‘I suppose I must,’ she agreed carelessly.
‘But in your case, without any lasting damage?’
She felt that he was pushing her to admit something, but had no idea what. She shrugged her shoulders, her eyes narrowing slightly as she concentrated on the snowy road.
‘Obviously not.’
‘Tell me, Heather, how many men have there been in your life since that first one?’
She was glad she was concentrating so hard on the road, otherwise she must surely have betrayed her shock. She willed herself not to look at him, nor to demand to know what business her personal life was of his.
‘You can’t honestly expect me to answer that,’ she countered instead.
‘Why not? If you were to ask me the same question, I’d answer it.’
‘You mean you can remember them all?’ she demanded drily.
She heard him laugh. ‘You’ve been paying too much attention to the gossip columns. I could count on the fingers on one hand the number of serious emotional attachments I’ve had, and still have fingers over to spare.’
He was waiting for her to make some sort of response, but she had no idea what to say. The very thought of admitting to Kyle that, not only had there been no serious attachments, but also there had not been any physical attachments, made her skin shiver with goose-bumps.
‘I… Oh, isn’t that the sign coming up for our turn-off?’ she questioned him thankfully, glad of a legitimate means of changing the conversation. ‘I don’t want to miss it, otherwise we’ll be late for visiting time.’
‘Your father’s allowed open visiting hours, surely?’ Kyle challenged, but to her relief he made no further attempt to direct their conversation into more personal channels.
* * *
They arrived at the hospital just as the nursing staff changed over. A small, smiling nurse directed them to her father’s room. Although he was still wired up to a drip and monitoring machine, already his skin had a much healthier hue. Her mother stood up and rushed over to hug them both, tears thickening her voice as she welcomed them.
Heather stepped back for a moment as Kyle embraced her mother, unsure if she really wanted to probe the sensation of jealousy darting through her. Not jealousy of her mother’s obvious love for Kyle, but jealousy of the look of concern and love in Kyle’s eyes for her mother. Just for a moment she wished she was the one in his arms, that she was the one being comforted with the security of his caring.
Stop being so self-pitying, she chided herself briskly, turning away to give her father a final, lingering look before heading for the door.
‘Don’t worry. He’ll be fine.’
Kyle’s quiet words of reassurance startled her, and she looked round, half expecting to see that her mother had followed them out into the corridor and that they were for her, they held so much understanding and compassion.
But the corridor was empty apart from the two of them, and colour crawled betrayingly ove
r her throat as she remembered how acutely perceptive Kyle had always been. Had he seen the look of lonely envy in her eyes as she’d watched him comfort her mother? She turned her head away, unaware of the sudden weary compression of his mouth as he watched her silent rejection of his words of comfort.
She had always been stubborn, yes, and proud too, and for a long time he had told himself that it was guilt and his love for her parents that had kept him away. But seeing her now, as a woman…
He cut the thought off, not wanting to pursue it.
‘Come on, it’s time we were on our way.’
Mutely, Heather followed him.
CHAPTER SEVEN
HEATHER and Kyle had been inside the hospital just over an hour, but during that time an alarming amount of snow had fallen. Already the car park was completely white, a sharp, mean wind blowing the flakes into ominous drifts.
One side of the Jaguar was almost completely white, and Kyle had to brush the snow away before they could get in.
It was still snowing, and the temperature had dropped. The air was crisp and cold, their breath sending small clouds of vapour into the darkness. Every time they moved, the snow that had already fallen crunched noisily underfoot.
‘Would you prefer to drive?’ Heather asked Kyle, but he shook his head.