One Night With The Italian Doc

‘You have a Christmas coat?’

‘I have a Christmas wardrobe,’ Louise corrected. ‘So, you’re just staying for a little while.’

‘No,’ Anton said.

‘Oh, I thought you said—’

‘You ruined my line. I was going to suggest that you leave five minutes after me but then you said that you were looking forward to it.’

‘Oh!’

‘I think you are right and that we should enjoy Christmas, perhaps together, and stop concerning ourselves with other things.’ He stopped walking and so did she and they faced each other in the night and he pulled her into his lovely warm coat. ‘Can you be discreet?’

‘Not really,’ Louise said with a smile, ‘but I am discreet about important things.’

‘I know.’

‘And having a nice Christmas is a very important thing,’ she went on, ‘so, yes, I’ll be discreet.’

Pressed together, her hands under his coat and around his waist there was nothing discreet about Anton’s erection.

‘I would kiss you but …’ He looked down at her perfectly painted lips for about half a second because he didn’t care if it ruined her make-up and neither did she. It had been a very long December, all made worth it by this.

After close to two weeks of deprivation Louise returned to his mouth. His kiss was warm and his lips tender. It was a gentle kiss but it delivered such promise. His tongue was hers again to enjoy. His hands moved under her coat and stroked her back and waist so lightly it was almost a tickle, and when their lips parted their faces barely broke contact and Louise’s short breaths blew white in the night. She was ridiculously turned on in his arms.

‘We need get there,’ Anton said.

‘Should we arrive together?’ Louise asked. ‘If we’re going to be discreet?’

‘Of course,’ Anton said, ‘we left work at the same time.’

She went into her bag, which was as well organised as her pockets at work, and did a quick repair job on her face and handed Anton a baby wipe.

‘Actually, have the packet,’ Louise said, and Anton pocketed it with a smile.

He might rather be needing them.

It was everything a Christmas party should be.

The theme was fun and midwives knew how to have it.

All the Christmas music was playing and Louise was the happiest she had been in a very, very long time amongst her colleagues and friends. Anton was there in the background, making her toes curl in her strappy stilettoes as she danced and had fun and made merry with friends while he suitably ignored her. Now and then, though, they caught the other’s eye and had a little smile.

It was far less formal than the theatre do and everyone let off a little seasonal steam, well, everyone but Anton.

He stood chatting with Stephanie and Rory, holding his sparkling water, even though he was off duty now until Monday.

‘Louise,’ Rory called to her near the end of the evening, ‘what are you doing for Emily at Christmas?’

‘I don’t know,’ Louise said. ‘I’ve been racking my brains. She’s got everything she needs really but I’m going Christmas shopping tomorrow. I might think of something then.’

‘Well, let me know if you want to go halves,’ Rory said. ‘Or if you see something I could get, then could you get it for me?’

‘I shall.’

‘I’m going to take Stephanie home,’ Rory said, and as Stephanie went to get her coat, even though Anton was there, Louise couldn’t resist, once Stephanie had gone, asking Rory a question.

‘Is it Stephanie?’

‘Who?’

‘The woman you like.’

‘God.’ Rory rolled his eyes. ‘Why did I ever say anything?’

‘Because we’re friends.’

‘Just drop it,’ Rory said. ‘And, no, it’s not Stephanie.’ He let out a laugh at Louise’s suggestion. ‘She’s married with two children.’

‘Maybe that’s why you have to keep it so quiet.’

‘Louise, it’s not Stephanie and you are to leave this alone.’ He looked at Anton. ‘She’s relentless.’

‘She is.’

Louise pulled a face at Rory’s departing back and then turned and it was just she and Anton.

‘Do you want a drink?’ Anton asked.

‘No, thanks,’ Louise said. ‘I’ve had one snowball too many.’

‘What are you drinking?’ Anton asked, because he had seen the pale yellow concoction she had been drinking all night.

‘Snowballs—Advocaat, lemonade and lime juice,’ she pulled a face.

‘You don’t like them?’

‘I like the idea of them,’ Louise said, and then her attention was shot as a song came on. ‘Ooh, I love this one …’

‘Of course you do.’

‘No, seriously, it’s my favourite.’

It was dance with her or watch her dance alone.

‘I thought we were being discreet?’ Louise said.

‘It’s just a dance,’ Anton said, as she draped her arms round his neck. ‘But Rory’s right—you are relentless.’

‘I know I am.’ Louise smiled.

They were as discreet as two bodies on fire could be, just swaying and looking at each other and talking.

‘I want to kiss you under the mistletoe,’ Anton said.

‘I assume we’re not talking about the sad bunch hanging at the bar.’

‘No.’

‘Did you know these stockings come with matching underwear?’

‘I do,’ Anton said, ‘I saw your work in the magazine.’

‘Did you like?’

‘I like.’ Anton nodded. ‘As I said, I want to kiss you under the mistletoe.’

‘I am so turned on.’ She stated the obvious because he could feel every breath that blew from her lips, he could see her pulse galloping in her neck as well as the arousal in her eyes.

‘Good.’

‘We need to leave,’ Louise said.

‘I’m going to go and speak to Brenda and then leave, and you’re going to hang around for a little while and then we meet at my car.’

‘I live a two-minute walk from here,’ Louise said.

‘Okay …’

She loved his slow smile as she gave him her address. ‘I’ll slip the key into your coat pocket,’ Louise said. ‘You can go and put the kettle on.’

‘I shall.’

‘Please don’t,’ Louise said. ‘I meant—’

‘Oh, I get what you meant.’

Anton said his goodbyes and chatted with Brenda for an aching ten minutes, though on the periphery of his vision he could see Louise near the coats but then off she went, back to the dance floor.

Anton headed out into the night and found her home very easily. Louise had left the heating on. She loathed coming home to a cold house and a furnace of heat hit Anton as he opened the door as well as the dazzle of decorations, which were about as subtle as Louise.

And as for the bedroom!

Anton couldn’t help but smile as he stepped inside Madame Louise’s chamber. He looked at the crushed velvet bed that matched the crushed velvet chair by the dressing table and he looked at the array of bottles and make-up on it.

Anton undressed and got into her lovely bed. He had never met someone so unabashed and he liked that about her, liked that she was who she was.

Louise had never been more in demand than in the ten minutes at the end of the party. Everyone, everyone wanted her to stop for a chat, and just as she finally got her coat on and was leaving, Brenda suggested they drop over to Louise’s as some work dos often ended up there.

‘I can’t tonight,’ Louise said. ‘Mum’s over.’

‘Your mum?’

‘I think she and Dad had a row,’ Louise lied, but she had to, as her mind danced with a sudden vision of a naked Anton in the hallway greeting half of the maternity staff. ‘It’s a bit of a sensitive point.’

Louise texted him as she walked out.

I just told the biggest lie

Should I be worried that there is a crib in your bedroom? Anton texted back.

She laughed because she had already told him it was for Emily’s baby and it was wrapped in Cellophane too, so she continued the tease.

Aren’t we making a baby tonight? Louise fired back. Get here!!!

She waved as a car carrying her friends tooted, trying not to run on shaky, want-filled legs, and almost breaking her ankle as she walked far too fast for her stilettoes.

She could barely get the key in the door, just so delighted by the turn of events—that they were going to put other things on hold and simply enjoy. Her coat dropped to the floor as she stepped into the bedroom and there he was, naked in her bed and a Christmas wish came true.

‘Who’s been sleeping in my bed?’ Louise smiled.

‘No sleeping tonight,’ Anton said. ‘Come here.’

Louise was not shy; she went straight over, kneeling on her bed and kissing him without restraint.

It was urgent.

Anton was at the tie of her dress as their mouths bruised each other’s. He tried to peel it off over arms that were bent because she was holding his head, tonguing him, wanting him, but there was something she first had to do.

‘I have to take my make-up off.’

‘I’ll lick it off.’

‘Seriously.’ She could hardly breathe, she was somehow straddling him, her dress gaped open and it would be so much easier not to reach for the cold cream. ‘It’s not vanity, it’s work ethic—I’ll look like a pizza for my photo shoot otherwise …’

She climbed off the bed and shed her dress and Anton got the full effect of her stunning underwear, and as beautiful as the pictures had been he far preferred the un-airbrushed version.

Louise sat on her chair and slathered her face in cold cream, quickly wiping it off and wishing she hadn’t worn so much mascara. Just as she had finished she felt the chair turn and she was face to groin with a naked Anton.

‘Poor Anton,’ Louise said.

‘Not any more,’ Anton said, as she started to stroke him. She went to lower her head but he was starting to kneel.

‘Stay …’ Louise said, because she wanted to taste him.

‘You can have it later.’

He caressed the insides of her thighs through her stockings then the white naked flesh so slowly that she was twitching. He stroked her through her damp panties till he moved them aside and explored her again with his fingers till she could almost stand it no more. Her thighs were shaking and finally his hands went for her mistletoe panties and slid them down so slowly that Louise was squirming. Anton pulled her bottom right to the edge of the chair and then took one stockinged leg and put it over his shoulder and then slowly did the same with the other. Such was the greed in his eyes she was almost coming as finally he did kiss what had been under the silken mistletoe.

Louise looked down but his eyes were closed in concentration and her knees started to bend to the skill of his mouth but hands came up and clamped her legs down, so there was nowhere to go but ecstasy.

She felt the cool blowing of his breath and then the warm suction of his mouth and then another soft blow that did nothing to put the fire out. In fact, her hips were lifting, but his mouth would not allow them to.

‘Anton …’ She didn’t need to tell him she was coming, he was lost in it too, moaning, as her thighs clamped his head and she pulsed in his mouth. Anton reached for his cock on instinct. He was close to coming too. He raised himself up, and was stroking himself at her entrance. They were in the most dangerous of places, two people who definitely should know better.

Louise was frantically patting the dressing table behind her, trying to find a drawer, while watching the silver bead at his tip swelling and drizzling.

‘Here …’ She pulled out a foil packet and ripped it open. She slid it onto his thick length and there was no way they could make it to the bed, but Anton took a turn in the lucky chair and she leapt on his lap. His mouth sucked her breast through her bra as she wriggled into position.

She hovered provocatively over his erection, revel-ling for a brief moment in the sensation of his mouth and the anticipation of lowering herself. Anton had worked the fabric down and was now at her nipple, her small breast consumed by his mouth, and then his patience expired. His hands pulled her hips down and in one rapid motion Louise was filled by him, a delicious searing but, better still, his hands did not leave her. Her bedroom was like a sauna and the sheen on her body had her a little slippery but his hands gripped her and did not relent, for she would match his needs.

It had her feeling dizzy—the sensation of being on top while being taken. Louise rested her arms on his shoulders as he pulled her down over and over, and then his mouth lost contact with her breast as he swelled that final time. Her hands went to his head and she ground down, coming with him, squealing in pleasure as they hit a giddy peak. They shared a decadent, wet kiss as he shot inside her, a kiss of possession as she pulsed around his length and her head collapsed onto his shoulder.

Louise kissed his salty shoulder as her breathing finally slowed down.

She could feel him soften inside her and she lifted her head and smiled into his eyes.

‘Ready for bed?’

CHAPTER TEN

AFTER ONE HOUR and about seven minutes of sleep they woke to Louise’s phone at six.

‘I thought you were off today,’ Anton groaned.

‘I am, but I’m going Christmas shopping.’

‘At six a.m.?’

‘I want to get a book signed for Mum so I have to line up,’ Louise said. ‘Stay,’ she said, kissing his mouth.’ Get up when you’re ready, or you can come shopping with me.’

‘I’ll give it a miss, thanks.’

‘Have you done your Christmas shopping?’

‘I’ll do it online. The shops will be crazy.’

‘That’s half the fun.’ She gave him a nudge. ‘Come on.’

She went into the shower and Anton lay there, looking up at the ceiling. He had a couple of things to get. Something for the nurses and his secretary and, yes, he might just as well get it over and done with.

‘We’ll stop by my place and I can get changed,’ Anton said, as she came out of the shower.

‘Sure.’ Naked, she smiled down at him and lifted her hair. ‘Check me for bruises,’ she said, while craning her neck and looking down at her buttocks where his fingers had dug in, but, no, they were peachy cream too.

‘No need to check,’ Anton said, for he had been careful, knowing that she had her photo shoot coming up.

Neither could wait till it was over!

Louise dressed while Anton showered. She pulled on jeans and boots and a massive cream jumper and then she tied up her hair and added a coat.

Anton put on the clothes he had worn last night, though they were stopping by his place so he could get changed.

‘Ready to do battle?’ she asked, thrilled that Anton had agreed to come along with her. She was determined to Christmas him up, especially when they arrived at his apartment.

‘You really are a misery,’ Louise said, stepping in. She didn’t care about the view or the gorgeous furnishings in his apartment—what she cared about was that there wasn’t a single decoration. There were a few Christmas cards stacked with his mail on the kitchen bench but, apart from that, it might just as well have been October, instead of just over a week before Christmas.

‘Aren’t you even going to get a tree?’ Louise asked.

‘No.’

‘Don’t you have Christmas trees in Italy?’

‘Some,’ Anton said, ‘but we go more for nativity scenes and lights.’

‘You have to do something.’

‘I’m hardly ever here, Louise,’ Anton said.

‘It’s not the point. When you come home—’

‘I don’t like Christmas,’ Anton said, but then amended, ‘Although I am starting to really enjoy this one.’

‘What do you have to get today?’

‘I need to get something for my secretary,’ Anton said. ‘Perfume?’

‘Maybe,’ Louise said. ‘What sort of things does she like?’

Anton spread out his hands—he really had no idea what Shirley liked.

‘What sort of things does she talk about?’

‘My diary.’

‘God, you’re so antisocial,’ Louise said.

‘Oh, she likes cooking,’ Anton recalled. ‘She’s always bringing in things that she’s made.’

‘Then I have the perfect present,’ Louise said, ‘because I’m getting it for my mum. That’s what we’re going to line up for.’

It wasn’t just a book. The first twenty people had the option to purchase a morning’s cooking lesson with a celebrity chef. It was fabulous and expensive and with it all going to charity it was well worth it.

Celebrating their success at getting the signed books and cookery lessons, at ten a.m., having coffee and cake in an already crowded department store, they chatted.

‘If your mother can’t cook, why would you spend all that money? Surely it will be wasted?’

‘Oh, no.’ Louise shook her head. ‘If she learns even one thing and gets it right, my dad will be grateful for ever—the poor thing,’ she added. ‘He has to eat it night after night after night. I usually wriggle out of it when I go and visit. I’ll go over tomorrow and say I’ve just eaten, but you can’t do that on Christmas Day.’

‘How bad is it?’

‘It’s terrible. I don’t know how she does it. It always looks okay and she thinks it tastes amazing but I swear it’s like she’s put it in a blender with water added, burnt it and then put it back together to look like a dinner again …’ She took out her list. ‘Come on, off we go.’

Louise was a brilliant shopper, not that Anton easily fathomed her methods.

‘I adore this colour,’ Louise said, trying lipstick on the back of her hand. ‘Oh, but this one is even better.’

‘I thought we were here for your sisters.’

‘Oh, they’re so easy to buy for,’ Louise said. ‘Anything I love they want to pinch, so anything I love I know they’ll like.’

Make-up, perfume, a pair of boots … ‘I’m the same size as Chloe,’ she explained, as she tried them on. ‘It’s so good you’re here, I’d have had to make two trips otherwise.’

Bag after bag was loaded with gifts. ‘I want to go here,’ Louise said, and they got off the escalator at the baby section. ‘I’m going to get something for Emily and Hugh’s baby,’ Louise said. ‘Hopefully it will be a waste of money and I can give it to NICU.’ She looked at Anton. ‘Do you think she’ll get to Christmas?’

‘I hope so,’ Anton said. ‘I’m aiming for thirty-three weeks.’

Louise heard the unvoiced but and for now chose to ignore it.

They went to the premature baby section and found some tiny outfits and there was one perk to being the obstetrician and midwife shopping for a pregnant friend, they knew what colour to get! Louise said yes to gift-wrapping and they waited as it was beautifully wrapped and then topped with a bow.

‘I’ll keep it in my locker at work,’ Louise said.

It was a lovely, lovely, lovely day of shopping, punctuated with kisses. Neither cared about the grumbles they caused as they blocked the pavement or the escalators when they simply had to kiss the other and by the end Louise was seriously, happily worn out.

‘You want to get dinner?’ Anton offered.

‘Take-out?’ Louise suggested. ‘But we’ll have it at my place. I’m not going to your miserable apartment.’

‘I have to go back,’ Anton said. ‘I have to do an hour’s work at least.’

‘Fine,’ Louise conceded, ‘but we’ll drop these back at my place first and I’ll get some clothes.’

‘You won’t need them,’ Anton said, but Louise was insistent.

All her presents she put in the bedroom. ‘I can’t wait to wrap them,’ Louise said. ‘I’ll just grab a change of clothes and things, you go and make a drink.’

Louise grabbed more than a change of clothes. In fact, she went into her wardrobe and pulled out some leftover Christmas decorations and stuffed them all into a not so small overnight bag. She also took the tiny silver tree that she’d been meaning to put up at the nurses’ station but kept forgetting to take.

‘How long are you staying for?’ Anton asked, when she came out and he saw the size of her overnight bag.

‘Till you kick me out.’ Louise gave him a kiss. ‘I like to be prepared.’

Anton really did have work to do.

A couple of blood tests were in and he went through them, and there was a patient at thirteen weeks’ gestation who was bleeding. Anton went into his study and rang her to check how things were.

Louise could hear him safely talking and quickly set to work.

The little tree she put on his coffee table and she draped some tinsel on the window ledges and put up some stars, a touch worried she might leave some marks on his walls but he’d just have to get over it, Louise decided.

She took out her can and sprayed snow on his gleaming windows, and oh, it looked lovely.

‘What the hell have you done?’ Anton said, as he came into the lounge, but he was smiling.

‘I need nice things around me,’ Louise said, ‘happy things.’

‘It would seem,’ Anton said, looking not at her handiwork now but the woman in his arms, ‘that so do I.’

CHAPTER ELEVEN

‘WHAT HAPPENED LAST Christmas?’ Anton asked, late, late on Sunday night. They’d started on the sofa and had watched half a movie and now they lay naked on the floor bathed by the light from the television. ‘You said it was tinsel-starved.’

She really would prefer not to talk about it. They had had such a lovely weekend but there were so many parts of so many conversations that they were avoiding, like IVF and Anton’s loathing of Christmas, that when he finally broached one of them, Louise answered carefully. There was no way she could tell him all but she told him some.

‘I broke up with my boyfriend on Christmas Eve.’

‘You said it was tinsel-starved before then, that you didn’t go to many parties.’

‘It wasn’t worth it.’

‘In what way?’

‘I know you think I’m a flirt …’

‘I like that about you.’

‘But I’m only really like that with you,’ Louise said. ‘I mean that. I used to be a shocking flirt and then when I started going out with Wesley … well, I got told off a lot.’

‘For flirting with other men?’

‘No!’ Louise said, shuddering at the memory. ‘He decided that if I flirted like that with him, then what was I like when he wasn’t there? I don’t want to go into it all, but I changed and I hate myself for it. I changed into this one eighth of a person and somehow I got out—on Christmas Eve last year. It took months, just months to even start feeling like myself again.’

‘Okay.’

‘Do you know the day I did?’ Louise asked, smiling as she turned to face him.

‘No.’

‘We were going to Emily’s leaving do and I saw you in the corridor and I asked you to come along …’

‘You were wearing red,’ Anton easily recalled. ‘You were with Emily.’

‘That’s right, it was for her leaving do. Well, even when I asked if you wanted to come along, I deep down knew that you wouldn’t. I was just …’ She couldn’t really explain. ‘I was just flirting again … sort of safe in the knowledge that it wouldn’t go anywhere.’

‘But it has,’ Anton said.

‘I guess.’ Louise smiled. ‘Have you ever been married?’ Louise asked.

‘Why do you ask?’

‘I just wondered.’

‘No,’ Anton said. ‘Have you?’

‘God, no,’ Louise said.

‘Have you ever come close?’

‘No,’ Louise admitted.

‘You and Rory?’

Louise laughed and shook her head. ‘We were only together a few weeks. Just when we started going out I found that it was likely that I was going to have issues getting pregnant. It was terrible timing because it was all I could think about. Poor Rory, he started going out with a happy person and when the doctor broke the news I just plunged into despair. It wasn’t his baby I wanted, just the thought I might never have one. It was just all too much for him …’ She looked at Anton. ‘I think I was just low at that time and that’s why I must have taken my bastard alert glasses off. I’ve made a few poor choices with men since then.’ She closed her eyes. ‘None worse than Wesley, though.’

‘How bad did it get?’ Anton asked, but Louise couldn’t go there and she shook her head.