West nodded, then picked up the laptop, clicked Send to queue it up for the instant the Wi-Fi established. “I’ll let you know when he responds. If he responds.”
“What if he doesn’t?”
He stood up, tucked the computer under his arm again, then mashed down a spot on her crazy hair to kiss her messy crown of curls.
“Cross that bridge when it gets here. I’m ready to work, so I’ll just be out there getting my schedule in order for the day, and I won’t leave the department until after the sat passes out of our orbit again.”
She nodded, and though he caught her looking at the ring, neither of them said a word about it, and he went out as he’d said, to get started with his day.
Reading something into either instance would make her stupid. Maybe his chain broke. Maybe he just wanted to help her so that they could work together with a little less stress for the months and months remaining of winter.
She couldn’t read anything into it. He still hadn’t sanctioned her plan to give part ownership of the vineyard to the village, which she was going to do. But she could wait. They had seven months, and she wasn’t giving up.
* * *
The rest of the day passed at an achingly slow pace. When the satellite had passed out of range, West had made sure she saw him packing the laptop back up and carrying it out with him as he went about chasing down his physicals.
If his plan worked, she might get her father back, sort of. Or at least get to tell him he didn’t have to run anymore. If it worked, it might change West’s mind about whether he could do anything but damage to the lives of those he loved and not view them as one more catastrophe waiting to happen.
If it worked, she might get her fiancé back.
If it didn’t? She’d be stuck waiting on Pai to come forward, or slip up so her investigators could find him. West would definitely not get over thinking he couldn’t be trusted with important, life-changing decisions.
The evening satellite had come and gone, and West stopped by her cabin long enough to let her know there had been no response, looking as glum as she felt. And no longer wearing the ring.
That night, she’d visited a bar to get a couple shots of whiskey in her, in honor of their lie, like an offering to the universe for a little help. It also helped her sleep.
The last thing she remembered doing was watching an aurora-free starry sky out of her window, thinking about how someone could fall in love with the sky, and the next she knew, someone was knocking at her door.
Like yesterday, she staggered out of bed and opened it to find West standing there. This time, he didn’t ask, just scooted right past her, opening the door wider and turning sideways to get into her cabin. “You overslept.”
“I did?” She closed the door, then swiveled to see the clock. Five minutes past seven a.m.
Her breath caught and she turned back to West, who was grinning and opening the laptop.
“He emailed?”
He actually laughed as he spun the laptop to show her. “He’s really mad.”
“Did he say where he was?”
At the last second, as she almost took the computer, he pulled back. “Keep in mind, that email was designed to make him angry enough to get in my grille about this plan.”
“I know.” She said the words before really considering what he meant by that warning. “He’s mad at me?”
“A bit.” That was underplaying it; the set of his mouth gave it away as he considered more fully how it might affect her. “Are you okay with that? You can choose not to read this, and I can give you highlights—well, the bits I can understand. His English isn’t as good as yours and he resorts to Portuguese in several places.”
“I’ve been waiting for months, I’m ready. I know we set him up to be mad.” She licked her lips, rubbed her eyes again to make sure the letters would be clear and held out her hands for the laptop.
Certain phrases stuck out, and mostly they were the ones in their native tongue, the one he could most effectively jab at her in. The email was written decidedly to her, but in the form of Tell my worthless daughter...
A few familiar jabs about her being a disappointment, and how much better his life would’ve been if she’d been a boy. Everyone’s life. Et cetera. Things designed to make her feel as badly as possible, but which had stopped having much power over her as she’d heard them so many times.
Suddenly, he took hold of the computer and pulled it right out of her hands to sit on the table. “Enough. I think you’ve seen enough. I’ll email back...”
Suddenly, him having sent those things to West was what tipped her over the edge from mildly dismayed to actually angry.
“Oh, no,” she said, snapping her fingers for him to hand it back. “I’ll write to him. Because you know what? He’s done way more damage to the family name than I ever could. I’m cleaning up his mess, like I always do. And you know what? I am going to have his bank access shut down. See how well he does without someone else’s work supporting him.”
At some point, she’d stood up, and now paced in the short space around the bed, West’s brows practically gone beneath the brim of his usual navy cap.
“Well, you know, maybe.” He waved a hand, then stood up. “Let’s just take a breath. Sit down. You don’t have to respond this minute.”
“Yes, I do. I have to send that email to my investigator so he can do whatever computer magic he does to trace it. Then go find him, and...and...”
“And what?”
“I don’t know!” She grunted and then flung her arms toward the ceiling before flopping her bum back onto the bed.
West didn’t sit beside her. He also didn’t let her reach for the laptop again, snagging her hands as she leaned and pulling them in front of himself as he squatted down to be more on eye level with her again.
“We made him angry, and now he’s lashing out. We made him angry so he’d talk, right?”
“It’s one thing to say those things to me. It’s another to say those things to you, and the implication that you were lowering yourself.”
“That must have been one of the Portuguese bits.”
“Yep,” she confirmed, then decided against translating anything else. “He didn’t have to say those things to you.”
“No, he didn’t. And you’re right to be angry, but if you respond to him angrily, there is no way to salvage this.” His voice was gentle, and when she looked at his hands again, her ring was back on his finger, where it had been yesterday when he wasn’t on duty. “An angry email is worse than no email at all. Send it to your investigator, and let it sit until you don’t want to break his heart in return.”
She wiggled one of her hands free so she could trace it around the ring. It worked; she’d asked him to break her father’s silence, and he’d done it.
“Forward it to me, and I’ll forward to my investigator. Though I don’t really know what I want him to do. Aside from go there and slap some sense into him.”
A couple of minutes later that had been sorted, but she still wanted to send him an email in all caps.
“Before this morning, what was it you wanted to happen with him? You said you wanted him to know everything was okay, and have his health checked, right? Did you see him having any part of the business in the future?”
“Yes, just not the work.”
“The pomp and ceremonies?” he asked.
She nodded.
“You can still have that. You’re not converting to a distillery. There is no MacIntyre Whiskey. Right?”
Again, she nodded. This time, he lifted her hands as he straightened from his squat, pulling her to her feet and directly into a tight hug.
“Remember, he isn’t himself. He might have been drunk when he emailed. He might be affected by his hypothyroidism. And he knows right where to hit you to make it hurt the most.”
To make sure he didn’t misunderstand, she squeezed him tight.
“Me, too,” came the soft reply, and a nuzzle in her hair.
“I want my ring back.”
He laughed at her grumpy demand, and although she was admittedly sulking and probably pouting, and definitely mentally picturing all the ways she wanted to scream at her father, West took the grumpy demand, let go of her and sunk right down to one knee.
She pushed the hood down on her fuzzy pink onesie, and splayed the fingers of her right hand expectantly, a smile starting to come back to her face as he twisted and tugged on the ring. “Are you going to say new words this time?”
“I might need to ask you to go get some of the ultrasound jelly...”
“It’s stuck?”
He licked his finger, gave another twisting yank and the intricate band finally slipped past his knuckle. “Sorry, it’s a little slobbered on.”
She wiggled her finger, anyway, laughing. “And many years from now, when our children ask to hear the story of how Pai proposed, we’ll sigh wistfully and say, ‘Sorry, it’s a little slobbered on.’”
“No, we’ve got time to come up with a better story than that.” He slipped it onto her finger, and it settled into the well-worn rut that had not yet filled back in. Comfortably back where it was supposed to have been. “Maybe something like this beautiful ring that we designed together represents the wonderful life and family we will build together.”
Words she’d painfully lobbed at him when she’d first arrived, but twisted to add new promises where promises had been broken.
She couldn’t think of anything to add, just shook her hands at him urgently until he stood up, and she launched herself at him, her arms flinging around his shoulders as she kissed the side of his neck and said one word, “Bed.”
“I thought you were supposed to say yes. Last time you said yes.” He chuckled at her, back to teasing as his arms wrapped eagerly around her.
“Yes,” she said, then, “Sim.” And, while backing toward the bed, “Bed—cama.”
He didn’t let go, the biggest smile on his face as they waddle-swayed back toward the thing. “We only have—” he paused to check the clock “—fifteen minutes before shift starts.”
“We can do a lot in fifteen minutes.” She let go of him just long enough to yank down the zipper on her onesie while his lips found her and he fumbled for his trousers.
EPILOGUE
One week later...
WEST STOOD WITH Lia and all nonessential personnel in the lounge, lights off, before a long bank of windows showing a midnight-dark late-afternoon sky.
“I’ve got another ten minutes before my window closes, have a call at seven I need to prepare for,” the captain said, casting a dubious eye toward the windows and the sky utterly devoid of aurora.
“If they don’t come, we’ll do it tomorrow,” West said, standing behind her, his arms wrapped around her heavily insulated body. Her wedding outfit was standard-issue red, and they were planning to make a mad dash out into the howling wind to say, “I do,” and kiss, just as soon as the first shock of color arrived.
She shook her head, and argued, “They’ll come. I have a good feeling.”
Everything else had come together, from the captain agreeing to the odd wedding, to the galley cooks baking a cake, to Eileen lending her metalsmithing skills to smelt and polish some tinfoil from a ripped out, unused section of ventilation to make West a proper, non-silicone-gasket ring.
The only thing that was missing was an internet connection, so Jordan and Zeke could witness from their sunny, Southern California beach. But she was recording it to upload once the satellite passed over.
Just after the captain had given the five-minute warning, the sky began to glow ever so faintly blue.
Someone shouted it out, and a stampede of red suits made for the nearest exit, funneling through. The sky was clear—it had to be to see them—but wind was an issue today. A blast smashed her into West as she turned to face him, and with them both grinning and gripping cold, gloveless hands, the captain began talking. Not that they could hear anything. They got their cues by him slapping one of them on the arm and making gestures and mouthing, “Do you?” at each in turn, and pausing for a nod. Finally, he jabbed a gloved finger at their hands, and they hurriedly crammed rings onto stiff unruly fingers as the sky finally lit up. A wave of blue undulating to purple and pink rippled past them, and while she still had her eyes toward the heavens, West grabbed her by the cheeks and got his kiss.
Three minutes flat, probably the fastest wedding in Antarctic history, and they all ran back inside, teeth chattering but big smiles. On their way to the cake, which was probably why everyone showed up, the guests formed lines from the door to the lounge, inside, and tossed homemade construction paper confetti at them—because no one was willing to waste dry-goods staples at the start of winter, but everyone wanted cake.
Much later, after they’d adjourned to the sauna to thaw out a little, and did their best to steam up the bubble window on the cabin they now shared, Lia lay with her cheek on his chest, her favorite position, and they watched the window, which had now gone dark and starry again.
“Aurora.” She said the first name that came to her mind of all the things she wanted to plan for.
“Where?”
“If we have a daughter her name should be Aurora.”
“And if it’s a boy?”
She squeezed his waist with the arm she always draped over it, then whispered, “Charlie.”
His chest dipped in sudden and quick, bouncing her head slightly as he felt for her hand, and squeezed. He didn’t say anything—he didn’t need to. She slid up to him, and hugged his head, pressing her cheek to his for as long as he needed it, and that was progress.
Just as she was giving up to comfort and exhaustion, she heard him whisper, “Amo-te.”
And she whispered back, “Always.”
* * *
If you missed the previous story in the Doctors Under the Stars duet, look out for
His Surgeon Under the Southern Lights
by Robin Gianna
And if you enjoyed this story, check out these other great reads from Amalie Berlin
Rescued by Her Rival
Healed Under the Mistletoe
Their Christmas to Remember
Back in Dr. Xenakis’ Arms
All available now!
Keep reading for an excerpt from The Nurse’s Christmas Temptation by Ann McIntosh.
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The Nurse’s Christmas Temptation
by Ann McIntosh
CHAPTER ONE
AT HER FIRST sight of Eilean Rurie, or Rurie Island, rising like a granite fist from an angry, frothing sea, Harmony Kinkaid gave a satisfied nod.
Rugged black cliffs fronted dismal light green hills wreathed in mist, and the overcast sky was giving everything a sad gray tone. Mizzly rain pattering down on the ferry deck in fits and starts elevated the entire scene to the epitome of dreary.
After the year she’d had, it was the perfect place for her.
Set in the sheltered curve of a sea loch, Eilean Rurie was just far enough from the west coast of Scotland to give Harmony the sense of leaving everything behind. Of course, she had no idea what she was facing once she got there. Being on a somewhat remote island and not knowing anyone would be out of her comfort zone, but she was determined to be up to the task.
The job had come up suddenly, but at just the right time. And when Caitlin, a friend from nursing school, had called out of the blue, Harmony hadn’t been able to help thinking it was a sign.
“Hey, I’m in the hospital in Fort William, and I won’t be able to go back to work on Eilean Rurie. Can you take over for me until Dr. MacRurie finds a permanent replacement?”
“What’s wrong?”
“Preeclampsia. They’ve put me on bedrest for the duration, and the island’s too remote to make it feasible for us to stay there. I know you’re in between jobs, and I hoped you’d be willing to fill in for me.”
Caitlin was expecting her first child, and Harmony had heard the stress in her usually placid friend’s voice. But before she’d been able to reply, Caitlin had continued.
Reunited in the Snow Page 17