Australian Affairs: Claimed: Dr Chandler's Sleeping Beauty / Countering His Claim / Australia's Maverick Millionaire. Margaret Way
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can stay with me for a few days. We’ll sort something out.’
‘I don’t need a place to stay,’ Robbie said. ‘I just need some cash.’
Jake dropped his hand from his face. ‘You know what I feel about handing you money, Robbie. If you need food I’ll buy it. If you need rent paid I’ll pay it. But don’t ask me to hand you money to pay for drink or drugs. I can’t do that. I won’t do that.’
The phone went dead.
Jake put the phone back on the desk and dragged his hand over his face. Was this nightmare ever going to end? Where had he gone wrong? He had thought it bad enough when Rosie had got herself pregnant by that jerk who had left her stranded at the age of nineteen. But that was nothing compared to this. Robbie was hellbent on self-destruction and there wasn’t a thing he or anyone could do to stop it.
All the sacrifices he had made to keep his family together were still not enough. All the opportunities he could have taken he had gladly relinquished, just to see his siblings make their way in the world. He had curtailed many of his own plans to make sure his siblings got the care and the resources they needed. The girls were finally on their feet now. And he had been so proud that Robbie had decided to go to university—thrilled that all the hopes their mother had had for each of her children were finally coming to fruition. He had thought when Robbie was doing well in his studies that things would be smooth sailing from then on. But just when he had thought it was safe to have a life of his own, free of the responsibilities he had shouldered for so long, everything had come crashing down.
What more could he do? Did he have to spend the rest of his life worrying about his brother? Was Robbie ever going to grow out of this stage and be responsible for himself? Or was this how it was going to be for ever?
* * *
‘What’s this I hear about you getting it on with the new recruit in A&E?’ asked Greg Hickey, one of the orthopaedic surgeons, in the doctors’ room later that day.
Jake put his teaspoon down on the sink. ‘Just a rumour, Greg,’ he said. ‘You know what this place is like. You only have to look at someone and everyone thinks you’re sleeping with them.’
Greg gave him a cynical grin. ‘That’s because you usually are.’
Jake gave a dismissive shrug. ‘She’s not my type.’
‘She’s a London girl, isn’t she?’ Greg asked as he poured himself a coffee from the brew on the hotplate.
‘Yeah,’ Jake said, thinking of Kitty’s cute little accent and the way she put her nose in the air when she wanted to make a point.
‘And quite pretty, so I’ve been told,’ Greg added.
Jake took a sip of his coffee as he thought about the heart-shaped face and the stormy grey eyes that had stared him down across his desk earlier that day. His body had leapt to attention. He had felt so tempted to come around from behind his desk and taste the temptation of her full mouth. Was it really as soft as it looked? She wasn’t the lipstick type, but she wore a shimmery lip gloss that made her lips look luscious. Would they taste of vanilla or strawberries?
Her hair had been pulled back in a tight, schoolmarmish knot at the back of her head. He had wanted to release it from its prim confines and let it cascade freely around her shoulders. He had wanted to run his fingers through it to see if it was as silky as it looked. He couldn’t quite rid his mind of imagining her cloud of hair spread out over the pillows on his bed, her slim, creamy limbs entwined with his. Would she be a kitten or a tigress in bed? He got hard just thinking about it. He couldn’t rid his mind of her fragrance, either. She had smelled of frangipanis this time, an exotic and alluring scent that had lingered in his office for hours.
‘She’s all right, I guess,’ he said, with another casual up-and-down movement of his shoulders.
Greg chuckled as he reached for the artificial sweetener on the counter. ‘You’ve got it bad, Jakey boy,’ he said. ‘I can see all the signs.’
‘What d’you mean?’ Jake asked, frowning. ‘What signs?’
‘Every time I mentioned her just then you got this goofy sort of dreamy look on your face,’ Greg said, leaning back against the counter. ‘I reckon you’re falling for her.’
Jake gave an uncomfortable laugh. ‘You’re crazy. I’ve never fallen for anyone in my life and I’m not going to start now.’
Greg kept grinning. ‘Gotta be a first time for everything, right?’
‘Wrong,’ Jake said, putting his mug down on the table with a little thwack. ‘Kitty Cargill’s far too conservative for me. She doesn’t have a funny bone in her body. She’s prim and proper and she sweats over the small stuff all the time. She doesn’t smile—she glowers. Besides, she’s still hankering over some guy who broke her heart back in the home country. I don’t think she’s here to advance her career at all. She’s running away from her failed love-life. I don’t need any lame ducks on my staff; God knows it’s hard enough to keep everyone’s morale up as it is with all these wretched cutbacks. I don’t want to have to babysit someone who isn’t up to the task.’
‘What? You don’t think she’s competent?’ Greg asked, frowning over the rim of his coffee cup.
Jake released a breath and rubbed at the tight muscles at the back of his neck. Maybe he’d laid it on a bit strong. It wouldn’t do to sound too defensive. ‘No, I’m not saying that. She’s conscientious—a little too much so if anything. She’s eager to learn and the patients like her. She’ll find her feet soon enough.’
‘Might be just what she needs to boost her confidence,’ Greg said. ‘A meaningless affair with a man she won’t think twice about leaving when it’s time to say goodbye.’
‘I’m not putting my hand up for the job just yet,’ Jake said. ‘Not unless I hand over a thousand bucks to one of my sisters.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I made a bet with her over Christmas dinner,’ Jake said. ‘No sex for three months.’
Greg’s brows rose. ‘So how’s that working out for you?’
Jake gave him a rueful look as he shouldered open the door. ‘Let’s put it this way,’ he said. ‘I’m spending a whole lot more time at the gym.’
JAKE was on his way back to his town house after a heavy session at the gym when he saw Kitty in the car park, washing a car that had seen better days. She was wearing a pair of shorts that ended at mid-thigh and a loose-fitting T-shirt. Her hair was up in a high ponytail, swinging from side to side as she rubbed the soapy sponge over the duco of her four-cylinder vehicle. She looked young and nubile and so sexy he felt a surge of lust go through him like a rocket blast. Her small but perfect breasts were outlined behind the clingy dampness of her T-shirt, and every time she bent over he caught a delectable glimpse of her creamy flesh. She was humming to herself—a tune he was familiar with but couldn’t quite place. She had a hose in her other hand and it was spraying water all over the concrete, running in wasteful rivulets down the storm water drain.
‘I hate to take on the role of the fun police but you can’t do that around here,’ he said.
She jumped and turned around so quickly the high-pressure hose in her hand shot him straight in the groin with a blast of cold water.
He let out a stiff curse as he stepped out of the line of fire. ‘What the hell?’
‘Sorry,’ she said, pointing the hose at the ground, where it sprayed water all over the concrete at her feet. ‘I didn’t hear you. You scared the wits out of me, coming from nowhere like that.’
He