Blake’s breath was let out in a whoosh of relief. ‘There you go, then. What’s your resting blood pressure?’
‘Ninety over seventy.’
‘That’s great. Perfectly normal.’
‘I know that.’ She glared on, refusing to let go of her terrors. ‘But I still might get eclampsia. And I might die.’
‘Is that why you’re sitting out here, then?’ he demanded, things becoming clear. ‘Worrying about dying?’
She hesitated. And, finally, she let go. ‘A bit,’ she admitted. ‘I guess I’ve been worrying about who’ll fill my daughter’s Christmas stocking next year if I do.’
‘Or your son’s?’
‘As you say. Or my son’s.’
He thought about this, trying to be professional—as he’d be if he were sitting on one side of his desk while his patient voiced her fears from the other. ‘You really do have no one?’
‘I really do have no one.’ She took a deep breath, fighting to regain her normal cheerfulness. ‘There’s only Ernest and I can’t see him changing nappies. Bay Beach has great children’s homes, though.’
‘You’re so worried you checked out the orphanage?’ he demanded, startled, and she gave a shamefaced nod.
‘Just a bit.’
‘Just a lot!’ He could see it all now. Rationality had gone out the window. She’d been alone throughout this pregnancy and she’d lost perspective.
So she needed reassurance. Tell her she’ll be fine, he told himself. Tell her there was less than a chance in a thousand that things would go wrong. Tell her…
But suddenly he knew what he’d tell her, and it was none of the above.
‘I’ll look after your baby if anything happens to you.’
He’d said it—and neither of them could believe he had. They sat on the floor and stared at each other and he thought, What on earth have I done?
And she thought, What on earth is he saying?
‘Blake…’
‘Nell?’
‘You don’t…you don’t mean it?’ she whispered, and the look on her face was one he was starting to know. And he didn’t like it. It was her Nell-against-the-world look. Nell declaring she didn’t need anyone.
It was Nell kick-starting her new life in her wonderful patchwork overalls and with a heartful of courage that was so much greater than any he had.
What he was offering was a tiny thing, he thought—a promise for an outcome he knew would never happen. But it meant the world to her. Her eyes were shining, shimmering with unshed tears, and her hand caught his and held.
‘Blake, how could you? You don’t have the least idea of what you’re saying. You’re a dyed-in-the-wool bachelor and the last thing you need is a baby.’
Yeah, but it’d be Nell’s baby.
The thought hit home with quite amazing clarity that he wouldn’t mind so much. If this baby was like Nell. A child… He could get a housekeeper, he thought. Bring it up here. Keep Ernest…
Hell, Nell wasn’t going to die! But if she did…
It was a dreadful thought. Appalling. And he’d have a baby.
‘Where would you squeeze a baby into your schedule?’ she demanded, and he chuckled at the horror in her voice.
‘So I guess you’d better live, then.’
‘But…you are serious?’
Blake’s laughter died. ‘Yes, Nell. God knows why, but I am serious.’
‘Even though you never want to marry again? You never want a woman? But you’d still take on a child.’
‘If he or she needed me. Yes, I would.’ And he knew, suddenly, that he spoke the truth.
‘Oh, Blake…’
He gazed down at her upturned face, still trying to come to terms with what he’d offered. He must be mad. But he didn’t feel in the least mad. He felt sure and strong, and warm and tender and…
And then, before he knew what she intended—before he could even guess—she’d twisted and taken his face between her two hands. And she’d kissed him full on the mouth.
The kiss was supposed to be one of gratitude—of surprise and pleasure and overwhelming thankfulness that he’d made such an offer—that he’d eased such an aching fear within.
But it never could be simple gratitude. Never. Because the two of them had been apart for too long—partnerless—each of them aching with loneliness and with need. So there was that between them which neither understood but which became apparent at the first touch of lips to lips.
And it was something that was mind-shattering. It was like their world was blown apart at first touch.
Fire to fire…
That was what it was like, Nell thought dazedly. Wildfire! She’d made the first move—she’d reached up to kiss Blake—but the moment they touched she was no longer in control. Her body had a life all of its own, and it was an all-engulfing blaze of white-hot heat.
Her mouth met his, and was it hers who claimed his or the other way around? Who knew? Nell didn’t. All she knew was that there was warmth where there had only been ice before, and there was comfort and longing and aching, aching need…
He felt so good. He felt so right! From the first time she’d seen him she’d felt this magnetic pull between them, and it had grown stronger with every piece of evidence that here before her was a wonderful human being.
No. Not just a wonderful human being, she thought dazedly. A wonderful man.
He was big and tender and caring, and aching with the desolation of loss himself. He was as different to Richard as he could be.
He was…
He was Blake. Just Blake. And that was enough and more for her body to respond. She melted into him, aching to have his arms come around her and hold her. And when they did she could hardly believe it. Miracles did happen. Love could flower where there’d only been barren waste…
Love.
She was falling in love, she thought, bewildered beyond belief, and then she thought, No.
She wasn’t falling. She’d fallen.
She was head over heels in love with Blake Sutherland, she decided right there and then, and there wasn’t a darn thing she could do to stop herself being just that.
And she wasn’t going to begin to try.
And Blake… He had no idea what was going on. No idea at all. One minute he was sitting on the living-room floor under the ridiculously decorated Christmas tree, trying hard to be professional, trying hard to be concerned, and suddenly the axis of his world had tilted.
He hadn’t meant to make such an offer. He hadn’t meant to get involved at all. Hell, he never got involved. He was a doctor, for heaven’s sake, and he heard hard-luck stories every day of the week. What if he offered every single mother the reassurance he’d just offered Nell?
But this wasn’t any single mum. This was Nell.
It didn’t make any sense at all, he told himself desperately, but the way his body was responding to hers, the way his head was threatening to explode and his thighs were on fire and his body was screaming his need and…
And hell!
If only he was wearing something on his upper body! But he was naked to the waist and her crazy pyjamas were brushing his bare skin, and her breasts were against his chest and…
And his arms came around and held her to him. It was a measure of reassurance, he told himself desperately. Not so he could deepen the kiss. Not so he could feel her gorgeous body against his. Both those things were side issues and they didn’t matter.
Like hell they didn’t matter! They were all that mattered. His mouth was plundering hers, starving for something he hardly knew he’d been missing. Or something that he’d never had.
Had he ever felt this way with Sylvia?
No. No and no and no.
Sylvia…
But suddenly she was there. His dead wife. She was in his brain, screaming at him that letting his emotions rule his head led to disaster. Not just for him. For everybody.
A tiny six-year-old was dead because of his stupid emotions…
Once before
he’d let his emotions hold sway and two people had died because of it. It was a desperate lesson, but it had been drilled in so far that even now it surfaced.
The way he was feeling was crazy. Terrible! The way Nell made him feel… Like it or not, he was emotionally involved, and this was the way of madness.
What was he doing? he thought dazedly. It was one thing to offer to care for a child when he knew that offer need never be taken up. It was another to kiss the child’s mother as if he meant it.
He was falling toward… Falling toward he didn’t know what, and it scared the life out of him. He didn’t want this sort of involvement. He didn’t.
And so, finally and with a shuddering gasp that left him feeling desolate with loss, he managed to pull away. Confused, Nell fell back, and she looked up at him in the dim light with eyes that were enormous. Her eyes reflected his confusion and his…his fear?
And that’s what it was all about, he thought bitterly. Fear. Somehow he dragged himself to his feet, though afterwards he could never figure out how he’d done it. How he’d managed to break the link.
He was afraid, but at least he had the sense to admit it. To run before it could get any worse. ‘I’m sorry. Nell, I’m sorry.’ His voice was a husky whisper.
‘Hey, I’m the one who kissed you.’ She was striving for lightness but it didn’t come off. How could it? ‘I guess we’ve both been alone for two long. Sex-starved medicos, that’s us.’ And if her voice hadn’t trembled he’d have thought she was joking. ‘I—’
‘It’s just as well I’m pregnant already,’ she continued, her voice growing firmer in the face of his uncertainty. ‘And I deserve to be. Wandering round strange men’s houses in the middle of the night, wearing nothing but elephant pyjamas.’
He stared down at her, and somehow she managed to get her face in order to smile back at him. Keep it light, her brain was screaming, while all her body wanted to do was rise and…
Nope. Listen to your mind, Dr McKenzie, she ordered herself. It’s the only safe course.
She didn’t want to be safe. She wanted more! More of Blake Sutherland. More of Blake Sutherland right now!
But he was managing a smile as well, albeit a pretty strained one. His eyes were as wary as hell, and he backed a couple of feet like she wasn’t safe.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘For a kiss?’ Her eyes mocked. It wasn’t too bad that he was disconcerted, she decided. Normally he was too damned…concerted for his own good! ‘I refuse to accept your apology. No one apologises for a kiss as good as that one.’ She twinkled. ‘Together we pack a powerful punch, Dr Sutherland.’
‘We do indeed.’
‘So you’d best be safely off to bed before we do something we might regret?’ She ended on a note of interrogation, and he nodded.
‘Yes.’
‘Me, too.’ She struggled to her feet. He couldn’t help himself—his hand came out automatically to help, but after she was steadied he withdrew again. His eyes were like those of a watchful jaguar, a big cat not sure whether what he was watching was hunter or prey.
Nell hesitated. She should bolt for cover, she thought. She should. But…
‘You did mean it?’ she whispered. ‘About caring for the baby if anything happens?’
‘I dare say I’d be in a queue. After Emily and Jonas and—’
She didn’t let him finish. ‘But you did mean it?’
There was a long silence. ‘Yes, I did mean it,’ Blake said heavily, committed despite himself. ‘I did.’
‘Thank you,’ she whispered, and then, because there was nothing else to say—nothing else to do—she clicked her fingers for Ernest to follow her and she headed for bed.
She stopped at the door and looked back. He looked desperate, she thought. Gorgeous and manly and very, very sexy, but desperate for all that. She so wanted to go to him. To hold him.
But all they had in common was medicine and it was a pretty tenuous link.
‘You sleep in tomorrow,’ she told him. ‘To make up for tonight. I’ll do ward rounds and morning surgery.’
‘Just morning surgery.’
‘Blake…’
‘That’s all I want,’ Blake said heavily. ‘Nothing more.’ And both of them knew he was talking about something other than medicine.
‘Fine.’ She was suddenly angry. ‘Fine by me, Dr Sutherland.’ She clicked her fingers again. Ernest had been dozing underneath the Christmas-tree popcorn, waiting for some to fall on his nose. It was like wishing for the moon, Nell thought bitterly. Or like wanting emotional response from Blake Sutherland. ‘Come on, Ernest. We know when we’re not wanted.’
Ernest made to follow her, but when he reached her side, he too looked back, as if he would really, really like to stay.
And, amazingly, he was looking at Blake and not at the popcorn. ‘Come on, Ernest,’ Nell growled again, and cast a last hostile look at the man who was messing with her equanimity. And her dog’s equanimity. ‘Let’s go! We ought to learn when we’re not wanted. Heaven knows, we should be good at it by now.’
And after that she couldn’t get near him. Even with medicine Nell had to fight him every inch of the way, and after a couple of days she was ready to scream.
Blake—graciously—allowed her to conduct morning surgery, which went on for three hours, but that was it. Everything else she tried to do she was politely told to butt out. And sometimes he wasn’t even polite. He just ordered.
‘Who do you think you are?’ she demanded five days before Christmas. They’d just eaten dinner and Blake was about to head out yet again, for the fifth house call for the day. ‘I’m being paid as much as you are. What gives you the right to do all the work?’
‘You’re pregnant.’ He was holding himself stiffly away from her, as if she had body odour, and she felt like slapping him. Or throwing the dish she was holding at him. Of all the stupid, pig-headed, obstinate…
‘And you’re exhausted,’ she snapped.
‘I’m not exhausted.’ He was so matter-of-fact that it was almost impossible to argue with him. ‘You’re giving me time off.’
‘Ha! You do house calls when I’m doing surgery. Time off indeed.’
‘It gives me time to run.’
‘And that’s another thing,’ she said darkly. ‘You don’t need to run for miles every day. It’s not normal. It’s not even natural.’
‘It’s healthy.’
‘Is it? I believe I was given a certain number of preordained breaths and I’m not going to waste a single one of them jogging.’
‘That’s the difference between you and me,’ he said virtuously, striving for lightness. ‘You’re indolent.’
‘I’m only indolent because you won’t let me be anything else.’
‘You could spend more time out at your grandparents’ house. That way you could move out there earlier.’
‘Meaning you could get rid of me earlier?’
‘Yes,’ he said promptly, and she glowered.
‘I can’t go out there. They’re restumping, and if you think I can live in a house while it’s stumpless… Of all the mean things. And it’s Christmas, too. Blake Sutherland, you are less than polite.’
‘I need to be. It’s my only defence.’
‘You sound like you’re afraid of me.’
‘I’m not.’
‘And you’re looking forward to having Christmas with me?’
‘I’m not looking forward to having Christmas with anyone.’
‘You, Blake Sutherland, are being too stupid for words.’ She rose and slammed her dishes in the sink. One cracked. She stared at it, and then the corners of her mouth creased upward. ‘Whoops…’
It was her favourite word, he thought, and why it had the power to twist his thoughts so he hardly knew what he was thinking…
Nell was right. He was being too stupid for words. But something was being threatened here and he didn’t know what.
Hell, he was running and he didn’t know why.
But Nell suspected. Blake was scared stiff of commitment, she thought. Well, so was she, but it didn’t make her mutton-headed.
Blake was a wonderful doctor, she thought time and time again as she watched him at work. Wherever she went there were instances of his skill—and his compassion.
Grace Mayne was a prime example. The old lady came into the surgery the next morning with her hand wrapped in a bloodstained bandage. She’d been filleting fish and had almost filleted herself in the process. The jagged cut needed cleaning and stitching, which took quite a while.
‘What on earth are you doing to yourself?’ Nell demanded. ‘For heaven’s sake, after all our trouble with your diabetes… Are you determined to keep us busy?’
‘Just stick a stitch in it and don’t fuss, girl,’ Grace told her. Then she hesitated. ‘Actually, I was coming in anyway so Dr Sutherland wouldn’t have to come all the way out to my place.’
Nell frowned. ‘Why would he come out to your place?’ She carefully cleaned the jagged cut, stitched the edges neatly together and tied off her thread. Then, with the task done, she probed some more. ‘Your diabetes is stable again, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, but…’ Grace hesitated again and then decided to continue. ‘You know my Jack died a couple of months back?’
‘Blake told me that.’ Her voice gentled. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Yeah, well, I didn’t take it very well. It seems sometimes that I’ve lost everyone. Our daughter died of whooping cough when she was just a baby. Mike, our son, was drowned surfing when he was nineteen. And now Jack…’ She took a deep breath. ‘Anyway, Dr Sutherland comes a couple of times a week—just to make sure I’m OK.’
‘And are you OK?’ Nell probed gently, and Grace shrugged. Then she smiled. ‘Actually, I am,’ she said. ‘At least, I’m better. The rescue in the boat—it made me feel like I was still useful. And with you in town…’ She broke off, as if she feared saying too much, and Nell was left confused. But Grace was moving on.
‘It was Dr Sutherland who got me fishing again,’ she said, and Nell knew she was changing the subject but didn’t know why. ‘I’ve been fishing for garfish for the nursing-home patients—there’s a couple of oldies who love them and he knows I’m good at catching them. That’s what I was doing when I sliced myself.’
Dr Blake's Angel Page 13
