Hawaiian Medic to Rescue His Heart

by Annie O'Neil

  A not entirely settled peace surrounded them. They both had questions. Lots of them.

  They started with facts.

  He filled her in on how they’d found Duke and the injuries he thought he had. “I suspect he’ll need quite a bit of recovery time, and a lot of physio, but from the looks of this waiting room he’s got a pretty amazing support team.”

  They both looked round and saw that the room had filled up. It was so full, friends were actually having to wait outside as well as in.

  “Thank you,” she said, her voice scratchy with emotion. “You went above and beyond. If you hadn’t pushed things...” she took a wavery breath “...he might not have a recovery to fight through.”

  Zach shook his head. “I did what I had to.”

  “You did more than that,” she replied, with a fierceness that warmed him straight through to his heart. “I have it on good authority that you stepped outside the rule book to find him.”

  “What? How?”

  * * *

  Lulu pointed over to another section of the waiting room—one that was filled to the gunnels with tall, muscular, dark-haired men in various uniforms. Her brothers and their in-laws, and their brothers, and everyone else she’d grown up with. There in the middle of them was Makoa, who gave her a little flick of the chin to say he saw what was going on.

  A gathering like this a year ago—hell, a month ago—would’ve sent her running for the ocean, surfboard tucked under her arm, ready to paddle out as far and as fast as she could. Doubly so if they’d caught her baring her heart to someone right here in the middle of it all.

  But she’d learned something today. Protectiveness didn’t have to mean suffocation. It could mean support. Something to hold all the emotions she felt in balance, catching her as she negotiated the best course of action. Sometimes she’d be right. Sometimes she’d be wrong.

  She’d been wrong to think Zach was trying to sideline her.

  She’d been right to find his parents and Harry, even not knowing if Zach would speak with her again.

  When Harry saw where Lulu was looking, he waved at Mak. Her brother grinned at the little boy, his hand instantly folding into the island greeting. Harry jumped up and down, thrilled to have someone so spectacular singling him out for a shaka.

  Mak, clearly sensing that Lulu and Zach were having an important talk, beckoned the little boy over.

  “You cool with that?” Lulu asked, hanging on to the hood of Harry’s hoodie so that he wouldn’t run off.

  “Of course,” Zach said. “I know he’ll be safe.”

  It was his version of saying that he trusted her and her family, and it meant the world. He might as well have got down on bended knee and asked her to spend the rest of his life with her. Told her he loved her. But they weren’t there just yet.

  Lulu gave Mak a wave of thanks when she saw him pick the boy up and start introducing him to everyone as Harry the Beast, well aware that a six-year-old around a sea of supersize men would be a lot to handle.

  Mahalo, she mouthed to her brother, and then to Zach she said, “I heard Duke was coming in from Casey. I was already here with your dad, so I let these guys know. They wanted to be here in case—you know—in case it hadn’t gone according to plan...” She continued in a rush. “Everyone’s gathered here now, and they will head out to help the crews who are looking for Jessica.” Her eyes flicked to the waiting room clock. “Only a couple more hours until sunset.”

  She looked up at him. His blue eyes were filled with the love she’d been so frightened of receiving. The love she had to put through one more test.

  “If it’s cool with you, I’m going to help.”

  Zach pulled her to him and tipped his head to hers. “I shouldn’t have stopped you before. It wasn’t my place.”

  “No,” she corrected. “You were right. I was out of my mind. I needed the proverbial slap in the face.”

  He flinched and pulled back at her choice of words.

  She held up her hands. “I know you weren’t doing what you did to hurt me. Quite the opposite.”

  He nodded. “I’ve got to go see my dad—but, Lulu, we need to talk. Properly.”

  “I know. We will. For as long as we need to. Days, if necessary. Which reminds me...” She dug in her pocket for a piece of paper. “I have to give you this.”

  He knew what it was without looking at it. “No. I won’t accept it.”

  “You have to.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  She gave a gentle laugh, her features softening with affection. “You made me realize something really important today.”

  “What? That you hated your boss?”

  “No. That I really, genuinely, do not want that job anymore.”

  “What? You love it.”

  “I do...but I love giving back more.”

  He shook his head, clearly not understanding.

  “I want to work for Superstars Surf Club. Full-time.”

  “I don’t understand... I thought Chantal was the only paid staff member.”

  “She was,” Lulu said. “Until she got an offer to set up another Superstars Surf Club in Australia.”

  Zach let out a low whistle. “That sounds like an offer that would be hard to say no to.” His brow creased. “How did you fit all these things into an afternoon? Visiting your family, my family, saving my dad’s life, writing a resignation letter and finding a new job?”

  She gave him a sheepish smile. “I can do a lot when I put my mind to it.”

  His smile was soft and sincere, infused with the deep kindness she’d first spotted in him back when she’d thought he was someone who would make her life hell. Meeting him hadn’t been hell, but she felt as though she’d been through a journey. One of those epic, life-changing ones that had taken her heart and mind and plunged her deep into the parts of her life she’d been actively ignoring.

  Falling in love with Zach had meant confronting demons and, to her disbelief, she had come out whole. Better than whole. She was in love, and she couldn’t wait to spend a lifetime of sharing this amazing feeling with Zach and Harry.

  He ran a couple of fingers through her hair, tucking it back behind her ear. “I love you, Lulu Kahale. You’re mad as a hatter, but you’re good for me. You remind me that being a better person doesn’t always mean sticking to the rule book.”

  “I love you, too. And Harry,” she added, wanting him to know that she knew they came as a package deal. She went up on tiptoe and gave him a kiss. “Go see your dad. I’ll meet you in a few hours, yeah?”

  He returned the kiss, and the depth of connection they’d just shared was transferred between them like energy. She’d never do anything again to compromise what they had together. No matter what.

  “Mahalo, Zach.”

  “Thank you? For what?”

  “For being you. For taking a chance on me.”

  “There was no chance in this, my love,” Zach said, cupping her cheeks with his hands. “This was destiny. And don’t you forget it.”

  She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t ever forget. Not as long as she had a heart beating in her chest.

  EPILOGUE

  One year later

  LULU HID BEHIND a palm tree, watching as everyone filtered down onto the beach, where there were huge plank benches spread in a massive circle. And her grandmother, her brothers—Duke walking without his cane for the first time in a year.

  They were all so different from the people they’d been just one year ago.

  Duke had ended up needing months of recovery in the hospital. His injuries had been far more profound than they’d originally thought. He’d spent those long months not only diligently following his strict rehab routine, but coming up with new safety guidelines for stuntmen and women.

  Today he was pushing Jessica in her new wheelchair, sportier tha
n the one she’d initially had after her injuries had made it clear she wouldn’t walk again. But she swam. Every day with her rehab specialist in the pool, and twice a week with Lulu in the ocean, on a surfboard kitted out with special support harnesses.

  Makoa was wearing a traditional outfit, of course. As were her grandmother and her brother Laird. Kili was wearing his Navy dress whites uniform and looking stupidly handsome, even if he was her brother. And Pekelo was wearing one of his trademark Hawaiian sunset shirts...the goof.

  All of them were wearing leis. All of them except for Lulu, who was wearing a crown of flowers because today, of all of the days in her life, she truly felt like Hawaiian royalty.

  Harry had insisted upon wearing a traditional Hawaiian shirt, covered in flowers and surfboards. Zach was wearing a gorgeous linen suit that, if possible, made him look even more gorgeous than he’d been that first day, when she’d seen him and thought, Uh-oh, here we go... Fire and ice don’t mix.

  But it turned out they did when they worked together. Lived together. Loved together.

  When most of the guests had arrived, Mak pulled out the family’s conch shell horn and sounded several long calls—the Hawaiian way of calling the gathering together and bringing everyone they’d asked to join them into the same mind space—into the beautiful reflective energy that was charged with the power of bringing Zach and Lulu together as husband and wife.

  As the reverend began to chant the Oli Aloha, Lulu began her journey down the “aisle” to the center of the circle, where Zach stood. They’d agreed together that they wanted a circle. A shared space for friends and family to witness their public declaration of shared love. A reminder that once they were joined together they wouldn’t just be two people—or, in their case, three—but an entire community made up of family and friends. It fitted perfectly with the Oli Aloha’s verses, which spoke of seeking a loved one, finding them and becoming one with each other and with all who loved them.

  Throughout the ceremony—complete with the exchanging of leis and the Hawaiian ring blessing—Zach and Lulu beamed at one another. They’d been through it all with the reverend several times, but this time it was as if every cell in their bodies knew it was the one that counted.

  Once they had exchanged their vows, and their hands had been bound together with a lei for a blessing that reminded them that it wasn’t anything physical that bound them together, it was love, they were invited to kiss and seal the marriage.

  Zach pulled her so close to him she actually felt her feet lift up and off the ground. The guests began to laugh.

  “Why are they laughing?” Zach whispered against her lips. “Don’t they do kissing the bride in Hawaii?”

  “They do,” she said, kissing him in between ever fewer words. “But normally the bride’s flip-flops don’t fall off when the groom kisses her.”

  “Just like Cinderella!” He grinned.

  “Better than Cinderella,” she said, as the reverend asked them to face one another for the final step of the ceremony.

  “Why’s that?” asked Zach, reluctantly returning her to the ground, weaving his fingers through hers.

  “Because Prince Charming lives in a castle and we live somewhere far, far superior.”

  They grinned and looked up at Turtle Hideaway, which was absolutely covered in tropical flowers and looked more as if it should be a float in an Aloha Parade than the place where they were going to spend their honeymoon.

  The reverend began to recite the He Alo A He Alo.

  Lulu beamed at Zach as the short prayer invited them to share aloha in their marriage.

  “For those of you who do not know,” said the reverend, “Alo means person and ha means breath. Together Lulu and Zach will honor the breath of life they have each been given and the added strength that comes from the love they share.”

  “Do we get to kiss again?” Zach asked.

  “By all means. It’s your life to live. Together.”

  And that was the joy of giving herself to Zach, Lulu thought as she willingly tucked herself into her husband’s warm embrace. Giving meant receiving. Until she’d learned to give herself completely to him, without any hope or expectation of anything in return, she hadn’t known the true meaning of love. And now that she had it was better than she could ever have imagined.

  * * *

  If you enjoyed this story, check out these other great reads from Annie O’Neil

  The Princess and the Pediatrician

  A Family Made in Rome

  Christmas Under the Northern Lights

  The Vet’s Secret Son

  All available now!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Tempted by Her Convenient Husband by Charlotte Hawkes.

  WE HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS BOOK FROM

  Life and love in the world of modern medicine.

  Escape to the world where life and love play out against a high-pressured medical backdrop.

  6 NEW BOOKS AVAILABLE EVERY MONTH!

  Tempted by Her Convenient Husband

  by Charlotte Hawkes

  CHAPTER ONE

  ‘HOW LONG HAS the kid been on the oxytocin drip, Oti?’

  ‘Two hours,’ Octavia Hendlington murmured softly. ‘Six drops per minute.’

  Not turning around as her colleague joined her, Oti continued to eye the young woman perched uncomfortably on the end of the bed and being cared for by her sister. The labour ward—or what passed for the labour ward in this end of the large hospital tent in her medical camp in South Sudan—was tiny.

  But they had worked so many miracles in this place over the past four years, she could only hope tonight—her last night—would be a good one.

  ‘Dilation?’ Amelia queried.

  ‘She’s been at six centimetres for the past ten hours. Her name is Kahsha; she’s eighteen, primigravida.’

  ‘And the baby’s head still shows no sign of descending?’ Amelia frowned.

  Oti’s teeth worried at her lower lip, and she stopped herself abruptly. In a matter of days she would be back in the UK, and her father would not accept such unattractive, unladylike habits.

  Five more days of being herself, and then she would be back to playing a role again.

  Would her new husband be just as irritated by her as her father had always been? Oti shoved the thought from her head and focused on her colleague.

  ‘No sign of the baby descending at all,’ she told Amelia.

  She cast her gaze around the tent and tried to swallow down the thick lump of emotion that lodged itself so uncomfortably in her throat. If it hadn’t been for the fact that it looked as if it was going to be a complicated labour, Oti might have been grateful for the distraction from her own thoughts tonight.

  She had been volunteering with the medical charity HOP—Health Overseas Project—for four years, ever since her brother’s accident, and this was the only place where she’d ever felt herself. Possibly the only time in her life—certainly in the last fifteen years.

  Dr Oti.

  It was simple and clean, and she thought that was perhaps what she loved the most. Out here, far away from the clamour of home, it was just about helping people and making a difference.

  She had value.

  Surely that was as uncomplicated as it got?

  But soon that would all be over. And it didn’t matter which mask she would be donning this time—Oti the socialite, the It-girl, or Lady Octavia Hendlington, daughter of the Earl of Sedeshire and soon-to-be Lady Octavia Woods—it would still suffocate her, just the same.

  What would Amelia and the other volunteers think if they knew she was about to marry the much-lusted-after billionaire, Lukas Woods? Or Sir Lukas Woods—given the knighthood he had received in the previous year’s New Year’s Honours list. Not the youngest recipient, but certainly one of the youngest.

  Busying herse
lf with the oxytocin drip, as though occupying her hands could also occupy her wayward mind, Oti tried to pretend that her stomach hadn’t just flip-flopped at the thought.

  The man was one of the most eligible bachelors in the world right now—certainly one of the most eligible in the country—and in five days she would be marrying him. The thought was terrifying.

  Lukas Woods wasn’t merely good-looking...he was practically elemental. As though there was fire, earth, wind and water...and then there was him. And that beautifully muscled exterior was rivalled only by his inner core of pure steel. Ruthless business magnate, media personality and self-made billionaire. How many other kids had written an app at the age of fifteen, and made their first million by the age of eighteen?

  She might have met him on only that one intimidating occasion five months earlier, but it had been enough to leave her with the impression that he might as well have been honed from the very magma of the planet itself.

  How was she ever to endure a marriage to this man? This stranger? What if she couldn’t even stand him?

  Her body prickled in protest, and she ignored the tiny voice inside taunting her that she already knew the answer to that question.

  Then again, the alternative had been a forced marriage to Louis Rockman, son of the Sixth Earl of Highmount, vicious, dictatorial and cruel. Even now, fifteen years on, she could still feel the grip of his fingers biting into her arms, his weight pinning her down...

  ‘You’re thinking a C-section?’

  Amelia’s voice dragged her mercifully back to the present.

  ‘Yes. But now Kahsha wants to return to her own village to seek out help from a traditional healer.’

  ‘Right.’ Amelia nodded grimly. ‘It’s her choice, Oti.’

  Oti dipped her head. They both knew that they couldn’t stop the young girl from seeking traditional help if that was what she chose to do. HOP had long drilled it into their volunteers that they were there to offer medical advice and options, but not dictate. Some of the women they encountered had little enough autonomy over their own lives as it was. They didn’t need a group of foreigners swooping in and taking away their choices on how they wanted to give birth.