Six Sexy Doctors Part 1 (Mills & Boon e-Book Collections): A Doctor, A Nurse: A Little Miracle / The Children's Doctor and the Single Mum / A Wife for ... / The Playboy Doctor's Surprise Proposal

by Carol Marinelli

  ‘I won’t put one on this race,’ Laird said. ‘No clue about any of these horses.’

  They all looked magnificent. Their rich chestnut and chocolate coats gleamed in the sun, their bodies moved with incomparable power and grace and you could see how highly strung they were, positively eager to prove their worth at top speed.

  But how did you tell about their heart and soul? It was the question that consumed him. Whether you were considering horses or your own heart, how did you tell what mattered, what ran bone deep, what was lasting and important and real?

  ‘Most other people don’t have a clue about the horses today, and it’s not stopping them,’ Tarsha said with a smile.

  ‘True.’ Laird was briefly distracted by the flare of her sharp humour, which hadn’t been much in evidence so far today. He flicked his gaze briefly in her direction and grinned at her. She was a good person, a far cry from the stereotype of the bitchy model.

  He wasn’t by any means a gambler, but it was a national tradition to put money on horses on Cup Day, as Tarsha had implied, and almost an act of treason not to. The whole of Flemington Racecourse was crowded with once-a-year punters.

  ‘So can we put on a bet and then go back to the marquee?’ she asked, cajoling him.

  ‘It’s your feet in those shoes,’ he guessed. ‘You want to sit down. My arm’s not doing enough, even though you’re practically dragging it from its socket.’

  ‘And I’ll attempt to schmooze some more and have another great big glass of champagne…’

  She’d already had one, although it wasn’t yet much past noon. Laird was a little surprised. Tarsha drank roughly the same amount as he gambled—in other words, not much. She seemed to be putting on a performance today. Her smiles didn’t reach her eyes, beneath that shadowy confection of a hat, and a distant look appeared on her face whenever she wasn’t talking. What was going on? Whatever it was, he shouldn’t ignore what she wanted.

  ‘All right, we’ll go back,’ he said, turning with Tarsha’s arm still linked through his.

  And that was when he saw Tammy.

  Like an apparition manifesting in a magical way from a slightly obsessive corner of his thoughts, she was suddenly there, right in front of him, standing on the worn-out grass as if she’d forgotten how to move. She looked terrific, in a very Tammy way. Bright and fun and lavishly shaped, and not in any danger of taking herself too seriously. Not with those chillies on her hat.

  She’d clearly seen him several minutes earlier but had been pretending very hard that she hadn’t. More chillies garlanded the ruffled neckline of her silk top, and he had to fight not to give a lingering, appreciative look down at her fabulous sumptuous figure, all curvy and generous and fine-skinned and a little more on show than usual.

  And he was so instinctively, unthinkingly happy to see her—the sun seemed brighter, the race day atmosphere instantly more interesting and meaningful—that he didn’t understand what her problem was until it was far too late.

  ‘You’re here, too,’ he began. Not the most perceptive remark of his life, while his heart just kept on lifting like a hot-air balloon.

  Tammy, Tammy, Tammy.

  The tip of a chilli nudged the creamy slope of one breast the way his tongue had nudged the same spot the other night. His breath caught for a moment in his chest when he thought about it, but then he saw that she hadn’t smiled at him, still hadn’t moved, and her face and lips were white.

  And then she spoke.

  ‘I—I—I can’t do this,’ she gasped. ‘I can’t bear it. I should have known.’

  She fled before he could answer, turning and pushing through the crowd to disappear within seconds, while his thought processes moved like snails. She thought— Tarsha was standing there, dressed to the nines and dragging on his arm, and Tammy thought—

  ‘That’s her, isn’t it?’ Tarsha said quietly beside him, after the blood beating in his ears had begun to subside and understanding had dawned.

  ‘Yes, and she thinks—’

  ‘I could see what she thinks. What a royal mess we’re all in today!’

  ‘Oh, hell! Hell! She talked to me about it. The kind of woman I should be going out with. She thinks—’

  ‘Aren’t you going to go after her and set her straight? You look like death warmed up.’

  He turned a stricken, unseeing look in Tarsha’s direction. ‘Would she believe me?’

  Tarsha gave a tiny shrug, her mouth turned down, then said, ‘If it’s any consolation, I believe you. I never thought I’d see such a look on your face, Laird. Forget all the advice I gave you before about getting off lightly. You crazy man, I think you’re really in love with her.’

  ‘I know I am,’ he said bleakly. ‘I couldn’t possibly feel like this if I wasn’t. Lord, there’s no more doubt, no thinking it through, I just am. I love her. Oh, hell. I love her.’ He wanted to keep saying it, but he wasn’t saying it to the right woman. ‘Help me find her, Tarsh, so I can tell her and get this right for once.’

  She touched his arm, way more in control than he was. ‘We’ll separate, and meet back at the marquee every half-hour.’

  ‘Every half-hour?’ He didn’t want to have to wait five minutes to get that stricken, wounded look off Tammy’s face, let alone half an hour or more.

  ‘Laird, there’s a huge crush of people here, and she’s hurting so much. She doesn’t want to be found. She has several minutes’ head start on us already. I admit she stands out in a crowd, but how easy do you think this is going to be?’

  Kelly and Liz would be worried.

  It wasn’t too hard to hide at the Melbourne Cup. There were so many people here. Tammy could easily have spent the whole day at Flemington Racecourse and never chanced to cross paths once with Laird and the gorgeous woman on his arm. She could have gone for weeks without knowing the truth, thinking there was still a chance, kidding herself that Laird staying away from her would make him realise how much he wanted to be with her. Permanently.

  Fate had decreed otherwise.

  ‘It’s good that I saw them,’ she mouthed to herself. ‘It’s good. It’s for the best. It’s over with, now. Short and sweet.’

  But, oh, she didn’t want to see them again!

  She wanted to hide from Laird and his model, from Kelly and Liz, from the whole world and her own Lairdless future, and just lick her aching wounds. She found the quietest corner of the parade ring and stood there, watching the strappers walking their horses around before each race. She lined up at a drink kiosk for some iced water to cool her dry mouth. She hid out in front of the mirrors in several different ladies’ rooms, soaking her handkerchief under the tap in order to press it to her tear-swollen eyes.

  Which was where Laird’s thin, gorgeous friend eventually found her and tried to tell her that she had it all wrong.

  ‘Tammy, he and I are not involved. I promise. You must believe it. I’ve never seen him so distressed. You’re the woman he wants. He’s here with me today because I asked him to come with me as a favour, that’s all.’

  She explained about their past involvement, and the fact that she needed a man on her arm at important functions. She seemed genuine and sympathetic and urgent about all of it.

  ‘I believe you,’ Tammy said eventually. The strength had returned to her legs. Her chest no longer ached like a knife wound every time she breathed. Life could go on. ‘But it doesn’t make any real difference.’ Because she knew it didn’t.

  ‘How can it not make a difference?’ Laird’s friend had begun to sound a little impatient by this point.

  Her name was Tarsha. She seemed extremely nice, but she had the brittle, fast-paced confidence of a successful and sophisticated woman who didn’t have time to sit around on Cup Day while a suburban mum cried on her shoulder. The ladies’ room had begun to empty out…Tammy couldn’t think why…and they had it almost to themselves, apart from a cleaning team filling the air with the pungent scents of disinfectant and lemon.

  It wa
s the most ludicrous place for a heart-to-heart, and yet somehow they were having one.

  ‘Because there’s always going to be a thin, single, gorgeous, socially appropriate woman,’ Tammy said. ‘Whether she’s real, or a misunderstanding, like you turned out to be, or just my own stupid imagination, she’s going to be there, somewhere, ready and waiting. She’s the woman Laird should find to fall in love with, and I’ll always know it, I’ll always be waiting for it and it will always get in the way. If Laird and I… If by some miracle he did decide he was serious about me…’

  ‘Tammy, he is serious about you.’

  ‘I’d never be able to believe it with my whole heart. Some part of me would always be waiting for the thin, single, appropriate woman to show up and ruin my life.’

  ‘He’s had enough of those in the past. I know his mother. If he wanted a woman like that, he would have picked one by now.’

  ‘A woman he could have his own children with, Tarsha. One who’d look as good on his arm as you do. One whose only baggage is her designer wardrobe.’

  Tarsha fixed her with a critical eye. ‘Tammy, you look damned fantastic in that ridiculous outfit, let me tell you. It’s only women who think that women should be thin as rakes, not men. And can’t he have his own children with you?’

  ‘I—I…’ She hadn’t even considered it.

  ‘I mean, have you had some gynae thing done, or something so you can’t? Sorry to pry!’

  ‘No, but—’

  ‘You already have five, including triplets…’

  ‘Oh, he’s told you?’

  ‘Trust me, he talks about you. And from what he’s said, he’s thoroughly enjoying your baggage.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘So would another couple of babies really make things so much harder? He has that property. Hobby farm, he always calls it now.’

  ‘Does he?’

  That’s because of me.

  Like the fact that he’d talked about her to Tarsha, the realisation gave Tammy a flicker of something she didn’t dare to call hope.

  ‘And he has enough money for fleets of help. Tell me.’ Tarsha fixed her with gorgeous, impatient, dark-eyed scrutiny. ‘Wouldn’t you have a child with Laird, if he wanted one?’

  ‘Yes, any time he said the word,’ Tammy confessed, and flushed.

  ‘As for the thin and gorgeous part…’ She took a sweeping look over Tammy’s generous figure and the bold chilli colours that mocked her emotional state of mind. ‘He wants you, Tammy. Trust it.’

  ‘I—I can’t.’

  Trust? After Tom? The very word scared her. Trust was only a code word for ‘no safety net’, and Tammy felt like a tightrope walker still only halfway across, with Niagara Falls gushing below. She hadn’t had a safety net since Tom had left and she was just about managing, just about used to it, just about ready to think that as long as she had Mum and her own determined strength, a safety net wasn’t required…

  How could she dare to lose all that hard-won strength and self-reliance now?

  She couldn’t. The thought scared her too much.

  ‘Well, I can’t do any more to convince you,’ Tarsha said. ‘Except to say life can be short.’ She sighed. ‘If you see a chance at happiness, grab it before something happens. Don’t wait, Tammy. Don’t say no to it just because you’re scared it might not always stay as rosy and beautiful as it is at first. And don’t say no because you’ve been hurt. There’s always the chance that life will hurt. Because none of us, even the luckiest and most blessed, ever know what’s around the corner, do we?’ She brushed something that might have been a crooked eyelash from the corner of one eye, and then blinked. She was…

  ‘Tarsha, I’m sorry, are you…?’ Crying.

  ‘My make-up.’

  It wasn’t. She had tears in her eyes, and for the first time Tammy managed to look beyond her own turbulent emotions to discover that Tarsha had problems, too. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You’re not.’

  ‘Really. We’re just about to miss the big race.’

  ‘Do you care about the big race?’ Tammy asked gently.

  ‘No, not in the slightest.’

  ‘And you’ve just wangled my darkest emotional secrets out of me when we don’t even know each other. Couldn’t I return the favour?’

  ‘Where do you want me to start?’ Tarsha asked. ‘With the man in Europe who’s just left his wife, but doesn’t know how I feel about him? Or the new modelling agency I don’t know if I can manage to get off the ground? Or the—?’ She stopped. Looked at Tammy. Narrowed her eyes. Pressed her lips together, then opened them again. ‘You’re a nurse,’ she said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You know about this stuff.’ She brushed her fingers across the underside of her left breast and grimaced. ‘I haven’t told Laird. I don’t know if it’s my imagination, or if it means anything. Tammy, I—I— Why the hell am I telling you? I’ve got to tell someone. I felt a lump in my breast in the shower this morning.’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  LAIRD had lost Tarsha, now, too.

  She’d missed the past two rendezvous they’d scheduled at L’Occidentale’s marquee, and he couldn’t see her anywhere in the crowd. Somehow, she just didn’t stand out the way Tammy did. Race 6 had been run and the winner had been paraded in all his sleek and rug-bedecked glory before the crowd. Twenty-four horses were now being loaded into the barriers for the Cup itself.

  And Laird didn’t remotely care.

  He pushed through the crush of people, scanning the bobbing hats for the only one at the whole of Flemington Racecourse that was covered in red plastic chillies, cursing his own impatience, Tarsha’s unpunctuality and the fact that he’d ever agreed to the role of escort in the first place.

  The race caller began reeling out the details of the race. The horses were off and running. A string of early leaders gave way to new hopes. One lacklustre performer could ‘see them all’ five lengths in the rear. The crowd’s focus was noisy and electric, but surely Tammy and Tarsha weren’t among all those people watching the track when they knew he was looking for them. He realised he was searching in the wrong place.

  Away from the course, scanning for them was easier. He caught sight of Tarsha at last, after only a couple of minutes, and even though Tammy wasn’t with her, he hurried up to her in a rush of relief. ‘Where have you been? Did you find her? You must have, surely!’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘So where is she now? Why isn’t she with you?’ He had to raise his voice to be heard, because the amplified race commentary had reached fever pitch, the sound booming and distorted and the caller not even pausing for breath. The horses were into the final straight and almost at the finish.

  ‘She’s gone back to her friends.’

  ‘But I wanted—’

  Tarsha laid a hand on his arm. ‘Don’t you want to see who wins?’

  ‘No, damn it!’ It was over anyway. Some people cheered and hugged and laughed. Others tore up their betting slips with expressions of disgust. Laird had no clue about any of the placings, and cared even less. He was distantly aware that Tarsha looked exhausted, although she was trying to hide it. Probably the shoes pinching her feet. ‘Tell me about Tammy!’

  ‘She’s lovely, somewhat to my surprise,’ Tarsha said. ‘You do have some taste in women after all. We had a really good talk.’

  ‘Where? Where the hell did you go that I couldn’t find you and you took so long?’

  ‘In the ladies’ room. Sorry. Unintentionally inaccessible, as far as you’re concerned.’ She turned down her mouth. ‘Turned out we had a lot of ground to cover.’

  ‘So tell me what she said.’

  Tarsha sighed. ‘She’s strong, Laird, but very vulnerable. If you ever hurt—’

  ‘Don’t you dare tell me not to hurt her!’ he exploded. ‘I don’t have the remotest intention of hurting her.’

  ‘The problem is, I’m not sure how you’re ever going
to get her to believe that…’

  She outlined what Tammy had said. And Laird’s understanding of how he felt about her and his frustration at not being able to find either her or Tarsha for two hours, along with the crowd-borne atmosphere of let-down now that the race was over, coalesced into a sensation of hopelessness that made him feel ill and almost paralysed.

  ‘Then it’s a lost cause,’ he said bleakly. ‘She wanted me to take time to think, but she’s done some thinking of her own, and this is what she’s come up with. And you’re right, I don’t know how to convince her. Words aren’t enough. I can’t think of anything that would be enough, if what you’ve said is true. Thin, single and gorgeous. Oh, hell!’

  Tarsha touched his shoulder. ‘Hey, is this the Laird Burchell I know? The one who never had time to go out with me twelve years ago because coming a mere second in his exams wasn’t good enough? The one who turns babies into miracles every week? We’re not giving up on this without a fight.’

  ‘Tarsha—’

  ‘I’ve never seen you in such a mess. That means something. That tells me we have to take action.’

  ‘Does it?’

  She did that tired, odd, upside-down smile again. ‘As a wise woman in a very strange hat said to me only recently, Laird…you’re not dead yet.’

  ‘You didn’t have to come with me. Go, if you need to. You must have…nappies to buy, or something.’

  ‘Four-year-olds aren’t still in nappies.’

  Tarsha was unfamiliar with the finer details of childrearing, and she was horribly, painfully, desperately nervous. Waiting for a fine-needle aspiration in the outpatients department at Yarra Hospital on Thursday morning, she sat beside Tammy with her knees locked tight together and her hands folded even tighter in her lap. The tart wit and tight pose were a poised ex-model’s version of falling completely apart, Tammy realised.

  ‘Of course I had to come with you,’ she told Tarsha, feeling an odd degree of protectiveness towards a woman facing the possibility of cancer whom she hadn’t even met this time two days ago. ‘You needed someone here. And since you’re stubbornly refusing to tell anyone else about this…’