‘Of course I am,’ Luke said severely. He frowned direfully down at the two children. ‘What do you think I should do to her?’
‘Nothing,’ Karen said nervously, but Amy was made of sterner stuff.
‘I think she should be spiff…spifflicated,’ she pronounced.
‘Oh, yes?’ Luke’s straight face broke. ‘And what exactly is spifflication?’
‘I’m not sure,’ Amy confessed. ‘I think…I think it’s sort of like tickling.’
Luke grinned. ‘I can do that,’ he agreed. He turned back to Nikki. ‘Prepare to be spifflicated, Dr Russell.’
‘Don’t you touch me-’
‘In front of the children,’ Luke finished for her smoothly. ‘Of course not. You have your dignity to maintain. I only ever spifflicate in private. Beattie!’
The housekeeper appeared from nowhere. She had obviously missed nothing of the proceedings. ‘Yes?’ Beattie Gilchrist was close to laughter, fighting to keep a straight face.
‘Is dinner something that will spoil?’
‘It’s casserole, Dr Luke.’
‘Would it ruin your day if I told you I was taking Dr Russell off to dinner and hence to a fate of spifflication?’
Beattie chuckled delightedly. ‘Of course not,’ she beamed. ‘The casserole will taste better than ever tomorrow night, and me and the girls will cook ourselves hamburgers. You won’t mind, will you, girls?’
‘No way,’ Amy shouted, but Karen looked troubled. Luke crossed to the little girl and knelt down.
‘What is it, Karen?’ he asked gently.
‘You won’t…you won’t hurt Dr Russell, will you?’ the child asked tremulously. ‘She didn’t mean to get you wet.’
‘Don’t you believe it. Our Dr Russell did so mean to get me wet.’ Luke took Karen’s hands in his and gave them a reassuring squeeze. ‘But no, Karen. I may tickle Dr Russell until she screams for mercy but I won’t hurt her. Not now. Not ever. I don’t hurt people. That’s a promise.’
The laughter had gone from his voice. He met the little girl’s eyes, and what she read in his seemed to reassure her. The corners of her mouth struggled to smile. ‘I like hamburgers,’ she said simply.
‘Then that’s settled.’ Luke turned to Nikki. ‘Go and get yourself into a pretty dress, Dr Russell. I’ll take off one sodden shirt and then…then prepare to meet your doom!’
‘But I like hamburgers too,’ Nikki said weakly. This was going too fast for her. She had no intention of going out to dinner with this man.
‘Beattie, if you were doomed to spifflication, where would you want to eat your last meal?’ Luke demanded, ignoring Nikki’s protest and turning to the housekeeper.
Beattie chuckled. ‘Only one place to eat out hereabouts,’ she told him. ‘The fishing co-op runs a club. The dining-room looks out over the harbour. It’s real pretty and the food’s not bad either.’
‘It sounds just what the doctor ordered,’ Luke smiled. ‘OK, Dr Russell. You have ten minutes to prepare yourself. Let’s go.’
The man was like a bulldozer, Nikki thought grimly. She stood in her bedroom and gazed helplessly at the mirror. A meal out…To be taken out by a man…
To be taken out by Luke Marriott! Nikki closed her eyes as a wave of confusion ran through her. What was happening? She should be staying at home studying. She should put her hands on her not so ample hips and tell Luke Marriott exactly what she thought of him.
If he hadn’t been ill, she would do, she decided, but it was hardly fair when he’d been through such a bad time.
‘That’s not the reason and you know it,’ she told her reflection out loud. ‘You want to go out.’ No, you don’t, a little voice inside her protested.
‘Yes, you do.’
Nikki thought back to Luke Marriott kneeling before the troubled Karen, and a feeling of warmth flooded over her. This man was kind and caring and…
This man was trouble. Capital T. Trouble.
He would be gone in a couple of weeks. He was transient-a transient presence in a life which so far hadn’t been all that much fun.
‘Why shouldn’t I go out, then?’ Nikki demanded of her reflection. ‘Seize the day. Live for the moment.’
You’re talking rubbish! that inner voice asserted.
‘Oh, leave me alone!’ Nikki turned her back on her wiser self and stared into the wardrobe. She had hung the clothes Charlotte had sent her and then ignored all that she could. Now she crossed to pull the racks apart.
Charlotte was never a girl to do things by halves. She had taken Nikki’s wardrobe as a personal challenge, omitting nothing.
And there was something just right for tonight. Something just right for a first and last date. A night to forget she was Dr Nikki Russell who took the world seriously. A night to forget the loneliness of the rest of her life…Taking a deep breath, Nikki slipped the fabric over her shoulders.
The dress was soft white silk, loose-fitting but clinging with the sheerness of the fabric. It hung low across her breasts, the soft sleeves cut away so that they exposed her slender arms. The dress fell in delicate folds around her thighs and down to swirl around her long legs. A ribbon of palest green looped around the waist and down to hint at its presence among the folds as she moved.
The dress turned her into someone she wasn’t. Or someone she had once been but had forgotten existed. Nikki stood before the mirror and stared. Unconsciously she brought her hand up to gather her hair into a loose, curling knot of flame. The action made her seem younger, and more vulnerable. She let it fall, and then in swift decision put it up again. Before she had time to change her mind she pinned it and turned from the mirror. She had done it. She was ready.
‘Wow!’ It was Amy, bursting through the door, her new friend tagging behind. ‘Wow, Mummy, you’re beautiful. Isn’t she beautiful, Karen?’
‘My mum’s prettier,’ Karen said stoutly. ‘But…but you’re really pretty, Dr Russell.’
‘Is she ever!’ Luke Marriott was standing in the passage. He too had changed, into a dark suit which made Nikki see just why he had caused so many problems among the nursing staff in the city. Drop-dead handsome, the man was. She looked up, blushed and looked away again. What on earth was she doing?
‘Have a really good time, now,’ Amy ordered them. ‘What time will you be home?’
‘By midnight, Mother,’ Nikki laughed, swooping her small daughter up to give her a kiss. ‘Don’t wait up for me.’
‘Don’t spifflicate her too hard, will you, Dr Luke?’ Amy warned.
‘I make no promises,’ Luke grinned. His arm came around Nikki in a proprietorial gesture. ‘Vengeance is mine, Dr Russell. For tonight, you’re at my mercy.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
IF THERE was to be only one evening left in the world, this could well be the evening. It was a night to forget the past, forget the future and just be.
Something had snapped inside Nikki’s controlled head. Who knew what had caused it? Was it the culmination of long years of work and worry, Charlotte’s lovely dress floating around her slim form, the balmy tropical night, or the presence of the man at her side-a man whose smile made her heart do crazy jumps inside her body and made her forget that she was Dr Nikki Russell with the weight of the world on her shoulders? Which of these things was causing the feeling of euphoria creeping over her? Nikki didn’t know, and she no longer cared. The night was hers.
And somehow for Luke it seemed the same. The world was put on hold. They were alone together and nothing else mattered.
Miraculously there was a table available in the best part of the club-a sheltered alcove with windows looking out over the lights of the harbour to the sea beyond. The waiter showed them to their seats with an astonished
