Falling For The Single Dad Surgeon (A Summer In São Paulo Book 2)

by Charlotte Hawkes

  ‘No, I waited before when I shouldn’t have. I should have told you, because the simple truth is that I love you, but I’m not asking you to give up what you do. I know that makes you who you are. My fears were that something would happen to you, but I’ve come to see—actually, Brady has helped me to see—that those fears are for me to deal with. Not for you.’

  ‘You don’t understand—’ she began, until Jake cut her off again.

  ‘I can’t subject you to a life where you spend every waking day in a lab, unable to escape into the rainforest, or spend time in that sanctuary which is so precious to you. I won’t be the kind of man who does that—that isn’t love. Not when I know who you are, and I understand what makes you tick. That is to say, I’m beginning to understand, and I truly can’t wait to learn more about you. Every single day.’

  ‘So...what are you saying, Jake?’

  ‘I’m saying that I’m moving to Brazil. I’ve spoken to the board and we’ve started the ball rolling on the necessary procedures.’

  It was more than she could ever have hoped for. Of course, guilt would have to hold her back. And it wasn’t that protective armour she’d pulled around herself for years. It wasn’t about her at all. It was about the baby that she hadn’t even told him existed.

  He might be saying all these things now, but how would he feel when he realised what she’d kept from him? Panic surged through her.

  ‘You can’t...’ Every syllable quavered. She desperately fought against getting her hopes up, in case he hated her once he knew the truth. ‘You said it yourself. Brady has to be your priority.’

  ‘Brady loves you. He has made it unequivocally clear where his heart lies. And, like mine, it’s very definitely out here. With you. You connected with him in days, in a way that I never could in almost ten months. He never came close to trusting me the way he trusts you. And Maria and her family, for that matter. You’ve made me realise that family is more important than anything. A good one, anyway.’

  Flávia couldn’t take it any more.

  ‘Stop, Jake. Please, you have to stop.’ Swinging around, she fumbled with the lock before pushing the door open wide. ‘There’s something you deserve—need—to know.’

  Then, because there was no other way to say it than to be honest with him—finally—Flávia simply blurted it out.

  ‘I’m pregnant.’

  * * *

  If she had slammed him in the gut, he wasn’t sure it would have winded him any more than he already was.

  He stared at her. Numb. Disbelieving. He waited for the betrayal to kick in, but although there was something there, it never quite kicked in.

  ‘Pregnant?’ It was him speaking, but he didn’t recognise his voice.

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

  ‘How? When?’

  ‘You need me to run you through the mechanics of creating a baby?’

  She was trying to brazen it out, that much was obvious. But the quake in her tone betrayed her. He couldn’t answer, but his eyes never left hers until, abruptly, she slid her gaze away, her cheeks flushed.

  ‘Possibly from that day we returned from the rainforest that first time. And it was the only time we didn’t use protection.’

  The time in the pool house, he remembered. Only too vividly. And now he was going to be a father.

  Again, if he counted Brady, because for all intents and purposes, he was the closest thing the boy was going to have to a father.

  ‘How long have you known?’

  ‘Ever since the doctor told me in the hospital room that day. It was extremely early days, usually too early to tell, but I guess this little guy or girl was a fighter from the start.’

  ‘I was in the room,’ he realised with sudden clarity, and felt a tremor of impatience. But nothing like he might have expected.

  That was the moment that had replayed in his head all this time. And then another thought slammed brutally into him.

  ‘The bushmaster bite...?’

  ‘The baby seems fine.’ She practically fell over her words. ‘I had tests and so far everything has checked out, but they’re monitoring it.’

  ‘I have a contact,’ he growled, pulling out his mobile and beginning to punch in numbers. ‘I met him this summer.’

  ‘It’s fine. I have someone already.’

  He wasn’t prepared for the way she placed her hand out to stop him. The contact seared straight through him.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me? As soon as it happened?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ She dropped her shoulders, her eyes meeting his imploringly. ‘I was going to, but I didn’t know how to. And then...’

  ‘And then I told you that I couldn’t put Brady through losing someone else he was close to,’ he realised, and Flávia nodded awkwardly.

  ‘But still...’

  It was odd, but he couldn’t quite decide how he felt. Both about the baby, and about the fact that Flávia had concealed the pregnancy from him.

  ‘I didn’t know if the baby was going to be all right at that point. Also, I didn’t want you staying out of duty. Then resenting me.’

  ‘I should never have put you in that position,’ he rasped, because it was finally starting to sink in.

  ‘You were looking out for Brady. I can understand that.’ She shook her head, and he couldn’t bring himself to elucidate.

  Not yet. Not until he knew exactly what he wanted to say.

  ‘I have to go into Paulista’s. There’s someone I need to speak to. Fancy a ride?’

  She looked at him as though she was about to say something, then changed her mind.

  ‘Sure.’ She shrugged. ‘They’ll be surprised to see me here when I’m meant to be on a plane to London, but they won’t complain.’

  Jake took her keys, unlocked her door and deposited her cabin bag back inside, trying to make sense of these emotions sloshing around inside him. Was he angry or happy? He couldn’t be sure. And until he was, he didn’t want to confuse the issue.

  He just knew he wanted to find a solution. Quickly.

  * * *

  Flávia left her lab late that evening, her mobile phone in her hand and the text from Jake still illuminating the screen.

  She’d spent the day working since Jake had been in with the board all day and, to some degree, it had been a relief. At least it had distracted her from all the worries racing around her head.

  Jake hadn’t been furious as she might have expected when she’d told him about the baby, and she’d initially taken that to be a good sign.

  Now, she wasn’t so sure. What if it meant that he didn’t care?

  Trudging through the corridors, she pushed open the door to the car park and looked for his rental car, her heart nonetheless leaping as she saw him leaning on the bonnet. His impossibly masculine chest was shown off to perfection in a fitted shirt. Had he gone to a hotel room to clean up and change? Because that certainly wasn’t what he’d been wearing this morning.

  She edged nearer, her low heels tapping on the ground.

  ‘Fruitful day?’ he asked, his even tone giving nothing away.

  ‘I guess,’ she hedged. ‘You?’

  ‘Very.’ And she thought she saw a quirk of his lips, but she couldn’t be sure.

  ‘Jake, listen, I should have said something this morning. Just so you know. But I knew I wanted this baby from the second I realised I was pregnant.’

  ‘That’s good to hear.’ He dipped his head.

  It wasn’t the clearest of signals, but she’d take whatever she could.

  ‘And I know I told you about the rainforest being my life, and the way my mother was, but I don’t know if you understand how it relates. I don’t know if I even understood it before.’

  ‘But you do now?’

  ‘I think I do,’ she began. ‘I told you that I was always
...different as a kid, you’ve heard that before. The rainforest fascinated me from before I could even walk or talk. But when my mother walked out on us, I threw myself into it with everything I had. Maybe I thought fighting for a cause, taking on pet projects, gave me a place in life. I wanted to make a difference. I think I felt it made me relevant. Less disposable. Whatever, it became my life.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with that. What you do matters. You make a difference, Flávia.’

  ‘Yes, and that was who I was. Without it, I feared I was no one. When I met Enrico, I thought my priorities would shift. I’d never give up my career, but I’d embrace being a wife. I’d want a family.’

  ‘But you didn’t.’ He shrugged. ‘That isn’t who you are. It doesn’t matter, we’ll find a solution.’

  ‘No, you don’t understand.’ She smiled. The realisation that Jake wanted to work through it with her buoyed her more than it had any right to. ‘I was afraid that I was like her.’

  ‘Your mother?’

  She jerked her head in a semblance of a nod, but she couldn’t bring herself to say it.

  ‘I hated myself for it, but I couldn’t make myself feel any of the things I thought I should. All the things Enrico wanted me to feel. And I thought it was my fault. For two years, I thought it was my fault. And then I met you.’

  Jake moved closer to her. She could feel the heat, the energy, coming off him, pouring into her. The most glorious feeling she’d ever had.

  ‘Even from that first night—our attempt at a one-night stand—I started to feel things for you that I’d never once felt for Enrico. But you were on the summer programme, you would be leaving, so I told myself that I was being ridiculous.’

  ‘And do you still think that?’ he demanded, his voice thick, a half-smile curving that all-too-tempting mouth of his.

  She forced herself to stay focused.

  ‘Who knows? I only know that I was ready to give up my life here, in order to follow you to the UK, before I even knew you would have me. Before I knew I was pregnant.’

  ‘And now that you’re pregnant?’

  ‘Now I don’t want to do anything to ever risk my baby, or myself. I love my career, but I want to be a mother, too. A good mother. A loving mother. I don’t resent my baby. I can’t want to meet it. Him. Her. I don’t care.’ A giddy laugh escaped her at the mere thought.

  ‘Well, if it’s confession time, then I guess I should make one to you,’ he surprised her by saying. ‘This morning, you told me that I was only looking out for Brady, but the fact is that I was looking out for myself, too. It suited me to hide behind Brady rather than acknowledge this multitude of...feelings I have for you.’

  ‘You really do?’ she breathed.

  He loved that she sounded so breathless. So filled with anticipation.

  ‘I really do,’ he confirmed.

  ‘That’s good, because I’d almost started to think this morning was a hallucination. Too perfect to be true.’

  ‘You’re carrying my baby. Which only means that you belong with me. For ever.’

  ‘For ever,’ she echoed softly, almost a question.

  And finally, Jake stepped forward and took her face in his hands, an infinitely tender gesture.

  Then he lowered his head and kissed her. Slow, deep, intense. And she wrapped her arms around him, held him close and gave herself up to every exquisite second of it.

  A second chance she had feared she would never get.

  And then, when the kiss finally ended and he set her slightly back from him, Jake moved to the side, gesturing to the small copse of trees in the near distance. Rubber figs, flooded gums, blue gums. And suddenly, in amongst them, she spotted a shadowed area and her eyes narrowed instinctively.

  A sleep system, with a basher and hammock, swayed lightly in the breeze. And little lights besides.

  ‘What is this?’ she breathed.

  ‘Go and find out,’ suggested Jake, so sure, so confident, that it sent a current of electricity pulsing through her veins.

  Flávia had no idea how her shaking legs carried her over to the area. She only cared that she got there. And when she did, she realised the lights were tiny, twinkly, solar-powered stars.

  ‘Not that it can ever compare to the canopy of stars in the jungle.’

  ‘When the trees aren’t so dense they cover it.’ She laughed as best she could when she could barely breathe.

  She was nervous, yet she didn’t know why. Carefully, she slid to sit on the hammock. More for something to do than anything else.

  ‘Pretty good,’ she managed. ‘Though there’s only room for one.’

  ‘I’m fine here,’ he told her, his voice sounding even more strange.

  And then he dropped on one knee and she realised he’d pulled a box out in front of her, and her heart stopped. Or raced. She couldn’t quite tell.

  She’d spent the day thinking he was discussing a patient case, wondering if he’d even remembered she was here. Instead, it seemed he’d been racing around getting changed, buying a ring and setting up this scenario.

  As though nothing else had been on his mind but her. It was touching.

  ‘Flávia Maura, you are the most complex, complicated woman I’ve ever known. And yet, you’re also the most genuine and straightforward. You’ve been stealing your way inside a heart which I didn’t even know I had, ever since the first moment. You make me feel things I’ve never before felt in my life, and now I know what it’s like, I can’t ever imagine going back.’

  ‘Me, either,’ she whispered.

  Her head was spinning and twisting so fast it might as well have been on a coaster ride. Everything he was saying was almost too much. Too dreamlike. Too perfect.

  ‘I don’t see my life without you in it.’ And she loved that it sounded more like a vow. ‘And I know for a fact that Brady feels the same. You saved me, Flávia. You saved both of us and I love you. Marry me.’

  ‘I love you, too,’ she choked out. ‘Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you.’

  Then, as Jake slid the most stunningly simple ring onto her finger, she realised she had never, ever felt so complete—so right—before. This time, when he drew her into his arms and kissed her, she knew it would never end.

  This wasn’t an end. This was just a beginning. And she couldn’t wait to start the rest of her life with the man who had saved her just as much as he told her she had saved him.

  * * *

  They were married a month later in a quiet, closed ceremony in the botanical gardens where they had first got together. Eduardo gave her away, whilst Brady shared the responsibility of best man with an astonished Oz.

  Julianna and Marcie were possibly the most excited bridesmaids in the history of weddings, whilst their mother cried enough tears to replenish the Amazon River. They had about thirty guests, including Cesar, Raoul and Fabio, and everyone cried a little, drank some wine and danced a lot.

  The Maura-Cooper family welcomed their fourth member six months after that, on a glorious spring morning when the sun couldn’t have shone any brighter.

  Antonia Maura-Cooper came into the world with a battle cry fit for trailblazer, and Jake took her in his arms and gazed at her with such unadulterated love that Flávia’s heart swelled so much she feared it might shatter.

  And then he shifted his gaze to her and she felt as though she was the most powerful woman in the world.

  * * *

  Look out for the previous story in the A Summer in São Paulo trilogy

  Awakened by Her Brooding Brazilian

  by Ann McIntosh

  And there is another fabulous story to come!

  Available June 2020

  If you enjoyed this story, check out these other great reads from Charlotte Hawkes

  Surprise Baby for the Billionaire

  Unwrapping the Neurosurgeon’s Hea
rt

  The Army Doc’s Baby Secret

  A Surgeon for the Single Mom

  All available now!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Their Hot Hawaiian Fling by Traci Douglass.

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  Their Hot Hawaiian Fling

  by Traci Douglass

  CHAPTER ONE

  “SIR, CAN YOU tell me your name?” Dr. Leilani Kim asked as she shone a penlight to check her newest patient’s eyes. “Pupils equal and reactive. Sir, do you remember what happened? Can you tell me where you are?”

  “Get that thing outta my face,” the man said, squinting, his words slightly slurred from whatever substance currently flooded his system. “I ain’t telling you my name. I know my rights.”

  “How many fingers am I holding up?” she asked.

  “Four.” He scowled. “How many am I holding up?”

  She ignored his rude gesture and grabbed the stethoscope around her neck to check his vitals. “Pulse 110. Breathing normal. Blood pressure?”

  “One-thirty over 96, Doc,” one of the nurses said from the other side of the bed.