, despite the passion he had felt, Alessi actually doubted now that she’d even turn up at his door.

He checked his phone and, no, she hadn’t responded and Alessi found himself scrolling back and looking at their brief communication.

There was an eighteen-year-old Isla, as blonde and as glossy as she was now and smiling for the camera, but there was still that keep-out sign in her eyes. Alessi stared at the image for a long time, zooming in to avoid seeing Talia, for she had no place here tonight. Instead, he looked into Isla’s cool gaze and wondered about the secrets she kept, especially when he heard a knock at the door.

‘I was wrong,’ Alessi said as he opened the door to her. ‘I was starting to think you wouldn’t come.’

‘Why would you think that?’ Her voice lied—it was clear, it was confident, it was from the actress she had learnt to be.

‘Because you’re impossible to read.’

‘Better than boring,’ she said as he poured her a drink and handed it to her. She didn’t like brandy but it was a necessary medicine tonight. She was on the edge of both terror and elation and she wanted her demons gone.

To him.

He really was impossibly beautiful. His tie and jacket were off. If she ignored their surroundings, if she could pretend that they weren’t in his apartment, it could almost be the night they’d met for he had been wearing black pants and a white shirt then. He was just as toned, just as sensual, just as confident as he had been that night as he walked over to her, removed her now empty glass from her hand and placed it on a small table. His hands returned to her hips as they had that night, only his mouth did not take hers.

‘So …’ Alessi looked at her. ‘Here we are again.’

He was going to keep to his word, Isla realised as his lips did nothing to meet hers.

‘Up to you, Isla.’

Her lips actually ached from his ignoring them, and her body wanted to twitch from the lack of attention she craved. His hands were warm on her hips, his fingers just at the curve of her buttocks, and he moved not a muscle yet he stirred her deep on the inside. ‘I thought you were the great seducer,’ Isla said, willing her voice to be even, begging her heart to slow down.

‘So it’s my job to turn you on?’ Alessi checked, staring into her eyes.

‘Yes.’

‘But I already have.’

Was it that simple? Isla thought. Because, yes, he already had.

‘You will make the move, Isla.’

Was she here to be served her just deserts, was payback on his mind? She voiced just one of her many fears about this night. ‘So you can blow me off this time?’

‘God, no.’ The need in his voice put paid to that fear and so did his words. ‘I wanted you then and I want you now.’

Her eyes told Alessi she wanted him, too. ‘So what do you have to say about that night?’

‘I’m not going to apologise.’

He shrugged his shoulders but he didn’t move and she thought she might die if their lips didn’t meet, so she offered her haughty best.

‘Sorry!’

‘That’s a poor excuse for an apology,’ Alessi said. ‘Say it with your mouth on mine.’

‘Alessi …’ Isla cringed. She had no idea what was happening, no idea what his game was. She wanted to put up her hand and take a time-out, to consult the rule book, phone a friend, but there was only one other player in this game and she could hardly consult him.

I’ve never done this before, Alessi, she wanted to reveal. Apart from one kiss with you, I’ve never really been intimate or affectionate with a man before …

Only that wasn’t true.

Thirty seconds ago she had never been this intimate or affectionate but now she was pressing her lips to his mouth as if it was the most natural thing in the world. ‘Sorry,’ Isla breathed, feeling his lips stretch into a smile beneath hers as she joined in the game.

And she’d just been intimate again because her hands were running over his back as she whispered to his lips again.

‘I can’t hear you,’ Alessi said, and her lips moved to his ear, to the lovely, soft lobe, such a contrast to the scratch of his jaw, and she was saying the same word again.

‘Sorry.’

Sorry for being a bitch, sorry for shutting you out, sorry for a year of deprivation when it was so easy after all.

She was unbuttoning his shirt as her mouth moved to his neck. It really was that simple. He shrugged out of his shirt and she ran her hands over the lean chest, stroking his hardening nipples, and all she had to be, Isla realised, was herself, and she knew what she wanted.

It was Isla’s fingers rather than Alessi’s that undid the halter neck to her dress and the feel of skin, of his firm chest against her naked one, matched the moan that escaped from him, and then she removed her mouth from his neck and stood, taking in the feast going on in his eyes as he looked at her bare breasts.

‘I’ve run out of sorries,’ Isla said.

‘I haven’t.’ Alessi’s eyes lifted to hers. ‘I’m sorry for every terrible thought I have had about you and I’m even sorry for the inappropriate ones—they didn’t do you justice …’

His mouth came down on hers then, so hard that Isla thought she might taste blood. Almost a year of anger and pent-up frustration was unleashed from Alessi and for Isla it was electrifying and completely consuming to be so thoroughly kissed. His fierce tongue claimed her as her breasts were crushed to his chest. One of Alessi’s hands was at the back of her head, the other on her bottom, yet it was Isla who was pushing in.