Italian Surgeon to the Stars (15 page)

‘I’m fine,’ I said. ‘I had three coffees in the waiting room. I’ll be awake for the next week. Anyway, it’ll be quicker driving at this time of night.’

He slowly brought his head down until his mouth was just above mine. ‘Until tomorrow night, then.’

‘What are we doing tomorrow night?’ I asked.

He smiled against my lips. ‘Guess.’

And without waiting for me to answer he kissed me.

***

I was right about those coffees. I barely closed my eyes all night, even though I had a good run back to Bath in record time. I tossed and
turned and fidgeted. I relived that kiss a thousand times. The way his mouth had moved against mine—tenderly, in an exploratory way, as if rediscovering a taste for something he had long given up and now craved.

It had been a kiss of promised passion, an anticipatory kiss that had made every cell in my body quake with need. His tongue was gentle with mine. Not pushy or too overpowering. I got the feeling he was kissing me as if it were my first kiss. The kiss I should have had as a teenager.

I was drifting into dangerous territory with him. I knew it and yet I couldn’t stop myself from dreaming about him… Well, I would have dreamed about him if I’d been able to get to sleep.

I gave up in the end, and got showered and ready for school by six a.m.

Bertie sent me a text, bless her, asking if I was okay. I sent her one assuring her that I was fine. We often communicate using emoticons. But this time I couldn’t find one to adequately describe how I was feeling. I felt worried about my father, guilty about my mother, and full of excitement about seeing Alessandro tonight.

There was one other thing I was feeling,
but I wasn’t going to acknowledge it in case it took a foothold.

There was no way I was going to fall in love with Alessandro.

I wasn’t
that
stupid.

***

After lunch I did a drama lesson with my class. The other children were excited but Claudia hung back, obviously intimidated by the thought of having to act in front of the class. I had it all planned, though. The exercises would be whole-class exercises at first. There would be non-speaking roles to begin with, and then I would up the ante.

It worked like a charm. She was a brilliant little pot plant for the first scene—in fact much better than some of the other more outgoing pupils. She stood with her little thin arms stuck out like branches. And when I said someone had forgotten to water the pot plant she visibly wilted.

I was thrilled.

Then I asked the class to pretend to be puppies that wanted someone standing outside the pet shop to come in and buy them. Claudia was amazing at it. She put on this little take-me-home-with-you face that made me feel like taking her home right then and there.

Then I asked individual pupils to act out certain emotions. I told them to use words or gestures or expressions—whatever they wanted. We did sadness, anger, excitement and happiness. The only one Claudia had trouble with was happiness. Her smile looked a little forced.

I knew the feeling.

Then I moved on to speaking parts. I told the children to work in pairs and I asked Claudia to pretend to be someone who was unhappy with a gift she’d bought from a store. Her partner was to be the unhelpful assistant. What a little champion Claudia was. She morphed into the role as if she had been born for the stage. There was no stuttering. No hesitancy. She put her hands on her hips and stared down the other pupil, insisting on getting a refund. The whole class clapped when she was done.

I can’t remember a time when I felt more satisfied as a teacher.

‘You’re looking pretty pleased with yourself,’ Lucy Gatton said when I went into the staffroom at the end of the day.

I told her about Claudia and how well she had performed. ‘It was fantastic. I think we should put her in the end-of-term play. We
should give her the leading role. It will be brilliant for her. She’s a born actor. It’s like she totally morphs into the role.’

Lucy cocked her head at me. ‘This isn’t a case of nepotism, is it?’

I immediately bristled. ‘What do you mean?’

She gave me a knowing look. ‘You and her uncle?’

I tried to look nonchalant, but right then and there I thought my six and seven-year-olds would have done a much better job. ‘There’s nothing going on between her uncle and me.’

‘Then why were you seen having dinner with him last night?’

I wondered who had seen us. I hadn’t noticed anyone—although that didn’t mean no one had been there. I’d been more than a little distracted by Alessandro’s company. Not to mention having that tongue-loosening glass of wine. Anyone could have seen us and reported it back to the school gossip network.

‘We met to discuss Claudia’s specific educational issues,’ I said, with just the slightest elevation of my chin.

Lucy snorted. ‘And what did you do
after
that?’

I pressed my lips together and then blew out a breath. ‘Actually, he came back to my place and sorted out a health issue of my father’s. He transferred him to London and operated on him this morning.’

Lucy looked a little taken aback. ‘Is your father all right?’

‘He’s fine,’ I said. ‘Al—Dr Lucioni texted me during break.’

In fact, Alessandro had called me and left a very reassuring voicemail, telling me how much he was looking forward to seeing me tonight, but I didn’t want her to know that.

‘Everything went well. My father will be out of hospital in a couple of days.’

Lucy was still looking at me as if she wasn’t sure whether to believe me or not. ‘You’re a seriously dark horse, Jem Clark. You could be sleeping with the guy and your own mother wouldn’t know.’

You can bet on that
, I thought as I collected my things before I left.

CHAPTER NINE

I
WAS STILL
running on caffeine when the doorbell rang to announce Alessandro’s arrival. I opened the door to see him standing there with a bunch of creamy tea-roses. How on earth had he remembered I wasn’t a red roses girl?

The delicacy, the subtle fragrance and the old-fashioned quality of those blooms took my breath away. I buried my head in the bouquet to disguise my reaction. Not that it worked. If I’d wanted to disguise how much his gesture meant to me I probably should have tossed them aside as if they were a bunch of cheap supermarket fragrance-free blooms. But it was too late now. I breathed in the gorgeous scent while the velvet-soft petals tickled my face.

‘Your father is making an amazing recovery,’ he said.

‘Which he and my mother no doubt put down to the fact that they haven’t eaten meat or been anywhere near a processed item of food in the last thirty-odd years,’ I said.

He smiled. ‘Your mother has been down to the kitchen and revamped the hospital menu—or at least tried to.’

I rolled my eyes and carried the roses to the sink, so I could put them in water before they could wilt.

‘I had a breakthrough with Claudia today.’

‘So she said.’

I swung around to face him. ‘You’ve seen her?’

‘I called in to the boarding house on my way past,’ he said. ‘She was just getting ready for bed. She told me about the drama lesson. She loved it, by the way.’

I turned on the tap to fill the vase I’d selected.
Selected?
Snort. I only had one. Just shows how often anyone brings me flowers. I made a little fuss over the way the blooms were positioned rather than look at him. I had a feeling he was getting far too good at reading me.

‘She was a natural,’ I said. ‘She didn’t stutter at all. I want her to take the lead role in the
end-of-term play. It’ll be great for her confidence. I just know she’ll be brilliant.’

He came up behind me, put his hands on my shoulders and turned me. His eyes held mine with such warmth I felt something slip inside my stomach.

‘I don’t know how to thank you for what you’re doing.’

‘Yes, well—when it comes to thanks, what about what you did today?’ I countered. ‘You saved my father’s life.’

He shrugged one of his shoulders. ‘Any decent cardiac surgeon could’ve done that.’

I reached up with my hand and stroked his stubble-covered jaw. ‘Yes, but
you
did it—and then drove all the way back down here to call in on Claudia and catch up with me.’

‘Ah, yes, but I have an ulterior motive when it comes to you.’

‘Let me guess. You want to get laid?’

He cupped my face in both his hands, his expression so darkly serious and intent it made something inside my chest quiver like a moth was trapped between my ribs.

‘I don’t want to pressure you into something you’re not ready for,’ he said, in that gravel-and-honey tone.

I’m ready!
I wanted to shout. But the thirteen-year-old
girl inside me appreciated his sensitivity. Oh, how she appreciated it! Adored it. Clung to it. Was healed by it.

‘I want you,’ I said, shocked at how much truth there was in that bald statement. I had never wanted anyone before him or since. I had no sex drive. Zero. Zilch.
Nada
. But when it came to him it was like a switch had been turned to ‘on’. And not just on but flashing with neon lights.

I put my hands on the top of his shoulders, drawing him closer, feeling the heat of his aroused body next to my starving, aching one. ‘Make love to me,’ I said, in a whisper-soft voice.

His mouth came down and covered mine, fusing it with heat, with passion, and yet with such excruciating tenderness I felt tears gather at the back of my eyes. I kissed him back, with all the passion I had suppressed for so long. It came bursting out of me like a centuries-old fountain that had been blocked.

I heard him groan as our tongues met and tangled. I felt his erection surge against me as he gathered me closer. The heat that flared between us was like a wildfire. And yet he kept control of it. He held me as if I was a
delicate bloom that would be bruised and crushed by rough handling.

I could feel my frozen heart melting, as if someone had aimed a laser-hot beam at it. I desperately tried to keep the crusty old armour that had guarded my heart for so long in place, but it was like trying to defend an ice cream cone from a naked flame. I was oozing with feeling. With feelings I’d locked away for years.

He kissed my mouth with aching tenderness. Then he trailed his mouth down my neck, lingering over my collarbone, moving to the valley of my cleavage. His tongue lit a fire beneath my flesh, making every nerve go off like a firecracker. I could feel that racing river of fire running along my nerve-endings. It was running out of control—along with my pulse.

His hands moved down my body, skating over my breasts without lingering. I wanted more. I wanted him to possess them, to palpate them as he had done in the past. I whimpered and pressed closer, urging him to take things to the next level.

He put his hands on my hips, holding me to his arousal. Letting me know how much he wanted me and yet letting me set the pace.
There was no pressure. Not like I’d felt in the past. Wasn’t that why I had struggled with anyone else as a sexual partner? I had never trusted them. I had never trusted them to gauge when I was out of my comfort zone.

Only Alessandro had done that. Had intuited that even without knowing what had happened to me.

I moaned with approval against his mouth as it covered mine again. I opened it to welcome his tongue back in, stroked mine along it and around it, sucking on it to make him aware of how much I wanted him.

He made a similar sound of approval as he released my hair from its tie. It cascaded around my shoulders and he took a handful of it as he angled my head for a deeper kiss.

I got to work on his clothes, but my fingers were in too much of a hurry. His hands came to the rescue, releasing buttons so I could slide my hands over the sexy planes and contours of his chest. He had just the right amount of chest hair. Call me old-fashioned, but I love a man who isn’t ‘manscaped’. My fingers spread through those tight whorls and then I pressed my mouth to his sternum, running my tongue down and then over and around each of his flat nipples.

He tipped my head back up and slowly slid my shirt off my shoulders, revealing just enough skin for his mouth to tease and tempt. I shivered as his lips moved over my bare flesh. My nipples tightened in anticipation inside the lacy cups of my bra. He slid the strap of my bra over my shoulder and trailed his hot mouth over the upper curve of my breast.

He didn’t go anywhere near my nipple. He explored every other slope, leaving me in a state of frenzied sexual excitement. I pushed myself towards him. Wanton, I know, but I was going to die if he didn’t take my breast—or what he could get of it—in his mouth.

And then he did it.

It was just as breathtaking as I remembered. Maybe even more so. His lips closed around my nipple, softly at first—a teasing little touch that made my sensitive nerves go haywire. Then he used his teeth in a light graze that made the hairs on the back of my neck dance at their roots. He did the same thing to my other breast, his touch so mind-blowing, I whimpered in delight.

He kissed his way back to my mouth, subjecting it to another passionate exchange that made my inner core coil with want. I put my arms around his neck, linking them behind
his head, kissing him with such vigour I could feel the rasp of his stubble on my chin.

He eased back and lifted me in his arms, then carried me to the bedroom. You might wonder how he knew which one was mine, but the detritus of my parents’ aborted stay was still evident in the spare room. I hadn’t had the time or the inclination to clean it up.

Alessandro laid me down on the bed, but he didn’t come down on top of me as he might have done in the past. He sat to one side of me, stroked my face as if I were young child.

‘Are you sure you want to do this?’ he said.

‘What part of
I want you
are you not getting?’ I said, tugging at the collar of his shirt so his head came down.

He kissed me softly as he joined me on the bed.

We were still wearing way too many clothes. I started on his trousers and he got working on mine. It was a mutual journey of discovery. I loved finding him again—the heat and strength and potent power of him springing out from the confines of his underwear made something deep in my core shudder in rapture.