But she was the last person to be deciding what Daniel should, and shouldn’t do in his private life when her own was in such a mess, and the memory of the wedding dress in the charity shop window came back to haunt her.
They all had their problems. Herself with no clear way ahead. Daniel denying himself the pleasures of family life. Her gran trying to get back to health and strength with a failing heart, and her mother cheerful as always, but far from home in a stressful situation.
Then there was Tom facing an uncertain future due to the seriousness of his injuries, and Alex, young and defenceless, who had been plucked out of the only security he’d ever known and brought to live in a strange place.
Out of all of them he was the one she was concerned for most and, taking his hand in hers, she said, ‘Let’s go and find Daniel, shall we, and tell him that we saw a salmon?’
They had to pass the school on their way to seek him out and, pointing to the single-storey building nearby that housed the doctors, Kate said, ‘That is the surgery where Daniel and I will be working. When school is over one of us will come for you and take you there until we’ve finished for the day. You can take some of your toys there so that you’ll have something to play with while you’re waiting. Would you like that?’
He nodded, and she thought thankfully that Alex seemed contented enough in the circumstances, until he said in the next breath, ‘Is my dad going to die?’
When Kate looked up Daniel was standing in the entrance to the surgery. He must have seen them pass the window and had come out to greet them, and she could tell by his expression that he’d heard what Alex had said.
‘No. He’s not going to die, Alex,’ he said gently as Kate felt tears prick. ‘It might be hard for him to walk for a while because it was a very nasty accident that he had, but do you know what? Your dad will get better a lot sooner if he knows that you are all right, and you are all right here with us, aren’t you?’
Alex nodded. ‘Mmm. I like it here.’
‘That’s good, then,’ Daniel told him. ‘Because we like having you here, don’t we, Kate?’
‘Yes, we do,’ she agreed, glad to see Alex looking happy again.
‘Do you want to come in and wait?’ Daniel said. ‘I’ve a couple more patients to see, then I’m finished for the day.’
When they went inside, Jenny on reception told him that his next patient had cancelled so there was no rush. She had a smile for Alex and when Daniel explained that he was staying with them and would be coming to the surgery after school each day, she said brightly, ‘Well, this is a surprise!’ She turned to Alex. ‘Do you want to be a doctor, too?’
He was looking around him curiously. ‘I don’t think so,’ he told her, and with his visit to the building site fresh in his mind, ‘I’d rather be a builder in a yellow hat.’
‘The men lent us hard hats,’ Kate explained.
‘Ah! So that’s what you’ve been up to,’ Daniel said laughingly. ‘I hope you laid a few bricks for me while you were there as time is pressing.’
‘Why is that?’ she questioned.
‘Why do you think?’ he said wryly as they went into his consulting room. Jenny had taken Alex into the surgery kitchen for a drink and a biscuit and they were alone for the moment. ‘The sooner my house is finished, the sooner Alex and I can move out of Jasmine Cottage and give you some breathing space.’
That hurt. Didn’t he realise that she wanted to help with Alex? Give him some happy home life while his father was in hospital?
He’d seen her expression and said, ‘Don’t be upset, Kate. I just want to do the right thing. You’re lovely with Alex. Having lost both his mother and his sister, the boy is short of a woman in his life, and that is no criticism of Tom. He’s doing a great job.’
‘So is your eagerness to move into your own place your way of saying that if Alex is short of a woman’s love, you aren’t?’ she interrupted coolly.
He was growing accustomed to her face, he thought, the spiky blonde mop, the coltish slenderness of her and most of all the warmth of her personality. He’d only known her for a short time yet she’d captured his imagination as no other woman had since Lucy had been taken from him.
He would have been lost without her the night before when he’d brought Alex to stay with them, and the more he saw of Kate the more he found that his determination to stay clear of relationships was weakening.
‘No. It isn’t. Just the opposite,’ he said quietly. ‘It might have been a short time ago, but not now. The way the three of us have been thrown together reminds me of my own happy family life when I was a kid and I can see what I’m missing. I’ve made my choice, as you know, and I never thought I would question it, yet I am.
‘I said what I did about moving out as soon as possible because I can’t help feeling that I’ve butted into your life at a time when you would rather have been alone, and now that Alex is here there are two of us presuming upon your good nature.’
‘That isn’t how I see it,’ she protested. ‘It was the other way round. I was the one who butted into your life, whether you wanted it or not, and you’ve helped me to climb out of a black pit of rejection. Given me the strength to bounce back after what Craig did to me, and when I think that tomorrow I’ll be here, working in the practice as a GP, I am truly grateful for all that you’ve done for me. You even saved me the anguish of taking my wedding dress to the charity shop. Though I would never have let you do that in a thousand years if I’d known about Lucy.’
‘All right,’ he said with a smile. ‘After that vote of confidence I’d hate to blot my copybook. The last thing I intended was to upset you. If you will put up with us, we’d love to stay for as long as it takes.’
At that moment Alex reappeared and Daniel said, ‘My last patient of the day is in the waiting room, Kate. Do you want to wait for me or go on ahead?’
‘We’ll go home,’ she said as it began to register that it was only since Alex had appeared on the scene that Daniel had begun to question his single status. Perhaps he viewed her role as the third member of the trio as coincidental, rather than meant to be.
Yet, whatever the circumstances, she knew one thing. Getting to know him had shown her what a real man was like. Where Craig had been unfaithful, Daniel was ever faithful and she had to admire him for it, even though she didn’t entirely agree with his reasoning.
It appeared that Alex’s arrival on the scene had caused him to have a rethink, but there was nothing to say that it wasn’t just a spur-of-the-moment thing and that he would soon be back to his original resolve. If she was crazy enough to let herself fall in love with him, the hurt it could bring would make her broken engagement seem like a minor upset.
The patient that Daniel had referred to was Keith Baxter, who lived on a narrowboat moored in a nearby basin on the canal that ran parallel with the river. Until recently he had owned one of the cottages in the main street of the village, but the pull of the waterways had got to him and he’d sold his house and bought the boat.
Daniel had thought of doing something similar himself when he’d had nowhere to live while his house was being built, but Ruth’s kind offer had been tempting and he’d put the idea out of his mind.
Yet he was always interested to hear what Keith had to tell him about life on the water and the social activities at the moorings where he was based. Though today it wasn’t his beloved boat that Keith wanted to talk about. He had a health problem.
His skin had a yellow tinge to it as if he was slightly jaundiced and he explained that he’d just got over a gastric upset and was now feeling unwell with other discomforts.
‘I’ve been binge eating, then feeling nauseous and bringing the food back,’ he said. ‘I just don’t feel right somehow, and when I saw that I was yellow I thought I’d better get it sorted.
‘It’s a strange thing,’ he went on to say, ‘but my family are prone to this sort of thing. I can remember my father being like this when he was alive and he never kn
ew what caused it.’
‘It’s possible that you are suffering from Gilbert’s syndrome,’ Daniel told him after he’d examined him. ‘A mild liver infection that usually flares up after something else. In your case most likely the gastric upset, and it is hereditary. So if you ever have any children it is something that they might inherit too just as your father could have passed it on to you.’
‘Ugh!’ Keith groaned. ‘That’s great!’
‘There’s no need to get too upset,’ Daniel explained. ‘The good news is that Gilbert’s syndrome is quite common and usually clears up of its own accord. But having said that, I’m going to send you along to the nurse for a blood test just to make sure that is all it is. The result should be back within three to four days so make another appointment to see me then on your way out.’
‘Thanks, Daniel,’ Keith said, getting to his feet and now bringing up the subject closest to his heart. ‘When are you going to come and see the boat? You’re welcome to bring Kate—that was Kate Barrington I saw talking to Jenny, wasn’t it? I didn’t know she was back in circulation, although maybe she isn’t. She had a child with her.’
‘I’m staying at the Barringtons’ until my house is ready,’ Daniel said abruptly, ‘and the young boy that you saw is the son of a friend of mine who is in hospital. Kate and I are looking after him, so socialising isn’t possible at the moment, I’m afraid.’
‘Not a problem,’ Keith said breezily. ‘I’m sure I’ll catch up with her soon. I’ll see you around, Daniel.’
Not if I see you first, Daniel thought, nettled at the thought of Keith being interested in Kate. He liked the other man, but he had a reputation for being a womaniser.
He knew that his annoyance was due partly to the realisation that having Kate in his life was providing tantalising glimpses of what he was missing. But in his life she was, and the only way he was going to be able to resist her was by playing it cool for the time being, which was not going to be easy while they were living in the same house, working in the same practice and looking after Alex together.
Yet he was going to try. He had been too long on the path that he had set for himself when Lucy had died to abandon it so suddenly, and once Alex was asleep that evening he said, ‘I’m going to turn in, Kate. I want to catch up on some sleep after being awake most of last night listening for Alex. I don’t think we’ll hear much from him tonight. He seems to be taking everything in his stride so far.’
‘Like he was when he spoke to his father this morning?’
‘Yes, Alex was fine, but Tom wasn’t. He’d come round from surgery and was in the high-dependency unit in a lot of pain. We spoke to a nurse first and she said to keep the call short, so I let Alex do most of the talking. Hopefully by tomorrow they will have been moved him into an orthopaedic ward.’
‘Are you all right?’ she questioned. ‘You’ve been very quiet since we came home.’
‘Yes. I’m fine,’ he replied. ‘I just have a lot on my mind. Such as what will happen to Tom and Alex if he can’t ever work again. Then there is the matter of keeping an eye on the builders, and last, but by no means least, making sure that the practice runs smoothly.’
He wasn’t going to tell her that the main thing on his mind was the effect that she was having on him. She was only just coming to terms with a broken engagement, and if she found out that he was lusting after her, the high opinion she had of him would topple off its perch in no time at all.
‘Cross your bridges when you get to them,’ she advised. ‘It’s early days to be worrying about Tom’s future, and however long you have to wait for your house to be finished, in the end you will have a beautiful home. As for the practice, from tomorrow there will be three of us to carry the load. I met Miriam who was about to make a quick departure while I was at the surgery this afternoon, and she said she was pleased to hear that I’ll be on the job tomorrow.’
‘Good,’ he said absently. He looked around the kitchen at the clutter from the evening meal. ‘Leave everything. I’ll clear away in the morning. Goodnight, Kate.’
When he’d gone she sat with elbows on the table and chin in cupped hands. There was something eating at Daniel that he wasn’t prepared to discuss, she thought. But what was new about that?
The things he’d mentioned were responsibilities, but from what she’d seen of him so far he dealt with those sort of problems with a cool efficiency. The only thing that seemed out of character was the way he had chosen such a monastic way of life.
He didn’t give the impression of being a defeatist, which only went to show how deep his hurt went, and now he had a constant reminder of it in the presence of the young brother of the woman he’d loved. Yet he hadn’t hesitated for a second when Tom had made his frantic request.
She got to her feet slowly and, ignoring his instructions, began to tidy up the kitchen. There was no way that Daniel was going to have that chore facing him in the morning. If she couldn’t compete with the woman he’d loved, at least she could try to make his life as stress-free as possible.
She became still, hands resting in warm suds in the sink as the realisation of what she was thinking registered. She’d just admitted to herself that she wanted the love that Daniel wasn’t prepared to give.
When the phone rang in the quiet house some time later it was her mother, wanting to know if everything was all right. They hadn’t spoken the night before, so as yet she wasn’t aware of Alex’s arrival.
When Kate explained the circumstances Ruth exclaimed, ‘The poor lamb! Look after him, Kate. He couldn’t be in better hands than yours and Daniel’s. How is my lovely lodger?’
‘He’s fine. We’re a team, he and I. At least, that’s what I think. I’m not sure what Daniel thinks, but he has made me see just how shallow Craig was.’
She couldn’t see her mother’s satisfied smile, but her approval came through in her voice as she told her, ‘So keep up the good work.’
When Kate asked after her grandma her mother’s voice still had a lift to it as she said, ‘Gran is much better. The hospital is talking about a pacemaker in the very near future.’
As they were on the point of saying goodbye Ruth asked, ‘What have you done with your wedding dress, Kate? It must be a painful reminder.’
‘It’s gone to the charity shop.’
‘Oh! Taking it there must have hurt.’
‘Daniel took it for me.’
‘Really! How did that come about?’
‘He offered. Although he wasn’t sure if it was a good idea, me being in such a hurry, but I wanted it gone.’
‘Yes. I can understand that,’ Ruth said gravely.’ But, Kate, sometimes these things happen for a purpose. The fates might have something better in store for you.’
‘I hope so,’ she replied, glancing upwards. ‘But at the moment I very much doubt it.’
The following morning Kate told Daniel, ‘One of the workmen at your site has a boy the same age as Alex. His name is Scott Thompson. It was his hard hat that his father lent us. Do you know anything about the family?’
‘No, not really, but I know the guy you mean and he seems a decent sort. Yet I think that we should let Alex choose his own friends. He’s a sensible kid, and now that Graham knows his home circumstances he’ll keep an eye on him for us. I suggest that we both take him as it’s his first day, and after that we drop him off on our way to the surgery each morning, and then one of us collects him when school finishes in the afternoon.
‘Really, he’s old enough to make his own way to us at the end of each day. We’re only talking about a couple of hundred yards, but it’s getting dark by the middle of the afternoon at this time of year and I’m not taking any chances.
‘Tom has placed Alex in my care and I want to hand him back to him safe and sound when the time comes.’
‘He certainly chose the right person when he asked you to look after his son,’ she commented.
‘He chose the only person,’ he said whimsically. ‘There wasn
’t anyone else to ask, and as for my side of it, Lucy asked me to look out for her dad and Alex. I said I would, and when I make a promise I keep it.’
‘I can tell that,’ she said wistfully.
‘I wasn’t making comparisons,’ he explained quickly, observing the soft droop of her mouth. He’d just been stating a fact, not intending to remind Kate of the Craig fellow.
Daniel had no idea that Kate’s moment of melancholy had nothing to do with her ex-fiancé. She was remembering another promise he’d made and on that occasion it had been to himself.
They’d seen Alex safely into school without any obvious reluctance on his part and when a smiling teacher had taken him in hand the two doctors made their way to the surgery.
As they got out of the car Kate was aware that Daniel was distancing himself from her now that Alex wasn’t around. He’d shown a united front while the three of them had been together, but now it had disappeared. Although he did ask, ‘Are you nervous at the thought of your first day back as a GP?’
‘No. Not at all,’ she said, stung into nonchalance. ‘When one has worked in A and E, every other aspect of health care seems less challenging.’
‘Such confidence!’ he exclaimed with a grin. ‘I’ll watch your performance with interest.’
She had regretted her attitude almost before the words had come out and now Daniel had retaliated with smiling sarcasm.
‘What’s wrong?’ she asked in a low voice. ‘I thought we had become friends. Why are you being so aloof now that we’re alone?’
‘We are friends,’ he said evenly. ‘Don’t ever have any doubts about that. We only met a short time ago, yet I feel as if I’ve known you for ever. You are the easiest of people to get to know.’
‘So what’s the problem?’
‘That. That is the problem,’ he said in the same level tones. ‘And now shall we get the day under way before Miriam sends out a search party?’
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