It was a no-choice situation if Oliver was going to have any quality of life, but what they were planning to do was dangerous. If he came through the operation successfully, they would discover in the days that followed if it had been worth taking the risk.
On occasions such as this every other thought was put to one side. In their hands lay a child’s life. She knew only too well that there was nothing worse for a doctor to leave at the end of the day knowing that a life they’d tried to save had been lost.
* * *
It was evening. Oliver had come through the operation and was now in the recovery unit, but Aaron’s expression was still anxious as he stood beside his bed.
‘So far so good, eh, Annabel?’ he said as she pushed a strand of hair back off her brow. ‘I’ll want to go and bang my head against the wall if there’s no improvement after this.’
‘At least we’ve tried,’ she told him with a tired smile. ‘We’ve done all we can. Let’s hope that nature isn’t going to let us down. What time are you due to go off duty?’
‘Soon, but I want to stay on a bit to make sure that the boy surfaces all right when the anaesthetic wears off. Charles and I were the ones who suggested the surgery to his parents and although they didn’t need much persuading, I feel very much responsible. You’re off now, are you?’
‘Yes. Mr Drury is still on the premises so I’m not needed any more. I’m going for a meal.’
‘Oh? Who with? Not Richard Clements, I hope.’ The question was out before he’d considered how officious it was going to sound.
She sighed.
‘No. If you must know, I’m eating with Mark.’
She was making a big thing out of going for a snack with a colleague after long hours of surgery, but couldn’t resist teasing Aaron. What did he take her for? Or had he sized her up already? Guessed that she’d already once been too eager to get close to a man she’d trusted...and where had that got her? She’d shed no tears for him, but had cried her heart out for the baby she’d lost.
‘He’s old enough to be your father!’ Aaron protested.
‘What does that matter if I’m happy in his company?’ she replied perversely. ‘I said that we were eating together...not sleeping! What is the matter with you, Aaron? One moment you’re warning me off, keeping me at a distance, and the next you’re acting as if you were my father.’
As he faced up to the fact that fatherly was the last thing he felt toward this doctor, Aaron’s mind was in turmoil. He was watching her slowly break out of the drab chrysallis of misery that had encased her when they’d first met and the effect it was having on him was amazing.
She was the opposite to Eloise in every way and yet he couldn’t get her out of his mind. Maybe it was because she wasn’t falling over herself to get to him. In the last four years there’d been a few women who’d pursued him and he’d wanted none of it. But Annabel had a sort of take-it-or-leave-it air about her that had him hooked, and if he didn’t stop behaving like an interfering busybody the relationship was going to fizzle out before it had even got going.
* * *
‘And so what was it that you and Aaron were discussing so seriously just before we left the hospital?’ Mark asked quizzically as they ate the offerings of a nearby burger bar.
‘He was warning me off older men,’ she told him laughingly.
‘What? Aaron was warning you about me?’ he said, joining in her amusement. ‘The cheek of the guy. Though it doesn’t sound like him. The head of Paediatrics keeps himself to himself with regard to his private life and rarely interferes in ours. But it would seem that he’s out to save you from the wolves. Though I feel it’s hardly an accurate description of a fifty-year-old bachelor whose boat is the only thing that makes his pulse beat faster. Every spare moment I get I’m down at the coast.’
He was an amiable, unfussy sort of man and she could believe him when he said that sailing filled his life. He was as likely to make a pass at her as volunteer for a mission to Mars.
It was weird. From being manless for months she was now coming into contact with all types of the species. Richard Clements, the fast worker. Mark, sitting beside her, who was in love with his boat...and Aaron. What kind of man was he? She wished she knew.
On the outside he came over as cool and clever. A loving family man, but wary. What of, she wasn’t sure, but if she had to make a guess she would say it was herself.
Why, though, for heaven’s sake? She’d done nothing to make him so. He’d met her while she’d been at her lowest ebb, at her least attractive, and devoid of purpose.
She wouldn’t have expected him to give her a second glance and she didn’t think he had until the other night when he’d invited her to dine at his house. It had been the beginning of her return to normality, but ever since he’d been as prickly as a hedgehog.
* * *
When Aaron left the hospital that night Oliver was conscious and in a stable condition. It was now a case of wait and see. His mother, grey with weariness, had said, ‘It was a terrible decision to have to make, Dr Lewis, but we really had come to the end of our strength and so had Oliver. If it turns out that we were wrong then we’ll have to live with it, but at least we tried to give our son a better life and we’ll be forever grateful to yourself and the other doctors for helping us towards that.’
He went home feeling unusually emotional and when Lucy met him at the door, ready for bed in her nightdress and clutching the doll he’d brought her back from America, he picked her up and held her close.
It wasn’t all that long ago since he’d been in the terrible limbo of a parent whose child might die or suffer severe disability, and within the recollection was Annabel, tired and white-faced yet cool and calm. A rock to hang on to.
Was that why he was fascinated by her? Gratitude? No. It was more than that, much more. The turn of her head, the soft line of her throat, the beautiful hazel eyes. When he’d picked her up the other night he’d seen her for what she really could be, and it had taken his breath away.
But instead of the evening being light-hearted and upbeat it had turned out to be a time of harking back to the past on both their parts, and for his mother’s anxious thoughts about the future.
She was here now, smiling across at him as he hugged his daughter to him, and tenderness washed over him. She never did anything but what she thought would benefit Lucy and himself, and if sometimes they saw things in a different light, what did it matter?
He was feeling restless and on edge and knew the feelings weren’t going to go away until he’d seen Annabel, though what excuse he could give for calling he didn’t know. That was if she was back from her meal with Lafferty.
Lucy was asleep and his mother was dozing beside the fire when he came into the sitting room with his coat on.
‘I’m popping out for half an hour,’ he told her, and she nodded drowsily.
* * *
There was a light on in the flat and he thought that at least Annabel was in. What sort of a reception he would get was another matter.
When she saw him standing there Aaron thought she was going to close the door, and he said with a quirky smile, ‘Am I going to have to put one foot inside like the bailiffs do?’
She stepped back to let him in but wasn’t returning the smile.
‘What do you want, Aaron?’ she said levelly. ‘Have you come to see if I’m behaving myself with Mark? Were you expecting me to answer the door in a satin nightdress or something? If you were, I’m sorry to disappoint you. I haven’t got one. I wear an old T-shirt in bed, which ought to tell you something.’
‘I haven’t come to discuss your sleeping habits,’ he told her, serious now. ‘I’m here to apologise for what I said earlier this evening about Mark and you.’
‘We went our separate ways at eight o’clock, if you must know,’ she told him in the same level tone. ‘He to drool over his boat and I to put the washing-machine on. But do sit down now that you’re here. Your wish is granted. You�
�re actually inside the rabbit hutch. If you wish to complain to the authorities on my behalf, feel free to do so.’
He took her hand in his and looked down at the long, capable fingers that could wield a scalpel with such precision. ‘We’re not getting anywhere, are we?’ he said in a low voice.
Annabel was acutely conscious of his nearness. The clean male smell of him. The physique that made heads turn, the dark searching glance that seemed to see right into her soul. But it didn’t, did it? Otherwise he would know that she hadn’t enough zest in her to respond to what he was saying.
‘Is that what you want?’ she asked weakly. ‘For us to get somewhere?’
It was laughable, he thought. He’d been told that he was seen as a good catch by the female staff at Barnaby’s, but not by this one, it would seem.
‘Possibly,’ he told her drily. ‘But don’t get too excited about the idea. I’ve been trying to fight it, but I seem to keep coming back for more.’
‘More of what?’
‘Being with you... This, maybe.’
He’d swivelled round and was reaching out for her, and the next moment his mouth was on hers. He had one hand in the hollow of her back and the other was wrapped in her hair. Her breasts were hard up against his chest, her thighs beginning to ache, and Annabel knew in those moments that this was what had been missing with Randy.
She’d mistaken what they’d had for real passion and it was taking this charismatic widower to show her the difference. But Aaron was an idealist. If she let this wonderful chemistry that was springing up between them take over, one day she might have to watch disillusion take its place.
‘It’s too soon,’ she said, easing herself out of his arms. ‘We haven’t known each other five minutes.’
It was the first excuse she could think of and would have to do. The fact that she felt as if she’d known him always was not going to get an airing. Aaron had told her in his own words that he was in no hurry to marry again and yet here he was, stirring her dormant senses, making her blood run warm again.
There were two reasons why it had to stop. The first was that maybe he was like Randy. That he’d meant what he’d said about not marrying again, but wasn’t amiss to a bit on the side. And secondly, if that wasn’t the case and he really was sincere, she didn’t want him to see her as less than the woman he wanted her to be.
‘So what is it?’ he asked. ‘You’ve just responded to me like I never dreamed possible and now you’re drawing back. You are the first woman I’ve touched since losing Eloise. Doesn’t that tell you something?’
‘Yes, it does,’ she told him bleakly. ‘It tells me that you have high expectations of me. Expectations that I might not be able to live up to.’
He was angry now.
‘That’s a lame excuse if ever I heard one. There’s something you’re not telling me and until I know what it is I’m groping in the dark. Or maybe you think that groping is what it’s all about!’
He was on his feet, towering over her, and as she looked up at him, Annabel knew that Aaron deserved to know the truth. So that he could make his own judgement and, for a man who’d been celibate for four long years because of his love for a courageous woman, her own sorry tale would make distasteful hearing.
CHAPTER FOUR
BUT the words were sticking in her throat. Those moments in Aaron’s arms had been like a glimpse of the promised land after months in the wilderness. Did she want to spoil this tender thing that was shooting up between them? Maybe if their relationship was given the chance to put down some roots, her past wouldn’t sound so grim when she told him.
So instead she explained lamely, ‘It’s how I feel, Aaron. We haven’t known each other long...and I am afraid I might not come up to your expectations.’
His smile was tight. ‘You came up to my expectations a few moments ago.’
Annabel could feel her colour rising.
‘I don’t mean in that way. I was referring to the difference in our lives. You have a stable, financially comfortable background and mine is far from that. I think my insecurities stem from my pillar-to-post sort of childhood. I never had the opportunity to establish myself in one place and if the chance came now I wouldn’t know how to go about it.’
He sighed.
‘Why do I feel that you’re making excuses? I’m the one who should be having doubts. I have Lucy to think about...and my mother. I owe her a lot, and with that thought in mind I need to be going. I told her I would only be out a matter of minutes. Maybe you’re right in what you say, Annabel. I shouldn’t have come.’
‘What was she like?’ she asked, as he turned to go.
He swivelled round to face her again.
‘Who?’
‘Your wife.’
‘Small, blonde, bubbly.’
‘So I’m nothing like her. A tall, brunette, whose fizz has gone flat.’
‘A good shake-up usually brings it back.’
‘Not always.’
‘Look, Annabel,’ he said impatiently, ‘I’m tired of listening to you talk in riddles. Let me know when you’re ready for some plain speaking. In the meantime, goodnight.’
You’re a glutton for punishment, Annabel told herself when he’d gone. That man is something else! And you’ve just fobbed him off. What is the matter with you? He’s in a different league to Randolph Graham. Way above him in looks, stature, integrity...and the way he kisses. So why put a dampener on him?
It was a good question and she didn’t know the true answer. Or maybe she did. The sadness she’d felt when they told her she’d miscarried was still there like a dull ache inside her.
She’d longed for a child, vowing as the wonder of her pregnancy had taken hold that it would never be made to feel unwanted as she had been. Even after Randy had made his uncomfortable confession, her joy at the coming birth had kept her spirits from falling too far. Until the day when she’d been hurrying to Theatre to deal with an emergency and had slipped.
Yet she was coming alive again and it was because of the man who’d just left her with his mind in a state of irritation and confusion. They were both as bad as each other. She was like a seesaw. No sooner had her life taken an upward thrust than it was plunging back down again, and as for Aaron, he was just as unpredictable.
Less than a week ago he had made it clear he had no wish to remarry and yet tonight he’d made no bones about the fact that he was attracted to her. But that didn’t have to mean that he was considering her for the role of the second Mrs Lewis. Lots of men were interested in sex, but weren’t necessarily rushing to put a ring on the woman’s finger.
Though something told her he wasn’t like that. He’d said she was the first woman he’d touched in years. She’d believed him, and four years was a long time.
* * *
Aaron’s thoughts were running along different lines. He felt he’d made a prize fool of himself. He should have remembered that Annabel had never shown she was interested in him in any shape or form. Why he was so obsessed with her he didn’t know. He’d never sensed any warmth in her towards him, with the exception of when he’d had Lucy with him and during those moments when she’d been in his arms.
Apart from that she was cool, cold almost, and he doubted that it was only an unhappy childhood that was to blame for that. Annabel was right when she’d said she was nothing like Eloise. But if he married again he didn’t want to be living with a carbon copy of his first wife.
He would want it to be a fresh start in every way and was constantly amazed that it had only been since he’d met her that he’d been thinking along those lines.
Let it rest, he told himself irritably as he undressed. You were living in a state of muted contentment before Annabel came. Revert back to that. But it was easier said than done with the memory of his mouth on hers and his loins aching at the contact.
* * *
The first-year children of a neighbouring primary school were waiting wide-eyed to be shown round the cheerful Rainbow
and Lollipop wards.
The hospital had checked with the school to see if there were any parental objections and had discovered that apart from one nervous mother all the parents were in favour of the children being shown the inside of a hospital.
‘I was in there,’ Lucy was telling them, pointing proudly to the small side ward that led off Rainbow, ‘after Dr Swain mended my head.’
Watching from a few feet away with one of the ward sisters by her side, Annabel hid a smile. She’d been right when she’d prophesied that this visit would give Lucy some standing amongst her classmates after her prolonged absence.
They were looking suitably impressed, some of them almost envious, and it was hard to keep a straight face. Aaron was to join them any moment. He was bidding farewell to Oliver who was going home after a very successful result from the brain operation. The convulsions had stopped. It was early days, of course, but the future looked good for him and his parents.
When Aaron joined them he was smiling and Annabel wasn’t sure if it was because of his pleasure at seeing Oliver off in a much-improved condition or seeing his daughter and her friends waiting to be shown round, with their teacher in attendance.
Actually, his pleasure was a bit of both and, though she wasn’t aware of it, her presence was adding to his happiness. Even though they hadn’t exactly been best buddies since the night he’d called at the flat.
They had no problems with each other on the job. They were both too professional to let personal matters get in the way of their work with poorly children, though Annabel found herself wishing frequently that they were back on the old footing. But Aaron had given her an ultimatum. Plain speaking was required and she wasn’t ready yet.
If he had any such thoughts he kept them well hidden behind a brisk air of competence and that was the present state of play. But now, seeing Annabel waiting for him with the children, he was reminded that this was her idea and concern for Lucy was at the heart of it.
She had a way with children. Lucy liked her and their young patients in the two paediatric wards reacted well to her calm air of reassurance. She would make a good mother, he’d thought a couple of times, and then had switched his thoughts elsewhere. There was no husband or children in the background so maybe Annabel wasn’t that way inclined, having no experience of proper family life to fall back on.
The Surgeon's Family Wish Page 5
