as sweetly as he could, he leaned into that soft, sweet-smelling spot at the nape of her neck. ‘Okay, we’re at work, and it doesn’t feel right, that’s fine. But listen, I have a kidney on its way from Dargaville. And a recipient driving up from Cambridge. I have to operate. Today. Or both the kidney and the patient will die. But I will be free after that.’
‘So?’
‘So, you are six hours away from the best sex of your life. Do not walk away from me now.’
‘You have no respect.’ Pinching his hand with her free fingernails, she sent jarring spiky pains through his skin.
‘Ouch. What the...?’
Grabbing his moment of weakness as an opportunity, she wrenched her fingers out of his. Shoved her fists on her hips and looked at him the way his uncle used to. A long time ago, but he still felt that familiar sting of shame, usually two seconds before he’d felt the sting of the belt. He was expecting the must try harder retort. He’d clearly disappointed her and he didn’t know why.
She scowled at him. ‘You don’t want a relationship, Max. That I can understand. You don’t want to commit. I get that too, I really do.’
‘So what’s your problem?’
‘Your problem is I will not be left waiting naked in bed...only to hear you describe me as “nothing important”.’
He would have reached out to her again but valued his intact skin too much. ‘You thought I meant you?’
‘You did mean me. Us. Spending the day in bed.’
‘I didn’t mean it like that. It was a slip of the tongue.’
‘It came out all too easily, Max. And as I lay there naked and waiting, I got to thinking. I thought I was happy with our arrangement. It was fun, it sounded like a good idea. All grown up and sassy.’ Her shoulders slumped forward a little and her voice got smaller. ‘But I’ve never done anything like that before. I’m just not cut out to have sex and walk away.’
‘You managed it quite well before.’
Her eyes blazed. ‘But don’t you see? I didn’t manage it at all. It was a mistake. I thought it was the kind of sophisticated Auckland thing to do. I thought I could walk away unscathed, but I can’t. I can’t treat you like that and I definitely deserve more respect. I’m not a toy and I’m not going to be treated as nothing.’
‘Whoa. I didn’t realize. I messed up pretty big, didn’t I?’ He’d blown it. Acted like a jerk, trying too hard to please Jodi, look after Jamie, rise in his brother’s unforgiving eyes. And had hurt Gabby in the process. Not realised that, despite her bravado, in reality she needed more from him. Trouble was, he didn’t know if he was capable of giving it. ‘I’m sorry, Gabby.’
‘Yes, me too. But it wasn’t working.’
He’d heard those words before. Too many times. And each time he’d thought it was someone else’s problem. Not his.
But maybe she had a point. A small one. And worse, this time he didn’t want to lose this thing they had. Sure, he was going soppy in his old age, but he liked having her around. Hell, he ached to have her around. He wanted to fall asleep with her, wake up with her again. He liked the way she added colour to his apartment. She just needed to be convinced. ‘We can fix this.’
‘I don’t think so, Max. Not by taking me to bed again or having a quickie over my office desk. That won’t work.’
‘Then what would?’
She stalked away, her words trailing back to him on a hiss. ‘Hell, if you can’t work it out with all those fancy medical qualifications, you are six hours away from missing the best sex of your life.’
Atta girl. He smiled as he watched her retreat. He was not going to miss out on that sex for anything. Challenge was his middle name. And that was the kind of gauntlet he could run.
Six hours, three minutes and fourteen seconds later, Gabby carefully placed the last of her blue boxes into the bottom of her wardrobe with a heavy heart and dashed to answer the door.
‘You’re late,’ she said, to the thick green spiky bush bristling outside on her porch. She wouldn’t admit to the ridiculous rabble of butterflies flexing their wings in her stomach.
But... What. The. Hell? He’d actually thought about what she’d said. That he’d even turned up was an amazing step forward. That he’d come