Before she could depart they’d seen her. Melissa called for her to join them and there was no way she could refuse. There was an empty seat next to Callum, which she had no choice but to take.
He started the conversation.
‘What sort of a day have you had?’
‘Busy as usual,’ she replied.
‘But no emergencies or I would have heard from you,’ he commented. ‘I had my phone with me all the time.’
Leonie smiled. What was he expecting her to say to that? He didn’t have to explain himself. No one worked harder than he did.
A waitress was hovering and when she’d ordered her meal Melissa asked, ‘So what have you planned for tonight, Leonie?’
‘They’re having a disco at the community centre and I said I’d go along to help,’ she explained, aware of Callum’s nearness.
She wasn’t expecting any comment from him. He’d got the message that her life away from the hospital was a private thing, if life was the right description of lonely evenings, brightened only by an occasional visit from Julie either going or returning from the centre.
She wondered sometimes why she’d opted to continue her nursing career with children after what had happened to her own baby, but there was comfort in being able to do something for the children of others, as there had been no opportunity to help her baby. It had been too late from the start.
When they’d all finished eating they went outside to listen to the band again. Callum hadn’t left her side.
‘I know you don’t like me behaving as if we have any relationship apart from the hospital, but you need have no concerns about that. My life is mapped out how I want it to be and I presume that yours is the same, so do we have an understanding?’ he said in a low voice.
She nodded bleakly, thinking that his lifestyle might be from choice, but hers had been thrust upon her, and for evermore she would be wary of giving herself to another man, whoever they might be.
‘So how about I come along to that disco too tonight? I can give you a lift there and back to save your legs,’ he suggested. ‘I’ve nothing planned for tonight and I’d like to help.’
‘Yes, all right,’ she agreed weakly, with the thought that he might have cleared the air, as he described it, but she hadn’t, and wasn’t likely to in the near future because it would hurt too much to talk about her past.
Still, Callum had made a kind gesture and she didn’t want to make a fuss and draw even more attention to her unhappiness. She bid her farewells to the group and headed back to get ready for the evening ahead.
* * *
When Callum pulled up outside the yurt at seven o’clock Leonie was ready and waiting, dressed in jeans and a smart sweater and looking revitalised after a shower.
In spite of their conversation in the park she had taken great care with her appearance. Her hair hung in a bright swathe on her shoulders and her make-up was just right. The last thing she wanted was for Callum to think her dowdy when out of hospital uniform.
She was still in a state of incredulity to think that he was actually prepared to endure the noise and the youthful chatter for a whole evening, and when Julie saw them arrive together she observed them wide-eyed as she went to greet them.
Callum was at his most charming as Leonie introduced them to each other, adding to her friend’s amazement, and when Julie told them that they’d been let down by the disc jockey, that he’d got the same bug that she’d had the previous week, Callum offered to fill in.
‘I used to do a bit of that kind of thing when I was at medical school. I’ll take over if you like.’
And as Julie gratefully accepted the offer Leonie stood beside them in amazed silence.
Julie’s fiancé Brendan appeared at that moment and was accordingly introduced, and when told about Callum offering to take on the job of disc jockey thanked him profusely while Leonie wished herself far away. Was this his idea of clearing the air? she wondered.
Callum looked at her. If she thought he was going to embarrass her she was mistaken. He’d dealt with the music at discos many a time, and doing it once again would be like the old days before he’d met Shelley and been so besotted with her that he hadn’t been able to think straight.
Thankfully he had never let his life with her affect his work in orthopaedics, but it had affected everything else he’d enjoyed, and to be involved with these kids for a few hours, playing music, would be therapeutic.
‘You don’t need to worry, I won’t embarrass you,’ he told her with a smile tugging at his mouth. ‘What are you going to do while I’m occupied?’
‘What I always do on these sorts of occasions, help Julie with the refreshments. Callum, it’s good of you to do this,’ she said stiltedly. ‘You never cease to amaze me.’
Brendan was approaching with the equipment that the disc jockey would need and as Callum watched her walk towards the kitchen he was content for the first time in months with his life away from the hospital, as well as in it.
Whether Leonie was happy in her life outside the place he didn’t know, but he had his doubts. Sometimes he picked up on a sadness in her and knew instinctively that she wouldn’t want to talk about it, but it didn’t stop him from wondering what could be its cause.
* * *
Later that night, when they arrived outside the yurt beneath a full moon in a velvet sky Callum wondered if he would be invited in for a coffee but no such invitation was forthcoming and he wasn’t surprised. Leonie had just a word of thanks for him regarding the transport he’d provided, and in a warmer tone her gratitude for the way he’d saved the occasion by filling the empty DJ spot, and then was ready to go inside, because as far as she was concerned the night was over.
* * *
As he drove back to his apartment across the bridge that spanned the river Callum reflected that it would have been a great night back there at the community centre if Leonie had been as easy to communicate with as she was on the wards.
But it was as if she became a different person when away from the hospital. She had been wary and unapproachable in spite of his deliberately casual comment that his life was organised and wasn’t going to take any side turnings.
If he’d known her friend Julie well enough he might have felt that he could ask tactfully if everything was all right in Leonie’s life, but he could hardly ask that sort of question of someone he’d only just met.
He decided that tomorrow he would let the breezes up on the moors blow away what were probably his imaginings and he stopped off at the hotel for a sandwich and a coffee before calling it a day.
* * *
Back in the yurt Leonie was going over the night’s events in her mind. Callum was the last person she would ever have imagined rolling up his sleeves and getting involved. He had been a far cry from the man who’d taken over from her up on the moors road, more like the one who had sought her out to apologise for his abruptness.
If she were to be asked which of his attitudes she liked the best it would be when he was on the wards with her. She felt safe then. The hurts of her past were forgotten, and because he’d got one or two of his own, if the hospital grapevine could be relied on, she was more relaxed in his presence.
She’d been totally ungracious when he’d brought her home and had been acutely aware of it, but they’d become closer over the past few hours and she hadn’t known how to cope with that. Without saying it outright, Callum had implied a couple of times that he had no intention of being involved in any new relationship, which was fine, but what about her?
She was already attracted to him and the last thing she wanted was another heartbreak after what had happened with her ex. She’d been so naïve and trusting that she hadn’t seen it coming.
She’d worked with Adrian Crawley as a nurse. Been captivated by the easy charm that he’d spread around. Aware of the attraction he had for her, Adrian had dated her, and they’d slept together.
When she’d fallen pregnant he had promised that they wou
ld marry when the baby came and she’d believed him. She had been so happy and excited for the future.
Her parents had died in an accident fairly recently and as she was an only child there had been no one to grieve with her and offer comfort. Adrian had brought brightness into her life at a time when she had been at her most vulnerable.
The news that he had a wife living in the north of England had come from the woman herself after he’d confessed his misbehaviour.
In a voice of calm reason she had explained over the phone to Leonie that there would be no husband, no wedding, because Adrian wasn’t free and didn’t want to be.
When Leonie had tackled him about his horrendous treatment of her, with her first reminder being about the baby she was carrying, he’d had the nerve to suggest that he and his wife would adopt it. She had ended the affair then and there, promising Adrian he’d play no part in their child’s life even if they had to fight it out in court.
But it hadn’t come to that. Her unborn baby, the only source of joy in a life that had become dark and cheerless again, had been stillborn and it had been then that she’d met Julie, who had been a social worker at the London hospital. They’d become firm friends very quickly and it had been Julie’s suggestion that she move up to Heatherdale with her.
With nothing to keep her in London any longer, Leonie had agreed and once there had found herself a position as a ward sister at the famous children’s hospital.
She loved it, she loved her job and had been reasonably content until Callum Warrender had appeared in her life, awakening feelings that were too raw and recent to contemplate.
Yet wasn’t she fussing about nothing? Callum had told her outright a couple of times that his life was sorted. It seemed that she wasn’t the only one who’d made a big mistake in the past, but where he seemed to have accepted his change of circumstances hers still haunted her with a sorrow that never went away.
* * *
Leonie awoke the next morning to a bright sun overhead and birdsong in the trees. A fine mist over the river was gradually disappearing and as she ate the lazy breakfast that she treated herself to at weekends her glance was on the apartments where Callum lived. Suddenly he appeared in front of the one opposite, dressed for a day in the great outdoors. She found herself envying him the prospect.
She sighed. It was going to be a long day. Her home was clean and tidy, any washing had been laundered and put away, and she couldn’t rely on Julie for company because she and Brendan needed some time together.
Almost as if they had read her mind a dozen or so of her neighbours, who had also been tempted by the weather, called round to see if she would like to join them on a walk of their own.
Leonie agreed immediately, quickly packing a picnic and joining the group as they left the site.
‘Which route will we take?’ she enquired.
‘Straight up the road to the moors and along the tops,’ she was told. ‘Are you up to that sort of thing?’
She smiled. ‘I wasn’t until a couple of weeks ago when I took the kids from the community centre for a similar walk and had a nasty accident thrown in for good measure, but I am now so no cause for concern.’
Her neighbours were relaxed and friendly and she joined in their chatter as they moved slowly upwards towards the bend in the road where the biker had crashed, but as they drew nearer Leonie became silent as the memory of those moments came back.
As they rounded the bend she gasped in disbelief. Callum was there, looking down at the spot where the two of them had saved a young life. When he saw her his amazement equalled hers.
‘Leonie!’ he exclaimed, as if there was just the two of them there. ‘What brings you out here? You are the last person I would expect to see after what happened!’
‘Yes, I know,’ she replied, and indicated the now silent group that she was with. ‘My friends invited me to join them for a walk on the moors and here I am.’
‘So I see,’ he commented dryly, and wondered what her answer would have been if he had been the one who’d issued the invitation.
The others were getting fidgety and someone said, ‘Do you want us to drop you off here with your friend, Leonie?’
‘Er, I’m not sure,’ she told them. ‘This is the place where Dr Warrender and I were involved in that nasty accident. It has both good and bad memories.’ She glanced at Callum’s inscrutable expression.
‘Maybe it’s best if I stay with you folks.’ She smiled awkwardly. ‘I’ll see you at work, Callum.’
‘Yes, fine. See you then,’ he said with an easy smile, though his smile faded as Leonie moved away. She really couldn’t get away from him fast enough!
Since the divorce he’d been very wary of any woman coming on to him after Shelley, but Leonie Mitchell was something else. He need have no concerns about her. She would run a mile if he even touched her! So what was it that had made her so much on the defensive?
His day had suddenly turned sour. With a heavy heart he turned and made his way back to his apartment.
* * *
He wasn’t to know that Leonie was feeling the same. She was ashamed to have expressed a preference to stay with her neighbours when just the sight of Callum made her heart beat faster.
She owed him an explanation and the moment she was back on home ground she would seek him out, explain the reason for her behaviour, and hope that he would understand.
Since moving to Heatherdale she hadn’t spent much time in the countryside as there was no one available to explore it with. Julie was always tied up in some way, and the first time she had ventured forth had been on the day that she’d taken the youth group up the road to the moors and met Callum.
So a day with her new friends would have been something to really enjoy if she hadn’t found Callum at the very spot where they’d first met, and after letting it appear that she would rather be with them than him she was wallowing in self-inflicted misery.
She returned with the rest of them in the early evening and the moment she’d said her goodbyes, Leonie grabbed her bike, and looking sun kissed and windblown, she set off across the bridge to make her peace with him.
But when she rang the doorbell of the ground-floor apartment that she’d seen him leaving that morning it wasn’t Callum who answered. A tall blonde, beautifully made up and dressed in designer clothes, stood in the doorway. When Leonie explained awkwardly that she must have got the wrong address for Callum Warrender the stranger disagreed.
‘This is his place, but the sweet guy is showering at this moment, and then he’s taking me out to dinner somewhere special. Can I tell him who’s called?’ she asked in a Texan drawl.
‘Er, no,’ Leonie told her hurriedly. ‘It wasn’t anything important. I was just passing.’ She jumped back on her bike. ‘I hope you enjoy your meal.’
‘We always have before,’ the woman said, ‘but those times were back in Texas when I played hostess. Tonight Callum is doing the honours.’
Embarrassed, Leonie pedalled over the bridge and into her own small home where she sat in the silence and faced up to fact that the she’d had a narrow escape from making a complete fool of herself.
* * *
‘What would you have done if I hadn’t been here when you arrived, Candace, as I wasn’t excepting you?’ Callum asked his visitor.
She pouted across at him with rouged lips. ‘Guess that’s so, but it was meant to be a surprise. I wanted to see you again and the hospital that is so important in your life.’ She waved vaguely in the direction of the hotel on the riverbank. ‘Don’t panic, I’ve booked a suite in that place for the time I’m here.’
‘Good,’ Callum said, and meant it. Any nearer and she would be inviting herself to stay with him and he was in no mood for that. Candace Kelsey had attached herself to him whilst he was in America, inviting him to dine at her place several times and latching onto him when he had been working in the same hospital over there. It had been a relief to leave her behind!
But poli
teness required that he should show her some hospitality in return and as long as she stayed away from him in the hotel he would accept her presence in his life for hopefully not too long.
‘How long are you intending to stay, Candace?’
She was an orthopaedic consultant like himself, clever, and beautiful with it, and one of his male colleagues out there had warned that she was on the lookout for husband number two. Candace was making a big mistake if she had him down as a possible candidate. He wasn’t harbouring any thoughts about marrying again, not after Shelley!
But now she was here, only a short time after his return, and was no doubt sincere about wanting to see the hospital that meant so much to him.
Yet knowing her, it wouldn’t be just that she’d crossed the Atlantic for.
He’d suggested taking her out to dinner as she was showing no signs of jet-lag. He was already wondering how much of his time she was going to demand tomorrow.
Then there would be Monday when she’d already informed him she was going to be there, watching him work and taking note of the way the orthopaedic unit was run.
He could cope with her interest in his medical life, he supposed, but wished her miles away with regard to the rest. It was typical of life’s twists and turns that after Leonie preferring to stay with her friends when they’d met on the moors road, he’d returned to the apartment to find Candace on his doorstep, panting to renew their acquaintance.
As they drove along the riverbank that branched off onto the main road into the town he cast a brief glance at the group of colourful yurts on the other side and saw no signs of life around the third one in the development, which could mean that Leonie was still somewhere with the folks she’d been with earlier in the day. Was she as wary with any of those guys as she was with him? he wondered.
* * *
As Leonie’s evening dragged on the silence in the yurt was broken by a phone call from Julie to say that she and Brendan had just seen Callum escorting a glamorous blonde into the most famous of the posh hotels in the town. Did Leonie know?
‘Yes, I knew that he was taking a visitor from America for a meal,’ she replied listlessly.
Heatherdale's Shy Nurse (Mills & Boon Medical) Page 4