Second Chance with Her Island Doc

by Marion Lennox

  They didn’t trust Anna. Why should they?

  They trusted him.

  * * *

  He was hers—and then he wasn’t. She felt the moment he realised, the moment passion turned into something akin to despair. He pulled away and held her at arm’s length, and it was all she could do not to sob.

  ‘Anna, I can’t,’ he said, and his voice was ragged with emotion. She could almost see the war raging within. ‘Not... I can’t.’

  ‘Why not?’ Somehow she made her voice even. Somehow she stopped herself reaching out again.

  But the world was moving in. She thought suddenly, stupidly, that the workers would be arriving at the castle soon. The new hospital wing was on the sea side, and windows were being installed. There’d be workers at those windows, and she and Leo were far enough away from the sheltering castle wall for them to be seen.

  She raised her arms to her chest almost as a gesture of defence. Leo saw and grimaced.

  ‘We need to get back. Are you right to swim?’

  ‘Of course I’m right to swim.’ It was almost a snap. ‘But, Leo, about us...’

  ‘There’s no us.’

  ‘Are you kidding? After this? You want me as much as I want you.’ What was happening? She was so confused.

  But the time for silence was over, she thought. They’d lost ten years. What did she have to lose by breaking the barrier of emptiness?

  ‘Leo, ten years ago you walked away from me.’ She was inordinately proud of how steady her voice sounded. ‘I told myself that it was a teenage romance, nothing more. I moved on. Sort of. But now...the way I feel... The way you feel... Leo, this thing between us, it’s real and it’s strong. Can we continue to ignore it?’

  ‘I think we must.’

  ‘So tell me the reason,’ she said, struggling to keep her voice even. ‘You walked away from me. It seemed then that you betrayed me, you broke a promise, you broke my trust. But ten years later I still want you. More, I still need you.’

  How much pride did she have to lose by saying that? she wondered, but she’d been six months in this place. Six months of knowing there was no other woman in Leo’s life. Six months of knowing how much he loved his country, how strong his reasons had been for walking away.

  ‘Leo, I believe I can trust again,’ she said, and there was a wobble in her voice now that she couldn’t disguise. She was laying so much on the line here. ‘But can you?’

  ‘I never stop trusting.’

  ‘That’s not true and you know it. You classified me as a Castlavaran and trust flew out the window.’

  ‘It’s not you,’ he said, heavily now. ‘But, yes, it’s the Castlavaran thing. How can I go there?’

  ‘You hardly have to go there,’ she said with irony. ‘In case you haven’t noticed, you’re sitting on a rock in the middle of the sea with an almost naked woman right by your side. This is not a large rock. Go there? I believe you’re already there.’

  ‘I shouldn’t be.’

  ‘So tell me why not? You don’t love me?’

  ‘Love’s got nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Really?’ Anger was rising now. She was baring everything, her body and now her thoughts, laying everything on the line. But the look on his face... He was about to say no?

  And here it came.

  ‘Anna, do you know what you’re asking of me?’

  ‘What? It seems to me that I’m giving.’

  ‘You are,’ he said heavily. ‘But that’s part of the problem. Anna, we’re poles apart and you need to accept that, because it’s reality. I’m the son of an impoverished widow, and my father died because of the power imbalance, the money imbalance on this island. I’ve seen what power can do, and so have each and every one of these islanders.’

  ‘It can change. It has changed and you know it.’ The knot of anger, of resentment was growing stronger. She’d exposed herself so much, and here he was still classifying her. Just another Castlavaran. Just another power wielder.

  ‘You need to think this through,’ he said, urgently now. ‘Let me paint the whole picture.’

  ‘You need to.’ She was shivering, despite the growing warmth of the sun. Rejection was all around her.

  But Leo’s face was resolute. Implacable. She thought suddenly of the expression she’d seen on his face all those years ago and she thought, Nothing’s changed.

  ‘Anna, what would the islanders think if we married?’ He closed his eyes for a moment as if reinforcing his own thoughts, and when he opened them again she saw resolution in spades. ‘They’re cautiously optimistic about what you’re doing now. Of course they are, but what you expect of them is trust and you can’t buy that with six months of building. It takes generations to build it. And, Anna, they trust me.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t they?’

  ‘There’s any number of reasons they wouldn’t. Anna, they allow me to vaccinate their children, and if you knew how long it took me to get them to agree... There’s little internet access on the island—there’s no infrastructure and no one can afford satellites. Poverty breeds superstition and fear. Carla hasn’t been able to persuade them in all her years of practising medicine. You know why? Because the sister of her great-aunt by marriage was your grandfather’s wife. That’s how she got the money to pay for her medical training. She came back here and the islanders were grateful for her skills but they still didn’t trust her. She could treat the worst of cases but she couldn’t change things.’

  It was her time to close her eyes then. She felt so bleak she was almost ill.

  ‘So I’m a Castlavaran and I’m tainted.’

  ‘By association, yes. No matter what I want... Anna, I can’t risk it. I can’t risk what I’ve built.’

  ‘So after ten years nothing has changed.’

  ‘It can’t.’ There was despair in his voice but she couldn’t listen to his despair. It was nothing, she thought, compared to how she was feeling. Exposed. Betrayed. Helpless. All from a finger of fate she’d had nothing to do with.

  ‘So that’s that, then,’ she said bleakly. ‘We all live ever after, but happily doesn’t come into it.’

  ‘Anna, maybe you could—’

  ‘Don’t you dare,’ she hissed, cutting over whatever he’d been about to say. There was nothing that could make this better. ‘Don’t even think about making suggestions as to what I could do or not do with my life. It has nothing to do with you. I’ll get on with making this castle the best hospital I possibly can. I’ll put every ounce of energy into making this island more liveable, making up as much as I can for the greed and selfishness of people I don’t even consider my ancestors.

  ‘But it seems I’m not allowed to love you. So I can’t listen to what you think I should do personally. You butted out of my life ten years ago and obviously that decision sticks. Okay, I accept it. I’ve humiliated myself enough. From now on, you’re my professional colleague and nothing more. So if you’ll excuse me I need to get back to shore and get some clothes on. You set your barriers in place ten years ago and it’s time I set mine up, just as rigidly.’

  There was nothing left to say. She could feel tears slipping helplessly down her face.

  He raised a hand as if to wipe them away, and she slapped it away.

  ‘Don’t touch me,’ she managed. ‘Not now and not ever.’

  And she turned and dived into the water. She swam back to shore, hard and fast.

  Sobbing underwater was hard, but she managed it.

  She had the rest of her life to manage everything else.

  * * *

  Ten years ago Leo Aretino had walked away from the woman he loved because of loyalty to his country. He’d thought then that nothing could hurt more.

  He’d been wrong. He sat and watched her swim away and the pain he felt was bone deep.

  Ten years ago he’d argued t
hat his cause was noble. He’d thought separation would cause Anna pain but she’d get over it. She’d been young, beautiful, talented. Her life was in England. Walking away from her had felt like he was cutting away a part of himself, but he’d been young, he’d been optimistic and he’d been sure that Anna’s pain on rejection would be fleeting.

  Now, watching her swim away, having her words replay over and over in his head, that surety was gone.

  He’d hurt her as badly as he’d hurt himself and that pain was ongoing.

  So swim after her. Gather her into his arms. Be damned to the consequences, you love her.

  But marriage to a Castlavaran...

  The impossibility was still there.

  Things were changing, he thought. Anna was building a medical service that could finally equal that of its neighbouring countries. She was building not only a hospital but also apartments luxurious enough to attract medical staff. The castle would be transformed into a hospital that the islanders trusted and used.

  But he had no doubt that tonight the boats had brought the injured to the castle because of him. Trust in him had allowed burned men to be brought into a medical centre that seemed almost foreign. More. Foreign didn’t begin to describe the islanders’ distrust of all things Castlavaran.

  If he was seen to align himself with Anna... If he was to become part of the Castlavaran family...

  Maybe it could work. Given time.

  But if it didn’t... If the islanders didn’t accept assurances...

  He thought of the fledgling vaccination programme that he’d worked so hard to get off the ground. He thought of the home rehab programmes he’d set up for so many people. He thought of diet charts, diabetic schedules, exercise regimes. He thought of child and adolescent health programmes he’d instigated. They all sounded simple, sensible, but for an island cut off by poverty for so long, they were huge.

  They existed because he was seen as one of them. He was an islander the people themselves had sent away to train. He knew he was trusted.

  He wasn’t a Castlavaran.

  Anna had reached the beach now. He saw her grab her clothes, slip a T-shirt over her head and start to make her way up the ancient steps, to disappear into the castle. To her fantastical apartments.

  To where she belonged. To where fate had decreed she stay.

  Whereas he belonged elsewhere. Not in her castle. Not even on this rock, or on this beach, which had been controlled for so long by a family who ruled by greed.

  The weariness and grief he felt was making him feel ill, but part of that—a huge part—was grief for Anna. This morning he’d seen just how much he’d hurt her, but there was no escaping that hurt.

  He was an Aretino, an islander. Anna was a Castlavaran. The middle ground was this magnificent new medical centre. Maybe it would work, because of Anna’s generosity and because of the trust the islanders had in him and his staff, but that middle ground had to stay purely medical. The risks of muddying it were far, far too great.

  Anna was gone. The castle loomed grey and forbidding and Anna was inside.

  He had work to do. He needed to check on his mother. He had house-calls to make. He had a clinic to run.

  Life went on. It had to.

  And the love between two people? Like Romeo and Juliet, he thought suddenly, and found himself choking on a bitter laugh. Yeah, those two had sorted it well.

  He’d always thought the story was ridiculous. Dying for a teenaged love? How stupid. They’d been kids. Given parental approval, given permission to see each other whenever they wanted, would they have been doing anything in their old age besides remembering with vague fondness—or even a bit of embarrassment—their first delicious romance?

  Now he wasn’t so sure—but he was sure that Romeo and Juliet had only thought of themselves and their grief. If Romeo had had the same level of duty and care as he did, could the Shakespearean ending have been the same?

  That was crazy thinking, but at its heart he knew there was a germ of truth.

  Given thought, care, the faith and dependence of his people, surely Romeo would have walked away.

  Like Leo, he’d have had no choice.

  CHAPTER TEN

  THE CELEBRATION TWO weeks later, ostensibly to open the Castle Castlavaran Medical Centre, was definitely premature. The castle wasn’t nearly ready but if Anna was to provide for the injured fishermen then the celebration had to be now.

  ‘It’s the opening of my special project,’ she’d told the trustees in what was beginning to be a ritual contact rather than serious negotiation. ‘You’ve let me build my hospital because I can’t be happy practising my medicine without facilities to match. Now that the first section is open for emergency use, I need a party to celebrate.’

  So the Deed of Trust, written so long ago, was invoked yet again. ‘Funds shall be used for the pleasure of the present incumbent.’

  Now, on the Saturday of what was to be a weekend of celebration, what she should be feeling was pleasure. She wasn’t. Her morning’s swim with Leo had pretty much destroyed her hard-won equilibrium, and she was back to being that dumb nineteen-year-old, in love all over again.

  Which was dumb. What had changed? She still had her gorgeous apartments. She had her doofus dogs. She had her glorious beach. She had a project that took every waking hour, and she had an island home that’d make most millionaires swoon with envy.

  She’d also had so little sleep she was running on empty and she was...desolate. That one kiss had thrown her straight back to feeling as if wedding vows had been broken.

  But she couldn’t think of that today. As the islanders streamed into the castle on this bright May Saturday, Anna walked slowly through the grounds, trying to see it through fresh eyes.

  For the last couple of weeks she’d thrown everything into setting this place up so the islanders could see it as it would be. The plan was the Open Castle today followed by speeches and a feast, then a blessing by the local priest on Sunday morning. The whole weekend was designed to draw the locals in, make them see what she was doing—engender trust?

  So now she did her own wandering through, trying to see it as the islanders were seeing it.

  Outside areas first. The castle courtyard was to be separated into two. Right now it was filled with marquees, stalls providing food and drink, with hoopla stalls and fortune tellers—‘Because an island party’s not a party without them,’ she’d told the trustees. But eventually—soon—it would be transformed, with an ambulance bay and reception area on one side, and a walled garden for ambulant patients on the other.

  There were eventual plans to incorporate a visitors’ precinct, art centre, tourist hub, formal tours of the underground labyrinth, history tours. For the hospital itself... She wanted a swimming pool, a rehabilitation centre to make major city hospitals weep in envy. Huge posters showed visitors her vision.

  And now... The islanders certainly seemed happy—maybe they were—but everywhere she went, the moment she was seen, the noise level dropped to wary. She was greeted with politeness, with gratitude for what she was doing—but with distance.

  She made her way up to the battlements, to the area that was to be converted to a massive patient lounge. This would be able to be cleared fast, at need, to be used as a helipad for patient evacuation, but there’d be covered areas with lounges, everything necessary for recovering patients to enjoy the sun and a view that up until now only Castlavarans had had the right to see.

  There were more islanders here, showing huge interest as they inspected more posters showing plans. But there was still caution as Anna approached. She could still see distrust. What she gave, couldn’t she take away?

  She left the battlements and made her way down through what was still a rabbit warren of unused rooms, but with more posters showing them as individually designed wards, scrubbed, painted, hung with colourful curtai
ns, with patchwork coverlets on the beds. Every detail had been meticulously thought out. There’d be work here for every islander who could sew. Yes, plain would be easier and even more hygienic, but this way there’d be wages coming into families who’d never seen such largesse.

  ‘Pretty makes me happy,’ she’d told the trustees, and, bemused, they’d simply signed off.

  It did make her happy. Sort of. People were thanking her—awkwardly—but then turning back to their friends. To people they knew and trusted.

  She walked into the last ward, the kids’ ward. This had been a fun project and she’d started it early, so it didn’t need posters to show what she intended. What had been the castle ballroom was now set up with cubicles, where removal of screens meant each child could become part of a communal recovery area.

  She’d brought in occupational therapists to advise. The play area was designed for subtle rehabilitation, but it was fun and fantastical. It made her happy to see it.

  But now she walked into the room and the customary silence fell. A group of locals admiring posters showing proposed play equipment parted to let her through.

  Leo was at its centre.

  Of course he was at its centre. He was part of this cautious, distrustful crowd. Part of the island.

  During every step this last six months he’d talked to the islanders, told them what was happening, helped them to accept that there was no hidden agenda, no trap.

  The islanders trusted him. If this was a democracy he’d be their elected president, she thought.

  And Anna? She’d be the Crown. A figurehead, to be accorded respect but not friendship. There was far too much history for a Castlavaran to be a friend.

  There was too much history between herself and Leo.

  ‘Dr Raymond.’ He greeted her with a smile, though the smile didn’t reach his eyes. ‘This is wonderful.’

  ‘I know,’ she said, and gave him the same forced smile back. ‘We should all be proud of what we’ve achieved.’

  ‘You’ve achieved,’ he said, raising his voice so all the islanders could hear. ‘You’re giving us generosity without price. And what you’re doing for our injured fishermen... Believe me, we’re grateful.’