As she released him, she took both his hands in hers, and looked deep into his haunted eyes.
‘She’s going to be okay,’ she said firmly. ‘She roused earlier and spoke to me—knew me—and she asked about the cat. It’s a great sign, Cam. She just needs time and plenty of rest.’
And because his smile was so pathetic, and she sensed that he, too, was fighting tears, she kept talking.
‘Anyway, I wanted to tell you about what’s happening back in the other world. That Debbie certainly is a whirlwind. She got on to a vet she used to work for—he’s retired now, and lives on the lake—and she has him coming in to cover for you. And she’s put leaflets in letterboxes and posters in shop windows, and she says if she stays as busy as she is now you’ll need a receptionist as well as her on your staff.’
Cam shook his head. ‘I hardly know the girl—woman, I suppose—and she’s doing all this for me.’
Lauren laughed. ‘People are basically good, you know. By now everyone will have heard that Maddie’s sick, and one thing the Lakes community does well is rally around. There are probably enough casseroles in your freezer to keep you all fed for a month!’
He smiled, and Lauren knew he’d finally relaxed.
‘Go and get some sleep. I’m happy to stay tonight and doze here—it’s an ability doctors have, to be able to sleep anywhere at any time. I’ll go home in time for work in the morning and I can sleep in my afternoon break.’
He shook his head. ‘I can’t have you doing that,’ he said.
She smiled at him. ‘I know—but I also know that if you don’t get a proper night’s sleep you’ll be no good to anyone tomorrow, and by tomorrow Maddie might be well enough to talk to you, or at least smile.’ She paused, and when he said nothing, she added, ‘Go!’ in her most authoritative voice and pointed to the door.
He leant across the space between them and kissed her on the lips. Then he stood up, kissed Maddie on the forehead, and left the room.
* * *
He did sleep, deeply and dreamlessly, waking with a start at four in the morning.
Refreshed, he showered and shaved, then dressed in his last set of clean clothes—he’d have to find a laundromat somewhere or make a trip home today. He made himself a coffee, and ate a day-old sandwich out of the refrigerator, then headed across to the hospital.
He stopped at the ICU desk, to hear the latest on his daughter’s progress, and was told she’d actually asked for water during the night and let Lauren give it to her from a glass. So his step was lighter as he made his way to Maddie’s room—and probably lightened more by the thought of seeing Lauren.
He found her where he’d left her, sitting in the same chair, reading quietly to his sleeping daughter.
He looked at the pair of them and knew that this was what he really wanted in his life—these two, dear, precious people.
‘Did you sleep?’ the one who was awake asked him, and he nodded, his throat so tight with emotion he couldn’t express it in words.
Instead, he crossed the room and kissed her, then drew her to her feet and held her, snug in his arms, while he looked at Maddie and smiled.
‘I’ve got to go,’ the precious woman in his arms was saying, edging away from him. ‘Did the nurse tell you she woke again and drank some water from a glass?’
She was far enough away from him now to look into his face.
‘That is really good news, Cam,’ she added. ‘Really good!’
CHAPTER TEN
THREE DAYS LATER, Maddie was well enough to be transferred to a room on the children’s ward. She was kept isolated as her specialists wanted to ensure she stayed quiet, and she remained in bed for most of the day, still sleeping a lot.
A CT scan had revealed that the swelling in her brain had reduced to near normal, but the damaged area needed time—probably weeks—to heal completely.
‘We should be able to take her home in a couple of days,’ Cam told Lauren, when she arrived to do a late-afternoon shift with the little girl.
‘That’s great,’ Lauren said, wondering just who ‘we’ was. She hadn’t seen Cam since the night she’d stayed with Maddie, and had no idea whether or not the actress was still around.
But the kiss Cam gave her before he left told her she shouldn’t be worried. Which she wasn’t, really—because he was too young for her, and he would surely be better off getting back with his wife.
And if that thought made her heart hurt—well, that was just bad luck.
Madge came at midnight and insisted on staying the night.
‘I’ve been sleeping better in that comfortable recliner than in the hotel bed,’ she said. ‘I’d have been in earlier, but Cam and I went out to dinner—he wanted to talk about Kate. Why he didn’t divorce her when she first left him, I’ll never know. Now she’s found out about the wildlife sanctuary and wants to come back to him.’
Madge paused, and Lauren held her breath.
‘Apparently, saving the planet is her new thing, and she can see herself as the actress who gave it all up to save Australia’s native animals. Cam’s told her the sanctuary has nothing to do with him, it’s just on his land, but it seems that’s good enough for her.’
Madge looked at Lauren in a helpless way.
‘Some people make a mess of their lives, don’t they?’ she said, so plaintively that Lauren had to give her a hug.
‘It’ll all work out,’ she said. ‘And won’t Maddie like having her mother around?’
‘Hmph!’ said Madge. ‘As if that woman’s ever been a mother—not in the real sense of the word. She got pregnant so she could marry Cam, and as soon as Maddie arrived she virtually handed her over to me to raise—well, me and Cam. She’d found religion at that stage and was working with church youth groups, putting on strange so-called religious plays. “Street theatre”, they called it. Load of old rubbish! Cam was working in a bar at night and trying to get to lectures and study by day, as well as help me with Maddie. The house was full of placards that said All for God—which I didn’t disagree with at all. But I did think God would probably have preferred her to be a mother—for a little while at least.’
Lauren had to smile. She could imagine how much work a new baby could be, and she wondered just what Madge had had to give up to help Cam raise his daughter.
‘What had you been doing before?’ she asked.
Madge smiled. ‘Running a very successful legal aid business. Most of my clients were single mothers...many trying to get away from abusive husbands.’ She looked ruefully at Lauren, then added, ‘For a while I thought I could do it all—mind Maddie and work from home, all that stuff—but the reality was very different, and I soon knew I wasn’t doing either job particularly well.’
‘Oh, Madge, what a loss for you—a career like that!’
Madge smiled again. ‘Not such a loss when the reward was a beautiful granddaughter who needed me and a son who needed back-up so he could get his life back together again.’
They sat in silence for a while.
Then Madge said, ‘Get off home with you and get some sleep. You have to look after yourself as well as all of us, you know.’
Lauren grinned at her. ‘My presence is purely selfish—it’s years since I read the Pooh books.’
‘Out!’ Madge said, but she smiled.
Although something in that smile told Lauren she was worried, and now that Maddie was getting better, there was only Cam left for Madge to worry about. Was she concerned that Kate, if she came back into their lives, would hurt him again?
The thought brought silly tears to Lauren’s eyes and an aching tightness to her throat. Knowing he was too young for her didn’t stop her loving him, and she couldn’t bear the thought of him being hurt.
* * *
It was a couple of days before Lauren was free to get up to the hospital to see Maddie again, because th
e cat had had kittens and the dog had turned cat-protector, not allowing anyone near them—which meant that when her long-suffering cleaner needed to clean the back of the house Lauren had to take Henry for a long walk.
As he knew she was the source of food for himself and the cat, Henry had allowed her close enough to check each tiny animal, and today, with the kittens’ eyes now open, and their adventures taking them further from their mother, she couldn’t resist picking up the little pure black male and tucking him inside her jacket while she and Henry walked.
When she took the kitten back, it was accepted by the others as if it had never been away. Which was why, when the day came for her to go to the hospital—possibly for the last time, she once again kidnapped—or catnapped—the little black one and took it with her.
Cam was there, and her heart flipped at the sight of him, but the smile he offered her in greeting was wan, and something about the way he stood by the bed told her to stay clear.
Kate?
Was he back with her?
It’s for the best, her head muttered at her, but her heart would have none of it. All she wanted to do was hold him—try to ease away the strain she could see in every sinew of his body.
Her body tensed...until she realised she might squash the kitten! And that thought turned her attention to Maddie, who was overjoyed as the tiny creature tumbled over her in the hospital bed, and snuggled up in her small hands.
‘I have to go home, Daddy, so I can see them all,’ she announced—which was when Kate walked in.
‘You’ve brought an animal in here?’ she said to Lauren, anger burning in her eyes. ‘Into a hospital?
Lauren was taken aback by this virtual stranger being so upset. Was it because she was Maddie’s mother?
‘I thought it might cheer Maddie up—she’s been waiting and waiting for the kittens to be born.’
‘And she probably got the virus from the cat!’ Kate stormed, lifting the kitten off the bed and pushing it none-too-gently into Lauren’s hands.
‘There are eight,’ Lauren said, ignoring the other woman and turning to Maddie, ‘and you can come and see them all when you get home.’
‘Only when she’s well enough to be up and about,’ Kate said.
Lauren’s stomach tightened. So Madge’s fears that Kate wanted to come back into their lives had been right. The woman was obviously taking over from Madge as Maddie’s carer as carelessly and thoughtlessly as she’d left her child in the first place.
Lauren walked away from them. It was more than she could bear to think about Kate upsetting Maddie and Madge with her behaviour. Moving into the house—into Cam’s bed?—and then, as the limited social life at the Lakes struck her, walking away again. Hurting all of them—hurting Cam.
No wonder he looked so strained.
Although maybe Kate would find Cam and Maddie were all she needed for her to decide to stay on.
Maybe that would be best for all of them.
Because surely then her own feelings for Cam, and the anxiety they caused her, would simply fade away.
* * *
Maddie came home the following day, having been prescribed bed rest, with occasional short walks or playing with her toys as exercise.
And that afternoon Maddie’s idea of a short walk constituted a visit to Lauren—although Lauren knew full well it was really a visit to the kittens.
Maddie sat quietly on the floor, Henry beside her, and played with all of them. But her hands kept going back to the little black fellow, and Lauren knew, when the time came for the litter to leave its mother, that that particular kitten would become Maddie’s.
But Lauren could see the little girl was tiring.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I’ll drive you home.’
‘I don’t want to drive. I want to go through the bush. I need to smell the trees again,’ Maddie said, with the querulous tones of a child still weak and unwell.
‘Then I’ll piggyback you home,’ Lauren countered, and Maddie agreed with delight.
From the top of the front steps, she clambered onto Lauren’s back. ‘Daddy says I’m too big for piggybacks now,’ Maddie said, her lips close to Lauren’s ear.
‘Daddy’s right,’ Lauren told her as she took up the solid weight and began to trudge towards what she still thought of as Henry’s house.
They must have just passed the halfway mark, and Lauren was flagging, when Cam appeared.
‘She’s far too heavy for you to be carrying her like that,’ Cam said, the crossness in his voice betraying the anxiety he had to have been feeling when he’d been told Maddie had wandered off to Lauren’s.
‘She’s all yours,’ Lauren said, letting Maddie slide to the ground. ‘I did want to drive her, but she wanted to smell the trees.’
‘Of course she did,’ Cam said, his voice scratchy as he gathered his daughter in his arms. ‘I think we all do, don’t we, Mads?’
Maddie put her arms around his neck in a hug and smiled at him. ‘I saw all the kittens, but the black one is my favourite.’
‘Better that than wanting all of them,’ Cam murmured to Lauren, his face close enough for her to see the lines of strain on it, and to read a kind of despair in his eyes.
The air between them seemed charged with some kind of force, prickling her skin with heat, yet sliding icy fingers down her spine. She wanted to hold him, tell him she loved him, but knew that would make things worse.
She touched his cheek, unable not to, and said, ‘You’ll be all right...’ as casually as she could. Because right now he looked as if nothing would ever be right for him again.
Lauren hurried home, trying not to think about what was happening at his place—refusing to think about where Kate might be sleeping.
Plenty of bedrooms, she told herself, not that it’s any of your business.
None at all.
* * *
Apart from Maddie coming to visit and play with the kittens, and Kate cooing over the animals when Lauren was on shift at the sanctuary, Lauren had seen little of her neighbours.
After that first visit, Madge always drove Maddie over to play, and usually went on into the village to get a few groceries before returning to collect her granddaughter. One day her return coincided with the end of Lauren’s morning session.
‘Let her play a little longer and come and have a cup of tea with me,’ she said to Madge, who accepted with alacrity.
‘Anything to keep me away from that woman,’ Lauren heard her mutter as they walked through to the big kitchen.
‘Madge is staying for a cuppa,’ Lauren called through to the laundry.
‘So I can stay longer?’ Maddie replied, with utter delight in her voice.
But as they sat at the huge old kitchen table Lauren could see from Madge’s face that all was not well.
‘Maddie’s fine,’ she told her, pouring Madge a cup of tea and pushing a plate of warm scones towards her.
‘It’s not Maddie I’m worried about,’ Madge said, then bit her lip. ‘I promised myself I wouldn’t talk about it,’ she added, looking so upset that Lauren wanted to hug her.
‘Then don’t,’ she said. ‘Just sit and relax, have your tea, and there’s jam and cream for the scones. There’s something I want to ask you about anyway. Last night at the Regional Fire Service meeting they were talking about getting someone in to do the books and fill in all the government paperwork. I wondered if you might be interested.’
She paused, looking at Madge.
‘The RFS is a volunteer organisation,’ she added, ‘and we get plenty of younger men and women—and quite a few older ones too—who are keen. They practise hard, give lectures, et cetera. But book work! They seem to have a complete horror of it. But it has to be done and Nellie, whose been doing it for thirty years, really wants out. She’s seventy-nine, and she feels she’s done enough.’
>
‘Well, I think that would be far more interesting than joining a quilting group or even the bridge club,’ Madge said, perking up considerably.
‘You could probably do both. Well, the bridge club and the RFS—Nellie’s a bridge player. Would you like me to take you down to the service base, show you around, and maybe meet up with Nellie so she can explain the job? It’s not full-time, and really there are no set hours—although it’s always good to go to the meetings so you know what’s going on. What do you think?’
‘Lead me to it,’ Madge said, a huge grin on her face. ‘It’s just exactly what I need, and now Maddie’s spending most of her time over here, until she goes to school, I’ve plenty of free time to work out what the job entails.’
She called to Maddie, who left the laundry and came in carrying the black kitten.
‘He’s not quite old enough to leave his mum,’ Lauren said gently. ‘But another week and he’ll be all yours.’
‘But then I’ll be at school and he’ll have no one to play with,’ she said, in such tragic tones that Lauren had to hide a smile.
‘Not really,’ Lauren said. ‘Because the mother cat is really yours too, and she can go home with you when he goes. Debbie is busy finding homes for all the other kittens, so everything will be fine.’
Maddie beamed and flung her arms around Lauren’s neck. ‘I do love you, Lauren,’ she said—just as Cam appeared through the laundry door, a kitten in one hand and a watchful Henry by his side.
Lauren hoped her delight in seeing him wasn’t making her glow—that the warmth she felt inside wasn’t visible on her face.
‘Now the whole family’s here,’ she said, hoping her voice was light and casual. Although to her it sounded kind of squeaky—a dead give-away of her excitement.
‘Not really,’ Madge muttered, glaring at her son. ‘Maddie, it’s time to go. You need some lunch before you have your rest. Put the kitten back with his mother and meet me at the car.’
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