Friends to short-term lovers...
Could a miracle unite them forever?
Surgeon Noah only expected one night of abandon with physiotherapist Abby. But crossing the line of friendship ignited a hidden chemistry...leaving Abby pregnant and the once carefree Noah struck by memories of his painful past. But when his son’s premature arrival makes him a father sooner than expected, Noah must fight against the odds to become the man his family deserves...
Medics, Sisters, Brides
From second chances to forever afters!
Ever since an accident left Abby Phillips wheelchair-bound as a toddler, sister and nurse Annalise has been by her side. The two sisters have been inseparable. But when they each receive a once-in-a-lifetime chance to face the world alone and follow their professional dreams, they decide to seize the moment.
As their adventures unfold, neither are prepared for the romantic roller coaster awaiting them, too!
Look out for Annalise’s story in
Awakening the Shy Nurse
And follow Abby’s in
Saved by Their Miracle Baby
Both available now!
Dear Reader,
My mother had a big glass jar of buttons and when I was sick and had to stay in bed as a child, I would be allowed to play with the button jar. It kept me happy for hours as I made button “families” and sorted them into groups according to color or size or how many holes they had. Perhaps the satisfaction of finding those links can help explain the pleasure I get from writing stories that are linked in some way.
I chose sisters this time—Lisa and Abby—and I gave them very strong links, not only because they lost their mother early on but because of a terrible accident that left Abby in a wheelchair and Lisa feeling responsible.
They both have a more complicated journey than most to find love, and I hope you enjoy discovering how, and why, their heroes—Hugh and Noah—meet the challenges the Phillips sisters present.
Happy reading.
With love,
Alison xx
Saved by Their Miracle Baby
Alison Roberts
Alison Roberts is a New Zealander, currently lucky enough to be living in the South of France. She is also lucky enough to write for the Harlequin Medical Romance line. A primary school teacher in a former life, she is now a qualified paramedic. She loves to travel and dance, drink champagne, and spend time with her daughter and her friends.
Books by Alison Roberts
Harlequin Medical Romance
Rescue Docs
Resisting Her Rescue Doc
Pregnant with Her Best Friend’s Baby
Dr. Right for the Single Mom
Hope Children’s Hospital
Their Newborn Baby Gift
Twins on Her Doorstep
Melting the Trauma Doc’s Heart
Single Dad in Her Stocking
Harlequin Romance
The Baby Who Saved Christmas
The Forbidden Prince
Visit the Author Profile page at Harlequin.com for more titles.
Praise for Alison Roberts
“I read this in one sitting. This was such a heart-felt story. I loved the characters. The author really did a fantastic job.... I highly recommend this story to anyone. It was a real treat to read.”
—Goodreads on Pregnant with Her Best Friend’s Baby
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
EPILOGUE
EXCERPT FROM TEMPTED BY THE SINGLE MOM BY CAROLINE ANDERSON
CHAPTER ONE
IT CAME OUT of nowhere.
A sickening crunch. A thump as the back of Abigail Phillips’s head hit the headrest and the car lurched as the engine stalled. The fear that worse was about to come made Abby her screw her eyes shut for a few seconds and grip her steering wheel as if her life depended on it. Was her car going to get hit again and go spinning off into oncoming traffic or the nearest lamppost?
But there was only silence now and her car was just as stable as it had been before the crunch, when Abby had been the first to stop at this red traffic light. She’d only been rear-ended, she realised, and it was probably no big deal. She’d love to jump out of the car and go and inspect any damage to the vehicle that was her pride and joy but that wasn’t going to happen. What she did do was take a couple of deep breaths and try to control the way her heart was still hammering against her ribs. Instead of slowing down, however, it completely missed a beat when someone rapped on her window and gave her another fright.
Her eyes flew open. There was a face at her window now. A very concerned-looking face.
‘Oh, my God...’ she heard him say. ‘I’m so sorry. Are you hurt?’
He tried the door but it was locked. Abby wasn’t stupid—she knew to lock her door and keep herself safe from something like carjacking. She also remembered some advice she’d heard about never admitting culpability at the scene of an accident because of potential legal ramifications. Either this man had never heard the same advice or he was just too honest not to admit something was entirely his own fault and then apologise for it. Abby liked that enough to make her reach for the switch to lower her window so she could talk to him.
‘I’m fine,’ she said. He had blue eyes, she noticed. Very, very blue eyes and a tangle of dark lashes that any woman would envy. There were a lot of little creases at the corners of his eyes, too. As if he spent a lot of time smiling. Or focusing on something very small.
He certainly wasn’t smiling right now.
‘Are you sure? Can I check your neck, at least? I’m a doctor.’
They were only a couple of blocks away from where Abby worked at St John’s Hospital so it was quite possible he’d been heading in the same direction. Not that Abby had ever seen him in the hospital corridors or cafeteria. She could be quite sure of that because she would have noticed him. He was rather an attractive man.
Okay...make that very attractive. Those intensely blue eyes beneath black hair that was tousled enough to suggest that he didn’t bother looking in a mirror very often, along with a bit of designer stubble, was a combination that made it unlikely that Abby’s heart rate was going to slow down anytime soon. Especially when he was looking at her like that—as if it was absolutely critical that she wasn’t injured.
And then he reached into the car to slide his hand beneath her long hair, which was loose at the moment, to touch her neck.
‘Does this hurt at all?’ he asked.
‘No...’ It didn’t hurt. Quite the opposite. She’d never had a man’s hand cupping the nape of her neck before, Abby realised, and it felt rather nice. More than rather nice, in fact. He had gentle hands but she could tell he knew exactly what he was doing and it was sending odd little spirals of sensation right down her spine.
Abby wasn’t at all sure that it was appropriate to be feeling that tingle when this was the purely professional touch of a doctor checking for a physical injury but it felt like something far more personal. Had she avoided letting any men this close to her for so long she’d forgotten that it could be something rather nice?
‘Try putting your chin on your chest. Very slowly. Stop if it starts hurting.’
The traffic lights had changed but Abby wasn’t going anywhere. A car dr
iver tooted irritably as he pulled out to get around the obstruction the two cars were making. Someone else rolled down their window and shouted.
‘Everything okay? Want me to call an ambulance?’
‘I think we’re okay,’ the man shouted back. ‘But thank you.’ He turned back to Abby. ‘Look over one shoulder and then the other. Carefully...’
Abby did as she was told. The second direction sent her gaze back to him.
‘No pain?’
‘No pain,’ she confirmed.
‘And nothing else hurting at all? Can you take a deep breath? Oh, God...that’s the first thing I should have asked.’ His grimace was so like a face palm that Abby almost laughed.
He was so worried about her but she was quite sure she was fine. It had only been a little bump, really, and it probably hadn’t even done much damage to her beloved car. The relief came in such a strong wave that Abby felt slightly light-headed. Happy enough to make a joke.
‘I really am fine,’ she told the stranger. ‘Except...’
‘Except...?’
‘I can’t move my legs.’ Abby kept a straight face. ‘I don’t think I’m ever going to walk again.’
The way the colour drained out of his face made her realise that her attempt at humour had backfired.
‘Sorry... Maybe I should have said I’ll never play the violin again.’
The poor man was looking bewildered now.
‘You’re supposed to ask if I could play the violin before,’ Abby said helpfully. ‘And then I say “no” and it’s, you know...funny...’ It clearly wasn’t funny, though, so Abby offered up her brightest smile and used her hand to indicate what was folded up and fitted behind the passenger seat of her modified car.
Her wheelchair.
He wasn’t slow, that’s for sure. It took only a split second for him to realise that she was paraplegic and that she’d been making a joke about it. His breath came out in a strangled sound—as if he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
He chose to laugh, albeit shaking his head and catching Abby’s gaze at the same time. She could feel her smile stretching into a delighted grin. She was enjoying this, she realised. How inappropriate was that? Especially when she heard the blare of a siren trying to get through traffic that had been slowed down enough to be turning into the kind of traffic jam nobody wanted at peak rush hour. The flashing light of a police motorcycle could be seen threading its way through the traffic and Abby knew there was going to be even more of a hold-up while they sorted this minor accident out.
She was going to be late for work—something that she never allowed to happen—but, strangely, she was actually quite pleased she had an excuse to stay here a bit longer. With the blue-eyed stranger whose face had just become even more attractive when he’d laughed.
* * *
Good grief... Noah Baxter had just rear-ended the car of some young woman who was already living with a probable spinal injury that had made her paraplegic, standing in the middle of a traffic jam he was responsible for, and he was laughing about it?
Not just a wry chuckle either. It was a real laugh that came from somewhere deep in his gut and it felt like...
...it felt like he’d just stepped back in time, that’s what. To a life that was so utterly different to the one he led now. A life where things were funny and tender or stupid and you could simply enjoy the absurdity. Where laughter had been such a normal part of life that he hadn’t given it a second thought—never imagining for a moment that even the desire to laugh would be obliterated in a matter of only two terrible days.
A police officer was getting off his bike and coming towards them.
‘Anyone hurt here?’
‘No.’ It was the young woman in the car who spoke first. She still had a twinkle of amusement in her eyes after making that joke about never walking again. Hazel eyes, he noticed now, in a pale face that was framed by long waves of golden red hair. A rather striking-looking woman, in fact. And that smile...it was astonishingly contagious. Noah found himself smiling again as well.
‘It was entirely my fault, Officer,’ he said. ‘I’d been looking for a street sign to make sure I was going the right way and I braked a second too late. Do you need my details?’
The police officer was scanning the road around them. ‘What we need to do is clear this obstruction. Nobody’s hurt?’
‘No.’ Both Noah and the attractive redhead spoke together this time.
‘Any damage to the vehicles?’
‘I don’t think so.’ Noah hadn’t noticed a bumper lying on the road or anything when he’d rushed to the car in front to see if anyone had been injured. Now he followed the police officer to see that there were only very minor bumps and scratches. No big deal at all.
‘No need to write this up, then,’ the police officer decided. ‘I’m going to start directing the traffic. If you can both move your cars and get going, that would be very helpful.’
Noah nodded. He went back to the car in front. ‘There’s very little damage,’ he said. ‘Probably not worth losing a no-claims bonus with our insurance companies for either of us. And there’s no reason for the police to be involved.’
‘Oh...thank goodness for that. I love this car.’
‘He wants us to move our cars and head off asap. Are you sure you’re okay?’
‘I’m sure. Are you?’
‘Yes.’ Although there was an odd knot in his gut. Left over from that unfamiliar laughter? Maybe it was also responsible for Noah to do something he hadn’t done in more than a decade. ‘Can I have your phone number?’ he asked. ‘Just in case...?’
In case of what? That he’d want to check that symptoms of whiplash hadn’t become obvious? Or that her insurance company wouldn’t cover the damages if she decided to make a claim? Or...simply because he’d like to see her again? Was her smile this time, as she held his gaze for a heartbeat longer than he might have expected, because she was thinking that she might like to see him again?
‘Just in case you decide you do want to make an insurance claim and you need my details,’ he added hurriedly. He always kept a small notepad in his shirt pocket, with a pen attached. A leftover habit from his days as a junior doctor when there had been just too many things to remember at times and keeping notes of anything important had been vital.
She was telling him her phone number. And then she turned the key in her ignition and started her car up again.
‘Oh...’ she said, catching his gaze again as she slid the car into gear, using controls that were attached to her steering wheel. ‘My name’s Abby, by the way.’
‘Noah,’ he responded. He was smiling again, too, as he slipped the notepad back into his pocket and got into his own car. How weird was this? He’d had a stupid, thankfully minor, accident that was a disruption he certainly didn’t need on his way to a meeting with the new colleagues he would be working with in a matter of days and yet it felt like the best thing that had happened to him in quite a while? Like...a few years?
The police officer was overruling the traffic lights to direct vehicles. He waved Abby through the intersection but then put his hand up to stop Noah going through yet. He watched Abby’s car getting further and further away and then the indicator went on and she turned, disappearing from his line of sight.
He still had the remnants of that knot in his gut.
Yeah...it was weird all right...
* * *
The routine was so well rehearsed, Abby could go through the steps without even thinking about it. Her disabled parking slot, on the ground floor of the hospital’s parking building, was extra wide, which made it easy to open her driver’s door and leave it wide open. The special controls on the central console allowed her to move the car seats. She could tilt the back of her own seat and then pull the passenger seat forward to make it easy to lift out the folded frame of her chair to
put it on the ground beside her door.
The wheels, which were removed for transport, came out next and Abby clicked them back into place, pulled the bar at the back of the chair that unfolded it and then locked the brakes on.
It took less than sixty seconds after that to manoeuvre the chair into the best position, put the cushion on the seat, sling her shoulder bag over a push handle, lift her legs out of the car and then, with one hand on the cushion of the wheelchair and the other on the car seat, Abby used her upper body strength to swing herself into her chair. She pressed the remote to lock her car as she turned her chair and started rolling towards the parking building’s exit. She was ready for her work day and she was only a few minutes late, despite the delay caused by that minor accident.
Abruptly, Abby stopped and then swung her chair to go back to her car. How on earth had she forgotten to go and check the damage? Because she’d been thinking about a pair of dark, blue eyes with crinkly corners, perhaps, and that tingle of something she’d felt when they’d met her own gaze, not to mention that other tingle that his hand on her neck had generated? About a name that was unusual enough for him to be the first Noah she’d ever met? Wondering how soon he might ring her?
She would know it was him as soon as he spoke because his voice was etched into her memory as well. Abby could hear an echo of his voice right now, telling her that there was very little damage to her car as she inspected the rear bumper. He was right, there was only a scratch or two and one small dent that she traced with her fingers. It really wasn’t going to be worth either the hassle of the paperwork or losing any discount in the cost of her insurance policy.
It wasn’t the first ever scratch in that shiny red paintwork. She’d had the car for over two years now after all, and Abby had knocked the side more than once with the frame of her wheelchair but she still needed to get less precious about this vehicle. The problem was that it had been—and still was—such a big deal in her life.
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