‘Straight on for about ten miles then we’ll need to turn off the main road and head into hills,’ she told him, checking the map.
‘That’s when the fun really starts, is it?’ he asked with a laugh as he picked up speed again.
‘It will be fine.’
‘Spoken like someone who’s used to tearing around the back of beyond. Jim told me that you’ve done several stints overseas in the last couple of years. How did you get into that sort of work?’
‘Richard suggested it. He worked for an aid agency when he was a junior registrar and said it was invaluable experience.’
‘Richard?’
‘Richard Walker, my boss,’ she explained.
‘You obviously get on well with him,’ he observed, and she frowned when she heard the edge in his voice.
She had the impression that something had displeased him, but had no idea what it could be.
‘Yes, I do,’ she said a shade defensively. ‘All the team think very highly of him, in fact.’
‘I see.’ He changed gear then glanced at her and there was no sign of anything other than friendly interest on his face. ‘Working overseas must be challenging, I imagine.’
‘Sometimes.’ She shrugged. ‘It all depends where you’re working. If you’re based at a clinic, like the one I’ve just worked in, then it tends to be easier. The facilities are better, and there’s usually more staff to help out than if you’re working at a field hospital.’
‘And do you enjoy surgery as much as you thought you would?’
Emma frowned. She had the strangest feeling that her answer was important to him and couldn’t understand why. Why should it matter to Daniel if she was happy or not? He certainly hadn’t cared about her happiness five years ago, had he?
The thought pierced a hole right through the protective shell she had built around her heart. It was an effort to respond when it felt as though it was in danger of cracking wide open. It was only pride that gave her the strength to carry on, pride plus a desire not to let him know how badly he had hurt her.
‘Yes, I do. It’s everything I hoped it would be.’ She laughed wryly. ‘I suppose I should thank you, Daniel. If you hadn’t been so committed to your own career, I might have turned down the chance to become a surgeon and that would have been a huge mistake. I don’t doubt that in time I would have come to regret my decision.’
CHAPTER FOUR
DANIEL drew up in front of the farmhouse and switched off the engine. Emma hadn’t faltered as she had directed him along a series of increasingly narrow tracks. He knew that he would have had a much harder time finding the farm without her help but, contrarily, wished that she had stayed at home. At least then he wouldn’t have to face up to the realisation that he had been right all along. Their relationship would never have survived if she had given up her dreams to be with him.
‘I’ll let Harry know that we’re here.’ She got out of the car and ran over to the house. The door was open and she didn’t waste time knocking before she hurried inside.
Daniel got out and took his case out of the back. He also lifted out the pack of medical supplies that Jim kept ready for just such an emergency as this. There was no sign of Emma when he let himself into the house but he could hear voices coming from upstairs so headed in that direction and soon found himself in the main bedroom. A fair-haired man in his thirties, whom he assumed must be Harry Groves, was holding the hand of the woman lying on the bed. She was very pale and obviously in a great deal of pain. Emma was in the process of checking her pulse so Daniel left her to deal with that while he introduced himself.
‘I’m Daniel Kennedy. I’m covering for Dr Haynes while he’s in hospital.’
‘So Emma said,’ Harry replied. He looked anxiously at the door. ‘Did you pass the ambulance on your way here?’
‘No, but it may have taken a different route from us.’ Daniel smiled reassuringly at the couple. ‘Can you tell me exactly what’s happened?’
‘I started having pains after tea but thought it was because of the way the baby was lying,’ Sarah Groves explained. ‘I lay down on the settee for a while and that seemed to help, but then the pains started again, worse than ever. That’s when I discovered I was bleeding. I told Harry to phone the midwife, but she was out at another call so he phoned for an ambulance.’ Her voice shook. ‘When they said it would take over an hour for it to get here, he rang the surgery.’
‘You did exactly the right thing,’ Daniel said soothingly. He glanced at Emma, hoping his feelings didn’t show. Maybe it was foolish to feel upset but he couldn’t help it. In a tiny corner of his heart, he had nurtured the hope that their love could have overcome any obstacle. Even though he hadn’t been prepared to take that risk, it had been something to cling to, but now he could see how stupid it had been. His relationship with Emma would have ended the same way as his parents’ had done if they had stayed together.
‘We need to know how much longer the ambulance is going to be,’ he said with a heavy heart.
‘I’ll get onto Ambulance Control and see if they can give us an update,’ Emma offered immediately.
She left the bedroom and Daniel turned his attention to Sarah again, relieved to have something to focus on apart from his aching heart. ‘Has the bleeding stopped now?’
Sarah shook her head, her pretty face clouded with worry. ‘No. In fact, I think it’s got worse in the last ten minutes or so.’
‘I’ll just take a look, if that’s all right with you.’
Daniel drew back the bedding, struggling to hide his dismay when he saw the bright red pool that had collected on the sheets. He fetched the foetal stethoscope from the pack of emergency medical supplies and listened to the baby’s heartbeat. It was slightly slower than it should have been but not worryingly so, which was a relief. He had just finished when Emma came back and he could tell immediately that it wasn’t good news when she beckoned him over to the door.
‘What’s happened?’ he demanded.
‘Apparently, the ambulance has had a puncture. They’re waiting for the breakdown truck, so Ambulance Control has dispatched a second vehicle.’
Daniel rolled his eyes. ‘Which means we’re starting from scratch. It could be another hour before an ambulance gets here.’
‘It looks like it.’ Emma looked at Sarah. ‘How is she?’
‘She’s lost a lot of blood. I’m going to set up a drip, which should help, but I’m not happy with the way things are going.’
‘How about the baby?’
‘Foetal heartbeat is slightly slower than I would like it to be. We’ll need to keep a close check on what’s happening.’
‘It looks like a placental abruption, doesn’t it?’
‘Yes, that’s my guess too. At least part of the placenta has become detached from the wall of the uterus.’ He sighed. ‘If we were able to perform an ultrasound scan then we could tell how bad the abruption is, but at the moment we’re batting in the dark.’
‘What’s going on, Doctor? I may not have seen a human baby being born before but I’ve delivered umpteen lambs and I know this isn’t normal.’
Daniel turned when Harry came to join them. The farmer was obviously worried and Daniel led him out onto the landing. The last thing he wanted was to upset Sarah any more. ‘The bleeding could be a sign that the placenta has become partially detached from the wall of the uterus.’
‘But why?’ Harry demanded. ‘Sarah’s been fit as a fiddle up to now, so why on earth should this have happened right out of the blue?’
‘It’s impossible to say. These things just happen sometimes and there’s no explanation as to why.’
Daniel glanced back into the room. Emma was bending over the bed while she inserted a cannula into the back of Sarah’s hand. Her face was set with concentration, even though she must have performed the procedure many times before. Daniel felt a wave of emotion wash over him as he watched her. He might regret having to let her go but he knew that he would do the
same thing all over again. He simply couldn’t bear it if Emma ended up hating him for ruining her life.
Emma could feel Daniel watching her but she didn’t look up. She felt too emotionally raw to take that risk. Had Daniel ever regretted breaking up with her? she wondered as she taped the cannula into place. Had he ever missed her? Even though she knew how stupid it was, she couldn’t help wishing that he’d felt something.
Sarah moaned softly, clutching her stomach, and Emma quickly returned her thoughts to what was going on. ‘Are the pains coming at regular intervals?’ she asked, placing her own hand on the woman’s distended abdomen.
‘I don’t know … they seem to be coming closer together,’ Sarah murmured.
Emma kept her hand on Sarah’s abdomen and felt it tense as her uterus contracted. There was no doubt in her mind that Sarah was in labour. She reached for the foetal stethoscope and checked the baby’s heartbeat, frowning when she discovered how slow it was. It was a sign that the baby was in distress and that they needed to take immediate steps to help it. She beckoned Daniel over to the bed.
‘The baby’s heartbeat has dropped. We need to deliver it as soon as possible.’
‘A Caesarean section, you mean?’
‘Yes. I know it’s not ideal to do it here, but we don’t have a choice,’ she said, hoping he wouldn’t disagree with her. ‘Even if the ambulance arrives in the next few minutes, it will take at least another hour to get Sarah to hospital. That’s way too long in my opinion.’
‘You’re right, we can’t afford to wait that long.’ His dark brows rose. ‘It’s been ages since I did my obstetrics rotation. I assisted with a couple of sections then but I’ve not done any since. How about you?’
‘I did one a couple of weeks ago,’ Emma told him.
‘Great! You lead and I’ll assist.’
It was all arranged with the minimum of fuss. Although it made sense for her to take the lead in view of her surgical background, Emma was a little surprised that Daniel had suggested it. It certainly didn’t gel with the idea of him wanting to cover himself with glory, did it?
There was no time to dwell on the thought, however. Emma unpacked the emergency medical supplies while Daniel explained what they were going to do. Sarah and Harry were naturally concerned, but once Daniel had told them that their baby was in distress, they agreed to go ahead. In a very short time, everything was organised.
Emma draped the bed with clean sheets while Daniel attended to the anaesthetic. Harry showed her where the bathroom was so she could scrub up. Daniel did the same and then they helped each other glove up. Harry had elected to stay with his wife so once Emma had swabbed Sarah’s abdomen with antiseptic solution, she set to work, knowing there was no time to lose.
Daniel handed her a scalpel, standing back as she made a horizontal incision just above the bikini line.
Any qualms she may have had about carrying out the procedure soon disappeared as she focused on what needed doing. Within a very short time she was able to lift the baby out of Sarah’s womb and hand it to Daniel, who wrapped it in a clean towel and carried it over to the chest of drawers that was doubling as an examination table. There was a moment when they all held their breath and then the baby cried, a tentative sound at first that soon grew louder.
‘Congratulations!’ Emma smiled at the couple. ‘You have a lovely little boy.’
‘A boy?’ Harry repeated. He appeared completely shocked after what had happened and stared at her in confusion. ‘We decided that we’d wait until the baby was born to find out what it was, but we were convinced we were having a little girl. Are you sure it’s a boy?’
‘Oh, yes, there’s definitely no mistake about that. He’s got all the necessary bits and pieces,’ Emma replied with a laugh. She delivered the placenta and checked that there were no bits missing from it then set about stitching up the wound. Daniel brought the baby over to the bed while she was doing so.
‘So who gets first go at holding him?’ he asked.
‘Sarah,’ Harry said promptly. He bent and kissed his wife tenderly on the cheek. ‘If it wasn’t for Sarah, we wouldn’t have this little fellow.’
Daniel placed the tiny mite in his mother’s arms, smiling as he watched Sarah pull back the folds of towel to perform the age-old ritual of counting his fingers and toes. Emma looked away when she felt a lump come to her throat. Once upon a time she had imagined just such a scene, only the baby whose toes were being counted had been hers and Daniel’s. That was how much she had loved him, enough to want to give him a child.
Tears stung her eyes as she busied herself, stitching up. Even though she was over him, it still hurt to recall how much she had once loved him. She had wanted the whole lot with Daniel—marriage, motherhood, years and years of happily-ever-after as a family.
Would she ever have a family now? she wondered suddenly. Ever experience the joy of holding her own child in her arms?
She tried to picture it but it was impossible to imagine a life not dictated by her work. It made her question if she was right to devote every waking minute to her job, and it was worrying to be beset by doubts. For the past five years her work had been what had kept her centred, what had given meaning to her life, but all of a sudden she found herself wanting more, a life that wasn’t shaped by the demands of her profession, and it was unsettling. However, the worst thing of all was that it was being around Daniel that had triggered such thoughts.
It was an effort to push it to the back of her mind as she finished off. She made Sarah comfortable and then Daniel helped her clear everything away. By the time they’d finished, the ambulance was pulling up outside. Sarah was reluctant to leave the house at first until Emma gently explained that she and baby Thomas needed to be checked over in the hospital’s maternity unit. Although little Thomas appeared to be fit and healthy, technically he was premature, and Sarah herself had lost a lot of blood: it would be foolish to take any risks at this stage.
She and Daniel waited while the family were loaded on board the ambulance then they got into the car and followed it back to the main road. It roared away, taking the opposite direction from where they were heading.
‘All in all, I’d say that was a good night’s work, wouldn’t you?’
Daniel’s voice echoed with satisfaction and nothing else. If he’d experienced even a fraction of the anguish she had felt earlier then it certainly wasn’t apparent, Emma thought sickly as she murmured her agreement. Maybe they had never discussed having children but in her mind the two were linked—when you loved someone, you wanted to have a child with them. It proved beyond any doubt that Daniel’s feelings for her hadn’t been what he had claimed. Although she should have felt glad that she was rid of him, oddly enough it hurt to have yet more proof of the way he had lied to her.
Daniel knew that he would remember that night for a long time to come. Seeing little Thomas make his appearance in the world had touched him in a way he had not expected it to. All he’d been able to think about was how wonderful it would have been if he’d been watching his own child—his and Emma’s son—being born.
He glanced at her as they reached the outskirts of the town but she wasn’t looking at him. Her eyes were closed, although he didn’t think she was asleep. Had she been moved by tonight’s events, wondered how it would have been if it had been their child? He doubted it. Emma had made her feelings perfectly clear when she had told him that she was glad they had parted. She certainly wasn’t wasting her time by thinking about what might have been!
A feeling of dejection swept over him as he drew up in front of the house. He’d known it would be difficult to see Emma again when he had agreed to run the practice, but he had never imagined that he would feel this wretched. The only way he could hope to get through the coming weeks was to forget what had happened in the past and focus on what was happening at the present moment. And the one thing that was crystal clear was that Emma had moved on.
Daniel followed her into the house and h
eaded straight for the kitchen to make himself a cup of tea in the probably vain hope that it would give him a much-needed boost. He hadn’t expected Emma to join him and looked round in surprise when he heard her follow him into the room. ‘Would you like a drink as well?’
‘Please. I don’t know if it’s the excitement of what happened tonight or the fact that all that travelling has upset my body clock, but I’m too wide awake to sleep.’ She tossed her coat over a chair and went to the cupboard. ‘I wonder if there’s any hot chocolate. Ah, yes, there it is.’
She stood on tiptoe to try and reach the jar of drinking chocolate but it was just out of her grasp. Daniel crossed the room and lifted it down off the shelf. ‘Here you go, shorty,’ he said without thinking.
‘I’m not short, just tidily packaged,’ she retorted, as she’d done so many times when he had teased her about her height.
Daniel felt the blood rush to his head. He remembered only too well what came next, how he would apologise for the supposed slight with a kiss. His eyes flew to Emma’s face and his blood pressure zoomed several more notches up the scale when he saw that she too remembered what had used to happen. Whether it was that or the fact that his emotions were already in turmoil he didn’t know but all of a sudden he found himself bending towards her until he was close enough to feel the moistness of her breath cloud on his lips.
‘Emma.’
He wasn’t sure if he actually spoke her name out loud or not. He was beyond hearing by that point, beyond everything including reason. What did it matter if he had just resolved to forget about the past? It wasn’t a sin if he changed his mind, was it? All he wanted was to feel her lips under his once more, taste their sweetness, savour their warmth and softness. One kiss was all he asked for, just one kiss to stave off the pain that was gnawing away at his heart. Surely it wasn’t wrong to allow himself this one brief moment of pleasure?
His head dipped until merely a millimetre separated them. Daniel could feel the heat of her skin now, smell the scent of the soap she’d used. Memories crowded his mind but he no longer needed to recall the past when he had a chance to create a whole new delicious present.
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