A Miracle for the Baby Doctor

by Meredith Webber

‘Especially not Andy because he would tell me?’ Steve roared, and Fran took a step back, although she knew full well he wouldn’t—couldn’t—harm her.

  Her or anyone else...

  But his being so angry made it all easier somehow.

  And now he knew, well, she didn’t have to consider the problem of telling him.

  Or not!

  He was stalking around her living room now, muttering to himself, obviously trying to calm down before he spoke again.

  Please let him not be nice to me, she asked any of the fates who might be listening.

  It didn’t work, for here he was, standing across the bench from her, not touching her, although every fibre of her being was so aware of him they might as well have been touching.

  ‘Fran, I shouldn’t have yelled, but can you please explain why, when you knew how much I wanted children, you were going to keep this child to yourself?’

  He was holding himself together with difficulty, she could see that, but although she knew it would upset him all over again, she had to answer.

  She looked into his lovely eyes and answered honestly.

  ‘You want children, Steve, plural, not a one-off fluke of a child. If I’d told you, you’d have insisted on marrying me, and knowing my medical history you’d be stuck with the one thing you didn’t want, which was another only child.’

  She reached out now, wanting—no, needing—to touch him, and rested her hand on his where it lay on the bench.

  ‘I couldn’t do that to you, couldn’t ruin the goal you’ve strived for all your life. It’s all hypothetical now, I may not even carry this child to term. Just let me be, Steve. I said right from the start it would be nothing more than a short affair, a holiday romance. I said it couldn’t last. So go and get on with your own life. Find the woman to have your family with, the woman to be mother to your children.’

  Steve shook his head.

  This was madness!

  But she was right, he had to go now—had to get away so he could think about things, think clearly, something he was incapable of doing with Fran standing there, still pale but so beautiful his heart ached for what he’d lost.

  Although, he thought as he walked back down the endless steps, she was right in saying she’d told him all along it wouldn’t last, so how could he lose something he’d never had?

  How the hell could she compartmentalise so well that those three weeks were already filed away under ‘holiday romance’ in her brain?

  Well, she wouldn’t be able to do that in the future, with his child there to remind her every day.

  His child!

  Rage roared through him again but he couldn’t let it take control. He had to think, logically and sensibly, about how to handle this.

  She couldn’t—and she undoubtedly knew it—keep him from seeing his child and having input into the child’s life.

  Oh, hell! He didn’t have a clue how to think about this, not even where to begin. All he did know was that having input into the child’s life was a long way down the track.

  And would never be enough.

  He walked back to his car and drove home—home to the big house that had so called out for children that his parents had flown to the US for advanced IVF so he could have a sibling.

  And had died before they’d got there.

  * * *

  As Steve disappeared out the door, Fran sank down on the floor and buried her face in her hands.

  Steve was upset, and with reason!

  If only she’d had time to think things through—more time.

  Right now she was such a jumble of emotions there was no way she could think straight.

  Although the one thing she did know was that she’d upset Steve—hurt him badly with her flippant ‘wasn’t going to tell you’ remark.

  That would have cut deep.

  She shouldn’t have said it, shouldn’t have pretended she’d already made the decision.

  Unable to think, she closed her eyes and hugged her knees and gave in to the memories of just seeing him again.

  Tall, tanned, so strong when he’d caught her in his arms...

  And how feeble had that been on her part!

  She hugged her knees harder, protecting the secret in her heart—the knowledge of just how deep her love for him really was.

  But love was generous, and kind, which meant that she had to leave him free to live the life he wanted, the life he’d planned and worked towards since he was ten.

  Which meant the sooner she got out of the way the better.

  Full of new resolve, she stood up and finished unpacking her purchases, crumpling up the note with the iron supplement on it—the note that had given away her secret.

  She’d get onto the computer and look for jobs.

  Would they need embryologists in Antarctica? Or Kazakhstan perhaps?

  Impossible—she’d have the child.

  And that refocused her thoughts, pleasing her so much she patted her as yet undistended belly and got down to sensible work.

  * * *

  Steve got through the weekend somehow, waking early on Monday morning and heading into his clinic to check all was well.

  One of his colleagues met him when he was reading through the latest success rates—quite good as they were up about one per cent.

  ‘I’d like some advice about a patient,’ James told him. ‘She’s had two full cycles of IVF and two implants of embryos that had been frozen, all with no success. But this last cycle, the follicles failed to respond to stimuli and we were unable to get any eggs. Should we give her a longer break before the next cycle or is it likely that she just doesn’t have any more eggs and will probably go into early menopause?’

  It was as if a light bulb had suddenly lit up in Steve’s brain, but right now he had to turn it off and work through the problem with his employee.

  ‘Maybe discuss having a break—not long, perhaps a month to get her body back into normal cycles—then shall we see if we can get some immature eggs and use them for IVM?’

  James grinned at him.

  ‘Now, why didn’t I think of that?’

  ‘Because it’s very new and we haven’t done it here as yet, but on this last trip to Vanuatu we did successfully grow the eggs to maturity and ended up with two embryos, one implanted and one frozen for future use.’

  ‘So, we’ll do this? Do we need a specialist embryologist for the eggs? You’ll help me with the retrieval?’

  Steve smiled at his young colleague’s excitement.

  ‘Yes, and yes, and yes,’ he said. ‘I know just the embryologist and am reasonably sure I can borrow her for a week or so while the eggs mature.’

  ‘Great!’

  James positively bounded out of the room, while Steve picked up the phone and called Andy.

  ‘I know I’m begging again but the only IVM I’ve done so far was on Vanuatu, with Fran to nurture the immature eggs. I’d only need her for a few days—a week at most, not for a month.’

  ‘I’m sure she’d be delighted,’ Andy told him. ‘We should all be trading staff when different skills are needed, it’s how the younger ones can learn.’

  Steve promised to let Andy know at least a week ahead and hung up the phone with a feeling of great satisfaction.

  So, back to the light bulb...

  He thought back to the island but couldn’t remember just when the particular conversation had come up. What he did remember was Fran coming to ask him about the other couple—the one where the wife hadn’t responded to the treatment and had no eggs ready for retrieval.

  He’d been struck at the time by a shadow passing over Fran’s face—a look of such sorrow he’d wanted to hug her, but there must have been others around, or maybe she’d left suddenly, not want
ing him to see her sadness.

  Had she suffered a similar problem on that third cycle of IVF, and had her gynaecologist suggested a lack of eggs and early menopause?

  That would explain her determination to not marry him, her peculiar argument that he wanted children, plural, not just one child.

  She’d be seeing this child as a miracle, conceived when one last egg had emerged and met his sperm.

  And she’d ached for a child—she’d said that one day.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t love him but because she did love him, and loving him wanted him to have his family.

  Daft woman...

  * * *

  ‘You’re lending me to him again!’

  Fran couldn’t recall ever having yelled at Andy, but yell she did. Not that it did anything to flutter his normal calm complacency.

  ‘It’s only for a few days to help the eggs mature. He’s not done IVM at his clinic in Alexandria, so hasn’t anyone with experience in maturing the eggs. He said you did splendidly in Vanuatu, and you can show other lab workers exactly what you do.’

  This completely rational statement left Fran speechless. She should have done more about finding another job, but for all she might wish she was in Timbuktu, deep inside she quivered at the thought of being so far away—in truth, so far from Steve.

  Stupid, really.

  What she had to worry about now was acting normally in his clinic, concentrating on the eggs and on showing his lab staff how she worked.

  With him close by?

  It would take some fortitude but she would do it and do it well. The couple whose eggs she was caring for deserved nothing but her best effort.

  Which was all very well in theory but when she walked into the clinic, looking around at this place Steve had set up, meeting nursing staff, admin people, partners, and finally lab staff, her knees were like jelly and her stomach bunched so tightly she hoped the tiny life inside her wasn’t being affected by it.

  He was there to greet her, of course, and it was he who introduced her around, his body so close it took all her strength not to lean in to it, or to brush her arm against his or let their fingers touch.

  And he was there again at the end of the day, when the other lab staff had left and she was sitting at a bench, writing up a list of nutrients her little eggs would need.

  ‘I love you, Fran,’ he said, the words so unexpected she nearly fell off her stool.

  He came closer, close enough to touch but not touching.

  ‘And I think you love me.’

  She looked at him then, looked into eyes that were echoing his words.

  ‘And I think this stupid nonsense about not marrying me is all to do with children, right?’

  She didn’t answer, couldn’t—couldn’t deny, and couldn’t confirm.

  ‘Love is about making the loved one happy. It is generous—and giving—and that’s you to a T. You’re rejecting me because you think I need a woman who can give me children—as many children as I want—but how fair would it be to marry that woman when I couldn’t offer her love?’

  ‘Of course you could offer her love. What we had—it was madness—and its intensity led us—you—to believe it was love.’

  He smiled.

  ‘Gave yourself away there with the “us”,’ he teased, and she thought her heart would break.

  ‘Okay, us,’ she conceded. ‘But does love like that last? And can’t people, over a lifetime, love more than once? I loved Nigel, loved him deeply when we married. Yet now I haven’t one iota of feeling for him.’

  She paused, then added, ‘Though in all honesty he went out of his way to kill that love so perhaps that doesn’t count.’

  Steve laughed, and shook his head.

  ‘And that’s just one of the things I love about you,’ he said.

  ‘What?’ Fran demanded, unable to see anything funny in this conversation and still uncertain as to where it was leading.

  ‘That you are honest. You might fumble about a bit from time to time, but usually the truth comes bursting out. You could have denied you were pregnant until you’d thought a bit more about it, but you couldn’t. So...’

  He stepped closer so he was right across the bench from her, then continued, ‘Are you refusing to marry me because you think you can’t produce the children I want? Or have you taken your wild imagination another step to where I might walk away from you because of that?’

  Fran stared at him. He was right, she couldn’t lie—not easily.

  But to tell the truth?

  He’d walked around the bench and stood close enough for her to touch him, touch his hand, his face, but he touched her first, resting one hand against her cheek.

  ‘Fran?’ he prompted, and as emotion overwhelmed her she could only nod.

  Then he was kissing her, telling her how stupid she had been, as if the love they shared could be dismissed, no matter how practical the reasons.

  And her heart opened to his words so she could tell him of her love, although as they stopped for air she looked up into his face and asked, ‘But the children?’

  He smiled and kissed the tip of her nose.

  ‘Let’s just see what nature will provide and if this one turns out to be an only child then we do what Pop and Hallie did and take in kids in need of two very loving parents. Would that work for you?’

  She shook her head, but this time in wonder, then nodded in answer to his question, which led to another kiss then a suggestion that they go home.

  ‘My place is nearer,’ Steve said.

  CHAPTER TEN

  ONCE SHE GOT over the astonishment that ‘his place’ was a mansion right on the shores of Sydney Harbour, and the initial doubts that she could live in a place like this, Fran gave in to the joy, and delight, and excitement, that came with being in love.

  They walked hand in hand around the garden, looking out at the magnificent view, east towards the Heads and west towards the Opera House. Steve plucked one of the hibiscus flowers from bushes that ran rampant in the garden, and settled it securely behind her left ear, with a kiss and a murmured, ‘Mine!’

  ‘It’s huge,’ Fran said of the house, uncertain about his wealth now, uncertain she belonged.

  ‘Don’t give it a thought,’ he assured her. ‘I had an apartment in town for a long time, but after Liane died, it had too many memories for me so I sold it. And, anyway, now the people I see as my family are growing up, it’s good to have the space for them to come and stay. Liane’s daughter Nikki will be down in the Christmas holidays—she’s doing very junior work experience at the university, wants to be a scientist.’

  ‘Not that you have to worry about the size of the house or visitors,’ Steve hurried on to explain. ‘I just use the bottom floor. It used to be servants’ quarters but it’s got the great views as well. And I’ve a live-in housekeeper, Molly, who takes care of the upstairs, visitors and all.’

  Fran heard the words but could barely take them in, and looking at the house—mansion—she knew it should be filled with children and doubts assailed her once again.

  ‘Stop it,’ Steve said, picking up on her uncertainties. ‘It’s just a house and if you hate it, then we’ll move.’

  He took her in his arms and kissed her, long and hard, and, in kissing him back she released all the emotion that had been building since she’d left the island. So it wasn’t surprising when he whispered, ‘Maybe indoors?’ and led her up onto a patio, and through French doors leading into an area that must have been either extensively renovated or had been very luxurious servants’ quarters.

  And again doubts assailed her.

  ‘I don’t think I’m up to this,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t belong in a place like this.’

  Steve eased her away from his body so he could see
her face.

  ‘You mean a home? That’s all this is, Fran, my home. Our family’s home! And if the family grows as we would like it to, then we’ll banish the guests down here and we’ll shift upstairs to fit them all in. Did I tell you Pop and Hallie’s home was an old nunnery? It’s how they managed to house so many waifs and strays. Can’t we do that?’

  She read the excitement in his eyes and realised it was echoed deep within her.

  ‘Yes, I’d like that,’ she said, already thinking of a young girl in her apartment block whose abusive stepfather was making her life miserable. Yes, there’d be laws to protect the children and hoops to be jumped through, and her own baby to consider, but, yes, the idea of being able to build a special family was truly wonderful.

  * * *

  They flew to Braxton the following Friday, to be met by a tall, charming, blond and blue-eyed man who greeted Steve with a bow.

  ‘Sir Stephen,’ he said, then enveloped Steve in a warm hug.

  ‘And this is Francesca? My, Steve, she’s a vast improvement on that woman you thought you were going to marry.’

  He took Fran’s hand and kissed her fingers.

  ‘Welcome to the madness,’ he said with a smile that could probably charm the kookaburras she could hear down from their trees.

  ‘Just ignore him,’ Steve was saying. ‘If it wasn’t for the fact that he can give us a lift home in his little helicopter, I wouldn’t have told him we were coming.’

  ‘Liar!’ Marty responded. ‘There’s not one of us that wouldn’t turn up to meet the woman Steve’s going to marry. Well, none of us that were all here at the same time. If everyone turned up we’d have to hire the village hall.’

  Grabbing Fran’s bag, he led the way back out of the building and across the tarmac to where a little helicopter stood.

  ‘Mad about choppers,’ Steve said to Fran. ‘Women, too!’ he added, and Marty laughed.

  ‘He’s actually a paramedic but now flies the rescue helicopter out of Braxton. It’s doubly useful to have a pilot with advanced paramedic experience.’ Steve paused, turning to Marty. ‘Which reminds me, Marty, a woman I know, Emma Crawford, is coming up to work at Braxton A and E. You’ll probably run into her some time.’