Special Deliveries: Wanted: A Daddy: Dr. Dark and Far Too Delicious / Royal Rescue / Father by Choice

‘You were older than Simon when your dad left,’ Louise pointed out. ‘Penny’s a good bit older than you and she was born sensible—I used to ask the neighbour to listen out for you. It was different times then,’ she admitted.

Maybe, but nothing was going to fill the well of guilt Jasmine felt leaving Simon so much and it was only going to get more complicated for him when she added a babysitter to the mix.

Still, she did her best not to worry about next week or next month, just concentrated on giving him his dinner, and when he spat it out she headed to her mum’s freezer and, yes, there were chicken nuggets. He could eat them till he was eighteen, Jasmine thought, and let go of worrying about the small stuff for five minutes, just enjoyed giving him his bath and settling him, and then got herself ready for work.

There really wasn’t time to stress about facing Jed, especially when her mum didn’t get back till after eight, and by the time she raced into work the clock was already nudging nine but, of course, he was one of the first people she saw.

It was a bit awkward but actually not as bad as she’d feared.

As she headed to the lockers Jasmine met him in the corridor and screwed up her face as she blushed and mouthed the word, ‘Sorry.’

‘Me too,’ Jed said, and possibly he too was blushing just a little bit.

‘Upset, you know,’ Jasmine said.

‘I get it.’

‘So it’s forgotten?’ Jasmine checked.

‘Forgotten,’ he agreed.

Except it wasn’t quite so easy to forget a kiss like that, Jasmine knew, because through a restless sleep she had tried.

So too had Jed.

He was a master at self-recrimination, had been furious with himself all day, and that evening, getting ready for work, he’d braced himself to face her, to be cool and aloof, yet her blush and her grin and her ‘sorry’ had sideswiped him—had actually made him laugh just a little bit on the inside.

‘I got you a present.’ Vanessa smiled as, still blushing, Jasmine walked into the locker room and peered into the bag being handed to her. It was a bottle with ribbons tied to the neck. ‘I think it should be real champagne, but sparkling wine will have to do. You can open it when you’re ready to celebrate.’

‘Thank you!’ Jasmine was touched. ‘I’ll have a drink at the weekend.’

‘I mean properly celebrate.’ Vanessa winked. ‘You can’t pop that cork till …’

‘It will be vintage by then.’ Jasmine grinned.

It was a very different night from the one before.

It was quiet and the staff took advantage. Greg, the charge nurse, put some music on at the work station and when at four a.m. there were only a few patients waiting for beds or obs, instead of telling them to restock or reorder, he opened a book as Jasmine and Vanessa checked each other’s blood sugars. They were low enough to merit another trip to the vending machine, they decided. Then they came back and checked each other’s BP.

‘It’s so low!’ Vanessa pulled a face as she unwrapped the cuff and Jasmine grinned, proud of herself for keeping her pulse and blood pressure down, with Jed sitting at the station.

He noticed how easily she laughed.

She noticed him, full stop.

Noticed that this time when she cracked open her chocolate he took a piece.

‘Do you want your blood pressure checked, Jed?’ Vanessa asked.

‘No, thanks.’

Vanessa pulled a face at his grumpy tone. ‘Do you work on it, Jed?’ It was ten past four, well into the witching hour for night nurses, a quiet night, lights blazing, the humour becoming more wicked. ‘Do you work on being all silent and moody?’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I just work.’

‘And that beard you’re growing,’ Vanessa pushed as Greg looked up and grinned, ‘is it designer stubble?’

‘No,’ Jed said patiently. ‘I went for a run when I got in from work and I was too tired to shave afterwards, and then I overslept.’

‘You’re sure about that?’ Vanessa said. ‘You’re sure you’re not a male model on the side?’

Jed had forgotten those times of late. He hadn’t partaken in chit-chat and fun for a very long time, he’d been too busy concentrating only on work. Maybe he needed a coffee, maybe his blood sugar was down, because he was kind of remembering the harmless fun he had once had at work before it had all become a nightmare.

He sat there recalling the laughs that had been part of the job and he was almost smiling as Vanessa chatted on. There was such a difference between playing and flirting. Jed had always known that, he’d just forgotten how to mix the two of late, had lost one for fear of the other, but the atmosphere tonight was kind of bringing it back.

‘When you go to the hairdresser’s, do you ask them to leave that bit of fringe?’ Vanessa teased. ‘Just so it can fall over your eye?’

As he turned, Jasmine waited for a frown, for a sharp word, for a brusque put-down, but her smirking grin turned to a delighted one as he flopped his fringe forward, pouted his lips and looked over their shoulders in a haughty model pose.

And then as they screamed in laughter and even Greg did too, Jed got back to his notes.

Enough fun for one night, Jed told himself.

Except he’d set them off and now they were walking like models.

Greg was joining in too as he filled in the board, standing with one hand on his hip and talking in deliberately effeminate tones. Jed tried not to smile, not notice as he usually managed to—he had just blocked out this side of Emergency, had chosen to ignore the black humour and frivolity that sometimes descended.

And yet somehow it was coming back.

Somehow he was starting to remember that it wasn’t all just about work.

And Jed knew why.

It was just that he didn’t want to know why.

‘I’m going for a sleep.’ He stood. ‘Call me if anything comes in or at six if it stays quiet.’

He could hear them laughing as he tried to rest.

And whatever they were doing it must be funny because he even heard the po-faced nursing supervisor, who must be doing her rounds, start to laugh.

Jed turned on the white noise machine but still he couldn’t sleep.

He could do without this!

‘Morning, sunshine!’ Greg rapped on the door at six, but Jed was awake. He rolled out of bed and brushed his teeth, headed out, took a few bloods and discharged a couple of patients, and wished the place would pick up.

He got one query appendicitis and one very grumpy old man called Ken Jones. He had a chronically infected leg ulcer, which was being dressed by a visiting nurse twice a week, but he had decided at five-thirty a.m. that it was time to do something about it and had called an ambulance. He was very grubby and unkempt and had his radio with him, which was tuned in to a chat show.

‘What’s his blood sugar?’

‘Eight,’ Jasmine said.

‘You’re taking all your diabetic medication, Ken?’ Jed checked.

‘I just do what I’m told.’

‘Okay.’ Jed had already carefully examined the man and his leg and he chatted to him for a little while. ‘I’m going to get the medics to come down and have a look at you,’ Jed said, ‘but it might take a while. We’re really quiet down here but I know they’re very busy up on the ward, so you might have to stay with us for a while. And we could look at the dressings nurse to come and have a good look at your wound and maybe try something new.’

‘Up to you.’

‘It could be a few hours,’ Jed said.

‘I don’t make a fuss.’

Jed grinned as he walked out. ‘He’ll be ringing up the radio station to complain about how long he has to wait soon.’

‘Does he really need to see the medics?’

‘Probably not,’ Jed said. ‘Penny will probably clear him out by eight, but …’ he gave a shrug, ‘… the old boy’s lonely, isn’t he? Anyway, he could do with a good looking over, his chest is a bit rattly and he’s a bit dry. I’ll run some bloods.’

‘I’ll order him breakfast,’ Jasmine yawned.

She ordered a breakfast from the canteen and then checked on the query appendicitis. His drip was about through so she headed over to the IV room. When she swiped her card and saw that Jed was in there, sorting out his trolley to take the bloods, she nearly turned and ran.

But that would be making a big deal of things so instead she stepped in.

‘We need to talk,’ Jed said without looking up from his task.

‘No we don’t,’ Jasmine said. ‘Really, it’s fine.’

‘Sure about that?’ Jed said, and then looked over.

And, no, she wasn’t sure about that because the ghost of their kiss was there in the room. She could see the exact spot where he’d pressed her to the wall, feel again every feeling she had yesterday—except the anger, except the upset.

‘What about we meet for coffee after work?’ he suggested.

‘People will see,’ Jasmine said. ‘You know what this place is like.’ She certainly didn’t want a hint of this getting back to Penny.

‘I meant away from the hospital. Just to talk.’

She shook her head. She’d hardly slept yesterday and had to work tonight as well as stop by her mum’s at five and give Simon his dinner.

‘I just want to go to bed.’ She opened her mouth to correct herself and thankfully they both actually laughed.

‘I really,’ Jasmine said slowly, ‘and I mean really am in no position to start something. I know people say that, but I’ve got a whole lot of things to sort out before …’ She shook her head. ‘I’m not going there.’

‘I get that,’ Jed said. ‘Believe me, I had no intention of getting involved with someone at work but yesterday, hell, these past weeks …’ He wondered how something he had spent all yesterday regretting should be something he would happily do again right this minute.

‘Is that why you’ve been so horrible?’

‘I haven’t,’ he said, then conceded, ‘Maybe a bit. We need to talk, maybe clear the air—because if we don’t—’

‘If we don’t,’ Jasmine interrupted, ‘we’re going to be caught making out in the IV cupboard.’ She gave him a grin. ‘And I have no intention of going there again.’

Except she was lying.

She was looking at his mouth as she said it.

And he was looking at hers.

Had Greg not come in, that was exactly what would have happened and they both knew it.

Yes, the air needed clearing.

CHAPTER EIGHT

‘WHY IS HE waiting for the medics?’

Despite not having to start till eight, Penny was in at a quarter to seven, standing and staring at the admission board and determined to make the most of a rare opportunity to clear the board and start her working day with not a single patient.

‘He’s brewing something.’ Jed shrugged.

‘We’re not a holding pen,’ Penny said. ‘I’ll get the nurses to order him transport home.’

‘Let him have his breakfast at least.’

‘Of course he can have his breakfast—by the time transport gets here he’ll probably have had lunch as well.’ She glanced briefly at a weary Jed. ‘You look awful.’

‘It’s easier when it’s busy,’ Jed yawned.

‘Go home,’ she said.

‘I might just do that.’ And then he looked at Penny, who was rather determinedly not turning round to face him, just staring fixedly at the board. ‘Speaking of looking awful …’ he waited till she reluctantly turned to face him and he saw her red swollen eye ‘… what happened?’

‘I walked into a branch.’

‘Ouch.’ Jasmine walked over just as he was taking a look.

‘Ooh.’ She winced when she saw Penny’s red eye. ‘Penny, what happened?’ And then she remembered she wasn’t supposed to be her sister.

‘My neighbour’s tree overhangs,’ she said darkly. ‘Though it won’t by the time I get home—I’ve left them a note, telling them what’s happened and that they’d better cut it.’

Jasmine could just imagine she had, and what was in it. And she could picture the branch, too, and Penny’s gorgeous old neighbours who would be so upset.

Trust Penny to handle things so sensitively!

Of course she said nothing.

‘I’ll have a look,’ Jed said, and went to buzz Reception to get Penny an admission card.

‘I don’t need to be registered,’ Penny snapped. ‘It’s just a scratch.’

‘A nasty scratch on your cornea,’ Jed confirmed a few minutes later. Penny was sitting at the nurses’ station and Jed had put some fluorescein drops into her eye. It made her eye bright yellow but any scratches showed up green. ‘You need antibiotic drops and to keep it covered. When was your last tetanus booster?’

‘I can’t remember,’ Penny said. ‘I’m sure I’m up to date.’

‘Penny?’ Jed checked, as Jasmine walked in.

‘Ken Jones just spiked a temp—his temp’s thirty-eight point nine.’

‘I’ll do cultures.’ Jed grinned, and Penny rolled her tongue in her cheek because now the old boy would have to be admitted.

‘I’ll do them,’ she sighed.

‘Not yet,’ Jed yawned. ‘I’ll just give you your tetanus shot.’

‘I’ll go to my GP.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Jed said, already opening a trolley and pulling out a syringe.

It was then that Jasmine had to say something.

‘I’ll do that.’ Jasmine smiled. ‘You can do the cultures.’

‘I’ll do the cultures,’ Penny said. ‘You go home, Jed, and think about shaving.’

Jasmine said nothing, not a single word as they headed into a cubicle and Penny unbuttoned her blouse. She just handed her a wad of tissues as Penny started crying.

Penny was, as Jasmine knew only too well, petrified of needles.

Not a little bit scared, completely petrified of them, though she didn’t blink when sticking them in others.

‘If you breathe a word of this …’

She was shaking on the seat as Jasmine swabbed her arm.

‘No, wait!’ Penny said.

‘For what?’ Jasmine said, sticking the needle in. ‘Done.’ She smiled at her. ‘You big baby.’

‘I know, I know.’ Penny shuddered. ‘Just give me a minute, would you? Go and set up for those blood cultures.’ She had snapped straight back to being Penny, except this time Jasmine was smiling.

Jed didn’t think about shaving.

He had a shower and tried not to think about Jasmine.

And then he pulled on some running clothes and ran the length of the beach and told himself to just concentrate on work.

Only this time it didn’t work.

And he saw where she lived and her car pull up in her carport and he saw Jasmine minus an armful of Simon but holding a bottle of champagne, which confused him, and he tried to continue to run.

What on earth was he going to say to her if he knocked at her door?

At least nothing would happen, he consoled himself, as ten minutes later he found himself doing just that, because given he wasn’t exactly fresh out of the shower, there would be no repeats of yesterday.

Except she was fresh out of the shower when she opened the door and he prided himself on the fact that he did not look down, that he somehow held her eyes, even though her dressing gown did little to hide her womanly shape.

‘Bad timing?’

‘A bit.’

‘Well, I won’t keep you from your champagne.’ He didn’t want to make her laugh, except he did so, only he wasn’t here for that.

‘It’s in the fridge.’

‘Good.’

‘A present.’

‘That’s nice.’

‘Well?’ Jasmine demanded. ‘Which Jed am I talking to this morning?’ And she looked at him standing there, and she knew who it was—the beachside Jed, the man who made her smile, the Jed who had made his first appearance at work just a few hours ago.

‘I like to keep my work and personal life separate,’ he offered as way of an explanation, only it didn’t wash with Jasmine. Penny did too but she was a cow both in and out of work. Yet with Jed sometimes she felt as if she was dealing with two completely different people.

But she liked this one.

Really liked this one, and, no, maybe they weren’t going anywhere, maybe it was just all a bit much for him, she was a mother to one year old after all, but that he was here, that at this hour of the morning he stood at her door, when sensible shift workers should be firmly asleep, proved the undeniable attraction.

‘I just wanted to say that I am really sorry and that it won’t happen again. There’ll be no more inappropriateness.’

‘And it won’t happen again at this end,’ Jasmine said. ‘Nothing inappropriate …’

Jed nodded and turned to go, except she didn’t want him to. She was tired of running from the past, tired of saving for the future—she just wanted a little bit of living for now.

‘At least, not at work.’

And for two years Jed had kept things separate. Despite some temptations, he had kept fiercely to his rule.

But Jed’s rules had never been tested at this level.

Had they not kissed yesterday he might have been able to walk away.

Had he not tasted lips that were exactly suited to his, he might have headed back to the beach and then home.

But more than that, her blush and eye roll and ‘sorry’ last night, her total lack of pursuit or demands meant more to Jed than Jasmine could possibly know.

Bottom line?

They wanted each other.

Not a little bit of want, it was a morning after a sleepless nights want. It was twenty-five hours since yesterday’s kiss and for twenty-five hours it had been on both of their minds.

He walked into the hallway and his mouth met hers.

And his chin was even rougher than yesterday.

And yesterday, though their kiss had been fierce it had been tempered on both sides with bitter restraint.

But now they could have what they wanted.

Each other.

For now, at least, it could be as simple as that.

She didn’t care that he was damp from running. He smelt fresh and male and she knew what was under that T-shirt, and as she pulled it up and over his head she didn’t just get to glimpse, she got to feel, and, no, he wasn’t annoyed at the intrusion this time.

He tugged at her dressing gown as his mouth was everywhere—on her lips, on her neck and on her breasts. Meanwhile, she pulled at his shorts, because he was pressed so hard into her, and they pulled apart just enough to get to the bedroom—they weren’t in the treatment room now and they quickly celebrated the fact.

She wanted to see what she had felt and she manoeuvred his shorts and all things unnecessary and he kicked off his running shoes and stepped out of them and they were naked in seconds, and seconds from impact.

‘Condoms.’ She was on the floor, going through his shorts.

‘I don’t run with them.’ Jed laughed.

She was at eye level with his crotch as she knelt up and pressed her lips to him, pleased with a brief taste. Too selfish to continue, she dashed to her tiny bathroom and pulled the cupboard under the sink apart for condoms that were somewhere in a box she hadn’t sorted in ages.

She was uncaring as Jed watched her bottom sticking up as she searched in the cupboard and her breasts jiggling as she turned round and it was safer that he go back into the bedroom.

Oh, my.

It was all Jasmine could think as she walked back towards him, because he was better than anything she had fashioned in her mind. He was incredibly fit and toned. She should have been shy as she walked over, but shy was the furthest thing from her mind and anyway, he didn’t wait for her to finish walking—both of them were happy to collide.

He was just so into her body, so wanting, and he didn’t need to worry about speed or things moving too quickly for her because as his hands slid between her thighs and met her heat she was moaning and he was pushing her onto the bed, with Jasmine wondering where her inhibitions had gone.

She had hundreds of them, Jasmine reminded herself as he knelt over her and examined every inch of her, his eyes greedy with want.

A telephone book full of them.

Or she had, but they had just all disappeared today.

It was almost impossible to tear the packet for him.

And she found herself licking her lips as he slid it on.

She had never had sex like it.

She had never felt less mechanical in her life.

Thought had been replaced by pure sensation.

Him, she thought as he got back to kissing her.

Her, he thought as he reclaimed her mouth.

And then the power that remained sort of fused into one.

His fingers were there and she was wet and warm and wanted this just as much as he did.

‘First time since …’ She sort of braced herself and he held back and took a moment to not be selfish, even if she wanted him to be. Instead, he slid deeper into her with fingers that were skilled and frantic, and she left it to him, because he knew what he was doing. If they were quick it was mutual, if they were fast it was with begging consent.

Even with much preparation she was incredibly tense when the moment came and she willed him to ignore her. Slowly he pushed in, and she stretched and resisted and then stretched again, and he gave her a moment of stillness to get used to him inside.

Well, not really a moment because he knew he only had a few left in him but Jed left it for her to initiate movement, felt the squeeze and the pull on him as she tested herself as she moved herself up and down his long length.

Just when she thought she had adjusted, just when she pulled him in, he beat her to it and drove into her, and she met him and then he did it again and she tried to trip into his rhythm, except he was so hard and fast now it was bliss to not try, to simply let him, only it wasn’t a passive response, it was more trusting.

Jed could hear Jasmine’s moans and her urging, and he wished for a second she’d be quiet, because it made it impossible for Jed not to come, except she was starting to. He felt the lift of her hips and the arch of her into him, the feel of a slow uncurling from the inside, reluctant almost to give in to him, and then as he moaned his release she shattered.

She did, she just gave in in a way she never had, felt and delivered deeper than she ever had, and found out in that moment how much of herself she had always held back, the intensity fusing them for a moment in absolute bliss.

She lay there trying to get her breath back as he rested on top of her, and still they were one as reality slowly started to intrude.

She wasn’t ready for a relationship.

He’d sworn to not get involved with someone from work.

Penny.

Promotion.

Simon.

Single mum.

Simultaneously the real world flooded its lights onto them and they both turned looked at each other for a long moment.

‘Well,’ Jasmine said. ‘We must have both needed that.’

He laughed, actually laughed on the inside too as he had when she had mouthed ‘sorry’, and the doubts that had started hushed.

And they hushed some more as they lay in bed and drank Vanessa’s sparkling wine that hadn’t even had time to cool, and they congratulated each other on how fantastic that had been, rather than trying to work out where they were, and then she told him not what was on her mind but the truth.

‘I have to go to sleep.’

‘And me.’

‘I hardly slept yesterday.’

‘Me neither.’

‘Jed, I don’t know what happened. I don’t really know what to say.’ She was as honest as she could be. ‘I’m nowhere near ready to get involved with someone, so I don’t really know how we ended up here.’

‘I do,’ Jed admitted. ‘Why the hell do you think I’ve been avoiding you since I found out you weren’t married?’

‘What?’

He just shrugged.

‘Tell me.’

‘You just …’ He gave an embarrassed grin. ‘Well, you know when you’re attracted to someone? I suppose when I saw you talking to Penny and then she said you were here for an interview and then someone called you Mrs Phillips, well, I was relieved you were spoken for.’

Jasmine frowned.

‘I don’t like mixing work with things and thought I might have trouble keeping to that with you—it wasn’t a logical thing, just …’