As they proceeded to the ward Ryan said, ‘Callum, why don’t you go and see to Leonie? We’ve not found any broken bones or suchlike that require your expertise. The problems will be with the skull, which is my department, and I can always give you a buzz if necessary.’
‘Yes, OK,’ Callum agreed gratefully. ‘I left her having a bath and am keen to know that she managed it and is now warm and comfortable after what happened, though knowing Leonie she won’t have settled until she knows how the boy is.’ He turned to go. ‘How is Melissa? Any sign of my godson yet?’
‘No, not yet,’ he was told. ‘If he’s on time it should be next week.’
‘Melissa said you folks would like Leonie to be godmother—has she asked her yet?’
‘No, but she’s going to when she gets around to it.’
‘Fine!’ Callum said, and off he went, hoping that Leonie might have changed her mind and would feel the same about it as he did.
When he arrived back at the apartment he called her name the second he was through the door but there was no answer, and having checked that she wasn’t in any of the downstairs rooms thought thankfully that she must have done as he’d said and gone straight to bed after the bath.
But the bedroom door wasn’t closed, as he would have expected it to be, and when he reached the landing he saw her lying face down on the carpet dressed in his pyjamas, with no sound or movement to be heard or seen. He was beside her in a flash.
He turned her over gently and saw that she was pale and puffy faced. He felt her pulse and it was erratic, so was her heartbeat, and when Leonie opened her eyes and observed him it was as if she was looking at a stranger. She began to cry and call out for someone called Benedict. The guy from her past that she would never talk about?
She kept on calling for him and he decided it must have been some affair that the two of them had been engaged in for her to be crying for him like this, which was a dampening thought as far as he was concerned. It was no wonder that she was keeping him at a distance if she was still carrying the torch for this fellow.
On impulse he went into the bathroom and tested the bathwater that was still there. It was quite hot, which was surprising as he’d been away for an hour or more. Had she immersed herself in water that was too hot in her chilled state?
It wasn’t something Leonie would do normally but she hadn’t been normal when he’d left her, had she? She’d been chilled to the bone, and all medical folk and lots of others too knew that to bring heat to the body of someone dangerously cold could do more harm than good if it was done too hot and too fast, that they must be warmed gradually until back to normal.
When she called for Benedict again he winced at the sound but told her gently that he would try to bring him to her, and wondered if Julie would be able to tell him how to find this guy that he would like to throttle for causing Leonie to be so distraught.
For a second Leonie was lucid, observing him in bewilderment and crying, ‘You can’t!’ As she turned her face into the pillow he wondered what that was supposed to mean.
She had closed her eyes again and he checked her temperature, heartbeat, pulse and blood pressure once more. To his relief there was a slight improvement.
When he looked at Leonie she seemed to be sleeping naturally and he went downstairs to make a drink. He drew back the curtains and it was incredible to find that it was barely daylight after not the best night in either of their lives.
First he’d experienced the horror of seeing her swimming in the deepest part of the river in just a nightdress, followed by her loss of body heat, which had really worried him, and then, fool that he was, in his concern for the boy he’d left Leonie, who’d been anything but well, to have a bath when she had been on the border of hypothermia. It would seem that somehow she had thawed out too quickly for whatever reason and made herself really ill.
Also, bordering on delirium, she had wept for someone called Benedict to come to her, yet when he’d offered to try to locate him she’d said he couldn’t.
But a positive of all that had happened was that he’d been there for her when she’d needed him most...or had he? Had he been ready to put the job first?
As he looked out unseeingly at the morning that was unfolding itself out of the darkness of the night Ryan was getting out of his car on the forecourt of the apartments and Callum hastened to let him in.
‘Thought I’d call to see how your patient is and to report on mine,’ he said as Callum passed him a coffee from the pot.
‘Leonie is not good,’ Callum told him sombrely. ‘I came back to find her out of it on the bedroom floor and when she came round she was delirious, calling all the time for some guy that she’s pining for.
‘I’ve been doing all the usual checks on her and she’s improved slightly, is sleeping naturally, but I have a feeling that she was on the verge of hypothermia when I left her and might have warmed herself up too quickly in the bath, because she was confused, managed to get out and get dressed then collapsed. I was a fool to have left her.
‘And now tell me about Midge. What’s the score with him? It will be the first thing Leonie asks when she’s fully recovered.’
‘Fractured skull, no brain damage thankfully, or bone fragments. We’ve done the necessary and he should be all right eventually.’
‘That’s good—two serious situations, two hopeful recoveries.’
Ryan was getting up wearily from the chair that he’d perched himself on. ‘I need to get back to Melissa and the girls,’ he said. ‘With the baby so near I don’t want to be far away from them, but I had to find out how Leonie was. Now I’ll be able to report back to those at home and get some sleep.’
When he’d gone Callum went back upstairs and found Leonie sitting up against the pillows, still pale and puffy-looking but with her gaze clear of any confusion, and when she smiled at him his heart leapt with thankfulness.
‘So tell me what happened,’ he said softly.
‘I was so cold that I couldn’t wait to warm myself in the bath,’ she told him, ‘and heated up the water because it didn’t seem hot enough. When I got in it felt lovely, but within minutes I didn’t know what I was doing. I felt so ill, I was confused, but knew vaguely that I had to get out of the bath and just managed to do that and put the pyjamas on before everything went black. Obviously I had hypothermia but was too ill to realise it.’
‘And how do you feel now?’ he asked. ‘I can’t believe that I left you in that state. Do forgive me, Leonie.’
‘You did nothing wrong, Callum. I was all right when you went. What happened to me was partly self-inflicted. How long was it before I regained consciousness when you found me?’
‘Not long, but you were delirious for a while afterwards and kept asking for someone called Benedict, whoever he might be.’
He watched bright colour stain the puffiness of her face and hoped for an explanation, but there was none forthcoming, just a weak smile and a shrug of the shoulders inside his voluminous pyjamas.
In that moment he gave up on a love that he knew was hopeless as far as he was concerned, unaware that he had just rendered her speechless from discovering that the ache that she carried around with her had surfaced in front of Callum.
It was obvious what he was thinking and the truth would take only seconds to clear the air, but what the two of them had was clean and beautiful. Did she want to spoil it?
‘I feel well enough to go home now if you wouldn’t mind taking me,’ she said quickly. ‘Thank you for looking after me. I needed a friend and you were there, as I knew you would be.’
She brushed her hand gently across his cheek and smiling down at her he asked, ‘Is a friend allowed to do this?’
He kissed her tenderly then went to find his car keys and a wrap of some sort to cover the pyjamas.
It took only a matter of minutes and they were outside the yurt that she had left the night before for what had been intended to be a breath of air to relieve her sleeplessness, and as
Callum came round to her side of the car to help her out he said, ‘As this place has been unlocked all night I’ll come in with you for a second to make sure that everything is all right inside.’
Leonie nodded mutely. She could still feel his kiss bringing her senses to life and increasing the longing for him that she lived with day and night, but her secrecy had gone too far this time. She’d been crying for a child that he’d thought was an adult, and he had been willing to go in search of him for her.
All was as she’d left it in the yurt and after a quick glance around he was ready to go, but he paused for a moment to say, ‘Take some time off to recover from last night, and if you have any more after-effects send for me.’
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him that she was already suffering from after-effects, but they were from bringing the not-so-far-away past into the open. Callum deserved an explanation and she watched him drive away with a lump in her throat.
* * *
Leonie was sitting in the sun outside the yurt in the early afternoon, deep in thought, when Julie turned up, having only just heard about the river episode from someone at the community centre.
‘You are something else!’ she said, giving her a hug. ‘And Callum was involved too I’m told. I guess you didn’t complain about that?’
‘True,’ Leonie admitted. ‘I didn’t complain at all, at first! It was magical when he appeared beside me in the river. Together we got the boy to the bank and managed to get the water out of his lungs.
‘Then when an ambulance arrived Callum sent him to the hospital and asked Ryan Ferguson to go there to treat him, as he had a bad head wound, while the two of us went to the apartment to get cleaned up and warm. I was absolutely frozen and it was then that it all went wrong.’
‘How?’
‘I’d got a touch of hypothermia, became confused and kept crying out for Benedict. When I was rational again Callum asked me who he was and I couldn’t get the words out to tell him. The result being that he now thinks that Benedict is a lover.’
‘Oh, no!’ Julie exclaimed. ‘Callum Warrender is the catch of Heatherdale and he wants you, for goodness’ sake! You aren’t treating him fairly.
‘I know how you feel about the past and can understand your reluctance to talk about it because the pain of it is always there, but, Leonie, for heaven’s sake, you did nothing wrong. You were a victim, not a culprit.’
‘Yes, but I should have known what I was letting myself in for with Adrian,’ she said. ‘Finding out he was married was horrendous, but nothing will ever hurt as much as losing my baby.’
‘No, of course not,’ Julie agreed sympathetically, ‘and it is your life. What you can live with in peace is all that matters.’
* * *
When Julie had gone the day seemed never-ending in the quietness of the yurt. Callum rang briefly to make sure that she was continuing to improve from the trauma of the night, and just the sound of his voice was enough to lift her spirits, even though she felt it was more of a duty call than anything else.
‘I’m all right,’ she told him. ‘Improving by the minute.’
‘So what have you been doing since I left you? Nothing strenuous, I hope?’
‘No, of course not. Julie came round and gave me a telling-off about a few things and for the rest of the time I’ve been resting.’
‘Your best friend told you off? That seems strange.’
‘Yes, well, I suppose I’ve been asking for it,’ she said flatly, and was relieved when he didn’t pursue the subject because he had a message to deliver.
‘Melissa has been on to me about you,’ he told her. ‘She’s concerned about you being so unwell after being in the river and has asked me to bring her to see you tonight. Obviously I said yes, that we would call in at about seven. Be prepared, Leonie, she is going to mention the christening.’
‘All right, thanks for the warning,’ she told him levelly. ‘And just one thing more before you ring off. The boy, Midge, how is he?’
‘Bouncing back, mentally and physically. Got a sore head that could have been a lot worse if Ryan hadn’t come out to him in the middle of the night. And by the way, everyone on the wards sends their good wishes and hopes that you’ll soon be back with us. Now I must go, I’m due in Theatre.’
* * *
When he came with Melissa in the evening Callum wasn’t relishing being present when Leonie refused to be the baby’s godmother. But she must have her reasons, he told himself, because she loved being with children of all ages and it was going to be completely out of character.
The three of them had chatted for a while before Melissa brought up the subject and he felt his jaw go slack when Leonie said, ‘I would love to be godmother to your and Ryan’s baby, Melissa. It will be a privilege and a delight.’
They didn’t stay long as Melissa was heavy with the last few days of pregnancy and Callum was keen not to overtire Leonie after the scare with the bath water. So there was no opportunity to ask why the change of mind, but it would be the first thing he mentioned the next time they spoke, which might be in a few days if she took some time off as he’d told her to.
How much notice she had taken of that became evident when he saw her cycling along in front of him the next morning, hospital bound, and when they met in the car park she spoke before he had the chance and told him, ‘I know you said not to be too quick to get back into routine, Callum, but I feel fine now, and haven’t forgotten that I wasn’t the only one who was wet through, and you had to rush to the hospital within seconds of having arrived at the apartment with barely time to get dried or have a hot drink. So here I am, desperate to be back where you are.’
He observed her thoughtfully. ‘Are you quite sure about that? It isn’t a follow-on to your change of heart regarding being the baby’s godmother? That for once you are relaxing the rules that you live by?’
‘No, nothing like that, and any rules that I live by are not of my choosing,’ she told him, and went to put the bike away without a backward glance. She made her way to the unit to start the day, with the pleasure of being close to Callum again disappearing like water down a drain.
They did the ward rounds together, like they always did, and as they moved from bed to bed Callum said of a pale-faced little girl who was sitting up in bed and holding her mother’s hand tightly, ‘This is Joely, she was admitted yesterday when you were not with us, and has a funny hip that keeps clicking out of place. I’m hoping to put that right in Theatre this afternoon.’
At that moment the phone in the ward office rang and he went to answer it. She heard him say, ‘Wonderful! And are mother and baby all right?’ After a pause while his question was answered he said, ‘Yes, I’ll tell her. Leonie is here and will be just as delighted as I am to hear that all is well.’
She was smiling her relief as he said, ‘I don’t need to tell you what that was about, do I?’
‘No,’ she breathed. ‘Melissa has had the baby and they are both fine. It must be a great relief after the accident when it could have been so different, and I’m so happy for her and Ryan that they will be bringing their new little one into a loving, carefree home.’
Her voice had thickened with emotion. On impulse he said casually, ‘What sort of a family was yours?’
‘All right, I suppose,’ she told him, ‘except I would have liked some brothers and sisters, but my mother had a top job in the city, and my father, who had a pilot’s licence as I once explained, was obsessed with flying, and it was through that I lost them. I suppose I was happy enough until then but afterwards was lost and lonely.’
‘I wish I’d been around at that time,’ he said gently.
‘Yes, I wish you had been too, you have no idea how much!’ she said, and it was as if that was as far as she was going to go regarding her life before they’d met, as she’d turned her attention to the small apprehensive girl and mother with her usual caring approach.
As one part of Callum’s mind was taking in what
she was saying, the rest of it was experiencing the feeling of having been on the brink of hearing something that he desperately needed to know, but if his past success rate when he’d tried to coax Leonie to talk about herself was anything to go by, it could be a long time coming.
* * *
Summer had come to Heatherdale. The hills and dales were wearing the rich green mantle of the time of year, and the parks in the famous small market town were ablaze with flowers and ancient trees in full leaf that added to its delights.
With summer came the tourists to this place that had a charm all of its own, and Leonie wondered if she and Callum would ever go on the sightseeing tour that he had suggested, as their relationship felt as if it had been put on hold ever since the night when she’d cried out for her baby and left him totally uninformed as to who Benedict was or had been.
Their working relationship at the hospital was still the same, but he never came to call at the yurt or asked her out, and she had to console herself with the thought that at least they would be together socially at the christening, which was to take place in two weeks’ time.
The difference in their lives at present was that he had two special events to look forward to—the visit of his mother and stepfather in the near future and the christening—and she had none.
She viewed the baptism as an ordeal where she was going to be affected by the atmosphere and the words she would have to say, and with regard to the visit of his parents she had no joy of that kind to look forward to because she didn’t have her own.
The christening was to take place in an old stone church near to where Melissa and Ryan lived and where his first wife was buried, with the grave of Melissa’s grandmother close by, and on the Friday before the Sunday when it was to take place, as they were leaving the hospital, Callum said, ‘Are you sure you will be all right for the ceremony?’
‘Yes,’ she told him, ‘I would never do anything to upset Ryan and Melissa.’
‘Of course not. So I’ll call for you on Sunday morning. I need your advice on what kind of a gift to take. What is the usual thing for a christening?’
Heatherdale's Shy Nurse (Mills & Boon Medical) Page 12