Louisa Heaton - One Life-Changing Night

It was what worked for him. The work was a salve. A sticking plaster over the savage gash that was his heart. If he worked, if he took care of patients, if he investigated their ills, then he didn’t have to focus on his own. His own pain. His own grief. Work kept the hurt firmly in its box where he never had to pay it any attention.

He’d been on his way home. Heading back for a shower, a change of clothes, maybe a quick four-hour nap. Then he’d planned on coming back to work.

But then he’d seen this woman climbing up a wobbly ladder, a ladder she should never have been up in the first place, on her own. He’d seen her reaching out for things that she hadn’t got a chance in hell of reaching.

He’d seen how badly it had wobbled and he’d dropped his own briefcase and caught her, feeling the weight of her fall into his arms. He’d looked into her eyes up close, those pools of liquid brown, flecked with gold and green, and had felt a smack of something hard in his gut.

He’d intended to give her a dressing-down there and then. To yell at her for being so stupid and complacent, but in the fall her long hazelnut hair had come loose of its clip and lain over his arm, soft and silken, and it had taken a moment for him to realise that he’d been staring at her for much too long and that he really ought to let her go. The way you let go of a dangerous animal before it could bite or sting you.

She’d been unthinking in her actions. She’d assumed she would be okay, that somehow the rules didn’t apply to her, and she’d been wrong.

Her beauty had thrown him briefly. There had been a second, maybe two, in which he’d momentarily been stunned by those chocolate eyes of hers, but then he’d cast those distracting thoughts to one side.

So she was attractive. So what? Beauty counted for nothing in his department. He needed solid workers. Excellent nurses. Team players. People who played by the rules. Not lone rangers who thought the whole world ought to revolve around them.

She’d blushed, looked embarrassed and had glanced down and away from him. His insides had twisted at her sweetness, flipping and tumbling like an acrobat in the Cirque du Soleil and the sensation had so startled him that he’d almost been unable to speak.

Offering to help her with the tree had seemed logical. Gentlemanly. A way for him to gather his thoughts and reactions. To make sure she stayed safe. And give him time to put his own walls back up.

But it had been more than that. Exactly what, he couldn’t say. It had been a long time since a woman had disturbed him like that.

Not since Meredith …

He looked at the rest of Naomi’s things dashed across the floor and started to pick them up again, trying to find places for them, trying to find order in the chaos.

He hadn’t thought about Meredith for ages.

But that was a good thing surely. It meant he was moving on, didn’t it? For too long, it had been a painful, persistent memory. When he’d thought of his wife, it had been about the days following the accident—sitting at her bedside in hospital, holding her hand, praying that she would wake, praying that she would recover. Holding out hope for her.

As the years had passed, the better memories of his time with Meredith had come to the fore. He was able to remember the good times they’d shared. Their happiness on their wedding day. Their love. The pain and grief was still inside would still torment him when he allowed it to, but it had taken on a different form recently.

His vow to never get involved with another woman, never to open his heart up to another, had held strong. He could never love another the way he’d loved his wife; it just wasn’t possible.

Until now, he’d never had to doubt himself, or feel that that vow was threatened in any way.

Yet something about Naomi Bloom needled him. In the short time he’d known her, she’d practically demanded his attention, his protection, his help. He’d been forced to get involved. No decent man would have left her to fend for herself with Mick. No gentleman would have walked away from her after the burglary. When he’d found out she had nowhere to go, there’d been no other sensible option but to ask her to stay.

It would be difficult having her in his home. But he could stay out of her way. It would be all above board. She could have Meredith’s old craft room that he’d turned into a spare bedroom during one mad weekend of decorating before he’d thought of what to do with his time and his life to cope with his grief.

One night to allow Naomi to get proper locks for her doors, better security. It was just about one colleague helping another. It was about being a decent human being.

One night only.

She opened her bedroom door and came out, lugging a heavy suitcase with her. He got up to take it from her and lifted it easily. ‘A lot of clothes for one night!’

‘I’d rather not leave anything here to be stolen. Just in case.’

‘Is there anything else you want to take?’

‘There was some paperwork, but I’ve packed that away. I’m ready to go.’

He nodded. ‘I guess we’d better get going, then. Are you hungry? Would you like me to pick us up something to eat on the way home?’

‘Oh! Well, only if you’re eating, too. I don’t want to get in your way or disrupt your routine any more than I already have.’

‘You haven’t disrupted me at all,’ he said, picking up her case and heading for the front door, hoping she couldn’t see the lie in his eyes.

They walked back to the hospital car park in silence. He put her suitcase in the boot of his car and then opened the passenger door for her. She looked surprised, smiled a thank you and then slid into the seat. He closed her door and walked round to his side, his mind going a mile a minute.

The only woman to have set foot in his home had been Meredith and that was, of course, because she had lived there. Now he would be bringing home a stranger, a very attractive stranger, one who he hoped he could keep his distance from until she moved out. It ought to be easy, he thought. His penthouse flat was pretty large, and it was just one night.

If all else fails, I’ll just put on my headphones and wear a blindfold.

Dr Williams’s home was amazing. She’d never seen anything like it. She felt like Cinderella—going from her poor, ragamuffin lifestyle to this rich, sumptuous, stunning elegance that all seemed too much to take in.

His flat was on the top floor, not the bottom, like hers. The square footage must have been in the thousands and the space was open-plan, all glass windows, wooden floors and soft leather sofas. It had a minimalist element to it but looked nothing like what she’d expected from a single man. There were even fresh flowers on top of a grand piano in the corner of the living room.

He saw her notice them. ‘My cleaner brings them in.’

She nodded, touching the long green stems. ‘That’s kind of her.’

‘She insists. Tells me it brightens up the place. Makes it welcoming.’ He didn’t sound convinced.

‘She’s right.’ Her fingers slid over the smooth black sheen of the piano. ‘You play?’

He nodded. ‘A little. You?’

She blew out a little puff of air. ‘I could probably manage chopsticks if you reminded me how to do it.’

He smiled grimly, a darkness to his eyes. Was there pain there? Something … As if a part of him was missing. Or as if there was a part he was hiding, or at least trying to.

‘You have a lovely home, Dr Williams.’

‘Tom.’

She looked at him and smiled, feeling strange using his first name like that. ‘Tom, okay.’

He looked about him as if seeing the flat for the first time. ‘Let me show you to your room. Then you can settle, or I could make us something to eat. You must be hungry—it’s been a long night.’