City Surgeon, Small Town Miracle

CHAPTER FOUR

THE tepid bath had worked. When he finally made it to the bathroom he found the little family comforted and happy.

‘We need two doctors so much,’ the woman said as he saw them to their car a little later, the baby wrapped in light cotton and nothing else. ‘We had old Doc Sharrandon, but the minute Maggie arrived he left. Said he’d waited ten years too long for retirement and he wasn’t waiting a minute longer. So instead of having one ancient doctor we have one pregnant one. Not that we’re complaining. Maggie’s lovely, only it’s too much for her.’

It was.

He saw them off from the veranda-then as he turned to go inside he paused. There was a dark shape moving down the track, behind the tractors. Or… Several shapes.

He stood watching, waiting for his eyes to become accustomed to the moonlight.

It was a figure in some sort of greatcoat, behind three-no, four-calves. And one dog.

Bonnie and the calves, he thought, and this must be Angus. Until now he hadn’t realised it was weighing on him-the thought of calves and dog on the beach alone-but it felt great to see them come. He walked down through the garden to meet them, only to have both man and calves start away from him. Fifty yards away it was clear he wasn’t getting closer-indeed, it looked as if only the dog stopped both man and calves from bolting.

He left them, walking slowly back into the house to find Maggie propped up on her cushions, watching the door with anxiety. Was she wondering whether he was true to his word-that he’d come back? More and more the knowledge settled in his mind. He couldn’t leave her. The part of him that was fearful of relationships was screaming at him to stay dispassionate but it was being firmly overruled by sensations he wasn’t close to understanding.

‘What’s wrong?’ Maggie demanded. Maybe his emotions were showing on his face. Who knew? If he was having trouble quelling them internally, how did he keep his face in order?

‘Nothing’s wrong,’ he told her. ‘Angus has the calves. Four calves and Bonnie, walking up the driveway right now.’

‘He’s brought them here.’ For a moment he thought she was about to cry-and once again came that stab of need to comfort. He stayed where he was but it was hard.

‘He must have seen you bring me home,’ she said, so happily that she was obviously oblivious to what he was feeling. ‘He’d have walked back looking for them.’ She sighed and managed a wavering smile. ‘Thank heaven. Can we wake Gran and tell her?’

Wake Betty? That was the last thing he wanted to do. ‘I’m about to clean your head.’

‘This is more urgent.’

‘Waking Betty?’

‘Please,’ she said, suddenly passionate. ‘It really is. If you knew how Gran’s connived for this, you couldn’t doubt it. Gran’s sole focus for the last year has been to get me and my baby here, to set Angus up with a milking herd again, and keep him safe. She’s so close to running out of time and she knows it. I had to get the calves today no matter what, and she’s desperate to know they’re here. Please.’

‘So we wake her up and tell her?’

‘No. We wake her up and show her. Can you get me a set of crutches? You’ll find some out in the garage. There’s three pairs-I reckon I’m the middle.’

‘Why do you want crutches?’ he demanded, appalled at the sudden change in her. From passive and frightened patient she was suddenly all purpose.

‘I’m going with you. And you’re carrying Gran over to see Angus’s calves.’

‘In the morning, maybe.’

‘No! Look at her,’ she said urgently. ‘Can you guarantee there’ll be a morning? Max, I know this seems dumb,’ she admitted, ‘but medicine’s not only about drugs and bed care. Betty needs this more than anything in the world and I need to give it to her. This whole night will leave me with a debt I can never repay, but you’ve said you’ll stay and we have to do this. Please can you carry Gran over to see what she’s achieved.’

He stared down into her face, saw desperation, saw passion, and more. There was love, he thought. Maggie had spoken of coercion but, whatever was between these two women, her commitment to her now was absolute.

And suddenly he thought, It’s not just for Betty. Maggie must be a wonderful doctor. She cared. Where he’d spent the last six years pushing his emotions away, hers were out there, front and centre. Her husband’s death hadn’t taught her to protect herself. She was way too exposed.

What should he tell her now? ‘You’re not fit to do anything more tonight. Betty needs to sleep. To do what you ask would be crazy.’

He couldn’t. Her passion was shifting his armour, finding a way in.

Tomorrow he’d put this behind him, he thought, but for tonight…he had to do it her way.

He stared down at her and she stared straight back, those luminous eyes meeting his with a directness he found disconcerting. More than disconcerting.

He should run a mile from what he was starting to feel, he thought inconsequentially, and then he thought maybe he was running out of time to run.

Maybe he couldn’t run if he tried.

Time out of frame.

He was walking across an unused cow-yard in the moonlight, carrying a dying woman in his arms, with a seven-months-pregnant colleague limping along on crutches beside him.

Gran was still half-asleep. She’d roused when he’d lifted her, but Maggie had simply said, ‘The calves are here, Gran. You’ve got what you want. You need to see them.’

She shouldn’t be on crutches. He was walking slowly, worrying about her, but she wasn’t complaining. Her whole focus was on what lay ahead.

Ahead was a haystack, dark and forbidding against the night sky. As they neared it Maggie paused and so did he.

‘Angus?’ she called, and there was no answer, but a soft lowing told them the calves were there.

‘Angus, Gran wants to see the calves she’s given you,’ Maggie called. ‘I have the doctor who helped me home from the crash. You’ll have seen him. His name’s Max and he’s carrying Gran because she can’t walk. Angus, Gran really wants to see you with the calves.’

Again, there was no response, but Maggie looked up at him and nodded, a tiny, definite nod. ‘It’s as good as we’ll get,’ she whispered. ‘Let’s go.’ She limped on.

He stood back and watched her for a moment, knowing how much she must be hurting, knowing how desperately she needed to be in her own bed, but knowing she wasn’t going to stop.

She paused and glanced back at him, questioning, and he caught himself, tightened his grip on Gran and kept going. He was rounding the haystack, following a woman he was starting to be in awe of. More. A woman who left him feeling disorientated, as if his world was shifting on its axis and he was having trouble getting it the right way up again.

And here were the calves. At the foot of the haystack, bales had been shifted to form an enclosed, warm place. Angus was behind them, a dark figure in a dark coat, out of the pool of light from a lantern he’d set up. He was holding Bonnie as if holding a shield.

‘How did you find them?’ Maggie asked, and he appeared to shrink even more.

‘Bonnie,’ he said at last, and it was as if the words were dragged out of him. ‘Brought ’em along the beach. Came up to find me. Knew something was wrong when you come home in that car. Bonnie made me go down the beach.’

‘Oh, Bonnie,’ Maggie said, and she sounded close to tears.

He wanted to hold her. He couldn’t. He was holding Betty, and Betty was awake and looking across at the calves.

Maggie was looking at Betty and in the lamplight he could see the shimmering of her tears.

‘What…what do you think of them?’ Gran whispered. Gently he set her down on a couple of hay bales, still wrapped in the blanket he’d carried her in. The calves shifted nervously as he stepped back, but they were still close enough for Betty to reach out and touch them.

There was a long silence. Max thought maybe he should say something but Maggie’s hand came out to catch his. She leaned on him, heavily, and instinctively his arm wrapped around her waist to support her.

She leaned on him some more, and the pressure of her hand told him to stay silent.

He stayed silent. He held onto Maggie.

Family, he thought suddenly, and the same feeling he’d had when he’d seen the farmhouse came over him. It was a longing, deep in his gut, for something other than the solitary path he’d elected to travel.

Family? This? There were commitments all over this place. For Maggie to accept such responsibility… Her strength left him awed and his hold on her tightened instinctively.

Betty had asked Angus if he liked the calves. She was waiting for him to answer, and Max could see Angus knew he had to say something. And he knew by the tension in Maggie’s body that she was desperate for Angus to respond.

‘Yeah,’ he said at last, and it was a beginning.

‘They’ll be milkers,’ Gran whispered. ‘It’s just the start. Now Maggie’s here you can have your herd again.’

‘We could use the milk from these for cheese,’ Angus said, in a voice that sounded rusty from disuse. ‘Until we build the herd up enough to sell milk to the co-op again.’

‘Yes!’ It was still a whisper but Gran’s tone was almost triumphant. She turned to Maggie. ‘Four calves are a start. If you buy Angus another every time you can afford it… Promise me you will. Promise.’ The last word was such a fierce demand that he felt Maggie flinch against him.

‘I’ll do my best,’ she said.

‘And you’ll help her.’ The old lady was suddenly staring at him. ‘You’ll help her. Yeah, you will, I know it.’ She closed her eyes, as if exhausted and Max was spared having to answer. ‘It’ll be okay. Farm’s safe. Will’s son’ll be here. It’s okay.’

‘Gran,’ Maggie said roughly, sounding desperately anxious.

‘Yeah, it’s time to go to sleep,’ Gran said, without opening her eyes. ‘And if your fella’ll give me another shot of that morphine stuff, I’ll take it with pleasure. You’ll do that?’

‘I will,’ Max said, because there was nothing else to say, and the pressure of Maggie’s hand in his increased.

Thank you, the pressure said. Thank you.

More and more he had no idea what he’d been propelled into. This was a weird setting, so strange he felt as if he’d been transported to another world.

But there was peace here, of a sort. Angus was waiting with ill-concealed impatience for the people in the tableau to disappear so he could be alone with his animals. Maggie was leaning against him, taking strength from him and giving him warmth in return. An old lady was saying goodbye.

Maggie was weeping openly now, tears slipping down her cheeks unchecked. He held her tighter, and he felt her shudder against him.

‘Can you carry Gran back to bed?’ she whispered.

‘I’ll do that, and then I’ll come back for you.’

‘I’ll make my own way,’ she whispered. ‘I always have and I always will.’

He looked down at her in the moonlight, a woman who needed to be cared for, yet who was worrying about everyone around her. She worried about more than just these two people, he knew. She worried about the whole community.

Maggie. The word alone was making him feel strange, like he’d never known what a woman could be until now.

He was involved until the morning, he told himself. No more.

Did he believe it?

First things first.

Leaving Maggie-as ordered-he carried Gran back to the house. She roused enough to direct him to her bedroom, a room of grand proportions overlooking the front garden. He tucked her into a huge bed heaped with faded eiderdowns, he injected more morphine and he thought she was asleep. But as he made to leave, her hand came out and grasped his.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘You’ve made it perfect. I can go now. Look after them for me.’

Her eyes closed again and he stood looking down at her, trying to take in what she’d just said.

It was a farewell, and by the look of her…

She desperately needed fluids, he thought, touching the back of her hand, pressing the dry skin back a little and watching it stay where he’d pressed it. She was so dehydrated.

She was emaciated. Weary. Done.

If this woman presented at Emergency right now, the wheels of medical technology would move into overdrive.

He should at least set up a drip to get fluids in.

But he knew instinctively that this woman wouldn’t thank him for extending her life. He didn’t need to talk to Maggie to know it. The decision had already been made.

She was dying and she knew it. So how did he react to the old lady’s request. Take care of them?

What sort of request was that?’

Should he rouse her and say ‘Hey, I’m a passing stranger, stuck for the night but out of here first thing in the morning.’?

As if he could rouse a dying woman and tell her that. But not to tell her…

He could tell her nothing. She was already asleep.

He flicked off her bedside lamp and left, feeling that a promise had been made regardless. By failing to deny her…

Nonsense. She had no right to ask anything of him, and he had no need to answer.

Move on, he told himself harshly. Move on to Maggie?

He came out into the living room, expecting her to be there, but there was no sign of her. He’d come ahead with Betty, and he thought she’d have struggled back on her crutches. Apparently not.

He swore and went out again, to find her sitting on a low stone wall by the garden gate. Just sitting, staring into the night.

She should be in bed, too, and those wounds still needed dressing. He came up behind her and saw her shudder. Involuntarily his hands rested on her shoulders. She flinched, and then, unexpectedly, she leaned back into him.

‘She’ll go now,’ she whispered. ‘Thank you for caring for her.’

The night was growing more and more surreal. He’d turned into Gran’s treating doctor?

There was nothing for it but to agree. ‘I expect she will,’ he agreed. ‘Unless we get proactive.’

‘There’s no point. But today… It would have been a disaster without you.’

‘I suspect it was a disaster because of me,’ he said ruefully. ‘If I hadn’t driven around that bend…’

‘You had every right to drive around that bend.’

‘Come inside, Maggie,’ he said gently. ‘Can I carry you?’

‘No point,’ she said, and sighed. ‘Sorry. That sounded ungracious, but there’s not a lot of use in getting accustomed to leaning on anyone.’

Yet still she leaned on him.

‘You’re cold.’

‘I do need to go inside,’ she agreed with reluctance.

‘You don’t want to?’

‘I want to run,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so tired.’

He hesitated. There were things he should be doing. Carrying her inside, cleaning her face, strapping her knee, putting her to bed as he’d just put Gran.

But out here the stars were hanging low in the sky. From over at the haystack came a soft lowing as the calves settled down for the night. Angus would be with them. As Max had left, carrying Gran, he’d turned back and seen the elderly man settling onto the straw with an expression on his face that was almost joy. Angus and Bonnie wouldn’t be leaving their charges.

They wouldn’t be coming to the house to help Maggie, either.

How alone was this woman?

What was he doing? There was still something inside him yelling go no further, ask no questions, back off. He couldn’t. The old lady’s words were like a spell cast across the night. Take care of them.

It wouldn’t hurt, he conceded. For one night he could help, and maybe he could help by staying outside with her for a little. Instinctively he knew she didn’t want to go into the beautiful old house. No matter how Maggie had filled it with flowers, no matter how she’d fought to keep it lovely, for now age and infirmity had taken over, leaving an intangible air of impending sorrow.

His hands rested on her shoulders, gently, yet with a message he didn’t need to say. I’m with you, was his unspoken message. You’re not alone.

But he had to leave her for a moment. She was growing colder.

‘Wait,’ he said, and strode swiftly into the house, searching for what he needed. When he returned she hadn’t moved.

He set an eiderdown around her shoulders. He put another across her knees, tucking it under her, and then, because he had no taste for martyrdom, he wrapped a third around himself. Then he sat down beside her. Close.

‘That’s piles taken care of.’

‘Piles,’ she said, cautiously.

‘Never let your backside get cold,’ he said seriously. ‘First thing they should teach any medical student. Nasty things, piles.’

He felt rather than saw her smile, and felt also a tiny lifting of tension. Great. Those smile lines round her eyes had come from somewhere. He didn’t like it that they seemed to be getting rusty from disuse.

His arm wrapped around her waist and held. He could feel the warmth of her body through the eiderdown. That meant she could get warmth from him. That felt okay, too.

More than okay.

‘You want to explain the calves?’ he said, for want of a point to start. For a little while he didn’t think she’d answer, but then she started, staring out at the stars like her story was written there.

‘It’s Gran’s dream. The great plan. To get me back here, to have William’s son inherit the farm, to give Angus back his milking herd.’

‘William’s son,’ he said cautiously. ‘As in the little girl you’re incubating right now?’

‘Yeah, and Archibald turning into Annie’s the least of our problems. It’s all a bit of a dream,’ she said dryly. ‘Gran’s dream and my dream, all mixed up.’

‘Do you want to share?’

‘Do you want to listen?’ But then she seemed to catch herself. ‘Look, this is nothing to do with you. There are probably places you should be. To ask you to stay the night is big-to make you share any more is crazy.’

‘I’m not volunteering to fix anything,’ he said. ‘Just listen if you want to talk.’

And it seemed she did. She sighed and unconsciously leaned closer. ‘Okay, potted history. I’m English and so was William’s mother. William’s father-Betty’s son-is a hotshot businessman who left the farm when he was eighteen, moved to England and has never been back. William was therefore brought up in London. We met as interns, we fell in love, we married, and we were typical Londoners. Only William used to talk about the Australian farm his parents had sent him to when they’d wanted to get rid of him over the school holidays. He spoke of an awesome gran, a fabulous farm and a wonderful community at Yandilagong. He kept saying we’d move here one day, set up practice, have bush kids.’

‘Dreaming?’

‘It was more than that,’ she said softly. ‘Neither of us had happy childhoods. The thought of a farm and country medicine and family sounded so magical we thought we’d get the training we needed and go. Only then Will died. I was miserable and alone, working in a dreary little haze, until I got a letter from Betty.’

‘Reigniting the dream?’

‘That’s a good way of putting it,’ she said, still staring out at the stars. Still letting her body share warmth with him. ‘I have no idea why Will told his father he’d stored sperm, or why his dad told Betty, but she knew. She wrote and said if I wanted to have Will’s baby then why not come here and live. She told me there’s a self-contained apartment at the back of the house so I could be as independent as I wanted. She could help with the baby. I could get a part-time job helping the doctor in town. She even enclosed a lovely letter from the Yandilagong doctor saying there was a vacancy here for as much work as I wanted.’

She gave a wry chuckle then, which made him think she should laugh more. Her laugh was rusty, with traces of bitterness, but still he liked it.

‘And so?’ he asked, and she sighed and the chuckle faded.

‘So then I got dreamy and impractical. I’d been in a fog of grief and apathy since Will died, and suddenly I thought why not? I don’t intend to marry again-not after the sort of heart-ache Will and I went through-but to have Will’s baby seemed like a giant leap into the future. I thought if it didn’t work out at the farm I could always leave. There’d be lots of jobs for part-time doctors in Australia. So I went through IVF in London and when I was four months pregnant I came.’

‘To find…’

‘What you see,’ she said, and he could tell she was trying hard now to keep bitterness at bay. ‘Betty’s here, and Angus. Angus is Betty’s son, Will’s uncle. Will had met his shy Uncle Angus who lived in a separate house on the farm, but he knew little about him. Now I realise how disabled he is. He has high-level Asperger’s, which means he’s intelligent enough to care for himself, but he’s pathologically afraid of the outside world. Betty’s been in and out of hospital for the last couple of years, and by himself Angus has let the farm fall apart. Betty’s had to sell the milking herd and half the land to recoup, and she’s now terrified that when she dies he won’t be able to stay here. So her plan was to induce me to come, help her care for Angus, and work as a doctor while she minded the farm and the baby.’

‘But she must have been ill when she wrote to you.’

‘Yes, but she didn’t intend the chemotherapy not to work. Hope has to feed on something. So I walked straight into a mess, but by the time I’d been here for twenty-four hours I knew I couldn’t walk away. I am…I was William’s wife. William loved Betty. He loved this farm. To turn my back on them…I can’t.’

‘I see,’ he said slowly, and he did, and he was seeing chasms everywhere. He’d also seen the way she’d looked at Betty. Maggie’s husband had loved his grandmother. Like it or not, deception or not, Maggie’s allegiance was inviolate.

She was some woman. A feisty, loyal, doctor.

A woman to make his heart twist…

‘It’s not a great story,’ she said across his thoughts. ‘I… Thank you for listening.’

‘I wish there was more I could do.’

‘There isn’t.’ She hesitated. ‘So why gynaecology?’

‘Sorry?’ he said, startled.

‘I’ve told you mine. You tell me yours.’

‘We need to get those wounds dressed.’

‘You’ve been saying that for hours. Another ten minutes won’t hurt.’

‘There’s nothing to tell.’

‘I watched your face as you watched my baby. There’s shadows.’

‘My shadows are none of your business.’

‘They’re not,’ she agreed obligingly, and tugged her eiderdown closer and pushed herself to her feet. ‘Sorry. Of course I don’t want to know if you don’t want to tell me.’ She looked thoughtfully out to where he’d parked his car beside the last tractor in the row. ‘There’s probably a really logical reason, like gynaecology makes more money than obstetrics.’

‘So it does.’

‘And you can sleep uninterrupted at night.’

‘So I can.’

‘But that’s not the reason.’

How did she know? He couldn’t figure it out, but there was something about this night, something about this woman, that said only the truth would do. It was none of her business, but suddenly it was.

‘I lost my wife when she was six months pregnant,’ he said, and she plumped straight back down beside him. Close. Her hand took his and held it.

‘Oh, Max…’

‘Past history,’ he said. ‘Six years ago. A case of the doctor’s wife getting the worst care. I was an obstetrician. She died of pre-eclampsia.’

‘You’re saying it was your fault?’

‘I should have monitored her more closely.’

She frowned. ‘You wouldn’t have been the treating doctor. She’d have had her own obstetrician?’

‘Yes, but-’

‘So how often would you have checked her blood pressure if you’d been in charge?’ To his astonishment she was sounding indignant.

‘That’s not the point.’

‘It is. Unless you ignored swollen ankles and puffy hands and breathlessness and any of the other signs.’

‘She didn’t-’

‘She didn’t have obvious signs until too late,’ she finished for him, as if she knew. As indeed she might. ‘You know as well as I do that pre-eclampsia can move really fast. Terrifyingly fast. You’ll be pleased to know I take my own blood pressure twice a day, but I’m paranoid and if I was your wife and you tried to take mine twice a day I’d be telling you where you could put your cuff. Tell me about your wife. What was she called?’

‘Alice.’

‘That’s a lovely name,’ she said warmly. ‘Was she lovely?’

‘I… Yes.’ But he said it hesitantly. Sadly even. Aware that the memory of the lovely, laughing girl he’d met and married so long ago was fading. Aware that photographs of her were starting to superimpose themselves over real memory.

‘It’s awful, isn’t it?’ she said confidingly, breaking a silence that was starting to be too long. ‘You think you’ll remember for ever. You think how can you ever move on? It’s impossible. And all of a sudden…’ She paused, then gave herself a shake, tossing away thoughts she obviously didn’t want. ‘And your baby?’

‘A little boy. He lived for twenty-three hours.’

‘And you called him…’

‘Daniel,’ he said, and he was suddenly aware that it was the first time he’d said it since the funeral. Daniel. A tiny being, robbed of his mother; robbed of his life.

Odd that his memories of Alice were fading, yet the memory of that tiny part of him, Daniel cradled in his hands, his son, was still so strong. Still so gut-wrenchingly real.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, and the pressure of her hand was warm and strong. Maggie would certainly be a great doctor, he thought. Empathic and caring and…lovely?

Lovely. There it was again. It wasn’t a professional word, he thought, but it was in his head and it wouldn’t go away.

‘So?’ she said.

‘So I abandoned obstetrics, left England and came to Sydney to be a gynaecologist,’ he said, too briskly, and rose to his feet. ‘End of story. You need to go to bed.’ He sounded rougher than he’d intended.

‘I do,’ she admitted.

‘Let me carry you. That leg must be giving you hell.’

‘It’s not tickling,’ she admitted, and somewhat to his surprise she didn’t object as he gathered her up in her pile of eiderdowns.

‘Maybe it’s time we both moved on,’ she said as he carried her through the roses, and he didn’t disagree at all.

The fire was dying in the grate. He settled her on the settee again, loaded the fireplace with logs, found a can of soup, made them both soup and toast-he was hungry even if she wasn’t-and bullied her into eating.

Then, finally, he tended her face and her knee. And all the time…

Lovely.

The word kept echoing over and over.

Which was crazy. And impossible. She was seven months pregnant. He was mixing her up with his memories of Alice, he thought as he worked. He had Alice in his mind-that it was Alice he was helping, It was Alice he could save.

No!

But there were memories coming at him from everywhere and the only word that kept superimposing itself on all of them was…

Lovely.

He had the gentlest hands.

She was drifting. He was cleaning her face, carefully ridding it of every trace of dirt, then making it secure with wound-closure strips and dressings. Occasionally what he was doing hurt, but she hardly noticed.

His face was so close to hers. Intent on what he was doing. Careful.

Caring.

How long had it been since someone had cared for her? How long since someone had even opened a can of soup and made her toast?

It was an illusion, she told herself. This man was trapped by circumstances, in the same way she was trapped. The only difference was that tomorrow morning he’d leave and she’d stay.

But somehow the bleakness had lifted. For tonight she could let herself drift in this illusion of tenderness. She could look into his face as he worked, watch his eyes, abandon herself in their depths. Feel the strength and skill of his fingers. Watch his concern.

He was worried about her. She should reassure him, she thought. She should say she had things under control, everything was fine, that she’d bounce up in the morning like Tigger. As she’d bounced before.

Only right now she didn’t feel like Tigger. Surprisingly, though, neither did she feel like Eeyore, for who could feel sorry for herself when a doctor like Max Ashton was right in front of her? He was so close she could take his face between her hands and…

And nothing. Get a grip, she told herself, and something in her face must have changed because Max’s hands lifted away and his brows snapped downward.

‘Did I hurt you?’

‘I… No. I believe I’m nearly asleep.’

‘I need to wash your knee.’

‘Go right ahead.’

‘You want to wriggle out of what’s left of those jeans?’

‘I can do that,’ she said with an attempt at dignity, and then tried and it didn’t work, and when Max gave up watching and helped she was pleased. Only then his hands were on her thighs and she thought that was pretty good, too.

Whoa. Keep it in focus, Maggie. He was a doctor and she was a patient.

She felt like she was drifting on painkillers, yet she’d had nothing. She felt drifty and lovely, and like it was entirely right that she was lying half-naked on a settee in front of a roaring fire with the man of her dreams taking her leg in his hands.

The man of her dreams?

‘Ouch!’

Yikes, that brought her down to earth. Earth to Maggie? It was about time contact was made.

‘Sorry,’ he said ruefully. ‘But it’s not looking as bad as I thought.’

‘Good,’ she said sleepily. ‘Excellent.’

‘Have you been worrying?’ he asked, sounding bemused.

‘I guess I’ll worry if it’s about to drop off,’ she said. ‘Speaking of dropping off…’

‘You want me to carry you to bed?’

‘I’m fine here.’ The thought of going out to her apartment at the back of the house seemed suddenly unbearable.

‘You are fine,’ he told her. ‘Some of that initial swelling’s already subsiding. I think you’ve simply given this one heck of a bang. I suspect the X-ray tomorrow will show a nice big haematoma at the back of the knee and nothing else.’

‘Excellent. Then life can get back to normal.’ She hesitated. ‘You know, I don’t really need you to stay.’

‘I need to stay,’ he said. ‘You banged your head, you shook your daughter about and you need to be in hospital under observation. If that’s not possible, you’re stuck with me.’

‘Or you’re stuck with us. I’m sorry.’

‘Forget it,’ he said roughly, and then looked contrite. ‘Sorry. ‘It’s okay, though. Just forget the sorry and think of it as one colleague helping another. You look like you need far more help than I can possibly give, but one night out of my life isn’t much.’

Put like that, it even sounded reasonable that he stayed, she thought. And there was no way she was arguing any more. Not when she wanted him to stay so much.

For all the right reasons, she told herself hastily. For very sensible reasons, which had nothing to do with the way her insides did this queer little lurch when he looked at her.

“You want to use Gran’s settee?’ she managed.

‘You want me to stay here with you?’

She did. It sounded wimpy and she had no right to ask him. There were plenty of spare bedrooms. But…

‘This room’s warm.’

‘So it is,’ he said, and suddenly he was smiling.

‘I-it seems a waste to heat another.’

‘It does,’ he agreed. ‘And it’ll mean I can check your vital signs during the night without getting up. Also it’ll mean I don’t need to get my sleeping bag from the car.’

‘You don’t need to check my vital signs.’ But the night was getting fuzzier and she was getting past arguing. ‘You have a sleeping bag?’

‘For camping. At the music festival. Not that I needed to. My friends organised us a camp that’d make a Bedouin sheikh jealous.’

‘Your friends?’

‘Fiona did most of the organising. She’s a radiologist and she’s a very organising person.’

Fiona. He had a girlfriend, then. Of course he did. Anyone with a smile like that would have a partner. There was no reason then why her somersaulting insides would suddenly somersault in a different direction.

It was too much. She was too tired. She needed to sleep and not think of problems and how she was going to manage with an injured knee and how she could check Gran through the night when she was so tired and what she was going to do tomorrow.

Without Max. Who had a girlfriend.

‘Do you need help with the bathroom?’ he asked, and she had to think about it before answering.

‘I can manage,’ she said with another of her dumb attempts at dignity.

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

‘Very well,’ he said, and smiled and lifted her eiderdown and tucked it up under her chin. And then, before she knew what he intended-before she could even guess he’d thought of such a gesture-he bent and kissed her.

It was a feather kiss, maybe a kiss of reassurance, of warmth and of comfort. But surely such a kiss should be on the forehead. Not on the lips.

But on her lips it was.

His mouth brushed hers, and it was as if the heat of the room was suddenly centred right there, and it was a surge of warmth so great it was all she could do not to reach out and hold him and lock the kiss to her.

Only her hands were under the eiderdown. Thankfully. Because to hold this man…

To hold him would be a shout that she needed him, that she was alone, she was bereft and he was everything she most wanted but could never have.

William…

She made herself say her husband’s name in her head but it didn’t work. There was nothing there.

William. Gone.

Max. Here. All male.

‘Goodnight, Maggie,’ he whispered, and she could have wept as he drew away.

‘Goodnight,’ she made herself whisper back.

She closed her eyes. She didn’t want to, but she did.

William, William, William.

As a mantra it had no strength at all.

Max. She wanted him to stay. Right here. Right now.

For ever.