Читать книгу One Night With Dr Nikolaides - Annie O’neil - Страница 13

CHAPTER FOUR

“WELL, LOOK WHO we have here. If it isn’t Little Miss I’m-Going-to-Make-a-Difference.”

Theo Nikolaides. As she lived and breathed...barely.

She opened her mouth. She’d prepared for this. Spent hours of her life thinking about what to say when and if she ever saw him again.

Fffzzzzttt! There went her ability to use actual words.

“Come to help out at our little backwater clinic, have you?”

“I...uh...”

Kaboom! An explosion of fireworks she was clearly powerless to resist went off in her chest, then her belly, then her... Well, everywhere, really.

“Cailey? Are you all right? You haven’t been hurt, have you?”

Crrrrassssh! Down came the defenses she’d worked so hard to build up.

She batted away his hand as he reached toward her. She wasn’t ready yet. For that voice. Those words. His kindness.

Her cheeks burned at the memory of their heated exchange all those years ago. She forced herself to swallow the array of comebacks she could’ve spat back, and instead shifted the infant she’d been cuddling back into the arms of his mother.

Prove you’ve grown up. Prove you’ve made something of yourself!

“It looks like a superficial wound to me. Cuts always bleed a lot. Just keep the pressure on and I’m sure the good doctor here will get to you as soon as possible.”

“Absolutely.” Theo gave the mum a quick nod in Lea’s direction. “Dr. Risi will be down in a minute to log the case, and we’ll get someone to see you and this little one as soon as possible.”

Cailey watched, transfixed, as Theo ran his index finger along the infant’s face. How could someone so incredibly caring leave his father to do his talking for him?

Pffft. They’d both been young and stupid. At least she had been. On too many fronts.

Didn’t mean they could kiss and make-up, though.

A vivid image of Theo pulling her roughly to him for a hot, heated kiss swept through her body. And then she crushed it. That was all in the past.

“How funny—you remember my goal.” She turned on her brightest smile. “Mission accomplished. I am here to make a difference, thank you very much. A good one. So, if you don’t mind putting one of the ‘little people’ to work, I’ll happily get out of your way.”

Sea-green eyes bored into her from a face featuring the strong, evenly planed cheekbones she’d dreamt of tracing with first a finger...then her lips...

He was looking at her curiously. She shifted under his gaze, not enjoying the intense scrutiny.

“Here I was, thinking an earthquake would’ve reminded you that we’re all born equal,” he said blandly.

It would’ve been a hell of a touché if she hadn’t known for a fact he thought she was in an intellectual league well below him.

She held her ground, arched an eyebrow that might have looked defensive but was in fact proud and resilient and completely without insecurity. She hadn’t knuckled down for years of painstaking study, work and paying off student loans to get this far only to feel belittled again.

“I think you would probably be most useful working alongside me. C’mon.” He scooped up her backpack, turned and signaled for her to follow him. “Let’s get you some scrubs and then you can show me what you’re made of.”

He put his hand on the small of her back and began steering her through the crowd, using his own body as a shield against the push and surge of people desperate to see a doctor.

While her infuriated brain shot off in one direction Cailey’s body was actively registering Theo’s on a much more primal level. All six-foot-something, long-legged, trim-waisted, white-coated package of complete and utter male perfection kept brushing up against her as if...as if they had already shared an intimacy beyond that one perfect kiss...

“I think I can get scrubs on my own, ta.” She shot him her best I’m-a-big-girl-now look, eyes sparking as they landed on his amused expression.

“No, you can’t. You’ve never been here before.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Yeah, but nothing.” He grinned down at her. “You can quit the ‘city girl’ act, Cailey. You’re home now. Time to see what my little kouklamou of Mythelios is made of.”

It certainly wasn’t sugar and spice. Not these days, anyway.

Despite her rising fury, something in her softened as she stomped alongside him to get kitted out in scrubs.

Beautiful doll. He’d always called her that back then. Sure, she’d just been his kid sister’s friend. Daughter of his family’s housekeeper. But even though they’d never put words to it there’d been something... Something magic between them.

She’d been absolutely sure of it right up until the moment she’d heard him tell his friends that a Nikolaides would never end up with a cleaner.

And that had been that.

Rage at the memory did nothing to stop her insides from fluttering as his hand shifted on the small of her back. How on earth she’d thought she would be immune to him even after all this time was beyond her.

She stole a glance at him as he stepped to the side to avoid a gurney being wheeled through the packed corridor at high speed.

Theo might not be everybody’s cup of tea. He had his flaws. A tiny scar by his eye acquired from daredevil antics in one of his father’s olive groves. Hair that always looked as if it could do with a cut. Another small scar just below his nose that only seemed to add to the strength of his unbelievably sensual mouth. Sensual, but male.

Everything about him screamed alpha. Masculine. It had since they were young—as if he’d been born vividly aware of the world’s mysteries and was just biding his time until the rest of the world caught up. Take it or leave it—that was his attitude. Not cavalier. Or haughty. Simply knowing. As if he’d made a deal with the universe to do his part and in exchange...

That was the mystery. She’d never seen him take anything. Not one single solitary time. That was the Theo enigma.

He might talk the talk of a rich, privileged so-and-so, but she’d always thought the shadows that crossed those sea-green eyes of his betrayed greater depths. Hidden sorrows he’d rather keep secret. He’d never bare the heart behind that insanely touchable chest of his.

He turned back to her with a smile still playing on his lips. Trust him to be all calm and relaxed amidst a level of mayhem that would have rendered any sane person tearing out their hair.

“There’s no need for a tour of the clinic. Shall we just get to work?”

“I think you’re going to want to get out of that top first.”

“I...uh...” She looked down at the white top she was wearing that had somehow magically acquired a layer of grime and rolled her eyes. Kyros. Her brother had been filthy.

Oh, good grief. Where’s your spine? Your vocabulary? Use them!

“It’s not—I’m here to...”

What is wrong with you?

A nurse skidded to a halt beside Theo and put a hand on her chest to stop him. Lucky minx.

“Dr. Nikolaides, we’ve got five patients coming in the next ambulance.”

“Five!”

Two pairs of eyes snapped to her.

“There are only two ambulances on the island. We bring in as many people as they can carry,” Theo explained.

There was nothing in his voice beyond passing on information. Where was the derision? Why was he taking his time with her? When had he become so...so...extra-perfect?

Her eyes fixed on Theo’s lips as he spoke to the nurse. On the tip of his tongue as it touched and retreated from the smooth run of teeth save one crooked one just to the left of center that she’d always liked. Yet another slight imperfection that made him mysteriously even more perfect.

His tongue swept the length of his lower lip before his teeth snagged that lip and pressed down on it while he thought for a moment when the nurse asked where he wanted the patients. It was like being in a slow-motion version of her teenaged fantasies...before the kissing began.

She watched, still mesmerized, as he released his lip and rattled off a list of updates.

A Mrs. Carnosi with a broken arm needed to go to Cubicle Three while her plaster set. A man was in Recovery on the first floor after a heart attack—could someone find his wife down at the harbor? She was helping the baker, he thought. A four-year-old with a head wound could probably do with some crayons to pass the time as the televisions weren’t working. All the children, in fact. There were some in a storage locker along with some paper. He was sure of it. Oh, and he’d organized a water delivery so everyone who entered the clinic could be given a two-liter bottle to see them through their waiting time.

Was there nothing the man hadn’t thought of? All this while also seeing patients? Where was the young man she’d last seen? Arrogant. Elitist. The one who’d turned against her as easily as kicking a door shut. The one who’d compelled her to scrimp and save and study and learn. To leave her homeland pushed by the towering wave of shame that she would never be good enough for a man like him.

She couldn’t have been wrong about him after all of this time. Could she?

Theo reached back and gave her shoulder a little pat and a squeeze as another doctor took the nurse’s spot and asked him to run his eye across some X-rays. A compound fracture. Were they up to performing the surgery the patient would require?

Vividly aware of Theo’s fingers on her shoulder, Cailey was barely capable of lucid thought. Her insides were behaving like electricity cables cut loose in a storm. Sparks flying everywhere. Nothing behaving the way it should.

She squeezed her eyes tight against the warm olive color of Theo’s skin. His toned physique. The perfect, capable hands touching her.

Just imagining the man holding a child, helping a yiayia to cross the street with her shopping or explaining to a daredevil teen that he couldn’t go swimming while his arm was still in a plaster made her insides turn into liquid gold.

Which was all very irritating because she was meant to have become immune to Theo Nikolaides.

She forced herself to open her eyes and meet the mossy hues of his irises whilst trying her level best to ignore the fact that the man was in possession of the longest, darkest lashes she’d ever seen. He also had more than a five o’clock shadow, but that indicated he’d been working hard and—surprise, surprise—made him look more like a rock star than an unkempt layabout.

No doubt about it. As a grown man Theo Nikolaides was a living, breathing example of a mortal embodying the majesty of the Greek gods of legend. Zeus, Adonis, Apollo... Eros...

“Shall we get you out of these things?”

Theo was looking pointedly at her filthy top, but her thoughts and his tone suggested anything but an innocent need to improve her hygiene.

Was he...flirting with her?

This was taking being cool in the eye of a storm to a whole new level.

Just one lazy scan of her dust-covered body and—poof!—just like that she felt naked. Each sweep of his eyes drew her awareness to the cotton brushing against her belly, her breasts, the tingling between her legs that was really, really inappropriate seeing as she’d vowed to remain immune to the Nikolaides effect. Not to mention the scores of patients waiting.

Seeing him looking at her the way he was...hungrily...she felt a brand-new array of fireworks light up her insides and actual electricity crackle between them.

This was all wrong. There was a crisis happening not inches away. People needed help. Patients needed his attention. Her attention.

He’d never looked at her like this before. As if she were an oasis and he’d crawled in from the desert desperate for one thing and one thing only.

The sun abruptly lit up the clinic’s central glass dome, its rays filtering down to them through a tumble of rooftop wisteria like film lighting. Dappled. Hints of gold and diamonds.

When Theo tilted his face, green eyes still locked with hers, it was all she could do not to reach into her chest and give him her heart. It had always been his. He’d just never wanted it.

Before she could say anything, though, he held out his arm to clear a path for her toward the rear of the clinic.

Of course the crowd parted. Things like that happened for the Theo Nikolaideses of the world. And the Patera and the Xenakis families. Not to mention the Moustakas family. The four families who commanded the bulk of the island’s wealth thanks to their business savvy.

Mopaxeni Shipping. The glittering star of the Aegean Seas and beyond. All those businessmen’s sons would inherit untold millions—if not billions. So what on earth was Theo doing here in this small town clinic when the world was his oyster?

“Aren’t you meant to be—?”

“Right.” Theo cut her off, directing her to a green door at the far end of the corridor. “In here.”

She turned and tried to take her bag from him.

He shook his finger—tick-tock, no, you don’t—in front of her lips. “I’m coming with you.”

Great. Just what she’d always dreamed of. Death by proximity to the unrequited love of her life.

She pushed open the swinging door to the changing room. Might as well get it over with.

* * *

Theo had absolutely no idea where this cavalier Jack-the-lad attitude he was trying on for size had come from.

He was exhausted. Running on adrenaline. He needed food, coffee, and yet... Was this—? Was he trying to flirt? Was this what stress did to him? Or was this what all-grown-up Cailey Tomaras did to him?

There’d been that one time as teens, when they’d all been running around the pool, messing about. He’d grabbed her, and she’d slipped on the grass, and they’d fallen in a tangle of limbs on top of one another and there’d been a moment...a kiss...

Μakapi!

There were a thousand other things Theo should be doing besides going down memory lane to find hints of a romance that had never been. A restorative fifteen minutes of sleep. Walking the small wards, filled to bursting wards, and diving in where an extra pair of hands were needed. Helping with rescue efforts.

Not staring at a pretty girl from the past.

She looked good. A far cry from the reedy teenaged girl who had seemed to all but live in the shadows of his father’s ridiculous mansion. A full cherry-red mouth. Inky black hair. A deliciously curvy figure he could almost feel—as if he’d already tugged her close to him for a passionate embrace.

He scrubbed a hand through his long hair, hearing his father’s distinctive voice in his head.

“If you’re going to slum it as the island medic, the least you can do is maintain the family reputation. I’ll not have you gallivanting round the island with a halfwit cleaner’s daughter.”

His eyes flicked to Cailey’s. Dark. Full of passion and empathy. And, if he wasn’t wrong, the smallest dose of fear.

His heart cinched. That she should feel that way around him... His father was a cruel man. Why he couldn’t see that kindness, understanding and empathy were far more effective tools for so-called “people management” was beyond him.

Theo had grown immune to Dimitri’s tendency to cut a person to the quick, but Cailey...? He’d never subject her to the ego-lashings his babbo had dealt out without a second’s thought. And for some reason his father had always had it in for the girl. He’d need to keep her close to him. Far easier to keep her out of harm’s way then.

“Are you ready to go straight to work?”

Smooth. Nice way to make a woman who’s flown overnight to come and lend a hand welcome.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re not going to stand there while I change my clothes, are you?”

Cailey’s sharp tone brought him back to the present.

He ran his eyes down the length of her. Long legs. Sensually curved hips making a nice dip at the waist. A tug of desire unexpectedly tightened in his groin. What the hell? He was supposed to be exhausted, not horny.

“I’ll sit with my back turned.”

“Yeah.” Cailey’s hands landed solidly on her hips. “I don’t think so. Say what you need to say and then...” She swirled her finger around in an out-you-go gesture.

“Fair enough.” Despite himself, he grinned. She was setting parameters. The old Cailey would’ve been too shy to be so feisty. This new Cailey was becoming more appealing by the minute.

Another tug below his belt line broadened his smile. Quite an impact for an unexpected reunion. One of the earthquake’s silver linings, he supposed. Maybe she was strong enough now to stand up to his father.

She pursed her lips and tipped her head from side to side in a when-are-you-going-to-get-going? move.

Fine. He got the message. “Right. Here’s the story. All hell’s broken loose. As you probably know, the quake was strong. It hit this side of the island hardest. A lot of old buildings weren’t up to the magnitude. It hit in the afternoon—”

“I know. I know all that,” interrupted Cailey impatiently. “I saw the news. Late lunch. Quiet time. Lots of people taking naps... Only the Brits mad enough to go out in the sunshine. You should probably know I specialize in pediatrics and maternity nursing, so if it’s—”

“You’ll be working with me in urgent care,” he cut in. He didn’t care how bolshie she was. He was going to look after her, and the easiest place to do that was in his trauma unit.

“I haven’t done trauma for over a year.”

“But you’ve done it. And that’s where I need you. Case closed,” he said firmly before she could protest.

Her shoulders shot up, her mouth opened, but when she saw his stance go rock-solid she dropped the challenge with a flick of a shrug.

“Casualties? Any idea of the scope yet?” she asked.

“Hundreds.” Theo shook his head. “I don’t know. Several hundred at the very least. The island’s got...what?...fifteen or twenty thousand people on it, so it could be more. Patients are presenting with injuries hitting every level of the spectrum, from cuts and bruises to...well...” His mood sobered at the thought of the older gentleman who’d had a fatal heart attack earlier in the day. “Worse than cuts and bruises.”

Unexpectedly, Cailey reached out and took his hand. “Are you sure you don’t need some rest? You look awful.”

“Ha! Thanks. Don’t beat around the bush anymore, do you, Cailey?”

She gave him a sad smile. One that said, I think you might know why.

The door to the locker room swung open and with it came the chaos and mayhem of the quake’s aftermath.

“Dr. Nikolaides?” The nurse was halfway out through the door already. “There’s a helicopter on approach to collect a couple of patients. We need you to sign off on them. And the ambulance is pulling up now.”

“Of course.”

He brusquely pointed toward a cabinet. “There are spare scrubs in there. All sizes. Report to trauma when you’ve changed. You’re working with me. And that’s an order.”