Novels by Toby brown

"Is my brother in the hall, nurse?"The previous evening Elizabeth had been moved to a small, private room in the west wing of St. Jude’s Memorial. That night she experienced a series of fluorescent flashes, the constant low hum of the monitoring machinery, and the ongoing, cold sensation caused by the IV needle which had been firmly taped to the back of her hand. Morning came in the form of pale, overcast grey light, slipping quietly through the narrow blinds, but the one face she longed to see—the one that could possibly provide her with a sense of familiarity in this difficult situation—had not yet appeared. All she wanted was to go home; she felt utterly exhausted, irritable, deeply lonely, and completely ruined, even though the nursing staff appeared to be determined to postpone her discharge by carrying out an endless number of checks and chart reviews and giving polite evasions.The nurse, a woman of middle age having a most unexpectedly mild and kind voice, fidgeted by the fo

With a sigh—just a sound of profound exhaustion—he pushed his heavy chair around and looked across the long, dark expanse of his office. Along the right wall there was a neat arrangement of a dozen plasma television screens. During market hours the screens kept the room alive with a continuous flow of news, financial tickers, and flashing lights; tonight, however, they were dark and lifeless, giving the room an atmosphere of solemnity which Henri considered to be exactly in keeping with his current mood.In fact, a morgue would have been just the right sort of place to match his mood.He rose, his limbs weighing heavily on him, and walked out of his private inner office into the reception area. He went straight to the slim wooden desk which was located just outside his door. It was her desk. Her personal things were still neatly laid out on it. He looked over the smooth surface, which had been polished until it shone like a mirror—all the items were in order, reflecting her exacting a

Henri was alone in his office and, standing in his executive leather chair, stared out through the floor-to-ceiling glass window.The 19th floor was completely unoccupied and was filled with a thick, unnatural silence. It was 3:00 a.m., yet nothing on this earth, nor any power in hell or in high water, could make him go back by himself to his empty apartment tonight. Never had his penthouse seemed so immense or so bitterly cold since Elizabeth Stone had left.His entire house was filled with the memory of her being gone. The clean silk sheets still bore the faint, clear smell of her lavender perfume. More terrible still, earlier that same hour he had knelt on the cold floor of his bathroom and discovered a tube of her usual nude lipstick lying underneath the sink. Never, throughout all the years of his coldly calculated behaviour, had he experienced such intense sorrow. The deep and continuous loneliness that followed from that simple and unexpected discovery was incredible and create

The heavy door to the executive suite closed with a soft, metallic click and thus cut the room off from the noise of the corporate floor.Sebastian went in, hanging his wool travelling coat over one forearm and holding a neat leather briefcase in the other hand. He stopped just inside the door, looking at the mess of the room. Spread out over the large floor area, the executive desk was a scene of chaos: the legal documents were scattered about like fallen leaves, a fountain pen was leaking black ink onto a leather blotter, and the large desk chair had been knocked off its position. Behind all this stood Henri, his hands flat on the polished mahogany and his head bowed as though he were attempting to recall the precise instant when a bomb had exploded in the room.Sebastian said in a quiet voice that he had met Elizabeth in the lobby; she seemed as though she had just walked away from a structural collapse and, from the condition of your desk, you had been right in the middle of the b

It was only when her dark lashes lifted and she looked directly at him that the complete devastation in her eyes drove all the remaining air out of his lungs. Although he had anticipated anger or perhaps passion or defiance, he never expected the sharp, piercing pain that shot through him at her next words."I don't want to be your mistress," she said, her voice falling to a quiet, deadly calm that was more damaging than any scream. "The only thing I ever wanted was something genuine—true love and sincere intentions—not this fake sexual arrangement you keep asking for since you're too frightened to risk your heart."She broke free from him, doing so in a deliberate and smooth manner, and opened the heavy doors.Henri muttered a curse and, as he stepped out into the hallway behind her, ran both hands through his hair. The outer office was completely silent. The three administrative assistants were frozen over their keyboards, their eyes wide and their fingers remaining in mid-air.Disr

The reaction was immediate. The way in which she automatically said no made it seem as though he had slapped her face.There was a sudden and severe pain in her eyes. Her mouth opened as if she had a whole ocean of words she wanted to speak, but no sound came out. She struggled to swallow and then clenched her jaw."No," she said once more with another breath—this time without any softness, made completely of steel.Henri had a tightness in his stomach. He was not used to being refused, not at all in the case of her, and certainly not when he was proposing to her a permanent position in his life, financial security, and access to all that he had."I don't think you've got what I'm saying," he said gently, as he tried to allay the sudden panic rising in his chest. He ran his hand along the side of her knee and then moved it up to grasp hers, which was lying firmly in her lap.​"Don't!"The word shot out of her throat in a voice so fierce and so full of real disgust that he came to a su