Raw Deal

‘How old are you, Dr Bradshaw?’

‘Ben. I’m thirty-one.’

‘Single?’

‘So far.’

‘Any—er—commitments?’

His lips twitched. ‘Not at the moment.’

She let her eyes trail slowly over his body. ‘You must move in exclusively male circles,’ she murmured.

He gave a short, appreciative laugh.

‘Touché.’ He raised his glass to her in a silent toast, and sipped the smooth red wine before setting the glass down and turning his attention back to her. ‘So, Miss Wells——’

‘Maggie.’

‘Maggie. What do you do to occupy your time when you aren’t gallivanting around the world with or without your matchmaking grandparent?’

She chuckled. ‘I work with children,’ she told him, half truthfully.

‘A teacher?’

‘No—I work in a hospital, actually.’

‘A nurse?’

‘No—I——’

‘Occupational therapist? Physio?’

She thought of the endless hours on duty, sometimes as many as a hundred and twenty hours a week. ‘Dogsbody, really,’ she replied with a tinge of bitter irony.

‘I’m sure they love you,’ he said, and she was surprised at the sincerity in his voice. ‘You have an openness, a frank honesty; kids like that.’

She thought of some of the painful procedures it was often her duty to perform, and shook her head. ‘I don’t know if they love me, but I do my best for them. It isn’t always enough.’

She glanced up and surprised a look of pain that twisted his features briefly.

‘No,’ he replied quietly. ‘It isn’t always enough, and sometimes it’s too much.’

She was saved from an inane reply by the arrival of the first course, a delicious hors-d’oeuvre.

She made her selection and nibbled the smoked salmon trout thoughtfully. So, her lightweight, playboy doctor had hidden depths, did he? Even more important, then, that she should keep a distance from him, because, while she could easily talk herself out of falling for an emotional lightweight, she had the uneasy feeling that for all his flirting Ben Bradshaw was anything but, and if they found too much common ground—well, it could be a disaster. She speared a king prawn with more force than was strictly necessary.

Maggie was no fool. She knew she was ripe for picking, but, having escaped the somewhat fumbled clutches of her generation of medical students, she was in no hurry now to hurl herself at the first half-decent man who came along—especially not one who was apparently in hiding from some demon in his past.

A hundred years ago, she mused, he might have joined the Foreign Legion. Now he was condemned to dishing out Kwells to pampered old ladies and bandaging the occasional twisted ankle resulting from an over-enthusiastic game of deck quoits!

And yet, despite her determination to keep her distance, as the food came and went and conversation ebbed and flowed around her, she found her glance straying to his face, and her thoughts straying to his words. She wondered what might have happened when his best had obviously been too much, and thought again of little Samuel Grainger whose fight had been so brief, and for whom her best had fallen a long way short of the mark.

‘Penny for them?’

She glanced quickly up, and saw that, above his smile, his eyes were concerned, as if her face had revealed too much. She shook her head. ‘Sorry, I was miles away. So tell me, Ben, what do I have to look forward to in the next few days?’

He laughed and eased back in his chair. ‘Almost anything. What would you like to do tonight—a quiet drink in the bar, flirting with Lady Luck in the casino, a film, or something romantic—dancing on deck in the moonlight, with the wind in your hair and the bright gleam of the phosphorescence leaving a sparkling trail in our wake?’

His voice had softened and deepened, and she was caught in the magnetic snare of his eyes, unable to look away.

‘That sounds almost too good to be true,’ she found herself saying, and then everyone was rising from the table and she was taking Ben’s arm, aware with every cell in her body of the sinuous strength of his muscles under the fine, soft wool of his white dress uniform.

They collected a drink from the bar and made their way out on deck. All around them people were talking softly and the air was filled with the tinkle of laughter and ice in glasses, murmured voices and sighs of delight.

They found a gap at the rail and stood together, and, due either to the slight motion of the ship or the unaccustomed alcohol, Maggie found herself swaying gently against his tall, hard body.

Ben took her empty glass and put it down, then grinned at her. ‘Come on,’ he whispered. ‘Perk of the job—I know somewhere quiet!’

They threaded their way through the laughing crowd, up a companionway and through a little gate marked ‘Authorised Personnel Only’, then they were out on the bows, watching the phosphorus turn the water a ghostly green as the ship sliced through the sea.

The hum of the engines and the splash of water drowned out the music and laughter they had left behind, and Ben moved up beside Maggie, wrapping his arm around her waist and easing her up against his side. The heat of the day was gone, and in the cooling breeze she was glad of the warmth of his body. The weight of his arm seemed so natural, so right, somehow. She relaxed against him and breathed deeply of the tropic night.

The air was rich with the salt tang of the sea and the smell of fresh paint, and every now and again she caught a glimpse of a flying fish leaping from the water, the phosphorescence trailing behind it like a tiny comet.

‘What a beautiful night,’ she sighed, and Ben’s arm tightened as he turned her into his embrace.

His face was sharply etched in the moonlight, and she watched the emotions play across it as he slowly pulled out her hairpins and shook her hair loose.

‘Absolutely beautiful,’ he murmured in response, and she knew in that second that he was going to kiss her.

I ought to run! she thought, but instead she tipped back her head to make it easier for him, and waited, fascinated, as his firm, full lips lowered and brushed against hers, teasing her with tiny, sipping kisses until her trembling sigh broke through his control and he threaded his fingers through her hair and steadied her against the onslaught of his mouth.

After what seemed like forever and yet wasn’t nearly long enough, he lifted his head and folded her against his chest, her head tucked neatly under his chin against the wild beating of his heart.

He held her there until his heart had slowed, and then he let her go, moving away to stand by the guard rail, his hands braced on the teak top rail, his head bowed.

‘We shouldn’t have done that,’ she said breathlessly, wondering if her legs would collapse without his support, and he lifted his head and met her eyes with a rueful grin.

‘You’re undoubtedly right, but I’m not going to apologise. You’re beautiful, Maggie, with your mermaid’s hair flowing round your shoulders and your eyes wide and innocent—they’re the colour of crushed pansies, did you know that? And your clear, pale skin—you’ll have to be careful not to burn.’ His finger trailed slowly over her bare shoulder and down her arm. ‘It would be a tragedy to mark that exquisite perfection.’

‘Has anybody ever told you you’ve got the smooth tongue of an Irishman?’ Maggie asked drily, to cover the wild leap of her heart.

Ben chuckled. ‘Just a natural ladies’ man,’ he said easily. ‘Come on, let me escort you back to the happy throng, then I must go and hand out more seasick pills. I saw a wave a moment ago—no doubt I’ll be the most popular man on board before long.’

His voice was tinged with irony, and Maggie looked up at him, catching a flash of discontent on his face.

‘Don’t you ever long to be involved in mainstream medicine again?’ she asked, and wasn’t surprised when his face went carefully blank.