Best Friend to Perfect Bride (Contemporary Medical Romance)

by Jennifer Taylor

  Mac grinned at her as he sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘What’s your teddy’s name? I have a bear just like him and he’s called Bruno.’

  ‘William.’ Chloe gave the bear a hug. ‘He’s my best friend and I take him everywhere.’

  ‘I expect he enjoys it.’ Mac took hold of the bear’s paw and solemnly shook it. ‘It’s nice to meet you, William. My name’s Dr Mac.’

  Chloe giggled at this piece of nonsense, but Mac knew that it was important to gain her trust. He smiled at her again. ‘So, now the introductions are over, I need to ask you some questions, Chloe. There are no right or wrong answers, mind you. And if you want William to help you then that’s also fine. OK?’

  ‘OK,’ Chloe agreed happily.

  ‘So, Chloe, have you noticed that sometimes you don’t seem quite as steady on your feet as normal and fall over?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ Chloe murmured. She glanced at her mother then hurried on. ‘It happened in school the other day. I got up to fetch a piece of paper to do some painting and fell over. Teacher thought I was messing about and told me off.’

  ‘I see.’ Mac glanced at Bella and saw her nod. Poor balance could point towards a disturbance to the function of the cerebellum and was often an indication of a tumour. Although he hoped with all his heart it wasn’t that, it was looking increasingly likely.

  ‘And have you found it difficult to walk sometimes, as though your feet don’t want to do what you tell them to?’ he continued gently.

  ‘Yes. Sometimes they keep going the wrong way,’ Chloe told him guilelessly.

  ‘I’m sorry, Doctor, but what has this got to do with Chloe’s headaches?’ Donna Adams demanded.

  ‘It all helps to build up a picture of what might be wrong with Chloe,’ Mac explained, not wanting to go into detail just yet. If their suspicions were correct then there would be time enough for the poor woman to face the fact that her child was seriously ill. He stood up and smiled at Chloe. ‘I’m going to send you for a special scan, Chloe, so we can see what’s happening inside your head. I just need to make a phone call first and then the porter will take you and your mum downstairs to have it done.’

  ‘Will it take long?’ Donna Adams asked anxiously. ‘Only I’ve got to get the others ready for school. They’re with my neighbour at the moment but I can’t expect her to see to them. She’s in her eighties and it’s far too much for her.’

  ‘The scan itself won’t take very long,’ Bella said gently. ‘However, Chloe will need to stay here until we get the results back. Is there anyone else you can contact who could see to the children?’

  ‘No.’ Donna’s tone was bitter. ‘There’s nobody since their dad upped and left.’ She glanced at her daughter and sighed. ‘They’ll just have to miss school today, I suppose.’

  Mac didn’t say anything as he followed Bella from the cubicle, but it didn’t mean that he wasn’t thinking it. Breaking promises was a definite no-no in his view. He only had to recall his own father’s despair after his mother had walked out on them to know that it was something he would never do. If he ever made a commitment then he would stick to it, no matter what.

  He glanced at Bella and could tell from her expression that she knew what he was thinking, but it was hard luck. Letting Tim down the way she had was beyond the pale, in his opinion. She had promised to love and cherish Tim for the rest of her days but she hadn’t meant it. She couldn’t have done if at the first sign of trouble she had turned her back on him. He felt guilty enough about not being there when Tim had needed his support, even though he’d had no idea what his friend had been going through. However, Bella had been there and, as Tim’s wife, she should have been the one person he could rely on. It was little wonder that his friend was so devastated.

  Mac’s mouth thinned as he followed her into the office. Maybe it was unfair of him to be so judgemental but he had always considered Bella to be the ideal woman. Not only was she beautiful, but she was highly intelligent too. Although he had been deeply attracted to her when they had met at Cambridge, he had been ever so slightly in awe of her as well. The fact that she had kept herself aloof from the rest of their class had only added to her allure, in fact.

  He had never been the reticent type. His upbringing, on a council estate on the outskirts of Manchester, hadn’t allowed for such luxury. He had learned early on that he needed to be tough to survive, focused and determined if he hoped to achieve his goal of becoming a doctor. Bella had been very different from the girls he had known at home, different too from the rest of the women in their year at university. Although many of them had come from privileged backgrounds too, Bella had stood out: her perfection had made her special. To discover that she wasn’t perfect after all had hit him hard. For all these years he had put her on a pedestal but the truth was that Bella was just a woman like any other, a woman who could make and break promises. She wasn’t special. And she wasn’t out of his league, as he had always believed.

  Mac frowned. It was the first time that thought had crossed his mind and he didn’t like it. Not one little bit. Or the one that followed it. There was nothing to stop him making a play for Bella now.

  * * *

  Sadly, the results of Chloe’s scan only confirmed their suspicions. Bella sighed as she studied the monitor. ‘There’s no doubt about it, is there? That’s definitely a tumour.’

  ‘It is.’

  Mac leant forward to get a better look and she tensed when his shoulder brushed against hers. She moved aside, not enjoying the fact that her heart seemed to be beating far faster than it normally did. She cleared her throat. The last thing she needed was Mac thinking that he had any kind of effect on her.

  ‘It’s probably a medulloblastoma, wouldn’t you say? That’s one of the most common types of brain tumour that occur in children.’

  ‘Oh, yes. The fact that it’s arisen in the cerebellum makes it almost a certainty,’ he concurred.

  ‘Chloe’s going to need immediate treatment,’ Bella said, focusing on their patient in the hope that it would stop her thoughts wandering again. Maybe she did seem to be unusually aware of Mac, but that was only to be expected. Ever since she’d heard he was back in England, she had been on edge. After all, Mac was Tim’s best friend and it must be hard for him to accept what had happened. It was bound to lead to a certain degree of...well, tension between them. The thought was reassuring and she hurried on.

  ‘From what I’ve read, medulloblastomas can grow very rapidly and spread to other parts of the brain as well as to the spinal cord.’

  ‘That’s right. Chloe needs to be seen by an oncologist ASAP so we shall have to set that up. She’ll probably need radiotherapy as well as chemotherapy if she’s to have any chance of surviving this.’ He shook his head and Bella saw the sorrow in his eyes. ‘I feel sorry for her mother. It’s going to be a huge shock for her.’

  ‘It will be a lot for her to deal with, especially with having the other children to look after,’ Bella agreed quietly. ‘Just travelling back and forth to hospital while Chloe receives treatment will be a major task with her not having any backup.’

  ‘It will.’

  Mac’s tone was flat. Although there was no hint of censure in his voice, Bella knew that he was thinking about the way she had seemingly deserted Tim in his hour of need. The urge to tell him the truth—the real truth, not the version that Tim was determined to tell everyone—was very strong but she refused to go down that path. It wouldn’t improve Mac’s opinion of her if she tried to apportion blame; it could have the opposite effect, in fact.

  It was hard to accept that there was very little she could do, but Bella knew there was no point agonising about it. Switching off the monitor, she turned to leave the office. ‘I’ll go and have a word with Mrs Adams,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘The sooner she knows what’s going on, the better.’

  �
��Fine. Do you want me to phone Oncology and start the ball rolling?’ Mac offered, following her out to the corridor.

  ‘If you wouldn’t mind... Oh, they’ve got a new phone number. They’re starting the refurbishments today so they’ve moved temporarily into the old building. I’ll get it for you.’ Bella went to go back into the office and staggered when she cannoned into Mac.

  ‘Sorry.’ He grinned as he set her safely back on her feet. ‘I didn’t expect you to turn round so suddenly, or that’s my excuse, anyway. It’s got nothing whatsoever to do with me being born clumsy!’

  ‘No harm done,’ she assured him, although she could feel heat flowing from the point where his hands were gripping her shoulders. She stepped back, setting some much-needed space between them, or much-needed by her, at least. Mac appeared unmoved by the contact. ‘Janet should have Oncology’s new number, now that I think about it,’ she said, hastily squashing that thought. ‘Let me know what they say, won’t you?’

  ‘Will do.’

  He sketched her a wave as he headed to Reception. Bella watched until he disappeared from sight then made her way to the cubicles. She wasn’t looking forward to the next few minutes. Breaking bad news to a parent was always difficult and one of the few things she disliked about her job...

  Her breath caught as she felt the heat finally consume her entire body. It felt as though she was on fire, burning up, inside and out, and all because Mac had touched her. She couldn’t recall ever feeling this way before, couldn’t remember when the touch of a man’s hands had set her alight, not even when Tim had made love to her. What did it mean? Or didn’t it mean anything really? Was it simply the lack of intimacy that had made her so susceptible all of a sudden?

  Once Tim had become hooked on the painkillers, they had stopped making love. He hadn’t been interested in anything apart from where his next fix was coming from and she hadn’t been able to stand the thought of them being intimate when it wouldn’t have meant anything. It was almost two years since they had slept together and there had been nobody else since, or at least not for her. Was that why she felt so aware of her body all of a sudden, so emotionally charged? It wasn’t Mac’s touch per se that had aroused her but the fact that she had been denied an outlet for her feelings for such a long time?

  Bella told herself that it was the real explanation; however, as she entered the cubicle, she knew in her heart that it was only partly true. Maybe the lack of intimacy was a contributing factor but she doubted if she would have reacted this way if another man had touched her the way Mac had done. The truth was that she had always been aware of him even though they had never been anything more than friends. There was something about him that she responded to, even though she had refused to acknowledge it. It made her see just how careful she needed to be. The last thing she wanted was to start craving Mac’s touch when it was obvious how he felt about her.

  CHAPTER TWO

  IT WAS A busy day but Mac enjoyed every second. Although he had worked in emergency medicine for some time, paediatric emergency care on this scale was a whole new ball game. The newly opened paediatric A&E unit accepted patients from a wide area and not just from Dalverston itself. Built on a separate site to the main hospital, it boasted the most up-to-date facilities available. Everything was geared up for children, from the bright and airy waiting room, which sported comfortable couches rather than the usual hard plastic chairs, to the on-site Radiography unit. X-rays, CT and MRI scans were all carried out in rooms that had been made as child-friendly as possible. Colourful murals adorned the walls and the staff wore brightly coloured polo shirts instead of their usual uniforms. Even the gowns the children were given to wear were printed with cartoon characters and had easy-to-fasten Velcro tabs instead of fiddly ties.

  Whilst Mac knew that all these things were incidentals, they helped to put the children at their ease and that, in turn, helped him and the rest of the team do their job. By the time his shift ended, he knew that he was going to enjoy working there. Not only would it allow him to develop his skills in paediatric medicine, but it promised to be a fun place to work too. Several of the nurses were leaving at the same time as him so he held the door open for them, bowing low as they all trooped past.

  ‘After you, ladies,’ he said, grinning up at them.

  ‘Thank you, my man,’ one of them replied, sticking her nose into the air as she sallied forth.

  They all laughed, Mac included, and it was a pleasant change to enjoy a bit of light-hearted banter. He hadn’t been overstating how bad things had been on his most recent aid mission. It had been extremely grim at times and it was a relief to feel that he could legitimately enjoy himself, even though he didn’t regret going and would do the same thing again if it were necessary. He often thought that he had the best of both worlds: he got to help people who were in dire need of his skills and he also had a job he loved to come back to. There was nothing else he could wish for...except, maybe, someone to share his life.

  ‘Thank you.’

  The cool tones brought him up short. Mac straightened abruptly when he recognised Bella’s voice, feeling decidedly awkward at being caught on the hop. Although he and Bella had spoken several times during the day, their conversations had been confined to work. He had made sure of it, in fact. Although he had promised himself that he wouldn’t say anything to her about Tim, he had realised how hard it was going to be to bite his tongue. Bella had let Tim down. Badly. And it was painful to know that she was capable of such behaviour when he had expected so much more from her.

  ‘You’re welcome.’ He forced himself to smile even though his insides were churning with all the conflicting emotions. On the one hand he knew it was none of his business, yet on the other it still hurt to know that she had fallen so far short of the picture he had held of her. ‘It’s been a busy day, hasn’t it?’ he said, struggling to get his feelings in check. It wouldn’t serve any purpose whatsoever to tell her how disappointed he felt, how let down. After all, why should she care how he felt when she obviously didn’t care about Tim?

  ‘It has. We’re seeing more and more children now that word has spread that we’re open. Obviously, the other hospitals know we’re up and running, but it’s the parents bringing in their children that has made the difference.’

  She gave a little shrug, immediately drawing his eyes to the slender lines of her body, elegantly encased in an emerald-green coat that he knew without needing to be told was from some exclusive designer’s collection. Bella had money—a great deal of money that she had been left by her grandparents—and it showed in the way she dressed, even though she had never flaunted her wealth. It was a tiny point in her favour and Mac found himself clinging to it. Maybe it was silly but he wanted to find something good about her, something to redress the balance a little. His smile was less forced this time.

  ‘It must take the pressure off the other A&E departments if more kids are being treated here. That can only be a good thing.’

  ‘Yes, although so many A&E units have closed that the ones which are left are still under a great deal of pressure.’

  Bella headed towards the car park, making it clear that she didn’t expect Mac to accompany her. He hesitated, wondering why he felt so ambivalent all of a sudden. He had been planning an evening doing nothing more taxing than watching television. It was what he needed, some downtime after the hectic couple of months he’d had and yet, surprisingly, he was loath to spend the evening slumped in front of the box. He came to a swift decision even though his brain was telling him that he was making a mistake.

  ‘Do you fancy grabbing a bite to eat?’ he said as he caught up with her. He saw the surprise on her face when she glanced round but he ignored it. For some reason he didn’t intend to examine too closely, he wanted to spend the evening with her. ‘Nothing fancy, just a curry or something.’

  ‘I don’t know if it’s a good id
ea.’ She stopped and looked him straight in the eyes and he could see the challenge in her gaze. ‘It’s obvious how you feel, Mac. You blame me for what’s happened, don’t you?’

  ‘So why don’t you set the record straight and tell me your side of the story?’

  He shrugged, wishing he felt as indifferent as he was trying to make out. Maybe he was wrong to blame her, but he couldn’t help it when he felt so let down. For all these years he had considered her to be the model of perfection and he didn’t want to have to change his view of her, especially when he sensed that it could have repercussions. Now that Bella had fallen from her pedestal, she was just a woman like any other. A woman he had always been deeply attracted to.

  The thought made his insides churn and he hurried on. ‘It seems only fair to me.’

  ‘Sorry, but it isn’t going to happen. I have no intention of trying to justify myself to you or to anyone else.’

  She carried on walking, ignoring him as she got into her car. Mac stared after her, wondering why she was being so stubborn. Leaving aside his reasons for wanting to get at the truth, surely it would make sense for her to explain why she had called time on her marriage? Nobody liked being blamed for something they hadn’t done and Bella must be no different...

  Unless the truth was that she was too embarrassed to admit that she had been at fault.

  Mac’s mouth thinned as he watched her drive away. Bella knew that she had been wrong to abandon Tim when he had needed her so desperately and that was why she couldn’t face the thought of talking about it. Although his opinion of her had already dropped way down the scale, it slid even further. Bella was a long way from being perfect, it seemed.

  * * *

  Bella spent a miserable evening. Not even the latest bestseller could take her mind off what had happened. Should she have done as Mac had suggested and told him her version—the real version—about what had gone on?