‘And then?’
‘Then I’m finished,’ Ruby said. ‘Then I start, I suppose—I want to be a mental health nurse.’ As he opened his mouth, she got in first. ‘I know, I know, the staff are as mad as the patients—’ she smiled as she said it ‘—so I’ll fit right in. Really, I’m just biding my time …’
‘Biding your time doesn’t work in A and E,’ Cort said. ‘And Sheila’s tough, but she’s good—listen to her.’
‘I will.’
‘Are you going back in?’ He didn’t like leaving her, didn’t understand why she would rather stand alone in the dark than join her friends.
‘I might just stay out here for a while.’ She thought of Siobhan and Connor and thought of going back in and doing the happy-clappy but she really couldn’t face it. ‘I might just go to bed.’
‘You’re not going to get much sleep with that noise.’
‘It’s not the noise that’ll disturb me. I’ll have Tilly coming up to find out what’s wrong, then Ellie then Jess. It’s just easier to …’ She gave another shrug. ‘I might go for a walk on the beach.’
‘Now, that really would be stupid—walking alone …’
‘Come with me, then.’ He could see the white of her teeth as she spoke, could hear the waves in the background, and for a moment he actually considered it, a bizarre moment because Cort didn’t do midnight walks. Well, he did, but not with company, except he did like talking to her.
‘I don’t think that’s a very good idea.’
‘I think it’s a very good idea,’ Ruby said, because he’d stepped a little bit closer and she didn’t want him to go. Cort had been the only solace in a day that had been horrible, and even if a while ago she had wanted to be alone, it was far, far nicer being here with him. ‘I like walking on the beach.’
‘I meant …’ Cort hesitated, ‘I meant you and me …’ He tried to change what he’d said, but only made matters worse. ‘Us,’ he attempted, and Ruby smiled.
‘As I said …’ She looked at his tie which was grey in the darkness, but which she knew was really a lovely lilac, and she did what she had wanted to do in the suture room—she put her hand up and felt the cool silk. She wanted him to go with her, wanted a little more of the peace she had found with him today. ‘I think it’s a very good idea.’
Cort wanted to go with her too, though not necessarily to the beach.
He didn’t do this type of thing.
He didn’t find himself at student nurse parties, neither did he find himself in situations such as this one because he didn’t put himself there.
He liked it now that he was, though.
Liked it a lot because the next thing he knew he was kissing her.
It was the nicest thing. It really was a lovely kiss. He sort of bent down and caught her, not completely by surprise because she’d felt his presence all night, or had it been before that? Ruby thought as his mouth roamed hers.
She’d never kissed anyone in a suit.
Never kissed anyone as lovely before, come to think of it.
She couldn’t hear the music from the house now, wasn’t aware of anything except the lovely circle his arms created around them and what was happening in the centre. He had a hand on the wall and one in her hair over her neck, and his kiss was measured and deep like its owner, but as his tongue met hers, as she tasted his breath, there was more passion in his kiss than she’d ever anticipated, more passion than she’d ever tasted, and that it came from Cort made it all the more wild, like a secret only she was privy to. He pulled her head closer just a fraction and his mouth welcomed her a whole lot more and Ruby wanted to climb up his chest to wrap herself around him. She wanted his tie off, she wanted his shirt off, she wanted the party to disappear … she wanted more.
He pulled back just a fraction, and if their mouths weren’t touching any more, they still thrummed. He looked down, not at a student nurse and a whole set of problems but into velvet-brown eyes and felt rare intimacy. It wasn’t just lust or a sudden urge. It was, quite simply, just nice to feel, and he hadn’t felt anything for so very long now—yet he was able to with her.
‘Do you want a nut?’ He could taste her words, could feel them because as she spoke her lips dusted his.
And in turn Ruby felt rather than saw him smile, felt his lips spread, and, yes, she would kiss them again in a moment, just not here. He was like her beloved pistachios, she decided, all brittle and hard but so readily cracked and such a reward to get to the delicious centre.
Cort was used to making rapid decisions—it was what he did for a living after all—but always his decisions were measured, tempered by outcomes and responsibilities. They just weren’t tonight.
‘I want you,’ Cort said.
Which he did.
It was as simple as that.
SHE went in first and checked that the coast was clear. It was, well, sort of. There was a couple necking in the hall, but the rest were all gathered in the lounge room, so she waved him in and up the stairs and they bolted along the hall.
‘Won’t they all come up?’ Cort asked as they stepped into her bedroom. ‘To see how you are?’
‘No,’ Ruby said, and grabbed a scarf and tied it onto the handle. ‘That means don’t disturb …’
He wanted to kiss her again, wanted to see her, but as his hand groped for the light switch she stopped him.
‘Don’t,’ Ruby said. ‘Don’t break it.’
‘Break what?’
‘Just … whatever it is that we’ve got.’
He stood a touch unsure as she lit a candle in the corner and then another and another till the room was bathed in dancing fingers of orange and white. Then she hauled over a chair and, just to be sure, wedged it against the door handle.
It was a room called Ruby. There were drapes, curtains, cushions, candles and crystals, all things that usually did not interest him.
There was the beat of the music and noises from downstairs and he was too old, too jaded, too bitter for someone so light and so lovely, but she’d been crying, he reminded himself as she turned to him.
He was going to leave, Ruby knew that. He was going to change his mind, but he could change it in the morning, because she wanted him tonight.
She wanted him in a way she had never wanted someone before. It was an imperative, a knowledge that this was their only chance, and she was incredibly bold in a way she wasn’t usually. She took him by the hand and to a bed that was really rather small. She felt his hesitation and tension and she wanted it gone so she kissed him, and in that moment she welcomed him back in an instant, because out went trouble as he kissed her onto the bed and they tumbled into paradise.
Tongues and taste and the lovely wedge of his body blew cares away as he lay sort of over and beside her—backed into a corner in possibly the nicest of ways. She could feel the belt of his suit against her stomach, feel the roaming of his hands over her waist then sliding to her bottom then almost apologetically heading back to her waist. She could feel him holding back when he didn’t want to.
When she didn’t want him to.
She kissed his chin and up his cheek, moved his hand back to her bottom and heard the sigh of his breath, and she pressed just a little into him and kissed his eyes and his ears, and it was