CAROL MARINELLI - The Baby Of Their Dreams

She met Dominic’s eyes again and this time he smiled.

You missed your chance, his eyes said.

I’ve changed my mind, was her silent plea.

Well, you’re too late!

He yawned and pulled out his pamphlet and with a very small smirk walked off.

What a bastard.

Cat laughed and then turned to Gordon’s confused expression.

‘I said, then she died…’

‘Sorry, I thought you said then she…’ Cat let out a breath. ‘What a terrible time you had.’

She just didn’t need to hear about it today of all days.

She didn’t see Dominic again all afternoon, not that it mattered by then. At 5:00 p.m. when she got back to her room to find that her luggage still hadn’t arrived, it wasn’t the Spanish-speaking English doctor who was on her mind.

It was Thomas.

She didn’t want to go down for dinner in an hour and be sociable.

Room service seemed a far better idea.

A huge plate of paella.

A bottle of wine.

She wished she’d brought his photo.

But there had been too many sad birthdays and, suddenly realising that she had a very small window if she didn’t want to spend tomorrow dressed in Gemma’s dress or linen pants that were more suitable for travel, she headed out.

She found herself in a large department store, explaining to an orange woman that, apart from a lipstick, she had no make-up with her.

‘My luggage was lost,’ she said.

The woman was so horrified on her behalf that Cat actually smiled. ‘It’s fine…’

It was.

So much so that instead of buying loads of make-up and then heading upstairs to the ropa de señora section to purchase a chic Spanish outfit Cat wandered out and found herself drawn to a busy market. There were gorgeous dresses blowing in the late-afternoon breeze and they were nothing like what she usually wore.

If she walked into work dressed as she was today, it would draw comment. Here, apart from a couple of vaguely familiar faces from conferences of long ago, no one knew her.

It was incredibly freeing—she could be whoever she chose to be.

Cat took her time with her purchases. She chose a loose long dress in lilac and shorts that were very short, along with a top and a stringy-looking bikini. And, she decided, instead of the museum on Sunday afternoon she was going to the beach.

She liked Barcelona.

Far more than she had expected to.

It was cosmopolitan, busy yet friendly, colourful and hot.

Walking back into the hotel, she was about to take her purchases up and get changed and, instead of hiding in her room, perhaps head out for dinner by herself when she saw him.

Dominic.

‘I was wondering where you were,’ he said by way of greeting, and Cat liked it that he was direct.

‘I went shopping…’ She was about to explain that her luggage was lost but then decided she didn’t have to explain anything.

‘Cat!’ a voice boomed, and she turned and saw that Gordon was bearing down on her. ‘There’s a group of us heading to the hotel restaurant. Why don’t you join us?’

‘Oh, I’d love to but I can’t,’ Cat said. ‘I’m expecting a call. A conference call. I—’

‘Maybe after?’ Gordon checked.

‘I’ll try.’

Gordon smiled over to Dominic. ‘Do you have plans or would you like to join us?’

Dominic dealt with things far more effortlessly than Cat. ‘I’ve already got plans, but thank you for asking.’

As the group walked off they were left standing.

‘Liar,’ Dominic said. ‘You don’t have a conference call you have to get to.’

‘Was it obvious?’ she groaned.

‘To me it was.’ Dominic nodded. ‘Liars always have a need to elaborate. You’d know that, working in Emergency.’

‘I know,’ she said. ‘So would Gordon.’

‘Is he a friend?’

Cat shook her head.

‘A colleague?’

‘No.’

‘So why not just say no if it’s something that you don’t want to do?’

‘I know that I should. I just feel bad…’

‘Well, don’t—he’s far too busy banging on about his late wife to notice what others are feeling.’

She felt her nostrils tighten. ‘That was mean.’

‘No,’ Dominic refuted. ‘He tried to run the whole sorry story by me yesterday. What’s mean is buttonholing a relative stranger and completely ruining their lunch.’

He shrugged.

He was dismissive.

She didn’t like that and she was about to head off when he halted her in her tracks.

‘Do you want dinner away from the hotel?’

‘I’ve got a conference call to make,’ she said, and gave him a tight smile.

‘Sure?’ he said.

Usually, yes.

She didn’t like his dismissal of Gordon but, apart from that, he was, well, deliciously overwhelming.

Gemma’s words were ringing in her ears. He didn’t have to be perfect, he didn’t have to be anything other than…

God, but she fancied him.

She could have left it there, just walked off and it would have been over. There were no games, no pretence, just his question, which she now answered truthfully. ‘Dinner away from the hotel sounds great,’ she said. ‘I’ll just…’ She held up her bags and was about to suggest that she take them up and meet him back here in…half an hour, or however long it took to get showered and dressed.

But by then she’d have changed her mind, she knew.

Half an hour from now she’d be calling Reception to pass on a message to him.

Or she could just go with how she felt now.

‘I’ll just ask Reception if they can take my bags up.’

The streets were noisy and he navigated them easily and took her to a place that Cat would never have found had she explored on her own—a few streets along from the strip the hotel was on. They walked down a stone stairwell and to an asado restaurant that was noisy and smoky, even with the open area out the back.

‘So, are you pleased your talk is over?’ he asked when they were tucked away at a table.

‘Very,’ Cat said. ‘I can relax now.’

And relax she did, admitting she had no clue about Spanish wine and letting him choose.

‘Are you staying till Monday?’ he asked, and she shook her head.

‘No, I fly out tomorrow evening—I’m back at work on Monday. I wish…’

‘Wish what?’

‘Well, I was really only thinking of my talk when I booked the flights. I wasn’t actually expecting to like Barcelona so much. I should have tagged on a couple of days’ annual leave and done a bit of exploring.’

‘You always could.’

It sounded very tempting but it was a little too late for that now. ‘We’re pretty short on staff at the moment. My colleague Andrew is going on leave and Hamish, he’s the other consultant…’ She rolled her eyes. ‘I’m sure you know how it is.’

‘Remind me,’ he said.

‘Remind you?’ she checked. ‘Where do you work?’

‘Scotland.’

She waited for him to elaborate, which he did but it was vague rather than specific. ‘I work a little bit here and a longer bit there,’ Dominic said, and Cat then felt the scrutiny of his gaze and the message behind his words as he spoke on. ‘I don’t like to be tied to one place.’ And then he elaborated properly. ‘Or one person.’

Well, that certainly told her.

In part, Cat was tempted to simply get up and leave. It wasn’t a meal, they both knew that. This wasn’t two like-minded colleagues sharing a dinner after a busy day at a conference.

This was exactly what the dear Dr Gemma had ordered.

Cat was old enough to know it.

Their knees were nudging and suddenly her lips felt too big for her face without the resting place of his mouth.

She felt his eyes glance down as she reached for her drink and from the sudden weight in her breasts she knew where his glance had been. Only, it wasn’t sleazy. Or, if it was, it came from both of them because she’d been doing the same to his bum a little earlier as he’d walked down the stairs.