‘You’ve been here for an hour and forty minutes,’ she told him, and that woke him right up. His eyes flashed open and she was laughing down at him.
He stared upward.
Her eyes were dancing. Her hair had fallen forward. She looked flushed from the exertion of the massage, flushed and happy and ready to move on.
She looked…beautiful.
‘Ally…’
‘I have to go,’ she whispered, and her smile slipped. She took an involuntary step back. ‘I…I…’
Her eyes were locked on his.
Ally.
He didn’t say it. He just thought it. Ally, Ally, Ally.
It was like a shout in his head. A release. A flood of pure sweeping joy that had nothing to do with the massage. Or maybe everything.
‘Ally,’ he said again, and this time his voice was more urgent.
‘I need to go,’ she told him, and took another step backward.
‘It can’t be an hour and a half,’ he said, and looked up at the clock over the door.
And blinked.
An hour and forty minutes, she’d said. How could that have happened?
‘I’ll see you when you’re dressed,’ she said-and fled.
He didn’t blame her. Things were entirely out of control. Maybe he should run, too.
Hell, no. Not feeling like this.
It was like a huge black weight had been lifted from his chest and he hadn’t known it was there.
In the last few years he’d worked through the grief of Rachel’s death. He’d moved on. Or he’d thought he’d moved on. He was aware that he was lonely but he was too damned busy to do anything about it. Anyway, comparing anyone to Rachel was impossible.
But he wasn’t comparing Ally to Rachel. There was no comparison. They were two different women.
Two different…loves?
He lay there with the sunlight dappling over him. He heard Ally running a sink full of water upstairs-getting rid of the oil on her hands. Preparing herself for the next client.
He had patients waiting.
Amazing as this new sensation was, it’d have to wait. He rose from the massage table and once again felt that sweep of unreality. That a massage could do so much…
Ally was right in calling this a remedial massage. Working through this extraordinary sensation would take adjustment, but even making allowances for his personal sensations he knew what she was offering had huge value. If Ally could take a client out of the problems of the present…
Claire Manning. Claire’s husband had prostate cancer and was fading slowly with as much agony to those around him as he could manage. Claire loved Doug with all her heart, but she had four children under twelve and she worked full time to try and keep the family afloat. The demands Doug was making on her were driving her to the point of collapse. Doug could well live for years but in a sense he’d buried himself already. He lay in front of the television and demanded and demanded and demanded.
Claire was coming here, Darcy decided as he hauled on his boots. If he had to drag her. Once a week.
How could she fund it?
The Rotary Club, he thought. The local service club had been aching to do something for Claire. Maybe he could suggest they donate three or four massages a week and he could use them to refer people who needed them.
Bob Proody.
There was another one. Bob had copped polio when he was ten. Now in his seventies, he was so stiff he could barely manage on two sticks. His wife was dead and his only daughter was in Canada. To have a rub like this once a week…to have his aching muscles eased and to have human contact…
It was like being given access to a new wonder drug, he thought, his feeling of excitement intensifying. Then he heard footsteps on the stairs and he turned to find Ally smiling at him.
‘All done?’
‘I’m done,’ he told her, rising and trying to keep his composure. She looked… Damn, she looked…
He was all at sea, he admitted to himself. For the last few years he’d been self-contained, calm and aloof-a spectator on other people’s lives. And suddenly he was into territory he didn’t recognise.
‘What do I owe you?’ he asked, and he didn’t recognise his voice.
‘It’s all paid for. I thought you knew that.’
‘What, even the sandalwood?’
‘The town paid for sandalwood. The best is what they ordered. They think a lot of you, Darcy.’
‘Yeah, well…’ Damn, he was trying not to blush. ‘They’ll think a lot of you, too.’
‘You liked your massage?’
‘Um…yeah.’
‘You’ve really never had a massage?’ she asked curiously, and he shook his head.
‘No.’
‘It wasn’t too unpleasant?’
‘You could say that.’ He hesitated. ‘Ally, if that’s how you make everyone feel…’
‘I didn’t do anything special to you.’
Like hell she hadn’t. He gazed at her and wondered if she had any idea at all what his emotions were doing.
Medicine. Concentrate on patients.
‘There are people in this town who this could really help,’ he told her, and she raised her brows in disbelief.
‘Yeah? But I’m the one who’s here to rip people off,’ she reminded him. ‘Pretending to be a doctor and ripping off the life savings of people like Ivy.’
‘I was out of line,’ he growled. ‘Can we forget it?’
She put her head on one side and thought about it. And then she smiled again. Hell, that smile… It made his gut clench.
‘Ally.’
‘Hmm?’ She glanced at her watch and then at the door. It was time for him to leave, he thought. But…
‘Ally, can we start again?’ he asked. ‘I’ve said some pretty unspeakable things to you.’
‘Basket weaving,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘Yeah, you have.’
‘Let me take you out to dinner.’
Silence.
‘You don’t want to do that.’
‘I do.’
‘Nope.’ She crossed and pulled the door wide. ‘Sorry.’
‘What do you mean, nope?’
Her smile widened. ‘Sorry, Darcy. But you’re a doctor. You know as well as I do that dating patients is out of the question.’
‘Dating patients?’
‘I’ve just given you the best massage I know how to give,’ she said gently, taking pity on his look of confusion. ‘You’re feeling warm and soporific and like everything’s right with your world. Like you giving a patient a shot of pethidine. Would you give a patient a mind-altering drug and then try to date her?’
‘Of course I wouldn’t.’
‘There you go, then,’ she said cordially. ‘I’m sorry, Darcy, but I do need to move on. If you’ll excuse me.’
‘Hell, Ally, the way I’m feeling…’
‘You’re feeling pretty good,’ she agreed. ‘And I’ve done that for you. Well done me. Now, off you go and see your patients and I’ll see mine. If you want another massage at any time, then of course you’re free to make an appointment.’
‘I don’t want another massage.’
