I’m not scared, she told herself, but she swallowed.
Guess he was still seething from yesterday, then. ‘Waiting for you.’
‘Why are you rifling my desk?’
She raised her eyebrows, outwardly calm. ‘Hardly rifling when it was all open for me to see.’
He stepped into the room and the space around her shrank to a quarter of the size. Funny what the aura of some people could do. ‘Not for you to see.’
Evie stood her ground. ‘Afraid I might suggest you consider it again?’ She paused. ‘So at least you’ve read it?’
He ignored that. ‘I’ve read it. And I don’t want to talk about it.’
She stepped around the desk until she was standing beside him. This man who infuriated and inspired and drove her insane with frustration and, she had to admit, a growing love and need to see him happy.
‘It’s a choice, Finn. One you’re going to have to consider.’
His voice grated harshly. His face was set like stone. ‘Now you want to look after me? One episode of good sex is all it took?’
She ignored that. Ignored the splinter of pain that festered inside from his contempt. Banished the pictures of him showing her the door afterwards.
‘Hippocratic oath,’ he mocked. ‘Save your patient.’
‘You’re not my patient.’ She met his eyes. Chin up. ‘Just think about it.’
His eyes narrowed further. ‘Why should you care?’
‘Because I do.’ She touched his arm and the muscles were bunched and taut beneath her fingers. ‘Is that so hard to believe?’
He shook her off. ‘I look after myself. Had to all my life and it’s never going to change.’
She took his hand and held it firmly. Looked into his face. ‘Tell me.’
He looked down but this time he didn’t pull away. ‘Tell you what?’
She shook his arm. ‘Finn. For God’s sake, let me in.’ Finally he seemed to get it. A glimmer of understanding of what she wanted to know. Why she wanted to know.
‘What?’ A scornful laugh not directed at her for a change. ‘The whole sob story?’
Evie didn’t move. ‘Yes. Please.’
He sighed. Her hand fell away as he turned and stared out over the harbour and when he started his voice was flat, emotionless, daring her to be interested in his boring tale. ‘Why would you want this? You probably know most of it. Orphan. Unstable foster-homes. The army was my best parenting experience and they don’t do affection or connection.’
A sardonic laugh that grated on her ears. ‘Maybe that’s why I fitted so well.’
She wanted to hug him. ‘You did connection okay the other night.’
She saw his frown from across the room. ‘Don’t go there, Evie.’ She flinched and he sighed. ‘Do you want to hear or not?’
She held up her hands. ‘Please.’
This time he turned to look at her fully and she watched the muscle jerk in his cheek as he held emotion rigidly in check. She wanted to cradle his head in her hands but she was too scared to interrupt him. Too scared she’d stop the flow she’d waited so long for him to start.
‘You know about Isaac. I had to watch my brother die. The same bomb that tore into me, which is wrecking my career now, took his life. The day Isaac died I died too, Evie. Since then, what little ability I had to love, I lost. And with Isaac gone I lost the only person who really cared what happened to me.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s why I am what I am. I don’t want to be around someone when I feel like that.’
She took a step towards him. Aware how much it would hurt if at this moment he rebuffed her. ‘You don’t have to feel like that, Finn.’
Sardonic sweep of eyebrows. Daring her to contradict him. ‘Don’t I?’
‘No.’ Closer.
‘Why’s that, Evie?’ The biting sarcasm was back but she refused to be put off by it. Toughened herself because she would never be cowed by this angry man who frightened others to keep them at bay.
Another step. ‘I care what happens to you, Finn.’
Vehement shake of his head. ‘Don’t pity me, Evie.’
She almost laughed. ‘You’re not a man anyone can pity, Finn. You won’t allow it. You alienate people so they don’t. But unfortunately I feel so much more for you than that.’
She swallowed, tossed caution to the winds, stepped closer and stared into his face so he couldn’t ignore her words. ‘I love you, Finn Kennedy. And there’s not a lot of reward for that at the moment.’
A more subtle shake of the head. ‘How can you love me?’
Now she was in front of him again. ‘How can I not, you stupid man? I think about you every minute of every day, wondering when you’re going to care for yourself like you should.’
He sidestepped her, crossed the room to shut the door, shut out the hospital for probably the first time since he’d started here, and then came back. Put himself in her space deliberately.
‘What are you saying, Evie?’
‘I love you. Foul temper and all.’
His hands slid around her waist. ‘I didn’t ask for that.’ Something in his voice had changed. Gave her a glimmer of hope.
‘You didn’t ask for it?’ She stared into the harsh and haunted face she loved so much. ‘Neither did I. But there’s not a lot we can do about it now.’
His face softened just a little. ‘So you weren’t just after sex the other day?’
This was what she dreaded. ‘What do you think, Finn? Did it feel like that to you?’ She’d laid herself open, exposed her soft underbelly of caring, and he could mortally wound her, even worse than he had after she’d given herself to him.
He lifted his hand and stroked the hair out of her eyes. ‘No.’ He sighed. ‘Though God knows why you bother. What I felt the other day scared the hell out of me, Evie. And that’s not all I’m scared of. I’m scared I’m not the man you think I am.’
‘Well, seeing that I don’t want to be without you, Finn, we’ll just have to take that chance. Whatever happens, I’m here for you. And always will be.’
He shook his head. Couldn’t accept that. ‘I might not just be an emotional cripple, Evie. I could be in a wheelchair.’
She leaned towards him. ‘Or it could be the answer to all your medical problems. You could get full control back. You have to take that chance.’
‘I don’t think it’s an option.’ He sighed. ‘But I’ll think about it.’ An air of finality.
She had to be satisfied with that. It was better than they’d had before today.
THE lift doors closed after Evie left and the silence deepened with Marco and Emily alone in the lift.
Finally. ‘I’m sorry.’ Marco sighed as the elevator began its ascent. ‘I thought you had spoken about our evening out with her.’
And, boy, were you unhappy! ‘I gathered that.’ So he was that embarrassed to say he’d taken her out. Not that she wanted to be the centre of a gossip storm.
She