Fairytale on the Children′s Ward
Fairytale on the Children's Ward
Meredith Webber
Emily dropped a kiss on her mother’s cheek. ‘Isn’t it fun having Dad around?’ she whispered, and suddenly Clare’s spring of happiness wasn’t bubbling quite as high.
She knew it wasn’t jealousy she was feeling, but disappointment of some kind—disappointment that the life she’d been providing for her daughter hadn’t measured up…
‘You need my pearls—the ones Gran gave me,’ Emily declared as she inspected her mother for the last time. ‘Wait here.’
She ran off to her bedroom and returned with the pearls that had been her great-grandmother’s, making her mother sit on the bed so she, Emily, could fasten them.
‘There,’ she said, ‘you’re beautiful. Dad will surely want to marry you now.’
Clare knew the words were nothing more than childish enthusiasm, but once again the joy of the morning dimmed, and despair wormed its way into her heart.
How could she resist if it became a matter of two against one?
CHRISTMAS AT JIMMIE’S
At Jimmie’s Children’s Unit, miracles don’t just
happen at Christmas time—babies are saved every day!
But this year there are two children
with some big wishes for Santa…
BACHELOR OF THE BABY WARD
—little Hamish McDowell wants a new mummy…
FAIRYTALE ON THE CHILDREN’S WARD
—all Emily Jackson longs for
is to see her mum and dad reunited…
Will Hamish and Emilyget the greatest Christmas gifts of all?
Find out in Meredith Webber’s heartwarming
linked duet, out this month!
Fairytale
on the
Children’s Ward
Meredith Webber
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
CONTENTS
Chapter One (#u23306828-edd3-5801-a88c-868804147131)
Chapter Two (#ud87cfe45-c7e3-50f3-8129-e4564dddacb3)
Chapter Three (#u5d5b81f0-044a-5ebb-a503-c833e409c177)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Meredith Webber says of herself, ‘Some ten years ago, I read an article which suggested that Mills and Boon were looking for new Medical™ Romance authors. I had one of those “I can do that” moments, and gave it a try. What began as a challenge has become an obsession—though I do temper the “butt on seat” career of writing with dirty but healthy outdoor pursuits, fossicking through the Australian Outback in search of gold or opals. Having had some success in all of these endeavours, I now consider I’ve found the perfect lifestyle.’
CHAPTER ONE
OLIVER RANKIN hated being late. He was a man who believed there were no acceptable excuses for it, and condemned the rudeness of it. But he was undoubtedly running late, due mainly to car trouble on his drive from Melbourne to Sydney—trouble that had delayed him twenty-four hours while a part was sent, apparently by camel train, from Melbourne to the Victorian border.
Then there was Sydney peak-hour traffic—un believable!
Eventually, however, the latest fellow appointed to Alex Attwood’s paediatric cardiac surgical team pulled into the parking lot at St James Hospital for Children, abandoned his car in a board-members-only parking spot and raced into the building.
Fortunately he’d spent a month with the team earlier in the year so he knew where to go, but he still only made the meeting with a couple of seconds to spare.
Relief swamped him!
Until—
The world whirled before his eyes. Low blood pressure—all the rushing…
He dropped into a chair as Alex introduced him to Angus, the new surgeon on the team, and reminded him he’d already met Kate. Then he closed his eyes, and opened them again.
Carefully.
The apparition had come right into the room, later than he was.
A totally beautiful, totally mind-blowing apparition…
‘And this is Clare Jackson, our new perfusionist,’ Oliver heard Alex say. ‘I’m more delighted than I can tell you to welcome Clare to our team as she trained in the US at the same hospital as Theo, and the oldies on the team will know how good he was.’
Oliver battled to sort out the disbelief in his head, to actually accept that the woman who still, from time to time, haunted his dreams was right here in this room.
Impossible!
Except it wasn’t! There she was, head tilted towards Alex, so he saw her in profile, and caught the long line of her neck—the neck he’d loved to—
Clare Jackson?
He’d had the list of team members’ names for a couple of weeks, but as she’d shown up on that as C. Jackson and most perfusionists he’d worked with had been males, he hadn’t given a thought to the coincidence of surnames.
Alex was talking, but the words didn’t penetrate Oliver’s brain. Not only was Clare right here in this room, but apparently she was a team member. He’d be working with her.
She was a perfusionist?
From actress to lifesaving medical equipment expert in ten short years?
‘Clare!’ he’d managed to blurt out when they’d been introduced.
She’d nodded, lustrous dark hair swirling around her head, brown eyes half hooded, long eyelashes hiding any emotion those eyes might reveal at this unexpected reunion.
‘Oliver,’ she’d said, her voice still so familiar a tremor of excitement had shaken his body.
He tried to concentrate on Alex’s introductions to the rest of the team, but how could he? He snuck a glance at Clare, and was annoyed to see that she seemed totally unfazed by this incredible coincidence.
* * *
Clare held her body very still, glad she’d learned how to do this years ago—back when she was a drama student at university, back when she’d first met Oliver.
Besides, if she held her body very still it might not fall apart, which was what it was threatening to do any moment.
Her body and her mind!
That he should be here—on the same team—was so unbelievable she had to wonder if it was some giant conspiracy of the Fates. Of course, even ten years ago, Oliver had been headed for a paediatric specialty, but he’d never mentioned surgery.
Whatever, it was indisputably Oliver sitting on the other side of the room, ignoring her in the politest possible way. Although what could he have said?
Long time, no see?
Not for Oliver the trite phrase, nor even idle conversation. The problem was that eventually the meeting would end and they would have to leave the room and some kind of conversation would obviously have to take place!
He’d come to claim Emily!
Nausea roiled in her stomach as the thought struck like the flick of a whip, but common sense prevailed. He’d obviously been as shocked to see her as she was to see him, and if he’d wanted his child surely he’d have got in touch back when she’d told him about the pregnancy.
Or in the intervening years?
And the fact that he hadn’t—that he obviously didn’t want to know his daughter—hardened her heart against him once again.
She could handle this! She could handle anything!
Easy to think, harder to do. Fear for her daughter fluttered in her heart, fear for Em’s emotional stability.
Her mind ran wild.
Now he was here, wouldn’t he want to see his daughter—to get to know her?
And if he still refused to acknowledge her, how would that affect Em?
Thinking about her daughter opened up a void so deep and black Clare felt as if she was teetering on a precipice, about to be plunged into a bottomless abyss.
Yet how could she not think of Emily, not put her first?
She’d have to talk to Oliver, find out what he wanted and whether Emily was part of it. Then she—perhaps they—could work out how to get father and daughter together—or not—with the least possible upheaval in Emily’s life.
She sneaked another glance at the man causing such havoc in her mind, and this time felt her heart turn over. Silver threads had infiltrated his sandy hair at both temples, lending him an air of distinction, but Oliver had always been a distinguished-looking man—tall, lean, tanned, with dark brows above those startling pale green eyes. In profile slightly hawkish, the long thin nose tipped down just slightly at the end.
Pointing to his lips?
That had been a stupid fantasy of hers in her youth, for Oliver Rankin had the most beautiful mouth she’d ever seen, on a man or woman.
Oliver!
Huge inward sigh!
She tried to concentrate on Alex’s words, but her mind was way back in the past.
With Oliver…
How had things gone so disastrously wrong between them? How had she been stupid enough to walk out on him?
Because he didn’t want the child you yearned for, she reminded herself. Didn’t want a child at all and definitely not right then for all it would have been an ideal time as far as you were concerned. But part of the stupidity had been thinking he’d come after you, and that somehow the two of you could have patched things up.
That hadn’t happened!
She’d spent a miserable Christmas at home on the farm with her family, then the realisation had dawned that, wanted or not, she was going to have a baby.
Tentative delight…
Quickly quelled at the thought of Oliver’s reaction.
Which hadn’t come!
Unable to contact him by phone or email, she’d finally written, but when he hadn’t answered her letters—had ignored her unexpected news—she’d decided she’d have to forget all about him, which, she’d admitted to herself even then, was easier said than done. Until the diagnosis of her father’s illness had turned her family’s life upside down and concern and grief for him had swamped the pain of losing Oliver. Then, within weeks of Em’s birth, life had changed so irrevocably Oliver had been the last person she’d been thinking of.
No, that was wrong. She’d longed for him—for his presence, his support, to have him there to share her dread and fear.…
And not having him, she’d turned to the man who was there—
She shuddered as she shook the memory away, and concentrated on what Alex Attwood, the team leader, was saying.
‘Oliver, Kate and Clare, you’ll all be working with Angus tomorrow. Clare, I know you’ve settled into your flat, so maybe you could show Oliver where his is. Did I tell you he’s taking the other flat in Rod’s house?’
Of course Alex hadn’t told her! Excited as she’d been at coming back to Australia and getting a job in such an elite unit, she’d still have remembered if someone had said, Oh, and a chap called Oliver Rankin will be living next door! Not only remembered, but packed up and left.
No, she didn’t run from men any more, but she’d have had time to at least think about this situation, to prepare herself.
To prepare Emily?
Oh, sweet reason, what was she going to do about Emily? For one crazy moment she thought of phoning the school and asking if they could take her as a full boarder rather than a weekly one, but it was hard enough on both of them to be separated five days a week.
Alex had turned to Oliver, and was explaining. ‘The flat I arranged for you is in my father-in-law’s house just down the road from the hospital. Rod Talbot, my father-in-law, is in a wheelchair so he has the ground-floor apartment and has turned upstairs into two small but comfortable flats. Of course, you don’t have to stay there. Once you get to know the area, you might find somewhere that suits you better. Because of the proximity to the hospital, the flats are easy to let—not that Rod needs the money.’
‘Rod Talbot?’ Oliver repeated, his voice stirring so many memories in Clare’s body she found herself shivering. ‘Is he the writer?’
Alex nodded, and while Oliver talked about how much he enjoyed Rod Talbot’s books—Oliver having time to read?—Clare muddled over the other information she’d received. The bit about Oliver being in the other flat in Rod Talbot’s house—the flat with the door right opposite her door. Oliver living so close, sleeping so close…
A tremor of memory ran through her body before she brought her mind firmly back to the major problem.
Oliver spending his weekends next door to her and Emily!
Once again her reaction was flight. They’d go back to the States; she’d always find work there. But she steeled herself against such weakness—flight wasn’t an option. She wasn’t an emotional young woman any longer; she was a grown-up, mature—a qualified and respected career woman with an important position in a team that saved children’s lives.
Even if she did feel like a teenager right now, with all the confusion and angst and dreadful insecurity that came with the transition from child to adult.
The meeting was breaking up, the anaesthetist from the second team taking the new surgeon off to the child-care centre. Dear heaven, had Oliver married again? Would he have children?
No, he’d been adamant about that, about never having children. That was why they’d split up. To a certain extent Clare had understood, because it had been soon after he’d found out a little about his own past, found out his life had been built upon a lie.
Thinking about that time—how hurt Oliver had been—diverted her thoughts from Oliver’s marital arrangements, although if there was a wife, what would she think about Em?
It was all Clare could do not to wail out loud. How could this be happening to her? And now, when both she and Em were so excited to be back in Australia?
She pulled herself together with an effort.
Best not to think about Em! Not here, not now…
And it was useless to be speculating about Oliver’s marital state, let alone whether he had children or not, although Rod had told Clare hers was the larger of the two flats, so a wife and children could hardly fit into the other one.
This realisation made her feel a little easier for all of five seconds, until it occurred to her he could have left his wife and kids—if he’d weakened on the children stand—in Melbourne while he settled in.
‘Clare.’
Her name in his voice, a sound she’d never thought to hear again. No-one said her name as Oliver did! And no-one else, with just that one word, could send those stupid shivers down her spine.
After ten years?
It was unbelievable.
She’d heard of muscle memory—sportspeople talked about it. Was there such a thing as nerve memory, that every nerve in her body remembered…?
He was close now, waiting for her. The composure he wore like a well-cut suit to hide the emotional Italian inside him was so familiar she wanted to reach out and touch him, to feel the warmth of the man beneath that cool facade.
Was she mad?
Touching Oliver would be disastrous—had always been disastrous!—because one touch had never been enough.
She dug through her memory for an image of that last morning, not long before Christmas, when, all composure gone, fury and resentment had flared from his body and burnt in his eyes. That was the Oliver she needed to keep in mind.
Which was okay as far as resisting his appeal went, but what about the rest? What about Emily?
Clare felt physically sick, nausea spreading through her body. How could this have happened? She pulled herself together with a mammoth effort, hoping outwardly at least she might look composed.
‘So we’re to be neighbours,’ she said, offering a polite smile, while her bewildered heart beat a wild tattoo inside her chest, and her thoughts ran this way and that like mice in a maze.
‘It seems that way.’
Were his words strained? Was Oliver feeling the same mix of disbelief, and confusion—and surely not excitement?—as she was?
Of course he wouldn’t be. For one thing, Oliver didn’t do confusion.
Her heart skittered again but this time it was nothing to do with excitement—more like dread and fear and trepidation. She had to say something.
‘I did write to you, you know.’
It sounded pathetic but at least it caught his attention.
‘When?’ he demanded, his voice hard and tight.
So hard and tight the tiny bit of courage that had prompted Clare to tell him faded, which meant the next words came out all breathless and confused.
‘End of January, and again later in the year.
‘You wrote to me at the end of January? Wasn’t that a bit late, considering it was before Christmas you walked out? I’d definitely moved on by then, physically and emotionally.’
Pain stabbed through Clare’s body at the last words, but what was he saying?
‘You didn’t get any letters from me—then or later?’
Glacial green—that’s how Oliver’s eyes could look…and were looking now.
‘No.’
He shook his head to emphasise the word and, knowing he would never lie to her, Clare felt a stab of deep resentment—not to mention pain—as she realised he didn’t know about her pregnancy. He didn’t know he had a daughter, a daughter who would be right there in the flat next door to his come Friday!
She had to tell him!
Easy enough to have the thought but how to do it?
And when, and where?
This was hardly an appropriate time or place and, what’s more, he was talking to her again, saying something, although with the wild furore going on her mind it was a struggle to make out the words.
Forcing herself to focus, she realised his conversation was nothing more than the polite inquiries of old acquaintances catching up.
‘But a perfusionist? What made you change course? What happened to life on the stage?’
Clare cast an anxious glance behind him, but there was no-one nearby to overhear an almost honest answer.
‘Long story short, I moved to Queensland and studied science. I met a perfusionist who used to work with Alex when he was in Melbourne. I learnt more about it and decided it was the dream job as far as I was concerned. I began my studies in Brisbane, then went to Chicago to get more qualifications and experience, and here I am.’
Oliver knew he was staring at her, replacing his mental image of a twenty-five-year-old soap-star Clare with this more mature adult version—more mature, and even more beautiful. And the reaction in his chest was an ectopic heartbeat, nothing more. Ectopic heartbeats happened to some people all the time, and most people some time in their life.…
But if he read the signs correctly, she was feeling even more strain at this unexpected meeting than he was.
‘Alex was saying we’re going to be neighbours.’
Could he really be having this stilted conversation with Clare? Clare who had laughed and loved and thrown herself into life with enormous energy and enthusiasm? Thrown herself into their relationship, making every moment they were together special and intense.
Until the day he’d told her he didn’t want a baby and, unable to believe he’d never mentioned this before, unable to even discuss it with him, she’d walked out.…
And he’d let her go, furious at her lack of understanding of his situation—his feelings in all of it! How could he have contemplated fatherhood when he didn’t know who his own father was, didn’t know himself? And how could he have considered marriage when his closest experience of it—his mother’s three attempts—had been so disastrous?
He was reminding himself of this justification when Clare spoke again.
‘You were saying you’ve read our landlord’s books?’
‘There’s no need to sound so surprised,’ he grumbled, memories of the past bothering him more than he’d thought possible. ‘I’ve time to read these days.’
She smiled at him and he felt his heart miss another beat. Frequent ectopic heartbeats might be indicative of a problem of some kind, his medical brain told him.
‘You didn’t have time for any relaxation back then,’ she said.
Except with you, he thought but didn’t say, for there was a barrier between them, like a glass wall through which he could see and hear but not touch. Not that he would touch her, of course. No matter how much his fingers tingled at the thought.
Of course there’d be a barrier between them. It had been ten years; they’d split up. There were issues—wasn’t that the word people used these days? So many unresolved issues it was more like a brick rampart than a glass wall between them.
Back to the present!
‘My car’s illegally parked downstairs. Can I follow you to the flat?’
‘You can give me a lift.’
The moment the words were out of her mouth Clare regretted them. She needed to get away from Oliver, not spend more time with him, especially not more time in the privacy a car offered.
She needed time to think things through, to work out how on earth she was going to tell him about Emily.
Not that he deserved to know! He hadn’t wanted a child.
The tiny whisper from one corner of her brain was tempting, but she slapped it down. Of course he’d have to know, and now they’d come together, didn’t Em deserve to know her father? Hadn’t Clare always told Em that one day they’d find him so she could meet him?
But ‘one day’ in Clare’s mind had been when Em was eighteen or so—an adult who would understand the traumatic period of time that had been Clare’s pregnancy, not to mention the aftermath of Emily’s birth!
She should have directed him to the flat; it was just down the road. But here he was, saying he’d be delighted—ever polite, Oliver Rankin—and putting out a hand to usher her towards the door.
She moved, just in time to avoid contact with him, but knew that as well as the Emily problem, she had to sort herself out, to strengthen her body against the insidious physical weakness just seeing him again had caused. There was too much at stake for her to be distracted by attraction.
‘I need to speak to Alex about something, so I’ll meet you downstairs. The easiest way is to take the blue exit from the car park. I’ll be down there near the gate in five minutes.’
Alex was still at the front of the meeting room, stacking some papers he’d spread out earlier. What excuse could she give? What question could she ask?
Had he noticed her hesitation that he looked up?
‘Everything all right, Clare?’ he asked. ‘Emily settled in at school?’
‘Just fine and dandy, and yes, she loves it,’ she replied, hovering by her chair while Oliver left the room. But Alex’s question had reminded Clare that Alex and Annie knew Emily, and Rod knew Emily—it wasn’t as if you could keep a nine-year-old a secret.
Clare dropped her briefcase, which gave her an excuse to sit down. Knowing she couldn’t just sit, she leant down to retrieve the leather case, fiddling with the catches on it while she tried valiantly to regain the poise on which she prided herself, the composure she’d fought so hard to achieve!
‘I only know of Angus from his colleagues, but Oliver worked with us earlier this year,’ Alex was saying. ‘He’s a fine surgeon, and if Angus is even half as good as people say he is, we’ve got a team that you’ll discover is every bit as good as the ones you’ve already worked with. At least, I hope you find it that way.’
Clare smiled at him. He was so nice! He and Annie, his wife, had invited her and Emily for dinner the previous Saturday, and seeing their relationship—the obvious love they felt for each other—had left Clare wondering why relationships worked for some people and not for others.
Her body tightened at the memory…
Ached…
* * *
Oliver eased his car out of the parking space, thankful he hadn’t been clamped. The signs to the blue exit were clear and easy to follow, but it took some manoeuvring to reach it. Clare came hurrying towards him, the movement blurring her image so he saw the beautiful girl who’d first caught his attention—the girl he’d thought was his for ever—running eagerly to meet him.
He couldn’t fool himself about ectopic heartbeats any longer; his body was reacting to this bizarre reunion, to her presence, although that could be explained away as well. It was a while since he’d had a relationship with a woman, put off women by the words of his most recent lover who’d informed him he was nothing but an empty shell of a man, with no understanding of love whatsoever.
The woman Clare, not the girl he’d known, climbed into the car and pointed ahead.
‘We go through the lights and straight down that road across from the park. I think most of the team seem to live along here, though maybe not the nurses, who’d be local Sydney people. It’s such a pleasant walk to work I haven’t considered buying a car yet.’
I, not we, Oliver thought, then he had to ask.
‘You’re on the team list as C. Jackson? You never married?’
He sensed her withdrawal and knew the glass wall was very definitely back in place.
‘Once, for a very brief time. It was a mistake,’ she said lightly, turning to look out the window at the houses they were passing. ‘We’re four more down, the house with the red door. There’s a common foyer on the ground floor, and stairs up to a landing. The two flats open off that. They’re fully furnished and very comfortable but I guess Alex already told you that.’
She might as well have said, Mind your own business, changing the subject from marriage to accommodation so swiftly, yet the thought of Clare with someone else had sent a shaft of pain through his belly.
Ridiculous, of course; he’d been with other women.
He pulled up outside the house she’d indicated, double-parking as all the marked spaces were already occupied.
‘There’s a garage around the back. Rod has a vehicle that’s been adapted for a wheelchair but there’d be room for another car. Drive on and I’ll show you how to get into the lane. Sorry, I didn’t think of it earlier.’
Clare knew she was babbling as he followed her directions, but sitting in the close confines of the car with Oliver was even worse than she’d imagined. Somehow she’d been transported back to when they’d met and she’d fallen so helplessly in love—to when any time with Oliver was special. Her stupid body was responding to his presence, her physical delight totally uncontrollable no matter how much she tried to overcome it with strong mental warnings.
Even the panic and worry she was feeling over Em did little to dampen her reactions.
‘Park here—I’ll get the gate. You can ease the car into the yard while I go in and check with Rod if it’s okay to use the garage.’
Finding the gate shut had been a relief. She all but leapt from the vehicle, opening the two sides of the gate, then hurrying to the rear door of Rod’s flat.
He was in the small conservatory at the back, his gnarled arthritic fingers pecking furiously at the keyboard of his laptop. She knocked on the glass.
‘I hope I haven’t ruined your train of thought,’ she apologised, ‘but Oliver, Dr Rankin, has arrived and has a car. Can he park it beside yours in the garage?’
Rod waved away her apology and wheeled towards her, coming out to meet his new tenant.
‘Can’t help you with your cases, mate,’ he said to Oliver a little later when the car was snug inside the garage and Oliver was heaving two cases from the trunk.
‘I can,’ Clare found herself offering, but Oliver, being Oliver, refused her offer, carrying them both himself.
‘Come through my place,’ Rod suggested, and led the way into his flat, always neat and tidy, the minimum of furniture allowing his chair to move freely through the apartment. He opened his front door, showed them into the foyer and handed Oliver a set of keys.
‘Clare will take you up,’ he said.
‘No papers to sign? No lease agreements?’ Oliver asked.
‘If you’re working for Alex, you’re okay,’ Rod replied. Then he smiled. ‘Actually all the financial details will be in a folder on your kitchen bench. Annie, my daughter, organises all of that for me. Her phone number is there as well as mine, so phone if you need anything or have any questions.’
He then looked from Oliver to Clare before he added, ‘Or ask Clare—she’s been here a week now, settling in, so she knows her way around.’
He turned from Oliver to Clare and added, ‘Have you heard from Emily this week? Does she still think the school’s the best in the world?’
Emily! Emily! Emily!
The name hammered in Clare’s head, but she had to reply.
‘She still loves it,’ she managed to say, although her vocal cords were so tight it was a wonder the words came out.
‘Emily?’ Oliver repeated as he followed her up the stairs.
Could she faint? Clare wondered. Faint and topple backwards down the stairs, possibly breaking her neck which right now, extreme though it might be, seemed preferable to answering Oliver’s question.
‘My daughter,’ she managed, forcing the words through even tighter vocal cords, so she sounded shrill, if not hysterical.
‘Fancy that! So you got the child you wanted,’ Oliver said as they reached the landing. The ice in his voice was visible in his eyes as he looked down at her and added, ‘Got the child and dumped the husband once his usefulness was over? Was that how it worked?’
Clare could only stare at him, her mind a chaotic battlefield, one voice yelling at her to tell him right now, another suggesting physical assault, while a third was advocating flight. She steeled herself against them all, looked him in the eyes and, hoping she sounded far more cool and in control than she felt, said, ‘You never used to be spiteful, Oliver.’
After which she turned away to unlock her door, and dive into the sanctuary of her flat. Oliver’s voice saying her name was the last thing she heard before she shut him out.
She leaned against the door, shaking with the hurt he’d inflicted, trying to breathe deeply, desperate to stem the waves of panic that washed through her mind and body.
Ten deep breaths, wasn’t that the rule—no, maybe that was counting to ten before you murdered someone. Well, there was an idea!
Three deep breaths…
Now think rationally!
Monday was as good as done, which meant she had four more days—four days to find a way to tell Oliver Emily was his daughter before Em came home and almost inevitably met him in person.
Clare’s mind went back into panic mode and breathing deeply didn’t seem to help.
Of course she had to tell him. Forget that his reaction just now had been so hateful. He had to know!
But the hub of it all was Emily. As far as Clare was concerned, Emily’s welfare, her happiness and emotional stability, had to be protected at all costs. Forget how Oliver might feel about Em’s mother, forget how Em’s parents might feel about each other—or whatever kinds of messes they’d made of their respective lives—at the heart of whatever lay ahead was Emily’s well-being.
CHAPTER TWO
OF ALL the impossible things to have happened! Oliver set his cases down in the small foyer and took a look around. Small sitting area, the open plan revealing a dining nook in a bay window and a kitchen behind a high bench at the back.
She had a child.
Stop thinking about Clare; look around your new home.
He could move; Alex had said it would be okay.
No, look around.
Neat, tastefully furnished, all he needed in the way of space. He turned aside, into a reasonably sized bedroom, again a bay window, this one overlooking the front yard and the street and park across the road, while down a small hall he discovered a bathroom and a second bedroom, small, but furnished with a good-size desk as well as a bed, so it was obvious any single tenant would use it as a study.
Or a tenant with a child could use it for the child.
How could he live next door to Clare’s child—the child he’d denied her?
A child who wasn’t a toddler, if she was at school. Why hadn’t he realised just how desperate Clare had been?
Because he’d assumed getting pregnant had been a whim, that’s why. Possibly something to make his commitment to her more—
More what?
Binding?
No, she’d known all along he had no intention of marrying and he’d assumed she’d understood that meant no children.
He closed his eyes but her image was once again imprinted in his mind. Not the image from the past, but the image of the new Clare, more heart-stoppingly beautiful than ever.
He swore quietly to himself. Why was he letting her affect him this way? On top of which, the fact that she had a child was none of his business. Where was his self-discipline? Surely he was professional enough that he could treat her as a colleague.
But even as that thought formed in his head another part of his brain was echoing with mocking laughter. As if that’s possible, it was saying, when your libido jolts to attention any time she’s around. Ectopic heartbeats indeed—be honest, it’s lust, mate!
Had it been more than lust the first time? Maybe not love—he wasn’t sure what love entailed—but definitely he’d felt a deep affection for her. How could he not when she’d been so beautiful and open and honest?
So loving!
Did she still see their relationship as five wasted years?
No! It was in the past. This was now. And if the child—Emily, Rod had said—was at school, Clare hadn’t exactly hung around mourning their break-up.
He gripped his head hard in his hands and squeezed to stop the mental arguments and to shut out the memories.
He would not think about Clare! He would not think about the past. He would move on, continue moving on, and if a tiny part of his mind kept questioning whether he’d ever really moved on from Clare emotionally—well, it was such a quiet voice he could ignore it.
She’d moved on, that was for sure. Changed careers, had a child—he doubted she’d ever given him a passing thought.
Until today, of course…
So?
Forget the past!
He took a deep breath, retrieved his cases, carried them through into the bedroom and began unpacking. He had chests with household items awaiting despatch in Melbourne, wanting to settle in and make sure he liked the flat before having them forwarded on, but for now all he needed to unpack were clothes, the one set of sheets he’d brought with him, a couple of towels and books—lots of books, although many more were in the chests. Reading had become his escape, but from what?
It was the first time he’d asked himself that question and now he had to probe further. Was it an escape from thinking too deeply about the sterility of his life? Or an escape from the inner emptiness his old girlfriend had pointed out to him? Or even an escape from feeling anything at all—for anyone…?
He gave a scoffing laugh, and shook off the stupid introspection. Reading was an escape from the intensity of his work, nothing more! And this unfamiliar delving into his psyche was the result of tiredness, having driven through the night to make the meeting this morning, stopping only for a couple of short breaks for safety’s sake.
And considering work, rather than the escape from it, he should read up on tomorrow’s op. With specialists all over the world, someone was always trying something new—discovering a tidier, or more effective, solution for the myriad problems they encountered.
He found his laptop, opened it on the desk in the second bedroom and settled down to search the internet. Hours later, stiff and tired, he closed the laptop and went in search of food—or information about food.
He found the folder in the kitchen and leafed through it. There was a selection of takeaway menus at the back of the notes—ha, food! He selected one and made a phone call. He’d eat, then shower, and get a good night’s sleep—practical, sensible decision making, that’s what was needed here.
A tap at the front door, his flat’s front door, made him wonder how people got in—how his pizza would get in. Did the outer door have a bell of some kind, an arrangement whereby it could be opened from upstairs? Had Annie’s notes explained? He’d read them again, but first see who was at the door.
Clare!
A very twitchy, uptight-looking Clare for all she smiled politely at him before explaining, ‘I thought I should tell you about the doors. On your keys you’ll have a bigger shiny silver key, it’s for the deadlock on the outside door, but if someone comes to visit you there are bells outside the front door. I’ve just labelled your bell with your name. You’ll hear the ring inside, and the button on that phone thing in the hall—this…Pressing it releases the door lock.’
She’d come in to show him the door-opening mechanism and was so close he could have taken her in his arms right there and then. He could feel her in his arms, feel her curves snug against his body, smell the perfume of her hair in his nostrils. He’d bend his head, just a little, to capture her lips—
He was losing it! Seriously insane! He had to pull himself together, get sorted, all that stuff.
‘Thanks,’ he managed when she turned to look at him, perhaps puzzled by his wooden stance and lack of response.
‘No worries,’ she said, then she frowned and looked more closely at him. ‘Are you okay? I know it’s hardly flattering to tell someone they look terrible, but you look exhausted.’
‘Car trouble on the way from Melbourne meant I had to drive through the night. One good night’s sleep and I’ll be fine.’
Clare turned to leave, uncertain whether to be glad or sorry. She’d buoyed herself up to tell Oliver about Emily, using the key explanations as an excuse to knock on his door. The plan was she’d casually offer dinner, and they could sit down in a civilised fashion and discuss the situation, though the problem of quite how she’d bring it up still loomed large in her mind.
But seeing how tired Oliver looked and finding out why, it was immediately obvious this wasn’t the time to be telling him he had a daughter, especially as he was operating the next morning. What he needed was a good night’s sleep, not a bombshell that was likely to rock his world and quite possibly prevent any sleep at all.
Part of her was relieved, but the other part aggravated that the telling would continue to hang over her head.
Then there was dinner—he had to eat…Should she still ask?
‘Thanks for explaining about the locks and keys,’ he said as she dithered in the doorway, so conscious of his body she wondered if he could feel the tension building in hers. In her mind his hand reached out for her, touched her shoulder, drew her close. She’d sink against him, feeling her body fit itself to his and—
The jangling buzz of the outside bell sounded in his flat, shocking her out of the stupid dream. He smiled as she looked at him, ashamed of her thoughts and puzzled by the intrusion.
‘Good thing you labelled my bell,’ he added. ‘I ordered a pizza for dinner.’
As Oliver pressed the button to release the front door lock, using the phone to tell the delivery person to come on up, Clare scuttled back across the landing, all but diving into the safety of her own flat.
Although as a refuge it was now severely lacking in serenity and peace, given who her neighbour was, and the wayward turns her mind was taking.
Back when he hadn’t replied to her letters, she’d put him out of her life, swearing never to think of him again.
But not thinking about him had proven difficult when their child had inherited his green eyes and curving, inviting lips.
* * *
Clare knew she needed a good night’s sleep, but how could sleep come when the huge, insurmountable problem of how to tell Oliver was cluttering up her mind and sitting like an elephant on her chest?
Earlier, when she’d gone in with the key excuse, she’d decided just coming out with it would be the best. Oh, by the way, my daughter, Emily, is your child.
But now that seemed impossibly, horribly flippant. She had to find some better way to say it.
Oliver, there’s something you should know?
No, that wouldn’t work. She’d lose courage after the Oliver part and ask about his mother or something equally inane.
Could she begin with self-justification? I did try to contact you; I phoned and wrote, then—
No, she couldn’t do that because it would mean explaining about Dad dying and even now thinking of that time still hurt too much for her to talk about it.
Finally, with herculean determination, she lulled herself to sleep, only to wake before dawn, tired, cranky and so uptight she thought her limbs might snap apart as she moved.
But move she did. Although she’d spent many hours at the hospital the previous week, getting to know the machine she would be operating, now she was anxious to get up to the theatre for one last check.
She showered and dressed, blotting everything from her mind except work, excited yet slightly apprehensive about her first day as part of the team.
Slightly apprehensive?
Understatement of the year, and although she was focusing on work, the other problem set aside, it had to be the thought of working with Oliver that had her twitching like a snake on drugs.
An image of him flashed across her mind—the now-Oliver with silver streaks in the tawny hair, and fine lines at the corners of his green eyes. More lines forming parentheses in his cheeks when he smiled, his lips still as mesmerising as ever, a pale line delineating their shape.
Em’s lips!
But it was better to think of Oliver’s lips than the problem of Emily right now. Thinking about Emily would put her mother into a panic again and a panicking perfusionist was of no use to anyone.
Unfortunately thinking of Oliver didn’t do her much good either. Look at it this way, she told herself. Yes, it was an unbelievable quirk of fate that had brought them together again, but they’d met as colleagues now, nothing more. Two professionals, working in the same team, working to save the lives of tiny babies.
Forget the fact you still feel an attraction to the man!
Forget Emily—well, not Em herself, but the problem she presented right now. Concentrate on work.
In the kitchen, she turned on the simple pod coffee machine that had been her treat to herself when she’d moved to Sydney, and dropped two slices of frozen fruit loaf into the toaster. Had Oliver found the shops? Did he have food to eat? Coffee?
The temptation to tap on his door and ask him was almost overwhelming, but it was barely six and their official working hours began at eight so it was likely he was still asleep. Besides, the more times she saw him outside of work hours, the more opportunities she would have had to tell him about Emily, and the angrier he’d be when she did tell him, that she hadn’t told him earlier.
Did that make sense or was her lack of sleep making her stupid?
She sipped her coffee, returning to the mental excuse of not knocking on the door in case he was still sleeping.
An image of a sleeping Oliver popped obligingly into her head—Oliver in boxer shorts, his back bare, lightly tanned, the bones of his spine visible as he curled around his pillow in sleep. An ache started deep inside her, and she left her toast half eaten, the coffee cup still half full, hurrying to the bathroom to clean her teeth, then fleeing her flat which was, she realised, just far too close to Oliver’s for her peace of mind. It was the proximity dogging her, reminding her, teasing at her body. If she moved—
But how could she when Alex had been kind enough to arrange the accommodation and she already felt settled here?
Or had done!
Although if she shifted…? No! her mind shrieked at her. Of course you have to tell him.
* * *
Oliver pushed his bedroom window to open it wider, sure there must be a breeze somewhere in the stillness of the summer morning. Below him the front door clicked shut and Clare strode into view, marching with great speed and determination up the path, then along the street, striding now—exercising or escaping?
But escaping from what? Not him, surely.
He laughed at the thought, a mocking laugh, but didn’t leave the window, watching until a slight bend in the road took her out of sight.
Clare!
He showered and dressed, reminding himself that both of them had changed in the ten years since the split. Now they were mature adults and could meet and treat each other as professional colleagues, nothing more, though the thought of her with a child niggled at him.
For one thing, where was the child now? She hadn’t had a child with her and there was no noise coming from next door.
Clare with a child.
Why did that hurt him?
The physical attraction he still felt towards her was probably nothing more than an emotional hangover from the past, some glitch in programming, possibly to do with the Italian revelations. And feeling this strong attraction, it was only natural that he’d been on the brink of taking her in his arms yesterday evening, when the front doorbell had sounded.
Saved by a pizza!
Think of food, not Clare.
Rod’s daughter had left some basic groceries in the flat—milk and butter in the fridge, coffee, tea, bread and spreads in the pantry. He’d have to find the supermarket and do some shopping, and until then he could eat at the hospital. In fact, if he left now he could have breakfast there; maybe that’s why Clare had left so early.
She wasn’t in the little coffee shop in the foyer, nor in the canteen, so he ate a solitary breakfast, then made his way not to the teams’ rooms but to the theatre, wanting to refamiliarise himself with the way Alex had it set up.
‘Oh!’
Clare was there ahead of him and she must have sensed his presence, for the startled expression burst from her lips before he was fully through the door.
Not that she was unsettled for long, greeting him with a smile—a very professional smile—and a cheery, ‘Good morning, Oliver,’ for all the world as if they hadn’t shared an extremely passionate relationship, albeit ten years ago.
‘Do you always begin this early?’ he asked, because two could play the calm and controlled game. She smiled again.
‘First-night nerves,’ she told him. ‘I’ve spent a lot of time here in the past week, but I’m still anxious about the machine, which is stupid as it’s exactly the same make of machine as I operated in the States. It’s just that—’
She stopped abruptly and he saw a faint colour appear in her cheeks.
‘Just that…?’ he prompted, hoping professional conversation would halt the disturbances in his body.
‘You’ll think I’m barmy, but to me the machines have personalities, maybe idiosyncrasies would be a better word, and until I get to know each one personally I won’t know what to expect.’
Clare watched him carefully as she explained her unease, and to her surprise, she caught no hint of a smile. In fact, Oliver was nodding as if he understood what she was saying.
‘You have so much to think about, with the responsibility for the respiratory and circulatory functions of the lungs and heart. I can understand you wondering if the machine has quirks you need to watch for. You’ve got the oxygenator, the pumps, the filters, the reservoirs and tubing, so many component parts that can go wrong.’
And now he smiled, sending tremors of remembered delight through Clare’s body, in spite of her determination to remain on strictly professional terms with him.
‘But have things ever gone badly wrong for you? Has there ever been a disaster you couldn’t overcome?’
She found herself smiling back at him, professionally, of course.
‘Tubes kinking, the membrane oxygenator failing, the machine turning off automatically when a clot or bubble gets into the tubes? I’ve seen most of the calamities that can happen, and had to cope with a few, but generally the machines, providing they are serviced regularly and checked before every operation, work brilliantly.’
Oliver heard the pride in her voice and recognised the dedication she had to her profession—speaking of which…
‘It still seems a strange choice for someone who had stars in her eyes and an established career as an actor.’
He saw her shoulders lift in a slight shrug.
‘Things happened, Oliver, that changed my goals. I’d done well in science at school, so a switch to that seemed logical.’
Which would have made sense, only her voice had tightened as she spoke, and he sensed a tension in her body. Or was he fooling himself that he was still so attuned to her he could feel her emotion, sense that she’d told maybe not a lie but certainly not the whole truth?
‘Then perfusion.’
He shook his head, as much at his own imaginings as at her choice of career. But at least her smile was back—a bright smile now.
‘If I’d known how much I would love this job I’d never have bothered with anything else. What amazes me is that there are so many jobs out there that no-one even knows about. I mean, the career adviser at my school didn’t mention perfusionist as a career option. In fact, he’d probably never heard of it either. By chance, I met a perfusionist and that was it.’
‘So here you are.’ Nice, normal conversation; he’d be able to handle this. Always assuming the attraction he still felt towards her wasn’t obvious to everyone who came in contact with him when she was around.
She bent her head as she answered, presumably checking some component of the machine, and Oliver found himself studying her, once again imagining he could sense tension in her voice.
‘It can’t have been easy, handling training and a child.’
It was a throwaway remark, the kind anyone might make, yet he saw her tense. No sensing it this time; he actually saw her stiffen.
Why?
‘Mum helped out.’
Obviously that was the only answer he was going to get, so should he keep the conversation going?
Might as well; it was awkward enough as it was without silence extending between them.
‘How old is she?’
More silence, then Clare looked up at him.
‘She’s nine,’ she said, before returning to whatever she was doing, fiddling with the machine.
‘Nine? As in nine years old?’ he muttered as a rage he’d never felt before, not even when his real father had denied him, burnt through his body. ‘You’re telling me you were so desperate for a child you went from me to him, whoever he was? Or were you already seeing him? Cheating on me? Did he offer marriage? Is that what swayed you? And did he offer before or after you announced you were pregnant, eh?’
Clare had never heard such anger in his voice, yet this was hardly the time to refute his hateful accusations. He was about to operate on a vulnerable infant. He needed to be calm and composed, totally focused on the job, not struggling to comprehend the fact that he had a daughter.
What’s more, she had to be calm and composed as well! Later she’d get angry. Later she’d tell him.…
Right now, she had to defuse the situation somehow.
‘It is none of your business what I did or didn’t do, Oliver, and right now I really need to get on with this.’ She looked up at him again, saw the harsh anger in his face and hated the contempt she read in his eyes. And though her own anger burned at the injustice of his words, she pushed it aside, adding calmly, ‘And you probably want to check out the theatre, although didn’t Alex say you’d worked with them before?’
For a moment she thought he’d reject the conversational shift, but when he nodded she knew she’d succeeded in tempering the tense emotional atmosphere in the room.
At least for the duration of the operation!
‘I have worked here before.’ Clipped, crisp words, but Clare knew he was turning his focus to work.
‘Do we know yet if we have a patient?’ she asked, pursuing professional conversation, although he was still unsettling her, prowling around the perimeter of the theatre, distracting her with his presence when she didn’t need distraction.
‘Last I heard about the TGA Alex listed yesterday was that he hadn’t arrived,’ he said, and this time his voice sounded more relaxed—his professional self taking over.
‘So we wait,’ Clare responded, determined to match his tone. ‘If Angus is as good at doing a switch of the great arteries as Alex seems to think, it will be exciting to watch him at work. Do you know any more about the patient?’
Oliver shook his head.
‘But you still have more contact with them than I do,’ she added. ‘I usually only get to meet patients when they come into Theatre, although with older children I sometimes do blood collection for autologous blood transfusions should one be necessary. My main contact with newborns is after the op if they go onto ECMO.’
Could she really be having this conversation with Oliver, when the echo of his accusations and the spectre of Emily hung in the room like twin thunder clouds?
‘Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation—of course, you’re in charge of those machines as well.’
‘Terrible necessities,’ Clare said. ‘Some babies need them post-op but they can do so much damage to the organs if we’re not really careful.’
She continued on about the problems the machine could cause, but Oliver had stopped listening to the actual words, hearing instead the confidence and professionalism in her voice, noticing the tension had lessened.
Maybe it had never been there. Maybe he’d imagined it!
Or maybe she was as good as he was at compartmentalising her life. It had taken him a mammoth effort, a few minutes ago, to block out the implications of the age of Clare’s child, but he’d done it, because the baby they were about to treat had to be his sole focus for the next few hours.
His pager buzzed against his belt and he glanced at the message.
‘Looks like it’s all systems go,’ he said, and heard Clare’s pager buzz at the same time.
‘Good luck,’ she said, smiling now, no hiding the excitement in her eyes. She was rising to the challenge that lay ahead, totally professional, the adrenaline rush in her veins lighting her up from within.
So why was he seeing black shadows hovering over her—the shadow of another man, another man’s child? Why was totally inappropriate anger festering inside him?
‘Good luck yourself,’ he said, blotting the dark clouds from his mind, repelling the anger from his body. In eighteen years of professional life he’d never allowed his work self to be distracted by outside issues and he wasn’t about to start now.
And the tension he was feeling at the base of his spine was because he was working with a new team, nothing else.
Other members of the team breezed in, inconsequential chat filling the air as people went about their allotted tasks while the atmosphere in the theatre seemed to tighten in expectation of the operation that lay ahead.
‘You’re opening?’ the circulating nurse asked Oliver.
In work mode now, totally focused, he nodded, then examined the instruments she’d laid out on a trolley. It would be his job to open the tiny chest, cutting through skin and the rib cage, using retractors to hold the ribs open and allow a clear field for operating.
‘Do you need a small suture?’ the nurse asked, and Oliver thought about what lay ahead. As he separated out the pericardium—the fine sheath of protective tissue that surrounded the heart—he would often take a tiny piece of it, and secure it to a spot in the baby’s chest, in case the surgeon needed it later to repair a hole in one of the interior walls of the heart.
The baby!
It seemed impersonal to think of him or her that way, but every one of them was very real to Oliver and every one he was involved in saving was special, even though his contact with them, at this stage, was minimal.
The baby!
His mind wavered for a moment—Clare’s baby, the one he hadn’t wanted, intruding—but only for a millisecond.
‘Leave a suture there—I’ll ask Angus when he comes in. I know from working with Alex that he always likes to have a piece of tissue in reserve.’
The nurse slipped the threaded needle onto the tray, while Oliver checked he had all he needed, shifting a couple of instruments into an order he was used to, in spite of the fact he would rarely pick up an instrument himself.
‘Okay, folks, we have a baby to save.’
Kate Armstrong, the anaesthetist, erupted into the room, nodding and smiling at everyone, then stopping beside Clare to discuss drugs and dosages. Oliver studied the two women—Clare, tall and straight, Kate smaller, but with so much animation in her face she seemed more of a presence. Her vibrant red hair was wrapped in a scarf, but its energy seemed to escape so she had an aura of liveliness about her.
Yet it was Clare who drew his eyes, although he didn’t know this Clare at all.…
He likes her. The thought came to Clare as she watched Oliver looking at Kate, and it niggled in her chest in a way it had no right to niggle, especially after the angry, hateful accusations he’d thrown at her earlier.
No, apart from whatever relationship he developed with Em, Oliver was no longer her concern. He could like whomever he cared to like, though for a moment Clare wished she had the same kind of lively personality Kate had—a personality that attracted men. Instead, she had a face and figure—outward things—that drew their attention.
The arrival of their patient put an end to any extraneous thoughts. As the nurses set the patient up for surgery, and Oliver, as the first assistant, began the simple part of the operation, Clare checked and rechecked her machine, watching the monitors, talking quietly to Kate from time to time, discussing the blood values they were getting.
But she watched Oliver as well, noticing how gently his hands touched the infant, how carefully he cut and opened up the little chest. She smiled to herself, remembering how much he’d loved his paediatric patients, back when they were together, how special he had thought each and every one of them.
Was that why she’d been so stunned when he’d said he didn’t want children? Although they’d never discussed the subject until she brought it up that fateful time, she’d always assumed, somewhere down the track, Oliver, loving children as he did, would want children of his own.
CHAPTER THREE
ANGUS arrived and the operation proceeded smoothly, Clare relieved for the baby’s sake when it was successfully completed. But her job wasn’t done, not with the baby still on a support system. She and Kate accompanied him to the small recovery room off the main cardiac PICU, Clare concerned about her first patient as part of this elite team, while Kate explained that she always wanted to see her patients come out of the an-aesthetic. When Kate left for a moment to check something on the ward, Clare looked down at the little boy with tubes and monitor leads practically obliterating his small body.
‘They’re so vulnerable,’ she whispered to herself. ‘But so valiant.’
‘They are indeed! We do terrible things to their bodies and they come out of it so well.’
She looked up at his voice, still startled by it, still unnerved by the coincidence of Oliver being in the same team.
Unnerved, unsettled and, remembering his remarks in Theatre earlier, angry.
Definitely angry.
Very angry.
But when Angus came in to check on the patient, Oliver left.
‘Look, there’s no point in all three of us being here,’ Kate said, soon after. She waved her hand towards Clare and Angus. ‘Why don’t you two grab a coffee break—in fact, it’s past lunchtime. The canteen is good, and cheaper than the coffee shop on the ground floor. You know where to go?’
Why was Kate so keen to send them away?
Not that it mattered. Kate was right that they did not all need to be there. It was a very small room. Angus was apparently open to the suggestion, for he was already holding the door for Clare.
But it was Oliver she should be talking to. As hateful as his words had been earlier, she had to tell him! Not that she could tell him in a hospital canteen…
Although where could she tell him?
Was there an optimal place for telling a man he had a nine-year-old daughter?
‘Yes, I’m glad that first one’s over,’ she said to Angus in reply to his polite conversation about the op. But as they reached the canteen she knew she had to stop asking herself impossible questions about the Oliver situation and toss the conversational ball back to Angus.
‘I’m using the same machine, but did you find the set-up much different to the way you worked in the States?’
After that it was easy, normal conversation about work, but although Angus was a very good-looking man with dark hair and eyes and a soft Scottish accent that should be sending ripples up her spine, neither looking at nor listening to him did anything to her.
He was a nice man, she decided, a little reserved and without the magnetism that drew her to Oliver, but very nice all the same.
Magnetism?
Oliver?
Wasn’t her reaction to him—the physical attraction thing—just a hangover from the past?
And how could she even think of being attracted to a man who thought so little of her?
There were no ripples up her spine from Angus because she was totally spineless!
‘I really should go back,’ she said as, coffee finished, the conversation dried up. She needed to escape, preferably to a dark cave where she could hide out while she sorted out her life.
Or at least until she worked out how to tell Oliver her child was also his.
A week ago, life had seemed so simple, been such an adventure. She and Em coming back to Australia, setting up house, just the two of them, for the first time. Now everything had erupted into chaos.
‘Are you all right?’ Angus asked, and Clare realised she’d been twisting her table napkin so tightly it had curled into something that looked very like a miniature noose.
‘Nervous about the baby,’ she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t reveal her lie.
‘So, let’s check on him together,’ Angus said.
Together was good. She wouldn’t be on her own if they ran into Oliver.
Which they didn’t, although the baby—now named Bob—had his parents with him at the moment, so Clare contented herself with sitting by the nurse on duty at his monitor, watching the information feeding out from all the paraphernalia attached to him.
Oliver didn’t reappear, which was both a relief and a cause of anxiety. She had to talk to him!
But just imagining that conversation filled her with such apprehension she found herself literally shaking. Bob was doing well and she had no excuse to hang around so she made her way to the team tea room, thinking another strong coffee might settle her nerves and, once they were settled, surely her brain would start working again.
No, that was the coward’s way out. Oliver wasn’t in the PICU, but he’d have an office somewhere in the unit rooms. On his first full day of work, he wouldn’t be seeing patients but he was likely to be in his office, reviewing files of children he would be seeing later in the week, patients he’d be taking over from the specialist who’d left the team.
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Meredith Webber
Emily dropped a kiss on her mother’s cheek. ‘Isn’t it fun having Dad around?’ she whispered, and suddenly Clare’s spring of happiness wasn’t bubbling quite as high.
She knew it wasn’t jealousy she was feeling, but disappointment of some kind—disappointment that the life she’d been providing for her daughter hadn’t measured up…
‘You need my pearls—the ones Gran gave me,’ Emily declared as she inspected her mother for the last time. ‘Wait here.’
She ran off to her bedroom and returned with the pearls that had been her great-grandmother’s, making her mother sit on the bed so she, Emily, could fasten them.
‘There,’ she said, ‘you’re beautiful. Dad will surely want to marry you now.’
Clare knew the words were nothing more than childish enthusiasm, but once again the joy of the morning dimmed, and despair wormed its way into her heart.
How could she resist if it became a matter of two against one?
CHRISTMAS AT JIMMIE’S
At Jimmie’s Children’s Unit, miracles don’t just
happen at Christmas time—babies are saved every day!
But this year there are two children
with some big wishes for Santa…
BACHELOR OF THE BABY WARD
—little Hamish McDowell wants a new mummy…
FAIRYTALE ON THE CHILDREN’S WARD
—all Emily Jackson longs for
is to see her mum and dad reunited…
Will Hamish and Emilyget the greatest Christmas gifts of all?
Find out in Meredith Webber’s heartwarming
linked duet, out this month!
Fairytale
on the
Children’s Ward
Meredith Webber
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
CONTENTS
Chapter One (#u23306828-edd3-5801-a88c-868804147131)
Chapter Two (#ud87cfe45-c7e3-50f3-8129-e4564dddacb3)
Chapter Three (#u5d5b81f0-044a-5ebb-a503-c833e409c177)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Meredith Webber says of herself, ‘Some ten years ago, I read an article which suggested that Mills and Boon were looking for new Medical™ Romance authors. I had one of those “I can do that” moments, and gave it a try. What began as a challenge has become an obsession—though I do temper the “butt on seat” career of writing with dirty but healthy outdoor pursuits, fossicking through the Australian Outback in search of gold or opals. Having had some success in all of these endeavours, I now consider I’ve found the perfect lifestyle.’
CHAPTER ONE
OLIVER RANKIN hated being late. He was a man who believed there were no acceptable excuses for it, and condemned the rudeness of it. But he was undoubtedly running late, due mainly to car trouble on his drive from Melbourne to Sydney—trouble that had delayed him twenty-four hours while a part was sent, apparently by camel train, from Melbourne to the Victorian border.
Then there was Sydney peak-hour traffic—un believable!
Eventually, however, the latest fellow appointed to Alex Attwood’s paediatric cardiac surgical team pulled into the parking lot at St James Hospital for Children, abandoned his car in a board-members-only parking spot and raced into the building.
Fortunately he’d spent a month with the team earlier in the year so he knew where to go, but he still only made the meeting with a couple of seconds to spare.
Relief swamped him!
Until—
The world whirled before his eyes. Low blood pressure—all the rushing…
He dropped into a chair as Alex introduced him to Angus, the new surgeon on the team, and reminded him he’d already met Kate. Then he closed his eyes, and opened them again.
Carefully.
The apparition had come right into the room, later than he was.
A totally beautiful, totally mind-blowing apparition…
‘And this is Clare Jackson, our new perfusionist,’ Oliver heard Alex say. ‘I’m more delighted than I can tell you to welcome Clare to our team as she trained in the US at the same hospital as Theo, and the oldies on the team will know how good he was.’
Oliver battled to sort out the disbelief in his head, to actually accept that the woman who still, from time to time, haunted his dreams was right here in this room.
Impossible!
Except it wasn’t! There she was, head tilted towards Alex, so he saw her in profile, and caught the long line of her neck—the neck he’d loved to—
Clare Jackson?
He’d had the list of team members’ names for a couple of weeks, but as she’d shown up on that as C. Jackson and most perfusionists he’d worked with had been males, he hadn’t given a thought to the coincidence of surnames.
Alex was talking, but the words didn’t penetrate Oliver’s brain. Not only was Clare right here in this room, but apparently she was a team member. He’d be working with her.
She was a perfusionist?
From actress to lifesaving medical equipment expert in ten short years?
‘Clare!’ he’d managed to blurt out when they’d been introduced.
She’d nodded, lustrous dark hair swirling around her head, brown eyes half hooded, long eyelashes hiding any emotion those eyes might reveal at this unexpected reunion.
‘Oliver,’ she’d said, her voice still so familiar a tremor of excitement had shaken his body.
He tried to concentrate on Alex’s introductions to the rest of the team, but how could he? He snuck a glance at Clare, and was annoyed to see that she seemed totally unfazed by this incredible coincidence.
* * *
Clare held her body very still, glad she’d learned how to do this years ago—back when she was a drama student at university, back when she’d first met Oliver.
Besides, if she held her body very still it might not fall apart, which was what it was threatening to do any moment.
Her body and her mind!
That he should be here—on the same team—was so unbelievable she had to wonder if it was some giant conspiracy of the Fates. Of course, even ten years ago, Oliver had been headed for a paediatric specialty, but he’d never mentioned surgery.
Whatever, it was indisputably Oliver sitting on the other side of the room, ignoring her in the politest possible way. Although what could he have said?
Long time, no see?
Not for Oliver the trite phrase, nor even idle conversation. The problem was that eventually the meeting would end and they would have to leave the room and some kind of conversation would obviously have to take place!
He’d come to claim Emily!
Nausea roiled in her stomach as the thought struck like the flick of a whip, but common sense prevailed. He’d obviously been as shocked to see her as she was to see him, and if he’d wanted his child surely he’d have got in touch back when she’d told him about the pregnancy.
Or in the intervening years?
And the fact that he hadn’t—that he obviously didn’t want to know his daughter—hardened her heart against him once again.
She could handle this! She could handle anything!
Easy to think, harder to do. Fear for her daughter fluttered in her heart, fear for Em’s emotional stability.
Her mind ran wild.
Now he was here, wouldn’t he want to see his daughter—to get to know her?
And if he still refused to acknowledge her, how would that affect Em?
Thinking about her daughter opened up a void so deep and black Clare felt as if she was teetering on a precipice, about to be plunged into a bottomless abyss.
Yet how could she not think of Emily, not put her first?
She’d have to talk to Oliver, find out what he wanted and whether Emily was part of it. Then she—perhaps they—could work out how to get father and daughter together—or not—with the least possible upheaval in Emily’s life.
She sneaked another glance at the man causing such havoc in her mind, and this time felt her heart turn over. Silver threads had infiltrated his sandy hair at both temples, lending him an air of distinction, but Oliver had always been a distinguished-looking man—tall, lean, tanned, with dark brows above those startling pale green eyes. In profile slightly hawkish, the long thin nose tipped down just slightly at the end.
Pointing to his lips?
That had been a stupid fantasy of hers in her youth, for Oliver Rankin had the most beautiful mouth she’d ever seen, on a man or woman.
Oliver!
Huge inward sigh!
She tried to concentrate on Alex’s words, but her mind was way back in the past.
With Oliver…
How had things gone so disastrously wrong between them? How had she been stupid enough to walk out on him?
Because he didn’t want the child you yearned for, she reminded herself. Didn’t want a child at all and definitely not right then for all it would have been an ideal time as far as you were concerned. But part of the stupidity had been thinking he’d come after you, and that somehow the two of you could have patched things up.
That hadn’t happened!
She’d spent a miserable Christmas at home on the farm with her family, then the realisation had dawned that, wanted or not, she was going to have a baby.
Tentative delight…
Quickly quelled at the thought of Oliver’s reaction.
Which hadn’t come!
Unable to contact him by phone or email, she’d finally written, but when he hadn’t answered her letters—had ignored her unexpected news—she’d decided she’d have to forget all about him, which, she’d admitted to herself even then, was easier said than done. Until the diagnosis of her father’s illness had turned her family’s life upside down and concern and grief for him had swamped the pain of losing Oliver. Then, within weeks of Em’s birth, life had changed so irrevocably Oliver had been the last person she’d been thinking of.
No, that was wrong. She’d longed for him—for his presence, his support, to have him there to share her dread and fear.…
And not having him, she’d turned to the man who was there—
She shuddered as she shook the memory away, and concentrated on what Alex Attwood, the team leader, was saying.
‘Oliver, Kate and Clare, you’ll all be working with Angus tomorrow. Clare, I know you’ve settled into your flat, so maybe you could show Oliver where his is. Did I tell you he’s taking the other flat in Rod’s house?’
Of course Alex hadn’t told her! Excited as she’d been at coming back to Australia and getting a job in such an elite unit, she’d still have remembered if someone had said, Oh, and a chap called Oliver Rankin will be living next door! Not only remembered, but packed up and left.
No, she didn’t run from men any more, but she’d have had time to at least think about this situation, to prepare herself.
To prepare Emily?
Oh, sweet reason, what was she going to do about Emily? For one crazy moment she thought of phoning the school and asking if they could take her as a full boarder rather than a weekly one, but it was hard enough on both of them to be separated five days a week.
Alex had turned to Oliver, and was explaining. ‘The flat I arranged for you is in my father-in-law’s house just down the road from the hospital. Rod Talbot, my father-in-law, is in a wheelchair so he has the ground-floor apartment and has turned upstairs into two small but comfortable flats. Of course, you don’t have to stay there. Once you get to know the area, you might find somewhere that suits you better. Because of the proximity to the hospital, the flats are easy to let—not that Rod needs the money.’
‘Rod Talbot?’ Oliver repeated, his voice stirring so many memories in Clare’s body she found herself shivering. ‘Is he the writer?’
Alex nodded, and while Oliver talked about how much he enjoyed Rod Talbot’s books—Oliver having time to read?—Clare muddled over the other information she’d received. The bit about Oliver being in the other flat in Rod Talbot’s house—the flat with the door right opposite her door. Oliver living so close, sleeping so close…
A tremor of memory ran through her body before she brought her mind firmly back to the major problem.
Oliver spending his weekends next door to her and Emily!
Once again her reaction was flight. They’d go back to the States; she’d always find work there. But she steeled herself against such weakness—flight wasn’t an option. She wasn’t an emotional young woman any longer; she was a grown-up, mature—a qualified and respected career woman with an important position in a team that saved children’s lives.
Even if she did feel like a teenager right now, with all the confusion and angst and dreadful insecurity that came with the transition from child to adult.
The meeting was breaking up, the anaesthetist from the second team taking the new surgeon off to the child-care centre. Dear heaven, had Oliver married again? Would he have children?
No, he’d been adamant about that, about never having children. That was why they’d split up. To a certain extent Clare had understood, because it had been soon after he’d found out a little about his own past, found out his life had been built upon a lie.
Thinking about that time—how hurt Oliver had been—diverted her thoughts from Oliver’s marital arrangements, although if there was a wife, what would she think about Em?
It was all Clare could do not to wail out loud. How could this be happening to her? And now, when both she and Em were so excited to be back in Australia?
She pulled herself together with an effort.
Best not to think about Em! Not here, not now…
And it was useless to be speculating about Oliver’s marital state, let alone whether he had children or not, although Rod had told Clare hers was the larger of the two flats, so a wife and children could hardly fit into the other one.
This realisation made her feel a little easier for all of five seconds, until it occurred to her he could have left his wife and kids—if he’d weakened on the children stand—in Melbourne while he settled in.
‘Clare.’
Her name in his voice, a sound she’d never thought to hear again. No-one said her name as Oliver did! And no-one else, with just that one word, could send those stupid shivers down her spine.
After ten years?
It was unbelievable.
She’d heard of muscle memory—sportspeople talked about it. Was there such a thing as nerve memory, that every nerve in her body remembered…?
He was close now, waiting for her. The composure he wore like a well-cut suit to hide the emotional Italian inside him was so familiar she wanted to reach out and touch him, to feel the warmth of the man beneath that cool facade.
Was she mad?
Touching Oliver would be disastrous—had always been disastrous!—because one touch had never been enough.
She dug through her memory for an image of that last morning, not long before Christmas, when, all composure gone, fury and resentment had flared from his body and burnt in his eyes. That was the Oliver she needed to keep in mind.
Which was okay as far as resisting his appeal went, but what about the rest? What about Emily?
Clare felt physically sick, nausea spreading through her body. How could this have happened? She pulled herself together with a mammoth effort, hoping outwardly at least she might look composed.
‘So we’re to be neighbours,’ she said, offering a polite smile, while her bewildered heart beat a wild tattoo inside her chest, and her thoughts ran this way and that like mice in a maze.
‘It seems that way.’
Were his words strained? Was Oliver feeling the same mix of disbelief, and confusion—and surely not excitement?—as she was?
Of course he wouldn’t be. For one thing, Oliver didn’t do confusion.
Her heart skittered again but this time it was nothing to do with excitement—more like dread and fear and trepidation. She had to say something.
‘I did write to you, you know.’
It sounded pathetic but at least it caught his attention.
‘When?’ he demanded, his voice hard and tight.
So hard and tight the tiny bit of courage that had prompted Clare to tell him faded, which meant the next words came out all breathless and confused.
‘End of January, and again later in the year.
‘You wrote to me at the end of January? Wasn’t that a bit late, considering it was before Christmas you walked out? I’d definitely moved on by then, physically and emotionally.’
Pain stabbed through Clare’s body at the last words, but what was he saying?
‘You didn’t get any letters from me—then or later?’
Glacial green—that’s how Oliver’s eyes could look…and were looking now.
‘No.’
He shook his head to emphasise the word and, knowing he would never lie to her, Clare felt a stab of deep resentment—not to mention pain—as she realised he didn’t know about her pregnancy. He didn’t know he had a daughter, a daughter who would be right there in the flat next door to his come Friday!
She had to tell him!
Easy enough to have the thought but how to do it?
And when, and where?
This was hardly an appropriate time or place and, what’s more, he was talking to her again, saying something, although with the wild furore going on her mind it was a struggle to make out the words.
Forcing herself to focus, she realised his conversation was nothing more than the polite inquiries of old acquaintances catching up.
‘But a perfusionist? What made you change course? What happened to life on the stage?’
Clare cast an anxious glance behind him, but there was no-one nearby to overhear an almost honest answer.
‘Long story short, I moved to Queensland and studied science. I met a perfusionist who used to work with Alex when he was in Melbourne. I learnt more about it and decided it was the dream job as far as I was concerned. I began my studies in Brisbane, then went to Chicago to get more qualifications and experience, and here I am.’
Oliver knew he was staring at her, replacing his mental image of a twenty-five-year-old soap-star Clare with this more mature adult version—more mature, and even more beautiful. And the reaction in his chest was an ectopic heartbeat, nothing more. Ectopic heartbeats happened to some people all the time, and most people some time in their life.…
But if he read the signs correctly, she was feeling even more strain at this unexpected meeting than he was.
‘Alex was saying we’re going to be neighbours.’
Could he really be having this stilted conversation with Clare? Clare who had laughed and loved and thrown herself into life with enormous energy and enthusiasm? Thrown herself into their relationship, making every moment they were together special and intense.
Until the day he’d told her he didn’t want a baby and, unable to believe he’d never mentioned this before, unable to even discuss it with him, she’d walked out.…
And he’d let her go, furious at her lack of understanding of his situation—his feelings in all of it! How could he have contemplated fatherhood when he didn’t know who his own father was, didn’t know himself? And how could he have considered marriage when his closest experience of it—his mother’s three attempts—had been so disastrous?
He was reminding himself of this justification when Clare spoke again.
‘You were saying you’ve read our landlord’s books?’
‘There’s no need to sound so surprised,’ he grumbled, memories of the past bothering him more than he’d thought possible. ‘I’ve time to read these days.’
She smiled at him and he felt his heart miss another beat. Frequent ectopic heartbeats might be indicative of a problem of some kind, his medical brain told him.
‘You didn’t have time for any relaxation back then,’ she said.
Except with you, he thought but didn’t say, for there was a barrier between them, like a glass wall through which he could see and hear but not touch. Not that he would touch her, of course. No matter how much his fingers tingled at the thought.
Of course there’d be a barrier between them. It had been ten years; they’d split up. There were issues—wasn’t that the word people used these days? So many unresolved issues it was more like a brick rampart than a glass wall between them.
Back to the present!
‘My car’s illegally parked downstairs. Can I follow you to the flat?’
‘You can give me a lift.’
The moment the words were out of her mouth Clare regretted them. She needed to get away from Oliver, not spend more time with him, especially not more time in the privacy a car offered.
She needed time to think things through, to work out how on earth she was going to tell him about Emily.
Not that he deserved to know! He hadn’t wanted a child.
The tiny whisper from one corner of her brain was tempting, but she slapped it down. Of course he’d have to know, and now they’d come together, didn’t Em deserve to know her father? Hadn’t Clare always told Em that one day they’d find him so she could meet him?
But ‘one day’ in Clare’s mind had been when Em was eighteen or so—an adult who would understand the traumatic period of time that had been Clare’s pregnancy, not to mention the aftermath of Emily’s birth!
She should have directed him to the flat; it was just down the road. But here he was, saying he’d be delighted—ever polite, Oliver Rankin—and putting out a hand to usher her towards the door.
She moved, just in time to avoid contact with him, but knew that as well as the Emily problem, she had to sort herself out, to strengthen her body against the insidious physical weakness just seeing him again had caused. There was too much at stake for her to be distracted by attraction.
‘I need to speak to Alex about something, so I’ll meet you downstairs. The easiest way is to take the blue exit from the car park. I’ll be down there near the gate in five minutes.’
Alex was still at the front of the meeting room, stacking some papers he’d spread out earlier. What excuse could she give? What question could she ask?
Had he noticed her hesitation that he looked up?
‘Everything all right, Clare?’ he asked. ‘Emily settled in at school?’
‘Just fine and dandy, and yes, she loves it,’ she replied, hovering by her chair while Oliver left the room. But Alex’s question had reminded Clare that Alex and Annie knew Emily, and Rod knew Emily—it wasn’t as if you could keep a nine-year-old a secret.
Clare dropped her briefcase, which gave her an excuse to sit down. Knowing she couldn’t just sit, she leant down to retrieve the leather case, fiddling with the catches on it while she tried valiantly to regain the poise on which she prided herself, the composure she’d fought so hard to achieve!
‘I only know of Angus from his colleagues, but Oliver worked with us earlier this year,’ Alex was saying. ‘He’s a fine surgeon, and if Angus is even half as good as people say he is, we’ve got a team that you’ll discover is every bit as good as the ones you’ve already worked with. At least, I hope you find it that way.’
Clare smiled at him. He was so nice! He and Annie, his wife, had invited her and Emily for dinner the previous Saturday, and seeing their relationship—the obvious love they felt for each other—had left Clare wondering why relationships worked for some people and not for others.
Her body tightened at the memory…
Ached…
* * *
Oliver eased his car out of the parking space, thankful he hadn’t been clamped. The signs to the blue exit were clear and easy to follow, but it took some manoeuvring to reach it. Clare came hurrying towards him, the movement blurring her image so he saw the beautiful girl who’d first caught his attention—the girl he’d thought was his for ever—running eagerly to meet him.
He couldn’t fool himself about ectopic heartbeats any longer; his body was reacting to this bizarre reunion, to her presence, although that could be explained away as well. It was a while since he’d had a relationship with a woman, put off women by the words of his most recent lover who’d informed him he was nothing but an empty shell of a man, with no understanding of love whatsoever.
The woman Clare, not the girl he’d known, climbed into the car and pointed ahead.
‘We go through the lights and straight down that road across from the park. I think most of the team seem to live along here, though maybe not the nurses, who’d be local Sydney people. It’s such a pleasant walk to work I haven’t considered buying a car yet.’
I, not we, Oliver thought, then he had to ask.
‘You’re on the team list as C. Jackson? You never married?’
He sensed her withdrawal and knew the glass wall was very definitely back in place.
‘Once, for a very brief time. It was a mistake,’ she said lightly, turning to look out the window at the houses they were passing. ‘We’re four more down, the house with the red door. There’s a common foyer on the ground floor, and stairs up to a landing. The two flats open off that. They’re fully furnished and very comfortable but I guess Alex already told you that.’
She might as well have said, Mind your own business, changing the subject from marriage to accommodation so swiftly, yet the thought of Clare with someone else had sent a shaft of pain through his belly.
Ridiculous, of course; he’d been with other women.
He pulled up outside the house she’d indicated, double-parking as all the marked spaces were already occupied.
‘There’s a garage around the back. Rod has a vehicle that’s been adapted for a wheelchair but there’d be room for another car. Drive on and I’ll show you how to get into the lane. Sorry, I didn’t think of it earlier.’
Clare knew she was babbling as he followed her directions, but sitting in the close confines of the car with Oliver was even worse than she’d imagined. Somehow she’d been transported back to when they’d met and she’d fallen so helplessly in love—to when any time with Oliver was special. Her stupid body was responding to his presence, her physical delight totally uncontrollable no matter how much she tried to overcome it with strong mental warnings.
Even the panic and worry she was feeling over Em did little to dampen her reactions.
‘Park here—I’ll get the gate. You can ease the car into the yard while I go in and check with Rod if it’s okay to use the garage.’
Finding the gate shut had been a relief. She all but leapt from the vehicle, opening the two sides of the gate, then hurrying to the rear door of Rod’s flat.
He was in the small conservatory at the back, his gnarled arthritic fingers pecking furiously at the keyboard of his laptop. She knocked on the glass.
‘I hope I haven’t ruined your train of thought,’ she apologised, ‘but Oliver, Dr Rankin, has arrived and has a car. Can he park it beside yours in the garage?’
Rod waved away her apology and wheeled towards her, coming out to meet his new tenant.
‘Can’t help you with your cases, mate,’ he said to Oliver a little later when the car was snug inside the garage and Oliver was heaving two cases from the trunk.
‘I can,’ Clare found herself offering, but Oliver, being Oliver, refused her offer, carrying them both himself.
‘Come through my place,’ Rod suggested, and led the way into his flat, always neat and tidy, the minimum of furniture allowing his chair to move freely through the apartment. He opened his front door, showed them into the foyer and handed Oliver a set of keys.
‘Clare will take you up,’ he said.
‘No papers to sign? No lease agreements?’ Oliver asked.
‘If you’re working for Alex, you’re okay,’ Rod replied. Then he smiled. ‘Actually all the financial details will be in a folder on your kitchen bench. Annie, my daughter, organises all of that for me. Her phone number is there as well as mine, so phone if you need anything or have any questions.’
He then looked from Oliver to Clare before he added, ‘Or ask Clare—she’s been here a week now, settling in, so she knows her way around.’
He turned from Oliver to Clare and added, ‘Have you heard from Emily this week? Does she still think the school’s the best in the world?’
Emily! Emily! Emily!
The name hammered in Clare’s head, but she had to reply.
‘She still loves it,’ she managed to say, although her vocal cords were so tight it was a wonder the words came out.
‘Emily?’ Oliver repeated as he followed her up the stairs.
Could she faint? Clare wondered. Faint and topple backwards down the stairs, possibly breaking her neck which right now, extreme though it might be, seemed preferable to answering Oliver’s question.
‘My daughter,’ she managed, forcing the words through even tighter vocal cords, so she sounded shrill, if not hysterical.
‘Fancy that! So you got the child you wanted,’ Oliver said as they reached the landing. The ice in his voice was visible in his eyes as he looked down at her and added, ‘Got the child and dumped the husband once his usefulness was over? Was that how it worked?’
Clare could only stare at him, her mind a chaotic battlefield, one voice yelling at her to tell him right now, another suggesting physical assault, while a third was advocating flight. She steeled herself against them all, looked him in the eyes and, hoping she sounded far more cool and in control than she felt, said, ‘You never used to be spiteful, Oliver.’
After which she turned away to unlock her door, and dive into the sanctuary of her flat. Oliver’s voice saying her name was the last thing she heard before she shut him out.
She leaned against the door, shaking with the hurt he’d inflicted, trying to breathe deeply, desperate to stem the waves of panic that washed through her mind and body.
Ten deep breaths, wasn’t that the rule—no, maybe that was counting to ten before you murdered someone. Well, there was an idea!
Three deep breaths…
Now think rationally!
Monday was as good as done, which meant she had four more days—four days to find a way to tell Oliver Emily was his daughter before Em came home and almost inevitably met him in person.
Clare’s mind went back into panic mode and breathing deeply didn’t seem to help.
Of course she had to tell him. Forget that his reaction just now had been so hateful. He had to know!
But the hub of it all was Emily. As far as Clare was concerned, Emily’s welfare, her happiness and emotional stability, had to be protected at all costs. Forget how Oliver might feel about Em’s mother, forget how Em’s parents might feel about each other—or whatever kinds of messes they’d made of their respective lives—at the heart of whatever lay ahead was Emily’s well-being.
CHAPTER TWO
OF ALL the impossible things to have happened! Oliver set his cases down in the small foyer and took a look around. Small sitting area, the open plan revealing a dining nook in a bay window and a kitchen behind a high bench at the back.
She had a child.
Stop thinking about Clare; look around your new home.
He could move; Alex had said it would be okay.
No, look around.
Neat, tastefully furnished, all he needed in the way of space. He turned aside, into a reasonably sized bedroom, again a bay window, this one overlooking the front yard and the street and park across the road, while down a small hall he discovered a bathroom and a second bedroom, small, but furnished with a good-size desk as well as a bed, so it was obvious any single tenant would use it as a study.
Or a tenant with a child could use it for the child.
How could he live next door to Clare’s child—the child he’d denied her?
A child who wasn’t a toddler, if she was at school. Why hadn’t he realised just how desperate Clare had been?
Because he’d assumed getting pregnant had been a whim, that’s why. Possibly something to make his commitment to her more—
More what?
Binding?
No, she’d known all along he had no intention of marrying and he’d assumed she’d understood that meant no children.
He closed his eyes but her image was once again imprinted in his mind. Not the image from the past, but the image of the new Clare, more heart-stoppingly beautiful than ever.
He swore quietly to himself. Why was he letting her affect him this way? On top of which, the fact that she had a child was none of his business. Where was his self-discipline? Surely he was professional enough that he could treat her as a colleague.
But even as that thought formed in his head another part of his brain was echoing with mocking laughter. As if that’s possible, it was saying, when your libido jolts to attention any time she’s around. Ectopic heartbeats indeed—be honest, it’s lust, mate!
Had it been more than lust the first time? Maybe not love—he wasn’t sure what love entailed—but definitely he’d felt a deep affection for her. How could he not when she’d been so beautiful and open and honest?
So loving!
Did she still see their relationship as five wasted years?
No! It was in the past. This was now. And if the child—Emily, Rod had said—was at school, Clare hadn’t exactly hung around mourning their break-up.
He gripped his head hard in his hands and squeezed to stop the mental arguments and to shut out the memories.
He would not think about Clare! He would not think about the past. He would move on, continue moving on, and if a tiny part of his mind kept questioning whether he’d ever really moved on from Clare emotionally—well, it was such a quiet voice he could ignore it.
She’d moved on, that was for sure. Changed careers, had a child—he doubted she’d ever given him a passing thought.
Until today, of course…
So?
Forget the past!
He took a deep breath, retrieved his cases, carried them through into the bedroom and began unpacking. He had chests with household items awaiting despatch in Melbourne, wanting to settle in and make sure he liked the flat before having them forwarded on, but for now all he needed to unpack were clothes, the one set of sheets he’d brought with him, a couple of towels and books—lots of books, although many more were in the chests. Reading had become his escape, but from what?
It was the first time he’d asked himself that question and now he had to probe further. Was it an escape from thinking too deeply about the sterility of his life? Or an escape from the inner emptiness his old girlfriend had pointed out to him? Or even an escape from feeling anything at all—for anyone…?
He gave a scoffing laugh, and shook off the stupid introspection. Reading was an escape from the intensity of his work, nothing more! And this unfamiliar delving into his psyche was the result of tiredness, having driven through the night to make the meeting this morning, stopping only for a couple of short breaks for safety’s sake.
And considering work, rather than the escape from it, he should read up on tomorrow’s op. With specialists all over the world, someone was always trying something new—discovering a tidier, or more effective, solution for the myriad problems they encountered.
He found his laptop, opened it on the desk in the second bedroom and settled down to search the internet. Hours later, stiff and tired, he closed the laptop and went in search of food—or information about food.
He found the folder in the kitchen and leafed through it. There was a selection of takeaway menus at the back of the notes—ha, food! He selected one and made a phone call. He’d eat, then shower, and get a good night’s sleep—practical, sensible decision making, that’s what was needed here.
A tap at the front door, his flat’s front door, made him wonder how people got in—how his pizza would get in. Did the outer door have a bell of some kind, an arrangement whereby it could be opened from upstairs? Had Annie’s notes explained? He’d read them again, but first see who was at the door.
Clare!
A very twitchy, uptight-looking Clare for all she smiled politely at him before explaining, ‘I thought I should tell you about the doors. On your keys you’ll have a bigger shiny silver key, it’s for the deadlock on the outside door, but if someone comes to visit you there are bells outside the front door. I’ve just labelled your bell with your name. You’ll hear the ring inside, and the button on that phone thing in the hall—this…Pressing it releases the door lock.’
She’d come in to show him the door-opening mechanism and was so close he could have taken her in his arms right there and then. He could feel her in his arms, feel her curves snug against his body, smell the perfume of her hair in his nostrils. He’d bend his head, just a little, to capture her lips—
He was losing it! Seriously insane! He had to pull himself together, get sorted, all that stuff.
‘Thanks,’ he managed when she turned to look at him, perhaps puzzled by his wooden stance and lack of response.
‘No worries,’ she said, then she frowned and looked more closely at him. ‘Are you okay? I know it’s hardly flattering to tell someone they look terrible, but you look exhausted.’
‘Car trouble on the way from Melbourne meant I had to drive through the night. One good night’s sleep and I’ll be fine.’
Clare turned to leave, uncertain whether to be glad or sorry. She’d buoyed herself up to tell Oliver about Emily, using the key explanations as an excuse to knock on his door. The plan was she’d casually offer dinner, and they could sit down in a civilised fashion and discuss the situation, though the problem of quite how she’d bring it up still loomed large in her mind.
But seeing how tired Oliver looked and finding out why, it was immediately obvious this wasn’t the time to be telling him he had a daughter, especially as he was operating the next morning. What he needed was a good night’s sleep, not a bombshell that was likely to rock his world and quite possibly prevent any sleep at all.
Part of her was relieved, but the other part aggravated that the telling would continue to hang over her head.
Then there was dinner—he had to eat…Should she still ask?
‘Thanks for explaining about the locks and keys,’ he said as she dithered in the doorway, so conscious of his body she wondered if he could feel the tension building in hers. In her mind his hand reached out for her, touched her shoulder, drew her close. She’d sink against him, feeling her body fit itself to his and—
The jangling buzz of the outside bell sounded in his flat, shocking her out of the stupid dream. He smiled as she looked at him, ashamed of her thoughts and puzzled by the intrusion.
‘Good thing you labelled my bell,’ he added. ‘I ordered a pizza for dinner.’
As Oliver pressed the button to release the front door lock, using the phone to tell the delivery person to come on up, Clare scuttled back across the landing, all but diving into the safety of her own flat.
Although as a refuge it was now severely lacking in serenity and peace, given who her neighbour was, and the wayward turns her mind was taking.
Back when he hadn’t replied to her letters, she’d put him out of her life, swearing never to think of him again.
But not thinking about him had proven difficult when their child had inherited his green eyes and curving, inviting lips.
* * *
Clare knew she needed a good night’s sleep, but how could sleep come when the huge, insurmountable problem of how to tell Oliver was cluttering up her mind and sitting like an elephant on her chest?
Earlier, when she’d gone in with the key excuse, she’d decided just coming out with it would be the best. Oh, by the way, my daughter, Emily, is your child.
But now that seemed impossibly, horribly flippant. She had to find some better way to say it.
Oliver, there’s something you should know?
No, that wouldn’t work. She’d lose courage after the Oliver part and ask about his mother or something equally inane.
Could she begin with self-justification? I did try to contact you; I phoned and wrote, then—
No, she couldn’t do that because it would mean explaining about Dad dying and even now thinking of that time still hurt too much for her to talk about it.
Finally, with herculean determination, she lulled herself to sleep, only to wake before dawn, tired, cranky and so uptight she thought her limbs might snap apart as she moved.
But move she did. Although she’d spent many hours at the hospital the previous week, getting to know the machine she would be operating, now she was anxious to get up to the theatre for one last check.
She showered and dressed, blotting everything from her mind except work, excited yet slightly apprehensive about her first day as part of the team.
Slightly apprehensive?
Understatement of the year, and although she was focusing on work, the other problem set aside, it had to be the thought of working with Oliver that had her twitching like a snake on drugs.
An image of him flashed across her mind—the now-Oliver with silver streaks in the tawny hair, and fine lines at the corners of his green eyes. More lines forming parentheses in his cheeks when he smiled, his lips still as mesmerising as ever, a pale line delineating their shape.
Em’s lips!
But it was better to think of Oliver’s lips than the problem of Emily right now. Thinking about Emily would put her mother into a panic again and a panicking perfusionist was of no use to anyone.
Unfortunately thinking of Oliver didn’t do her much good either. Look at it this way, she told herself. Yes, it was an unbelievable quirk of fate that had brought them together again, but they’d met as colleagues now, nothing more. Two professionals, working in the same team, working to save the lives of tiny babies.
Forget the fact you still feel an attraction to the man!
Forget Emily—well, not Em herself, but the problem she presented right now. Concentrate on work.
In the kitchen, she turned on the simple pod coffee machine that had been her treat to herself when she’d moved to Sydney, and dropped two slices of frozen fruit loaf into the toaster. Had Oliver found the shops? Did he have food to eat? Coffee?
The temptation to tap on his door and ask him was almost overwhelming, but it was barely six and their official working hours began at eight so it was likely he was still asleep. Besides, the more times she saw him outside of work hours, the more opportunities she would have had to tell him about Emily, and the angrier he’d be when she did tell him, that she hadn’t told him earlier.
Did that make sense or was her lack of sleep making her stupid?
She sipped her coffee, returning to the mental excuse of not knocking on the door in case he was still sleeping.
An image of a sleeping Oliver popped obligingly into her head—Oliver in boxer shorts, his back bare, lightly tanned, the bones of his spine visible as he curled around his pillow in sleep. An ache started deep inside her, and she left her toast half eaten, the coffee cup still half full, hurrying to the bathroom to clean her teeth, then fleeing her flat which was, she realised, just far too close to Oliver’s for her peace of mind. It was the proximity dogging her, reminding her, teasing at her body. If she moved—
But how could she when Alex had been kind enough to arrange the accommodation and she already felt settled here?
Or had done!
Although if she shifted…? No! her mind shrieked at her. Of course you have to tell him.
* * *
Oliver pushed his bedroom window to open it wider, sure there must be a breeze somewhere in the stillness of the summer morning. Below him the front door clicked shut and Clare strode into view, marching with great speed and determination up the path, then along the street, striding now—exercising or escaping?
But escaping from what? Not him, surely.
He laughed at the thought, a mocking laugh, but didn’t leave the window, watching until a slight bend in the road took her out of sight.
Clare!
He showered and dressed, reminding himself that both of them had changed in the ten years since the split. Now they were mature adults and could meet and treat each other as professional colleagues, nothing more, though the thought of her with a child niggled at him.
For one thing, where was the child now? She hadn’t had a child with her and there was no noise coming from next door.
Clare with a child.
Why did that hurt him?
The physical attraction he still felt towards her was probably nothing more than an emotional hangover from the past, some glitch in programming, possibly to do with the Italian revelations. And feeling this strong attraction, it was only natural that he’d been on the brink of taking her in his arms yesterday evening, when the front doorbell had sounded.
Saved by a pizza!
Think of food, not Clare.
Rod’s daughter had left some basic groceries in the flat—milk and butter in the fridge, coffee, tea, bread and spreads in the pantry. He’d have to find the supermarket and do some shopping, and until then he could eat at the hospital. In fact, if he left now he could have breakfast there; maybe that’s why Clare had left so early.
She wasn’t in the little coffee shop in the foyer, nor in the canteen, so he ate a solitary breakfast, then made his way not to the teams’ rooms but to the theatre, wanting to refamiliarise himself with the way Alex had it set up.
‘Oh!’
Clare was there ahead of him and she must have sensed his presence, for the startled expression burst from her lips before he was fully through the door.
Not that she was unsettled for long, greeting him with a smile—a very professional smile—and a cheery, ‘Good morning, Oliver,’ for all the world as if they hadn’t shared an extremely passionate relationship, albeit ten years ago.
‘Do you always begin this early?’ he asked, because two could play the calm and controlled game. She smiled again.
‘First-night nerves,’ she told him. ‘I’ve spent a lot of time here in the past week, but I’m still anxious about the machine, which is stupid as it’s exactly the same make of machine as I operated in the States. It’s just that—’
She stopped abruptly and he saw a faint colour appear in her cheeks.
‘Just that…?’ he prompted, hoping professional conversation would halt the disturbances in his body.
‘You’ll think I’m barmy, but to me the machines have personalities, maybe idiosyncrasies would be a better word, and until I get to know each one personally I won’t know what to expect.’
Clare watched him carefully as she explained her unease, and to her surprise, she caught no hint of a smile. In fact, Oliver was nodding as if he understood what she was saying.
‘You have so much to think about, with the responsibility for the respiratory and circulatory functions of the lungs and heart. I can understand you wondering if the machine has quirks you need to watch for. You’ve got the oxygenator, the pumps, the filters, the reservoirs and tubing, so many component parts that can go wrong.’
And now he smiled, sending tremors of remembered delight through Clare’s body, in spite of her determination to remain on strictly professional terms with him.
‘But have things ever gone badly wrong for you? Has there ever been a disaster you couldn’t overcome?’
She found herself smiling back at him, professionally, of course.
‘Tubes kinking, the membrane oxygenator failing, the machine turning off automatically when a clot or bubble gets into the tubes? I’ve seen most of the calamities that can happen, and had to cope with a few, but generally the machines, providing they are serviced regularly and checked before every operation, work brilliantly.’
Oliver heard the pride in her voice and recognised the dedication she had to her profession—speaking of which…
‘It still seems a strange choice for someone who had stars in her eyes and an established career as an actor.’
He saw her shoulders lift in a slight shrug.
‘Things happened, Oliver, that changed my goals. I’d done well in science at school, so a switch to that seemed logical.’
Which would have made sense, only her voice had tightened as she spoke, and he sensed a tension in her body. Or was he fooling himself that he was still so attuned to her he could feel her emotion, sense that she’d told maybe not a lie but certainly not the whole truth?
‘Then perfusion.’
He shook his head, as much at his own imaginings as at her choice of career. But at least her smile was back—a bright smile now.
‘If I’d known how much I would love this job I’d never have bothered with anything else. What amazes me is that there are so many jobs out there that no-one even knows about. I mean, the career adviser at my school didn’t mention perfusionist as a career option. In fact, he’d probably never heard of it either. By chance, I met a perfusionist and that was it.’
‘So here you are.’ Nice, normal conversation; he’d be able to handle this. Always assuming the attraction he still felt towards her wasn’t obvious to everyone who came in contact with him when she was around.
She bent her head as she answered, presumably checking some component of the machine, and Oliver found himself studying her, once again imagining he could sense tension in her voice.
‘It can’t have been easy, handling training and a child.’
It was a throwaway remark, the kind anyone might make, yet he saw her tense. No sensing it this time; he actually saw her stiffen.
Why?
‘Mum helped out.’
Obviously that was the only answer he was going to get, so should he keep the conversation going?
Might as well; it was awkward enough as it was without silence extending between them.
‘How old is she?’
More silence, then Clare looked up at him.
‘She’s nine,’ she said, before returning to whatever she was doing, fiddling with the machine.
‘Nine? As in nine years old?’ he muttered as a rage he’d never felt before, not even when his real father had denied him, burnt through his body. ‘You’re telling me you were so desperate for a child you went from me to him, whoever he was? Or were you already seeing him? Cheating on me? Did he offer marriage? Is that what swayed you? And did he offer before or after you announced you were pregnant, eh?’
Clare had never heard such anger in his voice, yet this was hardly the time to refute his hateful accusations. He was about to operate on a vulnerable infant. He needed to be calm and composed, totally focused on the job, not struggling to comprehend the fact that he had a daughter.
What’s more, she had to be calm and composed as well! Later she’d get angry. Later she’d tell him.…
Right now, she had to defuse the situation somehow.
‘It is none of your business what I did or didn’t do, Oliver, and right now I really need to get on with this.’ She looked up at him again, saw the harsh anger in his face and hated the contempt she read in his eyes. And though her own anger burned at the injustice of his words, she pushed it aside, adding calmly, ‘And you probably want to check out the theatre, although didn’t Alex say you’d worked with them before?’
For a moment she thought he’d reject the conversational shift, but when he nodded she knew she’d succeeded in tempering the tense emotional atmosphere in the room.
At least for the duration of the operation!
‘I have worked here before.’ Clipped, crisp words, but Clare knew he was turning his focus to work.
‘Do we know yet if we have a patient?’ she asked, pursuing professional conversation, although he was still unsettling her, prowling around the perimeter of the theatre, distracting her with his presence when she didn’t need distraction.
‘Last I heard about the TGA Alex listed yesterday was that he hadn’t arrived,’ he said, and this time his voice sounded more relaxed—his professional self taking over.
‘So we wait,’ Clare responded, determined to match his tone. ‘If Angus is as good at doing a switch of the great arteries as Alex seems to think, it will be exciting to watch him at work. Do you know any more about the patient?’
Oliver shook his head.
‘But you still have more contact with them than I do,’ she added. ‘I usually only get to meet patients when they come into Theatre, although with older children I sometimes do blood collection for autologous blood transfusions should one be necessary. My main contact with newborns is after the op if they go onto ECMO.’
Could she really be having this conversation with Oliver, when the echo of his accusations and the spectre of Emily hung in the room like twin thunder clouds?
‘Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation—of course, you’re in charge of those machines as well.’
‘Terrible necessities,’ Clare said. ‘Some babies need them post-op but they can do so much damage to the organs if we’re not really careful.’
She continued on about the problems the machine could cause, but Oliver had stopped listening to the actual words, hearing instead the confidence and professionalism in her voice, noticing the tension had lessened.
Maybe it had never been there. Maybe he’d imagined it!
Or maybe she was as good as he was at compartmentalising her life. It had taken him a mammoth effort, a few minutes ago, to block out the implications of the age of Clare’s child, but he’d done it, because the baby they were about to treat had to be his sole focus for the next few hours.
His pager buzzed against his belt and he glanced at the message.
‘Looks like it’s all systems go,’ he said, and heard Clare’s pager buzz at the same time.
‘Good luck,’ she said, smiling now, no hiding the excitement in her eyes. She was rising to the challenge that lay ahead, totally professional, the adrenaline rush in her veins lighting her up from within.
So why was he seeing black shadows hovering over her—the shadow of another man, another man’s child? Why was totally inappropriate anger festering inside him?
‘Good luck yourself,’ he said, blotting the dark clouds from his mind, repelling the anger from his body. In eighteen years of professional life he’d never allowed his work self to be distracted by outside issues and he wasn’t about to start now.
And the tension he was feeling at the base of his spine was because he was working with a new team, nothing else.
Other members of the team breezed in, inconsequential chat filling the air as people went about their allotted tasks while the atmosphere in the theatre seemed to tighten in expectation of the operation that lay ahead.
‘You’re opening?’ the circulating nurse asked Oliver.
In work mode now, totally focused, he nodded, then examined the instruments she’d laid out on a trolley. It would be his job to open the tiny chest, cutting through skin and the rib cage, using retractors to hold the ribs open and allow a clear field for operating.
‘Do you need a small suture?’ the nurse asked, and Oliver thought about what lay ahead. As he separated out the pericardium—the fine sheath of protective tissue that surrounded the heart—he would often take a tiny piece of it, and secure it to a spot in the baby’s chest, in case the surgeon needed it later to repair a hole in one of the interior walls of the heart.
The baby!
It seemed impersonal to think of him or her that way, but every one of them was very real to Oliver and every one he was involved in saving was special, even though his contact with them, at this stage, was minimal.
The baby!
His mind wavered for a moment—Clare’s baby, the one he hadn’t wanted, intruding—but only for a millisecond.
‘Leave a suture there—I’ll ask Angus when he comes in. I know from working with Alex that he always likes to have a piece of tissue in reserve.’
The nurse slipped the threaded needle onto the tray, while Oliver checked he had all he needed, shifting a couple of instruments into an order he was used to, in spite of the fact he would rarely pick up an instrument himself.
‘Okay, folks, we have a baby to save.’
Kate Armstrong, the anaesthetist, erupted into the room, nodding and smiling at everyone, then stopping beside Clare to discuss drugs and dosages. Oliver studied the two women—Clare, tall and straight, Kate smaller, but with so much animation in her face she seemed more of a presence. Her vibrant red hair was wrapped in a scarf, but its energy seemed to escape so she had an aura of liveliness about her.
Yet it was Clare who drew his eyes, although he didn’t know this Clare at all.…
He likes her. The thought came to Clare as she watched Oliver looking at Kate, and it niggled in her chest in a way it had no right to niggle, especially after the angry, hateful accusations he’d thrown at her earlier.
No, apart from whatever relationship he developed with Em, Oliver was no longer her concern. He could like whomever he cared to like, though for a moment Clare wished she had the same kind of lively personality Kate had—a personality that attracted men. Instead, she had a face and figure—outward things—that drew their attention.
The arrival of their patient put an end to any extraneous thoughts. As the nurses set the patient up for surgery, and Oliver, as the first assistant, began the simple part of the operation, Clare checked and rechecked her machine, watching the monitors, talking quietly to Kate from time to time, discussing the blood values they were getting.
But she watched Oliver as well, noticing how gently his hands touched the infant, how carefully he cut and opened up the little chest. She smiled to herself, remembering how much he’d loved his paediatric patients, back when they were together, how special he had thought each and every one of them.
Was that why she’d been so stunned when he’d said he didn’t want children? Although they’d never discussed the subject until she brought it up that fateful time, she’d always assumed, somewhere down the track, Oliver, loving children as he did, would want children of his own.
CHAPTER THREE
ANGUS arrived and the operation proceeded smoothly, Clare relieved for the baby’s sake when it was successfully completed. But her job wasn’t done, not with the baby still on a support system. She and Kate accompanied him to the small recovery room off the main cardiac PICU, Clare concerned about her first patient as part of this elite team, while Kate explained that she always wanted to see her patients come out of the an-aesthetic. When Kate left for a moment to check something on the ward, Clare looked down at the little boy with tubes and monitor leads practically obliterating his small body.
‘They’re so vulnerable,’ she whispered to herself. ‘But so valiant.’
‘They are indeed! We do terrible things to their bodies and they come out of it so well.’
She looked up at his voice, still startled by it, still unnerved by the coincidence of Oliver being in the same team.
Unnerved, unsettled and, remembering his remarks in Theatre earlier, angry.
Definitely angry.
Very angry.
But when Angus came in to check on the patient, Oliver left.
‘Look, there’s no point in all three of us being here,’ Kate said, soon after. She waved her hand towards Clare and Angus. ‘Why don’t you two grab a coffee break—in fact, it’s past lunchtime. The canteen is good, and cheaper than the coffee shop on the ground floor. You know where to go?’
Why was Kate so keen to send them away?
Not that it mattered. Kate was right that they did not all need to be there. It was a very small room. Angus was apparently open to the suggestion, for he was already holding the door for Clare.
But it was Oliver she should be talking to. As hateful as his words had been earlier, she had to tell him! Not that she could tell him in a hospital canteen…
Although where could she tell him?
Was there an optimal place for telling a man he had a nine-year-old daughter?
‘Yes, I’m glad that first one’s over,’ she said to Angus in reply to his polite conversation about the op. But as they reached the canteen she knew she had to stop asking herself impossible questions about the Oliver situation and toss the conversational ball back to Angus.
‘I’m using the same machine, but did you find the set-up much different to the way you worked in the States?’
After that it was easy, normal conversation about work, but although Angus was a very good-looking man with dark hair and eyes and a soft Scottish accent that should be sending ripples up her spine, neither looking at nor listening to him did anything to her.
He was a nice man, she decided, a little reserved and without the magnetism that drew her to Oliver, but very nice all the same.
Magnetism?
Oliver?
Wasn’t her reaction to him—the physical attraction thing—just a hangover from the past?
And how could she even think of being attracted to a man who thought so little of her?
There were no ripples up her spine from Angus because she was totally spineless!
‘I really should go back,’ she said as, coffee finished, the conversation dried up. She needed to escape, preferably to a dark cave where she could hide out while she sorted out her life.
Or at least until she worked out how to tell Oliver her child was also his.
A week ago, life had seemed so simple, been such an adventure. She and Em coming back to Australia, setting up house, just the two of them, for the first time. Now everything had erupted into chaos.
‘Are you all right?’ Angus asked, and Clare realised she’d been twisting her table napkin so tightly it had curled into something that looked very like a miniature noose.
‘Nervous about the baby,’ she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t reveal her lie.
‘So, let’s check on him together,’ Angus said.
Together was good. She wouldn’t be on her own if they ran into Oliver.
Which they didn’t, although the baby—now named Bob—had his parents with him at the moment, so Clare contented herself with sitting by the nurse on duty at his monitor, watching the information feeding out from all the paraphernalia attached to him.
Oliver didn’t reappear, which was both a relief and a cause of anxiety. She had to talk to him!
But just imagining that conversation filled her with such apprehension she found herself literally shaking. Bob was doing well and she had no excuse to hang around so she made her way to the team tea room, thinking another strong coffee might settle her nerves and, once they were settled, surely her brain would start working again.
No, that was the coward’s way out. Oliver wasn’t in the PICU, but he’d have an office somewhere in the unit rooms. On his first full day of work, he wouldn’t be seeing patients but he was likely to be in his office, reviewing files of children he would be seeing later in the week, patients he’d be taking over from the specialist who’d left the team.
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Meredith Webber
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Fairytale on the Children′s Ward, электронная книга автора Meredith Webber на английском языке, в жанре современные любовные романы