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Greek Doctor: One Magical Christmas
Meredith Webber


Neena Singh's pregnancy was unplanned, and has left her wary of men.When handsome doctor Mak Stavrou, a relative of her baby's father, turns up in Wymaralong she is immediately suspicious of his intentions and firmly ignores their instant chemistry! But Neena's unborn child is a Stavrou heir, and Mak wants this beautiful Outback doctor as his Christmas bride!









Greek Doctor: One Magical Christmas

Meredith Webber





















www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)




Table of Contents


Cover (#u18d77a3f-8009-5810-b701-d5d9e733a238)

Title Page (#ua8aa71b8-d218-5e9d-b347-5a886c0fb044)

About the Author (#u9c826274-d31e-5a62-822f-6d595de05d50)

Prologue (#u934d3c4c-a5b0-59db-bd21-6d8bbc790c64)

Chapter One (#u24489f64-30cd-5814-9722-5066c40f9a6b)

Chapter Two (#u6abcfb13-33ac-5fa5-b8f9-c8a5c92d4d6b)

Chapter Three (#litres_trial_promo)

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)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#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 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.’




PROLOGUE


‘SO I DON’T know what to do!’

Mak stared at his only sister in disbelief.

Never in his life had he heard this strong-willed, determined, driven woman admit such a thing.

‘Have you talked to her?’

Helen shook her head.

‘I’ve written, I’ve sent emails, and heard nothing in reply. I can hardly just go out there and land on her doorstep. What if she shut the door in my face? Besides, it’s impossible for me to get away. Since Dad’s death I’ve been running the business and trying to keep Mum going—you know how she is—the two deaths coming so close together, it’s as if she’s given up living. Look at Christmas—her Christmas productions rivalled the Oscar presentations. Feast and family, that was her mantra. This year she’s doing nothing and when I suggested I do it, she just shrugged.’

Mak was still puzzled. Yes, Helen was busy and, yes, his mother did seem to have understandably lost her zest for life, but did that add up to so much consternation? Wouldn’t time—?

‘There’s also the cousins,’ Helen muttered.

Ah!

He waited for Helen to explain, knowing she would, eventually.

It came with a sigh.

‘The cousins are doing their best to take control of the business and if we lose control of Hellenic, Mum will have to watch all Dad built up go into other hands. She’ll feel as if his whole life was for nothing.’

While Helen paced the office at the top of Hellenic Enterprises city headquarters, Mak considered what he’d just learned. With his father’s blessing, he’d gone into medicine rather than following the parental footsteps into engineering, but as well as Helen, half a dozen of his cousins, children of his father’s sisters, had entered the family firm.

And held shares in it!

He frowned, realising that, although still part of the company, he knew less and less of what went on within it these days, his studies and work leaving him little time to read the company reports. And his father’s unexpected death had left him with a lot of problems to sort out, as he was the executor of his father’s personal estate.

‘Can they take over? I mean, do they have the power to do that—the majority of shares between them? And what would it mean if they did?’

‘They can if they get that woman to vote with them in the extraordinary general meeting they’ve called for January, and the way they are talking they already have her vote in the bag.’

‘You know this for certain?’ Mak asked, aware of the bias Helen felt against ‘that woman’.

‘I’m pretty sure and equally sure money has changed hands. Con was out there just last week, ostensibly to check on the experimental power plant but he’s never been interested in geo-thermal power before.’ Helen hesitated before adding, ‘And there was a rather large item in his expenses, listed as a donation.’

Mak felt himself frowning.

‘Did you ask him about it?’

‘How could I?’ Helen muttered. ‘I shouldn’t have seen the information—not until the next board meeting when we all table our expenses.’

‘You were spying on him?’ Mak couldn’t hide his disbelief.

‘I was not—it was just that Marge, Dad’s old secretary, alerted me to it as she typed up the agenda.’

Which was the same as spying, Mak considered, but that wasn’t the issue right now.

‘Maybe Con really was checking on the power plant, and the donation was just that. After all, he’d hardly bribe the woman with the firm’s money.’

‘Well, he wouldn’t use his own,’ Helen snapped. ‘You don’t know Con like I do—he’s changed since he married for the third time. I reckon his wife keeps her hands on the purse strings. He’s as tight as a—as a you know what.’

Mak considered his easygoing cousin and wondered if the third wife might not be on to something—keeping control of Con’s spending. Was she also behind the push to take over the company? It didn’t seem like something Con, or any of the cousins, would instigate…

‘This is all supposition, Helen. Let’s give Con the benefit of the doubt for the moment. And in any case, why are you worried about a takeover?You’d still be part of the company, probably still CEO, as I can’t see any of them wanting that job.’

‘I wouldn’t stay,’ Helen said, her face pale and her lips tight. ‘I know how they think and the way they see the future. Heaven knows, we’ve argued it often enough in board meetings. If they take over it will be the end of Dad’s dream to produce clean power, for one thing. They see that as someone else’s job or something for the future. Anything experimental is expensive, and there’s no certainty of a return. The cousins want profits that are guaranteed and they want them now which would mean taking the firm in a different direction, looking more towards structural engineering than Dad ever did, and probably merging with a bigger firm.’

Mak understood what she was saying but his mind had snagged on the earlier conversation—at the thought of money changing hands, and Con’s third wife, and manipulative women in general. The juxtaposition had prodded another thought in his mind—a very unwelcome one.

Theo had been shameless in his pursuit of women, casually promiscuous, but he had always been careful, assuring Mak that he always took precautions—that he wasn’t totally irresponsible.

So had this pregnancy been planned—not by Theo but by the woman in question? Had she seen an opportunity to either trap Theo into marriage, or to benefit in some other way?

She’d benefit all right if the cousins gave—or had already given—her money for her votes, benefit at the expense of Helen and his mother, at the expense of his father’s dreams and at the expense of their small family unit, which had always been so tight.

Mak felt anger stir at the thought of a deliberate pregnancy, having been caught up in similar circumstances himself, years ago. Although no one, he was sure, could be as devious as Rosalie had been! However, to be fair, the ‘money changing hands’ scenario was only supposition on Helen’s part. As far as he knew, this woman hadn’t made any move to ingratiate herself with the family—in fact, the opposite was true, which brought another problem in its train. Mak’s Greek genetic heritage was strongly aligned to family values—family made you what you were, and children needed family.

She had a name, of course, the woman, but it was never mentioned in the family—particularly not in Helen’s hearing. Any more than Theo’s reputation as a ladies’ man was discussed in Helen’s hearing. To his sister, her only child had been perfect in every way—handsome, clever, loyal, a loving son and an obedient grandson, following the family tradition by studying engineering—the designated successor to his grandfather, the designated heir to the massive conglomerate of businesses that made up Hellenic Enterprises.

But Theo was dead, killed in a motor vehicle accident that had also taken the lives of three of his friends. Four young people tragically dead because of speed and alcohol, and Mak, who as a top emergency room doctor saw far too many young lives wasted this way, had felt more fury than grief when first he’d heard the news. Grief for his nephew, and his sister’s suffering, had come, but the fury had returned when Mak had learned that Theo had been irresponsible enough to leave behind an unborn child.

A child who would be family…

‘What stage are you at with the exploration teams out there?’ he asked Helen, as an idea that filled him with horror started to form, unwanted, in his head.

‘We’ve found hot rocks close to the surface and although the exploration teams will remain out there, we’ve sent more men in to build the experimental power plant. Now it’s nothing more than pipes and pumps but once we’re satisfied that the rocks are suitable for our needs, we’ll go ahead with a proper set-up.’

‘So, you’ve the first crews, and more men for the power plant and the likelihood that even more men will be going out there shortly. And if a power plant goes ahead, some of those men will be there permanently so families would be joining them. I’d think you must be putting pressure on a lot of the town’s resources but in particular the medical services if there’s only one doctor in town.’

Helen nodded, but it was a vague reaction, and Mak could almost see the cloud of grief that still enveloped her.

‘Helen?’ he prompted, but gently this time.

She nodded again.

‘We are,’ she said, visibly pulling herself together. ‘In fact, Theo suggested the company fund another medical practitioner, if only for the duration of the exploration, but he might have had an ulterior motive—that woman might have been prompting him. The company could certainly afford it but how do we find out if that’s what the town really needs?’

Mak knew how they could find out because there was already a raging argument going on his head. Go out and check on things for himself? No way, he was on study leave, it was midsummer, the temperature would be up in the stratosphere, he had his thesis to complete. On the other hand, the family was important to him and right now it appeared to be falling apart. Helen, on whom he had always relied to keep things running smoothly, was struggling—physically as well as emotionally, he suspected. His mother—well, if ever anyone needed some new interest in her life, it was her and surely a great-grandchild could supply that interest…

He’d have to think about it.

There was no time to think about it.

‘I don’t know what to do,’ Helen said, taking the conversation back to where it had started, but now her voice was a feathery whisper, filled with pain and loss. ‘I’ve lost my son and now I’ll never know my grandchild.’

‘I’ll sort it out,’ he heard himself say. ‘I’ll go tomorrow and that will give me the whole weekend to sort out somewhere to stay and introduce myself to Dr Singh.’




CHAPTER ONE


HEADLIGHTS coming up the drive lit up the room, rousing Neena from the comfortable doze she was enjoying in front of the television. Not a patient—at this time of the night, getting on for midnight, patients would go straight to the hospital.

Unless there was an emergency out at the exploration site! No, they’d have phoned her, not driven in.

She eased herself off the couch, aware these days of the subtle redistribution of her body weight. Tugging her T-shirt down to hide the neat bump of Baby Singh, she made her way to the front door, opening it in time to see a tall, dark-haired man taking the steps two at a time, coming closer and closer to her, looming larger and larger.

A tall, dark-haired stranger.

‘Can I help you?’ she asked, checking him out automatically in the light shed by the motion sensors above the door. No visible blood, no limp, no favouring of one or other limb, and gorgeous, just gorgeous—tall, black-haired, chiselled features…

Chiselled features?

Had pregnancy finally turned her brain to mush?

And he hadn’t answered her enquiry. He’d simply reached the top of the steps and stopped, his dark gaze, eyes too shadowed to reveal colour, seemingly fastened on her face.

She was beautiful!

Mak had no idea why this should come as such a surprise to him. After all, Theo had hardly been noted for bedding women who weren’t. Had he, Mak, been thinking maybe Theo had been desperate, out here in the middle of nowhere, and settled for someone available rather than stunning? Was that why he was standing here like a great lummox, staring at the straight, slim figure in shorts and T-shirt—staring at a face of almost luminous beauty?

Except that her left cheek was reddened down one side, as if she’d been sleeping against something hard.

Maybe it was the heat, pressing against him like a warm blanket, that was affecting his brain.

‘Are you ill? Injured?’

Her voice was soft, and concerned, not about the arrival of a stranger on her doorstep at getting on to midnight but about the state of his health.

‘No, but you are Dr Singh?’

‘Yes, and you are?’

He had to get past his surprise at seeing her—had to stop staring at clear olive skin and sloe-shaped dark eyes, framed by lashes long enough to seem false; at a neat pointed chin below lips as red as dark rose petals, the velvety red-black roses his mother grew.

‘Mak Stavrou!’ Right, he was back in control again, and had managed to remember his name, but she was still looking puzzled.

‘Mak Stavrou,’ she repeated, and it was as if no one had ever said his name before, so softly did the syllables fall from her lips.

She was a witch. She had to be. Witches had long black hair that gleamed blue in the veranda light. Witches would be able to handle this heat without showing the slightest sign of wilting.

He wiped sweat off his own brow and felt the dampness of it in his hair.

‘The company doctor—you must have received an email.’

The still functioning part of his brain managed to produce this piece of information, while the straying neurones were still looking around for a black cat or a broomstick parked haphazardly in the corner of the veranda.

‘Company doctor?’ she said, shaking her head in a puzzled manner so the long strands of hair that he now saw had escaped from a plait that hung, schoolgirl fashion, down her back, swayed around her face.

‘Check your emails—there’ll be something there.’

‘Check your emails?’ she repeated, the red lips widening into a smile. ‘Out here we have to take into account the vagaries of the internet, which seem to deem that at least one day in four nothing works. The big mistake most people, me included, made was thinking wireless would be more reliable than dial-up. At least with dial-up we all had phone lines we could use.’

Neena paused then added, ‘Are you really a doctor?’

It was an absurd conversation to be having with a stranger in the middle of the night, and totally inhospitable to have left him standing on her top step, but there was something about the man—his size maybe?— that intimidated her, and she had the weirdest feeling that the best thing she could do was to send him away.

Far away!

Immediately!

‘And what company? Oh, dear, excuse me. The exploratory drilling company, of course. They’re staying on. I’d heard that. And they’ve sent a doctor?’

It still didn’t make a lot of sense and she knew she was probably frowning at the man. She tried again.

‘But shouldn’t you be reporting to the site office—not that it would be open at this hour. Who sent you here?’

He shrugged impossibly broad shoulders and pushed damp twists of black hair off his forehead.

‘Nothing is open at this hour. Believe me, I’ve tried to find somewhere. A motel, a pub, a garage—even the police station has a sign on the door telling people what number to phone in an emergency. And it’s not as if it’s that late—I mean, it’s after eleven, but for the pub to be shut on a Friday night! Finally an old man walking a dog told me this was the doctor’s house and I should try here.’

‘It’s the rock eisteddfod,’ Neena explained, then realised from the look of blank incomprehension on his face that it wasn’t an explanation he understood.

‘The Australia-wide high-school competition—singing and dancing. Our high school was in the final in Sydney last week. In fact, they came second, and as most of the parents and supporters weren’t able to travel to Sydney for the final, the school decided to put it on again here—but of course Wymaralong is too small to have a big enough hall, so it’s on tonight down the road in Baranock.’

Disbelief spread across the man’s face.

‘Baranock’s two hundred kilometres away—hardly down the road.’

She had to smile.

‘Two hundred kilometres is nothing. Some of the families with kids in the performance live another hundred kilometres out of town so it’s a six hundred kilometre round trip, but they’re willing to do it to encourage their children to participate in things like this.’

‘You’re not there!’ Mak pointed out, totally unnecessarily, but the smile had disturbed something in his gut, making him feel distinctly uncomfortable. Or maybe it was the heat. He hoped it was the heat.

Whatever it was, his comment served to make her smile more widely, lending her face a radiance that shone even in the dim lighting of the front veranda.

‘Someone had to mind the shop and take in stray doctors. So, if you can show me some identification, I will take you in, and tomorrow we can sort out somewhere for you to stay.’

‘Did I hear you say you’re taking in a stranger?’

A rasping voice from just inside the darkened doorway of the old house made Mak look up from the task of riffling through his wallet in search of some ID.

‘Haven’t you learnt your lesson, girl?’

The girl in question had turned towards the doorway, where a small, nuggety man was now visible.

‘I knew you were here to protect me, Ned,’ she said. ‘Come out and meet the new doctor.’

‘New doctors let people know they’re coming and they don’t arrive in the middle of the night,’ the small man said, moving out of the doorway so Mak could see him in the light on the veranda. A tanned, bald head, facial skin as wrinkled as a walnut, pale blue eyes fanned with deep lines from squinting into the sun, now studying Mak with deep suspicion.

‘I’ve explained to Dr Singh there should have been an email, and I wasted an hour trying to find some accommodation in town. Here, my hospital ID from St Christopher’s in Brisbane—I’m on study leave at the moment—and my driver’s licence, medical registration card and somewhere in my luggage, a letter from Hellenic Enterprises, outlining my contract with them.’

The woman reached out a slim hand to take the offered IDs, but it was Ned who asked the question.

‘Which is?’

A demand, aggressive enough for Mak, exhausted after an eleven-hour drive made even more tortuous by having to change a flat tyre, to snap.

‘None of your business, but if you must know, I was about to explain to Dr Singh that the company has asked me to work with her to evaluate the needs of the community as far as medical practitioners and support staff are concerned. The company realises having their crews and now some families of the crews here is putting an extra strain on the town’s medical resources and the powers that be at Hellenic are willing to fund another doctor and possibly another trained nursing sister, should that be advisable.’

‘Realising it a bit late,’ Ned growled. ‘Those lads have been out there a full year.’

‘But more are coming, Ned, and we will need to expand the medical service.’ The woman spoke gently but firmly to the old man then turned to Mak. ‘We’re hardly showing you the famed country hospitality, putting you through the third degree out here on the steps. Come inside. You’re right about there being no one in town tonight, but even if there had been, there are no rooms to be had at the pub or in either of the motels.’

She paused and grinned at him. ‘Kind of significant, isn’t it—coming on to Christmas and no room at the inn? But in Wymaralong it’s been like that all year. The crews from the exploration teams and the travellers that service the machinery have taken every spare bed in town. You can stay here tonight, and tomorrow Ned can phone around to see if someone would be willing to take you in as a boarder.’

‘Which you are obviously not,’ Mak said, following her across the veranda and into a wide and blessedly cool hallway, rooms opening off it on both sides.

She turned, and fine dark eyebrows rose while the skin on her forehead wrinkled into a tiny frown.

‘Obviously not what?’

‘Willing to take me in as a boarder.’

‘No, she’s not!’ Ned snapped, following behind Mak, right on his heels, ready, no doubt, to brain him with an umbrella from the stand inside the door if he made a wrong move.

The woman’s lips moved but if it was a smile, it was a wry one.

‘You can have a bed for the night,’ she repeated. ‘Tomorrow we’ll talk.’

Then she waved her hand to the left, ushering Mak into a big living room, comfortably furnished with padded cane chairs, their upholstery faded but looking homely rather than shabby. Low bookshelves lined one wall, and an old upright piano stood in a corner, its top holding a clutter of framed photographs, while set in front of every chair was a solid footrest, as if the room had been furnished with comfort as its primary concern.

And the air in here, too, was cool, although Mak couldn’t hear the hum of an air-conditioner.

‘Have a seat,’ his hostess offered. ‘Have you eaten anything recently? Ned could make you toast, or an omelette, or there’s some leftover meatloaf. Dr Stavrou might like that in a sandwich, Ned. And tea or coffee, or perhaps a cold drink.’

Mak looked from the woman to Ned, who was still watching Mak, like a guard dog that hadn’t let down its guard for one instant.

‘A cup of tea and some toast would be great and the meatloaf sounds inviting, but you don’t have to wait on me. If you lead me to the kitchen and show me where things are, I could help myself.’

‘Not in my kitchen, you can’t. Not while I’m here,’ Ned growled—guard dog again—before disappearing further down the hall.

Now her visitor was sitting in her living room, Neena stopped staring at him and recalled her manners.

‘I’m Neena Singh,’ she said, introducing herself as if there was nothing strange in this near-midnight meeting, although suspicion was now stirring in her tired brain. She recalled something the man had said earlier. ‘If you’re on study leave, why are you here? Surely you’re not studying the problems of isolated medical practitioners.’

‘No, but it’s not that far off my course. I’m finishing a master’s degree, and my area of interest is in improving the medical aid offered by the first response team in emergency situations. I imagine in emergency situations out here you’re the first response—you and the ambos. In major situations the flying doctor comes in, but you’d be first response.’

She couldn’t argue, thinking of the number of times she’d arrived at the scene of a motor vehicle or farm accident and wished for more hands, more skilled help, more equipment and even better skills herself. Anything to keep the victims alive until they could be properly stabilised and treated.

‘Do you work in the emergency field?’

The stranger nodded.

‘ER at St Christopher’s.’

‘And the company plan is what? For you to work with me to gauge the workload in town or will you work solely with the work crew out on the site?’

‘Not much point in working out on site when I need to find out how the additional population—now the men are here permanently they’ll have family joining them—affects the medical services of the town,’ he said, looking up at her so she saw his eyes weren’t the dark brown she’d expected but a greenish hazel—unusual eyes and in some way uncannily familiar.

Like Theo’s?

Futile but familiar anger tightened her shoulder-blades, and the suspicion she’d felt earlier strengthened. She tried to shrug off the anger and the suspicion. The man’s name was Greek, so maybe there was a part of Greece where people had dark hazel eyes…

He was still talking—explaining something—but she’d lost the thread of the conversation, wanting only to escape his presence—to get out of the room and shake herself free of tormenting memories.

And to think rationally and clearly about the implications of the man’s arrival in town!

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I should have offered earlier. You might want to use the bathroom, freshen up. It’s across the passage, turn left then first door on the right.’

Getting rid of him, if only for a short time, would be nearly as good as escaping herself, but he didn’t move.

‘Thanks, but I did avail myself of the facilities at the service station. The rest rooms weren’t locked—they even had a shower in there, so I took advantage of that as well.’

‘Most outback service stations provide showers—for the truckies,’ Neena said, imparting the information like a tour guide. If escaping the man’s presence wasn’t possible, then neutral—tour-guide—conversation was the next best thing. Later she could think about personal issues. ‘This is sheep and cattle country and the animals are trucked to market, plus, of course, all our consumer goods have to be trucked in.’

‘And products for the farmers—stuff like fencing wire,’ Mak offered helpfully, wondering why the woman was so ill at ease in her own home. Or did she know who he was? That he was family? Unlikely Theo would have mentioned him. ‘I have an Uncle Mak who disapproves of me’ was hardly the kind of conversation that would lure a woman into bed.

‘Yes, it did sound pathetic, didn’t it?’ Neena said, a slight smile playing at the corners of her lips. ‘But I’d lost track of the conversation. I was dozing in front of the TV when you arrived and my mind was still halfasleep. I gather you want to work with me, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s fantastic because I can learn from you. You’ve no idea how often I wish I had more skills in first response stuff. Oh, I get by, but there are so many new ideas that it’s hard to keep up.’

Mak wished they’d kept talking about trucking. Neena’s honest admission that she hadn’t been listening to his conversation, followed by such an enthusiastic acceptance of his presence made him feel tainted and uneasy—unclean, really, for all he’d showered. And when she’d smiled—well, almost smiled—his gut had tightened uncomfortably, but he was fairly sure he could put that aside as a normal reaction to such a beautiful woman. It was the deception bothering him the most, but he could hardly announce now that he was really here to suss her out.

‘I’ve made you toasted sandwiches with the meatloaf.’

Ned marched in, bearing a tray which he set down on a small table beside Mak’s chair. ‘And there’s a pot of tea, but don’t you go thinking you can have a cup, Miss Neena. You’re sleeping bad enough as it is. I’ll make you a warm milk if you want something.’

Mak smiled as Neena hid a grimace.

‘No, thank you, Ned. I drank some milk earlier, as you very well know, and how can I have a cup of tea when you’ve only put out one cup?’

‘You’d drink it from the pot if you got desperate enough,’ Ned muttered as he made his way out of the room, pausing in the doorway to add, ‘I’ve put clean sheets on the bed in the back room.’

A quick frown flitted across Neena’s smooth brow.

‘Does the back room have rats and cockroaches or is it just as far away from your room as it can possibly be?’ Mak asked, and won another smile from his hostess.

‘It’s certainly not the best spare room in the house,’ she admitted. ‘And Ned does get over-protective. But I don’t think there are rats or cockroaches.’

‘Even if there were, I doubt it would worry me,’ Mak said. ‘It’s a long drive and I’m tired enough to sleep on a barbed-wire fence. In fact, if it’s okay with you, I might take my tray through and have the snack there. That way we can both get to bed.’

She turned away but not before he saw a blush rise in her cheeks. Surely not because he’d mentioned both of them getting to bed—it was hardly suggestive, the way he’d said it…

‘Through here,’ she was saying, and, tray in hand, he followed her, noting the bathroom she’d talked about earlier on the right then another two doors before they reached the end of the passage and the back room.

‘Oh, dear,’ she murmured as she opened the door and looked in, then turned back and ran her gaze over him from head to toe. ‘I’d forgotten about the bed in here. You’ll never fit.’

And over her shoulder Mak saw what she meant for Ned had put sheets onto a rather small—perhaps child size—single bed, and even from the doorway, Mak could feel the heat emanating from the room.

‘I heard him say he’d sleep on a barbed-wire fence,’ the gravelly voice reminded them, and looking through a French door on the other side of the room, Mak saw Ned standing on the veranda.

On guard?

‘Well, he can’t sleep here. Honestly, Ned, sometimes I wonder if your main aim in life is to frustrate me. Come this way,’ Neena added to Mak. ‘There’s a double bed that should take your height, if you sleep crossways, in the next bedroom, and that bedroom has an air vent as well. I’ll get some sheets.’

She opened another door.

‘I’ll have it made up by the time you get your gear out of the car, and as far as I’m concerned you’re welcome to stay here. This is the doctor’s house after all.’

She was doing it to get her own back on Ned, Mak realised that immediately. He also realised it would give him an ideal opportunity to really get to know her!

So why did he feel uneasy?

Because of the deceit? Or because on first impression this woman was nothing like the manipulative gold-digger he’d envisioned?

‘You don’t have to put me up.’ It was a token protest, brought on by the uneasiness, but she waved it away.

‘Of course I don’t, but sometimes I get very tired of being bossed around by every single person in this town. Sometimes I’d like to be allowed to make my own decisions. Now, get your things—you know where the bathroom is. I’ll put some fresh towels in there.’

She whirled away, opening a cupboard near the back room, pulling out sheets and towels.

‘Leave the sheets on the bed, I’ll make it up,’ Mak told her, and she silenced him with a glare.

‘Don’t you start,’ she warned, marching back down the hall, slipping past him into the bedroom.

Mak set the tray down and left her to it, wondering just why the town would be so protective of her. Okay, so it was hard to get doctors to serve in country towns and the further outback you went the harder it became, but…

Maybe it was her pregnancy.

The phone was ringing as he re-entered the house, silenced when Neena must have answered it. He heard her say, ‘I’ll be right there,’ and the click of a receiver being returned to its cradle.

‘Bed’s made,’ she said, passing him in the passage. ‘Towels in the bathroom.’

And she kept walking.

Dumping his bag, Mak followed her.

‘You’re going out on a call,’ he said as his long strides caught up.

She nodded but her pace didn’t slacken as she crossed the veranda and ran lightly down the steps—running when being back out in the hot night air immediately sapped his energy.

‘I’ll come with you,’ he said, determined to get used to whatever the climate threw at him. ‘It’s what I’m here for, to see how you work.’

‘You’ve been driving all day and you’re tired,’ she said, opening the door of a big four-wheel-drive that stood just off the main circular driveway. Then she turned to look at him. ‘But it’s probably your kind of thing and I could certainly use some help. An accident at the drilling site. The ambulance was out of town but it’s on its way.’

Mak didn’t answer, instead striding around the car and climbing in the passenger side, relieved to find she’d already started the engine and had the air-con roaring.

‘Motor vehicle?’ he asked, and as Neena reversed the car competently onto the drive, she shook her head.

‘I don’t know how much you know about it, but if you’re employed by Hellenic Enterprises presumably you know they’ve gone past the initial exploratory drilling stage and are setting up an experimental geothermal power station. Basically they pump water down into the bowels of the earth onto shattered hot rocks, and the heat of the rocks turns the water to steam, which comes up through different pipes and is harnessed and used to make electricity.’

Her explanation had holes in it but as a basic description of a scientific process it wasn’t too bad.

‘And what’s happened?’

‘A seam on a pipe burst and steam escaped. Two men badly burned, others less seriously.’

‘Steam burns—bad business,’ Mak said, wishing he had the facilities of St Christopher’s burns unit here.

‘The flying doctor’s on the way. We stabilise them as best we can and they’ll fly them to somewhere with a burns unit.’

‘So, it’s a first response situation,’ he said, turning to look at her. She was studying the road ahead, concentrating on the thin strip of bitumen, so all he could see was a clean, perfect profile—high forehead, straight nose, the flare of lips, the delicately pointed chin.

‘Exactly,’ she said. ‘Most of our emergencies are. We stabilise people and send them on—some, if they’re locals, come back so we know about the eventual outcome but many of them, travellers passing through, are never seen again.’

‘Most emergency medicine is like that—I rarely see anything of the patients I treat once they’ve left the ER. Rarely hear how they’ve fared, for that matter.’

‘And does that bother you?’

She glanced his way and he sensed she was really interested in his reply, an interest that intrigued him.

‘Why do you ask?’

She smiled.

‘I suppose because I know most of my patients so well. The local ones are part of my life and I’m part of theirs so we work together to get the best outcomes for them. I can’t imagine a scenario where I don’t know what happens next.’

The words rang true, and Mak wondered if a woman who could be so involved in her patients’ lives could also be the manipulative female he suspected she was.

Of course she could be. All human beings were multi-faceted.

‘I suppose part of the fascination of medicine is that it offers so many different opportunities in its practice,’ he said, although the way she’d spoken made him wonder about what had happened to some of the patients he’d treated. Just a few who’d made a big impression on him, or those who had been tricky cases…

‘Anyway, I’m glad you’re here for this job,’ she continued. ‘You probably have far more experience with burns than I do.’

Her gratitude made his gut squirm and her frank admission about her capabilities didn’t fit with the picture he’d built up in his mind. Served him right for pre-judging?

He turned his mind from the puzzle this beautiful woman presented to the task ahead of them.

‘Were the pipes in an enclosed space?’

She glanced his way again.

‘I haven’t been out there for a couple of weeks so I don’t know what’s been going on, but originally all the piping was exposed—right out in the open.’

Another glance then her attention switched back to the road. ‘You’re thinking inhalation injuries? Even outside, if they were close to the pipe when the accident happened…’

She paused, frowning as she thought, then asked, ‘Would obvious facial burns always be indicative of inhalation injuries?’

She had a quick mind, something he usually admired—and enjoyed—in a woman, but in this woman?

‘Yes, it should give us an indication. If there are signs of facial involvement—maybe even if there aren’t—we should intubate them. If there’s internal tissue damage that causes swelling—’

‘Intubating later might be impossible,’ Neena finished for him, happy to be talking medicine, although distinctly unhappy about this man’s sudden intrusion into her life.

Was he simply who he said he was—someone sent by the company to assess the strain the additional population was putting on medical services? Or had Theo’s mother, the coldly formal Helen Cassimatis of the emails and letters, sent him?

He was quiet now. Maybe, like her, he didn’t want to get too far ahead of himself before he saw the patients.

She risked a glance at him, pleased he was looking out the window into the darkness through which they passed.

A very good-looking man, but…

Greek name, Greek company…

Not that Neena hadn’t expected it. Theo’s complaints about his stifling family, while probably exaggerated, had suggested nothing less, and she’d doubted Theo’s mother wouldn’t do something to follow up the outrageous offers she’d made!

First there’d been an offer of financial help, followed closely by the suggestion that Neena move to the city so she could have the best medical attention. Then a letter just to let Neena know ‘the family’ had accommodation she could have rent-free in Brisbane so she wouldn’t have to work.

And all so ‘the family’ could get their hands on Neena’s child! The same ‘family’ that had produced Theo—charming, intelligent, handsome and smart, and so cosseted and spoiled, so used to getting his own way, he’d taken Neena’s panicky, and admittedly last-minute no as a tease and had forced her.

The squelchy feeling in her stomach wasn’t as bad as it used to be, but she still couldn’t think of that night without feeling a slight nausea. She breathed deeply, in and out, and concentrated on the road ahead.

They’d left the silent, deserted town well behind them and she pushed the memories equally far away.

The road was dead straight, a single-lane strip of bitumen that in daylight stretched to the horizon. Now, at night, a cluster of lights marked the site of the geothermal experimental station.

‘Is there an airstrip at the site?’ Mak asked. ‘Can the flying doctors land there?’

Neena shook her head.

‘At first it was just a couple of exploratory crews out here, drilling down to work out how far they needed to go to get to the hot rocks. When they found them closer to the surface than they’d expected…’

She stopped and turned briefly towards him.

‘I suppose you know the rocks can be anything from two to ten kilometres beneath the surface of the earth and apparently when you’re drilling and pumping water and steam every metre makes a difference?’

‘I know a bit about the process—I’m interested in all alternate power sources and geo-thermal in Australia makes a lot of sense. But you’re saying that for exploratory purposes there was no need for an airstrip? Because the crews moved around?’

She nodded and Mak saw the frown he’d glimpsed earlier pucker her brow.

‘And now?’

Glancing his way again, she shrugged.

‘I think they should have a strip. The land’s as flat as a table top so it wouldn’t cost much to ‘doze one, and although I wouldn’t for the world wish accidents on any of the workers, they do happen and in cases like this we could airlift the injured men straight out rather than having to bring them into town and then airlift them. Every time they’re moved, we put them more at risk of infection.’

‘Well, now the company is bringing in more men to build their experimental power plant, maybe they will put in a strip.’

The lights were getting closer—and brighter—glowing in the blackness of the night.

‘If it’s not already planned, you could put it in your suggestions,’ Neena told him, concentrating on how useful this stranger could be rather than the weird sensations he was causing in her intestines.

Or wondering whether the real reason he was here was to take her baby from her—to absorb her child—into the conglomerate that was ‘the family’.

Theo’s family.

‘Suggestions?’ he said, sounding so vague, anger surged inside her.

‘Isn’t that the job you were sent for?’

The words grated from her throat as she pulled up outside the camp office, noticing in her rear-vision mirror the flashing lights of the ambulance approaching in the distance. Slipping out of the vehicle, she grabbed her bag from the back seat and hurried into the well-lit but warm cabin.

‘We covered them with clean sheets like you said, turned off the air-con and gave them a small dose of morphine,’ an anxious-looking man told them as they walked in. He was hovering between two desks on which the injured men had been laid. ‘We’ve a stretcher in the medical room but the light’s better in here.’

Neena had set her bag down on the floor and opened it. Mak knelt beside her, silently congratulating her forethought. Burns victims lost heat rapidly, and with shock a likely side-effect of the trauma, they needed to be kept warm.

‘One each?’ he suggested as she handed him a suction device and an endotracheal tube.

‘Suction, intubate then fluid.’ She was muttering more to herself than to Mak.

‘Large-bore catheters in both arms,’ he said.

Although her confirming nod and quiet ‘We need to allow good fluid access’ told him she was thinking along the same lines as he was.

The ambulance attendants arrived as they worked, took in the situation at a glance and opened up the big bag they were carrying.

‘We’ve a burns kit with treated gauze. Want us to cover the wounds?’

To cover or not to cover? It was a question that had tormented Neena in the burns cases she’d handled previously. She turned to Mak, knowing he’d have more experience.

‘You’re flying them out to a specialist unit,’ he said, ‘but you’ve two transfers before they leave here and another when they get to the city—opportunities each time for contamination. Let’s cover.’ He was competently siting a large-bore catheter in his patient’s arm as he spoke. ‘You’ve Ringer’s in your bag?’

Neena nodded, concentrating on getting the catheter sited in her own patient’s arm.

‘That’s the plane,’ one of the ambos said, as a roaring overhead shook the shed that served as an office at the work site. ‘They said they’d buzz us as they came in.’

‘Okay, let’s move them,’ Neena suggested, as she attached tubing and a bag of fluid to the second catheter on her patient, adjusted the flow, then grabbed a transfer form to complete before the injured men left the site, noting down exactly what treatment they’d been given. ‘You guys take them straight to the airfield. Dr Stavrou and I will see the other injured men.’

‘Dr Stavrou?’ one of the ambos queried, as the other helped Mak lift his patient onto a stretcher.

‘Mak Stavrou, meet Pete and Paul, two of our crew of four local ambos,’ Neena said, then she stood aside as Pete and Paul lifted her patient.

‘He your replacement while you take maternity leave?’ Paul asked, wheeling the patient towards the door.

Neena shook her head.

‘I’ll explain some other time, but for now, would you leave your burns kit here? I’ll bring it back to town.’

Time enough for the townsfolk to learn why Mak Stavrou was here. And for him to learn the town’s reaction! Not everyone was happy with the exploration crews, or the experimental power plant, but he’d find that out soon enough.

And no one in the town would be happy if they knew the suspicions she had about his visit! This was a town that protected its own, and Neena was definitely its own.

She hid a sigh bred from the frustration she often felt over this protective attitude, but they meant well, her town’s people…

‘Let’s go see the others who were hurt,’ she said to Mak, who was talking to the foreman.

‘They’re in the mess cabin, I’ll take you over,’ the foreman said, as Mak lifted the burns bag from her grasp, his fingers brushing hers in the exchange. ‘They’re not badly hurt,’ the man continued, while Neena trailed behind the two men, telling herself she couldn’t possibly have felt a reaction when the stranger’s skin had brushed hers.

She was worried about the injured men, and uptight because she’d had this Mak Stavrou foisted on her. The twinge had been nothing more than tension.

‘Some of the steam was still leaking from the pipes when they went over to drag their mates away but I’d say they’re only superficial burns,’ the foreman explained.

They were superficial burns, soon treated and dressed.

‘Leave the dressings in place until Monday then come into town and we’ll check the wounds and dress them again if necessary,’ Mak told the three men.

They all agreed and thanked him, while Neena smiled to herself. In this case, Mak was the person with the most experience, but as far as these rough outback labourers were concerned, it was as natural to them as breathing to consider the male of the species as the main authority—the chief!

‘Best if you’re a boy,’ she muttered, patting the bump as she made her way back to her vehicle. ‘Life’s a lot easier for men.’




CHAPTER TWO


BEST if you’re a boy?

The phrase he’d heard Neena mutter hung in Mak’s head as they drove away from the exploration site, but the weariness of the long drive out to Wymaralong was claiming him and he couldn’t think clearly about the implication of the words.

‘Do you not know the sex of your baby? I thought with regular scans most people found out quite early.’

Neena didn’t take her eyes off the road, simply shaking her head by way of reply.

‘I didn’t want to know,’ she said, and before she could explain the vehicle struck something and jolted to a stop, slewed across the road, airbags inflating so the world turned white.

‘What the—!’

The muttered oath told him his companion was conscious and as he fought his way out of the airbag he heard her door open.

‘Are you all right?’ she asked. ‘Can you move your legs and arms? Coming on to dawn, I don’t drive fast because I’m always wary of ‘roos. I don’t think we hit whatever it is hard enough for major injury but your side took the impact and the front wing is crumpled. Are your feet free?’

Mak wiggled his feet and moved his limbs. There was less foot room than there’d been earlier, but his feet weren’t trapped.

‘I’m conscious and feeling no pain so I assume I’m okay and, yes, my feet are free. What did we hit? I didn’t see anything ahead of us and there certainly wasn’t anything on the road as we came out.’

‘It’s a camel, I just looked. I’d heard there was a mob of them out here, but hadn’t believed it. They’re usually further west, around Alice and over in the Western Australia deserts. By the look of things it was already dead—maybe the ambulance hit it a glancing blow on its way back to town. The damage is on your side so I doubt your door will open. Here’s a knife, can you cut your way free of the airbag? I’ll phone a tow truck.’

He felt the knife press into his palm then heard her move away, speaking quietly, no doubt phoning for help, but when he made his way out of the vehicle she wasn’t on the phone. The headlights, still working on the driver’s side, illuminated a macabre scene, the slight woman kneeling by the big animal, talking not to it but to a young calf that stood making bleating noises at its mother, no doubt waiting for her to get up.

‘She had this calf—the poor wee thing. See the cord—it’s not very old.’

The pain in the woman’s voice pierced Mak’s heart and he heard his own voice saying, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll look after it.’

We?

He was here for a month and what did he know about raising camels? Raising anything? Okay, so he’d thought he’d be a father—once upon a time—and he’d liked the idea, but his marital experience still rankled. It wasn’t something he was likely to repeat.

‘I’d like to get a rope around his neck,’ Neena said.

Mak smiled to himself, feeling the words were a great segue to his thoughts, then he realised she was trying to hold the struggling baby camel.

Struggling baby camel? The animal was kicking its ridiculously long legs and the woman holding it was pregnant.

‘Let go,’ Mak ordered. Guessing she was about to argue, he added, ‘If it kicks the baby, you’ll be sorry.’ He lifted it out of the way, standing up with it and wondering what to do next.

He supposed it was fate that the tow truck should arrive at that moment so he was illuminated by its headlights, standing in the middle of the road, a baby camel in his arms.

‘You guys been having fun?’ The tow-truck driver got out of his cab and surveyed the scene. ‘Not your baby, is it, Neena?’

‘It is now,’ Neena told him, standing up and moving across to where the driver was examining the calf. ‘We’d better put him in the back of my vehicle and get him out when we get to town. Can you drag the mother’s body off the road a bit before you hitch up to my car, Nick? Oh, sorry, Nick, this is Mak—Mak, Nick.’

‘New doctor in town, I heard,’ Nick said as he offered his hand to Mak.

‘Word gets around,’ Mak said, shaking hands with the man, although it did puzzle him just how this had happened in the early hours of a Saturday morning, especially as the town had been deserted when he’d arrived.

He didn’t puzzle over it long, putting the calf into the back of the vehicle then helping Nick wrap a chain around the dead camel and walking in front of the tow truck as it pulled the animal off the road and into bushes well off the track. Next, Neena’s vehicle, with its badly damaged bull bar and left wheel arch, was attached for towing, and Neena, who had settled the calf in the back of her big four-wheel-drive, talking to it all the time, was persuaded to leave it for the drive back to town.

‘Birds like ducks and geese attach themselves to humans if they don’t have a mother—do you think camels might do the same?’ she asked as she climbed into the tow vehicle, moving across the bench seat to make room for Mak in there as well.

‘Patterning, don’t they call it?’ Nick said, and Mak’s world became a dream again. Crammed into the cab of a tow truck as a brilliant dawn coloured the eastern sky, the smell of diesel fuel filling the air, and a slim, pregnant, beautiful woman squashed beside him, chatting on about the patterning habits of birds, stirring heat in his body again…

He’d put it down to tiredness and ignore it, that’s what he’d do, but, exhausted as he was, the night was not over. As Nick pulled up outside the big old house and Mak wearily alighted, his hostess was already making plans.

‘My office is the first room on the left, the computer’s on the desk,’ she said to Mak. ‘Could you hop on the internet and see what you can find out about camel milk? The little one will need a drink. And Nick, if you wouldn’t mind carrying it out to the stables. A rubber glove, that would do for a teat do you think, until I can get something sent out?’

‘It’s no use arguing,’ Nick said to Mak, as Neena made her way to the back of her vehicle to release the calf. ‘Once she’s got a bee in her bonnet about something, there’s no stopping her. I’d better catch up or she’ll lift the damn thing out herself.’

Nick hurried after her while Mak wearily climbed the front steps. They felt as high as Everest, but as tiredness cramped his legs he had to wonder just how tired a pregnant woman must be feeling. Not that he intended using her office for the internet search on camel milk.

Was he really about to do that?

Yes, he was, but he’d use his laptop—that’s if wireless worked out here. One day in four, she’d said—was that when it did work or it didn’t?

He sighed, too tired and confused to think about such irrelevancies. Though wasn’t the constitution of camel milk an irrelevance?

Not in Neena Singh’s opinion!

He ate the sandwich as he searched the ‘net, and even drank a cold cup of tea, making notes at the same time.

‘Camel milk is lower in fat and lactose than cow’s milk and higher in iron, potassium and Vitamin C,’ he reported, after finding his way around the back of the house to what had obviously been stables at some time and entering the one that was brightly lit from within.

Neena, seated on the stable floor with the calf’s head in her lap, looked up at him and smiled, although he was so far beyond smiles he wondered how she’d managed it.

‘That’s great. We can work out some kind of formula but to begin I’ve given him some newborn infant formula I had out here from when we were looking after an injured foal. There’s no vet in town, you see, and the stables aren’t used most of the time. Someone told me about rubber gloves and he seems to have taken to it because he drank quite a lot before he went to sleep.’

She held up a two-litre soft-drink bottle to which she’d attached a rubber glove, the fingers tied off so the thumb formed a soft teat.

Mak shook his head, although was feeding a camel calf through a rubber glove any more unbelievable than the rest of the occurrences of the night?

‘You should be in bed yourself,’ he said, knowing if he didn’t lie down soon he’d probably fall down but not wanting to portray such weakness in front of this apparently inexhaustible woman.

‘I’ll go soon. You go—have a shower and leave your clothes in a heap on the bathroom floor. Ned will take care of them for you. Grab something to eat in the kitchen if you’re hungry. You won’t sleep otherwise.’

‘And you’re going to do what?’ Mak demanded, sensing she had no intention of following her own advice and going to bed.

‘I’ll doze here. From the moment I was pregnant I took up dozing. I can doze just about anywhere. And I don’t want Albert waking up and finding himself alone.’

‘Albert?’

She smiled at Mak and he felt a now familiar stirring deep inside him. Tiredness!

‘He’s got a noble look about him and I think Albert is a noble name, don’t you? I did consider Clarence— Clarence the Camel, you know—but he might think that’s a bit sissy when he grows up.’

‘And Albert isn’t?’ Mak muttered, but not loudly enough for Neena to hear because right now he didn’t want to get involved in an argument over the naming of a camel calf. Besides, she was talking again.

‘When Ned gets up he’ll rig up something for him, some way that Albert can feed on demand and some music or something to keep him company, but until then I’ll stay here. There’s straw and bags, I’ll be perfectly comfortable.’

Mak knew he should argue, but with what—the on-demand feeding? What did he know? Her staying there? He doubted he’d budge her.

He walked away, but the image of her, sitting on the floor, dirty and dishevelled, the camel’s head on her lap, wouldn’t go away.

Might never go away.

And that thought made him shiver…

Neena watched him go, her mind churning. A man who’d check out the constitution of camel milk in the early hours of the morning couldn’t be all bad. But what if her suspicions were right—what if he’d come to take her baby from her, if not physically, then at least to persuade her to let the child be part of a family of which she had a very poor opinion?

She had to be wary of him—and not be taken in by little acts of kindness. Except that kindness, right now when she was feeling so terribly, terribly tired, seemed particularly important.

She studied the calf’s funny face through teary eyes and told herself it was just pregnancy making her weepy, and thinking of the pregnancy—of her baby’s welfare— she stretched out on the bag-covered straw and settled the calf so its legs were stretched away from her, then she patted Baby Singh, talked softly to him for a few minutes, telling him about the little camel he’d have for a playmate, wondering about family—a concept not all that familiar to her, although deep down she knew that every child deserved to have a family.

But that family?

She wouldn’t think about it now. Mak Stavrou was here for a month. She’d work it out before he left; right now she needed to sleep.

But every time she closed her eyes an image of her visitor was fixed to the inside of her eyelids and she was forced to study his face and try to work out just why it had so appealed to her.

It couldn’t just be the strength of his facial bones, obvious because of the way his tanned skin stretched tautly over them, or the thick black eyebrows above dark hazel eyes, or the long nose kept from perfection by a thickening in the middle, or lips, pale but rimmed with a line of even paler skin so the sensuous fullness of them was emphasized.

‘Oh, boy! Talk about trouble,’ she told the sleeping Albert. ‘Six months pregnant and I’m fantasising about a stranger. And not just any stranger—a Hellenic Enterprises stranger!’

As if one stranger from Hellenic Enterprises wasn’t enough!

She patted the baby then curled her hands around the bump.

‘It’s okay,’ she told him. ‘We’ll work it out. Together we can conquer the world.’

But the promise lacked conviction so she added, ‘And if we can’t there’s always Ned and one thousand, four hundred and forty-two other Wymaralongites. Who needs family when we’ve got all of them?’

And on that note, she finally slept.

‘How could you let her bring that animal home?’ Ned demanded, when Mak, refreshed from four hours’ solid sleep and now starving, made his way into the kitchen.

‘You could have stopped her?’ Mak enquired, and the old man shook his head.

‘Nah! Never been any different, she hasn’t,’ Ned admitted, twiddling a knob on the coffee machine and pulling a mug out of a cupboard. ‘Kittens, puppies, tortoises she picked up off the road, a duck one time, a galah with a broken wing—you name it, we’ve nursed it or reared it or sometimes had to bury it. But a camel—that’s going too far. What’s she going to do when it grows?’

‘I imagine there are camel farms somewhere that will take it, or some tourist operator on the coast who uses them for beach rides. A sanctuary perhaps. I’ve never come across a baby camel before so am not sure about what one does with it when it grows.’

‘Tourists riding on her camel? Yeah, I can see her letting that happen! People peering at it in a sanctuary? No, we’re stuck with it.’

Ned handed Mak the mug of coffee, and waved his hand to milk and sugar on the table, somehow making the simple act a gesture of acceptance. Although Mak guessed Ned might be looking to him as an ally in some endeavour. Persuading Neena to part with her new pet?

Whatever it was, the man’s suspicion of the previous night seemed to have vanished.

‘Has she gone to bed?’ Mak asked, and Ned nodded.

‘Under protest, but I told her if she didn’t sleep it would harm the baby—that usually works if ever you need to get her to rest.’

Definitely an ally, Mak realised.

‘And the calf?’

‘Happy as Larry,’ Ned assured him. ‘I’ve rigged up a bag of old clothes and I’ve got formula in a plastic bottle inside it. The calf nudges and sucks and as long as the milk comes out he doesn’t know he hasn’t got a mother.’

Mak shook his head, aware this was becoming a habit, but it was obvious from Ned’s conversation that he was just as dedicated to Neena’s strays as she was. Or perhaps he was just used to being the one who had to work out how to feed them! A strange relationship, the wizened old man and the beautiful young woman—Mak would have liked to ask about it, but he didn’t think the alliance between him and Ned was strong enough just yet.

Until Ned spoke again and he realised the alliance was less about the camel than about practical matters.

‘Neena usually does a few hours on Saturday mornings at the surgery. Young Paula Gibbons is the nurse-receptionist on duty and I phoned her to say we’re running late, but with Neena not long gone to bed I thought you might do it. Meet some people, talk to them about the town. You are a doctor?’

So Ned’s suspicions were still alive and well, Mak realised, and the old man had just been manoeuvring him towards this moment.

‘I am and I’m happy to do it, but won’t Neena—’

‘Object? Sure she will. She’ll mutter about people taking over her life but if we didn’t do that occasionally she’d run herself ragged. Here, eat this before you go.’

Mak had been taking little notice of what Ned was doing as he talked, but now a beautiful omelette appeared in front of him, golden brown on the outside and within its fold melting cheese and fine slices of ham and tomato.

He ate, had a quick wash then followed Ned’s instructions to the surgery, where Paula, a bright redhead, guided him through the patients for the morning, every one of whom asked him if he was Neena’s locum for maternity leave and every one of whom had only good things to say about their local doctor.

Could someone so obviously not only respected but loved in this community be the devious woman he suspected she was?

Or was he only questioning his opinion of her because he was attracted to her?

Instantly attracted! This was something that had never happened to him in his entire life and therefore something of which he should be extremely wary—maybe even suspicious. Other experiences had taught him that attraction could make you forget common sense and for many years, as far as women were concerned, common sense had ruled his life.

And would continue to rule it. No matter how wonderful the townspeople thought this woman, he had to judge her for himself, and that would be impossible if he let the attraction get in the way.

He saw the last patient for the morning, had a chat to Paula—another Neena admirer—and headed back to the house. He wanted to go out to the geo-thermal site and speak to Bob Watson, head man out there, having ascertained the previous evening that Bob would be on duty today.

Neena woke to bright sunshine flooding through her window, and stared confusedly around her. She was on her bed, wrapped in her lightweight cotton robe, clean and naked, though she couldn’t remember showering.

Or could she? Memories of Ned chasing her out of the stables, threatening to turn the hose on her if she didn’t go immediately. Somehow she’d made it to her room, stripped, showered—even washed her hair, from the feel of it, still slightly damp—then collapsed on the bed. But when? How long had she been asleep? And what was happening to her house guest? Ned might have turned him out by now.

Which, considering how she kept remembering the feel of his fingers touching hers as he’d taken the calf from her, was probably a good thing.

She’d think about the calf—about Albert!

She smiled and patted Baby Singh, picturing the camel calf’s rubbery lips and curly eyelashes, his huge, soft, doe-like eyes.

‘Such fun to have a pet again,’ she told the baby, then she heaved herself off the bed and began to dress, anxious now to check that all was well in her small world. She hadn’t phoned Brisbane to see how the burns victims were, or visited the hospital—though someone would have phoned if she’d been needed. And—

Her eyes fixed on the small digital clock beside her bed.

She’d missed morning surgery!

She shot out of her bedroom and blasted down the hall to the kitchen door.

‘Ned, why didn’t you wake me? It’s lunchtime. My patients—’

‘Have been seen. I brought back some notes in case you were concerned about any of them.’

Neena stared at the man who’d answered.

Her house guest, far from having been turfed out by Ned, had achieved the honour of being allowed access to the kitchen. In fact, he was sitting at the kitchen table—in her chair—eating lunch and chatting amiably to Ned.

‘You saw my patients?’ she demanded, anger and disbelief holding her motionless in the doorway.

‘It’s what I’m here for after all,’ he said coolly. ‘To gauge your workload, and even after less than twenty-four hours I can see you need another doctor.’

‘So now you know that, maybe you can leave,’ Neena snapped, then realised just how ungracious that sounded. But her kitchen, now she’d entered it, seemed to have shrunk, making the man seem closer than he was, the atmosphere thick and heavy.

‘Not on the strength of one morning’s surgery,’ he said, so cool in the face of her rudeness she wanted to throw something at him. Something hard!

‘Sit down and have your lunch.’ This from Ned, and she knew his voice well enough to know he, too, was angry, but with her.

As well he should be!

‘I’m sorry, that was terrible of me,’ she muttered at Mak from the doorway. ‘Yelling at you when I should be thanking you.’

He nodded a gracious acceptance of her apology, but she suspected he was laughing at her inside for his eyes were twinkling with delight, which made her mad again. But she had to enter the kitchen! For a start, she was starving. But her legs were heavy and stiff with dread because, for only the second time in her life, Neena was feeling physical responses to a man. Well, maybe not the second time—but only once before had they been as strong as this and that once had ended in heartache, pain and trouble.

‘How’s Albert?’ she asked, directing the question at Ned, trying to ignore the other person in the room.

‘Blooming,’ the man she was trying to ignore replied. ‘I’ve just been talking to him. He quite likes the Mozart but would prefer a little rock music from time to time.’

Neena frowned at the light-hearted comment. She didn’t want to like this man—bad enough to be getting physical reactions from him, but liking him?

‘Sit down and eat,’ Ned told her, pulling a plate of cold meat and salad from the refrigerator and putting it down at the other end of the table from Mak, setting cutlery beside it and pouring her a glass of cold water.

So here she was, right opposite Mak Stavrou, where every time she looked up she’d see some bit of him, like how the dark hair on his arms curled around his watch. At least the table was long so she wouldn’t be accidentally bumping his feet or have her knees knocking his…

Although not thinking about him was hard as once again came the memory of the previous night, of the touch of his hands on hers.

Ridiculous, fantasising about a stranger’s touch!

‘Lovely salad, Ned. Are these tomatoes from our garden?’

‘You’ll note she says “our”,’ Ned growled at Mak, ‘though it’s years since she dirtied her hands in the vegetable patch. Reckons looking after the roses is enough for her, not that roses take much looking after out here.’

‘I noticed the rose gardens on my way to the stables,’ Mak replied, smiling at Neena. ‘My mother grows roses but I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a wonderful display.’

‘The dry climate means you don’t get mildew or most of the bugs you get closer to the coast,’ Neena replied, keeping the words crisp and impersonal, the mention of his mother reminding Neena of her doubts about why this man was really here.

Reminding her he could well be the enemy!

An enemy who had helped out this morning, she reminded herself. She asked him about the patients he had seen, and managed to eat most of her lunch while they discussed them.

‘I’m going out to the drilling site this afternoon,’ the man who was disrupting her life announced as he stood up from the table, rinsed his plate and put it in the dishwasher. ‘I need to see some people and explain why I’m here. I want to talk to them about what they see as the impact on the township.’

‘You might as well stay out there, then,’ Neena told him. ‘They’re putting on a Christmas party for the town tonight. Every man and his dog will be there.’

Mak turned towards her and leaned against the kitchen bench.

‘And every woman and her camel?’

Neena had to smile.

‘Maybe not the camel, but as Ned is Father Christmas—yes, I know he’s not a normal size Father Christmas but he does a great ho-ho-ho—we have to go.’

‘Then I shall certainly stay for it,’ Mak said with a smile that made moths flutter in her stomach and caused regret that she’d mentioned it.

He departed soon after and Neena went up to the hospital to check on patients there, then crossed to the retirement home to sit with her old friend Maisie for a while.

But Maisie’s common sense, and their shared remembrances, failed to soothe the turbulence in Neena’s chest. The arrival of the man from Hellenic Enterprises had thrown her into such a muddle she couldn’t begin to think logically about him.

Or why he’d really come!

‘Don’t think too much,’ Maisie said as Neena was leaving, and although Neena hadn’t done more than mention Mak in passing, avoiding any discussion of him, she knew Maisie had picked up on her unhappy state of mind and had guessed he was the cause of it. ‘Sometimes our instincts are our best guide.’




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