Chapter 11
After not knowing the pleasures of a woman’s body for a long time it seemed Alessandro was insatiable. So was Nat. They’d gone twice more that night before Nat had slunk back to her own bedroom.
And every night since.
Alessandro would put Julian to bed, read to him and then he would pounce again, no matter where Nat was. The kitchen, the shower, the laundry, the sitting room. A week later there were very few places in the house they hadn’t done it.
Thank goodness Julian slept like the dead.
It never crossed Nat’s mind to refuse, especially considering she’d been so adamant she wouldn’t cross that line. But… she’d been around long enough to know that the magic they’d made that first time didn’t come along very often.
Why deny herself this little oasis of pleasure?
As long as she remembered it was about two convenient bodies finding a little mutual gratification for a finite period of time, she’d be fine. She was an adult. And for once in her life she was making a decision with her head and not her poor, easy heart.
Who’d have thought that would be so liberating?
Was she worried it was too soon for him after his wife’s death? No. Because this wasn’t love – it was… recreation, and God knew both of them deserved a little of that.
Plus, there was something compelling about the way Alessandro fucked that was addictive.
He was so… driven. Intense, like the rest of him.
Desperate, almost. When his body covered hers, it was like he was trying to absorb her into him.
He wasn’t satisfied with quick and easy and rolling over and going to sleep.
They went at it for hours each night until sheer exhaustion took over.
And his attention to detail was amazing.
Nat doubted she’d ever been so thoroughly bedded in her life. It was like, by reaching for the maximum level of pleasure, he was hoping to purge the grief. Not just sideline it. He was still hurting and it was as if he’d found the perfect antidote for it – her body.
And that was okay too. If her gratification helped him heal, who was she to argue? She wasn’t in it for anything profound either, so why should he?
The knock-on effect for Julian was incredible, too. The sex was making Alessandro more relaxed. He didn’t seem so grim. He was more… laid-back. He smiled more. Laughed. And Julian was slowly becoming less serious, less wary in return.
They were careful, of course, to keep their relationship from little eyes. Nat was always back in her bed by 5 a.m. It was hard and getting harder, especially when Alessandro was so warm and vital, his big arm tucked around her waist, his bigger body curled around hers.
And at that hour of the morning he was usually raring to go again with another treacherous seduction muddling her senses.
‘Stay longer,’ he’d whisper, his accent more pronounced when first waking.
Nat would smile as his lips nuzzled her neck, his hands kneaded her breasts and his erection brushed her belly. The temptation to stay was great but…
‘Julian,’ she’d murmur.
‘He never wakes before seven, bella.’
Which was true, but Nat knew it was best not to be found together.
Choosing to snatch these moments with Alessandro was fine – she was an adult.
Julian was a boy who dearly needed a mother and who plainly adored her.
And that wasn’t fair. What did four-year-olds know of adult games?
Adult relationships? It wasn’t right to confuse him any more when his world had already been turned upside down.
So, she dutifully dragged herself out of her lover’s bed, out of his possessive male embrace, every morning. And even when he looked up at her with a sexy half-smile and smouldering sable eyes that told her more than words what he wanted to do to her, she still turned away.
But it was getting more and more difficult…
Alessandro had tried to not let the chemistry between him and Nathalie spill over into their work and for the most part it was successful.
The fact she only worked two day shifts a week in the department and usually on the triage desk, made it easier to avoid direct contact.
But today, on this crazy, crazy day, she’d been allocated to the cubicles and they seemed to have giant magnets attached to their butts.
Today it was simply impossible to ignore her and their attraction. Impossible to not be utterly distracted by her and the memories of what happened when the lights went out at home.
Which was exactly what his house felt like know Nat Davies was in their lives.
Impossible not to know that asking Nat Davies to stay was the best thing he’d done in a very long time.
‘Twenty-year-old female, right lower quadrant pain, rebound tenderness, hypertensive, tachycardic, febrile.’
She pushed the chart at him trying to be brisk and professional in her handover, but when Alessandro met her eyes he could see the simmer in her gaze and knew her mind wasn’t on her work, either.
Everywhere she’d moved today he’d felt her eyes on his body to the point of being ready to combust. To drag her to the nearest private place and get his hands on her.
Alessandro smiled. ‘Probably appendix.’
She nodded. ‘Probably.’
‘Which cubicle?’
‘Twelve.’
He headed in the direction of the cube but with her following behind, his thoughts were on her low urgent whisper from last night instead of the pending patient. Her ‘fuck me harder’ twisted through his belly as a hot spike of need flooded his groin.
Snapping out of the memory as he snapped back the curtain, Alessandro greeted his patient. ‘Hi. Ellie? I’m Alessandro Lombardi.’ He held out his hand and the harried young woman shook it briefly, grabbing her side as she let go. ‘Nat’s been telling me you have some pain.’
‘Yes,’ Ellie agreed. ‘The odd niggle the last day or two but worse this morning. And by the time I got to work it was unbearable.’
Alessandro questioned her closely, taking a full history before methodically examining her, palpating her abdomen and deciding she probably had a hot appendix and would need to see a surgeon.
He flicked a gaze to Nat, who’d been watching him the entire time.
There was nothing sexual about her expression; instead, it blazed with admiration and respect and, hell, if that didn’t join the heat in his groin.
‘I’ll call for a surgical consult and order some bloods.
In the meantime, Nurse Davies…’ There was something deliciously illicit about using her professional title at work in front of everyone, knowing that he’d seen her naked only a handful of hours ago.
The flare in her nostrils told him she felt it too. ‘…I’ll write up some morphine.’
He handed the chart back and deliberately let his gaze slide to her mouth. Her lips parted at his blatant come-on and his groin was now officially on fire.
She cleared her throat, her eyes far from innocent as she murmured, ‘Certainly, Dr Lombardi.’
Alessandro nodded briskly, liking that she could give as good as she got. Liking it a little too much as he left the cubicle with a reassuring smile at Ellie and a hard-on that was entirely unsuitable for work.
It was like that for the rest of the shift, a slow tease that had Alessandro’s motor well and truly running. Wherever he was – she seemed to be.
Smiling at him with those private eyes as she handed over the twenty-six-year-old male who had accidentally ingested sterilising tablets instead of aspirin.
Her fingers brushing his as she handed him the chart of the forty-nine-year-old woman who was having an allergic reaction to an unidentified substance.
Watching him intently as he moved his stethoscope around the chest of a twenty-year-old male complaining of shortness of breath.
He gave as good as he got, however, grabbing her hips and lingering a little too long as he passed behind her in the cramped confines of a lift as they transported a thirty-six-year-old female who had suddenly gone blind in her right eye to a CT scan.
Calling her Nurse Davies every chance he got.
By the time they were halfway through the shift, Alessandro’s body was humming with desire like a damn tuning fork. She was everywhere and each hour cranked the anticipation up another notch.
He hoped she wasn’t planning on getting any sleep tonight.
After lunch Alessandro opened the curtains to cube nine and greeted his next patient as Nat introduced him. ‘Seventy-two-year-old Mr Gregory, a five-year prostate cancer survivor, complaining of acute hip pain.’
The patient gave a loud hoot. ‘Ron, please. Mr Gregory reminds me of my teaching days, and as much as I loved it I’m damned pleased I’m not doing it any more.’
She laughed. ‘Ron it is.’
‘Sorry to be such a damn nuisance, Doc,’ Ron said addressing Alessandro. ‘Bloody GP’s making a fuss about nothing.’
Ron was a sprightly guy, tall and snowy-haired with crinkles around his eyes like he enjoyed a good laugh, but there was a slight strained note in his voice that made Alessandro think that, beneath all that bravado, Ron was a little worried.
Shrugging, Alessandro said, ‘Better to be safe than sorry. No harm checking you over.’
After taking some history, Alessandro put his stethoscope in his ears and Nat helped Ron get into a sitting position so he could listen to both back and front.
As ordered, Ron took several deep breaths before he said, ‘I see you’re not married, missy,’ which Alessandro could hear perfectly clearly through the bell of the stethoscope. ‘Are young men blind these days or just plain stupid?’
Nat’s gaze briefly met his over the top of the patient’s head, a smile on her very kissable mouth. ‘Good question.’
Ron started to say something else but she put her finger to her lips in the universal sign for quiet please. Alessandro needed quiet to properly hear lung sounds, but when he was done with that and had moved on to Ron’s abdomen, the patient picked up where he left off.