Sunrise for Two (19 page)

He started to understand
her love of the quiet community in the old hotel, and he watched
the pleasure in her eyes as they settled back in front of one of
the many fireplaces in the gently shabby building. A blonde woman
with a labrador at her heels described the latest haul from the
greenhouse, and he forced down a cup of nettle tea.

Harry excused herself
quickly after dinner, and Chris followed her. He waited until the
door was closed, then he sat down on the bed and watched her tired
transfer. “Is it always like that Harry? People being so obvious
about their curiosity?”

She stretched out on the
bed and smiled up at him. “Chris that was nothing, unless I’m rude,
a trip to buy a pint of milk can take a good half an hour. I don’t
mind really, I am different, and when I’m not tired or in a hurry,
I remind myself that actually this is a really good way to educate
people about disability.”

He touched her hand with
a complex mix of protectiveness and desire. “But does it bother
you?”

She grinned ruefully at
him, “I should have known better than to give a doctor free reign
to ask me questions.”

“
Sorry, am I
as bad as them?”

“
No of course
not,” she settled back against the pillows, and was surprised to
find that she felt very relaxed in his company. “Does it bother me?
Well it depends how people go about things, and how careful they
are about their choice of words. Sometimes people’s choice of words
can sting a bit.”

“
Are you
always so polite?”

“
I must admit
I can be a bit terse sometimes.” She rubbed the back of her neck
and moved her shoulders uncomfortably.

“
Are you
okay?”

“
I’m just
rather out of practice, I’ve spent the past two weeks sitting in
one place, and we covered quite a lot of ground today. It’ll take a
couple of weeks for the transfers and the exertion of pushing my
chair to be a bit less tiring.”

“
Would you
like a massage?” He asked casually, and they looked at each other
for a very long time.

“
Thank you
Chris, I would like that.”

He grinned at her and
moved slightly closer. “Why don’t you take off your shirt?” His
eyes sank hungrily onto her breasts, and he fought the urge to
gently unfasten her buttons and delight in her sumptuous
curves.

“
Okay then I
will, could you get us some of that delicious liqueur?”

“
Of course,”
he walked slowly to the kitchen and realised that he would have to
tread very carefully indeed in this sensitive process of courtship
and lovemaking. He filled the glasses and waited until she called
him back into the bedroom. He felt so grateful to have this second
chance with the lovely woman he cared so much about and he wanted
to tell her that they could move as slowly as she wanted, as long
as she let him stay.

She was lying on her
stomach in a pair of stripy red pyjama trousers, she had a gentle
sprinkling of freckles over her shoulder blades, and he stood for a
moment pulled his pheromones under control. “There’s a body lotion
by the bed,” she said, and he heard the slight tremor in her
voice.

He ran his hands over her
back, finding the knots and savouring the warmth of her skin. He
had always trusted his hands more than his words, and he tried to
convey his care for her with every gentle stress of his powerful
hands. He felt the tension draining out of her delicate form and
heard her breathing starting to change. “Thank you,” she said
sleepily, “that was amazing.”

“
Shall I help
you into your top?”

“
That would
be lovely,” she said, too tired to maintain her boundaries. Her
arms were shaking as he helped her button up her shirt and the man
who carelessly seduced more women than he cared to remember, sat
down beside her with a tenderness in his heart that he did not
recognise and watched her fall asleep.

Chapter
twelve

The sound of his pager
woke them up in the morning, he pulled his phone out of his pocket
and called Mr Patel. “They want me back,” he said unhappily,
there’s been further unrest in the city centre.” He paused and
touched her lovely face. “I don’t feel happy leaving you. They’ve
probably released that violent idiot by now, perhaps I should phone
him back and ask if he can find someone else.”

“
Please don’t
do that Chris, not on my account, if people have been hurt then
they deserve the best.”

“
What will
you do?”

“
Julia will
keep me safe,” she said with a grin, “she’s pretty scary when she
wants to be.” They ate a final breakfast together and he tried to
think of a way of asking her if he could come round after he
finished at the hospital. He did ask her finally, and she smiled at
him in a way that made his heart lift. “I’d like that very much,”
she said simply, and he held the memory of her smile close to his
chest while he started his lonely journey back to the hospital
where they needed him.

Julia arrived in the
dining room with a spring in her step. “Belinda has asked the three
of us to come back, apparently my insights into the problems with
the results were incredibly helpful.”

“
Congratulations,” Harry said drily.

“
Where’s tall
dark and tactful?”

“
Don’t be
mean. I’m feeling rather fond of him.”

“
I’m glad to
hear it.”

“
Anyway, he’s
already left for the hospital.”

“
Do you think
they called him before they called us?”

Harry didn’t answer her,
she poured out another cup of coffee and realised with a secret
smile that her shoulders felt much better. They packed quickly and
said drawn out goodbyes. A weak autumn sun lit their journey back
to Manchester, and they filled their time with a debate about the
best programming techniques to patch the latest
problems.

Belinda was waiting for
them when they got back, she greeted them with a ghost of a smile
then stepped back into her office. Mike powered up his computer and
carried on his debate with Harry. He pulled his keyboard into a
comfortable position and tried out the strategy that Harry had
suggested. The screens started moving slightly faster and she
grinned at him. He smiled back and reflected on his feelings for a
moment. He had wondered if the warmth that he felt for her would
fade, but if anything his affection seemed to have intensified. He
realised that his deepening relationship with Julia allowed him to
understand that she would always be important to him, and that made
him rather glad.

At lunch time Julia and
Mike rushed out to buy sandwiches, Belinda watched them go and
stepped tentatively out of the office. “Welcome back, we all missed
you.”

“
Thank you, I
missed you lot too.”

“
Are you
okay? Has everything healed?”

“
Well it
doesn’t look pretty,” Harry held up her arm and showed Belinda the
red healing scar that ran from the back of her hand, almost to her
elbow.

“
You’re still
beautiful,” Belinda told her with a shy smile.

“
Thank you,
it’s kind of you to say so.”

“
Did you get
things sorted? With Chris I mean.”

“
I’m not
sure, he’s more complicated than he appears at first
glance.”

“
I think he
might be worth the risk.” Belinda told her wistfully.

“
I think you
might be right.”

They worked until the
light started to fade, then Belinda let them go and listened to
their comfortable debate about a choice of takeaway. They based
themselves in Julia’s house, the spectre of Harry’s unwanted
pursuer hung awkwardly in the air, and Mike realised that he didn’t
even want to let her out of his sight.

Chris was on the
post-operative ward when Mr Patel found him. “Sorry to drag you
back.”

“
It’s okay,”
he smiled at the older man and finished his careful post-operative
drawing.

“
There’s at
least two people that wouldn’t be walking out on their own legs if
it wasn’t for your work today.”

Chris grinned at him,
“You’ve got your pep talk voice on.”

“
Have you
looked at the time?”

Chris stopped smiling,
“How did that happen?”

He walked down the IT
suite in the desperate hope that she was still there, she wasn’t,
but PC Andrews reached the portacabin at the same time as they did.
Things unfolded in quick succession after that, the horrible
discovery that Lord Darley had drunkenly hit another car, the fact
that it was the same model that Julia drove, the fact that it
wasn’t Julia’s car and the fact that Lord Darley was no longer at
the scene of the crime.

Chris dashed to his car
and battled as quickly as he could through the congested roads to
South Manchester. He had planned to leave at five, he should have
left at five, the usual snarl of traffic obscured the end of the
road and he abandoned his car and broke into a run. Mike answered
the door, and a big man with a red face tried to step into the
room. “Her mother promised her to me,” he said with a slur, and
started to push past him. Julia sat down very close to Harry, and
tightly held her hand and Olivia emerged from the kitchen with a
pan, she was lifting it above her head when Chris burst through the
door. He waited for the man to turn around, then he knocked him to
the floor.

“
Don’t ever
touch her again,” he said softly, then turned around at the sound
of more running feet and nodded at PC Andrews. The policeman nodded
back at him, and said graciously, “I’ll take it from here.” He
smiled at Chris, subtly conveying defeat and his blessing, and
dragged the drunken man into the street.

“
Harry if you
don’t kiss him after that then I’m going to.” Olivia said
approvingly.

Chris looked at her for a
moment, then very gently he gathered Harry into his arms carried
her out of the house, purposefully he walked up to her front door
and looked down at her. Harry hesitated briefly, then pulled out
her keys and turned the lock. Chris smiled at her, then he kicked
the door open and placed her proprietally on the sofa. “That idiot
Lord finally managed to get bail granted. The first thing he did
was get really drunk again and crash into a car like Julia’s. They
told me that the people in the car weren’t hurt, but I must admit I
went a bit mad.” His phone rang, and he smiled at her
apologetically, he answered the call, and after a couple of moments
he started laughing and ended the conversation. “It turns out that
he crashed into two of the journalists that have been following
your story. They’re writing it up as an exclusive as we
speak.”

He pushed his hands into
his pockets and asked curiously, “Have you ever thought about
getting your own car? I looked into it and you can get really
decent hand controls.”

“
Can I just
say that if you carried me back here so that you can ask me if I’ve
got a driving licence then I’m really disappointed.”

He sat down beside her on
the sofa then, suddenly awkward as the adrenaline wore off. “Sorry
about all that Neanderthal stuff.” He said softly.

“
It’s okay,”
she told him, trying to catch his eye.

“
Well not
really, I want you to think I’m a gentleman.”

Harry took his hand and
waited until he was looking at her face, “Listen to me Chris, this
is important, I welcome your advances. Just because I can't walk
doesn't mean I don't want to be swept off my feet.”

“
What about
the things he did to you? I don’t want to bring back those
memories.”

“
Chris I’m
attracted to you, and I trust you.”

“
Thank you,”
he said softly, and ran his hand over her delicate knee. With her
legs outstretched, her jeans almost covered her trainers, and she
noticed his curiosity.

“
When I first
came out of hospital I didn’t care what I wore,” she explained,
“but when I hit puberty I got really self-conscious about my legs.
I couldn’t discuss it with mother, and I didn’t want to discuss it
with daddy, but bless him he noticed.”

“
What did he
do?”

“
He spoke to
my favourite aunt, his older sister, she’s got four boys and she’s
always spoilt me and Lib. It turned out that a friend of hers broke
her spine playing polo, and she took me round to see her.” Harry
smiled and ran her hand along his face. “It was the first time in
my life that I thought I could probably be okay, and that I could
be independent. She was living by herself in this enormous
warehouse conversion, she dressed fantastically and she had this
younger lover that she met in the afternoon. She was kind to me,
and blushingly honest about all sorts of things.”

“
What kind of
things?” he couldn’t help asking.

She grinned at him, “keep
up your good behaviour and maybe I’ll tell you.” He felt a tingle
in the pit of his stomach, perhaps they were finally on course
again and he could peel off her clothes. Harry watched his pupils
darken, but she wanted to finish her story, wanted to share the
insight into her existence. “She explained to me that if you’re
sitting down most of the time with your knees bent, you should buy
your trousers a size too long.”