The Magic of Christmas Page 13

  ‘Sorry. I wasn’t looking where I was going.’ He released her immediately and noticed her take a step backwards.

  So it wasn’t just him, then.

  ‘I just called Eddie’s girlfriend. She’s on her way in. She sounded immensely irritated to think he was here.’ Her mouth curved into a smile but her eyes were shadowed and tired. ‘Do you think we should call Security? He might need protection.’

  Christian studied her delicate bone structure and the tiny freckles that dusted her nose. Eddie was right. She was beautiful. He wondered why she was tired. Was looking after the house and the girls too much for her?

  Or was she lying awake at night, suffering as he was?

  ‘Eddie expressed an interest in your marital status.’

  Lara lifted a hand. ‘Oh, no.’ She shook her head. ‘I can see his flaws without even going on a date. He obviously drinks too much and his spatial awareness must be pretty poor if he couldn’t judge the distance to the ground. Disaster. If we went out for dinner, I’d strangle him before we reached the end of the first course.’

  ‘Has any man ever come close to meeting your impossibly high standards?’

  Why had he asked that question?

  She was obviously wondering the same thing because the laughter in her eyes faded and she looked away, clearly self-conscious. ‘No. Absolutely not. Never.’

  A tense silence followed her statement and Christian felt the slow throb of his heartbeat. ‘Lara—’

  ‘I forgot to mention,’ she interrupted him quickly, her tone unnaturally bright, ‘both the girls want to go to sleepovers tomorrow night. It’s with friends that they’ve played with before so I’m assuming that’s all right with you. I’ll send in a bag for them and they can go straight from school. It’s quite convenient, actually, because we have a bit of a staffing crisis on the nursing front and I’ve promised Jane that I’ll do a night shift.’

  Christian felt an immediate rush of tension. ‘I’m doing a night shift, too.’

  Something flickered in her eyes. ‘Oh. Right. Well, that’s—that’s…’

  ‘That’s what?’

  She gave a funny twisted smile. ‘Another test of self-control?’

  Christian felt a hot flame of lust burn through his body. ‘It will be fine. We’ll both be working.’

  ‘Of course we will. Just make sure there’s no mistletoe.’ She backed away from him. ‘Well, I’ll just go and break the news to Eddie that his girlfriend is on her way. Judging from her tone of voice, he might want to try and run away on two broken feet.’

  * * *

  Another heavy fall of snow brought chaos to the roads and the night was frantically busy.

  ‘Why don’t people just go to bed when it gets dark?’ Lara said desperately as she called the medical ward to try and hasten the transfer of two patients so that they could make room in the department.

  ‘This is why we don’t usually work nights,’ Jane said, juggling a pile of X-rays. ‘There’s never any chance to rest. Ambulance Control just rang. They’re bringing in a young guy who’s been stabbed. Can you go into Resus?’

  ‘My favourite place.’

  ‘I don’t know why you’re complaining.’ Jane tucked the X-rays under her arm. ‘Pretty soon you’ll be sunning yourself in Sydney and this will all be a distant memory.’

  ‘Yes.’ Why did that option no longer sound exciting? She wanted to see her brother, but as for the rest of it…

  Wondering why she’d suddenly lost all her bounce and energy, Lara joined the team in Resus and worked on automatic, relying on experience to carry her through.

  She wasn’t going to look at Christian more than was absolutely necessary.

  She wasn’t going to admire him.

  ‘He’s arrested.’ Penny’s voice rose slightly. ‘There’s blood everywhere. They must have hit his heart when they stabbed him. The cardiothoracic team are waiting for him in Theatre.’

  ‘He isn’t going to make it to Theatre,’ Christian said grimly. ‘Start external chest compressions. Lara, get me a thoracotomy pack.’

  Penny’s face was white as she followed his instructions. ‘You’re going to open his chest here?’

  ‘He’s arrested,’ Christian said bluntly. ‘We’re not exactly overwhelmed with options.’

  As Lara scrubbed and put on a gown, she glanced towards Penny and wondered whether she’d ever witnessed severe trauma before. ‘You’re doing really well, Penny,’ she said quickly, opening the pack for Christian and handing him gloves, a face shield and an apron. ‘I’ve called blood transfusion.’

  ‘Good. Let’s hope he’s going to need it.’Christian moved to the patient’s left side and lifted his arm. ‘Stop chest compressions, Penny.’Without hesitation he made an incision in the left chest wall.

  Lara handed him a rib retractor and adjusted the light. ‘Is that better?’

  ‘All I can see is blood.’ His fingers swift and decisive, Christian widened the incision. ‘I can see the pericardium—it’s bulging.’

  Hoping that Penny wasn’t going to faint into the wound, Lara watched as he skillfully evacuated the blood from the pericardial sac.

  ‘Right—now I just need to work out what’s going on here…’ He put a finger over the defect and performed internal cardiac massage. ‘Lara, give me a prolene suture.’

  She ripped open the appropriate packet and he took it swiftly and worked to repair the damage to the heart. ‘The knife must have gone straight between his ribs.’

  ‘Yes.’ Christian paused and glanced at the monitor. ‘Check cardiac rhythm and output.’

  ‘He’s in VF.’

  ‘Give me the internal defibrillation paddles.’ Without hesitation, Christian placed a paddle either side of the heart and delivered the shock.

  ‘He has a pulse,’ Lara murmured. ‘Gosh. It’s our lucky night. More Christmas miracles.’

  ‘Lucky?’ Penny looked at her, her face white. ‘How can you call him lucky?’

  ‘Because if Christian hadn’t opened his chest, he’d be dead now.’ Lara was still watching the monitor. ‘Do you want to put in a catheter?’

  ‘Yes, and an arterial line.’ Christian looked at Penny. ‘We need to check his bloods again. U and Es, FBCs, glucose and clotting. And give him 1.5 grams of cefuroxime.’

  Penny didn’t answer and Lara glanced towards her. The young doctor’s face was ashen.

  Noticing her sway slightly, Lara dropped a pair of forceps on the floor. ‘Oops. Silly me.’ Her voice was calm. ‘Do you mind picking that up for me, Penny? Just put them on the side, over there.’

  The action of stooping to retrieve the forceps restored the blood to Penny’s head and, when she straightened and put the forceps down, she had some colour in her cheeks. She gave Lara a hesitant smile of thanks, clearly aware that Lara’s sudden display of ‘clumsiness’ had been intentional.

  Christian was still involved with the patient and hadn’t noticed anything amiss.

  ‘It’s jolly hot in here,’ Lara murmured. ‘Why don’t you go out and take a breath of fresh air, Penny?’

  Christian lifted his head and frowned but at that moment the cardiothoracic team strode into the room and the focus of his attention shifted. ‘Gregg.’ He nodded to his colleague. ‘We have a patient for you.’

  The cardiothoracic surgeon walked up to the trolley and Lara took advantage of the extra staff to give Penny a little push.

  ‘Someone else can take those bloods. You go outside and breathe. Then go to the staffroom and have a cup of tea.’

  Penny didn’t argue and Lara turned back to the patient who was now in the hands of the cardiothoracic team.

  ‘Nice work, Christian. If you ever want a job, just pick up the phone.’

  They stabilised the patient sufficiently to move him and then Lara went to find Penny. There was no sign of her but she found Jane instead.

  ‘Have you seen Penny? She looked a bit sick. I wanted to check on her.’

  ‘I’m not s
urprised she looked sick,’ Jane said calmly. ‘I just put my head round the door in Resus and it looked as though you’d slaughtered a goat. Not very tidy, are you?’

  Lara bristled. ‘We saved that man’s life—well, so far, anyway.’

  ‘Next time try and keep at least some of the blood inside the patient.’ Jane gave a faint smile. ‘You did well. You and Christian are an amazing team. And don’t worry about Penny. I’ve already seen her. I talked to her and then sent her home.’

  ‘You did?’

  ‘Yes. She thought you were very kind. But she was very traumatised, as you rightly guessed.’

  Lara sighed. ‘I don’t think the pace of the ED suits her. She finds it all too stressful.’

  ‘It is stressful.’ Jane gave a philosophical smile. ‘I’ll talk to Christian about her at some point, see what he thinks.’ She picked up a pile of files and handed them to Lara. ‘Do you mind taking these to Christian? He’s in his office and he was asking for them earlier. It’s the next job on my long list. And tell him that Penny has gone home. I’ll give him the details tomorrow.’

  Lara opened her mouth to say that she didn’t want to go and see Christian in his office, but Jane had already left the room.

  Gritting her teeth, Lara clutched the files. Apart from the inevitable demands of Resus, she’d been avoiding him all night. She really didn’t want to see him outside the clinical situation.

  But delivering files was hardly a problem, was it? She’d just put them on his desk and leave.

  Trying to ignore the banging of her heart, Lara walked to Christian’s office. The door was open but the only light came from a flickering computer screen.

  Why was he sitting in the dark?

  ‘Jane said that you’re waiting for these.’ She put the files on his desk. ‘And she wants you to know that Penny has gone home.’

  ‘Why has she gone home?’

  The sound of his voice sent wicked, sensual heat curling through her pelvis. ‘Because she wasn’t feeling a hundred per cent. I think she was feeling a bit off colour when we were in Resus.’ The darkness created a dangerous intimacy and Lara started to back towards the door.

  ‘I wondered why you were sending her out of the room. I didn’t notice that she was off colour.’

  ‘You were opening a patient’s chest at the time so you have a decent excuse for not noticing. But that probably won’t stop her thinking that we’re cold and unfeeling.’

  He was silent for a moment. ‘Are we cold and unfeeling, Lara?’

  ‘You just saved a man’s life, Christian,’ Lara said softly. ‘How can you even ask that question?’

  He studied her, his eyes glittering in the semidarkness. ‘Working in the ED distorts your view of life, don’t you think?’

  ‘Yes,’she said honestly, ‘I think it probably does.’

  ‘Is that why you’re going to Australia? Because you want to return to normal life? Are you tired of living your life along the edge of other people’s disasters?’

  Her heart banged against her chest as she searched vainly for the answer to his question. She didn’t know why she was leaving anymore.

  ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time, but that was before—’ She stopped in mid-sentence and he rose to his feet and walked across to her.

  ‘Before what, Lara?’

  Silence enclosed them and then he reached behind her and shut the door, turning the key in the lock with a purposeful movement. ‘Before—what?’

  Why had he locked the door?

  ‘Before I walked into your office, holding mistletoe. Before I moved in with you. I don’t know.’ Her voice was a whisper in the darkness. ‘Sometimes when I’m working in Resus I remember that life is short and unpredictable. No one knows that more than we do. You have to make the most of every single bit of happiness that comes your way. But I understand that you don’t want to do that. I know how much you worry about upsetting your girls.’

  He was standing so close to her that the tension was almost unbearable and suddenly she knew she had to get away from him while she was still in possession of a grain of willpower.

  She turned swiftly and put her hand on the key, but his hand covered hers, warm and strong.

  For a moment they just stood like that and then his fingers tightened and she turned slowly to look at him. His face was close to hers and she saw in the depths of his blue eyes that he was fighting the same battle that she was. A war between sheer animal attraction and cold common sense.

  Then he gently slid his hand round the back of her neck and drew her towards him, lowering his mouth to hers.

  The slow, erotic skill of his kiss sparked an explosion of excitement so shockingly intense that she felt a sudden rush of heat through her body that threatened to melt her bones.

  He cupped her face with his hands, holding her firmly as he silenced her shocked moan with the heat and demands of his mouth.

  It was a kiss like no other she’d ever experienced and for a suspended moment in time she was unable to think or move, unable to do anything except react in the most primitive way.

  The heat of the kiss intensified until he lifted her into his arms in one easy movement and carried her across to his desk.

  Without breaking the kiss—as if the taste of her mouth was essential to give him life—he knocked papers and files onto the floor with an impatient sweep of his arm and then placed her on the desk.

  Lara lifted her hands to his shoulders, feeling the hard swell of muscle and the strength and power of his body.

  The tension that had been building for weeks exploded between them and with a frantic movement she slid her hands up inside his scrub suit, feeling warm male flesh under her desperately seeking fingers. With a low groan he slid his hands down her trembling thighs, pushed them apart and hauled her hard against him.

  ‘Christian…’ The shock of the contact stole the breath from her body and she gave a little sob as she felt the hard press of his arousal through the thin fabric of his scrub suit.

  ‘I need you naked. I need you naked now.’ He groaned the words against her mouth, breaking the contact only to jerk her top over her head. It landed in a soft heap and her bottoms followed moments later.

  Tortured by excitement, Lara felt his fingers slide over her arms and then her bra was gone too and his mouth finally moved from her lips to her breast.

  The slow graze of his tongue against her nipple sent shock waves through her system and she writhed against him, struggling to ease the growing ache deep in her pelvis.

  She felt desperate, completely desperate, and he was obviously aware of that fact because she felt his warm, seeking fingers move lower until he was touching her intimately.

  His skilled caress drove her past the point where restraint or common sense might have intervened and, when he brought his mouth back to hers, lightning heat and molten excitement poured through her body. She slid her own hands down over his warm, hard flesh and lower still, the sheer intensity of her need making her bold.

  ‘Please, Christian, please…’She whimpered the words against his mouth and her fingers closed around the warm, pulsing strength of his arousal.

  He stilled and she felt his last desperate struggle for control.

  She heard his harsh breathing, felt the tension in his powerful frame, and knew that, if he stopped now, she’d die for sure.

  She slid her hips closer to his and wrapped her legs around him, her trembling, aroused body delivering a blatant invitation that he met with his own fierce demands.

  His mouth found hers again and then she felt his hands on her hips, easing her forward. And then he was inside her, driving deep with a series of smooth thrusts that sent more shock waves spiralling through her thoroughly overexcited body.

  She climaxed immediately, her body in the grip of an explosion of sensation that allowed her no breathing space.

  ‘Lara…’ He muttered her name against her mouth, sliding a hand over her bottom to bring her closer still, and t
he intimacy was so perfect—so deliciously shocking—that she clung to him, afraid to let go.

  The feel of his body joined with hers was so amazing that another climax devoured her immediately and this time her uninhibited response tore through his own control and she felt the sudden increase in masculine thrust as he reached his own completion.

  It was terrifying and exhilarating and she clung to his shoulders, overwhelmed by the intensity of the experience, struggling to regain her breath.

  Gradually the sensations eased and she became aware of her surroundings. The flickering computer screen next to them, the few papers that hadn’t been knocked from the desk in the frantic pursuit of passion.

  They’d made love in his office.

  With a moan of disbelief she tried to draw away from him but he held her, his face buried in her neck as he breathed in her scent. Finally he lifted his head and his eyes met hers.

  ‘Lara—’

  ‘Don’t say anything.’ She didn’t want him to say anything because words could only spoil the perfection of what they’d just shared.

  He withdrew from her gently and reached down to retrieve her clothes. With gentle hands he replaced her bra and slipped her top over her head. ‘Are you sorry?’

  She slid her legs into her trousers and pushed her hair away from her face. ‘How could I be sorry?’ She spoke in a whisper even though they were alone in his office. ‘It was perfect.’

  ‘Yes. It was.’ His voice was deep. ‘That’s why I thought you might be sorry.’

  So it had been perfect for him, too.

  Impulsively she turned to him, overwhelmed by emotion that she didn’t understand. ‘What if I didn’t go travelling? What if I just visited my brother and then came straight home? I could look after the girls and we could—’

  ‘Don’t.’He groaned the words against her mouth. ‘Don’t say that.You know that isn’t an option. The girls can’t cope with any more changes. Their lives need to be stable and predictable.’

  ‘But I love the girls. We could make it work.’ Consumed by a misery that she didn’t understand, she looked at him. ‘We have something special, Christian.’