She stepped into his embrace as if she’d been waiting for him, but that was wishful thinking on his part.
Either way, her body fitted perfectly with his, and he held her lightly, barely needing to guide her as their steps matched the dance movements.
‘Where did you go?’ she asked above the music. ‘We looked for you after we finished in the kitchen.’
‘Stargazing. But the view is just as magical in here. Did I mention you look beautiful?’ You feel beautiful, he added silently, and as he leant down her subtle perfume was as intoxicating as he’d imagined it would be. Somehow he resisted the urge to brush that sensitive skin under her ear with his lips.
‘I think you look magnificent in your kilt, Dr Buchanan.’
‘Magnificent, eh? That sounds promising.’
‘Let’s just dance.’ She leant her cheek against his chest and he gathered her closer and closed his eyes. She was right—they needed to just dance.
After the party, when all the revellers had departed and the mess had been cleaned up, Montana disappeared before he could say goodnight. But maybe that was better.
He went for a fast walk along the lake to clear—or was that cool?—his mind, but it didn’t work.
Back in his room he dropped the kilt and shirt and, wrapping his towel around his waist, strode down the hallway to the bathroom.
Everyone else was in bed and probably sleeping the sleep of the innocent. He was anything but that.
Tonight he wanted Montana and he pulled back the screen and stepped into the shower, blasting his skin with an icy dousing from the shower. He shuddered as the onslaught beat against his chest and ran icily over his belly, but he knew it was the only way there was a chance he’d be able to sleep.
He twisted the tap to hot and then cold again and then hot and cold again until he stood at last with the cold water pelting him into submission.
He sighed, reached and turned the tap off, then slung the towel around his waist and took himself to bed.
CHAPTER EIGHT
A WEEK later Clare’s results had come back positive for Huntington’s disease, and the whole town reeled with shock.
Emma had gone into caring mode for her mother and was even reluctant to leave long enough to talk to Montana about her coming baby.
It was as if she didn’t want to think about the future too much and by being busy she could ignore what was hanging over her mother’s—and her own—head.
Montana could understand a tiny fraction of being busy to avoid things because she was ignoring a showdown with her own conscience.
She’d taken to spending long hours when Dawn was asleep in the evenings on her computer to assemble procedures and protocols for the running of the stand-alone caseload midwifery unit.
A lot of the paperwork she adapted from that she’d prepared before, which had been sent across by Misty from Westside. Apart from the state differences, the main area of organisation was in the transportation of women should medical need arise.
Andy was a general practitioner with his obstetric diploma so could give medical back-up prior to transfer, but they needed seamless access to an obstetric service for sick mums and babies.
The base would hopefully supply that but Montana needed to set up networking so everybody was happy.
It kept her out of Andy’s way, plus exhaustion was good, and didn’t leave enough time to think about how disloyal she’d been to Douglas, even if it was only in her mind as she approached a year since he had died.
It was indecently early for her to be even thinking of another man.
The first of May, a year since Douglas died, was a cold and rainy day at Lyrebird Lake. It fell on a Friday and she’d agreed to do a shift for Chrissie who wanted to go away for the weekend with her family.
She didn’t mention the significance of the day to anyone at the Lake because she didn’t know how she felt, though she had spoken to Misty and Mia that morning when they’d rung to see how she was.
At least she’d stayed busy with outpatients and when the shift was over she borrowed Louisa’s car and drove herself and Dawn up the winding road to the lookout where she gazed out over the town.
A town that she realised she’d grown to love.
‘Is it already a year since you left, Douglas?’ she said to the sky, and shook her head in disbelief.
She cuddled Dawn against her and sighed. It didn’t feel as though anyone was there.
She couldn’t even imagine Douglas could hear her and she wanted to believe that was a good thing. He was at rest. He wasn’t haunting her. He wanted her to get on with her life but she couldn’t help the feeling of guilt.
The distant sound of another car as it climbed the hill penetrated her reverie and she turned to watch it park beside hers.
She’d known it was Andy even before she’d seen his vehicle.
He walked across to her and she wasn’t sure if she was glad or sorry he had come.
‘I’ve been worried about you all day and I’m sorry if I’m intruding.’ His compassion made her want to weep all over him and she really didn’t want to do that. She tried to talk but her throat was closed.
When she didn’t answer he came to stand beside her and looked past her at the view. ‘Just tell me to go and I will.’
Misty must have rung him. ‘Stay. Maybe you can help. I’m just so confused that I feel this way when a year ago I thought I would never be happy again.’
He looked at her swiftly and then away, as if afraid of the answer. ‘Are you happy?’
She sighed and accepted the truth. ‘I love it here. Dawn is happy. Life shouldn’t be this good only a year after Douglas’s death.’
Andy rubbed his neck. ‘What’s the right time to start living after a loss like that?’ He turned back to face her and she could see he felt strongly about this. ‘Everyone is different. You knew to get away was the best thing for you and Dawn and I believe with all my being that you did the right thing.’
She looked into his face, and his eyes said that he did understand. Andy had always understood. ‘I can’t help feel it’s too fickle of me to be almost healed. To want a new life for Dawn and I. To look at happy families and want that for us. He’s only been gone a year.’
Andy nodded. ‘For some people a new life might not come along for ten years but for others it arrives within months. There are no rules to say you haven’t suffered enough. You just have to be strong enough to grab it when it comes.’
Late one afternoon Emma arrived at the doctors’ house for another antenatal class.
‘I’m glad you could come, Emma,’ Montana said when Emma hugged her.
‘I wanted to come.’ She looked around the familiar room and then back at Montana. ‘It is good to see you, too, and get out of the house.’
Montana followed her into the room. ‘Sit. Unwind. How are your father and mother?’
They sat at the table where Montana had set up cold drinks and savoury biscuits, and Emma began to relax.
‘Dad’s pretty amazing, really. He’s already made the house safer and easier to maintain for Mum, which has helped her cut back on accidents. He keeps telling her he loves her and he will love her for ever, no matter what.’
Emma’s eyes filled up. ‘If I have the gene then no one will have the chance to love me like that.’ She paused and blinked away the tears. ‘Because I won’t let them.’
Montana could tell something had upset her badly. ‘What has Tommy said?’
Emma threw her head up. ‘He said his mother reckons we should terminate the pregnancy.’ Her hands cupped protectively over her baby like they had the day Andy had diagnosed her mother. ‘How can people say things like that about my baby?’
Montana sighed. Poor Emma. ‘Some people say sad things when they’re scared.’ She squeezed Emma’s hand. ‘You’ll have to pretend she didn’t say it.’
Emma’s lip quivered and Montana ached to be able to comfort her. ‘There’s a big chance you don’t have the gene,
Emma. Even if you do, your baby has just as big a chance not to have it.’
Emma brushed her hand across her eyes, scrubbing the wetness away. ‘I’m not worried about me and it’s too far away to think about when my child is thirty. It’s when my baby is threatened now. But how could she even say that? Tommy’s not even talking to her any more.’
‘When your baby is born, Tommy’s mother will want to be involved too, and should be. A grandchild is a wonderful joy in life. Tommy’s mother is just not as strong as you at the moment and she will regret her comments when she loves your baby. But everything takes time.’
Emma nodded and Montana went on. ‘In less than ten weeks your gorgeous baby will be here and you will be an awesome mother.’
Emma dropped her voice. ‘I don’t know anything about looking after a baby. How will I know what to do?’
Montana smiled. ‘When you come in to have your baby we’ll help you practise caring for it before you come home. Then we’ll visit you at home and help with anything you need help with. But you’ll learn fast because you’ll love your baby.’
Montana lowered her voice. ‘Don’t underestimate that you still have your mother to help you learn to mother your baby as well.’
Emma nodded. ‘I know. One of my friends’ mothers was killed in the car three years ago. She said I’m lucky I still have my mum.’
She sniffed and visibly shook off her distress. ‘And I really don’t want to waste Mum’s good times worrying about the not so good ones to come.’
She looked Montana in the eye. ‘I am glad I came because I can talk about things with you I can’t say to other people and it helps me clear my brain.’
Montana hugged her. ‘Your baby is one lucky little boy or girl.’ She stepped back, brushed her eyes, and sniffed. ‘I’d better blow my nose and get on with it, then. It’s time we discussed labour.’
Andy had been sitting on the veranda and he couldn’t help overhearing the conversation. Poor Emma. Poor Montana, because she was fond of Emma, too.
He felt like strangling Tommy’s mother but instead he’d better go and see if he could talk some sense into her.
He had an hour and a half until Louisa served the evening meal. If he did half as well as Montana had with Emma, it would be worth it.
As he drove he shook his head at the amazing conversation he’d overheard. It made him see Montana again and what she’d brought to the Lake and to him.
If only he could use that same rationale with her in regard to getting on with life.
Her husband was dead and life was too precarious to waste opportunities like they had, but it was just too soon.
He could see how amazing those opportunities were for the two of them—now he needed her to see that.
He needed someone else to talk some sense into her. It had been too long since he’d pursued a woman with a view to commitment and obviously he was going about it all wrong.
Maybe he should ring his sister tonight, get some advice or see when she was coming out, even if he had to fly down and get her himself.
CHAPTER NINE
THAT Friday, when Montana had finished the first well-women’s clinic held at the hospital, Andy appeared.
He allowed himself the luxury of admiring her as she organised her desk.
Her hair was tied back in a shiny clasp and several dark wisps tickled her cheek. He wanted to brush them back with his fingers and make her see how good the two of them would be together.
Now that he’d come to realise how much Montana meant to him, he needed her to see it too.
‘Montana, a question?’ he said softly, not wanting to startle her, and Montana looked up at his voice. The unguarded, welcoming smile on her face gave him some hope at least.
She straightened and brushed the hair away from her cheek. ‘Hello, there, Dr Buchanan. Yes?’
He walked over and looked at the list of patients she’d seen that day. It was a long one. Obviously there were a fair proportion of the townswomen who had avoided their yearly checks until Montana had arrived.
As he stood beside her he could just catch the faintest hint of the lavender soap she used. Going into the bathroom at the house was always a struggle after Montana had been in there because that scent left too vivid a picture in his mind to relax with.
She stretched her neck to look up at him and he was tempted to kiss those pouting lips she teased him with.
‘We’re to be formal, then, Sister Browne? And I was going to ask you something very informal.’
Her beautiful brows went up and he smiled and went on. ‘It’s your first clinic. Let’s celebrate at the only restaurant in town tonight for dinner. Just the two of us.’
‘Like a date?’ She was teasing him again. What the hell? It was better than nothing.
‘Not like a date.’ He paused and she tilted her head and he could see she’d missed the point. ‘As a real date. Dinner, dancing, table service. A date. Say yes.’
Montana blinked. ‘They have dancing?’
He smiled. ‘They have a romantic opera collection on CD and a handkerchief-sized dance floor.’
She looked away and he couldn’t catch the expression he’d wanted to see.
‘Have Louisa mind Dawn, do you mean?’ She turned back to him and he watched different emotions cross her face as she considered the logistics.
Why couldn’t she just say yes and work it out later?
Then she did. ‘I’d like that, Andy. If Louisa isn’t busy, it would be nice to get dressed up a little and have a meal out.’
‘With me.’ He clarified the situation because he needed her to get it.
‘With you.’ She smiled at him as the idea grew. Just like the pleasure that expanded in his own chest. It felt good to hear her say yes.
‘Yes, please.’ She said again. ‘What time?’
‘Say six-thirty for seven.’ Already he was planning. ‘We can have a leisurely meal, a few turns around the floor.’ He wanted to relive that feeling of Montana in his arms. ‘We’d still not be home too late for Dawn.’
Maybe walk along the lake afterwards and watch the submarine races, he thought, but didn’t add that.
This was such a good idea. Misty had suggested it and it sent the message he wanted to make. A date shifted the platonic colleague thing into a whole new area.
He hoped so because the last few weeks he’d been going quietly insane.
Montana was ready early because she’d learnt that babies tended to have last-minute moments of unusual interest and she didn’t want to keep Andy waiting.
Andy found her in the kitchen with Dawn at six-fifteen, dressed and ready, and she blushed at the way his eyes lit up when he saw her.
She’d pampered herself in the bathroom and then spent extra time drying her hair so that it shone and bounced freely around her neck—a big change, as she rarely left her hair down.
Tonight it had seemed like the thing to do. Her apricot blouse left her shoulders bare and the floral skirt swirled when she twirled in her strappy sandals. All those things—and the way Andy looked at her—made her feel especially feminine tonight and it was a giddy feeling she wasn’t used to.
Dawn waved them goodbye, with a little help from Louisa, and they walked under the streetlights to the restaurant. The breeze from the lake seemed especially soft tonight.
Andy caught her hand and held it and she left her fingers there, warm and secure in his, and tried to ignore the flutter of tension that level of commitment left her with.
The Paragon, the only restaurant in Lyrebird Lake, was run by Angelo and Angelina, an eccentric Italian couple who supplemented the menu they loved to serve with a sideline pizza take-away.
In the main restaurant, to Montana’s surprise, the room was dim with dripping candles in basketed Chianti bottles and red-checked tablecloths.
Romantic Italian opera played softly in the background and she smiled at the memory of Andy’s forewarning.
The only other couple in the room were
being served their meal with a voluble flourish as Montana and Andy arrived, and the little Italian looked torn between the two tasks.
‘We’ll seat ourselves, Angelo. No hurry, please,’ Andy said and ushered Montana to a secluded corner where a sheaf of long purple roses lay across the table.
He smiled and pulled her chair out then tilted his head towards the Italian.
‘Angelo likes to explain the meal when he serves it, and I didn’t want to spoil his fun.’
Montana lifted the roses before she sat down. Andy being thoughtful again? She inhaled the exquisite scent. ‘Did you send these in for me?’
‘From Clare’s garden. I picked them up earlier. I swear she has every colour you could imagine.’
Her brows drew together as a memory teased her. ‘I’m sure you mentioned a special meaning for purple roses before.’
‘Later,’ he said, and seated her with such care she felt pampered and revered, as if she were a movie star. Secretly she thought Andy could hold his own with anyone on the big screen so she had the right dinner partner.
She brushed her hand over the cutlery, as if the coldness of the silver would rid her head of silly thoughts. Or at least bring her back to earth.
The tantalising aroma of herbs and garlic and mozzarella made Montana mouth water and she forgot about Andy’s reason for purple roses.
For the first time in months she realised how hungry she was. It was a classical Italian restaurant but there was nothing clichéd about the aroma of the food and she couldn’t wait to see the menu.
In fact, she hadn’t really been interested in what she’d eaten since Douglas had died. Maybe that was all a part of feeling so alive and vital tonight.
She smiled at Andy as he settled on the opposite side of the table. ‘Thank you for bringing me here.’
‘My pleasure, madam.’ He bowed and gave her one of those gorgeous hundred-watt smiles that made her whole body glow before he flicked his napkin onto his lap.
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