‘No. I guess not.’ Hugo felt some sympathy for the nameless hunk. How hard would it be to impress Maggie with having an adventurous soul? Good grief, it would be hard enough just keeping up with her, let alone providing any kind of exciting challenge. Hugo couldn’t even contemplate attempting such a feat. His speculative gaze was met by a glance from Maggie which, despite her obvious weariness, contained that unique, mischievous gleam.
‘I’m not in a huge hurry to find anyone else,’ she told him reassuringly. ‘I’m quite enjoying being a virgin.’
Hugo was stunned into silence. This was way too much information and he didn’t believe a word of it, anyway. Nobody who looked like Maggie could have successfully fended off the approaches men must have been making for at least the last ten years.
Maggie giggled at his expression. ‘I guess you don’t read the right magazines,’ she said kindly.
‘No,’ Hugo agreed wryly. ‘Closest thing I get to a magazine is a medical journal.’ And the only publications Joan ever had lying around for him to flick through were of the House and Garden or Gourmet Cuisine variety.
‘I doubt that this theory has hit The Lancet.’ Maggie chuckled. ‘But according to the article I read, if you haven’t had sex for more than a year you become a virgin again. Born again, so to speak.’
Hugo cleared his throat. He knew he was being teased. The turn in this conversation reminded him a little too clearly of the way both Maggie and Felicity used to see how far they could wind him up by embarrassing him with details of feminine issues. And he found himself reacting in the same old way. Trying to retreat and keep his dignity intact.
‘It’s late,’ he announced stiffly. ‘I’m going to give the dogs a bit of fresh air and then head off to bed.’
‘I’ll come with you.’ Maggie scrambled off the couch. ‘I still need to wind down a bit before I’ll sleep. A walk on the beach is just what I need.’
‘Get your coat, then,’ Hugo ordered. ‘And a hat. It’s starting to snow.’
‘OK, Dad.’ Maggie shot him a cheeky grin as she pulled a woollen hat down over her curls.
The dogs had woken and were circling Maggie’s legs. Hugo turned to check that the woodburner’s door was safely closed and then he smiled at the scene waiting by the front door. Maggie looked as eager as the dogs for the brief outing before bedtime. Despite the impressive account of her day’s activities and the somewhat shocking reference to her sex life, she was still just a kid. The thought of her even wanting to have children of her own seemed incongruous but Hugo realised with a jolt that she was the same age as Joan. All grown up. Maggie could easily have produced several children by now if she’d wanted to.
Hugo followed the small troop as they headed out into the freezing darkness, the dogs and Maggie apparently equally excited by the light swirl of snowflakes dancing in the beam from the torch Hugo held. The shingle crunched beneath his boots as they reached the beach and he found himself smiling again. Maggie couldn’t be considered exactly restful company but he wouldn’t want her any other way, would he? If she was different, she wouldn’t be Maggie. And he was glad she hadn’t found someone she wanted to have children with. If she had, she wouldn’t be here with him now, making him shake his head but laugh with increasing frequency.
A small corner of his brain suggested that he was pleased she hadn’t had sex with anyone for more than a year as well, but Hugo damped that thought down hurriedly. He didn’t want to know and he certainly wasn’t going to try and analyse why the information had been pleasing.
It snowed all night and the amount that settled on the ground meant there was no way Maggie’s little car was going to cope with the roads next morning.
‘I’ll take you in the Jeep,’ Hugo offered. ‘I’m in at the hospital all day today.’
The dawn was gathering momentum as they drove through paddocks softly blanketed with a startlingly white cover. The headlights of the Jeep made it sparkle alluringly but Maggie’s gaze was directed upwards, waiting and watching as the pink glow over the mountain peaks blossomed. Hugo stole a glance at her face. And then another. Her eyes had a brilliance that competed with the flashes of colour from the snow and her lips were parted slightly in wonder.
‘I just don’t believe it,’ she said softly a minute later. ‘This must be the most beautiful place in the world.’
‘It is lovely,’ Hugo agreed, but he broke his concentration on the road for only a moment to appreciate the sunrise. The view a little closer was also lovely. Disconcertingly so. He could never have anticipated that Maggie would have turned into such an astonishingly beautiful woman. The realisation that he could find her attractive hit him like a brick.
This was Maggie sitting beside him, for heaven’s sake. He had known the girl for ever, and the feelings he’d always had for her alternated between protectiveness and annoyance overlying a genuine fondness. It couldn’t have been termed a friendship. The difference in their ages had precluded a relationship on the kind of equal terms friendship required, but that would have come in time if it hadn’t been for the accident. The reminder of the still unexplored shadow in their past was enough to push Hugo’s errant thoughts into perspective.
Sure, Maggie was an attractive woman. And maybe now they had the opportunity to forge the friendship that had been denied, but that was all that could ever come from renewing their acquaintance. And it was all Maggie could possibly want. She’d called him ‘Dad’ last night when he’d reminded her to put some protective clothing on. She still saw him as part of a generation removed from her own. Safe. Restrictive, probably. And boring. He didn’t have any ambition to go on jaunts in a helicopter, did he? Or even to read popular women’s magazines.
Joan Pringle was much more to Hugo’s preference when it came to women. Collected and confident but not overly so. She sought reassurance about everything—a new hairstyle or outfit, her handling of patients and, most especially, her painting. She was looking a little apprehensive later that day when Hugo was escorting another visiting consultant to the outpatient department. Joan was adjusting the level of a new framed canvas on the wall of the corridor.
‘Stand over there for a second, could you, please, Hugh? Is it straight, do you think?’
‘Looks fine.’ Hugo eyed the picture. ‘Better than fine. It’s terrific.’
Joan’s gaze slid to his companion. ‘What do you think, Lewis?’
‘I like it.’ The respiratory physician took his time admiring the picture. ‘That’s the Kingston Flyer, isn’t it? That old steam train that does the tourist run around the lake?’
Joan nodded. ‘I thought it was a nice way to show the perspective of the Remarkables in the background.’
Hugo mirrored Lewis’s nod. ‘It’s great. Even without the train it would still be lovely with the lake and mountains. You’ve captured the feel of the landscape beautifully, Joan.’
‘You didn’t paint this, did you?’
Joan was basking in Lewis Evans’s disbelieving stare. ‘Yes, I did.’
‘But it’s fantastic! You’re very talented.’
‘Thank you.’ Joan glanced at Hugo who smiled his agreement.
‘There’s a few more gracing our walls,’ he told Lewis. ‘You must have seen the ones up in the outpatient department.’
‘Yes, but I had no idea who’d painted them.’ Lewis turned to Joan. ‘Do you sell any?’
‘I’ve never tried.’
‘Do you want to sell any?’
Joan was blushing now, with charming modesty. ‘I really don’t think they’re that good.’
‘I beg to differ,’ Lewis said firmly. ‘And I have a friend with a gallery in Dunedin whom I’m sure would agree with me. Maybe we should book you in for an exhibition.’
Joan’s gaze was fastened on Hugo. ‘What do you think, Hugh?’
‘I think you should go for it,’ Hugo said promptly. ‘If that’s what you want to do.’
Joan looked even more apprehensive. ‘But what if people
hate them?’
‘They won’t.’ Hugo and Lewis spoke at the same time.
‘Think about it,’ Lewis added. ‘Why don’t you lend me one of your paintings and I’ll show it to my friend and give you a ring next week? I’ll be down every fortnight over the winter anyway. We’re getting into peak season for respiratory problems.’
‘Mmm.’ Hugo was reminded of the direction they were supposed to be moving in. ‘There’s a heavy clinic for this afternoon and we’ve got another two people we want to get onto a home oxygen supply. I’ve got their files in my office.’
‘Let’s go and have a look before clinic starts.’ Lewis paused only long enough to smile warmly at Joan. ‘Don’t forget to think about that exhibition, will you?’
Joan didn’t forget. It was still uppermost on her mind when Hugo took her out to dinner on Friday night.
‘I’m really nervous about it,’ she confessed.
‘You need to have more confidence,’ Hugo told her. Maggie would never agonise over something like this. She’d throw caution to the wind, enjoy any success and simply laugh off any adverse reactions or put them down to experience. It was the kind of attitude that simplified life. Try anything and make the most of the good bits.
‘Being confident of one’s own abilities can come across as showing off.’ Was Joan following Hugo’s train of thought? ‘You should have heard Maggie in the staffroom yesterday, talking about that accident victim they had to cut out of the car that rolled off the Remarkables’ access road.’
‘It was a tough job,’ Hugo said mildly. ‘They were working in sub-zero conditions on a patient with serious head and spinal injuries. Getting him stable enough to fly out was a real achievement.’
‘You would have thought she’d done the intubation and everything else herself, the way she was talking.’
‘She did.’ Hugo shouldn’t have taken such pleasure in Joan’s astonishment but he actually felt proud of the way Maggie had handled that job. ‘Maggie’s an advanced paramedic. She has a range of emergency procedures and drugs she can give that make me feel quite redundant. There’s not much more I can do in A and E that she can’t do out on the road. In fact, she gets far more practice getting IV access or intubating than I do these days.’
Joan’s shrug was infinitesimal. ‘It’d be nice if she looked a bit more professional, then. Why doesn’t she tie her hair up properly?’
Hugo grinned. ‘She reckons there hasn’t been a hair tie invented that can cope with her curls.’ He liked the way she dragged the front pieces back to anchor the spirals that hung between her shoulder blades. When she was in her uniform of crisp white shirt and epaulettes, dark trousers and steel-capped black boots, she looked every inch the professional in his opinion. Not that the shirt was always so white when she came off duty, mind you. ‘And what about young Jason?’ he added. ‘You’ve never complained about his dreadlocks.’
‘That’s different.’ Joan was staring at Hugo with an odd expression. ‘Come to think of it, your hair looks a bit…different.’
‘I just haven’t got round to having it cut.’
‘So why isn’t it falling in your face like it usually does?’
Hugo felt vaguely embarrassed. ‘It’s fudge,’ he muttered.
‘Sorry?’
‘Goopy stuff. I wouldn’t have tried it but Maggie leaves all her stuff lying around in the bathroom and I kept knocking it off the shelf when I picked up my razor, so I decided to give it a go.’
‘Sounds messy.’ Hugo wasn’t sure if Joan was referring to the product or Maggie, but it became clear a moment later. ‘Hasn’t she found somewhere else to live yet, Hugh? She’s been at your place for three weeks. People are starting to talk.’
‘Let them,’ Hugo said airily. Joan’s eyes widened reprovingly but he just shrugged. ‘There’s nothing to talk about,’ he added firmly. ‘And it’s my business who lives in my house.’
Joan was silent for long enough to let Hugo know that it was also her business.
‘She’s been looking,’ he assured her. ‘She thought she’d found a perfect house last week and then learned they wanted six hundred dollars a week for it. Even with flat-mates, it’s more than she could possibly afford.’
‘There’s a unit in my complex that may be coming vacant. I could talk to the landlord.’
‘Hmm.’ Hugo couldn’t sound enthusiastic. He thought of the way Maggie headed outdoors with the dogs at every opportunity, no matter what the weather was like. She’d tramp over the paddocks and up the hills or along the beach and come back with glowing cheeks and eyes and wild hair that was begging for extra product. He couldn’t imagine her shut up in a shoebox apartment like Joan’s. ‘Why don’t you talk to Maggie about it?’ he suggested.
‘I’ll do that.’ Joan pushed her unfinished dessert to one side. ‘If I get the chance to get a word in edgeways some time.’ Her glance at Hugo was very brief. ‘She loves to talk, doesn’t she?’
‘Sure does,’ he agreed. ‘It will probably drive me nuts before long.’
Joan smiled. ‘She’ll probably drive us all nuts. Except Lizzie. Ever since that night out with the ambulance staff she seems to have adopted Maggie like a long-lost daughter. And Megan,’ Joan added after a pause. ‘She thinks Maggie’s wonderful.’
Hugo just smiled. ‘She’s always made friends easily. I remember the whole of her kindergarten class trailing home with her one day. She’d let them all out the gate when the teachers were dealing with some emergency in the loos. I came home from school to find three police cars parked next door.’
Joan rolled her eyes. ‘I can’t believe the way everyone’s gone overboard on her idea for the hospital fundraiser. I was sure the committee would vote for the craft fair or concert.’
Hugo had to agree with Joan on that one. ‘Can’t say I’m looking forward to a fancy-dress ball either. It’s not my idea of a fun night out.’
‘Nor mine,’ Joan said fervently. She smiled at Hugo. ‘Are you ready to go, Hugh? I’ve sorted out a few paintings at home. I’d really appreciate your opinion on whether I should include them in an exhibition.’
‘Actually, I really need to pop into the hospital,’ Hugo said apologetically. ‘Nancy’s been a bit off-colour again today and I want to check on her before leaving her for the weekend.’
‘I could come with you,’ Joan offered. ‘And wait.’
‘I’ll have to get home pretty soon. Maggie went out somewhere tonight and the dogs will need attention.’
‘Oh? Where did she go?’
‘I’m not sure. I suspect it has something to do with Donald Hamilton having a weekend in Queenstown.’
‘You don’t sound as though you approve.’
‘He’s far too old for her.’
‘He’s only in his forties. Hardly geriatric.’ Joan was playing with the spoon still resting in her dessert plate. ‘Lewis Evans is about the same age as Donald and he’s still an attractive man.’
Was that a challenge or was Joan just annoyed by his interest in Maggie’s social life? Hugo had the sinking feeling that he was getting himself into trouble here. Even without the constant references to Maggie that seemed to have peppered their conversation he was putting a patient and even his dogs’ needs ahead of Joan’s. She might well think he was making excuses not to go back to her apartment and Hugo felt a stab of guilt because he suspected there was an element of truth in that. He tried to sound a little more enthusiastic.
‘Maybe I could come back long enough for a coffee and to look at those paintings.’
‘That would be nice.’ If Joan was upset at the prospect of Hugo not staying longer, he couldn’t detect it. Maybe she’d never been that keen to break down the barrier that kept them as friends rather than lovers. Those hints about advancing age and having babies might have been generic and not intended as some kind of ultimatum. Hugo hoped so. Joan was a pleasant companion, a good friend and probably—as Maggie had suggested—perfect wife material, but Hugo had no intentio
n of stepping onto that path just yet.
Any attraction to the prospect of a permanent relationship with Joan had, in fact, diminished somewhat over the last few weeks but Hugo was at a loss to know precisely why. He hadn’t changed. Joan certainly hadn’t changed. Consistency was one of her attributes after all. He knew that Joan hadn’t exactly warmed to Maggie but that was hardly surprising, given their diverse personalities. The disapproval of him having Maggie as a house guest might have something to do with the new atmosphere but Hugo wasn’t going to jump through that hoop. If Joan wanted more than friendship she’d have to trust him, wouldn’t she? Having a female house guest who was the equivalent of a younger sister shouldn’t be enough of a problem to have thrown up a new barrier.
But something had. And Hugo had an uncomfortable feeling that he didn’t want to try and summon the amount of enthusiasm it would take to break through that barrier.
CHAPTER FIVE
‘IS MY nose as red as it feels?’
Hugo looked up from where he was towelling off one of the dogs after their Saturday morning outing on the beach the next day. ‘Yep.’
‘I think I’ve got frostbite. It’s even hard to smile.’ Maggie bared her teeth at Tuck who was stoically waiting for her to finish drying his feet. The old dog stretched his neck and licked her squarely on the lips. ‘Oh…yuck!’ Maggie used the corner of the soggy towel to scrub at her face.
‘That’s hygienic.’ Hugo grinned. ‘I think I would have stuck with the dog lick.’
‘I need a shower anyway.’ Maggie straightened from her crouch. ‘And a roaring fire. And some soup. I’m so cold.’
‘At least it’s stopped snowing. It might be a good afternoon to take the chair lift up Coronet Peak. The view is amazing and you haven’t done that ride yet.’ Hugo held the door to the living area open and the three dogs headed gratefully for the warmth of the fire. ‘Or…if you prefer to stay warm, we could do the gondola thing and have some hot chocolate in the restaurant at the top.’
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