He introduced her to the Browns, who had a complicated Vanuatuan name she knew she’d never pronounce, let alone remember. It was good to meet them in spite of Steve’s contention that she thought of them by their colours so as not to get too emotionally involved.
Alex was also there and, after assuring Fran he’d contact both Mr Yellow and Mr Purple, he walked out with Mr and Mrs Brown, giving Steve the opportunity he’d been waiting for since he’d seen Fran earlier this morning.
Even as she explained her mission, he’d drawn her close, holding her against his body until she finished with a faint ‘...so we need another specimen from Mr Yellow.’
‘Got the message—messages,’ he murmured, her lips so close to his she could have breathed in the words.
Then he kissed her, slowly at first, enjoying the taste of her once again, feeling a heady intoxication as she kissed him back.
Her fingers slid into his hair, while his hands roved her back, remembering...
‘We’re at work,’ she reminded him softly when they’d drawn apart in order to breathe.
‘Don’t I know it,’ he groaned, then he kissed her again, hard and fast.
‘Later,’ he said, releasing her and sending her on her way with a last touch to her cheek.
‘I’ve a meeting at the hospital so won’t be here for lunch, but when you finish for the day, we could go north to Havannah? There’s a resort there and the most beautiful beach. We can swim, laze about, maybe have dinner in the restaurant.’
Stay the night?
It was off season, so the resort would have rooms.
No, best not push things, but he knew she would love the place and the thought of seeing her in a swimsuit, swimming with her, had already produced a frisson of excitement in his body.
And maybe, before they left, in the week while they waited for pregnancy tests, they could go to Kukuhla, the most magical little island in the group and only a short boat ride from their island of Efate.
But as he walked across to the hospital he wondered about her proviso—her insistence that this would be no more than a holiday romance, a fling.
The obvious answer was that she was seeing someone back in Sydney, which, given she was a clever, bright, attractive woman, was highly likely.
But it didn’t fit with what he knew of her, or thought he knew of her.
She was too open, too honest to cheat on a significant other...
Although the little she’d shared of her private life—married and divorced—told him he really didn’t know her well enough to judge.
So why did he feel he did?
No, he didn’t know, and considering his own failed romance, maybe he was just a bad judge of women.
No, and no, and no! He couldn’t believe she’d be cheating on another man...
* * *
Havannah Beach was everything a tropical beach should be, Fran decided when Steve pulled in, not to the resort but just above it, almost onto the sand itself.
She dug in her bag for suntan lotion, and was smoothing it on her arms when Steve took it from her.
‘Hop out and I’ll do it. You’ll never reach your back to cover it properly.’
She did as she was told but was reluctant to remove the sarong she’d wrapped around her bikini—the sarong Steve had given her on her second night in Vanuatu.
But the decision was taken out of her hands.
‘I’ve been wanting to do this since I first gave it to you,’ Steve told her, undoing the knot that held the material together, and unwinding it from around her body.
‘Ah, just as I thought—perfection!’
Her hands wanted to move to cover what for her was nakedness, but she struggled against the familiar need for restraint.
‘You haven’t done a lot of swimming in that bikini,’ he teased, squeezing lotion into one hand. ‘It’ll be cold when it goes on, you know.’
And with that he proceeded to give her the most sensual experience she’d ever had.
No, remembering the previous night, she had to amend that—the most sensual experience she’d ever had with clothes on.
His hand, slick with lotion, slid across her skin, while sexual tension slithered along her nerves, tightening them almost to breaking point, even when he turned his attentions to her back, his hands straying ever so slightly now and then.
‘You’re done,’ he finally announced, his husky voice suggesting she wasn’t the only one who’d been affected by the process. ‘Let’s swim!’
He took her hand and led her down the beach, white powdery sand sinking beneath her feet. The water was a pure, translucent, blue-green colour so even when she’d walked in up to her thighs she could still clearly see her toes.
Steve dived in and swam then dived again, coming up right in front of her, his skin bronzed and beautiful, water droplets that she had to touch gleaming on chest and flying through the air as he flicked his hair.
‘Coward!’ he challenged, and she took the plunge, diving down to touch the sand then swimming out into the blueness of the deeper water.
Swimming back, he met and matched her stroke for stroke until their bodies touched and all restraint was broken.
They twined together in the water, bodies touching, lips searching for skin to kiss, and then for lips.
‘We’ll drown,’ Fran whispered to him as they drifted into deeper water.
‘As if I’d let harm come to you,’ he said, and looked deep into her eyes, so she couldn’t miss the message that he meant it.
Her heart somersaulted and she wondered just how foolish her decision to have this little romance had been.
Already she suspected it was more than attraction on her part, but if Steve felt that way—no, it was too complicated. Just live for now and enjoy it—don’t think about the future.
She kissed him, although moths were once again fluttering in her head. He wasn’t a man who didn’t think about the future...
He lifted her, still kissing, so she lay in his arms in the water, and the moths disappeared, flooded out by passionate sensation.
The sun was sinking before they left the water and dried themselves, Steve pulling on his shorts and shirt before rewrapping her, slowly and teasingly, in the sarong.
‘We’ll walk up to the resort and have a drink as the sun sets, then dinner so we don’t have to waste time with that when we get back.’
‘Waste time?’ she teased, so thoroughly relaxed a new Fran seemed to have taken over her body. A Fran who teased, and kissed in public, and ached to get back into bed with this man she barely knew...
* * *
This time she woke early, Steve still in bed beside her. She lay there thinking how wonderful their lovemaking had been—lacking the wildness of the previous night but still exhilarating.
He stirred and pulled her tight against him, then groaned.
‘No doubt you know what I’d like to do,’ he murmured in her ear, ‘but if I don’t run one morning it’s easier to not run the next, and it’s running that keeps me sane in this work where we have such disappointments as well as successes.’
She turned in his arms.
‘Can I run with you? I run at home, but mainly because I love the rush it gives me.’
His arms tightened.
‘Put some clothes on and we’ll run together.’
But as she pulled on a pair of shorts and T-shirt, Fran wondered if this was a good idea.
If too much togetherness was a bad thing. Wouldn’t it bring them closer? It was the one thing she really didn’t want because the closer they became—out of bed—the harder it would be to leave him.
Not that running left them with breath for conversation, although sharing a love for a morning run seemed to make them more of a couple, which—she reminded
herself—was what they couldn’t be. He had his list, and on that list was his desire for a family. With children.
But running with him along the top of the ridge behind the town, and through a little forest path he seemed to know well, was so exhilarating she forgot her doubts and just enjoyed the view out over the island-studded ocean, and the darkness and smell of the rainforest when they took the little path.
She knew he was matching his pace to hers, which was slower than usual after a week or so of not running. Firstly because she’d been so busy before she’d left it had been one thing she couldn’t fit in, then after the flight and settling in over here, although she’d brought her gear, it hadn’t occurred to her.
Other things on her mind?
She knew that brought a foolish smile to her face and was glad she’d dropped a little behind him so he couldn’t see it.
They ended up beneath the clinic and had the hill climb at the end, so Fran arrived back in their temporary home and collapsed into the nearest chair.
‘I thought you were a runner,’ Steve teased, and she glowered at him because he was barely out of breath.
‘It was the hill,’ she retorted. ‘You finished with a hill!’
‘‘That’s the bit that gets the endorphins surging,’ he told her. ‘But while you sit there, recovering, I’ll have a quick shower and duck over to the hospital. I usually have breakfast over there with Alex while we map out a timetable for the next specialist visit.’
‘Which is usually you?’ Fran asked, and he nodded, dropped a quick kiss on her hair and disappeared towards his bedroom.
He was such a good man, she thought as she watched him go, she had to hope he didn’t feel too much for her—that he had accepted the temporary nature of their relationship. And given his goals, how could it not be temporary?
He’d been hurt before, she’d known that when he’d spoken of the sister he couldn’t save. The pain she’d seen in his eyes had made her want to hold him and keep him safe from pain for ever.
But nobody could offer that...
* * *
Steve showered then left, reluctantly, for the hospital. He’d far rather have been having breakfast with Fran. He found himself hoping he hadn’t pushed her too far on the run, knowing she hadn’t run since she’d arrived.
Yet running with her had been special. Another bond between them.
Which brought him back to thinking about her insistence that their relationship would end when they left the island.
Not that thinking about it did much good. He barely knew her, so how could he possibly work out what she was thinking?
And hadn’t he, himself, decided that work and relationships didn’t mix?
Forget it, Fran was different!
Wasn’t she?
Returning to the clinic after breakfast, he went straight to the lab. Today was the day! The red eggs would certainly be ready for transfer—one to Mrs Red’s uterus, the other to be frozen for future use, and he guessed the yellow that Fran had inseminated would also have reached sufficient development for transfer.
Fran was at the lab when he arrived after breakfast. Why wasn’t he surprised? One thing he did know about her was that she loved the work she did, and was excited by the progress of her tiny eggs.
‘Will you transfer today?’ she asked as he walked in.
He grinned at her.
‘I’ve got both the Reds and the Yellows coming in, although why I’ve picked up your use of colours for their names I do not know! I’ve always been quite content to use the clients’ names and now you’ve got me calling them by colours.’
‘Not to their faces, I hope,’ she said, and he smiled again because she was smiling and a smiling Fran did something to his insides.
‘And Mr Hopoate—royal purple and the Lord of Heavens and Canoes—is he coming in to give a specimen?’
‘This afternoon,’ he told her, then firmly turned his attention to work, making arrangements for the transfer, checking the Yellow egg Fran had fertilised then deciding not to transfer it until the next day.
‘But you’ll get him to leave a specimen so we can fertilise the other viable eggs?’ she asked, and he nodded.
‘All under control,’ he assured her. ‘See you at ten.’
He left the lab, aware he could have lingered there all day. The woman had definitely got under his skin.
And again the question nagged of why the limitation. On that first night when he’d held the flower to put behind her ear, she’d said right, which meant there was no man in her life.
So?
* * *
Whether it was a night of slow and languid lovemaking, or the run, Fran wasn’t sure, but the desire to be near Steve, close to him again, was so overwhelming she went up to the clinic rooms far earlier than she needed, to find not only the Reds already there but another couple she didn’t know.
And a baby!
Not quite freshly minted but fairly young, and Steve was holding it in his arms and talking to it, making the infant smile and gurgle, its shiny dark skin almost glowing with delight at the attentions of the man who held him.
And there’s your proof if you needed any, Fran told herself, that there’s no future for you with this man. Forget the list, he’s obviously made to be a father and probably, from the look on his face, longs to be one.
The pain of this confirmation was so strong she felt her knees weaken and had to lean against the desk for a moment to recover her equilibrium.
You love him, the voice in her head continued in accusing tones, and she knew it was correct.
So, learn to live with it.
Steve was introducing her to Mr and Mrs Tamou.
‘Mrs Tamou and Mrs Inui are sisters. It was Mrs Tamou’s success that prompted Mr and Mrs Inui to come to us.’
He was smiling at her over the baby and she felt her heart break, but fortunately part of her brain was working and it understood he was telling her the names so she wouldn’t call Mr and Mrs Inui Mr and Mrs Red.
She shook hands all round, admired the baby, who was being handed back to its mother, then thankfully the Tamous departed.
Steve was practically glowing.
‘A lot of the couples come back with their babies,’ he told her, sure she’d share his delight. ‘It’s the best part of this job.’
‘I’m sure it is,’ she managed to reply.
‘But that’s not why you’re here, is it?’ he said, his smile still so bright it hurt. ‘Let’s get on with things.’
He led the Inuis into the procedure room, explaining what he was going to do. He would give Mrs Inui a light sedative, although this part was painless, then he’d transfer the little embryo to her uterus.
‘It can float around in there for up to a week before it settles into the uterine lining,’ he told the excited couple.
Or sometimes doesn’t settle in, Fran thought as painful memories of failures added to the pain she was already feeling.
But she kept a smile pasted on her face as she left the room, not wanting to intrude on the couple’s exciting moment. Mrs Inui would rest in the treatment room for a couple of hours, and although she could resume normal activities afterwards Fran knew from experience she’d probably take it easy, not wanting to dislodge the tiny seed.
She was checking the purple eggs when Steve came in.
‘I’ve got the Yellows coming in later,’ he said, ‘and although I’ll wait another twenty-four hours before I implant, do you still want a new specimen from Mr Yellow?’
‘I think so,’ she said. ‘The eggs are still viable and look strong and if we manually inseminate them and they produce embryos we can freeze them, which would save Mrs Yellow going through all the early IVF processes. We can just monitor her and implant another one when she’s ready.’
He shook his head.
‘You’re assuming this first one won’t implant,’ he chided. ‘Be positive! I know the percentages of failure as well as you do, but we have to always believe we’ll have success, otherwise what’s the use?’
Fran had to turn away so that he wouldn’t see her pain.
If she had believed during that third time, might it have been successful?
Probably not! Not according to her doctor, who had been lamenting her lack of eggs and predicting early menopause.
Steve watched her turn away, but not before he’d seen the shadow of what looked like pain in her lovely eyes.
Had she gone through IVF unsuccessfully herself? Was that why she was so attuned to their clients?
Was that why her marriage had broken down?
He longed to ask her, but she was bustling around the lab, now taking out one of the purple dishes to check the egg development.
He could almost feel the defensive barrier she’d erected around herself.
With him on the outside...
Work! he reminded himself. You, too, can be professional...
‘Will it—or they—be ready if we get Mr Hopoate’s specimen this afternoon?’ he asked.
‘I’m pretty sure they will be.’
No smile!
‘Here, look for yourself.’
She stepped away from the microscope. A step longer than necessary?
So as not to brush against him?
Or him against her?
Steve didn’t have a clue what it was, but he knew that in the time between when they’d finished their run and now something had shifted in their relationship.
They’d hardly spoken except about work and then in the presence of other people, so it couldn’t be something he’d done or said.
Had she received a phone call from home? A text, or an email?
Could he ask?
‘That looks good,’ he said, realising she was probably waiting for a response.
He straightened up and reached out to touch her on the shoulder.
‘You okay?’ he said quietly, and was surprised to see tears well in her eyes, though she blinked them back with a fierceness that told him he wasn’t meant to see them.
A Miracle for the Baby Doctor Page 10
