He runs a hand through his hair, looking almost—sheepish? “I did. Please, take a seat while I fetch you a drink.”
He clears his throat, tugs at the neck of his jumper, then opens the wine fridge. “What would you like to drink? I have a Chablis Premier Cru, or a Puligny-Montrachet. I also have a Gaja Barbaresco if you’d prefer that.”
I blink.
Sir. I am the woman who demonstrates hosepipes on television.
I can’t even remember the first two wines he rattled off.
“Gaja, please,” I say, play-acting confidence. For all I know, I could be committing to a glass of prune juice.
He nods, retrieves a bottle from his very fancy, veryadultwine rack, and pours. The formality of it all is making me even more nervous.
“I’m sorry, Daisy,” he says, a little stiffly. “I’m rusty at this. I haven’t dated in a long time.”
I raise a brow. “You literally save lives for a living. Dating should be the easy part.”
He exhales sharply, a humorless huff. “The human heart is far more complex outside the operating theater, I’m finding.”
My breath catches.
Oh.
My fingers trace the rim of my glass, trying to act like that sentence didn’t just send a little shiver up my spine. “Well, I haven’t dated many surgeons, so I suppose we’ll just have to be rusty together.”
He stares at me. “I find myself rather hoping you won’t be dating any other . . .surgeons.”
The way he says it—pointed—we both know he really meansmen.
I want to scream:Say it. Tell me you don’t want me with anyone else.
“Lucky for you,” I murmur, “no other top-class surgeons have caught my eye recently.”
His Adam’s apple bobs.
I lean in, slow enough to feel the weight of the air between us, thick and humming.
“Don’t look so serious,” I whisper. “Dating is supposed to be fun. What’s your idea of fun, Edward?”
“You.”
The single word lands between us.
My breath stutters, caught somewhere between a laugh and a gasp.
Then—
BEEP.
The oven timer is my cockblock.
He exhales, scrubbing a hand through his hair. His jaw tightens as he turns toward the oven, his movements suddenly clipped, like he needs something to do with his hands.
I take a sip of my wine. “So!” I say, voice a little too high-pitched, like I’ve just been caught doing something illicit. “What’s on the menu?”
“Salt-Baked Heritage Celeriac Wellington,” he says over his shoulder. “An attempt, anyway.”
I blink. . . what?
