by Karin Baine
‘I don’t want to pressure you into anything you’re not ready for. Perhaps we could rent a place together and see how it goes. I’m working in the emergency department at the local hospital. Maybe you could get a job there too or we could set up a medical practice of our own. If things work out, who knows where it could lead?’
‘You might propose again?’
‘If you’re lucky.’
‘I have some money from the sale of the house that could keep us going for a while too.’
‘That’s sorted, then. We’re moving in together.’
They’d discussed the practicalities of her moving to Italy and raising their baby but she wanted more.
‘It’s not very romantic, is it?’
‘Last time I tried to be romantic you called me ridiculous and left the country.’
‘True, but I’ve had plenty of time to think since then.’
‘And if I told you I still wanted to spend the rest of my life with you?’
Sophie screwed up her nose. ‘I’m a bit wary of the whole insta-love thing. I think great sex clouds judgement on that score.’
‘What if I said I think I could fall in love with you and could see us growing old together?’
‘Better. I think I could fall in love with you too.’ Who was she kidding? She knew she would. It was only a matter of time since she was halfway there already. Even then it was only her wounded heart preventing her from going all in.
He kissed her again, reigniting the passion she’d only experienced once in her life before. It seemed more intense this time as they expressed their feelings towards one another.
Moving all the way to Italy, pregnant, to be with a man she’d only known for a brief time might seem risky to some, but it was exactly the sort of thing the old Sophie would have done. And that made her so very happy.
EPILOGUE
One year later
‘SEI PROPRIA BELLA, CARA.’
‘I thought it was bad luck to see the bride before the wedding?’ Sophie spun around as Luciano entered the room.
‘Since when did we stick to the rules?’ He closed the distance between them quickly, took her hand and spun her round to get a full look at her wedding dress. ‘You look beautiful.’
‘You don’t look so bad yourself.’ Her heart continued to do that pitter-patter thing every time he came into a room but he looked so handsome in his tuxedo it went into overdrive.
Even though they’d opted for a low-key ceremony in the grounds of his parents’ villa, they’d gone for traditional wedding attire. She’d had fun wedding-dress shopping with his sisters in some of the classiest Italian boutiques they could find. In the end, she’d fallen in love with the simple ivory silk gown she was wearing now. It had Luciano’s approval too as he pulled her close and nuzzled into the flowers in her hair.
‘You know we could skip the ceremony and go straight to the honeymoon,’ he whispered, doing that thing that buckled her knees, almost convincing her to lock the bedroom door on the rest of the world.
‘As tempting as that sounds, I don’t think our families would approve of us abandoning them. Apart from which, I thought we were honeymooning at home?’ She’d been looking forward to a few days together without him having to go to work.
Despite all her worries, the time they’d spent together during her pregnancy had only served to strengthen their bond. More importantly, they’d gotten to know each other properly, their feelings growing as a result. They’d rented an apartment for a few months after Sophie had moved to Italy but with the impending birth of their baby and the growing certainty that they wanted to be together, they’d purchased their own little haven in the country.
With the arrival of baby Alessandro, she’d thought she couldn’t be happier, until Luciano had proposed to her again. This time he’d got the proposal exactly right when she knew this was the only place she wanted to be, with her two favourite people in the world. For now he was working hard at the local emergency department and, despite her reservations, she was actually enjoying being a stay-at-home mum, though they had big plans for the future, setting up their own practice for the locals.
Today, getting married, with her mum and son in attendance, was the icing on the wedding cake.
‘You haven’t travelled in a year. I couldn’t have you getting itchy feet.’ He produced two tickets from his jacket pocket.
‘It’s not a cruise, is it?’ She didn’t really care where they were going as she hoped not to be leaving their bed for most of the trip, though as much as she loved their son, he had a habit of interrupting their nocturnal activities.
‘Ugh. No. I’ll never regret meeting you on board the ship, but I have had enough of those. I got us two first-class flights to the Seychelles instead.’
‘What? Are you serious?’
‘Sì. Just you, me and cocktails on the beach.’
‘Sounds like paradise. Wait, what about Alessandro?’ They couldn’t just take off whenever they pleased when they had a baby who took priority over everything.
‘Don’t worry. You know my parents are dying to babysit and I’m dying to get you alone.’
The idea of spending quality time, preferably naked, with her new husband gave her the same thrill as the first night they’d succumbed to temptation.
‘What are we waiting for, then? Let’s go and get married.’ She tucked the tickets safely back into his pocket and hooked her arm through his.
She couldn’t wait to say her vows. Luciano was the only man she wanted to share her life and her dreams with. This time she knew it would be for ever.
* * *
If you enjoyed this story, check out these other great reads from Karin Baine
Reunion with His Surgeon Princess
Healed by Their Unexpected Family
Their One-Night Christmas Gift
Their One-Night Twin Surprise
All available now!
Keep reading for an excerpt from Falling Again in El Salvador by Julie Danvers.
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Falling Again in El Salvador
by Julie Danvers
CHAPTER ONE
CASSIE ANDOVER HAD been waiting at the Miraflores bus stop for almost two hours before she decided that her ride was not going to show up.
She was on the last leg of an increasingly arduous journey. After a tearful goodbye to her parents at the airport in Manhattan, she’d rushed to make her flight to El Salvador, only to learn that it had been delayed. By the time she arrived in the capital city of San Salvador, she’d missed the first bus to Miraflores, and the second was so crowded that the driver wouldn’t allow her to bring her overstuffed hiking backpack on board. The third bus had been blessedly empty, and she’d dozed off for most of the ride, only waking when the bus jerked to a halt.
Now, as she felt the sudden jolt of the bus stopping, she blinked her sleepy eyes open. The bus window revealed a landscape of lush green coffee fields over rolling hills. In the distance, she could see mountains wreathed with blue haze...and nothing else. No buildings, no sign of a town and no other people.
The driver swung the bus door open and waited. When Cassie made no motion to move, he said, “Miraflores,” expectantly.
“But that can’t be,” Cassie said. Six months ago, when she’d accepted her new job as an obstetrician with Medicine International, she’d started intensive refresher courses to improve her Spanish. Her preparation served her well now as she argued with the bus driver that this could not possibly be Miraflores.
“Miraflores is supposed to be a small town,” she said. “There’s no town here. There’
s nothing. There’s barely even a road.”
“Miraflores is a small town,” the driver replied. “But this is the bus stop for Miraflores. You want to go to Miraflores itself, you’ll need to walk two miles east or find a ride.”
Cassie looked at the patch of grass the driver had referred to as a bus stop. There was a knee-high concrete stump that seemed to be a road marker, but otherwise the dirt road that stretched into the distance appeared no different than it had for the past fifty miles.
“You’re sure this is the right bus stop?” she asked again. “If someone said they would meet me at the Miraflores bus stop, then this would be the place?”
“It’s the only Miraflores bus stop that I know about,” the driver said. “You’re welcome to stay on board, but I won’t be stopping again until we get to San Alejo.”
Cassie glanced at her phone. No bars. She might be able to make a call from San Alejo, but that would mean several more hours on the bus, and after a full day of traveling, she needed a rest. Even if that meant sitting by the side of an unknown road in the middle of nowhere.
She wrestled her giant backpack off the bus and settled down to wait as the driver left in a cloud of dust.
The sky was clear, and the air was still and quiet, punctuated by occasional notes of birdsong. The road ran along a hill, which deepened into a valley below, revealing coffee fields that stretched all the way to the mountains on the horizon. To the right of the road, tall ferns quickly thickened into a deep tropical forest.
Aside from the neat green rows of the coffee fields, Cassie could see no other signs of civilization. She was completely, utterly alone.
Well, almost alone. A single chicken emerged from the thick jungle foliage, pecking its way through the grass at the roadside.
You wanted to get away from New York, Cassie reminded herself. You wanted to reconnect with what really mattered to you. Now that it’s just you and the chickens, maybe you’ll get your chance.
Cassie had come to El Salvador in desperate need of a change. Being known as the best ob-gyn in New York City came at a price, and years of meeting the demands of New York’s society mothers had left Cassie feeling burned-out and disillusioned with medicine.
She’d never imagined that delivering babies could lead to burnout. Cassie had been born with a congenital heart defect, and it meant the world to her to be able to provide infants and mothers with the care they needed, just as Cassie and her family had needed extra care when she was born. But as Cassie’s reputation as an obstetrician had grown, her career had taken an unexpected turn, and she found herself increasingly in demand with New York’s wealthiest and most well-known families. When she’d started her job, it wasn’t unusual for patients to make special requests for mood music and underwater births, but it had become increasingly common for mothers to welcome their infants into the world with live string quartets, and the pools for the underwater births were filled with expensive water filtered through volcanic rock. Cassie’s clientele wanted designer maternity care, and the mothers she worked with were not shy about voicing their displeasure when their demands couldn’t be met.
“I feel like I don’t know who I am anymore,” she’d told her best friend, Vanessa, a fellow obstetrician. “All I do is run myself ragged while my patients complain that the walnuts in their macrobiotic salad are unevenly chopped, or that the lactation consultant can’t figure out their custom-fitted Louis Vuitton breast pump.”
“That’s what you get for being the best,” Vanessa had replied. “When you’re providing maternity care for the wealthy, they think they can have anything as long as they can pay for it. Last week I had a senator’s wife yell at me for thirty minutes because I refused to give her baby his first bath using San Pellegrino sparkling water—she got the idea from that pop star who had twins a few months ago. She said I’d be hearing from her if her kid didn’t get into Collegiate.”
Cassie shook her head. “I always thought that by the time I turned thirty, I’d have a relationship I cared about and a career that meant something to me. But now I wonder if I’m even supposed to be a doctor.”
“Maybe you just need a change,” Vanessa had proposed. “We get so much pressure from hospital administration to cater to the whims of wealthier patients. Instead of focusing on medicine, we’re forced to meet the demands of parents who are acting like babies themselves. That’s why you don’t feel like yourself anymore—you’re not connecting with what really matters to you about medicine. Maybe you just need to work in a different setting.”
Vanessa’s words had haunted Cassie for weeks. She had to admit that her heart leaped at the idea of leaving Brooklyn General Hospital for something...more. The trouble was, she wasn’t sure what something more might be. She had a steady, secure job at a hospital with the best obstetrics department in the city. If this wasn’t the right setting for her, then what was?
Her job at Brooklyn General was safe and dependable. It made no sense to leave. And she might have stayed there forever, if she hadn’t been offered the promotion.
They’d asked her to be the head of Brooklyn General’s Obstetrics Department. But just before she agreed, a vision of the next ten years flashed before Cassie’s eyes. Longer shifts at the hospital, with fewer days off. Endless deliveries of babies born with a higher net worth than she had in student loans. Hours spent soothing the feelings of new parents not because they were afraid or in distress but because their decaf no-foam latte lacked the exact amount of cinnamon they’d requested. Explaining to mothers that they didn’t have to keep the placenta and that no matter what the latest internet celebrity had done with hers, it was probably against all medical advice.
As Cassie envisioned her future at the hospital, she couldn’t deny the sinking feeling in her stomach. Or that nagging little voice in her mind, the one that reminded her of how her heart had soared at the idea of something more. That voice wasn’t so little anymore. In fact, it was louder than ever.
Her lips had parted to say “yes” to her safe, predictable future...but the words that had come out instead were, “I quit.”
She’d used her new abundance of free time to research options for doctors who wanted to work abroad, and she learned about Medicine International, a relief organization that placed health-care professionals into community agencies around the world. They had a need for good obstetricians.
Six months later, she found herself sitting on an unknown road in El Salvador with only a chicken for company. Wondering what she’d gotten herself into.
It had been a long time since Cassie had taken such a risk. Growing up with a heart defect meant that she’d spent her childhood surrounded by well-meaning adults who wanted to protect her. Her parents were constantly telling her to slow down and be more careful, even when she’d wanted to do things as commonplace as playing tag or riding bicycles with other children.
She knew that her parents had good reason to be overprotective, but she couldn’t help chafing against all of the rules and restrictions that governed her life. The result was a serious daredevil phase by the time she entered medical school. Her heart was finally as healthy as anyone else’s, and for the first time in her life, she was determined to live without fear. In pursuit of this goal, she threw herself into every daring activity she could think of. She bought a motorcycle and explored the countryside surrounding New York. She took a class on rock climbing and rappelling, loving the thrill of pushing off from high places. She visited karaoke bars and belted out terrible songs at the top of her lungs.
She also started dating the surgical resident supervising her clinical rotation.
Residents and medical students weren’t supposed to date, but Cassie was fed up with rules. For the first time, she was following what was in her heart rather than obsessing over how to protect it. And it was glorious...right up until she made a terrible mistake.
Her professors had always praised her ab
ility to make quick, bold decisions in clinical situations. A bright and gifted medical student, heady with freedom and confidence for the first time in her life, Cassie never hesitated to argue a point if she believed she was right.
And she’d believed she was right that night to push the surgical team into taking a risk with a patient. She may not have been responsible for the final judgment call—that had been the chief resident’s decision—but she was certain that if she hadn’t pushed, if she hadn’t convinced him to take action, that he would not have made such a risky decision.
Then again, maybe if they hadn’t been in a relationship, he simply would have pulled rank and ignored her protests.
And then maybe none of the heartbreak that followed would have happened.
Even though the patient survived, they both faced disciplinary action. He was put on probation and denied a competitive fellowship he’d applied for, while she received nothing more than a stern dressing down from the hospital’s training committee. It still made her cheeks burn to think how lightly she’d gotten off, while someone else suffered for her reckless behavior.
Riddled with guilt, she’d broken things off with him. She’d already put his job at risk and cost him a prestigious fellowship. If anyone found out they were dating, it would be the last straw for him. She couldn’t cause any more disruption to his life.
She left him a note, trying and failing to put all she felt into words. She felt a little guilty about sneaking off into the dead of night, but she knew that if she faced him, she’d never be able to go through with the breakup. And she had to go through with the breakup. She could handle her own heartbreak, but she couldn’t handle the thought of causing a good man even more pain than she already had.
She took a leave of absence from medical school, and returned home to live with her parents for a while. She resumed her clinical training the next fall. And while she still couldn’t let go of her guilt, she could at least vow to be more cautious and careful.