The Doctor & the Runaway Heiress

CHAPTER FIVE

SLEEPING over was a common occurrence. Riley was used to it.

Harry slept in the plane. ‘It’s not half-bad,’ he told Pippa. ‘We have a comfy bed in the back and I always carry some fine emergency literature.’ He grinned and hauled a fat paperback out of his back pocket. A buxom woman with tattoos, a dagger and not much else was pouting her lips provocatively on the cover. ‘I’m happy as a pig in mud.’

Riley wasn’t as happy.

They shared a late dinner with Joyce in the hospital kitchen, then it was time to head over to Amy’s little house-with Pippa.

She seemed fine with it. He had the feeling she was even eyeing him askance because she was sensing he was edgy.

Why was he edgy?

Normally he’d roll his sleeping bag out and sleep under the stars. He’d lost count of the number of times he’d gone to sleep listening to Cordelia snoring, or medical students giggling, or sobbing and telling him their latest love life drama-sleeping under the stars did that for some. He didn’t mind. He could listen to it all and keep his distance.

So tonight he’d much prefer to sleep under the stars, only that would leave Pippa in Amy’s house alone. Or under the stars with him. And something told him…

Pippa wasn’t as tough as she made out, he thought as they walked the short distance to the house. Five days ago she’d nearly drowned. He’d learned a lot about trauma in his years in this service-he’d had victims come back and talk to him about their experiences and he’d talked to psychologists. ‘There’ll be flashbacks,’ he’d been told. ‘You can’t go so close to death without suffering.’ And after eight hours in the water believing she’d drown… She’d been close to an appalling edge.

This trip had been meant to break Pippa in slowly, before sending her back to her luxury hotel tonight. To make her sleep outside… Personally he loved it but the sky was immense, and for someone already fragile… Someone who’d just re-entered the world of emergency medicine after being a casualty herself… Even Joyce had seemed to sense it.

It had to be Amy’s house.

‘I won’t jump you,’ Pippa said.

He stopped short. ‘You won’t…’

‘I thought I should tell you,’ she said. ‘Joyce took me aside and told me you were honourable. You’re looking worried. Maybe I should reassure you that I am, too. In fact I’m feeling exceedingly chaste. I guess that’s what comes from being a jilted bride.’

‘You don’t sound very jilted,’ he said cautiously. He was feeling cautious.

‘I’m not,’ she said. ‘I’m exceedingly pleased to be free, so you needn’t walk three yards away from me as if you’re afraid I might latch on and not let go.’

‘You’re pleased to be free?’ This conversation had him floundering.

‘Yes, I am. I have the rest of my life ahead of me. I’ve had a very exciting afternoon and a very satisfactory day. I’m starting to make all sorts of plans but men aren’t included. And I’m very tired. So show me a bed and then you can do what you want, but you don’t need to look after me and you needn’t think I’ll be needy. I’m independent, Dr Chase, and I’m loving it.’

Only she wasn’t.

He woke at three in the morning and she didn’t sound independent at all.

Pippa was sleeping in the double bed in Amy’s bedroom. Riley was on the fold-out settee in the living room.

It wasn’t sobbing that woke him. It was gasps of fear, then the sounds of panting, breathless terror, muted as if the pillows themselves were drowning her.

If he wasn’t a light sleeper he would have missed it, but Riley was a light sleeper at the best of times and he was awake and at her door before he thought about it.

Moonlight was flooding through the window.

Her bedding was everywhere. She was wearing panties and bra but nothing else. She looked like she was writhing in fear. Her curls were spread out on the pillows, and her eyes were wide and staring, as if she was seeing…

Hell?

It was enough to twist the heart.

‘Pippa.’ He was by her bed, grasping her shoulders, holding her. ‘Pippa, wake up, you’re having a nightmare. Pippa.’

Her eyes widened. She jerked sideways, as if he was the thing that terrified her.

‘Pippa, it’s Riley. Dr Chase. The guy in the helicopter. Pippa, it’s Riley, the guy you’re planning not to jump.’

And somehow the stupidity of that last statement got through. Her body stilled, slumped. Her eyes slowly lost their terror, and the terror was replaced by confusion. She focused. Her gaze found his. Locked.

She shuddered and the shudder ran the length of her body.

She was cold to touch. The temperature in the desert dropped at night to almost freezing. She’d gone to sleep with a pile of quilts, but the quilts were on the floor.

She shuddered again and it was too much. He tugged a quilt from the floor, wrapped it round her and tugged her into his arms. He held her as one might hold a terrified child.

She seemed so shocked she simply let it happen. The shudders went on, dreadful, born of fear and cold and sheer disorientation.

He should never have agreed to her coming here, he thought, swearing under his breath.

When he’d been a kid, tiny, he’d found a budgerigar-or rather one of the feral cats around the dump they’d been living in had found it. He’d managed to get it free, then brought it inside, warmed it and settled it into a box. A couple of hours later he’d checked and it had looked fine.

Delighted, he’d lifted it out. The little bird had been someone’s pet. It was tame, it talked, it clung to his finger, it pecked his ear.

With no adult to advise him, he’d played with it until bedtime. He’d popped it back into its box for the night and the next morning he’d opened the box to discover it was dead.

Years later he’d talked to a mate who was a vet, and he’d told him the sad little story.

‘It’ll still have been running on adrenalin,’ the vet said. ‘You weren’t to know, but you’ll have stressed it more.’

And today… He’d allowed Pippa to come here…

He’ll have stressed her more.

He swore and held her close.

‘It’s okay, Pippa. You’re safe. Yes, you’re in the middle of the Australian desert with people you don’t know, yes, you nearly drowned, yes, your marriage is off, but, hey, the threats are all past. No one and nothing’s doing you harm. We’ll get you warm, and tomorrow we’ll fly you back to the coast. We’re intending to fly via Sydney. You could catch a plane home to England from Sydney. How about if we phone your mother? That might make you feel like things are real.’

He was talking for the sake of talking, not waiting for a response, keeping his voice low and gentle, keeping the message simple. You’re safe, there’s no threat, you’re under control.

The shudders were easing. She was curled against his body as if she was taking warmth from him, and maybe she was. He hadn’t undressed to sleep-he’d hauled some rugs over himself and relaxed on the settee, knowing he’d be up two or three times in the night to check on Gerry. He was grateful for it now. He was in his Flight-Aid uniform. The shirt was thick, workmanlike cotton. If he’d undressed, as she had…

It’d be skin against skin…

And he could stop his thoughts going there right now.

He did stop his thoughts going there. Discipline. Nineteen years of discipline since…

‘I’m… I’m sorry.’ She was recovering enough to talk, but not enough to pull away. She was taking every shred of comfort she could find. Huddled against him, spooned against his body, wrapped in quilts, she needed it all. ‘I shouldn’t… I woke you…’

‘Nightmares are the pits,’ he said softly, and he smelled her hair and thought… and thought…

And didn’t think. It was inappropriate to think.

‘I didn’t… I mean, I don’t know why…’

‘You didn’t talk to the psychologists back at Whale Cove?’

‘I didn’t need to.’ That was better. There was a touch of asperity in her voice. She had spirit, this woman.

If she didn’t have such spirit she’d be dead, he thought, and the idea made him hold her tighter. For some reason…

Well, for a very good reason it was good she wasn’t dead. But… Why was it more important that it was Pippa?

‘I’m okay,’ she said, but she didn’t move.

‘You’re freezing. You pushed all the covers off. Stay where you are until you’re warm.’

She was silent for a while and he could feel her gathering her thoughts, gathering her senses. Figuring out what had happened. How she’d ended up where she was.

‘So I didn’t have any blankets on?’ she said at last, cautiously, and he grinned. The woman in her was back.

‘Nope.’

‘Oh, my…’

‘Don’t worry about it. I’ve seen worse things come out of cheese.’

She stiffened. She sat up and swivelled. ‘Pardon?’

‘I’m a doctor,’ he said, apologetically. ‘I learned anatomy in first year.’

‘I am not your patient.’ That was definite.

‘No.’

‘I’m your colleague.’

‘Yes.’ He thought about it. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

He felt her smile rather than heard it and it felt good. To make her smile…

But suddenly he was thinking of her back in the water again, and this time it was he who shuddered.

‘Hey,’ she said.

‘Sorry.’

‘You’re cold.’

‘Nope.’

‘I’m fine. You can go back to bed.’

‘You’re still shaking.’

‘Not much.’

‘I could go across and get some heat pads from Joyce.’

‘No,’ she said, and suddenly the fear was back in her voice. Born straight out neediness.

It had been some nightmare.

He’d had nightmares himself. As a kid. One of his stepfathers had enjoyed using a horsewhip. The beatings themselves hadn’t been so bad. Waking up, though, in the night, when dreams blended reality into something worse…

Okay, he wouldn’t leave her.

‘The bed’s big,’ she whispered. ‘Sh-share?’

He stiffened. She felt him stiffen, and he felt her immediate reaction. Indignation.

‘We’re colleagues,’ she said, pulling away. Backing against the bedhead. Eying him with something that looked suspiciously like scorn. ‘We have one bed. Why does everything have to be about sex?’

‘I didn’t think it was about sex.’

‘It wasn’t, until you reacted like that.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like I’d jumped you. Go back to your sofa.’

‘No.’ He could cope with her need, he thought. She was a colleague.

No. She was a patient. Think of her as a patient.

The lines were blurring. He wasn’t sure how he thought of her. But he knew he couldn’t leave her.

‘Why not?’ she demanded.

‘Because one of two things will happen,’ he said. ‘Either you’ll lie and stare at the ceiling for the rest of the night, scared to go back to sleep. Or you’ll go back to sleep and the nightmare will be waiting. You’re not out from it yet.’

‘How do you know?’

He knew. If the shaking hadn’t stopped…

‘So what’s happened to you?’ she asked, her voice suddenly gentling, and that caught him so unawares he could have dropped her. Only he no longer had her. She’d slipped back onto the bed and only her feet were still touching him.

He wanted, quite badly, to be holding her again.

The thought jolted him. What was happening here?

He didn’t react to women like this, but she’d somehow pierced something he’d hardly known he had. It was like she’d opened some part of him he’d been unaware existed.

It made him feel exposed. He had to get it sealed up again fast, but how could he do that while she was… here?

‘Harry says you have a daughter.’ Her voice was suddenly prosaic, like they were making polite conversation at a dinner party. She tugged her quilt. He let it go and she pulled it over her. She huddled under it and she tried to hide the next wave of shivers. ‘What’s her name?’

‘Harry talks too much.’ He sighed. ‘Lucy.’

‘You want to tell me about her?’ She was eying him over the top of the quilt. ‘I’m guessing Lucy isn’t one of 2.4 children in a suburban back yard with Mummy in her apron and a casserole warming on the stove.’

‘There are no slippers and pipe waiting at my place.’ He said it almost self-mockingly and she slid to the far side of the bed and hauled one of her disarranged pillows to the empty side. She patted it.

‘You want to tell me about it?’

She was still asking for help. He knew she was. She couldn’t camouflage those tremors. This woman was needy.

So what was stopping him lying on the spare pillow, hauling up a quilt and telling her about Lucy?

Pride? Fear? Fear at letting someone as perceptive as she was close?

He wouldn’t be letting her close. Or… no closer than she needed to be to get her warm.

She wanted distraction from terror. What harm?

He sighed. He slid onto the pillow and tugged up a quilt. Then, because it was what she needed and he knew it was, he slid an arm around her shoulders and tugged her close. She stiffened for a moment, but then he felt her relax. It was as if she, too, was reminding herself to be sensible.

‘Back to front,’ he growled. ‘I can warm you more that way.’

‘Wait,’ she said, and sat up, grabbed her shirt and tugged it on.

Two Flight-Aid shirts. Colleagues.

‘Needs must,’ she said, lying down and turned her back, letting him tug her into him. He felt her force herself to relax. Muscle by muscle.

He was doing the same himself. The smell of her hair, soft and clean and with a scent so faint… if he wasn’t this close he could never have smelled it.

‘Tell me about Lucy,’ she said, with sudden asperity, and he wondered if she realised what he was thinking.

If she had, then a man was wise to stop thinking it. Right now. Tell her about Lucy.

‘She’s my daughter.’

‘I know that much.’ She sounded amused.

‘She’s beautiful. She’s dark and tall and slim. Maybe a bit too thin.’ According to the one photograph he’d seen. What would he know?

‘How often do you see her?’

‘Never. I didn’t know she existed until three months ago.’

‘Wow!’ She didn’t sound judgmental. She just sounded… interested. It was the right reaction, he thought. She made it sound like not knowing you had a daughter was almost normal. That came from years of medical training, he thought. Nothing shocks.

‘Wow’s right.’

‘Harry says she’s coming tomorrow.’

‘So it seems,’ he said harshly. ‘Let’s talk of something else.’

‘Something else.’ She was silent for a while. Absorbing an absent daughter? He wondered if she was drifting into sleep, but apparently not.

‘So what about your parents?’ she asked.

‘What about them?’

‘Where are they?’

‘My mother’s in Perth. Last time I heard, my father was in New Zealand but that was twenty years back.’

‘Not a close family, huh?’

‘You could say that.’ Family wasn’t something he chose to talk about but if it stopped the trembling… This was therapy, he decided, and tugged her tighter and thought, Yep, medical necessity.

‘You’re so warm,’ she murmured, and she was relaxing a little, warming a little, tension easing.

‘So tell me about your family,’ he said, deciding to turn the tables.

‘What do you want to know?’

‘Why your mother didn’t get on that plane and come. She knew how close you’d come to death.’

‘Just as long as it didn’t hit the papers. That’s all she’d care about.’

‘Not close either?’

‘Too close. They should have had more children. Only one… it’s all your eggs in one basket and a girl can’t live up to it.’

‘Do they like you being a nurse?’

‘They hate me being a nurse.’ The tension was back again. ‘I wanted to do medicine so badly but there was no way they’d support me. I was to go into the family business. That was my grandfather’s decree. It’s my grandfather who pulls the strings. I’ve had to work my way through nursing. He fought me every step of the way.’

‘But you’re doing something you love.’

‘I’m not sure,’ she whispered. ‘Or… I am but I’m not doing enough. When I was trying to stop myself drowning, there was a part of me thinking… If I get out of here, I want to make a difference. Not just… be.’

‘I can’t imagine you just being,’ he said, and she sighed and yawned and snuggled.

‘It’d be so easy to sink into my parents’ world. Like my hotel room. I have three different types of bath foam.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’ She snuggled again. His body was reacting. Of course his body was reacting. He’d have to be inhuman for it not to react.

He was wearing heavy-duty pants with a heavy-duty zipper. He was becoming exceedingly grateful that he didn’t routinely pack pyjamas.

‘I’m so warm,’ she murmured. ‘I shouldn’t let you do this.’

‘My pleasure.’

‘I’m sure it’s not.’ Her voice was starting to slur. ‘I’m sure it’s just that you’re a very nice man and a fine doctor. You saved my life and you’ve rescued me from my nightmare. Now you’re making me feel wonderful. I’m so sorry you didn’t know about your daughter.’

‘I’m seeing her tomorrow. She’s the guest I told Coral about.’

‘That’s great.’ She sighed again, a long, sleepy, languorous sigh that made the night feel impossibly sensual. ‘That’s wonderful. Tomorrow you’ll turn into a father. You’re a lifesaver, a doctor, a father, a guy with pecs to die for… and you’re holding me. Like three types of bath foam… what more could a girl desire?’

She was making no sense at all. ‘Go to sleep.’

‘I will.’ She smiled-he heard her smile. ‘I am. But I first I need to say thank you.’

‘It’s okay.’

‘No, but tomorrow you’ll be a father,’ she said. ‘And a doctor again, and a lifesaver, and I need to say thank you now.’

‘Pippa…’

‘You saved my life.’ She was no longer even trying to make sense, he thought. She was simply saying what came into her head. ‘You saved me from Roger. I could have married him.’

‘That was hardly me…’

‘You were part of it. If you hadn’t been there for me… Apart from being dead… if it hadn’t been you I might even have been weak enough to let him come. He might have bullied me into believing in him again. Marriage for the sake of family. Ugh.’ She shuddered and clung.

‘Not now, though. You’ve shown me how… ordinary it all was. Just ordinary.’ Her voice was a husky whisper, part of the dreaming. Filled with pleasure and warmth and something more… ‘Today… Not only am I alive, not only do I not have to marry Roger, there’s a whole world you’re showing me. You’re showing me how it is to be alive. New. Wanting…’

‘Pippa…’

Was she still dreaming? She wasn’t, he knew she wasn’t, but still she was in some dreamlike state where normal boundaries didn’t apply. Saying exactly what she thought. Feeling what she wanted to feel. Loving the way she was feeling and letting him know that, too.

Her body was heating against his, and he knew… he knew…

That he should leave, now. Put her away from him. Let reality take over again. But she was holding him, needing him, wanting him, and how strong would he have to be to put her away? She was a mature woman. She was melting against him, sensual, languorous, seductive…

Seductive?

‘Thank you,’ she murmured again, and before he could realise what she intended she twisted in his arms. She wound her arms around his neck, then pushed herself up, just a little, so she was gazing down at him in the moonlight.

And before he could even think how to stop her, or even if he wanted to stop her-she kissed him.

She surely kissed him.

For this was no kiss of thanks, a polite brushing of lips, fleeting contact and then pulling away.

This was a kiss of a woman wanting a man.

More.

It was the kiss of a woman claiming her man.

Her lips met his and the contact burned.

Maybe his whole body had been heating before this point, and now… It was like the heat suddenly exploded into flame and the point of flame was his mouth, her lips, the melding of the two together.

This woman in his arms.

‘Riley.’ Had she said his name? She couldn’t have, but the sound was between them, a long drawn-out sigh, a sigh of longing, of aching need, of want.

Of need between two people?

This was crazy. Unwise. Cruel even. To kiss her under such circumstances…

He wasn’t kissing her-she was kissing him. But maybe the delineation was blurring.

Maybe they were simply kissing. A man and a woman and a need as primeval as time itself.

Pippa.

His defences were disappearing, crumpling at the touch of her loveliness, in the aching need of her sigh, in the heat of their bodies. He was kissing in return, demanding as well as giving, his mouth plundering, searching her sweetness, glorying in her need as well as his own.

Pippa.

She was like no woman he’d ever touched. His body was reacting without control. She was stripping him bare, exposing parts of him he never knew he had, parts hidden behind barriers he’d built up with years of careful self-restraint.

Where was the self-restraint now?

Certainly not with Pippa.

She needed this. He knew it at some basic gut level. She was a mature woman, a woman who knew her way in the world, a woman who fought for what she wanted. Or didn’t want.

Right now she didn’t want control.

Eight hours in the water had shown her, as his job showed him almost every day, that control was an illusion.

Pippa had cheated death. Her nightmares had brought it back but she was fighting past them.

Tonight was all about life, about affirmation of now. She was taking what she needed to survive.

This woman…

There were so many undercurrents, so many things he should make himself consider, but all he could think was how she felt in his arms. Her kiss, her mouth. Her hands holding him close, demanding he hold her close as well, growing closer… closer…

Her kiss was almost savage in its intensity-fire meeting fire. Sense was disappearing-had disappeared. There was only this woman.

There was only now.

Her fingers were unfastening the buttons of his shirt. He felt the tug, registered it for what it was, somehow made himself react. There was nothing between them but these clothes. If they disappeared…

He hauled back and it hurt, but he made himself put her away, holding her up from him, meeting her gaze in the moonlight.

‘Pippa, if we go further…’

‘Do you want to go further?’ Her voice was steady, as it hadn’t been steady until now. The tremors had ceased. She met his gaze squarely, surely, with honesty and with trust.

Trust. The sensation made something inside him wrench open. Barriers… Where were they? Not here. Not now.

‘More than life itself,’ he said, and knew it was true. ‘But it’s not wise.’

‘I’m not feeling wise.’ And before he could realise what she intended, she tugged her shirt off and tossed it aside. Her hands reached behind her back for her bra clip. ‘Riley, I’m a mature woman. I’ve spent the night deep in horror. Yes, I’m using you. I know I am. Can you accept that? Want it even? I want it so much.’

He caught her hands and held. Stopping the bra disappearing.

‘No.’

‘No?’ The tremor was suddenly back.

‘Pippa, this is unprotected sex we’re talking.’

‘I’m supposed to be on my honeymoon. I’m protected.’

‘You know as well as I do that-’

‘That there’s more risks than pregnancy?’ Her eyes didn’t leave his. ‘There is that. I’m safe. Roger’s a careful man. Double blind crossover tests, safe from everything except bridesmaids. How about you?’

‘You shouldn’t believe-’

‘Neither should you. But I will believe. Can I be safe with you, Riley Chase?’

‘You can be safe,’ he said huskily, for the feel of her body over his was making his whole body seem to transmute into something he barely recognised. ‘But, Pippa, is this purely to make you forget?’

‘Forget?’

‘Roger? Near drowning? Hopelessness?’

‘No,’ she said, surely and strongly. ‘It’s to make me remember. And before you ask,’ she whispered, lowering herself again so her mouth was close to his, ‘yes, it’s seduction. Yes, I’m using you. I need you to affirm… life.’

She faltered then, suddenly unsure, but he knew it wasn’t her actions she was questioning, it was her reasons. ‘This night… You… It seems as natural as breathing. I’ve signed no contract yet at Whale Cove. Tomorrow I can walk away. I well may, because what happens tonight could make working together impossible. But it’s not interfering with me wanting you now. And you… do you want me?’

How could she ask?

There was something changing within him. Something he hadn’t been aware could be changed. The tenderness… the aching need he had for her…

Pippa.

Was she a fool?

She probably was, but she didn’t care. She was in the middle of the Australian desert with a man she didn’t know. Or maybe she did know him.

He’d saved her life but this went deeper. Something about Riley Chase resonated with her as no man ever had before.

Someday she’d ask him about his childhood, she thought. If she stayed around that long. If there was a shared tomorrow.

It didn’t matter if there wasn’t.

Or maybe it did matter, but for now she couldn’t allow herself to care, for if she cared she’d allow in caution, rational thought, sense.

She didn’t want those things. She only wanted Riley.

She’d told him it was to drive away nightmares. It was, but there was more. More she could hardly admit. More she didn’t understand.

She was still resting lightly over him. She let her fingers run the length of his face, feeling the roughness of the stubble on his jaw, tracing the faint indentation of a scar at the side of his mouth, feeling the strength of his features.

She knew this man.

It was a strange sensation, but she believed it. She didn’t need to know how he’d got that scar, where the life lines had been formed. Something within this man was stirring a response within her that she couldn’t understand but could only believe.

Two halves of a whole? That was fantasy, but there was something. Some basic link.

If he told her now he’d had a happy childhood, a safe, secure existence, she’d never believe him. He was a man who walked alone. As she had, all her life.

As she would again tomorrow?

Maybe, but not tonight, for tonight she was holding Riley, and he was driving away every other thought. Taking away terror, giving her life.

She was exploring his face with her fingers, loving what she was learning. She met his gaze, devouring the look of him.

There was need in his eyes. There was strength and truth and passion.

Another man might have taken what she offered without questions. He was still and silent, making sure…

He could be sure.

‘Riley,’ she whispered.

‘Pippa.’ He smiled at her.

And here was a wonder, for the smile said he was loving her. She knew it was just for now, but now was enough.

With his smile, the terrors of the last few days disappeared. As did the betrayal that was Roger, the accusations of her parents, the pressures from home. Even the awfulness of the sea; in the face of Riley’s smile it was nothing. For now, for this wondrous moment, the horrors of the past made way. For Riley.

And then control was no longer hers. Impulse was no longer hers. For Riley took her face in his hands, he tugged her down to him, and he kissed her.

He kissed her as she ached to be kissed, a possessive, loving, searching kiss that said for tonight she was his woman and everything else must fade to nothing. This kiss was his seal of commitment. He deepened the kiss, and deepened it still more, and the sensation made her want to cry out with wonder.

He put her away from him once more and she almost cried a protest. But he was only moving her a little, so once more he could read her eyes.

‘This is love-making,’ he said softly. ‘Pippa, what you’re offering… it’s a gift without price. I won’t take it lightly.’

‘I wouldn’t expect you to,’ she said, struggling to make her voice light in response. ‘But I know it’s only for tonight. You won’t wake up to find yourself with a woman hanging on your sleeve, wanting commitment. I’ve been engaged to Roger on and off for more than ten years. That’s more than enough commitment. I’ve told my mother where she could put my wedding dress and it wasn’t anywhere polite.’

She smiled, finding shared laughter. Somehow she’d kept her voice steady. Somehow she’d made herself sound like she was telling the truth.

She didn’t want commitment?

She was under control?

There was an illusion. The truth was that even though she was now independent, since last Sunday night her life had spun totally out of control, and Riley Chase was making it a thousand times worse. Oh, it was no fault of Riley’s. She didn’t even mind.

In truth, for the first time in her life she was out of control and she was loving it.

‘So are you intending to kiss me again?’ she teased. ‘Because I’m getting a bit uncomfortable. I’m not sure if you’ve noticed but I’m lying on your chest and it’s not quite as comfortable as that nice, soft mattress you’re lying on.’

‘Then let’s fix that,’ he growled, and swung her over so they lay side by side. And she was being kissed as she’d never been kissed in her life.

Riley was kissing her, tasting her, exploring her.

Riley was loving her.

And all that must be said had been said. Hesitations were gone.

She closed her eyes, savouring the feel of him, the taste, the touch. His hands were working their magic on her skin, knowing every inch of her, and every tiny movement sent shivers of sensual pleasure through her entire body.

She arched back and he found the clips of her bra. It finally fell away and she loved that it did. His fingers cupped the soft swell of her breasts, tracing her nipples, making her sigh with sheer, unmitigated pleasure.

She wanted closer. She had his buttons undone now-how had she done that? She hardly knew but his shirt was gone and she loved that it was gone. The feel of her skin against his… the strength of his body… the sheer maleness of him… It was taking her breath away.

The moonlight washed through the window, and the sight of his body was making her dizzy. His body heat, the touch of his mouth, the feel of his hands…

She was starting to burn.

His breathing was becoming ragged, and she gloried in it, gloried that he was feeling as she was. This was mutual need. Mutual pleasure. This was right, she thought, in some far recess of her mind. This man had given her her life, and this… it felt like giving life in return.

Her hair was tumbled on his face. He tucked her curls behind her ears and then tugged her tight so he could reclaim her mouth.

Oh, his mouth…

It wasn’t enough. He was kissing her everywhere, a rain of kisses, her neck, her shoulders, her breasts, and the feeling was so breathtaking she could hardly take in air. Was that what was making her light-headed? She felt like she was floating, and he with her.

She was moving to another place. Moving to another life?

Her breasts were moulding to his chest as his hands tugged at her hips. Her clothing had disappeared entirely. Excellent, but fair was fair. She found the zipper of his jeans and tugged, and then her fingers returned to where the zip had been.

The night was swirling. Her mind was swirling.

Somehow she was shedding a skin, being hauled from her old life into this, the new.

Oh, the feel of him. The joy. He was discovering every secret of her body. She felt herself arch with sheer animal pleasure, abandoning herself to him entirely. He could do anything he wanted with her and she could do the same to him. For this night anything was possible.

The nightmares had faded to nothing. The terror that had lingered was gone, dissolved in Riley’s heat, Riley’s body, Riley’s need.

Her need.

Skin against skin.

She couldn’t get close enough.

She was on fire.

‘Riley.’ She heard herself moan but it wasn’t her voice. It was a stranger, a woman Riley was loving. She heard the aching need and wondered at it. ‘Riley.’

‘My beautiful girl…’

And he was up and over her, his dark eyes gleaming in the moonlight. ‘Are you indeed sure?’

Was she sure? For answer she reached and held his hips, she centred him, she tugged…

He was hers.

The night was dissolving around her. Riley…

‘Pippa.’ His voice was a husky whisper, in her ear. He was taking her slowly, with languorous pleasure, forcing her to wait, forcing himself to wait.

Riley.

This was where she was meant to be. This was her heart, her home, her centre.

This man.

He was a part of her, merged with her, one. Their bodies were riding each other, but there was no physical effort. Her mind was as clear as the stars outside. She came and came again but she didn’t lose sight of Riley for one moment.

How could she close her eyes? She marvelled at his body as he moved within her. His raw strength. His muscles, delineated, beautiful.

Riley. For tonight, her man.

He was deep within her, and her body was taking her rhythm from his. He could take her anywhere he wished. He could love her for ever. This moment…

And the next.

For it went on and on, building, building, and she felt herself weeping with joy. She wept and she held his beautiful body and finally, wondrously, she felt him surge within her-and she knew nothing could ever be the same again. When finally he lay back, spent, when she lay on his chest and felt his heartbeat merged with hers, when she felt his fingers run through her hair with tenderness and wonder and love…

She knew the nightmares wouldn’t return.

She knew he’d brought her out from the far side.

She just wasn’t exactly sure he’d come out with her.

She slept, cradled in his arms, warm, secure, safe.

Pippa.

What had he done?

He’d slept with her.

He’d made love with her.

He’d never meant to. She’d been his patient. She was his colleague.

She’d woken in mid-nightmare. He’d come to comfort her and he’d taken her.

Or she’d taken him.

It was her need as well as his. What had happened had been the culmination of a need so basic it was almost past comprehension, past his ability to judge on right and wrong.

Because right now, lying in the dark with Pippa’s naked body curled against him, it felt right. How could there be anything wrong with something that had felt so inevitable?

It didn’t feel like he was holding Pippa. It felt like he was holding a part of himself. If something was to wrench her away right now, it’d hurt like tearing a part of himself away.

He turned his head a little and his face was in her hair. He was smelling the faint clean scent of her. She murmured a little in her sleep, her hand shifted, sought, held. His fingers were entwined in hers.

Pippa.

He was lying in the dark, holding his woman in his arms.

He closed his eyes and a peace he’d never felt before settled over him.

Right or wrong, for now, for this moment, Dr Riley Chase had come home.