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'With a bit of work it'd be great,' she conceded, following him through into a broad, potentially open-plan kitchen and dining area. 'I'm glad you're thinking about leaving your apartment. Are you definitely going to buy it?'

'I'm interested in your opinions.' His expression enigmatic, he took her hand and she let him lead her. 'Since you so clearly had some on the apartment. Come and see upstairs.'

There were two bathrooms and five bedrooms, one of which was obviously the master one because it was huge and attached to an
en suite
bathroom. Once again the rooms needed work, she decided, but the bones were promising.

'The plumbing sounds OK,' she declared, turning the water in the bath and basin on full in the main bathroom. 'No tapping or hammering and it's coming though hot already.'

With two architect brothers, one of whom had specialised in upmarket home improvements, and another brother who'd spent two years renovating his own home, she knew more than a little about investigating a house. 'Have you had a proper inspection done?'

'He reported that it was basically a sound building,' he confirmed. 'The owner died two years ago and it's been empty while the relatives argued about the will. There's been some minor neglect but nothing too difficult to fix. What do you think?'

'It's great.' She tipped her head back, inspecting the simple cornices of the bathroom's ceiling. 'A huge improvement on the apartment. In fact, I love it. If I were you I'd snap it up immediately. What made you decide to look?'

'I talked to an agent a few months ago. After you came to the apartment the first time I decided that your...criticisms were valid. I've looked at a few places but this seemed by far the best.'

'I'm sorry if what I said disrupted your life,' she said slowly, feeling nervous about that even though she was sure it was for the best, 'but, truly, you'll be much happier here.'

'Would you live here?'

Merrin froze. Slowly, very slowly, she lowered her head and looked at him, but his expression was unreadable.
'Would
I,' she asked carefully, 'or
will
I?'

'Will
you?'

She swallowed heavily, clutching at the basin behind her. 'Are you offering me that as an alternative to me staying in a hospital fiat?'

'I'm offering you whatever you want to take,' Neil said quietly. 'On Friday you said you still loved me. I'm offering you this...' he gestured around '...and me for as long as I can persuade you to take me.'

'But I would want you permanently,' she said huskily. 'Please. Is that all right?'

'Yes.'

'Is this what you said you wanted to think about?'

'I thought I had a choice,' he said heavily. 'I thought I could still give you up. But I was wrong. And I was wrong about needing to think about what you'd said. On the weekend the agent gave me these keys and last night I came here again and I walked around and I realised that I couldn't picture this house without you in it.

'I don't want any of this without you. Without you this will always be a house, just a house, not a home. I can't give you up, Merrin. No matter how much I should, if you still love me then I can't give you up. I don't want any woman in my life but you. I want you with me for ever.'

'You don't have to marry me,' she said urgently, joy welling up inside her. 'I don't mind that. I just know I'll never want to leave. Do you...love me now or do you just want me very much?'

'Both.'

'Could you kiss me, then, please, because it's very hard to believe you when you're standing there like that.'

'Idiot.' He came and lifted her into his arms and carried her out into the main bedroom. 'You are the light in my life.' Her hand curled around his neck, but he turned around, looking about them. 'I want to make love to you very, very slowly, lying down, not standing up, but there's nowhere to put you.'

'I don't mind the dust,' she whispered, her hands around his neck. Her body felt as if it was vibrating. 'I love you.'

'I love you, too.' He looked preoccupied, but Merrin, understanding why, didn't mind. He took her through the other bedrooms, spinning her around as he checked them, then downstairs and through the rooms but there was dust everywhere and nothing looked especially clean.

'Standing,' she urged, pressing her mouth to his ear. 'Here. Now. I promise, I adore it that way.'

'Just as well.' His voice was rough as he lowered her, his hands at her clothing urgent. 'I wanted slow, but you're going to get fast,' he groaned, unfastening himself and making adjustments before he lifted her again and backed her against the wall, his mouth hard and appreciative on hers as she wrapped her thighs around his hips and gripped him tight. 'Good?'

'Yes.' It came out like a gasp. It felt like years since he'd touched her and her body was crying out for him. 'Tell me you love me.'

'Of course I love you. I love you.'

Afterwards, when her breathing had calmed and she could think again, he lowered her slowly, his hands soothing her thighs by rubbing slowly where they ached from holding him so hard. 'We have to go back,' she said faintly, remembering. 'I'm on call. Douglas—'

'Can cope,' he growled, capturing her mouth, his fingers probing now. 'For a little while. He'll be so relieved that I'm finally making an honest woman out of his vulnerable little house officer that he won't dare protest about anything I do.'

'Is that what you're doing?' Merrin kissed him back, arching herself into his palm, amazed at the tendrils of desire his touch was rekindling. 'Making an honest woman out of me? I thought this was called carrying out an indecent act?'

'Not this.' Neil withdrew his hand, laughing at her murmur of protest. 'Later,' he promised. 'I meant marrying you.'

'Oh.' She pulled back 'slightly, looking at him searchingly. 'That's not necessary.'

'To me it is,' he said softly. 'Now. I've compromised you enough. I'm too old for you but I love you. Will you marry me?'

'Of course.' She touched his mouth tenderly. 'Of course, of course. I love you. But...' She hesitated. 'What about Isabel? You loved her so much. I know you'll never forget her but are you sure you're ready to marry again?'

'You can't possibly know how much I loved her because the way I feel about you has taught me that I didn't,' he said heavily. 'Never. Not even in the beginning.'

She stiffened. 'Neil...? What...? What are you saying? What about the way you've grieved?'

'It hasn't been grief, Merrin. At least, not the sort of grief you imagine. It's been more complicated than that. Regret, yes, regret. Sadness, too. But mostly guilt.'

'Guilt?' She was bewildered, unable to make sense of what he was saying. 'Why would you be guilty?'

'Because I didn't love her enough to care,' he said finally. 'Isabel...' But he stopped. 'You're wrong about our marriage, Merrin. Very wrong. We were never happy. Isabel was...well, regardless of how she was, I was an indifferent husband. My work was always more important to me than anything else, including her. I failed her.'

She sank back against the wall, needing the support. 'But that doesn't make sense. If you didn't love her, why did you marry her?'

'She was beautiful and desirable and I wanted her and she made it plain that the only way I would get her was by putting a ring on her finger. That alone was sufficient novelty at the time for me to be intrigued. Plus she was a good nurse. We worked well together. I thought she'd understand how important my work was to me. I didn't know then how it felt to love properly. At the time I thought we'd be a good match.'

'Did she love you?'

'In her own way, possibly. But she wanted more than I could give her and that soured her feelings. She assumed she'd found herself an ambitious and soon-to-be very wealthy surgeon, but although she got the ambition right I was never interested in going into private practice. If we'd talked about that before the wedding we'd have saved ourselves a lot of time and arguments and a lot of misery.'

'You argued about your career?' Merrin asked, still bewildered.

'Our relationship started falling apart when she realised that while I'd always earn enough to keep her comfortable it would never be enough for the lifestyle she'd envisaged for herself. She used to plead with me to reconsider private work but working for money like that it went against everything I believed in.

'But she contacted practices behind my back. I used to get calls at work from other surgeons and private hospitals, offering me positions, and then I'd get home and she'd be furious I hadn't taken them. She stopped being interested in sex. She wouldn't talk to me. She'd sulk for days then fly into rages at nothing. In the beginning I blamed myself for not having talked more about the future before we married but we were heading fast for divorce.'

'But no wonder,' Merrin cried huskily, appalled. 'She sounds horrible. Cold and greedy and...manipulative. She just wanted money?'

'She wasn't horrible,' he chided. 'Just very insecure. Her father had been a wealthy solicitor until he hanged himself after being caught embezzling client funds. Isabel was only fourteen. Overnight she went from a public school with holidays abroad and every privilege to having to attend a local college with no holidays at all. But I didn't know any of that until I spent time with her mother after the funeral. Until then I hadn't understood the reasons why she was so obsessed about money.'

'So then...after the funeral and you did understand, was that when you started to feel guilty?'

'Perceptive.' He inclined his head, studying her. 'As usual. Yes, of course. I should have tried harder to understand why she was the way she was. If I had, I might have perhaps been able to help her.'

'Lindsay said she used to come to see you at work all the time.'

'Continuing to nurse was her way of showing me how convinced she was that we needed more money,' he said heavily. 'Coming to the wards all the time was her way of checking up on me.'

At her puzzled look he muttered, 'I didn't understand either. She wasn't interested in sex with me but for some reason she seemed convinced that other women might be and that upset her. She regularly accused me of having an affair with this one or the other. But it was all in her head. My life was complicated enough, without adding something new. Also, I'd lost any interest in sex by then myself.'

'Someone said...that she might have been pregnant when she died.'

'No.' He looked certain. 'Not possible. We hadn't slept together in over a year.'

'That's all so sad.' Merrin stroked his face, enjoying the rasp of his skin against the softness of her palm. 'You both must have been so unhappy.'

'Understand now why I became so easily infatuated with you?' he asked roughly, turning his head to kiss her hand.

'Because your marriage put you off sex and then you realised that you wanted me,' she answered softly. 'I understand. It was sex.'

'Obliquely,' he conceded. 'Of course. I'd lost interest and you brought that back to me so violently it was frightening. But it was never so simple. Compare yourself to Isabel.'

'I don't....' She frowned. 'You mean because you think that I'm so different to her?'

'You are her opposite,' he confirmed. 'You are the antithesis of her. You begged me to take you and welcomed any pleasure I gave you. You've never demanded anything from me and you practically gave me your permission to go to other women.'

He took her mouth hungrily, kissing her as if he needed something in her. 'That time I said something about your timing being exquisite, I meant that exactly. You could have been sent to save me.'

Merrin didn't understand. 'Save you?' she echoed. 'From what? You were fine.'

'I hadn't been fine for years.' His mouth compressed. 'I was a mess. I was bored and depressed and cynical. It was two years since Isabel had died yet my life, outside of my work, had been stagnant. Eddie's death made even my work seem pointless.'

'That was the weekend I started,' she remembered.

'I was seriously contemplating throwing in my career but your enthusiasm reminded me of how surgery could be,' he told her. 'You enjoyed everything. You were light and sunshine and utterly, unselfconsciously sexy. You reminded me of a joy I'd forgotten I ever possessed, and when you were there I felt it creeping back into my grasp. I couldn't keep away from you.'

'Not true,' she chided. 'I had to pursue you vigorously.'

'I didn't resist long,' he said wryly. 'And I should have. Douglas, irritating as he has proven himself to be, was right about me taking advantage of you. I should have known better. But by the time I came to my senses it was too late. When my conscience finally got the better of me I stayed away from you for as long as I could but I couldn't get you out of my head or my heart. I'm in love with you, Merrin. Hopelessly, madly, deliciously in love with you.'

'And now...?' she asked, feeling herself frown despite her incredulous delight at his words. 'About Isabel? Do you still feel guilty?'

'Regretful. I'll always wish I'd been more enlightened and that I hadn't married with so little thought. That will never go away. But now I know how love feels, I realise that there was nothing either of us could have done to salvage our relationship. Her death was a tragedy but I've stopped blaming myself. We were both at fault in not ending our marriage cleanly as soon as it was obvious our expectations were so different.

'I'm ready to look forward again. You once told me that I was your life, but you are mine. My work is important to me. It brings me joy and satisfaction. But you bring me ecstasy.'

'So make love to me again,' Merrin ordered, lifting herself against him.

'On one condition.' Abruptly stern, he drew back suddenly, holding her away when she tried to go back to him. 'One promise you must make to me now before I ever touch you again.'

'What?' She shook her head, bemusement by his sudden change of tone. 'What is it? Tell me. I'll do anything.'

'No one,' Neil said quietly, 'no one, absolutely no one and particularly no man other than your husband, must ever be allowed near those little feet of yours. And I mean no one. You don't even buy a pair of shoes if I'm not with you. Understand me, Merrin?'