just about summed them up really, Isla thought sadly. ‘I picked up my uniforms from the hospital as well. I called in to see you but you were tied up with a patient. I told them not to disturb you.’
‘It’s been like that all day—all week, actually.’ Looking up, Isla could see the lines of tension grooved around his dark eyes as he spoke. His black hair, which to most people probably looked immaculate, by Sav’s high standards was probably overdue for a trim, and she realized how tired he looked—not the usual, it’s-been-a-long-day tired, but totally, completely exhausted. ‘I’d better get used to it, I guess. I’ve got Heath questioning my every move, taking great pains to point out every T I don’t cross or I that I don’t dot in an attempt to show how much better he’d have been for the consultant’s role, and with Martin not due back for another three weeks it’s going to be hell.’
The problems with Heath had been an ongoing saga since Sav had been made consultant. Sav and Heath had both applied for the consultant’s position eighteen months ago, and both of them had agreed at the time, ‘May the best man win.’ But when the position had gone to Sav, mainly due to the unspoken fact that Heath had been going through a messy divorce and custody issues, Heath had taken it in bad part, taking an almost morbid delight in pointing out how much better a choice he’d have been for the job when Sav had taken a month off after Casey’s death.
‘Hell!’ Sav added just for effect, and Isla knew that little tag had been aimed at her. It wasn’t just Heath that was getting to Sav. Isla had lived with him long enough to read between the lines. Taking a breath, she decided to voice what was clearly on his mind.
‘And me going back to work isn’t exactly going to help matters.’
‘I didn’t say that,’ Sav snapped.
‘No, but you thought it,’ Isla retorted, taking an angry sip of her wine. ‘You don’t start till nine, Sav. The boys’ uniforms will be out, I’ll give them their breakfast before I go. All you have to do is drop them off at school—it’s hardly a big deal.’
‘It is a big deal if you’re having a heart attack,’ Sav retorted, his Spanish accent deepening the angrier he got. ‘It’s one hell of a big deal if you’re lying there bleeding to death in Resuscitation and the only consultant covering the department is at home, babysitting his children.’
‘If that happens,’ Isla responded, trying desperately to keep her voice even, ‘then you’ll ring Louise. She’s only around the corner, she’s said that she’ll come straightaway. We’ve already worked this out!’
‘No, you worked it out, Isla. You’re the one who worked this whole harebrained scheme out, you’re the one who decided to make your grand return to nursing the one month in the year when you know Martin Elmes is on holiday.’
‘There was never going to be a good time for you, Sav,’ Isla retorted. ‘The simple fact of the matter is that you don’t want me to go back to work, least of all as a nurse in your department. You have this archaic belief that any wife of yours should be firmly entrenched at home.’
‘That’s not true.’ Sav shook his head, pushed away his half-eaten dinner then shook his head again. ‘The plan was that you were going to go back to work next year—’
‘No,’ Isla broke in, ‘the plan was, once the children were at school I’d start back at work.’ It was Isla pushing her plate away now, Isla who couldn’t face another morsel, Isla trying to raise another subject that was out of bounds. ‘And the children are at school now. It would have been next year if…’
He was standing up now, ready to stalk off to the study or the living room, to pick up the phone and ring the hospital and hopefully find out that he had to go in. And on any other night, Isla would have followed him in, finished what she was saying, tried to force the conversation, but tonight she let him go, tonight she just let him walk off, because quite simply she didn’t have the energy to scrape at the stony walls of silence he so forcibly erected.
Just couldn’t do this any more.
‘I’m going for a run after I’ve tidied the kitchen,’ she was shouting into the hallway as he stalked off, and Isla saw his shoulders stiffen, an almost questioning look on that inscrutable face as he turned around, her lack of response clearly not what he’d expected. ‘I’ll take my mobile. You can call me if the hospital rings and I’ll come straight back.’
Sav didn’t call. In fact, he didn’t even come out of the study when she arrived home a good hour later, and barely looked up when, drooping with exhaustion, she popped her head around the study door and said goodnight.
She should have fallen asleep. Only half an hour ago she’d barely been able to keep her eyes open, but the shower had woken her, her mind spinning with guilt as she lay in bed, scarcely able to fathom where she had been today, reeling in horror as she pictured Sav’s face if he ever found out, tears slipping into her hair as she imagined the devastation on Luke’s and Harry’s faces if they ever had to break it to them that Mummy and Daddy wouldn’t be living together any more.
‘Isla?’ Sav whispered it gently as he tiptoed into the bedroom and Isla recognized the low throaty, unvoiced question.
At first, when Casey had died, their love life had been put on hold. They had clung to each other through the long dark nights more out of fear than intimacy, guilt impinging on guilt whenever passion had taken over, as if somehow it had been wrong to feel pleasure, to indulge each other. But as their marriage had dissolved around them as the communication gates had slammed firmly closed, still, surprisingly perhaps, the passion had remained, the huge sexual attraction that had sparked on contact all those years ago still burning brightly, the one shining light in their marriage apart from the twins. It was the only time Sav let his guard down, the sweet, sweet release of their lovemaking almost addictive in its nature, everything else temporarily cast aside as passion took over.
But not tonight.
Yes, she was going to give her marriage all she had, but the physical side of it wasn’t the issue. The physical side of it was the only bit that didn’t need rescuing.
‘Isla.’ He said it again, and when she didn’t answer, Sav moved into the en suite and she lay there staring at his reflection in the dressing-table mirror, watching as Sav quietly undressed then leant over the sink to brush his teeth, the vivid raised scar on his back so red and angry it was easy to make out even from this distance.
How she longed to touch it, longed to run gentle fingers over it, to ask him how much it hurt, wincing as she imagined the gnarled metal from the car wreckage stabbing into his beautiful back, the intricate operation to remove it.
Closing her eyes as the light flicked off, she concentrated on keeping her breathing even, willed her hammering heart to slow down as he came across the room and pulled the sheet back, felt the indentation of the mattress as he climbed in. She waited for him to roll over, to turn his back to her, only he didn’t. This time a strong arm reached out in the darkness, his body spooning in beside her, his face burying itself in her hair and inhaling the unfamiliar citrus scent of the hairdresser’s shampoo. She could feel his arousal nudging into the backs of her thighs, his hand dusting over the curve of her bottom. She could feel the stirring of her own arousal somewhere deep inside, her body responding just as it always did, her nipples jutting to attention at the mere suggestion of his touch. And it hurt, physically hurt, not to respond, to lie there feigning sleep when every nerve, every pore screamed for his touch, when her mind begged for the balmy oblivion only Sav could bring. But she couldn’t do it, couldn’t make love to him given where she’d been today.
Couldn’t pretend any more, even for a little while, that everything was OK.
‘YOU look nice, Mum!’ Luke, as blond and as sunny-natured as his mother had once been, smiled up from the table as Isla poured milk over his cereal,