The Nurse's Christmas Wish

His eyes glittered dangerously and there was no trace of amusement in his hard features.

‘Is this some sort of joke?’ His voice was suddenly icy cold and he was looking at her with all the enthusiasm of a pathologist looking at a deadly virus. ‘How can you be my Christmas present?’

She tilted her head to one side. ‘Because your brother arranged it. I’m Louisa.’

He closed his eyes and muttered something under his breath. It sounded suspiciously like, ‘I’m going to kill him.’

Louisa stood for a moment, waiting patiently, and finally he opened his eyes and his gaze fixed on hers.

‘All right, this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to rescue your things from your car before they’re soaked, we’re going to get you dried off and then we’re going to sit down and talk about this. Because whatever you and my little brother have cooked up between you, it isn’t going to work for me. Once you’ve had a hot drink and dried off, I’m sending you on your way.’

Louisa looked at him. ‘Josh didn’t tell you I was coming?’

He ran a hand through his hair in a gesture of pure exasperation. ‘No. Well, yes, sort of. He told me he’d arranged my Christmas present. He just omitted to tell me what it was.’

Louisa covered her mouth with her hand and gurgled with laughter. ‘That’s so like Josh. He probably thought that if he told you in advance, you’d refuse to let me through the door.’

His black eyes were flint hard and as cold as the Arctic. ‘He would have been right.’

Oops.

She smiled placidly, refusing to let him intimidate her. ‘So it’s just as well I came through the window, then.’ She’d never met a man with more defences but she wasn’t put off by his lack of warmth. Josh had warned her that his older brother would try and keep her at a distance and she had no intention of being sent away until she’d helped. And she knew she could. ‘OK.’ She glanced down at herself with a rueful smile. ‘I’m dripping all over your floor. If you don’t want me to catch a cold, you’d better show me where I can get dried off and changed.’

He studied her for a moment and then let out a sigh of undisguised exasperation. ‘Upstairs, first on the right. There’s a guest bedroom and bathroom. Use it and then you can be on your way. In the meantime, I’ll get your things. Keys?’

He held out a hand and she looked at him blankly. ‘Oh...’ She smiled in sudden comprehension. ‘I never lock my car. It’s such a wreck no one in their right mind would ever want to steal it.’

She followed him into the hallway and stopped dead in the large hallway, her eyes fixed on the sweeping staircase. ‘A fairy-tale staircase. I’ve never actually seen one in real life, only in films. That’s amazing,’ she said huskily, her gaze wistful as she gazed upwards. ‘Just like the one in Gone with the Wind. You could sweep a woman off her feet and carry her up those stairs—’

‘Or she could walk,’ he said tightly, piercing her dream with a sardonic lift of a dark eyebrow. ‘I thought you were catching cold?’

Obviously not a romantic.

‘I am.’ She walked slowly up the stairs, trailing her hand lovingly up the oak banister. ‘The wood is beautiful.’

‘I restored it,’ Mac said irritably, and she peeped at him quizzically.

‘You know, you should probably get some sleep.’

‘Why would I want to do that?’

‘Because you look tired. You’re also very, very crabby and that’s always a sign of tiredness.’

His dark eyes burned into hers. ‘It’s also a sign that my brother has introduced a strange woman to my house when I don’t need one.’

‘Men are always hopeless at knowing what they need,’ Louisa said sagely, ‘but fortunately for them, women are here to help them work it out. Do you think you could rescue my bag from the boot before everything is soaked through?’

He was staring at her with an expression of stunned disbelief on his handsome face. ‘Your bag...’ His tone was almost faint. ‘I’ll get it.’ He seemed to shake himself. ‘And once you’ve dried off, you’re leaving. I’m not blaming you and it isn’t personal. I’m fully aware that none of this is your fault and I intend to take it up with my brother. Bedroom is second on the right.’

Ignoring the frost in his tone and the ice in his eyes, Louisa followed his instructions and pushed open the door. The place had been decorated like a traditional beach house. Floor-to-ceiling windows, scrubbed floorboards and a huge bed covered in white bedding and creamy throws. There were touches of blue, interesting pieces of driftwood and piles of shells stacked in pretty bowls. Even in the depths of winter the room seemed to feel summery and light. And she loved it. She gazed out of the window as Mac strode in with her bags.

‘You were right. They’re soaking wet. Put them near the radiator and they should dry off.’ He dumped them on the floor and frowned at her. ‘Is something wrong?’

Her eyes were still on the sea. ‘Oh, no, nothing’s wrong—’ She broke off and cleared her throat. ‘Everything is right. I just love it here.’

Her dream.

A house by the sea. A village where everyone knew each other. Surely in a place like this a person could belong.

‘Well, don’t get too settled. You won’t be staying.’ His frown deepened and there was a moment’s silence, as if he regretted his rudeness. ‘Most people hate the beach in the winter,’ he said gruffly. ‘They find it wild and lonely.’

Louisa thought of her early childhood spent in a cramped high-rise flat in the middle of a soulless city until Social Services had taken her away. ‘I suppose loneliness means different things to different people.’ She pulled herself together and turned to face him, a bright smile on her face. ‘I’ll take a shower and change, if that’s all right with you, and then we can meet downstairs so that you can tell me again that this is all a mistake and I can’t possibly stay.’

He paused for a moment, his dark eyes wary, and then he gave a reluctant laugh. ‘Why do I have a feeling you’re going to be difficult to shift?’

Without waiting for an answer, he left the room and Louisa stared after him thoughtfully. ‘Oh, I’m not going to be difficult to shift, Dr Mac Sullivan,’ she muttered thoughtfully. ‘I’m going to be impossible.’

He needed her.

She’d always been good at reading people. It was her special gift. And all her senses warned her that Mac Sullivan was a troubled man. She could feel the tension in him. Feel the way that he pushed people away. Shut himself off.

Josh was right about one thing, she mused as she unzipped her bag and pulled out a warm jumper. His brother was going to do everything in his power to get her to leave.

She cuddled the jumper and for a moment her eyes swung back to the sea. The winter wind whipped the waves into a foaming mass and the sky was grey and laden with the threat of more snow.

It was cruel and cold and unwelcoming.

So why did she feel she was finally home?

CHAPTER TWO (#ue2dc6a87-64d3-5d37-bfe0-6db9801ba793)

DOWNSTAIRS, Mac put the kettle on the Aga and called his brother. ‘I owe you a black eye. Your Christmas present just arrived.’

His brother chuckled. ‘Isn’t she gorgeous? I’ve excelled myself, haven’t I?’

Mac felt the irritation rise. ‘When I need a pimp,’ he said tightly, ‘I’ll ask for one.’

‘Hey!’ Josh’s voice was suddenly sharp. ‘Don’t speak that way about Louisa. Believe it or not, this time I’m not fixing you up. This isn’t about sex.’

Mac rolled his eyes as he waited for the water to heat. ‘With you, everything is about sex and you’ve been trying to fix me up since the day Melissa died. And frankly I just don’t need it. I don’t need another woman in my life.’

He was no good at relationships.

He was better off on his own.

An image of Louisa with snow scattered through clouds of curling dark hair filled his brain and he pushed it away. It was all part of his brother’s plan and he wasn’t falling for it. He was perfectly satisfied with his life.

‘This isn’t just about you.’ Josh sighed. ‘Mac, we’re drowning under work. We don’t have time to turn around. We need someone to help in the house and we need another nurse in the department. Louisa fits both slots. She’ll make all our lives easier. If you frighten her off, I swear I’ll kill you with my bare hands.’