Nonsense. She had no right to ask anything of him, and he had no need to answer.
Move on, he told himself harshly. Move on to Maggie?
He came out into the living room, expecting her to be there, but there was no sign of her. He’d come ahead with Betty, and he thought she’d have struggled back on her crutches. Apparently not.
He swore and went out again, to find her sitting on a low stone wall by the garden gate. Just sitting, staring into the night.
She should be in bed, too, and those wounds still needed dressing. He came up behind her and saw her shudder. Involuntarily his hands rested on her shoulders. She flinched, and then, unexpectedly, she leaned back into him.
‘She’ll go now,’ she whispered. ‘Thank you for caring for her.’
The night was growing more and more surreal. He’d turned into Gran’s treating doctor?
There was nothing for it but to agree. ‘I expect she will,’ he agreed. ‘Unless we get proactive.’
‘There’s no point. But today…It would have been a disaster without you.’
‘I suspect it was a disaster because of me,’ he said ruefully. ‘If I hadn’t driven around that bend…’
‘You had every right to drive around that bend.’
‘Come inside, Maggie,’ he said gently. ‘Can I carry you?’
‘No point,’ she said, and sighed. ‘Sorry. That sounded ungracious, but there’s not a lot of use in getting accustomed to leaning on anyone.’
Yet still she leaned on him.
‘You’re cold.’
‘I do need to go inside,’ she agreed with reluctance.
‘You don’t want to?’
‘I want to run,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so tired.’
He hesitated. There were things he should be doing. Carrying her inside, cleaning her face, strapping her knee, putting her to bed as he’d just put Gran.
But out here the stars were hanging low in the sky. From over at the haystack came a soft lowing as the calves settled down for the night. Angus would be with them. As Max had left, carrying Gran, he’d turned back and seen the elderly man settling onto the straw with an expression on his face that was almost joy. Angus and Bonnie wouldn’t be leaving their charges.
They wouldn’t be coming to the house to help Maggie, either.
How alone was this woman?
What was he doing? There was still something inside him yelling go no further, ask no questions, back off. He couldn’t. The old lady’s words were like a spell cast across the night. Take care of them.
It wouldn’t hurt, he conceded. For one night he could help, and maybe he could help by staying outside with her for a little. Instinctively he knew she didn’t want to go into the beautiful old house. No matter how Maggie had filled it with flowers, no matter how she’d fought to keep it lovely, for now age and infirmity had taken over, leaving an intangible air of impending sorrow.
His hands rested on her shoulders, gently, yet with a message he didn’t need to say. I’m with you, was his unspoken message. You’re not alone.
But he had to leave her for a moment. She was growing colder.
‘Wait,’ he said, and strode swiftly into the house, searching for what he needed. When he returned she hadn’t moved.
He set an eiderdown around her shoulders. He put another across her knees, tucking it under her, and then, because he had no taste for martyrdom, he wrapped a third around himself. Then he sat down beside her. Close.
‘That’s piles taken care of.’
‘Piles,’ she said, cautiously.
‘Never let your backside get cold,’ he said seriously. ‘First thing they should teach any medical student. Nasty things, piles.’
He felt rather than saw her smile, and felt also a tiny lifting of tension. Great. Those smile lines round her eyes had come from somewhere. He didn’t like it that they seemed to be getting rusty from disuse.
His arm wrapped around her waist and held. He could feel the warmth of her body through the eiderdown. That meant she could get warmth from him. That felt okay, too.
More than okay.
‘You want to explain the calves?’ he said, for want of a point to start. For a little while he didn’t think she’d answer, but then she started, staring out at the stars like her story was written there.
‘It’s Gran’s dream. The great plan. To get me back here, to have William’s son inherit the farm, to give Angus back his milking herd.’
‘William’s son,’ he said cautiously. ‘As in the little girl you’re incubating right now?’
‘Yeah, and Archibald turning into Annie’s the least of our problems. It’s all a bit of a dream,’ she said dryly. ‘Gran’s dream and my dream, all mixed up.’
‘Do you want to share?’
‘Do you want to listen?’ But then she seemed to catch herself. ‘Look, this is nothing to do with you. There are probably places you should be. To ask you to stay the night is big—to make you share any more is crazy.’
‘I’m not volunteering to fix anything,’ he said. ‘Just listen if you want to talk.’
And it seemed she did. She sighed and unconsciously leaned closer. ‘Okay, potted history. I’m English and so was William’s mother. William’s father—Betty’s son—is a hot-shot businessman who left the farm when he was eighteen, moved to England and has never been back. William was therefore brought up in London. We met as interns, we fell in love, we married, and we were typical Londoners. Only William used to talk about the Australian farm his parents had sent him to when they’d wanted to get rid of him over the school holidays. He spoke of an awesome gran, a fabulous farm and a wonderful community at Yandilagong. He kept saying we’d move here one day, set up practice, have bush kids.’
‘Dreaming?’
‘It was more than that,’ she said softly. ‘Neither of us had happy childhoods. The thought of a farm and country medicine and family sounded so magical we thought we’d get the training we needed and go. Only then Will died. I was miserable and alone, working in a dreary little haze, until I got a letter from Betty.’
‘Reigniting the dream?’
‘That’s a good way of putting it,’ she said, still staring out at the stars. Still letting her body share warmth with him. ‘I have no idea why Will told his father he’d stored sperm, or why his dad told Betty, but she knew. She wrote and said if I wanted to have Will’s baby then why not come here and live. She told me there’s a self-contained apartment at the back of the house so I could be as independent as I wanted. She could help with the baby. I could get a part-time job helping the doctor in town. She even enclosed a lovely letter from the Yandilagong doctor saying there was a vacancy here for as much work as I wanted.’
She gave a wry chuckle then, which made him think she should laugh more. Her laugh was rusty, with traces of bitterness, but still he liked it.
‘And so?’ he asked, and she sighed and the chuckle faded.
‘So then I got dreamy and impractical. I’d been in a fog of grief and apathy since Will died, and suddenly I thought why not? I don’t intend to marry again—not after the sort of heartache Will and I went through—but to have Will’s baby seemed like a giant leap into the future. I thought if it didn’t work out at the farm I could always leave. There’d be lots of jobs for part-time doctors in Australia. So I went through IVF in London and when I was four months pregnant I came.’
‘To find…’
‘What you see,’ she said, and he could tell she was trying hard now to keep bitterness at bay. ‘Betty’s here, and Angus. Angus is Betty’s son, Will’s uncle. Will had met his shy Uncle Angus who lived in a separate house on the farm, but he knew little about him. Now I realise how disabled he is. He has high-level Asperger’s, which means he’s intelligent enough to care for himself, but he’s pathologically afraid of the outside world. Betty’s been in and out of hospital for the last couple of years, and by himself Angus has let the farm fall apart. Betty’s had to sell the milking herd and half the
land to recoup, and she’s now terrified that when she dies he won’t be able to stay here. So her plan was to induce me to come, help her care for Angus, and work as a doctor while she minded the farm and the baby.’
‘But she must have been ill when she wrote to you.’
‘Yes, but she didn’t intend the chemotherapy not to work. Hope has to feed on something. So I walked straight into a mess, but by the time I’d been here for twenty-four hours I knew I couldn’t walk away. I am…I was William’s wife. William loved Betty. He loved this farm. To turn my back on them…I can’t.’
‘I see,’ he said slowly, and he did, and he was seeing chasms everywhere. He’d also seen the way she’d looked at Betty. Maggie’s husband had loved his grandmother. Like it or not, deception or not, Maggie’s allegiance was inviolate.
She was some woman. A feisty, loyal, doctor.
A woman to make his heart twist…
‘It’s not a great story,’ she said across his thoughts. ‘I…Thank you for listening.’
‘I wish there was more I could do.’
‘There isn’t.’ She hesitated. ‘So why gynaecology?’
‘Sorry?’ he said, startled.
‘I’ve told you mine. You tell me yours.’
‘We need to get those wounds dressed.’
‘You’ve been saying that for hours. Another ten minutes won’t hurt.’
‘There’s nothing to tell.’
‘I watched your face as you watched my baby. There’s shadows.’
‘My shadows are none of your business.’
‘They’re not,’ she agreed obligingly, and tugged her eiderdown closer and pushed herself to her feet. ‘Sorry. Of course I don’t want to know if you don’t want to tell me.’ She looked thoughtfully out to where he’d parked his car beside the last tractor in the row. ‘There’s probably a really logical reason, like gynaecology makes more money than obstetrics.’
‘So it does.’
‘And you can sleep uninterrupted at night.’
‘So I can.’
‘But that’s not the reason.’
How did she know? He couldn’t figure it out, but there was something about this night, something about this woman, that said only the truth would do. It was none of her business, but suddenly it was.
‘I lost my wife when she was six months pregnant,’ he said, and she plumped straight back down beside him. Close. Her hand took his and held it.
‘Oh, Max…’
‘Past history,’ he said. ‘Six years ago. A case of the doctor’s wife getting the worst care. I was an obstetrician. She died of pre-eclampsia.’
‘You’re saying it was your fault?’
‘I should have monitored her more closely.’
She frowned. ‘You wouldn’t have been the treating doctor. She’d have had her own obstetrician?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘So how often would you have checked her blood pressure if you’d been in charge?’ To his astonishment she was sounding indignant.
‘That’s not the point.’
‘It is. Unless you ignored swollen ankles and puffy hands and breathlessness and any of the other signs.’
‘She didn’t—’
‘She didn’t have obvious signs until too late,’ she finished for him, as if she knew. As indeed she might. ‘You know as well as I do that pre-eclampsia can move really fast. Terrifyingly fast. You’ll be pleased to know I take my own blood pressure twice a day, but I’m paranoid and if I was your wife and you tried to take mine twice a day I’d be telling you where you could put your cuff. Tell me about your wife. What was she called?’
‘Alice.’
‘That’s a lovely name,’ she said warmly. ‘Was she lovely?’
‘I…Yes.’ But he said it hesitantly. Sadly even. Aware that the memory of the lovely, laughing girl he’d met and married so long ago was fading. Aware that photographs of her were starting to superimpose themselves over real memory.
‘It’s awful, isn’t it?’ she said confidingly, breaking a silence that was starting to be too long. ‘You think you’ll remember for ever. You think how can you ever move on? It’s impossible. And all of a sudden…’ She paused, then gave herself a shake, tossing away thoughts she obviously didn’t want. ‘And your baby?’
‘A little boy. He lived for twenty-three hours.’
‘And you called him…’
‘Daniel,’ he said, and he was suddenly aware that it was the first time he’d said it since the funeral. Daniel. A tiny being, robbed of his mother; robbed of his life.
Odd that his memories of Alice were fading, yet the memory of that tiny part of him, Daniel cradled in his hands, his son, was still so strong. Still so gut-wrenchingly real.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, and the pressure of her hand was warm and strong. Maggie would certainly be a great doctor, he thought. Empathic and caring and…lovely?
Lovely. There it was again. It wasn’t a professional word, he thought, but it was in his head and it wouldn’t go away.
‘So?’ she said.
‘So I abandoned obstetrics, left England and came to Sydney to be a gynaecologist,’ he said, too briskly, and rose to his feet. ‘End of story. You need to go to bed.’ He sounded rougher than he’d intended.
‘I do,’ she admitted.
‘Let me carry you. That leg must be giving you hell.’
‘It’s not tickling,’ she admitted, and somewhat to his surprise she didn’t object as he gathered her up in her pile of eiderdowns.
‘Maybe it’s time we both moved on,’ she said as he carried her through the roses, and he didn’t disagree at all.
The fire was dying in the grate. He settled her on the settee again, loaded the fireplace with logs, found a can of soup, made them both soup and toast—he was hungry even if she wasn’t—and bullied her into eating.
Then, finally, he tended her face and her knee. And all the time…
Lovely.
The word kept echoing over and over.
Which was crazy. And impossible. She was seven months pregnant. He was mixing her up with his memories of Alice, he thought as he worked. He had Alice in his mind—that it was Alice he was helping, It was Alice he could save.
No!
But there were memories coming at him from everywhere and the only word that kept superimposing itself on all of them was…
Lovely.
He had the gentlest hands.
She was drifting. He was cleaning her face, carefully ridding it of every trace of dirt, then making it secure with wound-closure strips and dressings. Occasionally what he was doing hurt, but she hardly noticed.
His face was so close to hers. Intent on what he was doing. Careful.
Caring.
How long had it been since someone had cared for her? How long since someone had even opened a can of soup and made her toast?
It was an illusion, she told herself. This man was trapped by circumstances, in the same way she was trapped. The only difference was that tomorrow morning he’d leave and she’d stay.
But somehow the bleakness had lifted. For tonight she could let herself drift in this illusion of tenderness. She could look into his face as he worked, watch his eyes, abandon herself in their depths. Feel the strength and skill of his fingers. Watch his concern.
He was worried about her. She should reassure him, she thought. She should say she had things under control, everything was fine, that she’d bounce up in the morning like Tigger. As she’d bounced before.
Only right now she didn’t feel like Tigger. Surprisingly, though, neither did she feel like Eeyore, for who could feel sorry for herself when a doctor like Max Ashton was right in front of her? He was so close she could take his face between her hands and…
And nothing. Get a grip, she told herself, and something in her face must have changed because Max’s hands lifted away and his brows snapped downward.
‘Did I hurt you?’
‘I…No. I believe I’m nearly
asleep.’
‘I need to wash your knee.’
‘Go right ahead.’
‘You want to wriggle out of what’s left of those jeans?’
‘I can do that,’ she said with an attempt at dignity, and then tried and it didn’t work, and when Max gave up watching and helped she was pleased. Only then his hands were on her thighs and she thought that was pretty good, too.
Whoa. Keep it in focus, Maggie. He was a doctor and she was a patient.
She felt like she was drifting on painkillers, yet she’d had nothing. She felt drifty and lovely, and like it was entirely right that she was lying half-naked on a settee in front of a roaring fire with the man of her dreams taking her leg in his hands.
The man of her dreams?
‘Ouch!’
Yikes, that brought her down to earth. Earth to Maggie? It was about time contact was made.
‘Sorry,’ he said ruefully. ‘But it’s not looking as bad as I thought.’
‘Good,’ she said sleepily. ‘Excellent.’
‘Have you been worrying?’ he asked, sounding bemused.
‘I guess I’ll worry if it’s about to drop off,’ she said. ‘Speaking of dropping off…’
‘You want me to carry you to bed?’
‘I’m fine here.’ The thought of going out to her apartment at the back of the house seemed suddenly unbearable.
‘You are fine,’ he told her. ‘Some of that initial swelling’s already subsiding. I think you’ve simply given this one heck of a bang. I suspect the X-ray tomorrow will show a nice big haematoma at the back of the knee and nothing else.’
‘Excellent. Then life can get back to normal.’ She hesitated. ‘You know, I don’t really need you to stay.’
‘I need to stay,’ he said. ‘You banged your head, you shook your daughter about and you need to be in hospital under observation. If that’s not possible, you’re stuck with me.’
‘Or you’re stuck with us. I’m sorry.’
‘Forget it,’ he said roughly, and then looked contrite. ‘Sorry. ‘It’s okay, though. Just forget the sorry and think of it as one colleague helping another. You look like you need far more help than I can possibly give, but one night out of my life isn’t much.’
City Surgeon, Small Town Miracle / Bachelor Dad, Girl Next Door Page 6