A Mommy to Make Christmas

by Susanne Hampton

  She reached for the front door and he stepped closer to her to hold the door open. Her face looked angelic, and he was intrigued by her. He momentarily wondered why, with all her experience and qualifications, she wanted to work in Adelaide, of all places? Suddenly he felt curious. She was just nothing like he had imagined. He could work out most people, and he prided himself on being able to know what made them tick. But not her. Not yet.

  When he’d glanced over her résumé in search of her contact details he had worried that she would not find the practice enough of a challenge, with her interests and her extensive experience in sports podiatry, but then had conceded that she had made her professional choice and it was none of his concern. And if she did grow bored and move on before the six months were up—again, it was not his concern. He wouldn’t be there long enough for it to have any impact on him. His father could find a replacement if she did.

  ‘Okay, I’ll see you on Thursday.’

  ‘Yes. I’ll see you then,’ Phoebe responded as she walked past him into a wall of warm, dry air.

  She wasn’t sure if it was warmer outside than in, but it felt less humid—although she quickly realised neither was particularly pleasant. It was still early, but the pavement held the heat from the day before and she could tell it would be blisteringly hot in a few hours.

  ‘I hope you find a way to stay cool.’

  Without much emotion in his voice, but clearly being polite, he said, ‘I think I’ll take my son to the pool later on today. Maybe you should hit the beach or a pool—there’s quite a few around. There are some indoor ones too. Oscar’s looking forward to finding some other children to play with.’ Before he turned to walk inside he added, ‘I hope you find a way to stay cool too.’

  Phoebe stopped in her tracks. ‘I thought you and your wife had twins?’ she called back to him from the bottom step, with a curious frown dressing her brow.

  ‘No, my sister Tilly has twin girls, but they’re only two and a half years old. Oscar’s five,’ he told her, with a little more animation. ‘Tilly’s like a mother to Oscar while we’re in town, and it’s been good for him since it’s just the two of us the rest of the time. I’m sure as they grow up the cousins will all be great friends, but right now Oscar really doesn’t find them much fun at all.’

  He looked back at Phoebe with an expression she couldn’t quite make out as he paused in the doorway, as if he was thinking something through before he spoke.

  Phoebe turned to leave.

  ‘It’s ridiculously hot out there,’ he remarked, catching her attention. ‘If you have time perhaps we could pop round to the corner café and grab a cool drink. I wouldn’t want you fainting on the way home. I can answer any questions you have about the practice.’

  Phoebe could see he was a very serious man—nothing like Giles, with his smooth flirtatious manner. But there was something about Heath that made her curious. She reminded herself that she would never be interested in him in any way romantically, but with his demeanour she didn’t flag him as a threat to her reborn virginal status. And she did want to know about the running of the practice so she decided to accept his invitation. He was her boss after all.

  ‘I have time.’

  * * *

  Phoebe had decided on the quick walk to the café that she did not want to discuss her personal life and that she would not enquire about his. She knew enough. He was Ken Rollins’s son. He was filling in for a month, and he was the single father of a five-year-old boy. That was more than enough. Whether he was divorced or had never been married was none of her business and immaterial.

  She wasn’t going to be spending enough time with Heath for his personal life to matter. Four weeks would pass quickly and then he and his son would be gone. She wasn’t sure if she would ever even meet the boy. It wasn’t as if a medical practice dealing with feet would be the most interesting place for a child to visit, she mused, so their paths might never cross.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said as she stepped inside the wonderfully cool and thankfully not too densely populated coffee shop.

  ‘They make a nice iced coffee,’ Heath told her as they made their way to a corner table and he placed his laptop containing patient notes beside him. ‘It’s barista coffee, and they add ice-cold milk and whipped cream. They do it well.’

  ‘Sounds perfect—but perhaps hold the cream.’

  ‘Looking after your heart?’ he enquired as he pulled out the chair for her.

  In more ways than one, she thought.

  * * *

  It was a surprise to Phoebe how easy she found it to talk with Heath. While he was still reserved, and borderline frosty, he was attentive and engaged in their discussion. He asked about her work at the hospital in Washington and their conversation was far from stilted, due to their mutual love of their specialty. With Giles, she had not spoken much about her work as he hadn’t seemed to understand it and nor had he wanted to. It had been plain that he wasn’t interested and he’d never pretended to care. It had been all about his career aspirations and how they could achieve them together.

  ‘I’ve seen your résumé—it’s impressive, but definitely geared towards sports podiatry. My father’s practice is predominately general patient load along with the occasional sportsman or woman—not the focus I assume you’re accustomed to. How do you think you will adjust to that?’

  ‘Sports podiatry is a passion of mine. I’ve been working in a fantastic unit within a large teaching hospital, where we offer a full spectrum of services for the athlete—including physical therapy and surgery, with an emphasis on biomechanics. My focus outside of essential surgical intervention was primarily on orthotic treatment directed to correct structural deficiency and muscular imbalance. But in general my goal is to return any patient, regardless of their profession, to their maximum level of function and allow them to re-engage in an active life.’

  Heath agreed with all she was saying, but added, ‘I understand—I just hope you don’t begin to feel that this practice is not what you signed up for.’

  ‘No, I love what I do—and feet are feet, no matter what the owners of them do.’

  Heath found her answer amusing, but he didn’t smile. He rarely did, and those moments were saved for his son. And there was still that unanswered question...

  ‘So tell me, Phoebe, if you love the hospital back in your hometown, you enjoy your work and your colleagues, why did you want to leave?’

  Phoebe nervously took a sip of the icy drink. It was rich and flavoursome, just as good as he had promised...and she was stalling. ‘I needed a break from Washington,’ she finally responded.

  ‘A Caribbean cruise or skiing in Aspen would have been easier than relocating to the other side of the world. And if you were looking for alternative employers I’m sure there must be loads of options for someone of your calibre in the US. It’s a big country.’

  ‘I wanted more than a quick vacation or a new employer. It was time for a sea change.’

  ‘Like I said, there are a lot of places that would fit that bill on your own continent—and I’m sure with a lot less red tape than it must have taken for you to work Down Under.’

  ‘I suppose,’ she said nonchalantly, trying to deflect his interest in her reasons for being there, which did not seem to be abating easily with anything she said.

  It wasn’t the Spanish Inquisition, but it felt close. Phoebe did not want to go into the details of her failed engagement to Giles. Nor her desperate need to escape from him and her mother to a place neither would find her. And there was no way he would ever hear from her the tale of the bridesmaids from hell bedding the groom. It was all too humiliating. And still too raw.

  Heath was her temporary boss and he would be leaving once his father’s knee had healed. The less he knew the better. In fact the less everyone in the city knew about her the better.


  ‘Your father’s interest in harnessing the power of biomechanics and advanced medical technology to challenge convention and his ensuing breakthrough results were huge draw cards for me to come and work with him. And I wanted to know more about his collaborative approach to co-morbidities. Your father wrote a great paper on the subject of the co-operative approach to treating systemic problems.’

  Heath sensed there was more, but he took her cue to leave the subject alone. He appreciated she had a right to her privacy on certain matters. Just as he did to his own. And there was no need for him to know too much, he reminded himself, as they would be working together for a relatively short time and then he would be leaving. Theirs would be a brief working relationship. Nothing more.

  But, stepping momentarily away from being her very temporary boss, he had to admit Phoebe was undeniably beautiful.

  Phoebe shifted awkwardly in her seat, not sure if Heath had accepted her response and they could move on. Unaware that her glass was empty, she casually took another sip through her straw. Suddenly the loudest slurp she had ever heard rang out. To Phoebe’s horror, apparently it was the loudest the people at an adjacent table had ever heard too, as they shot her a curious stare.

  The sound echoed around the café. Phoebe’s eyes rolled with embarrassment. Only half an hour before she had passed out in his arms, revealed far too much of her legs, and now her manners were more befitting a preschooler. She wanted to find an inconspicuous hole and slink inside. Heath had such a serious demeanour she could only imagine what he was thinking. It was, without doubt, the worst first day on the job of anyone—ever.

  ‘I told you they make the best iced coffee. There’s never enough in my glass either,’ Heath said, his mouth almost forming a smile.

  It was the first time, in the hour or so since they’d met, that she had seen him show anything even vaguely like a smile. And it was the most gorgeous almost-smile she had ever seen. Her heart unexpectedly skipped a beat.

  Giles would have been mortified, she thought. He would have shot her a glare that told her she had embarrassed him. His body language would have reminded her that it was unladylike without saying a word. She would have felt his displeasure while those around would have had no idea. But Heath didn’t appear to react that way, and it surprised her. Apparently in his eyes it was not cringeworthy behaviour—or if he thought it was he certainly masked it well.

  She felt her embarrassment slowly dissipate. Maybe it wasn’t the worst day ever after all. And that was confirmed when he continued the conversation as if nothing had happened.

  ‘So, how do you see this working arrangement? Are you happy to split your time with taking half of my father’s post-operative patients and the remainder to be new patients, along with a surgical roster?’

  ‘That sounds great to me. I’m fairly flexible—not a hard and fast rules kind of woman—so we can just see how it all works out, and if we need to move around within those parameters we can discuss it as it unfolds.’

  Heath didn’t feel the same way at all. ‘You’ll learn quickly that I’m a rules kind of a man. I live by a number of them, and if I set something up then I like to stick by it. So I’d rather we made up our minds and set up now the way it will play out.’

  ‘I guess...’ Phoebe replied, a little taken aback by his rigid stance on their working arrangements. She had heard that Australian people were laid-back. Heath didn’t fit that bill at all. ‘But in my opinion most situations have both a teething period and a grey area. There’s generally room to manoeuvre and move around with some degree of compromise if you’re willing to look for it.’

  ‘Not with me. Once I’ve made a decision, it’s rare that I’ll shift my viewpoint. In fact it would take something extraordinary to make me change my mind.’

  While she appreciated Heath’s honesty upfront, she thought she would pity whoever lived with him if they got the bathroom roster wrong. ‘Well, then, since it’s only for a month let’s go with your way. You undoubtedly know the practice and the patient load better than I do, so I’m happy to carve it in stone right now if that’s how it’s done around here.’

  Heath appreciated her wit, but made no retort.

  * * *

  An hour later they were still at the café. Once they had agreed to their working arrangements Heath had dropped all other lines of questioning and given Phoebe the lowdown on the city she would call home for a few months.

  Despite the ease with which they spoke, Heath had still not had his questions answered about Phoebe’s motives for relocating. But he did know she was a lot more adaptable than he was. It made him curious, although he didn’t verbalise it.

  With her academic record the surgical world was quite literally her oyster. There would be few, if any, practices or teaching facilities that would not welcome her into their fold with open arms. There was no ring on her finger, but he would not be arrogant enough to assume that there was no man in her life. If there was then he too must be as adaptable as Phoebe, and willing to compromise and let her travel to the other side of the world for work. He was not that type of man.

  ‘Adelaide is very quiet, I assume?’ she asked as she relaxed back into her chair and admired the artwork on the café walls.

  ‘Yes—a little too relaxed in pace for me. It’s very different from Sydney, which I prefer. I grew up here, but moved to Sydney about ten years ago when I finished my internship. I was offered a position on the east coast and I took it.’

  ‘I’d like to see Sydney one day, but I think Adelaide will be lovely for the next six months.’

  ‘Adelaide’s like a very large country town,’ Heath replied. ‘And that’s the reason I never stay too long.’

  ‘A large country town suits me. It isn’t the size of the town but more the attitude of the people that matters.’

  Heath watched Phoebe as she studied the eclectic collection of watercolour paintings and charcoal sketches on the wall. She was smiling as she looked at the work of novice artists and he could see her appreciation of the pieces. There was no sign of the big town superiority that he had thought she might display, and she didn’t launch into a spiel about comparisons with Washington, as he had expected.

  ‘That’s what my father keeps telling me when I try to get him to relocate to Sydney. He won’t budge. He likes the growing medical research sector in Adelaide, even if it’s a small city by comparison.’

  ‘From all reports he’s one of the finest podiatric surgeons in the southern hemisphere. I look forward to meeting him when he’s up to it.’ While Heath had not enquired more about her reasons for relocating, to cement that line of questioning shut she added, ‘Your father’s work is revolutionary in its simplicity, and I respect his conservative approach of proceeding, where possible, with surgery as the second not the first option. His expertise in soft tissue manipulation and trigger point therapy is impressive. A lot of practitioners routinely go for surgery, but your father is quite the opposite, preferring to view his patients through a holistic filter and follow a slightly more protracted but less invasive treatment plan.’

  Heath could see that his father’s work had made quite an impression on Phoebe. ‘I hope you’re not disappointed that you’ll be working with me. It’s like ordering Chinese takeout and having pizza arrive on your doorstep.’

  Phoebe liked his quirky analogy, although it seemed at odds with his less than lighthearted nature. He was far from a poor second, and she silently admitted that pizza was a favourite of hers. Heath was charming and knowledgeable, and his reserved demeanour was a pleasant change.

  Although his rigid viewpoint might possibly test her reserves of patience in the long term, she was very much looking forward to working with him in the short term. She doubted he would disappoint on any level, but professional was the only level she was interested in exploring.

  Heath considered the woma
n sitting opposite him for a moment. She was a highly regarded surgeon in their mutual field, but there was a mixture of strength and frailty to her. It was as if she was hiding, or running away from something. And he wasn’t sure why he wanted to work her out, except that it was as if she was second-guessing herself on some level. He had no idea why she would.

  Heath knew that she was an only child, that her father was a Presidential advisor and her mother a Washington socialite, and that she’d spent her high school years at a prestigious private school in Washington. She had openly chatted about that. He also knew that she had graduated top of her class from her studies at the New York College of Podiatric Medicine, and had done her three-year residency at the university hospital.

  It would appear she had the makings of someone who could be quite consumed with their own self-importance, but she wasn’t. She was, he’d realised quickly, very humble—because Heath knew of her Dux status from his father, not from her. Phoebe hadn’t brought it up. It was a huge honour and she was omitting it from her abbreviated life story over morning coffee.

  In that way she was not unlike his wife, Natasha—a former model and fashion designer who had also been very humble about the accolades she’d been given both on and off the runway.

  Natasha had not been at all what Heath had imagined a model would be like the night he’d met her at a fundraising event. He’d been thirty and she only twenty-three. After a whirlwind courtship they’d married, and Natasha had fallen pregnant soon afterwards. They’d both been so excited and looking forward to growing their family.

  Heath had come to learn that she worked actively and tirelessly for many causes—including one to support research into a cure for the disease that had eventually claimed her life. And from that day, Heath’s purpose in life—his only focus outside of his work—had been raising their beautiful little boy, Oscar, who had been given life by the only woman Heath had ever loved.

  And nothing and no one would ever come between them.

  Not his work and not a woman.