‘What can I get you?’
A room…
He hauled himself back in line. ‘Isabelle? May I buy you another coffee?’
‘Oh—well, I wasn’t—but actually, that would be lovely, thank you. Could I have a latte?’
‘Sure.’ He added a double espresso and a selection of pastries to the order, and turned back to her. ‘So—what brings you to Florence, Isabelle? It’s not the best time of year for sightseeing, in January.’
She gave a little shrug. ‘I just wanted a break. It’s so dreary in London in the winter, and I worked all over Christmas and New Year, so I thought I deserved a treat.’
‘I should think so. Weren’t you with your family?’
‘No—my mother lives in Canada with her husband.’
‘And your father? Brothers? Sisters?’
She looked slightly uncomfortable. ‘I’m an only child, and I don’t have a father.’
He frowned. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Why should you be?’
Luca shrugged. ‘Because my father is a very important person in my life, as are my mother and my brothers and sisters, and I can’t imagine Christmas without them. So—why Firenze?’
It was her turn to shrug. ‘I’ve always wanted to come here, so I thought, Why not? A couple of days—just time to take in a bit of culture, a bit of shopping, some lovely food…’ She shrugged again and smiled. ‘So here I am.’
‘Alone?’
Was it so obvious? ‘My friends wouldn’t come,’ she told him ruefully. ‘They didn’t mind the shopping, but they weren’t interested in traipsing round in the cold looking at mouldy old paintings and statues covered in pigeon poo!’
Luca chuckled, sending shivers down her spine. ‘And have you seen much yet?’
She shook her head, trying to drag her eyes off his mouth long enough to concentrate on what he was saying. He really had the most gorgeous mouth.
‘Not enough. I only got here early yesterday, and I’ve done the Ponte Vecchio and the Pitti Palace and a couple of markets, but there’s so much more to do today I don’t know where to start.’ And she was sick of sightseeing alone.
‘Would you like a guide?’
She frowned, and for a moment he thought he’d pushed it too far, but then she smiled. ‘Why would you want to do that?’
Because I want to spend time with you and I don’t care if I have to trudge round every last damned artefact to do it?
He shrugged. ‘I know the city inside out, and I can tell you what to see and what not to bother with. And my interview finished early, so I’m free for the rest of the day,’ he added.
‘Oh—didn’t it go well?’ she asked, thinking that it explained the rather beautiful suit and wondering what the interview had been for.
‘No, it went very well—they offered me the job.’
‘But not as a tour guide, I take it?’ she suggested, fishing for more information about him, and he gave a deep, sexy chuckle.
‘Me? No,’ he said with a grin. ‘I’m a doctor.’
‘Oh!’ she said, oddly relieved because doctors she understood. ‘So—are you working in the hospital already?’
‘No. I had the first interview there yesterday, and I had to go back today for another look round.’
‘Interesting job?’
He shrugged. ‘I suppose so. Wherever women are having babies the job’s essentially the same, though, and I’ve worked there before, so it’s perhaps a bit familiar—not enough of a challenge.’
She tipped her head on one side, fascinated by the coincidence. ‘So—you’re an obstetrician?’
‘Yes—why? Don’t tell me—you’re pregnant.’
She chuckled. ‘No, no chance of that, but I’m a midwife.’
‘Really? Hospital or community?’
‘Hospital—in the consultant unit, by choice, so I can make things better for women with high-risk pregnancies and try and give them a decent birth experience.’
A brow rose slightly. ‘Are you saying that doctors don’t?’
She smiled wryly. ‘No—but their focus is on something different, and it’s easy to get terrified by all the technology. My job’s to take away some of the fear and uncertainty and give my mums the labour they want, and it’s really rewarding—but that’s probably all about to change, because the unit’s being refurbished and I’m going to be sent off to some other hospital for months, so who knows what I’ll be doing? Anyway, about you—is this a step up? Will you take it?’
‘Maybe. But it’s not just a career move, it’s also a social move.’
‘Back to the city of your misspent youth?’ she asked teasingly, and he chuckled.
‘Perhaps. Actually, since you obviously have an interest, there’s something I’d love to show you that I wouldn’t show just anybody. It’s a bit gruesome but it’s interesting. We’ll start there, and we can do the mouldy paintings and the pigeon poo afterwards,’ he said. ‘That is, if you want to?’
She hesitated a second, then gave in. ‘Well—since you’re offering,’ she said, wondering why a man so gorgeous would have nothing better to do all day but spend it with her.
But Luca didn’t seem to have any trouble with that idea. He leant back so the waitress could set the tray down and smiled. ‘Good. That’s sorted. We’ll have our coffee, and I’ll show you the edited highlights of my city.’
So after they’d finished their coffee and demolished the pastries, he took her to the Museo di Storia della Scienza—the Science Museum—next to the Uffizi, and showed her a room where the walls were lined with fascinating but gruesome old wax models of obstetric complications.
‘Oh, horrors!’ she said, the professional side of her glad to be working in a modern, well-equipped hospital and her other side, the part that was a woman, just a little bit afraid.
‘Now you see why the Italians invented the Caesarean section,’ he said with a dry smile, and took her back out into the glorious but chilly winter sunshine. ‘Right, the pretty stuff,’ he said, heading for the Piazza della Signori by the Uffizi entrance.
Isabelle was awestruck by it all. The city was scattered with amazing and jaw-dropping sculptures in every piazza and public area, so that everywhere she turned she all but fell over another one, and they were all famous. ‘It’s like a Renaissance theme-park,’ she said, making him laugh. ‘It’s incredible.’
‘They’re not all originals,’ he pointed out. ‘You need to see the original David—it’s in the Galleria dell’ Accademia.’
‘Will we have time? We can’t possibly see everything!’
‘Of course not. I’m cherry-picking—showing you the best bits. Otherwise you’ll just get overwhelmed.’
How true, she thought, but it wasn’t only the art that was overwhelming, it was Luca, warm and funny and tactile, casually looping his arm around her shoulders to steer her in a different direction, resting his hand on her waist to usher her through doorways, his boyish grin at odds with those very grown-up eyes that were sending an altogether different message.
‘Right. The Duomo,’ he said after a lightning tour of the Uffizi, and led her through the narrow mediaeval streets to the magnificent cathedral with Brunelleschi’s huge terracotta dome that dominated the skyline, then up all four hundred and sixty-three