“We don’t have a relationship.
“It’s just impossible, Rowena. You must see that!”
“Why is it impossible?” She leaned closer as she asked the question, and he could see down the front of her shirt to the deep cleft between her breasts. Desire tightened his body again, while frustration blew the lid off his temper.
“Because there are too many question marks hanging over my head,” he roared.“I thought I could sort out the past—put it behind me. It’s why I wanted time off—to finalize things once and for all. Then I could…Perhaps we could…”
As his voice trailed away Rowena felt her heart jerk. Was he saying he did feel something for her?
“So what’s different now?” she asked, although she already knew the answer.
“Mary-Ellen’s arrival!” David replied.“She hasn’t come to wish me well in my future, Rowena. She’s come to stir up trouble.”
Dear Reader,
A couple of years ago, I was asked if I’d be interested in writing a series of books with a “forensic” flavor, because of the increasing popularity of television programs based on the forensic side of medicine.
I hit my first snag with the setting. The natural place to set such books would be in the forensic pathology department of a big-city hospital, but since all the patients there are dead, I wouldn’t have the patient interaction, which is so much a part of medical romance. So I invented Sarah, a doctor who works as a fill-in physician in country areas, and inadvertently attracts trouble wherever she goes!
In this book, she’s helping out a friend on a windswept island off the southern coast of mainland Australia, and, naturally, finds herself plunged into mystery and chaos.
I hope you enjoy this story, because I certainly love writing the “Sarah” books.
Her Dr. Wright
Meredith Webber
CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
PROLOGUE
‘MUCH as I’d love to, David, I don’t know that I can—I’ve a family to consider these days.’
Sarah Kemp pressed the receiver to her ear, listening to David Wright’s rush of understanding and apology, while, across the room, her husband was mouthing words at her and waving his arms in the air. Though how anyone could make sense of his whispered questions and strange gesticulations…
‘Tell him you’ll call him back!’ Tony suggested, obviously frustrated by his attempts to get his message across with hand signals.
‘David, can I talk to Tony about this and call you back?’
Another rush of words, of agreement this time. David must be in a tizz over his impending holiday for him to be talking so much. She asked for his number to save the bother of searching outdated address books for it, and promised to call back in an hour.
‘Was that your friend David from Three Ships Island?’ Tony demanded, as soon as she was off the phone. ‘Did he want you to do a locum? Wouldn’t you like to do it? Haven’t you been saying you must get back to proper work before you forget what it’s all about? Why did you hesitate?’
Sarah smiled at her husband. Since the arrival of James, twelve months ago, she’d worked occasional days at the local health service, and though, from time to time, she’d missed the closer association with colleagues and patients which her locum work had brought her, she had no regrets about the time she’d spent at home with their baby.
Tony, however, had worried about it, thinking it a sacrifice on her part.
‘Yes, and yes, and yes,’ she told him, answering his questions one by one. ‘And why did I hesitate? Because it’s so far away and I don’t want to be separated from you and James for any length of time.’
‘But I’ve always wanted to go there!’ Tony protested, in the tone of someone being denied a treat. ‘You wouldn’t have to be away from us. I’ve leave due to me, and even if I can’t go immediately, Lucy arrives tomorrow. I bet she’d be happy to mind the brat until I can get away—then James and I will fly over and join you. Lucy, too, if she wants to come. Nowhere’s too far away these days!’
Sarah considered the implications of a family holiday on a small and isolated island off the southern coast of Australia. Lucy, her much-loved daughter from a previous relationship, would soon be home from university. It was as though fate had decreed that various pieces of the past should now come together, as it was David, who had been Lucy’s father’s best friend, who was now appealing to her for help.
David Wright put down the phone and looked out the window to where a wind-tossed sea beyond the headland reminded him of the difficulties inherent in living and working on an island.
Of course Sarah hadn’t wanted to come! Not long married, and with a toddler to consider, it had been a foolish idea in the first place.
But she understood small communities, and also the delicate balancing act good locum work required—convincing patients one was capable without in any way diminishing the efforts of the absent doctor. She was the ideal choice because he hadn’t spent three years getting the locals to accept him, only to ruin things with one bad locum.
‘Problem?’
Rowena Jackman walked into the room, stopping on the far side of his desk.
He swung back to face her and felt the now familiar surge of desire her presence generated these days. Though why, after three years of working with this nurse-receptionist, he was suddenly seeing her as a woman—lusting after her as a woman—was a mystery.
Or perhaps it was a sign he was finally over the trauma of Sue-Ellen’s disappearance—and the hell that had followed it!
‘Sarah’s calling back,’ he said, hoping his voice sounded more noncommittal than he felt. Since realising how he felt about Rowena, his sole aim had been to put away the past for ever—and having Sarah here would give him the time to make it possible.
Rowena smiled, then said with the gentle firmness he’d come to know so well, ‘Well if she can’t do it, you’ll just have to get someone who can. You’ve had three years without a holiday that I know of—heaven only knows how long you went before you came here!’
Six years in all, he could have told her. He’d not had a real break since his honeymoon. Unless you counted a snatched few days here and there, and a tactfully suggested period of ‘stress leave’ from his group practice while he’d been investigated for murder.
He hid the shudder of reaction that particular thought caused—though the memories of his honeymoon were just as bad. Skiing at Aspen had sounded great in theory, until he’d discovered his new bride had had no intention of hitting the slopes. Her idea of a skiing holiday had been ensuring she didn’t miss any of the A-list social events being held at the time.
He focussed on Rowena to chase away the memories, and seeing her—her blonde hair coiled loosely on her neck, her skin lightly tanned from the long walks she took in her free time, her dark-lashed grey eyes steadfast and concerned—he felt more than desire.
Perhaps love?
‘If Sarah can’t come, I’ll try an agency,’ he told her, then he smiled to reassure her because he could feel her anxiety clear across the room. ‘I’ll take this holiday, I promise you!’
An inner smile accompanied the promise, starting a warmth in places cold for too long.
‘You’d better,’ she threatened, then turned the conversation to the patient list for the day.
And though he listened to the words, and nodded to show he was following, the warmth inside him flickered into
something like excitement. What would Rowena think if she knew exactly why he was so determined?
And how, when he’d sorted out the past and shut it away for ever, would she react to his declaration of—well, interest, he supposed was how you put it? But interest was such a feeble word for how he was beginning to feel about Rowena.
CHAPTER ONE
‘SO, WHERE are you going for this long-awaited holiday?’ Sarah asked, when, after a day and a half of introduction, she was about to be left in charge of David’s practice.
‘Would you believe Three Ships Island?’ he said, grinning at her with such delight he reminded her of the fun-loving student she’d known so long ago—before life had dealt him a series of cruel and bitter blows.
‘You’re s-staying here?’ she stuttered. ‘On the island? Why? Don’t you trust me to take care of your patients?’
His smile grew broader, lightening the dark brown eyes with sparks of suppressed excitement. But all he said was, ‘I have my reasons!’
One of which, Sarah guessed, having sussed out the atmosphere in less than two days, was a certain nurse-receptionist in the outer office—the lovely Rowena Jackman.
Though she wasn’t taking holidays…
‘OK—be mysterious!’ Sarah told him. ‘See if I care.’
David chuckled.
‘Of course you care. It’s why you’re such a great locum. You throw yourself into things with such gusto. You love people, and it shows. In fact, you’ll probably learn more about my patients in a month than I’ve learnt in three years.’
Well, hopefully I’ll learn more about Rowena, Sarah thought, though she turned the conversation back to medical matters, discussing the extent of her duties at the small hospital across the road from the surgery—a facility staffed by a group of full- and part-time nurses and some ancillary staff.
‘Any patient with major medical needs is airlifted to the mainland,’ David reminded her.
‘What about the weather? Can that be a problem with arranging air transport?’
David smiled.
‘Of course, but it doesn’t affect us too often,’ he assured her. ‘They’re hardy folk, the islanders, used to making do when the weather turns bad—which it can for weeks on end. Though at this time of the year, with storms likely, there aren’t many tourists, so you don’t get many accident victims, who are the most likely to require air evacuation.’
‘Well, I hope the weather doesn’t turn bad for a few days at least—Tony, Lucy and James are flying over on Friday’s flight.’
‘I saw a long-range forecast last night and though there’s a front approaching, it’s slow moving, so the flight should come in,’ David assured her. ‘But if it doesn’t, there’s always Monday’s flight, the one you came on, or, as a last resort, the ferry next Tuesday. It takes a really wild storm to stop the Trusty.’
‘An aptly named boat!’ Sarah responded, then she lifted a pile of forms and assorted paperwork off the desk and held it towards David.
‘Do you want me to tackle some of this in my spare time? From what I’ve heard and seen so far, I’m not going to be rushed off my feet with customers.’
‘If you wouldn’t mind,’ David replied. ‘I know I should have had it done before I left, but the tourist season was busier than usual and then we had the bush fires, which meant when I wasn’t doctoring injured fire-fighters, or tending native animals, I was fighting fires or shifting stock myself. The first of the winter storms, the week before I phoned you, was very welcome.’
It was also when he’d realised just how deep his feelings for Rowena went—not only working with her at the surgery, but seeing her beside him as he’d battled flames or hunted terrified sheep across already blackened pastures. Revelling in her refusal to be flustered by even the most hairy of situations, delighting in her uninhibited shouts of joy as the rain had finally come tumbling down!
‘But you don’t have to do it,’ he added to Sarah, trying to blot out an image of a very wet and surprisingly sexy Rowena with work-related thoughts. ‘Most of it is non-urgent and can wait until I come back.’
When, hopefully, my head will be clear, my past laid to rest and I could possibly have an exciting future ahead of me.
There was a tap at the door and Rowena popped her head in—right on cue.
But Rowena’s clear eyes were filled with pain, and her lips trembled uncertainly as she said, ‘There’s a woman here to see you, David. She said you’d be expecting her.’
Beyond Rowena, backlit by the light of the setting sun beyond the open door of the surgery, stood his long-lost wife.
His heart kicked so hard against his ribs he felt his throat close and he wondered briefly if shock could kill a man who was otherwise healthy. Then rational thought returned. It would be Mary-Ellen, not Sue, though why she’d think he was expecting her…
Rowena had seen the colour leach from his cheeks, and she stepped closer, gripping his arm, offering support in the only way she knew, by being close to him.
‘It’s Mary-Ellen,’ she whispered fiercely. ‘It has to be.’
She was far from certain, but David’s sanity depended on the woman in the waiting room not being his wife. He’d already been through the whole dreadful process of grief and denial and hurt and anger, not to mention dealing with the accusations and suspicion, when his wife had disappeared. Now he was finally coming out the other end.
For Sue-Ellen to reappear—to reclaim him—would be too much!
Wouldn’t it?
‘You didn’t have to come,’ David stuttered, brushing Rowena aside, as if she didn’t exist, to tower over the diminutive newcomer. ‘I told you I’d draw up an inventory for you, then whatever you wanted to keep, I’d have packed and shipped on to you.’
The ebony-haired woman, with her perfect features and classically casual elegance, stood her ground.
‘So you’d inventory everything, would you?’ she demanded. ‘Or only the things you didn’t fancy keeping for yourself?’
Rowena saw David’s shoulders tense, and longed to go to him, but he’d already brushed her off once. Her heart ached with the frustration of a love she couldn’t reveal, and the agony of not being able to comfort him.
Sarah had seen her friend go deathly pale and, looking beyond where Rowena had been murmuring something to him, had understood why. She’d never met Sue-Ellen Wright but photos splashed across the paper at the time of her disappearance had shown a petite but beautiful redhead, with perfect features and a look of polish that shrieked of wealth and privilege.
The woman in the waiting room might have dark hair, but the same precise features seemed untouched by age, and the air of assurance was more obvious than any photo could indicate.
Sarah replayed the initial scene in her head. David had been shocked by this woman’s arrival but he certainly didn’t seem surprised to find his missing wife alive and well and standing in his waiting room.
Less tactful than Rowena, who’d retreated further into the office, Sarah cocked her head to listen to the conversation.
‘I’d prefer to go through the things with you,’ the visitor was saying. ‘I assume I can stay in my sister’s house?’
Sister? It was the twin! Light dawned in Sarah’s brain, but Rowena must have missed the conversation and was still confused. In fact, she looked downright ill, leaning back against the filing cabinet, her pale eyes vivid against even paler skin.
‘Come here and sit down,’ Sarah murmured to her. ‘We’ll shut the door and let them work things out in peace. Do you know who she is?’
‘One of them! Of the twins,’ Rowena muttered bitterly. ‘Presumably his sister-in-law, though who would know? It could just as easily be Sue-Ellen, risen from the dead or back from wherever she went, here to reclaim her man. They came to the island every Christmas for their holidays, and used to tease us local kids about how stupid we were. Said it was because we were all inbred. They played us for fools by swapping around so you never knew who was who! I
can’t understand how David ever…’
Rowena, perhaps realising she was saying too much, slumped into the patient’s chair in front of David’s desk and leant forward, resting the heels of her hands against her eyes.
‘Hasn’t he been tortured enough,’ she muttered, ‘without her turning up again? Just when he seemed to be getting over it—to be coming out from behind his frozen armour of pain and indifference—this has to happen. Though if he loves her, I guess…’
‘It is his wife’s sister,’ Sarah assured the stricken woman. ‘I heard her talk about her sister’s house.’
She gave Rowena a comforting pat on the shoulder, and crossed the room to shut the door. David was still facing his sister-in-law, and the bunched fists he rammed into his pockets matched the lines of tension in his back.
Little love lost there!
‘This is my friend, Paul,’ the beautiful stranger added. ‘He’ll be staying at the house as well.’
Sarah saw the man step forward, wary watchfulness in every movement. She might only have been married to Tony for a couple of years, but she could recognise one of his colleagues when she saw one. The man might as well have had POLICEMAN on a banner across his chest, although his attire, excellent quality casual gear, suggested he’d left the force and was doing something more financially rewarding.
Not that it was any of her business.
She was closing the door when David must have sensed her presence for, just as it was almost shut, she felt resistance and he pushed it open again.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, addressing the woman, not Sarah. ‘But I really won’t have room to put you up. Most of the house has been closed for years and Sarah, my locum, is using the only habitable spare room. One of the things I was hoping to achieve with this time off was to clean out the rest of the house and decide if I want to sell it, or if I’m going to stay here.’
He ignored Sarah’s start of surprise, and his visitor’s hiss of anger, fixing her with a glare that challenged her to argue, as he added, ‘After all, it is my house, and has been since I bought it from your grandfather’s estate when Sue-Ellen and I were first married.’
Her Dr. Wright Page 1