Cort Mason - Dr. Delectable Read online

  ‘Text Tilly,’ Cort said as they drove past the Stat Bar towards his flat, the bay lit up by a huge moon, music pumping from the bars, and everything right with the world.

  ‘She’ll know where I am,’ Ruby started, but, yes, given the worry she’d caused today, it would be only fair.

  So she texted her friend, told her not to worry if she wasn’t home till late tomorrow, that she was at Cort’s. Two minutes later her phone bleeped and Ruby glanced at it and gave a smile.

  ‘What did she say?’

  ‘I’m not telling.’

  ‘What did she say?’ Cort grinned.

  ‘That she wants all the details on my return.’

  ‘She’d better not get them,’ Cort said, and they drove along the bay and once at his flat he turned off his phone, because that was what he would do now, and Ruby duly switched off hers.

  ‘It’s like the start of an exam,’ Ruby said, ‘when they tell you to switch off your mobiles.’

  ‘Let’s find out what you’ve learnt.’ Cort smiled and she was about to make a joke, to smile and dance for him, but she was suddenly serious, because with Cort she could be.

  ‘That you love me.’ She couldn’t believe she’d be so bold, just to say it.

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘That I love you.’ Nor could she believe that she could say that so readily either, but Cort just nodded.

  ‘Correct,’ Cort said, and pulled her to him. ‘Which, come what may, that we love each other is all we really need to know.’

  EPILOGUE

  IF YOU were lucky, life went on.

  Sheila walked into the changing room before her late shift a few weeks later and tried not to roll her eyes at the sight of a new set of nursing students, some nervous, some arrogant, all about to step right into the front line for the very first time, all naïve about how they would cope.

  ‘Lucky thing!’ a loud one said. ‘I wouldn’t mind being in Bali.’

  ‘I’ve asked her to bring me back a sarong,’ another loud one said. ‘But knowing Ruby she’ll forget.’

  Sheila smiled quietly as she headed to the staffroom, because Bali was so Ruby. She could see her now, drifting along the beach in a sarong or at the markets choosing jewellery, or just lying by a pool, soaking in the sun, knowing she’d qualified and could now follow her heart and study her beloved mental health.

  ‘Postcard from Cort,’ Doug said, and handed it to Sheila for a quick read, but her eyes lingered on the words for just a moment longer than they would normally.

  Now that they all knew what he’d been through, Doug hadn’t hesitated when Cort had asked for a couple of weeks’ unpaid leave—he needed a holiday, he’d explained. A real holiday, for the first time in many, many years. Maybe Fiji, perhaps Bali. And on real holidays, a postcard was expected in a place like Emergency, completely necessary, in fact, because it brought a little bit of sun to the workers, and a little smile to the sender when they glanced up at the cork board in the staffroom weeks and months later. A nice postcard of a stunning view from a stunning luxury hotel in Bali because, Sheila had a feeling, Cort had used the supplied hotel postcards, rather than exert himself by shopping for one.

  Cort, Sheila was sure, was rather too busy.

  Thinking of you all as little as I can.

  Clear the board for me

  Cort

  And she couldn’t be sure, but she almost was. Of course half the students were whooping it up in Bali now, it was a rite of passage almost, and just because Cort Mason happened to be there too…

  ‘Good for him.’ Sheila smiled. ‘He needed a break.’

  It was more than a break, it was a completely new start.

  He could hear the click-clack of her hair beads as Ruby, on the second-last day of their holiday, finally wrote her postcards—Cort’s had long since been posted.

  She’d had her hair beaded the first day they’d arrived and her feet and hands were adorned with henna tattoos and her pale skin was now golden brown. And every day he knew her a little bit more.

  ‘What can I put?’ Ruby asked as Cort lay on a sunbed, reading the English papers.

  ‘Who’s this one for?’

  ‘Mum and Dad.’ Ruby sighed. ‘I’ve said the weather’s nice, that the hotel is lovely…’ And Cort only wished they could see how much they were missing out on, by censoring their relationship with her. ‘And I’ve written really big…’ She added something else then scribbled her name, then got on with the next one, to her housemates, which would be easy.

  Except Cort was right. When it was ‘the one’, the ‘real one’, you didn’t share the details quite so much. He wasn’t on the list on the fridge and there were things that only they two knew.

  See you when I’m looking at you x

  She wrote that because they were real friends and, as she was working out, she didn’t have to pretend to them, didn’t have to write about the beach or food or weather. She’d tell them all her news in her own good time.

  ‘I need a rest,’ Ruby said, because writing postcards was exhausting work. She turned her head to where Cort now dozed beside her on the sumptuous white lounger. They were a million miles away from drama and she was so relaxed it was an effort to put out a hand and lift a straw to her mouth. ‘I’m exhausted, Cort. I haven’t even got the energy to put on some more sun block.’

  ‘I’ll put some on for you.’ Cort said without opening his eyes, but even if his face didn’t twitch, inside he was smiling, because that was how she made him feel.

  For Ruby it was different, because this morning when her mother had rung, instead of shrugging her shoulders and smiling and carrying on, she’d actually told him just how knotted up she felt inside, how she could feel the disapproval behind every word, and the world hadn’t stopped when she’d voiced her feelings. Cort hadn’t crumpled in a heap or accused her of ruining their holiday. Instead, he’d just rubbed her knotted shoulders and let her brood for a little while, because Ruby was finding out she was allowed to be miserable at times.

  ‘Here…’ He played the game, sat up and opened the tube.

  ‘I’m too tired to sunbathe,’ Ruby grumbled. ‘I need a proper rest.’

  ‘In bed?’ Cort solemnly checked.

  ‘I think so.’ Ruby nodded.

  She was so tired that he had to peel off her bikini and pull back the sheets and turn on the fan, but she soon perked up.

  ‘I’m feeling better already,’ Ruby said, in the cool, dark room with Cort stretched out beside her.

  ‘I thought you might be.’

  ‘How did I get so lucky?’ Ruby asked, when Cort was just thinking the same thing.

  And then it was just about the two of them, and the lovely click clack of her beads as they made love, followed by the sinking feeling that in one more sleep their holiday would be over, but excitement too at the thought of the real world, with the other one there.

  They had dinner on their deck the last night—Cort finally relenting and wearing ‘just this once’ the sarong Ruby had bought him, and finding it was surprisingly comfortable. Or was it just the company? Sitting there drinking cocktails and eating seafood, while Ruby ate from a huge selection of fruit kebabs. The waiters were waiting, the candles were hissing as one by one they fizzled out, and she didn’t want her holiday to end, though she was excited about starting her mental health nurse course and seeing her friends.

  ‘It’s been wonderful,’ Ruby said, when the sun had long since dipped down over the horizon and the only red glow was from her shoulders.

  The waiters took the trays and said goodnight and if she and Cort went to bed then it would be morning and she didn’t want it to be, didn’t want the magic they’d found to end, quietly wondering every now and then if their relationship would still stand up when they were back in the real world.

  ‘How was your seafood?’ Ruby asked.

  ‘Fantastic,’ Cort said, then added, ‘I won’t give up meat.’ Because he’d be himself too.

  �
�I’ll never ask you to.’

  ‘I’ll be eating a lot at work and stopping off—’

  ‘Fine.’ Now the waiters were gone she moved onto his lap, kissed his mouth. ‘You can do what you like.’

  ‘What about kids?’

  ‘What about them?’ Ruby asked, kissing his mouth and running her hands over his lovely brown shoulders. Then she paused because she wasn’t sure she was hearing things right.

  ‘Our kids.’

  ‘They’ll be beautiful…’

  ‘I meant about food.’

  ‘They can have meat any time you buy it,’ Ruby was magnanimous given it was a fantasy. ‘And cook it and feed them and wash up afterwards—every night if you want.’

  He got up and walked to their villa and Ruby sat and watched as he walked back. He was carrying a thick velvet box and she knew then it wasn’t a fantasy, that this was their future they were discussing, and that it was real and would last the scrutiny of day.

  ‘It’s white gold,’ Cort said, when she opened it. ‘I thought it would blend in…’

  It would never blend in to Ruby, it was completely and utterly exquisite—a heavy necklace she could wear every day, and only the knowing would see that it wasn’t glass in the centre but a deep red ruby, with purple hues when she held it up to the moon, and that the jumble of knots that held it was actually an R and a C and, yes, if asked, she could say the C was for her surname, but as she slipped it on, it was Cort who rested just above her heart.

  ‘There’s a matching ring to follow.’ He kissed the back of her neck as her body adjusted to the necklace’s new weight, as the cool metal blended till it matched the temperature of her skin, but still she could feel it, their names set in stone, or rather a stone set in their names, and Ruby knew that together was their future.

  ‘There’s an M there too,’ Cort said, and Ruby traced it with her fingers. ‘It stands for Mason—one day when you’re ready—that’s if marriage isn’t too conventional for you?’

  ‘I could think of nothing nicer,’ Ruby said, and took his hand when he asked her to dance, even though there was no music.

  It didn’t matter.

  Both of them could hear it.

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-1473-6

  CORT MASON — DR. DELECTABLE

  First North American Publication 2011

  Copyright © 2011 by Carol Marinelli

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

  For questions and comments about the quality of this book please contact us at [email protected].

  ® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

  www.Harlequin.com