She put on her new wedges and there was a flurry of nerves in her stomach as she looked in the mirror, and then there was the most terribly unfamiliar feeling as she filled her bag not just with lipstick and breath mints but with a few condoms too.
It was so not her.
Just so against her nature.
Cate picked up Kelly and Abby and kept having to force herself to keep up with the conversation, her mind was so full of Juan.
There was a flurry of hellos as they entered the garden to the restaurant where Christine’s leaving do was being held.
They had chosen outside, not just because of the balmy heat but because thirty Emergency workers tended to be loud at the best of the times.
Cate slipped into a seat beside Louise and, although she did her best not to look over, the second she arrived she searched for him. She saw that Juan was already there. He was, of course, in the middle of the long table, sitting beside Christine and enthralling his adoring audience.
Maybe, Cate thought, all this indecision was for nothing, because he’d barely looked in her direction.
Maybe she’d said no one too many times.
‘He could have his pick, couldn’t he?’ Louise said.
‘Almost,’ Cate sighed, they both knew who she was talking about.
‘It’s a shame he’s leaving.’
‘I just don’t get the drifting-around-the-world thing,’ Cate said. ‘He wouldn’t even commit to a three-month contract. I could understand it if he was in his twenties.’
‘I don’t need three months with him…’ Louise nudged, and Cate pushed out a smile.
It was actually a very nice night—at first. The restaurant was set high on Olivers Hill and looked over Port Phillip Bay. The view was stunning and the drink was flowing a bit too freely because Christine’s laughter was getting louder and louder, the stories at the table more outrageous. Cate laughed and joined in but her heart really wasn’t in it. She just wanted to go home, not to be sitting waiting for a sliver of Juan’s attention, not to be like Christine and hanging onto his every word.
And, yes, it hurt that he hadn’t so much as spoken to her once.
It was still, at eleven p.m., unbearably warm and Cate blew up her fringe as she let out a long breath. ‘Another sleepless night, tossing and turning…’
‘Well, if you insist.’ Juan’s voice from behind her made Cate jump but she managed to answer in her usual dry fashion when she turned round. ‘In your dreams, Juan!’
He lowered his head and gave her a brief kiss on the cheek, just as a few other colleagues had, but because it was Juan he took the tease one step further. ‘Often.’
‘You don’t know when to stop, do you?’ Cate really tried not to take his flirting seriously, for pity the woman who believed that any words that slipped from those velvet lips hadn’t been used many times before.
‘I brought you a drink…’ Juan put a glass of champagne on the table.
‘It’s very nice of you, but I’m driving.’
‘You can have one.’
‘I don’t want to have one.’
‘I’ll have it.’ Louise smiled.
‘Help yourself.’
He moved into an empty seat beside her—a few of the gathering had gone to dance and once she’d finished her drink Louise drifted off to join them.
‘Are you looking forward to Monday?’ Juan asked.
‘I don’t know that much will change,’ Cate attempted.
‘Of course it will.’
‘It might only be temporary,’ Cate pointed out. ‘I might not get the job.’
‘You know you will.’ He saw the swallow in her throat. ‘Is it what you want?’
‘Of course it is.’
‘Why?’
‘Why wouldn’t I?’ She gave a small shake of her head. She wasn’t about to discuss her career with a man who had turned his back on his.
‘Have you thought about doing the sky jump?’
‘The places are all taken.’
‘You can have mine.’ Juan grinned. ‘I’d happily pay to watch you jump out of a plane. I think it would be very freeing for you.’
‘I don’t need freeing.’ Her eyes narrowed as she looked at him. ‘I don’t need a shot of adrenaline from jumping out of a plane to prove that I’m alive…’ It annoyed her that he smiled. ‘I don’t.’
‘I’m not arguing.’ Still he smiled. ‘I wish you good luck with your interview. If I come back in a couple of years, I expect you’ll be carrying a clipboard and be the new director of nursing.’
‘And what will you be doing in a couple of years?’ Cate asked, because even though he was smiling she felt there was a challenge in his tone. ‘Still roaming the globe, still doing casual shifts and not knowing where you’re going to be each day?’
‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘I try not to think that far ahead, but I am thinking ahead now—after you’ve dropped everyone off, come back to mine.’
‘Pardon?’
‘I would like to have some time to speak with you.’
‘We’re speaking now.’
‘Okay, I would like to talk to you some more.’ He would. Juan was more than aware that this might be the last time they were together and he cared enough about Cate to prolong the conversation. She clearly didn’t want his career advice, so he switched track to something a little more palatable. ‘I would like to be a bit more hot in my pursuit but I don’t think you would appreciate it. You are senior, you don’t need the Dr Juan walk of shame, so I’m inviting you to come over afterwards…’
‘Why would I come back to yours?’
‘Because, as I said when I brought your drink, I think about you often and think it is the same for you. I believe if you want something you should at least try, and so I am.’
‘I don’t think—’
‘Don’t think, then.’
She couldn’t really believe he could be so upfront about it.
‘Juan…’
‘I can’t talk too long. Christine is being a pain and I don’t want to upset her at her leaving do. We can talk some more back at mine.’
Cate excused herself and nipped out to the toilets. She wished for a guilty moment that she hadn’t when she saw Christine in there in tears. Cate really didn’t know what to say.
‘It’s hard, leaving,’ Cate attempted, ‘but you’ll still keep in touch…’
‘Do you really think I’m crying about that place?’ Christine looked at her. ‘I couldn’t be happier to be getting away from it. It’s Juan.’
‘Oh.’
‘I made a bit of a fool of myself,’ Christine said. ‘I asked if he wanted to come back after…’ She cringed. ‘I was very politely rebuffed. I told myself before I came out not to drink and Juan.’ Cate gave a thin smile at Christine’s pale joke—she knew exactly what she meant.
‘Our livers will be thanking him,’ Cate said, because she wasn’t just being a martyr, driving everyone around—since she’d met Juan she’d been clutching