200 Harley Street: Girl from the Red Carpet

Her brain was ready to drift back to the office. To the feel of the hard planes of his chest against her firm breasts.

She pushed the gearstick into reverse and looked at him sideways. ‘The car was from my father. I’d like to think he spent hours thinking about it, but the reality is his PA probably picked the make, model and colour and all he had to do was sign the cheque.’

She pulled out into the street. It was practically empty at this time in the morning and her natural instinct was to floor it. Talking about her parents brought out the worst in her.

Iain surprised her. He let out a deep, hearty laugh. She glanced over, raising her eyebrows in surprise.

‘So you’re a cynic, then, Lexi Robbins. I never had you down for that. I thought you lived a remarkably charmed life.’

Her instant reaction was to bristle and put him promptly in his place. But this was her chance to work on him—not alienate him. Plus with that face she was still curious as to why a man as hard working and good looking as Iain didn’t have someone to rush home to. Why on earth would anyone like him want to sleep at the clinic? It just didn’t make sense.

‘I know you’ve been avoiding me. I’m not an idiot, you know.’

‘I’m sorry. I just don’t have the time. And to be honest, I can’t really see the point. Get someone else to do it. Someone who likes a bit of the limelight on them.’

‘Like who, Ethan?’

She let the question hang in the air. If Iain was prickly then Ethan Hunter was a floating underwater mine.

A former soldier, who was still recuperating from an injury he really refused to acknowledge. His heart was in the right place and he was committed to all the charity work the clinic was involved in—most of it he’d referred himself. But putting Ethan on screen for the clinic’s publicity would be a complete no-no. She’d already tried to interview him twice with no success. Ethan just wasn’t a people person.

Whatever had happened in his past meant he just wasn’t ready for this kind of thing, and Lexi knew enough about people to know when to leave it alone. Hence her relentless pursuit of Iain. He was her current golden goose—whether he liked it or not.

Iain eventually let out a long sigh. ‘Okay. Agreed, Ethan probably isn’t the best person right now. He asked me to be involved in his charity work and obviously I agreed—who wouldn’t? I can make a real difference to some of those patients’ lives. I’m happy to help. I’m happy to give up my time and do the surgery free. It’s just the rest of the stuff I don’t like so much.’

Lexi lifted her hands off the steering-wheel of the car and made quote marks with her fingers in the air. ‘You mean the “rest of the stuff” like me?’

Iain ran his fingers through his dark hair. It was obvious he was tired and she was putting him on the spot. But maybe, just maybe, in a moment of weakness he would relent and agree to what she wanted.

She indicated and turned the car into the nearest street. It would only be a few more minutes before they reached Iain’s townhouse. It was time to turn the screw. ‘I don’t think you understand how hard I’m working at all this, Iain. You might do the surgery for free, but what about everything else? We need to pay for theatre time, equipment use, other staff salaries and all the aftercare. We need the publicity to raise funds for all other aspects of the charity work. These interviews are really important.

‘Leo has just agreed to take on another charity for one of his friends. Did he talk to you about Fair Go—Olivia Fairchild’s charity? She’s doing some stellar work in Africa. There are children out there who really need our help. Kids who’ve been victims of the violence—victims of war. The kind of kids who fall through the cracks. Their conditions aren’t life-threatening or emergencies—but think of the difference we could make to their lives by doing what in this country would be seen as basic surgery. If we can do some interviews with staff members, focus on their special skills and surgeries, get the information out there for the world and media to see, it could really raise the profile of the Hunter Clinic. The more international customers we have, the more disposable income the clinic can use to help aid these charities.

‘The Hunter Clinic has finally managed to regain its reputation and polish. Things are looking even better now people know that Leo and Ethan are working together. It does wonders for the whole ethos of the place. Just think, Iain, if a clinic that’s known as the best of the best is going all out for some of these charities, don’t you think that will make people stop and think? It’ll make people look more closely at these charities and wonder what they could do to help too. That’s exactly the kind of publicity that they need, Iain. This isn’t just about your surgical skills and time, it’s about the bigger picture. It’s about what everyone else can do to help.’

She couldn’t stop the enthusiasm and passion that was coming through in her voice. She was excited just thinking about this and the huge realm of possibilities. She could tell she was getting to him. He wasn’t so quick to answer back, as if he were mulling over what she’d just said. Exactly the way she’d hoped he would.

Her brain was whirring again and her tongue itching to fill the silence in the car. But this was exactly the time to be quiet. To leave him with no excuse but to mull it over.

She changed gear and her hand brushed against his thigh. Wow. Now there were a hundred reasons for a girl not to concentrate on the road.

For a second she felt a little panicked. She could smell him. His scent was invading her senses and she was starting to feel swamped by his presence in her car. She could remember his firm hands on her shoulders, holding her down on the couch. It had been terrifying. All rational thought had flown out of the window.

Of course it had to have been Iain. He was the person she’d been hunting for in the clinic—who else could it possibly have been?

And once the terror had left her, all she’d been left with had been the whoosh.

That feeling of being close to a man again. How long had it been since she’d let a man touch her? And how much had her senses fired in Iain’s powerful arms?

She tried to shake the intimate thoughts from her head. She was a professional. She had a job to do. And Iain McKenzie was part of that job.

Her PR head started to buzz. Should she have concerns about Iain McKenzie? Why on earth was one of their top surgeons sleeping at the clinic? She’d read the information in his personnel file. She knew he was originally from Edinburgh and had a broad general experience before specialising in plastics. He’d printed several professional papers, spoke at conferences and conducted scientific clinical studies into different techniques for various types of plastic surgery. Technically, he was brilliant.

So why did she feel as if something was wrong? More importantly, why did it make her stomach twist?

That was the thing about Iain’s personnel file. There was hardly a ‘personal’ thing in it. All professional. It just didn’t sit right with her.

She pulled up outside his townhouse.

‘How did you know where I stay, Lexi? I never told you.’

The frown was etched on his brow again. If he wasn’t careful it would become a permanent fixture.

She smiled. ‘I’m the Head of PR, Iain. I know everything about everybody.’ She looked up at the dark townhouse. It wasn’t exactly welcoming.

Bleak and sombre. A bit like Iain.

She’d expected him to more or less jump from the car the second they arrived but he didn’t. He sat for a few moments then turned to face her. With so little space between them in the car she was almost afraid to turn round.

‘I appreciate what you’re trying to do for the charities. Really, I do, Lexi. And if Leo hired you then he must think you’re good at your job.’

‘And you don’t?’ Was that the implication? Because that train of thought alarmed her.

He shook his head and lifted his hand. ‘Don’t be so defensive. What exactly is it you want from me?’

She took a deep breath. Finally. She was going to get somewhere with him.

‘I want to shadow you for a few days. See your consultations with patients. Watch you perform surgery. Once I’ve had a chance to get to see the real you, I’ll interview you on camera. It will work better that way, I’ll know you—you’ll know me. The interview will go more smoothly.’

He frowned. ‘That’s a bit more in-depth than I expected. I can’t have you disturbing things with my patients. If they don’t want you around you have to leave.’ His words were absolutely definite.

She nodded quickly. ‘Agreed.’

‘And I’ll need my patients’ consent for you to watch any surgeries.’

‘Will that be difficult?’

He let out a slow stream of air through his lips. ‘Not tomorrow it won’t. I’m performing surgery on Aida Atkins. You know how fame-hungry she is. She’ll be falling all over herself at the mere thought of some publicity for herself.’ He paused. ‘You signed a confidentiality agreement when you started at the clinic?’

She nodded.

‘I think you’ll find with Aida Atkins you may as well throw it out the window.’

Aida Atkins. The latest model-cum-actress-cum-trophy wife. Lexi had seen more of them than she’d eaten home-cooked meals. Hardly difficult.

‘This publicity is really about the clinic, the work you do and the associated charities.’

‘Aida won’t care. If she gets her five minutes of fame she’ll be happy. Her type are all the same.’

‘What does that mean?’ There was a horrible little gnawing feeling at the pit of her stomach. She could almost predict what he was about to say.

‘Vain. Pretentious. Fixed ideas about what a perfect body should look like.’

‘If you feel like that, why are you operating on her?’

‘Because it’s what she wants. Because she’s medically and psychologically competent to make a decision about surgery and she’s not an anaesthetic risk. As simple as that.’

Lexi could feel a wave of disappointment sweep over her body. Was that what he thought about all his plastic-surgery clients? That they were all superficial and vain? Was that what he thought about her because she’d had a boob job?

He shook his head as if he realised his words sounded unnecessarily harsh. ‘Wait until tomorrow. You’ll understand then. There’s a reason I’m doing Aida’s surgery instead of a general plastic surgeon.’

Iain put his hand on the door handle. ‘Princess Catherine’s. Seven a.m. tomorrow. And bring something to eat. It will be a long day.’ It took him a few seconds to release his long legs from the foot well. He straightened up and pulled some house keys from his pocket.

She watched as he looked over at the house. There was no look of relief to finally be home. More a look of resignation. He bent back down. ‘Thanks for the lift, Lexi. See you tomorrow.’ Then he slammed the door and trudged up his steps.

Lexi took a deep breath. There was so much more hidden behind the handsome façade of Iain McKenzie. The question was, how much did she want to find out?

CHAPTER THREE

THE DARKNESS PERVADED him as soon as he set foot in his house. It was such a shame as it was a beautiful home and, in theory, all his dark memories should have been left behind in Edinburgh.

Coming to London was supposed to be the start of something new for him. He just couldn’t seem to shake off the big black thundercloud of guilt that hung permanently above his head.

He flicked on a light and looked out at the road. Lexi hadn’t pulled away yet. Should he have invited her in? Had he been impolite? It had been so long since he’d done any of the social niceties with women that he’d probably forgotten what most of them were.

He watched as she indicated and pulled out onto the quiet street. It was after midnight. If he’d invited her in it might have been misconstrued as something else entirely. And whether he admitted it or not, he was trying to avoid the woman who was causing uncomfortable flarings in his libido, not invite her into his home.

He paused at the dark polished sideboard, which held a photograph of himself and his wife, Bonnie. They were sitting on the grass in their garden in Edinburgh, her back leaning against him and his arms wrapped around her enlarged abdomen. Bonnie had the most contented look on her face. The look of a woman who had finally got the thing she’d always dreamed of. They both looked like that, but Iain knew the truth behind that photo.

One of his friends had suggested he put that picture away. A friend who’d been close enough to both of them to know what had actually happened.

But Iain couldn’t do that. His guilt didn’t matter. This was still his favourite picture of them both. They looked so relaxed. They looked so happy. As if they had their whole lives ahead of them.

If only he’d known …

His fingers touched the glass in front of the photograph. ‘Three years, Bonnie,’ he whispered. And not a single day had gone by that he hadn’t thought of her.

They’d been childhood sweethearts. Destined to be together for ever. Or so they had thought.

When Leo Hunter had pursued him to work at the Hunter Clinic he’d thought the guy was crazy. His world had just collapsed around him and Leo had wanted him to up sticks and move to another part of the country?

But Leo had understood him better than he’d understood himself. He’d known he would never be able to pull himself up if he stayed in the family home, with the same work colleagues with their averted eyes and sad expressions. The move to London had been exactly what he’d needed at the time. Apart from Leo, no one knew about his wife. He’d skirted around the edges of any potentially difficult conversations, avoiding any personal details.

London was easy to lose yourself in. And the clientele coming to and from the Hunter Clinic had more to worry about than the personal background of their surgeon. And it was better that way. It really was.

Iain walked into his vast kitchen and pulled a glass from the cupboard, pressing it against the dispenser on his stainless-steel fridge. A beautiful kitchen that he hardly used. Just like the rest of this house.

He climbed the staircase to his bedroom, peeled off his jacket, trousers, shirt and tie, not bothering to hang them up. He’d have to be up in a few hours to get to Princess Catherine’s for surgery and he had a whole rail of identical business suits in the cupboard.

He sank into the bed with white Egyptian cotton sheets. Praying that tonight—even for a few hours—he might get a few hours’ precious sleep.

But it wasn’t to be.

It seemed that it wasn’t only the scent of Lexi Robbins that had pervaded his memory. He sat bolt upright in bed, sweat pouring from his body.

This was why he’d purposefully been avoiding Lexi Robbins.

He’d known it. Right from the first time he’d seen her and he’d felt a skitter of impulses across his shoulders that he couldn’t be around her. He couldn’t be near her.

He leant forward and wiped the sweat from his brow. Erotic dreams weren’t the norm for Iain. But when Lexi’s firm breasts had pressed against the planes of his chest it had left an indelible imprint. Not just on his skin.

Those tiny, fleeting thoughts that hadn’t even taken up a second in his brain when he’d had her pressed down on the examination couch had just taken front and centre stage in his mind in all their erotic beauty. Dreams like that had more than one obvious effect on the body.

He’d never be able to look Lexi Robbins in the eye today. It was almost as if he could smell her here, now.

He jumped from the bed and walked through to the en suite, flicking the switch on the shower then coming back and gulping the glass of water at the side of his bed. Was he going crazy? He could smell Lexi Robbins.

Then he remembered how close they’d been. He snatched his crumpled shirt from the floor and pressed it to his nose. There. Not the smell of his own aftershave. The smell of her.

That heady, exotic smell that left an invisible pied-piper trail wherever she went. That was what had caused the dream. Nothing else.

The shirt had been lying at his bedside and her scent had obviously drifted up and around him while he’d slept. How could this woman find a way into his dreams?

Guilt flooded through him, seeping in through every pore on his body. The hot sweat instantly turned cold, chilling his skin. Bonnie. That’s who he should have been dreaming about. No one else.

Steam was starting to billow from the shower. He stalked back through and instantly turned the switch to cold. That was what he needed. Icy, cold, blasting water to wash away any unwanted thoughts or feelings.

He stepped into the freezing water, shuddering as it came into contact with his skin. There was no point going back to sleep now.

Not if Lexi Robbins was going to feature in his dreams again.

CHAPTER FOUR

‘MORNING, MORNING.’ LEXI nodded at the sea of faces in and around the theatres at Princess Catherine’s, or Kate’s, where the Hunter Clinic had an arrangement to perform adult surgery. Children’s surgery was carried out at the Lighthouse Children’s Hospital.

Lexi had thought she’d be in good stead, turning up early. But early seemed to be normal in the theatres here.

She’d followed all the instructions carefully. Even though she wouldn’t be near any patients, she’d removed the nail varnish from her fingernails, ensured her face was scrubbed clean of any make-up and left her perfume and jewellery at home. She didn’t want to give Iain McKenzie any reason not to let her shadow him today.

And her stomach was churning a little. Nerves. Lots of them. Most of the world saw Lexi Robbins as a together, sorted woman. She didn’t reveal the insecure woman that hid away underneath. The person who was horrified to be here with a bare face and pulled-back hair.

It was odd, but she felt strangely safe here. No paparazzi were going to jump out from a corner and snap her, showing the world she wasn’t as beautiful as her mother. No one here cared. Everyone here had one purpose in mind—excellent patient care. It was almost a relief to know she could fade into the background.

Kate’s was buzzing. There was a rainbow of coloured scrubs around her. She’d been under the illusion that everyone wore the same-coloured scrubs, but Kate’s had scrubs in every colour, shape and size. One of the theatre nurses had pointed her to a laundry cupboard and told her to help herself. So she had, and she was currently sporting pale pink scrubs and white clogs.

‘Ready?’

The deep voice behind her made her jump. ‘Oh, Iain. Great. I was waiting for you.’

The words seemed to come out all wrong and she could feel the colour rushing into her face. She might have guessed it. Even dressed in navy scrubs there was no disguising his broad frame and muscles. If she was going to have to watch that muscled back all day she might as well just go and lie down in a corner now.

‘I’ve already spoken to Aida. She signed a disclaimer. She’s more than happy for you to watch her surgery—you can even film it if you like.’

Lexi cleared her throat. ‘Actually, it’s you we would be filming, Iain. We don’t intend to focus on the patient. Just let people see your expertise at work.’

‘Whatever.’ He gave a shrug and pushed open the door to the theatre. ‘After you …’

She nodded and brushed past his arm as he held the door open for her. No contact. That’s what she’d been telling herself all night. Seems like she’d broken her first rule already.

She tried to back herself into a corner as the rest of the staff moved in perfect unison around the theatre. Iain and one of his colleagues scrubbing meticulously at the sinks. The nurses opening up theatre packs, the anaesthetist and his assistant bringing Aida into Theatre and talking to her quietly and calmly as they put her under.

Lexi could feel herself holding her breath as the drapes were placed around Aida and her skin cleaned with betadine. Wow. Scars like she’d never seen before.

Iain’s brown eyes connected with hers above his mask. He nodded towards her. ‘Step a little closer, Lexi.’

Her feet moved forward, even though her body wanted to remain pinned against the wall.

‘This is the reason that Aida isn’t being operated on by a general plastic surgeon.’ His gloved hand pointed at her scarring. ‘She has significant scarring caused by her previous surgery. This operation isn’t just about replacing her implants, it’s about reducing the scarring and trying to give her the best possible outcome.’

Lexi nodded behind her mask. ‘Why does she have scars like that?’

Iain spoke slowly. ‘All patients react differently to surgery. Some form thick, keloid scars, others hypertrophic scars like these. It’s to do with collagen in the skin. The most important aspect for Aida isn’t what I do today—although that’s obviously important—it’s more about her aftercare to minimise scarring.’

‘But if she’s prone to scarring, is there anything you can do to avoid it?’

‘We’ll monitor Aida very closely. We can use various things after surgery to reduce inflammation and scarring. A series of steroid injections might be appropriate or silicone gel sheeting used to flatten the scar. Aida knows that she has to follow my instructions to the letter for her aftercare. It was the only reason I agreed to do her surgery in the first place.’

Lexi could feel the hairs rise at the back of her neck. Iain wasn’t joking. She could just imagine how stern he’d been with Aida before agreeing to her surgery. The scarring was a complete surprise to her. She was sure she’d seen semi-naked pictures of Aida before, and nothing had been noticeable. How had she managed that?

Of course. The beauty of photographic touch-ups. She knew better than anyone how fickle the beauty industry was. As long as they got the picture they wanted it didn’t matter how they got it—or whether it was an accurate portrayal of the person or not.

Her feet moved slowly backwards, edging towards the wall again. She wished she’d known about the surgery beforehand and had given herself a little time to prepare. Watching breast surgery and having breast surgery were two entirely different things. In a way she was glad she’d slept through her own surgery and had never had to think too much about it all. She had to press her hands against the cool wall to stop herself automatically lifting them and holding them against her breasts.

She glanced downwards. There they were. Perfect, in every way.

If only she’d got them because she’d wanted them and not because someone else had criticised her. It almost made her feel like a fool.

But she was stronger now. More resilient.

She was happy with her shape and regardless of anyone else’s opinion she had more confidence like this.

Iain’s concentration was intense in Theatre. Woe betide anyone who interrupted the master at work. But the theatre staff were comfortable with him, obviously used to his techniques and procedures. He hardly needed to utter an instruction.

The surgery flew past. Quickly followed by another, more standard breast enlargement. He turned to face her as he scrubbed for yet another surgery.

‘Now would be a good time to grab a quick bite,’ he said to Lexi.

As if on cue, her stomach gave a low rumble. ‘Haven’t you finished yet?’

He shook his head. ‘Not by a long shot. I’ve got some reconstructive surgery to do on a professional football player’s knee and then some facial surgery on a lady with head and neck cancer. That one will last around four hours.’

Lexi tried to stop her jaw from hitting the floor when she realised exactly how long Iain would be in Theatre. ‘I didn’t know you did things like that. If that surgery will take so long, shouldn’t it have been done first?’