The Doctor & the Runaway Heiress

by Marion Lennox

  He looked… anything but trembly, she decided.

  He also made her heart twist. There was enough gravity behind his laughter to make her think this guy really did care. He really did worry that she might have nightmares.

  ‘There’s a psychologist at the hospital,’ Riley said gently, and she knew she was right. ‘Peter’s great with post traumatic stress. Make an appointment to see him. This week.’

  She didn’t need…

  ‘Do it, Pippa,’ he said. ‘I should have made the appointment for you but it’s…’

  ‘Not your job?’

  ‘I just scrape people off,’ he said. ‘It’s other’s work to dust them down. I was only in the ward on Monday because we’re permanently short-staffed.’

  ‘So now you’re surfing.’

  ‘Who’s not on my side now?’ he demanded, sounded wounded. ‘Our team picked up two car-crash victims north of Dubbo in the wee hours. I’m off duty.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry,’ he said, switching back to caring almost immediately. ‘It doesn’t suit you. You know…’ He hesitated. Looked out to sea for a bit. Decided to say what he wanted to say. ‘The world’s your oyster,’ he said at last. ‘You’re back in the water. You have a honeymoon suite in the most beautiful place in the world. I get the feeling you’ve been drifting. Maybe you could use this time to figure what you want. What’s good for you.’

  ‘Standing here’s good.’

  ‘It’s a great spot to be,’ he said softly. ‘And the surf’s waiting.’

  Then, before she guessed what he intended, he lifted his hand and brushed her cheek with his forefinger. It was a feather touch. It was a touch of caring, or maybe a salute of farewell-and why it had the power to send a shudder through the length of her body she had no idea.

  She stepped back, startled, and his smile grew rueful.

  ‘Pippa, I’m not a shark,’ he said. ‘I’m just me, the guy at the end of the rope. Just me saying goodbye, good luck, God speed.’

  And with that he raised his hand in a gesture that seemed almost mocking-and turned and headed back to his surf, back to a life she had no part in.

  If he’d stayed on the beach one moment longer he would have kissed her.

  He’d wanted, quite desperately, to kiss her. She’d looked lost.

  No matter how strong she’d been-walking away from the appalling Roger, managing not to drown, helping with Amy, all of those things required strength-he still had the impression she was flailing.

  She was nothing to do with him. She was a woman he’d pulled out of the water.

  Like Marguerite?

  He’d met Marguerite on a beach in the South of France. Of course. She had been there as it seemed she was always there, working on her tan. Wealthy, English, idle.

  On a scholarship at university in London, he’d been on summer break, the first he’d ever had where he hadn’t needed to work to pay for next term’s living. His roommate had known someone who wouldn’t mind putting them up. The South of France had sounded fantastic to a kid who’d once lived rough on the streets of Sydney.

  He’d bumped into Marguerite on the second day in the water, literally bumped when she’d deliberately swum into his surfboard. She’d faked being hurt, and giggled when he’d carried her from the water. She’d watched him surf, admired, flirted, asked him where he came from, asked her to teach her to surf-and suddenly things had seemed serious. On her side as well as his.

  The first time he met her parents he knew he was hopelessly out of his class, but he didn’t care. For Marguerite didn’t care either, openly scorning her parents’ disapproval. For five weeks she lay in his arms, she held him and she told him he was her idea of heaven. For a boy who’d never been held the sensation was insidious in its sweetness. She melted against him, and the rest of the world disappeared.

  Then reality. The end of summer. He returned to university and the relationship was over. For weeks he phoned her every day, but a maid always took his calls. Marguerite was ‘unavailable’.

  Finally her mother answered, annoyed his calls were interfering with her maid’s work.

  ‘You were my daughter’s summer plaything,’ she drawled. ‘A surfer. Australian. Amusing. She has other things to focus on now.’

  He thought she was lying, but when he insisted she finally put Marguerite on. Her mother was right. It was over.

  ‘Oh, Riley, leave it. How boring. You were fun for summer, nothing more. You helped me drive Mummy and Daddy crazy, and it’s worked. They still want to send me to finishing school. Can you imagine?’ She chuckled then, but there was no warmth in her laughter. There was even a touch of cruelty. ‘I do believe they’re about to be even more annoyed with me, but they won’t know until it’s too late, and I’ll enjoy that very much. So thank you and goodbye. But don’t ring again, there’s a lamb. It’s over.’

  She’d become pregnant to rebel? To prove some crazy point over her parents?

  And Pippa?

  Pippa was rebelling against her family as well-like Marguerite?

  Don’t judge a woman by Marguerite.

  No, he told himself harshly. Don’t judge at all and don’t get close. He’d seen enough of his attempts at family, his attempts at love, to know it wasn’t for him.

  So why did he want to kiss Pippa?

  He didn’t. A man’d be a fool.

  A man needed to surf instead, or find someone else to rescue.

  Someone who wasn’t Pippa.

  She wandered back to the hotel, lay on the sun lounger on the balcony, and gazed out to sea.

  Thinking.

  ‘I get the feeling you’ve been drifting. Maybe you could use this time to figure what you want. What’s good for you.’

  And…

  ‘We’re permanently short-staffed.’

  The idea of staying had taken seed and was growing.

  To be part of a hospital community doing such good…

  ‘It’s romantic nonsense,’ she told herself. ‘Yes, you should go back to nursing but you know your old hospital will give you your job back.’

  But to live here…

  She could make herself a permanent home. A home without the ties, the guilt, the associations of a family who disapproved of her, who’d never cease expecting her to be something she wasn’t.

  She could buy a house. Something small overlooking the sea.

  Home. It was a concept so amazing she couldn’t believe it had taken her until now to think of it. Maybe she’d never been in a place where the call had been this great until now. Like a siren song. Home.

  She could put up wallpaper. Plant tomatoes. Do… whatever people did with homes.

  Do it, she told herself. Now, before you change your mind.

  And then she forced herself to repeat the question that had been hovering… well, maybe from the time she’d been hauled out of the sea.

  Am I doing it because of Riley?

  Don’t be ridiculous. Her sensible self was ready with all the justification in the world. You’re doing it because of you. It’s time you settled, got yourself somewhere permanent. And Riley’s hardly in the hospital.

  He is sometimes.

  There was a reason doctor/patient relationships were banned, she thought. Was she suffering a bad case of hero worship?

  How could she be friends with Riley? The relationship would be skewed from the start.

  ‘So what?’ she muttered. ‘I can avoid him. Is hero worship enough to stop me applying for a job, making a home in the best place in the world?’

  Yes. Sleep a bit more. Think about it.

  I can’t drift, she told herself.

  Give yourself another day.

  Yes, but that’s all, she decided. One more day of drifting and then…

  Then move forward.

  Toward Riley?

  No, she told herself harshly. Toward a home. Nothing more.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  RILEY enjoyed Thursdays. He liked the
flights to the Outback settlements. Today he was scheduled for a clinic at Dry Gum Creek and Dry Gum was one of his favourites. It was Amy’s home. It was also the home of Sister Joyce, possibly the fiercest senior nurse in the state. He loved her to bits. He pushed open the door to the Flight-Aid office feeling good, and found Harry sitting at his desk, with news.

  ‘No Cordelia,’ he said morosely. ‘Her head cold’s worse and her German shepherd’s in labour.’

  They stared at each other, knowing each was thinking the same thing. Cordelia was a first-rate flight nurse but she was in her sixties, her health wasn’t great and her dogs were growing more important than her work.

  ‘We can go without her,’ Harry ventured. Working without a third crew member was fine unless there needed to be an evacuation. There wasn’t an evacuation due today-they were simply taking Amy home and doing a routine clinic.

  But there was always a chance that a routine clinic would turn into an evacuation. Crews of two were dicey.

  They had no choice.

  ‘There’s a note for you to go see Coral.’ Harry said, shoving himself off the desk. ‘Take-off in ten minutes?’

  ‘I’ll check what Coral wants first,’ Riley said. Their nurse-administrator was good. She usually let them be-that she’d contacted them today meant trouble.

  More trouble than a missing crew member?

  ‘Are you sure?’ Coral was short and almost as wide as she was tall. She was sitting on the far side of her desk, looking at Pippa’s CV like it was gold. ‘You really want to work here?’

  ‘I’m not sure if I can get a work visa.’

  ‘I’ll have you a work visa in the time it takes my secretary to make you a coffee. You’re a midwife?’

  ‘Yes, but…’

  ‘But don’t say anything,’ Coral begged. ‘I’m reading this thinking I’m shutting up about two of your post-grad skills. I could have me a war if this gets out. The surgeons will want you. Intensive Care will want you. I want you. When would you like to start?’

  ‘I need to find somewhere to live. I’d like to find a house but it might take time.’

  ‘We have a house for med staff. Four bedrooms and a view to die for. You can move in this morning.’

  ‘My hotel’s paid until Sunday.’

  Coral nodded, reflective. ‘You are still getting over your ordeal,’ she conceded. ‘Riley’ll say you should rest.’

  ‘I’m rested.’

  ‘Your chest okay?’

  ‘I’ve been given the all-clear.’

  ‘Hmm.’ The middle-aged administrator gazed speculatively at Pippa. ‘How about we break you in gently with a training day-give you an overview of what services we offer outside the hospital?’

  ‘I’d love that.’ She surely would. Her lone honeymoon wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.

  ‘Well,’ Coral said, glancing with approval at Pippa’s jeans and T-shirt, ‘you’re even dressed for it.’

  ‘I’m not,’ Pippa said, alarmed. ‘I came with resort wear. I bought these jeans yesterday. I’ll need to buy serviceable clothes if I’m to nurse here.’

  ‘For where you’re going, jeans are great,’ Coral said, beaming. ‘Just wait until I tell Riley.’

  Coral’s door was open. She was drinking coffee with someone. That someone had her back to the door but she turned as she heard him approach.

  Pippa.

  What was there in that to take a man’s breath away? Nothing at all. She’d probably come here to thank them. Something formal.

  She rose and she was wearing neat jeans and a T-shirt. She looked almost ordinary.

  But this woman would never look ordinary. Yesterday on the beach in her bikini she’d looked extraordinary. Now, in jeans, she still looked…

  ‘You two know each other,’ Coral said, and he pulled himself together. Coral was intelligent and perceptive, and she was looking at him now with one of her brows hiked-like there were questions happening and she was gathering answers whether he liked it or not.

  ‘I… Of course. You know Pippa’s the one we pulled from the water? Who helped with Amy’s baby?’

  ‘I do know that,’ Coral said, her brow still hiked. ‘So you know she’s skilled?’

  ‘I know she’s skilled.’ He felt wary now and he wasn’t sure why. Pippa’s face wasn’t giving anything away. If anything, she looked wary as well.

  ‘I have Pippa’s application to work for us on my desk,’ Coral said. ‘Right here. It looks impressive. You’ve worked with her. Any reason I shouldn’t sign her up on the spot?’

  Pippa? Work here? There was a concept to think about. But Coral was giving him no time. Answer, he told himself. Now.

  ‘There’s no reason at all,’ he said, and was aware of a stab of satisfaction as he heard himself say it. Was that dumb? No, because Pippa was an excellent nurse.

  Yes, because the satisfaction he was feeling didn’t have a thing to do with her competence. It was everything to do with her looking at him measuringly, those calm green eyes promising a man…

  Promising him nothing. Get a grip.

  ‘For how long?’ he asked.

  ‘Indefinitely,’ Pippa told him. ‘I don’t want to go back to England.’

  ‘You’ll change your mind.’

  It was Pippa’s turn to hike an eyebrow. She had him disconcerted. Very disconcerted.

  But he didn’t have the time-or the inclination-to stand around being disconcerted. He remembered work with relief. Harry was waiting. Amy and her baby would be loaded and ready to go.

  ‘This is great,’ he said. ‘Pippa, welcome to Whale Cove Hospital. But can we talk about it later? I need to leave.’

  ‘I’ve sent a message to the ward to hold onto Amy for fifteen minutes,’ Coral said. ‘We have a couple of things to discuss. First, I’ve told Pippa she can move into the medical house. You have four bedrooms. I assume there’s no objection?’

  They both stilled at that. He saw Pippa’s face go blank and he thought he hadn’t been part of that equation.

  ‘You never said I’d be sharing with Riley,’ she said.

  ‘It’s the hospital’s house,’ Coral said. ‘Riley mostly has it to himself but we occasionally use it for transient staff.’

  ‘I’m not transient,’ Pippa said.

  ‘I have a guest coming tomorrow,’ Riley said over the top of her.

  ‘You have four bedrooms.’ Coral glanced at her watch, clearly impatient. ‘If you have one guest, there are still two bedrooms spare. It should suit Pippa for the short term. I’m not going to knock back a great nurse for want of accommodation. Meanwhile, Pippa would like to work immediately but I don’t want to put her on the wards until I’m sure she’s fully recovered. Cordelia’s not coming in. You need another team member. Pippa needs an overview of the service so I’m sending her out with you. Can you fit her up with a Flight-Aid shirt so she looks official? She can tag along while you can talk her through life here. You’ll be back by late tonight. Pippa, I’ll let you sleep in tomorrow-it’d be a shame to waste that honeymoon suite of yours. You can move into the house at the weekend, you can start here on Monday, and we can all live happily ever after. No objections? Great, let’s go.’

  It had happened so fast she felt breathless. She had a job.

  She was flying over the Australian Outback in an official Flight-Aid plane. Harry was flying it. ‘Dual qualifications,’ he said smugly when she expressed surprise. ‘Triple if you count me riding a Harley. Riley here doctors and surfs. He has two skills to my three. It’s just lucky I’m modest.’

  Harry made her smile.

  The whole set-up made her smile.

  The back of the plane was set up almost as an ambulance. Harry and Riley were up front. Pippa was in the back with her patients, Amy and baby Riley.

  This was the start of her new life.

  She was wearing a Flight-Aid shirt. The Flight-Aid emblem was on her sleeve and there was a badge on her breast. She was about to attend a clinic in one of the mo
st remote settlements in the world.

  This time last week she’d been planning her wedding. Four days ago she’d been floating in the dark, expecting to die. Now she was employed as a nurse, heading to an Outback community to help Dr Riley Chase.

  The man who’d saved her life.

  He was a colleague. She had to remind herself of that, over and over. But in his Flight-Aid uniform he looked… he looked…

  ‘Isn’t Doc Riley fabulous?’ Amy was headed home with her baby, and things were looking great in her world. She was bubbling with happiness. ‘He’s made me see so many things. You reckon one day my baby could be a doctor?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I wish I’d gone to school,’ Amy said wistfully. ‘Mum never made me and there were always kids to look after. Then Doc Riley read the Riot Act and now they all go. My littlie’ll go to school from day one.’ She glanced at Amy’s uniform. ‘It’d be so cool to wear that.’

  It did feel cool. Wearing this uniform…

  Her parents would hate it, Pippa thought. They hated her being a nurse, and for her to be a nurse here…

  They still had Roger. They liked Roger.

  They didn’t like her.

  She was getting morose. Luckily little Riley decided life had been quiet long enough and started to wail. That gave her something to do, a reason not to think of the difficulties back home. She changed the baby and settled her on Amy’s breast. As she worked she marvelled at how neat everything was in the plane’s compact cabin, how easily she could work here-and she also marvelled that she felt fine. She’d had a moment’s qualm when she’d seen how small the plane was. If she was to be airsick…

  No such problem. She grinned at mother and baby, feeling smug. Somehow she’d found herself a new life. She’d be good at this.

  Flight-Aid nurse. Heir to the Fotheringham millions?

  Never the twain shall meet.

  ‘So do we use her straight away?’

  Riley sighed. He was having trouble coming to terms with their new team player, and the fact that Harry was intent on talking about her wasn’t helping.

  ‘She doesn’t have accreditation,’ he said. ‘She’s an observer only.’