‘Do you have many ill children?’
Why did he ask that? Because he wanted to shift the focus onto medicine? Okay, maybe he did. Ever since he’d arrived on this island, things had been personal and it was time to back away.
‘We have too many ill children,’ Caroline told him, obviously ready to follow his lead. ‘As well as normal kids’ stuff we have a vicious ulcer caused by the local mosquitoes. It starts out as a mosquito bite and grows. If left untreated it needs to be cut out and requires skin grafts. What’s worse, we also have encephalitis caused by the same mosquito. There’s a local remedy—a plant that seems to give immunity—but sometimes parents forget how important it is to use it. We aim to send the encephalitis patients to the mainland but that’s not always possible. In the meantime, we need to do the front-line treatment here and the cases are increasing. The island’s desperate for more medical staff but there’s no money. The government funding’s limited and we’re running out. And now the encephalitis cases are increasing.’
‘Why?’
‘Because the money’s run out, for education and also for mosquito eradication,’ she said bitterly. ‘My uncle seems to have been embezzling funds for years. Heaven knows how we can attract any more staff. We’re just blessed that Maddie’s decided to stay.’
And he’d asked her to leave.
But for her to stay here... With Lea...
Ulcers. Encephalitis...
‘You needn’t worry. We take very good care of our staff,’ she said, seeing him glance at the sleeping baby and guessing his concern. ‘And our staff’s children. This baby will be cared for by the whole island. But that’s not what I came to talk to you about. Keanu’s just had a call from Cairns Air Sea Rescue. From Beth. She says to tell you the cyclone’s tracking north and the airport’s open from dawn tomorrow. So, unless you don’t want it, they’re flying out to collect you. She wanted to know if Maddie wants evacuation, too, but Maddie’s adamant that she stays. Keanu doesn’t see any reason why she shouldn’t. Oh, and the plane’s bringing our permanent doctor back, Sam Taylor, so we’ll have a full medical contingent again, or as full as we can afford. Can you be ready to leave at ten tomorrow? Keanu’s trying to find you some decent clothes to wear on the way home.’
Unless you don’t want it.
In all that she’d said, those were the words that stood out.
Ten tomorrow morning, unless he didn’t want it.
His boss would insist he take a break, he thought, at least until the cut on his arm healed. He could...
What? Stay here?
What was the point? He’d only upset Maddie.
‘Of course,’ he said, and the matter was decided.
She left, taking Lea with her. He stayed sitting on the rocker, staring sightlessly out over the island.
What was the point?
He’d rescued Maddie. He’d played emergency doctor because that was what he did. That was who he was. There was no use pretending he could be anything more.
It was time to move on.
* * *
At nine the next morning, Maddie had just finished feeding when there was a knock on the door.
‘Come in,’ she called, and it was Josh. Of course it was. Caroline had told her he was leaving. She’d warned her he’d want to say goodbye.
He was wearing clean jeans and a crisp, short-sleeved white shirt. He was washed and brushed and almost impossibly handsome. He looked like Josh again. If it hadn’t been for the dressing on his arm she’d say he was back to being her invincible Josh. No, not her Josh. The Josh. The Josh who was in control.
‘Caroline says if I promise not to upset you I can have ten minutes,’ he said, and part of her wanted to say he could have the rest of her life. But she was sensible and there was no way a sensible woman could say such a thing. Even if he looked like Josh.
‘I won’t get upset,’ she managed. ‘You’ll be glad to get back to work.’ Of course he would. An idle Josh was like a bear with a sore head. Or a sore arm? ‘Will they let you work with that arm?’
‘Office duties.’
‘You won’t take a holiday?’
‘No.’
‘You need to rest.’
‘Says you. Are you sure you don’t want us to take you to Cairns?’
‘I’ll go in a week or two, when I’m recovered,’ she told him. ‘I need to see Mum, but I can’t for a little while yet.’
He understood. She couldn’t push a wheelchair. She couldn’t spend a whole day with her mum.
‘I’ll go and see her if you like. I’ll send word back.’
‘That’d be...kind. She’ll remember you. She l—’
But then she bit back the word. Loved. It was too big to say, and Josh was moving on.
‘Going back and forth to Cairns will be hard with a baby.’
‘It won’t be.’ Her chin tilted, a gesture he knew and loved. His brave Maddie. ‘It’ll be the same as before, only this time I’ll have Lea, too. I’m thinking Mum will love her.’ And she did say the L word then.
‘Maddie, how can you manage?’
‘How I can is none of your business,’ she said, gently but firmly. ‘I’m not asking you to care. In fact, I’m asking you not to care. You’ve cared before and it almost broke you. You walked away from our marriage because of it and nothing’s changed. Lea and I have nothing to do with you, Josh.’
‘Yet...’
‘There are lots of yets,’ she murmured. ‘But none of them work.’
‘I love you.’
‘Not enough.’
‘Maddie...’
‘When Lea cries, I’ll comfort her,’ she said, trying to make sense of what didn’t make sense at all. But it did—in a stupid, muddly way. ‘And you know what? She’ll comfort me back. Oh, she won’t—she can’t—care for me. Even in old age I hope she won’t need to care for me, but she’ll hug me and she’ll be there and just knowing I’m her mum, knowing I’m loved, that’s enough. I won’t ask for more. But to be there for her when she hurts? What a privilege to be permitted to be so close to someone. And when I hurt and she hugs me...that’s a gift, too. A gift you could never accept.’
‘You know I can’t.’
‘I know you can’t,’ she said, sadly now, and she hugged Lea tightly. ‘All I can do is hope that one day you’ll meet a woman strong enough to crack that armour.’
‘Maddie—’
‘It’s time to go, Josh,’ she said, and her bottom lip wobbled a bit. ‘It’s over.’
Only it wasn’t. He stooped as if compelled. He put his hands on her shoulders and he bent so his eyes met hers.
And, as if she was compelled in turn, her face tilted to meet his. Her eyes were wide, her lips parted, just slightly, in just the way he remembered.
And he kissed her. Properly this time, not like the kiss they’d shared in the darkness and the stress of the mine.
* * *
Some things were the same.
Some things were mind-blowing.
He remembered the first time he’d kissed her, the sweetness, the taste, the rush of heat. He remembered the way his body had responded—like here was the other half of his whole.
He remembered thinking it must be something in the water—or what they’d eaten. It had been their first date. They’d bought hamburgers and eaten them on the beach at sunset.
They’d kissed and when they’d finally drawn apart he’d felt like his life had just changed.
He remembered thinking it was ridiculous. She was a colleague. She was just someone...nice.
Nice hadn’t come into that kiss.
Nice didn’t come into this kiss.
The heat was still there, and the power.
Two bodies, fusing.
They m
ight just as well be naked between the sheets. This kiss said they knew each other as they’d know no other.
Two becom one? They’d made their wedding vows but vows didn’t come into this. It was the way he felt.
It was the way she made him melt.
Her lips were parted and the kiss she gave him was all Maddie. Generous. Holding nothing back.
She was soft and strong, warm and wanting.
She gave everything.
He remembered that about her. Her love for her mother. Her generosity to her friends.
The way she gave her body to his.
He’d thought he could lie with this woman forever. He thought he’d found his home, and somehow it was still here, this sweet, perfect centre. This aching, loving perfection.
Her kiss said it all. Her hands were in his hair, tugging him to her, kissing him back with a passion that made his heart twist. That made him want to gather her into his arms and carry her.
To where?
To where he could protect her forever?
She must have felt the discordant note, for suddenly the fierce hold eased and she was pushing him back. When their lips parted he felt as if their bodies were being wrenched apart, but she was smiling.
Sort of. He knew this woman. He could see the glimmer of tears behind the smile. But he could also see the strength—and the decision.
‘Time to go, Josh. If I ever need rescuing again you’ll be the first person I call on, I swear.’
‘I’ll come.’
‘And if you need rescuing?’
Silence. Her smile stayed, but there was infinite sadness behind it.
‘If ever you change your mind...’ she whispered. ‘If ever you want to hop off your white charger and let me have a turn...’ But then she bit her lip. ‘No. I won’t make a promise like that. I’ve tried to move on, and I’ll keep trying. You go back to your life, Josh Campbell, and I’ll stay here with mine.’
‘Maddie...’
‘No more words,’ she whispered, and put a finger to his lips, a feather touch, almost a blessing. ‘Just go.’
* * *
He was gone.
She lay in her too-big bed and hugged her baby. Her body ached.
Her heart ached.
She’d made the right call—she knew she had—but, oh, it hurt. And it was hurting Josh, too.
‘Impossible,’ she murmured to herself, but then Lea wriggled and opened her eyes and screwed up her nose and told her mother in no uncertain terms that all was not right with her world.
She was a mother and she was needed.
‘But not by Josh,’ she told herself. ‘I’m on my own.’
Only she wasn’t. She had her baby. She had her mother, her friends, the islanders.
It was only Josh who was alone, she thought bleakly.
He had no choice. With the demons he was carrying he’d stay alone forever.
CHAPTER TWELVE
‘I’M NOT LYING on any stretcher.’
‘Honey, we came to pick you up on the grounds that you’re a medical evacuation,’ Beth told him. ‘If we told the powers that be you’re fine, apart from a gashed arm, you’d be told to have a nice holiday on Wildfire and come back with the supply boat next week. But you’ve a gashed arm, a haematoma and shock. Post-traumatic stress disorder is yet to be ruled out. Lie down, like a good boy, and let me give you an aspirin.’
‘I’m not lying down,’ he said, revolted, and she raised her brows.
‘Um...I have backup. The medical opinion on your bruised leg is that sitting upright for the flight is asking for clots and you’re not growing clots on my watch. You lie down or we land again and I’ll have Sam and Keanu come in here and sit on you. Straitjacket if necessary.’
‘You wouldn’t dare.’
‘Try me,’ she said, and grinned and crossed her arms and kept her brows raised. ‘Down!’
He had no choice. He lay on the stretcher. She smiled and strapped him in.
‘Mind, we could have left you there,’ she said serenely. ‘We gave you that option.’
‘There’s no point.’
‘Maddie’s moved on?’
‘I... Yes.’
‘Funny things, marriages,’ she said. ‘Unless they end really bitterly, you always leave a bit of your heart behind.’
‘I haven’t.’
‘No?’
‘No,’ he said, and then decided if he was to be treated as a patient he could act like a patient. He lay back and closed his eyes as the plane raced down the runway and took to the skies.
He’d have kind of liked to sit up and look down at the disappearing islands behind him.
Saying goodbye hadn’t been enough.
It had to be enough. They’d go back to Christmas and birthday cards and that’d be it.
You always leave a bit of your heart behind.
Philosophy of Beth, he thought dryly. After two marriages and four sons, she had an opinion on everything.
She was wrong this time. It wasn’t a bit of his heart. It was a lot.
No. It was the whole box and dice. He lay back with his eyes closed, and it felt like he was leaving a part of himself down there. It wasn’t just Maddie, either, he thought. He’d delivered Lea. He’d cradled her in his big hands and he’d felt...he’d felt...
Like she was his?
She wasn’t, though, and neither was Maddie.
They could have been his wife and his daughter.
He’d walked away.
And all of a sudden it was just as well he was lying down, as the sweep of emotion flooding through him might have sent him reeling.
He wanted them with a fierceness he’d never experienced before. He wanted to be part of their lives.
He wanted his marriage back.
Marriage... In sickness and in health. Why did that line suddenly slam into his head?
Because he remembered Maddie saying it. To love and to honour, in sickness and in health.
He’d said the words as well, and he’d meant them.
But he hadn’t let Maddie mean them.
He’d met Maddie just as her mother had suffered her stroke; when Maddie had been in distress. He’d been able to help. He’d been strong, capable, ready to move heaven and earth if it could make Maddie smile again.
He’d loved helping her and he’d fallen in love.
Because she’d needed him?
Why should he have these insights now, after all these years? It was impossible to understand, and suddenly his thoughts were everywhere.
He remembered the night Mikey had died, trying desperately to hold on to his rigid control. ‘It’s okay to cry,’ Maddie had said, more than once, but he hadn’t. He’d held her while she’d broken her heart, and then he’d walked off his pain and his anger where she hadn’t had to see.
His job was to protect.
And then, five months later, the policemen at the door. Your sister, sir...
He remembered Maddie moving instinctively to hold him, to take him into her arms, and yet he’d backed away.
He’d failed even more. He couldn’t protect his sister. He couldn’t protect his wife.
They’d been in the air for over half an hour now. Back on Wildfire a funeral would be starting.
Kalifa Lui. Nani’s husband.
His thoughts were flying every which way but suddenly they were centred on Nani. Mourning her husband but finding the strength to visit Maddie.
Nani, touching Lea’s face, taking strength from a baby.
Maddie, taking strength from Nani.
Loving was all about giving? That had been his mantra, but in Maddie’s world loving worked two ways. Giving love and receiving love. Giving comfort and
receiving comfort.
Just loving, no strings attached.
Maddie would be at the funeral now, he thought. No matter how sore, no matter how much she’d prefer to be in her magnificent bed with her sea view and her beautiful baby, she’d be at the funeral and no one would send her away.
There’d be no objection from Nani. He knew it. Nani knew that accepting love was the same as giving it.
To accept love wasn’t a weakness?
To accept love might even be a strength.
How had it taken so long for him to see it? Was he stupid?
Could he admit he’d been stupid? More, could he act on it?
His thoughts washed on. He lay so silent that finally Beth moved from her seat to check on him.
‘Don’t you dare die on my watch,’ she told him. ‘We’re only an hour from Cairns.’
‘No, we’re not.’
‘Not?’
‘No.’ He was trying to unclip the straps holding him in place. ‘Give me the radio.’
‘What? Why?’
‘This is a medical emergency,’ he told her. ‘I believe Maddie is attending a funeral without proper medical attention. She needs an emergency physician.’
‘You’re kidding.’
‘I would never kid about anything so serious,’ he told her. ‘But this isn’t your decision.’
‘Josh...’
And then he softened. Start now, he told himself. Share.
‘Beth, I’m in love,’ he told her. ‘I’ve been stupid and blind and any number of adjectives you want to call me, but I’m over it. I need your help.’
‘You?’ she said in disbelief. ‘You need my help?’
‘I need your help,’ he said humbly. ‘Dear Beth, please help me unfasten these straps and hand me the radio. And then let’s get this plane back to Wildfire.’
* * *
The day thou gavest, Lord, has ended, the darkness falls at thy behest...
If there was one thing the islanders of M’Langi prided themselves on it was singing, and the combined voices of what seemed at least half the population was enough to bring tears to Maddie’s eyes.
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