Her Doctor's Christmas Proposal. Louisa George

destined to be. But wanting answers to questions that would break her heart all over again … and his.

      She made direct eye contact with the door handle and started to move towards it again.

      ‘Izzy?’

      She would not turn round. Would. Not. ‘Don’t call me that here. It’s Isabel or Dr Delamere.’

      ‘Hello? It’s not as if anyone can hear. There’s only you and me in here. It’s so empty there’s an echo.’

      ‘I can hear.’ And I don’t want to be reminded. Although she was, every day. Every single day. Every mother, every baby. Every birth. Every stillborn. Every death.

      She made it to the door. The handle was cold and smooth. Sculpted steel, just like the way she’d fashioned her heart and her backbone. Beyond the clouded glass she could make out a bustling corridor of co-workers and clients. Safety. She squeezed the handle downwards and a whoosh of air breathed over her. ‘I’m sorry, Dr Anderson, I have a ward round to get to. I’m already late. Like I said, thanks for your help back there.’

      ‘Any time. You know that.’ His hand covered hers and a shot of electricity jolted through her. He was warm. And solid. And here; of all the maternity units he could have chosen … This time it wasn’t a coincidence. His voice was thick and deep and reached into her soul. ‘I just want one minute, Isabel. That’s all. One.’

      One minute. One lifetime. It would never be enough to bridge that time gap. Certainly not if she ever told him the answer to his question.

      ‘No, Sean, please don’t ask me again.’ She jabbed her foot into the doorway and pulled the door further open.

      Then she made fatal error number one. She turned her head and looked up at him.

      His chestnut hair was tousled from removing his surgical cap, sticking up in parts, flattened in others. Someone needed to sink their fingers in and fluff it. So not her job. Not when she was too busy trying not to look at those searching eyes. That sculptured jawline. The mouth that had given her so much pleasure almost a year ago, with one stupid, ill-thought-out stolen kiss, and … a lifetime ago. A boy turned into a man. A girl become a woman, although in truth that had happened in one night all those years ago.

      Onwards went her gaze, re-familiarising herself with lines and grooves, and learning new ones. Wide solid shoulders, the only tanned guy in a fifty-mile radius, God bless the sparse Aussie ozone layer. Toned arms that clearly did more working out than lifting three-kilogram newborns.

      His voice was close to her ear. ‘Izzy, if it was over between us … If everything was completely finished, why the hell did you kiss me?’

      Good question. Damn good question. She’d been brooding over the answer to that particular issue for the better part of the last year, ever since he’d crushed her against him in a delivery suite very similar to this one, but half a world away. It had been a feral response to a need she hadn’t ever known before. A shock, seeing him again after so long, turning up at the Melbourne hospital where she’d worked. He’d been as surprised as she had, she was sure.

      Then he’d kissed her. A snatched frenzied embrace that had told her his feelings for her had been rekindled after such a long time apart. And, oh, how she’d responded. Because, in all honesty, her feelings for him had never really waned.

      Heat prickled through her at the mere memory. Heat and guilt. But they had to put it behind them and move forward. ‘Really, Sean? Do you chase most of the women you kiss across the world? It must cost an awful lot in airfares. Still, I guess you must do well on the loyalty schemes. What do you have now, elite platinum status? Does that entitle you to fly the damn planes as well?’

      His smile was slow to come, but when it did it was devastating. ‘Most women aren’t Isabel Delamere. And none of them kiss like you do.’

      ‘I’m busy.’

      ‘You’re avoiding the issue.’

      She held his too blue, too intense gaze. She could do this. Distract him with other issues, deflect the real one. Get him off her back once and for all. She was going away tomorrow for a few days. Hopefully everything would have blown over by the time she got back. Like hell it would. She could pretend that it had. She just needed some space from him. ‘So let me get this straight. You turn up out of the blue at the same place I’m working in Melbourne—’

      ‘Pure coincidence. I was as shocked as you. Pleasantly, though. Unlike your reaction.’ The pressure of his thumb against the back of her hand increased a little, like a stroke, a caress.

      She did not want him to caress her.

      Actually she did. But that would have been fatal error number two. ‘Then after I leave there you turn up here. Also out of the blue? I don’t think so.’

      ‘Aww, you missed a whole lot out. … where I didn’t see you or have any contact with you for many, many years. As far as I was concerned you were the one that got away. But also the one I got over.’ At her glare he shrugged shoulders that were broader, stronger than she remembered. ‘I put you out of my mind and did exactly what I had planned to do with my life and became a damned fine obstetrician. Then one day I turn up at my cushy new locum job at Melbourne Maternity Unit and bump into my old … flame. I never dreamt for a minute you’d be there after hearing you’d studied medicine in Sydney. I assumed you’d moved on. Like I had. But then, Delamere blood runs thick with the Yarra so I should have realized you’d be there in the bosom of your … delightful family.’ He gave a sarcastic smile. Sean had never got on with her hugely successful neurosurgeon daddy and socialite mother who ran with the It crowd in Melbourne. ‘Well, in that sumptuous penthouse apartment anyway. Cut to the chase—the first chance you get: wham, bam. You kiss me.’

      ‘What?’ She dragged her hand from under his and jabbed a finger at him. ‘You kissed me first. It took me by surprise—it didn’t mean anything.’

      ‘No one kisses like that and doesn’t mean it.’

      He’d pulled her to him and she’d felt the hard outline of his body, had a crazy melting of her mind and she’d wanted to kiss him right back. Hard. Hot. And it had been the most stupid thing she’d done in a long time. Not least because it had reignited an ache she’d purged from her system. She’d purged him from her system. ‘And now you’re here to what? Taunt me? Tell me, Sean, why are you here?’

      ‘Ask your sister.’

      ‘Isla? Why? And how can I?’ There was no way Isla would ever have told Sean what had happened. She’d promised to keep that secret for ever and Isabel trusted her implicitly. Even though over the years she had caught Isla looking at her with a sad, pitiful expression. And sure, Isabel knew she’d been badly scarred by her experiences, they both had, but she was over it. She was. She’d moved on. ‘Isla is back home in Australia and I’m here. I’m hardly going to phone a heavily pregnant woman in the middle of the night just to ask why an old boyfriend is in town, am I? What did she say?’

      ‘It was more what she didn’t say that set alarm bells ringing. I asked her outright why you had suddenly gone so cold on our relationship, she said she couldn’t tell me but that I should ask you myself. Between her garbled answers and your sizzling kiss, I’m guessing that there’s a lot more to this than you’re letting on. Something important. Something so big that you’re both running scared. My brain’s working overtime and I’m baffled. So tell me the truth, Isabel. Tell me the truth, then I’ll go. I’ll leave. Out of your life.’

      Which would be a blessing and a curse. She was so conflicted she didn’t know if she never wanted to set eyes on him again or … wake up every morning in his arms. But if he ever found out why they’d split up option two would never, ever happen. He’d make sure of it. ‘It doesn’t matter any more, Sean. It was such a long time ago.’

      ‘It matters to me. It clearly still matters to Isla, so I’m sure it matters to you.’ He leaned closer and her senses slammed into overdrive. Memories, dark, painful memories,