Table of Contents

       Cover

      Praise for Amy Andrews

       Title Page

      Dedication

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

       CHAPTER FIVE

       CHAPTER SIX

       CHAPTER SEVEN

       CHAPTER EIGHT

       CHAPTER NINE

       CHAPTER TEN

       CHAPTER ELEVEN

       CHAPTER TWELVE

       EPILOGUE

       Copyright

       CHAPTER ONE

      ETHAN HUNTER NEEDED a drink.

      Bad.

      After five hours of complicated surgery his legs ached like a bitch and finding the bottom of a bottle was the only sure-fire way to soothe the fiery path of hot talons tearing from thigh to calf.

      It was that or painkillers, and Ethan refused to be dependent on drugs.

      ‘We’re heading to Drake’s, Ethan,’ a voice with a thick Scottish brogue said from behind. ‘Why don’t you join us?’

      A sudden silence descended into the male change-room as Ethan turned around to find Jock, the anaesthetist from the surgery, addressing him. He looked around at the four others, who’d all been chatting merrily until now. Clearly none of them were keen on having Ethan join them.

      Jock didn’t look particularly enthused either.

      Not that he could blame them. The longer the surgery had taken, the more his legs had ached, and the more tense and terse he’d become. Accidentally dropping an instrument had been the last straw, and kicking it childishly across the floor until it clanged against the metallic kickboard of the opposite wall hadn’t exactly been his most professional moment.

      He hated prima donna surgeons, but his simmering frustration at his shot concentration and the pain had bubbled over at that point.

      Even so, he didn’t need or want their duty invitation, no matter how much he craved some alcoholic fortification. Ethan was just fine with drinking alone.

      In fact, he preferred it.

      ‘No thanks, Jock,’ he said. ‘I’ve got to get back to the clinic.’

      Which was true. There was an important case file he needed to familiarise himself with on Leo’s desk. And some classy fine malt whisky to go with it.

      He looked around at his colleagues. ‘Thanks for your help in there, everyone. Good job.’

      There was a general murmuring of goodnights and then Ethan was alone. He sank gratefully onto the bench seat just behind him, easing his legs, muscles screaming, out in front of him. He shut his eyes as the pain lessened considerably and sat there for long minutes as the rush of relief anaesthetised the lingering tension in the rest of his body.

      It felt so damn good to be off them!

      But he couldn’t sit here forever. Work called. He reluctantly opened his eyes and reached for his clothes.

      The black cab pulled up in front of the imposing white Victorian facade on Harley Street. Like the many clinics and physician’s offices that called Harley Street home, the Hunter Clinic was as exclusive as the address implied.

      Ethan’s father, celebrated plastic surgeon James Hunter, had founded it over three decades ago, and it had gone on to become world-renowned as much for its humanitarian and charity work with civilian and military casualties of war as for its A-list clients.

      Thanks largely to his brother Leo.

      Certainly not thanks to their father and the scandal that had not only resulted in his premature death through a heart attack but had almost caused the closure of the clinic over a decade ago.

      Again, thanks to Leo’s drive and commitment, it had been avoided.

      Not that Ethan gave a rat’s about any of that right at this moment. Thinking about his father and his previously rocky relationship with his brother always got things churned up inside, and tonight he was barely coping with standing upright.

      Ethan paid the driver and hauled himself out of the back through sheer willpower alone. The only thing that kept him putting one foot in front of the other was the lure of Leo’s whisky.

      Ethan grimaced as he limped through the corridors to his brother’s office, holding on to the polished wooden handrails for added support. His badly mangled ankle and knee felt ready to give at any second, and the effort it took for his muscles to support them was bringing him out in a sweat.

      Ethan wished he hadn’t neglected his physio so much, or ignored Lizzie—Leo’s wife and his ex-home visit nurse—when she’d scolded him about not using his stick. He hated the damn stick, and the questions it inevitably aroused, and he didn’t have time in his busy schedule for the intensive physio required—but at this moment in time he was prepared to embrace both.

      Not that it would help him now.

      But what would help beckoned just beyond Leo’s door, and Ethan had never been so glad to get to his brother’s office. It had once belonged to his father, and he’d used to hate being summoned here by the great man himself, in a rage over some imagined slight or other, as his father had slowly spiralled downwards into alcoholic depression.

      Thankfully those days were gone, but it was pleasing to know that a decanter of finest whisky could still be found within the walls of this