Chapter 1

The room was dimly lit, illumination coming from a single spotlight and the bank of monitors hanging from the rails set in the ceiling. To an untrained observer, the equipment that dominated the space would have looked like the set of a Frankenstein movie. To me, it was as familiar as the back of my hand. I looked up at the images displayed on the monitors for a final time. Then I glanced down at the patient lying on the X-Ray table in the Angio suite

“Well, that’s it, Mrs. Malone,” I reassured her, “We’re all done. We’ve opened that nasty blockage in your leg, and the stent is in place. We just need to remove the tube and press on your leg for a wee while. Then we can send you back to the ward for a nice cup of tea.”

Mrs. Malone murmured her thanks. Her voice soft and barely understandable due to the medication she’d been given.

I turned to my Senior Registrar, “Dave, would you mind finishing up here? It looks like she’ll need a closure device.” I looked at the clock on the wall of the Angio suite. “As of two minutes ago, I officially retired.”

“Sure thing boss, thanks for the help, I was struggling there,” he replied. “I didn’t think I was ever going to get across that stenosis.”

“I’m your ex-boss,” I reminded him. “And it was just a case of using the right guidewire.”

“True, but I would never have thought of using a coronary guiding catheter and wire.”

“Make sure the nurses check the pulse in her foot every hour for the next twelve hours. She’ll need to be on anticoagulants for a couple of days.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll pass the messages on to the vascular surgery registrar, he’ll keep an eye on her.”

I pulled my gloves and blood-smeared surgical gown off and tossed them in the bin. I walked into the control room and hung up my lead coat and thyroid collar. My lead glasses went into the pocket of my scrubs. I stretched, trying to work out the kinks in my spine.

Mila, the lovely young radiographer, got up from the chair behind the control desk and came over to me. She looked up at me and gave me a coy smile.

“Now you’re retired, Dr. Fitzpatrick, I can finally do this,” she said and stood on tiptoe and wrapped her arms around my neck and gave me a long sensual kiss that had my toes curling. She moved back, panting slightly and blushed as our colleagues gave us a round of applause.

“Damn, I need to retire more often,” I said, and then I bent down and kissed her again. “Thank you, Mila.” I looked around the room; I was going to miss this crowd.

I asked in a loud voice, “I will see you all tomorrow night, won’t I?”

There were a lot of nods and yes’s from around the room. I’d decided to throw a thank-you party for all the department’s staff and friends. Now I was hoping Mila would be there and I’d be getting a few more of her kisses.

“Who else is going, Mike?” Ann, the senior scrub nurse, asked.

I replied, “Just the people I like.” We both laughed.

“Good, does that mean I might get a kiss like that,” she asked.

I laughed, “If you play your cards right and treat this old man correctly, you could get lucky.” I squeezed her shoulder in an affectionate gesture.

The hospital administrators had hosted my official retirement party last week. It had been populated by the usual bores from the hospital hierarchy; It had lacked the people I liked. For them, I’d arraigned a more informal party on Saturday so I could say goodbye and offer them a proper thank you.

I received a few more kisses and handshakes before I made it to the sanctuary of my office – my now almost empty room, the door standing open. Sally Fox, my secretary, was packing away the last of my personal items into a box. I stood in the door watching her, tracing my fingers over the gold lettering on the door as I did so.

Professor M. Fitzpatrick,

Director of Radiology.

I’m fifty-four, tallish at six foot one. Dark brown hair flecked through with grey, that’s started to recede at the temples. Blue eyes set in a slightly angular face. I’ve put a couple of pounds on recently, but only a couple.

I’m an interventional radiologist, and this department had been part of my life for so many years, that I knew I was going to miss the place. The redheaded woman came over and hugged me. Sally had been my secretary for the past thirteen years and a lot more than that for the past twelve.

She’d arrived straight from the local college. A beautiful innocent eighteen-year-old redhead looking so nervous that all I’d wanted to do was wrap her protectively in my arms. Now she was an even more beautiful and extremely competent woman. Not tall, five foot six, her red hair glowing in the late afternoon sunlight that slanted through the windows.

She looked at me, and pointed at a photo standing on the desk, “I left that for you, I didn’t want to pack it away with the rest of your stuff.”

“Thanks,” I muttered, sat down, and picked it up. The face that looked out at me was that of my late wife, Linda. She’d died in a car crash twelve years earlier, leaving me to bring up our twin girls, Gillian and Julia. They’d only been thirteen when she had died. Now they are both married and I have grandchildren.

I held my hand out to Sally. She came and sat on my lap and gave me a kiss. “I’m going to miss working with you, boss.”

“No regrets?” I asked.

She replied, “Never a one.”

I had descended into a deep dark place of my own making soon after Linda’s death. I sent the twins away to my sisters for the summer, as I didn’t want them to see me like this. I was a mess, drinking myself to sleep almost every night. I don’t know how I was able to work. I knew my colleagues were covering for me, but I knew it couldn’t continue.

Sally had taken it upon her young shoulders to drag me from the depths of my despair. The girls had seen her as their confident and friend during those agonizing weeks after Linda’s death. They had got in touch with her, worried about me after I called them one evening and I’d been rambling and incoherent. She had appeared on my doorstep later that evening; I had been half drunk and looked like an unshaven and scruffy slob.

She’d taken one look at me and had marched me to the bathroom. She’d forced me to stand in the shower and used the cold water until I sobered up. I remember standing in my soaking wet jeans and tee-shirt shivering with the cold, my teeth chattering. She had stripped off my wet clothes and dried me. She had led me to the bedroom and put me to bed. Then she had taken her wet dress off, and wearing just her bra and panties, had climbed in behind me and held me until I fell asleep in her arms.

She stayed with me for a whole week, throwing or locking away all the alcohol in the house. She looked after me; she fed me and kept me clean. She held me in bed while I cried myself to sleep. She was my sounding board, and finally, when she felt I was ready, she made love to me.

She became my closest friend, my confidant, wise far beyond her nineteen years. She was the person the girls and I turned to whenever they needed a mother’s shoulder. My daughters took to her as a surrogate stepmom even though she was only six years older.

Ever since that time, whenever she sensed I was having a black day, she would appear on my doorstep. She might only stay a night or it could be a week. She might come over every few days then not for a couple of months. I asked her on numerous occasions if she wanted to move in, but each time she would refuse. She told me that it wasn’t what I really wanted or needed. And deep down, I understood why, Linda had been my life and I wasn’t ready to commit to another woman in the same way.

At work, she was the epitome of a professional secretary. At home, she was my sanity, and she never mixed the two. Only my daughters had known what she meant to me, and they had never broken her confidence.

This state of affairs continued until four years ago when Sally met her husband to be, Clive Fox. When I first met him, I found I liked him, although I wondered how their relationship would affect me. Within a month, she and Clive were engaged and less than two months later married.

The anniversary of Linda’s death was a month after Sally met Clive, just before they got engaged. I had been sitting at the kitchen table staring at an unopened bottle of single malt. I hadn’t drunk to excess for over six years. The occasional glass of wine with a meal and the odd whiskey nightcap, last thing at night, had been my limit. But not that night. That night I was weak, my hand reaching out for the bottle and the promise of sweet oblivion hidden in its depths when the doorbell rang. I’d opened the door, and Sally stood there with her overnight bag over her shoulder.

I’d stepped back in surprise. “What ... Sally, what are you doing here?” I stuttered.

She’d looked puzzled at my question, “What do you think I’m doing! I know what today is. It’s always a bad day for you, so here I am.” She walked past me, picked up the bottle, and put it away. Then she came and sat on the sofa.

I sat down beside her. “But what about Clive?” I said.

She looked at me with a smile that almost hid the steely glint in her eyes. “I really like him, and maybe I love him. He’s already asked me to marry him, but he’s not you. He knows that I’m here. I told him all about you, on the very first day we met. That any relationship we could have would have to include my visits to you.”

I’d looked at the girl ... no, she was no longer the girl from those first visits. She had transformed into a beautiful, confident woman. What were my feelings for her? Should I tell her to go and live her own life? Losing her would be painful, and like a drug addict, l needed my fix of Sally. After the girls and my rose-tinted memories of Linda, she had become the most important person in my life. Yet I knew I was too old for her. That was the reason I’d tried to maintain an emotional distance from her; she deserved so much better than me.

I shook my head to clear my thoughts, and like a coward, I took what I could get.

“And he agreed?”

“If he hadn’t, I would have let him go. He knows that you and the girls are the three most important people in my life. I’ve told him while you and I will sleep together when I visit, we only occasionally make love.”

She paused and gave me a serious look. “He agreed to my conditions, but he has some of his own. Which I have agreed to, and so hopefully will you. They are that no one can ever know about us; we are to keep our relationship a secret. He’s also asked that I will never tell him what happens when I’m here. So if the three of us meet in public, I will treat you as a benevolent boss and that’s all.”

I nodded in agreement, and she folded into my arms.

So our unusual relationship continued, and over time, it evolved. The visits became less frequent but were still as important as ever to both of us. I tried breaking the cycle and went out on dates a couple of times. But the women I dated always paled as I inevitably compared them to my memories of Linda, and the reality of Sally.

It led me to consider, was I admitting that I was in love with my red-headed savior? Most likely, but I’d never had the guts to admit it to myself, and now with Clive on the scene, I wasn’t going to tell her. I’d had my chance and stupidly let it slip through my fingers.

Sally’s visits had been decreasing since the previous year, and this year it had been only the once on the anniversary of Linda’s death. We had met and socialized, usually, if she and Clive were invited to the same social event or party.

I was looking at the photo, and the memories it had invoked were still fresh in my mind when Sally got back from putting my stuff in the car. She gave me a studded look, then pulled out her phone. She sat down on the edge of my desk and dialed a number and then spoke when her call was answered.

“Clive darling, I won’t be home tonight.”

...

“Yes, that’s right, he needs me.”

...

“I’m sorry too.”

...

“No, I won’t see you in the morning; there is no point. I told you I was going over in the morning to help him get the place ready for the party. I might as well just stay over. I just need you to bring my dress.”

...

“It’s hanging up on the bedroom door, and the matching underwear, you know the ones.”

...

“Yes, I need you to come over about four before the others arrive.”

...

“Please don’t forget the present.”

...

“Yes, I know; I love you too.”

She disconnected and picked up Linda’s photo. She took my hand and then led me for the last time from my office.

She followed me home in her old car. I pulled into the gravel drive past the estate agencies sold sign. She helped me unpack my car. Then we stood in the kitchen, and I put my arms around her.

I said, “You do know that I’m okay, don’t you?”

She put her finger to my lips, “I know you are, but, this time, I’m the one that needs you!” Her statement should have surprised me, but it didn’t, which was even more surprising. I’d noticed over the past year; our relationship had been changing towards that of a mutual need. She went out to her car and returned with her overnight bag. I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

“I’m sorry!” she said with a catch in her voice, “but I planned this. This will be the only time I’m going to lie to Clive about us, but I need this last night with you.”

There were tears in her green eyes and she burst out crying. “I love you, and you’re leaving me.”

“Sally, Sally, I love you too, you’ve been my best friend for so long. But it’s Clive you really love, not me.”

She looked at me, still with tears in her eyes. “I know; I love him,” then she said something that surprised me. “At least, I think I do, but I do know I love you!” She paused and stared into my eyes and added for emphasis, “Anytime, anywhere you need me, I’ll be there for you.”

I hugged her and said, “Let’s get a drink and sit down and talk about this.”

I poured a couple of glasses of wine and then led her into the somewhat empty lounge where we sat on the sofa. She kicked her shoes off and tucked her legs up under her before curling up beside me and putting her head on my shoulder in a familiar, loving gesture.

She asked, “But why do you need to go away?”

I replied, “Come on, you know the reason why. They want me to make way for the next generation. The hospital Trust’s manager has been pushing me for months to take early retirement. ‘Clear out the deadwood and let the young doctors get a chance,’ was how he put it. So when I was asked if I was interested in becoming the professor emeritus for the Radiology department in Denver, it was just too good an opportunity to turn down.”

I looked at her. “It’s only for two years, and then I’m coming back, I promise.”

“But if you’re coming back, why have you sold this place?”

“I was going to do it in any case. I’ve been meaning to sell it for years, well at least since the girls left. It’s just far too big for me to live in on my own, I rattle around in it. The damn place has got six bedrooms. I’m going to buy something smaller when I get back.”

“You are coming back?” She said hopefully.

“Of course, I am. You’re here.”

I looked at her, “There’s not a lot of food in the house, I wasn’t expecting guests. The caterers are supplying all the food and drink for tomorrow evening, so my cupboards are rather bare. I was going to pick up a takeaway if that’s okay with you.”

Sally replied, “Or we could go out.”

I stopped and said, “I thought us going out as a couple was something we would never do for Clive’s sake.”

“I don’t think this one time will hurt us, please, I want to do it. If we see anyone who knows either of us, then you can tell them that Dr. Fitzpatrick is taking his secretary, Mrs. Fox, out to dinner; a thank you for the good work I’ve done for you for the past years.” She looked at me almost desperately.

I thought about my options and came up with a solution. “There’s a gastropub I know about twenty miles away that serves an excellent meal; how does that sound?” She hugged me and agreed.

“I need to get changed; I’m still in my scrubs. Do you want to freshen up?”

Sally smiled at me, “I would have gone with you whatever you were wearing. But if you are changing, then I have got some less secretarial looking clothes in my bag.” She picked up her bag and I led her upstairs and into my bedroom.

I said, “I’m going to grab a quick shower, I won’t be a moment” I went into the attached bathroom and stripped off my scrubs for the last time, throwing them into the linen basket. My T-shirt and boxers joined them, and I stepped naked into the shower. I’ve kept myself reasonably trim these past years, I’m six-one in my socks and I weigh a hundred and eighty pounds. My muscle tone is okay, I run a couple of times a week, and I’m a member of the local rowing club. I still row my scull on the river at the weekend.

Through the water spattered glass, I saw Sally had followed me into the bathroom, undressing as she moved. She joined me in the shower, something that we occasionally did.

I looked at her beautiful body; her long wavy red hair piled up on top of her head. She wasn’t tall, the top of her head would rest on my cheek, but I am six foot one. She was slim and elegant; her breasts were slightly too large for her body, a generous C cup tipped with a prominent pink nipple. She’d trimmed her pussy so all that was left was a ginger landing strip pointing in the direction of her slit.

“Clive’s a lucky man,” I told her as I started to wash her down.

She sighed in contentment as the soapy sponge ran over her breasts. “Tonight Clive doesn’t exist; it’s you who is the lucky man,” she whispered as she looked up at me for a kiss.