To the Doctor: A Daughter

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To the Doctor: A Daughter Page 14

by Marion Lennox


  ‘I don’t know…’

  ‘OK, don’t worry about it. Let’s get you onto a stretcher.’

  Gemma helped, and Nate let her. OK, she was slight but she knew what she was doing. Moving a patient with suspected spinal injuries was a skill in itself. Nate directed with care, until he had Ian safely onto a rigid stretcher.

  ‘Great.’

  ‘Do we need an air ambulance?’ Gemma whispered out of Ian’s hearing. ‘If there’s spinal compression…’

  ‘I’ve got one on standby.’ He hesitated and then took a knife from his bag and sliced off the man’s boots. He’s done this before, Gemma thought. As a country GP he’d be the one who had to cope with trauma. With the boots discarded he put a hand on Ian’s shoulder, prodding him into wakefulness.

  ‘Ian, can you hear me?’

  ‘Mmm.’ Ian opened his eyes. ‘Yeah. You sound a long way off.’

  ‘Can you wiggle your toes for me? Try.’

  They all stared at the farmer’s grubby socks as if they were the most important things in the world.

  And blessedly, miraculously, they wiggled.

  ‘That’s great,’ Nate said, and there was a tremor of raw emotion in his voice. They weren’t looking at quadriplegia here, then. ‘And your fingers?’

  Once again, there was a shaky wiggle.

  ‘Geez, my back hurts…’ Ian whispered. He closed his eyes and was almost immediately asleep again.

  ‘Let’s keep the air ambulance on standby.’ Nate straightened. ‘We’ll take him in and give him an X-ray but with luck he’ll be more bruised than broken.’ He nodded to the men at the ends of the stretcher. ‘OK, boys, load him into the ambulance. And, Gemma…’

  ‘I’ll take your car if you want to go in the ambulance.’ The local ambulance was manned by volunteers-which was why it had taken so long to get there. The ambulance officers were a plumber and a schoolteacher respectively. They had first-aid training and nothing else.

  But there was no way Nate was letting Gemma drive herself-or do anything herself. ‘Nope.’ He threw his car keys to the fire chief. ‘We both go in the ambulance,’ he told her. ‘And you, Dr Campbell, will go lying down.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘If you don’t lie down you’ll fall down,’ he told her, and she realised suddenly that what he was saying was the truth. Reaction was setting in and her knees were threatening to give way. ‘OK.’ He looked down at her and he smiled-and what a smile! It was a smile she’d never seen in her life before.

  ‘What…what?’

  She was too tired, too battered to think. All she knew was that Nate’s arm was around her and she was where she most wanted to be in the world.

  ‘How’s my patient?’

  ‘You mean me?’ Gemma woke to confusion and found Nate smiling down at her.

  ‘Who else would I mean?’

  For a moment she was thoroughly confused. She was lying in her gorgeous four-poster bed. Mrs McCurdle had taken charge when she’d arrived home, clucking like a mother hen. Then Jane had arrived. ‘OK, I’m on night duty but when something like this happens we all come in-and there’s enough staff without me sticking my oar in.’ Together they’d washed Gemma’s scratches, applied enough sticking plaster to provide a small assembly line with a week’s work and settled her under the bedcovers.

  ‘I don’t want to be here,’ she’d said, distressed, and Jane had fixed her with a look.

  ‘Dr Ethan says if you try and move we’re to sit on you.’

  ‘I should be helping.’

  ‘The pilot’s dead,’ Jane had told her bluntly. ‘He’s beyond help. And Ian’s being taken through to X-ray right now. If Dr Ethan needs you then he’ll call, but for the moment we’re under instructions to keep you where you are.’

  So Gemma lay and fretted, wanting to get up but aware at the same time that she was trembling all over. Mrs McCurdle provided hot tea and hot-water bottles but Gemma still couldn’t get warm.

  And then Nate arrived, crossing swiftly to the bed, and her heart started hammering even harder than it had when she’d thought she might die.

  ‘Gemma…’ There was such tenderness in his voice that it made her blink. He sounded…different.

  ‘How goes it?’ Why wouldn’t her voice work properly? She tried again. ‘Ian…’

  ‘Ian is going to be OK. He’s one very lucky farmer.’ Nate sank onto her bed and lifted her hand, linking her fingers with his. It was a gesture of comfort, she told herself. Nothing more. So there was no reason at all for her heart to hammer even harder. ‘The X-rays show a green-stick fracture of his forearm and a couple of broken ribs. That’s all. His spine is only bruised-the numbness was temporary, caused by the blow, and now it’s completely gone. That’s not to say he won’t be sorry for himself for a good long while-that was a huge beam that slammed down on him. Graham and I have stitched his head, strapped his ribs and set his fracture and now he’s fast asleep. Like you should be.’

  ‘I’m not sleepy.’

  He smiled down at her, with that smile that had her heart doing somersaults. ‘How about if I give you something to make you sleep?’

  ‘No. I should get up. Cady…’

  ‘Milly’s mother collected Cady an hour ago and has taken him out to have a party tea.’

  ‘Wh-why?’

  ‘Because she heard what was happening, of course. That’s what country practice is all about, Gemma. People looking after their own.’

  And still his hand held hers. People looking after their own. That was how she felt, she thought, and it was the strangest sensation. Like she was cherished.

  People didn’t cherish the likes of Gemma Campbell.

  ‘You realise you saved Ian’s life?’

  ‘I didn’t-’

  ‘He’d have bled to death in there, Gemma. You risked your life to save him. In fact, you risked your life to save us. Going near that damned power pole… And the community knows it. Ian’s wife is with him now. She’d normally have been in the dairy with him but she’d taken the kids to the city, shopping, so there’s another little miracle for you. She’s ready to fall on your chest with gratitude.’

  ‘I don’t-’

  ‘You don’t think you’re up to having anyone falling on your chest?’

  ‘Um, no,’ she managed, and he chuckled.

  ‘Jane says a couple of your scratches are deep. Can I see?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’m a doctor.’

  ‘Yeah, and so am I,’ she said with a note of asperity. ‘I can check my own scratches, thank you very much.’ The scratches Jane was talking about were in places she wasn’t having this man look at in a million years.

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘Gemma…’

  ‘Mmm.’ She was still defensive. Still trying desperately to maintain an armour plating round her heart. What was it with this man? He just had to look at her and she felt like jelly.

  ‘Gemma, when that iron shifted…when you were underneath…’

  ‘It wasn’t a good moment,’ she admitted, and Nate closed his eyes.

  ‘No, Gemma. It wasn’t a good moment. It made me see…’ Nate hesitated, and the grip on her hand tightened. He opened his eyes but he wasn’t looking at her. It was as if he was looking into an abyss. ‘It made me see how much…how much you’re starting to mean to me.’

  ‘I don’t-’

  ‘No, let me finish.’ He did look at her then, his dark eyes meeting hers and holding her gaze. ‘When I asked you to marry me…I was stupid.’

  ‘Well, there’s one thing we agree on,’ she whispered, but he shook his head.

  ‘No. I wasn’t stupid for asking you to marry me. In fact, I’ve never done anything so sensible in my life. But I was stupid when I thought that we could lead separate, independent lives.’

  ‘Nate-’

  ‘No, let me finish.’ He’d been shaken to the core. There was emotion in his voice-Nate Ethan had been thrown right off
track and he was trying to make sense of it. ‘My parents didn’t have a good marriage. They had…well, I guess it could be called a marriage of convenience. My mother was a society hostess and my father was a brilliant surgeon. The role model they gave me was a marriage where the partners only came together as a matter of convenience. And I thought, well, for a long time that was what I thought should happen to me. Sure the life they led left me cold-that was why I turned to country medicine. But as for contact…as for loving…’

  ‘Nate, you’re shaken up.’ Somehow Gemma managed to make sense of this. Somehow. ‘You’ve had a shock. You’ve had two weeks of shocks. You learned that you have a baby. You’ve seen a man killed and you’ve been traumatised by this afternoon’s events. Now’s not the time to be saying-’

  ‘Now is the time to be saying. Marriage as a convenience… I must have been mad. It was only because I hadn’t yet met the right woman. And now I have. Hell, Gemma, I think I’m in love with you.’

  There. The thing was said and it was out in the open.

  He couldn’t believe he’d said it.

  He looked…astonished, Gemma thought. As if he didn’t believe he was capable of such a thing.

  He loved her?

  People didn’t love Gemma Campbell.

  ‘Nate, you’ve had a fright,’ she said wearily. ‘You’ll see things differently in the morning.’

  ‘I won’t.’

  She shrugged. There was a tiny part of her-a small warm core of her-that wanted to say yes! That wanted to accept every protestation this man could make. That wanted to take his face between her scratched hands and kiss him and kiss him…

  To make him hers.

  What was she thinking of? She wasn’t free to love this man. She couldn’t take him even if she wanted him.

  ‘Gemma…’ His hands were on her face, forcing her eyes to meet his. A girl could drown in those eyes, she thought drearily. If she could just let herself…

  No. She’d let him kiss her once and that way could only lead to disaster. Somehow she had to pull back-to make him see.

  ‘Nate, I don’t want this.’

  ‘You do.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not? It could be so great. You and me…’

  ‘No!’

  ‘You’re tired.’ His eyes were searching hers, puzzled and concerned. He didn’t understand. Well, why should he? She barely understood herself.

  She was tired. Right, that was it. She was tired. ‘Yes.’ It sounded pathetic. She sounded pathetic.

  ‘We’ll talk in the morning.’

  ‘Yes.’ Maybe in the morning she’d have herself together. She’d have her armour back in place.

  But she so wanted to kiss him.

  ‘You’d better go…’

  ‘Mmm.’ But he didn’t. His hands were still holding her face. He gazed down at her for a long, long minute and then very slowly he lowered his mouth onto hers.

  She should refuse. She should push him away-shove-do anything but let herself sink into that kiss.

  But she was no longer capable of fighting. She was no longer capable of pushing him away. Because suddenly there was nothing in this world except Nate. Nate holding her, Nate’s eyes searching hers, Nate’s mouth pressing against hers… Her brain told her to push this man away but her brain wasn’t the major force any more.

  So what was? She didn’t know. All she knew was that it was a force as strong as life itself. Man meeting woman and merging with passion and with love. She wanted to push him away but her arms wouldn’t work. Nothing worked. Only the need of him-the want.

  The love.

  She gave a tiny moan and tried again to break away but it must have felt like encouragement to the man who’d gathered her in his arms. He was deepening the kiss. Searching her mouth. Searching her soul…

  He felt so good. So right. The only thing in her world was Nate. His hands, his mouth and his body.

  Nate.

  Her body was aching for him. Her lips-her breasts-her thighs. In his arms the dangers of the day faded to nothing. Here was her life. Here was her home.

  He’d said he loved her!

  She should fight but was no longer capable of fighting. For this one wonderful interlude she abandoned herself to his kiss. Glorying in the fact that she could be loved. She, Gemma…

  There was a knock on the door.

  Hell!

  They pulled apart. Somehow they pulled apart-just. Inches only. Gemma looked up at the man beside her, and her face was dazed with confusion.

  And Nate’s expression mirrored hers.

  But the knocking continued. ‘Yes?’ Nate’s voice was distant, as if the outside world had nothing to do with what was happening here.

  But the outside world was intent on intrusion. Jane was peering around the door and her expression was rueful. It was as if she knew what she’d interrupted and she hated doing it.

  ‘Gemma?’

  ‘Mmm.’ Gemma was still looking at Nate.

  ‘There’s a man outside who wants to see you,’ she said, and her voice was tinged with uncertainty. ‘Gemma, he says he’s your husband.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  WHAT the hell…?

  Nate made his way back to the wards, his head spinning. He’d only had a glimpse of the man waiting to see Gemma-a big man in his early thirties, smoothly dressed and immaculately groomed. He was wearing a three-piece suit, Italian cut and expensive. Nate hadn’t liked what he’d seen-but he wasn’t in the mood for liking.

  Gemma’s husband.

  She hadn’t said she was still married.

  Or had she?

  Maybe he’d just assumed it was over. He’d never thought there could possibly be a man in the wings waiting to claim her.

  ‘Is something wrong?’ He started as Graham’s hand came down on his shoulder and he wheeled to face the older man. He didn’t want to face anyone-especially not someone whose eyes saw as much as Graham’s did.

  ‘No.’

  But Graham did see. Sort of. He knew enough to sense that something was troubling Nate. Something more than the tragedy of the afternoon. And what he had to ask wouldn’t make things easier. ‘They’ve brought the pilot in. You want to get this over with?’

  Great. A post-mortem. Just what he needed to finish off a perfect day.

  ‘Hell.’

  ‘I can do it myself.’

  He collected himself at that. Post-mortems in this community were the devil. Everyone knew everyone-there was no such thing as an autopsy on a stranger.

  ‘If you’re really cut up we could send him to Blairglen,’ Graham suggested. ‘But Olive…’

  Hector’s wife. Olive.

  ‘She’d like him to stay here,’ Graham said softly. He was watching Nate’s face, trying to figure out what was troubling him. Was it this useless death-or something more?

  Something more, he decided. Gemma?

  ‘Let’s do it,’ Nate snapped before Graham could think further. ‘Hell. I don’t want to do this.’

  ‘Neither do I.’

  ‘Then let’s get it over with.’

  The post-mortem was bad enough. The interview with Olive afterwards was worse.

  ‘The fool.’ She was so angry she was nearly spitting. Grief would come later, Nate knew, but for now all she could see was the waste. ‘That damned boundary dispute. It consumed him. They said he was trying to spook Ian’s cows when he flew into power lines. The fool. Oh, the damned fool…’

  ‘He died instantly,’ Nate told her, knowing that she’d hear and that later it would provide a modicum of comfort.

  ‘You think I care?’

  ‘I think you care,’ he said gently, and propelled her into a chair.

  ‘The damned feud…and he’s left me for it.’

  ‘I’m sure he didn’t mean-’

  ‘He didn’t mean to kill himself, but he meant nothing but mischief. And I loved him.’ She raised tear-drenched eyes to Nate and gulped back a body-wrenching sob. ‘I loved him. W
hat am I going to do now?’

  And that was the whole trouble, Nate thought as he caught up with the medical needs of the little community-the firefighter who’d ripped his leg on a piece of roofing iron, the dead pilot’s mother needing tranquillisers to get her through the first awful spasm of grief, Ian needing more painkillers and reassurance, and his wife and children to counsel.

  The phrase kept running over and over in his head. I loved him. What am I going to do now?

  He changed the one word.

  I loved her. What am I going to do now?

  Then he realised he had the tense wrong.

  I love her.

  How had he got himself into this mess? He’d never planned to fall in love. He didn’t know how on earth it had happened.

  At nine o’clock Sandra Jefferson returned with a very sleepy-and very contented-Cady. ‘They’ve had a wonderful time,’ she told him. ‘Any time you want Cady looked after, feel free to call on me. He and Milly get on so well-it’s just lovely.’

  It was lovely.

  What would happen now? Nate wondered as he took Cady’s sugar levels and gave him his nightly dose of insulin. He really was the best kid-he didn’t protest at all. He’d adjusted very easily to his new regime.

  The thought of losing him was almost as wrenching as the thought of losing Gemma.

  Hell, what was happening to him? Had he fallen for Cady as well as Gemma? What was it?

  Why should he care?

  But he did. Would Cady return to the city? And what on earth was happening with Gemma? Why had she decided to stay in the first place if she had a husband?

  With Cady snuggled up fast asleep, Nate checked his daughter and found she was also sleeping and then he thought, What now? Should he go back to Gemma’s bedroom?

  No. Because how on earth could he look at her without emotion threatening to overwhelm him?

  Graham came into the kitchen and his face was impassive.

  ‘There’s a bloke out there wants to see you.’

  ‘Yeah?’

 

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