After a few breathing cycles, Zoe thought her technique was starting to work. ‘Now keep your eyes shut, stay lying in your chair and we’re going to relax you even further. Put your feet together, press them hard against each other until you can feel the muscles in your legs ache. Right? They’re aching? Now relax the muscles in your legs. You know where they are now.’
Zoe took Barbara through all her major muscle groups, tightening and then relaxing them in turn. The aim was to have a completely relaxed body. It was important to have the right voice for this, and luckily Zoe knew she had it. Soon Barbara was much calmer, which meant that her pulse and blood pressure would be nearer normal. ‘Now you’re just going to be calm for a while,’ she murmured. ‘Don’t think anything, don’t do anything, just let life pass you by.’
She waited a minute, saw that Barbara’s face looked happier, fewer worry lines. ‘Think of a time in your past when you were perfectly happy and perfectly calm. A holiday. Or a day with a friend. Or just sitting in your garden. Remember that time?’
‘Yes,’ Barbara said after a moment. ‘Roy and I went to Filey to a caravan. It was warm and we sat all week by the swimming pool. It was lovely.’
‘Remember how you felt then. Remember the peace. In a moment you can open your eyes and we can talk.’
‘Right,’ said Barbara.
Half an hour later Jo put her head round the door, saw a relaxed Barbara sitting in her chair drinking tea with Zoe and looking brighter. ‘Kids are in bed and we ought to be going,’ she said. ‘It wouldn’t be a good idea if Roy found us here.’
‘I’m going to tell him you’ve been.’ Even Zoe was surprised at how firm Barbara sounded. ‘I’m just as entitled to friends as he is. Jo, thanks for bringing Zoe round. I’ve been so tired I just couldn’t think straight. I feel a lot better and I know what I have to do. Roy won’t like it, but I can keep calm and tell him what I’ve decided. I want to sign back on with you. He does love me really; he’ll agree. You looked after me far better than the doctor I’m going to now. Will you have me back as a patient?’
‘You do ask daft questions,’ said Jo, giving her a hug.
Zoe felt Jo’s eyes on her as they walked out to the car. ‘What did you do? How did you work that miracle?’
‘I just showed her the relaxation technique that always works for me, and then I mentioned that I was sure Roy loved her, but in the wrong way. And that if she stood up to him quietly but firmly they’d both be happier.’
‘Right,’ said Jo. ‘And I suppose she wasn’t in any sort of semi-hypnotic state at the time?’
‘Absolutely not,’ said Zoe. ‘Just very, very tired. There’s a lot of work to be done yet. As soon as she’s a signed-on patient of the Centre I can go round officially and see her again. We can probably persuade her to take the extra help she’s been offered, which Roy turned away.’
They were driving down Buckley’s main street. Zoe gazed out at the War Memorial surrounded by banks of flowers, at the sixteenth century church just beyond, at the shops, different shapes and sizes, not one long boring row. She felt happy here; this was a calming place, she felt at home. And she thought she had just done a good job. It was ironic that the one person whose problems she’d never been able to fix was herself.
Ahead she saw a shop, the Buckley Wine Store, and she had an idea. ‘Jo, can you pull in a minute? I can’t offer Connor money for babysitting Jamie, but I could get him a bottle of wine to show how grateful I am. Do you know what he likes?’
‘Heavy oaky reds. Rioja or something similar.’ Jo looked at her. ‘What are you going to do if he offers to share it with you?’
‘You told me he didn’t like socialising.’
‘Even so, it would be an idea to think about your answer before he asks the question, love.’
Zoe didn’t want to think about it. It wouldn’t happen. She would give Connor the wine; he would say thank you and go home, they would both breathe a sigh of relief. She went into the shop and asked the young man behind the counter if he had a good Rioja. He obviously took his job seriously. He fetched her three bottles. ‘These two are both good wines, good value,’ he said, lining them up on the counter. He placed his hand on the third bottle. ‘This wine is superlative, well worth the extra money. For someone special, is it?’
‘Not really,’ she said. ‘Yes, I’ll have that bottle.’ She looked at the gift bags that held just one bottle and had a variety of messages on the side. For the Man in my Life. Oh, no. Not ever again. Zoe decided plain paper was best.
When she got back in the car, Jo pulled down the wrapping and looked at the label. ‘He’ll like that,’ she said approvingly, ‘but he might think we’re paying you too much. Do you want a coffee before you head off?’
‘I ought to get back to Jamie.’
‘Of course,’ said Jo. She smiled.
‘What?’ asked Zoe.
‘Nothing.’
‘I’m back,’ called Zoe as she opened the back door, then got a shock as she saw Connor sitting at his ease at her kitchen table, reading the Buckley Gazette. It gave her an odd feeling. He looked so comfortable there, as if he belonged. As if he was at home. Which he was, of course, in a way. But she’d forgotten how nice it was to come home after a call to a friendly presence. It took her right back to the old days before Neil went off the rails. For a moment she couldn’t speak, drowning in a whirlpool of memories. Why hadn’t she seen the warning signs before it was too late? Why hadn’t they talked it through when he first started to change?
Connor looked up. ‘All done? Did you manage to do what Jo wanted?’
‘I think so,’ she said, pulling herself together. ‘How was Jamie? Did he cause you any trouble?’
‘We had a great time. He had another go on the swings and then we played football. We turned his salad into a face and he ate every bit. We also discovered a couple more of those scones of yours. He had his bath, a bedtime story and fell asleep almost instantly. I told him you’d go up the minute you arrived home. I’ll be on my way.’
‘Wait.’ Zoe was disoriented, beset by conflicting thoughts. On the one hand, she knew from experience that now she had started, she’d worry over every detail of her and Neil’s life until she pinpointed something she’d said or done that had turned him bad. Or something she’d not said or done when she should. But if she asked Connor to stay so that she wasn’t alone and could break the destructive-thought cycle, he could easily take the invitation the wrong way.
He stretched his arms above his head. It made him seem larger than ever in her tiny kitchen. He had a faint smile on his face, so he really must have had a good time with Jamie. It was another side to him. Who would have thought the reserved Dr Maitland would enjoy playing scrappy football with little children?
‘I’ll only be a second,’ she said quickly. ‘You don’t need to rush off, do you?’
He hesitated. ‘Not straight away.’ He indicated the paper. ‘I’ll carry on studying stock prices at the local market. They’re important round here. It helps with small talk for my patients.’
She felt oddly breathless as she went upstairs. She looked at the sleeping Jamie, kissed his cheek, smoothed his hair, pulled up his sheet. He was lovely! Then she went into her own bedroom, slipped out of her uniform and hesitated. What to put on instead? Not shorts, that was for sure. She’d seen the way Connor looked at her in shorts. Jeans and a blue silk top. And just the quickest moment in front of the mirror to brush her hair, to dab on a touch of make-up. It made her feel less vulnerable.
He folded the paper as she came back in. She caught the flash of appreciation in his eyes as he took in her outfit. Was the V-neck just a little too low?
She wasn’t sure what to say so she simply took the bottle from where she had left it on the worktop. ‘In London the babysitting rate is exorbitant. This is a small thank you.’
He shook his head. ‘I don’t need thanking. I meant it when I said I enjoyed myself.’
She shook her own
head in turn. ‘I’m glad, but I always pay my debts. If you don’t accept this bottle, we’ll have to haggle over whether it should be six or seven pounds an hour. It would be undignified, don’t you think?’
He looked at the bottle and whistled at the label. ‘This is a very generous present. I can’t take it, Zoe. Keep it for a special occasion.’
‘I don’t have special occasions. It might lie in the cellar for years.’
‘At least it would be there when you needed it.’
She chuckled. She’d missed normal adult conversation at home. But she still felt guilty that he’d spent some of his precious off-duty time looking after her son. ‘Have you had any kind of food yet?’ The invitation slipped from her mouth before she had a chance to consider it. It wasn’t just that she didn’t want to be alone—it was his comfortable presence in her kitchen and the fact that when he forgot to be wary he was good company. And if the comfortable presence had a casually muscular body, a mop of dark hair, a face that hid so much and yet could melt her with a smile, so what? There was never going to be anything in it. She’d been too badly scarred by Neil to want to repeat the experience. Besides which, she had Jamie to look after for the next ten years or so; she wasn’t going to do anything that might mess him up, like starting a new relationship so quickly.
Connor paused before replying. ‘I haven’t eaten, no. I’ve got vegetable soup that I made yesterday and I was going to have a sandwich with it.’
She had a small moment of wonder that he made his own soup, followed by a disturbingly appealing domestic vision of him cooking in his kitchen. She cleared her throat. ‘I bought some really gorgeous ham from that butcher on the High Street yesterday. Would you like to stay for a small meal? Ham and grown-up salad? You’d be very welcome.’
The corner of his mouth twitched. ‘What’s grown-up salad?’
She grinned. ‘The same as Jamie had earlier, but we get to have dressing on it.’
‘Difficult to turn down an offer like that.’ She’d made him smile. He glanced at her a moment longer, as if he was trying to work something out. ‘Are you sure there’s enough?’
‘I’m sure.’
‘Then yes, please. And if you find me a corkscrew, we can have a glass each of this wine.’
But it’s not a special occasion. The words nearly tumbled out. She compressed her lips, horrified. Because if she had said them and he’d said, It could be, then she’d have a conversation to face that she really didn’t want to even contemplate tonight. But Connor’s dark blue eyes were friendly and casual, so she waved him towards the second drawer down. It would be okay. They were two adults who had both come through pain and who weren’t about to get hurt again.
After he had opened the wine and left it to breathe, he split and buttered the wonderful wholemeal rolls from the baker Jo had told her about. She protested that he didn’t have to. He retaliated that he would feel awkward sitting doing nothing. It was a very mild obstinacy, but Zoe thought it wouldn’t take much to turn it into full-blown intransigence. It felt weirdly intimate to be making a meal together when they hardly knew each other.
He turned suddenly. ‘Is this bothering you?’
It was bothering her that she was almost enjoying herself. Whose stupid idea had this been anyway? ‘Not at all,’ she said. ‘It gets the meal on the table quicker.’
He smiled and Zoe felt her heart beating faster. Stop it, she told herself. Remember Neil.
How had this happened? One moment Connor was reluctantly offering to babysit, not wanting a reminder of what life might have been like had things gone to plan four years ago but not seeing that he had any option—and the next he was agreeing to an intimate supper with an attractive woman! He didn’t need this sort of complication. Zoe didn’t appear to be offering anything more than food, but he was going to have to make it plain that if she was, there was nothing doing. That would hurt. It would hurt her to be rejected, and it would hurt him to be the one turning her down. It would have been very much simpler had he just gone home as soon as she arrived back.
But he hadn’t, so he would eat supper with a good grace, make general unthreatening conversation and try not to dwell on the fact that in the normal course of events, he would have found Zoe very alluring indeed.
Connor focused on the generously filled plates. Ham, quartered eggs, sliced new potatoes, pickles and a mound of salad. ‘If this is your idea of a small meal, I’d hate to see what you’d lay on for a starving man,’ he said.
‘You don’t have to finish it,’ she replied, transferring the plates to the table.
‘That would be plain rude.’ He picked up the Rioja and stopped her sweeping away the cork as she wiped down the worktop. ‘Whoa. I’ll need that to re-cork the wine.’
She stared at him, her hand flying to her mouth.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing. It’s just that Neil never put a cork back in a bottle of wine in his life.’
In an instant, the atmosphere changed. Zoe’s colour was high, but she had the air of having meant every word. ‘He was an alcoholic,’ she said simply, and sat down opposite him to eat.
Connor was dumbfounded. He could deal with statements like that in the surgery during his working day. In the kitchen, when all he was expecting was a salad supper with a colleague, they were rather more difficult.
She stretched across the table and put her hand on his arm. ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s in the past. It seemed like a good opportunity to tell you, that’s all. Can we talk about something else, please?’
He poured both of them a glass of wine. ‘To be honest, I’m not sure what I should say anyway.’ He lifted his Rioja, inhaling the aroma and taking a sip, giving himself time to think.
She drank too. ‘This is very nice. I must remember to thank the assistant in the shop.’
Connor recognised the deliberately cheerful style. So be it. Soul-searching over a meal always gave him indigestion anyway. ‘It’s grand,’ he said. ‘Not just the wine—the food and the company as well. It makes a change from eating alone.’
The tension went out of her. ‘Thank you.’ They both knew it wasn’t thanks for the compliment.
‘So, what was the call tonight?’ he asked, applying himself to his plate. ‘Any emergencies we need to look out for?’
He’d said it to make casual conversation, but Zoe hesitated. ‘Not an emergency,’ she said carefully. ‘More of a friendly visit. I’d say more, but it’s not really my story to tell.’
Connor groaned. ‘Another Jo Summers special, in fact.’
She fired up at that. ‘Jo is my friend and I love her. It’s not her fault that she has the biggest heart in the universe. It’s all right—no notes were taken, no drugs prescribed. And, for what it’s worth, she was absolutely right. We did need to go.’
Now he knew something else about her. She was loyal, especially to the people she cared about. ‘I’m not arguing. This food and this wine are too good to spoil.’
Zoe grinned. ‘I agree. Tell me about Buckley and the Peak District instead. What else do I need to know about life up here?’
Astonishing, thought Zoe as she cleared away. Their one glass of wine had lasted all through the meal. Connor had corked the bottle and—after a small argument—put it ready to take back with him. So very different from other meals in her past. And as a bonus, after that initial awkwardness, she’d enjoyed chatting to him. She was no nearer finding out why he was reserved at work and more outgoing at home, but it didn’t seem to matter.
‘Would you like a coffee?’ she asked. ‘We could take it onto the patio to drink.’
‘I think I would. Yes, please.’
The sun was sinking, casting long shadows over her little lawn. The light had that particular late-evening quality that tinted everything it touched with gold. A magic time of day.
They sat outside, one in each wicker chair. He stirred his coffee thoughtfully, then glanced up and their eyes met. All of a sudden, Zoe had a
n odd feeling of adventure, as if she were doing something slightly dangerous. How ridiculous. It was simply that they’d finished eating so there was nothing to occupy them. They were thrown fully into each other’s company.
‘I really love sunset here,’ she said.
‘Yes. As if the day’s cares are being wound up. I’ve often sat here and thought so.’
But now he couldn’t, because she and Jamie were in residence. She bit her lip. ‘I feel guilty, robbing you of your view.’
He shrugged. ‘I’m sure if I exert myself I can find a west-facing window in my house.’
A small silence fell between them.
‘Zoe—’
‘Connor—’
He gestured. ‘Ladies first.’
She took a deep breath. This had to be said, and it had to be said now. For much the same reason as her telling him about Neil’s alcoholism earlier. She didn’t want him labouring under any misapprehensions. ‘Connor, remember that spark that passed between us when we first met?’
‘Very well. You shouted “Ow”. It was just static electricity.’
‘Just static electricity? Didn’t you feel something else passing between us? Something affecting us both?’
He turned his head and looked at her directly. Unflinchingly, she stared back, noticing that his face had gone blank. Impossible to guess what he was thinking. Oh, Lord, had she got this completely wrong? After what seemed an age, he slowly said, ‘Yes, I felt it.’
Village Midwife, Blushing Bride Page 6