The Secret in His Heart

by Caroline Anderson

  He swore, quietly and viciously, stabbed a hand through his hair and headed back to the house. Sleep wasn’t an option, he realised, so he went into the sitting room, unearthed the boxes of books and unpacked them, putting them on the empty shelves that had mocked him for the last two and a bit years.

  Better, he thought, and it had only taken him a little over an hour. They weren’t sorted, but they looked a lot better than they had, and he could always move them. And it was pointless spending a small fortune on a picture to hang it up in a room that was so obviously unloved.

  He debated cleaning the room properly, but tomorrow would do. He’d dusted the shelves, put the books on. That would do for tonight. And anyway, he needed something to do tomorrow to keep him out of Connie’s way.

  Connie. Always it came back to Connie.

  He gave in to the urge and went back up to his bedroom, lay down in the cloud-soft bedding and went to sleep, wrapped around in Connie’s perfume. It was almost like lying in her arms...

  * * *

  ‘Wow, that looks amazing!’

  She stood in the opening between the kitchen and the living space and stared in astonishment at the transformation. There were books on the shelves, he’d rearranged the sofas and it actually looked lived-in rather than as if the removal men had just walked out the door. ‘What time did you get up?’

  ‘Two,’ he said, trying to ignore the pyjamas. ‘I’ve been back to sleep since for a while.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. Want a cup of tea?’

  ‘Yeah, why not? Have I got time for a shower?’

  ‘Sure. You won’t be long, will you? I’ll make it now.’

  He’d like to be long. He’d like to be long enough that she went and got dressed into something he was less excruciatingly conscious of, but that clearly wasn’t going to happen. He paused in the doorway. ‘How was Saffy last night, by the way?’

  ‘Fine. I’ve let her out, she’s sniffing round the garden at the moment. Thank you so much, James. I actually had room to stretch my legs out.’

  He laughed. ‘Happy to oblige,’ he said, and hit the stairs. ‘Don’t make it too strong, I’ve already had a lot.’

  He had. There were three teabags lying on the side, and she picked them up and put them in the bin. He always did that. So idle. No. Not idle, she corrected herself, remembering how hard he’d worked yesterday. He just had odd little habits. She made the tea, wiped the worktop down and went into the sitting room to study it.

  Saffy followed her, looked at the sofas and then at her, and lay down on the floor.

  ‘Wise move,’ she said, and Saffy’s tail banged the floor.

  ‘What’s a wise move?’

  ‘Saffy. She eyed the sofas.’

  ‘Did you?’ The tail thumped again.

  ‘So where are you putting the picture?’ she asked him.

  ‘I don’t know. I’m not sure yet. I can’t have it till after the exhibition, so I thought I’d work out where I want everything else. The first thing I’m going to do is give the place a thorough clean, now I’ve got it more or less straight.’

  ‘I’ll give you a hand.’

  He almost groaned with frustration. ‘You don’t need to—’

  ‘Oh, come on, you spent all day yesterday making the run for Saffy. It’s the least I can do. Here, drink your tea while I get dressed, and we’ll get started.’

  So much for his escape plan.

  * * *

  He went to the hospital in the afternoon, and savaged the rota.

  He had to leave most of the coming week alone, but the following week onwards he chopped to shreds. He spoke to the other key people who would be affected, shifted whatever he could and managed to minimise their contact really quite successfully.

  And if it all got too much at home, there was always a massive stack of admin with his name on it. He could always come back in. If necessary he could invent a few meetings.

  He gave his desk a jaundiced look. Locked in the drawers for confidentiality were a stack of files.

  So—Connie, or admin?

  Admin won, which was testament to his desperation, and it only kept him going till six that evening, at which point he gave up. Six on a Sunday, when he wasn’t even supposed to be working, was more than late enough.

  He locked the files away, headed home and walked in to the smell of roasting chicken.

  ‘Hey, smells good.’

  ‘Saffy thinks so.’

  She unravelled herself from the sofa and wandered through to the kitchen looking sun-kissed and delectable, and he had to forcibly stop himself from kissing her. ‘So how’s your day been?’

  ‘Tedious. I had to rework the rota and do some admin. I’ve moved us around—we’re really short of suitably qualified people in the next few weeks, so I’ve split us up a bit so one or other of us is there. I know it’s not ideal, but I’ll only be here or doing admin in the department, and it’ll be better for Saffy.’

  She nodded. ‘OK. And if the offer’s still open, I might go and collect all the stuff that’s in store and sort it out. You’ve only got me down part-time on the rota, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So when you aren’t here and I am, I can go through it all. And I can have the kettle and toaster in the cabin, so that if it’s raining I can make tea without coming over here.’

  Except in practice she’d been over here all the time, and it had never been an issue—well, not for her. Still, it was an excuse to get the things and start to go through them, and maybe it was because of James dealing with his boxes, but she suddenly just wanted to clear up all the loose ends and get it sorted out.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asked, watching her closely. ‘I just remember going through Cathy’s stuff. It can be a bit gut-wrenching.’

  ‘I’m sure it can, but it has to be done, and I’m ready now.’

  ‘Well, go for it. You can always stop and put it all away if it gets too much. And I won’t charge you storage.’

  He smiled, a wry quirk of his lips that said so much, and she felt warmed inside. He was such a good friend. She had to protect that friendship at all costs.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said humbly. ‘So—roast, mashed, boiled or jacket?’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Potatoes. With the chicken.’

  ‘Um—roast. Always.’

  She smiled. ‘Thought you’d say that. I’ll put them in.’

  * * *

  It worked well.

  He did a little more shuffling that week, and it ended up panning out nicely, so that Saffy wasn’t shut away for too many hours in her run, both of them had some personal time alone and there was enough company to make the place feel homely.

  Actually, he realised, it was great. She’d got the stuff out of storage and started working through it, and everything was going fine. And since he’d washed his sheets, the hormones weren’t such an issue, either. She didn’t wear perfume at work or if they weren’t going out anywhere, and life settled down into a regular and almost cosy routine.

  And then he had a job application in from someone who sounded perfect. A woman with two children whose husband had taken himself off to another country with his second wife and left her literally holding the babies.

  He phoned her, and she came in that afternoon to look round and impressed his socks off.

  She wanted part time, her mother was in Yoxburgh, and she was going nowhere. She was young, younger than Connie, and it would be her first consultancy, but her CV and references were stunning. And she could start whenever he pressed the button. He just had to put it to the hospital board, get her a formal interview and it would all be set in motion.

  It was like a dream come true—but it meant that he didn’t really need Connie beyond the end
of Andy Gallagher’s paternity leave, and a bit of him felt gutted because he loved working with her.

  But she wasn’t there forever, he knew that. She wanted to go off and have her baby and start her new life somewhere else, and there was nothing here to keep her now.

  Nothing except him, and he knew that didn’t count.

  He went home and found her sitting in a welter of Joe’s possessions with Saffy snoozing on the floor at her side.

  ‘How are you doing?’ he asked, sitting down cross-legged on the floor opposite her and scratching behind Saffy’s ears.

  ‘OK. There’s a lot of rubbish—paperwork that’s meaningless now, irrelevant stuff about our army accommodation and so forth. I’ll never need it, but it’s got personal information on it.’

  ‘Want to borrow my shredder?’

  ‘Oh, please.’

  He went and got it, and they spent an hour shredding documents. Then finally he called a halt.

  ‘Stop now. I need to talk to you.’

  She stopped, her heart hitching for some reason. He sounded so—serious? ‘About?’

  ‘I’ve had a suitable applicant for the job.’

  ‘Wow.’ She stood up on legs that trembled slightly, picked up the bag of shreddings and followed him downstairs, Saffy trailing after them. ‘What’s he like?’

  ‘She. Very good. Divorced, two kids—twins. Dad walked. I interviewed her today.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She’s nice. Really nice. Open, friendly, efficient—little bit nervous, but that’s to be expected. I need to get it rubber stamped, but we’ve been looking for someone for three months now without success, so I’m sure it won’t be an issue.’

  She nodded, trying to be practical, trying not to cry for some crazy reason. ‘Good. Well, for you. For Andy, too. Takes away the guilt.’

  ‘And you?’

  She shrugged. ‘I knew it was short term. I guess it’s just going to be shorter than I’d expected. I had hoped I’d have a bit longer to find a permanent job and somewhere to live, but I’m sure I’ll find something. When can she start?’

  ‘Now. She’s free, so as soon as the formal interview’s taken place and she’s officially accepted, she can start.’

  She stared at him across the kitchen, feeling the bottom drop out of her stomach. ‘Oh. Right. So I haven’t got time.’

  ‘Well, you don’t have to leave here, you know that, but the job will go. I’m really sorry. I honestly thought it would take months and I’m really grateful to you for what you’ve done.’

  She shrugged, her shoulders lifting a little helplessly, and he felt a complete heel, but what could he do? It was only the truth. The job was taken, he didn’t need her.

  Not in that way, and he wasn’t even going to think about the other.

  ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine. I’ll find a job, I always do. And I’ll get out of your hair, just as soon as it’s all rubber stamped and she’s ready to go.’

  ‘If you find something else you want to go to, if there’s a job that comes up with your name on it, I don’t expect you to give me any notice, Connie. You can leave whenever you like,’ he said, and she felt her heart break a little more.

  ‘Oh. Right. Well, I’ll start packing.’

  ‘But you haven’t got anywhere to go to! I’m just saying, do it in your own time, don’t worry about fitting in with me.’

  ‘But you’re right, there’s nothing here, I might as well get myself out into the job market.’

  ‘Connie, there’s no rush. Sleep on it, give yourself time to work out what to do next.’

  What’s to sleep on? You want me out! Out of your home, out of your department, out of your life!

  ‘Good idea. I’m tired. We’ll talk tomorrow. Saffy, come on, James is going to bed.’

  And she all but dragged the reluctant dog out of the door and down the steps and into her cabin. She got the door shut—just—before the little sob broke free, but it had a friend, and then a whole posse of them, and she shut herself in the shower room, turned all the taps on and sobbed her heart out.

  Then she blew her nose, washed her face and put her pyjamas on.

  She didn’t need James. She could do this. She could still have a baby, still have her dream without the complication of knowing the father.

  Simpler all round—except her dream had changed, and she’d realised that she didn’t just want a baby, any baby. She wanted James’s baby. And she wanted James.

  God, what a mess.

  She put Saffy out for a moment, and when she ran back in, she jumped straight up onto the bed, circled round and lay down in a perfect pattern of earthy footprints on the immaculate white bedding.

  Tough.

  Connie got into bed, shunted Saffy over a little and curled on her side, the dog behind her knees, and wondered what on earth she was going to do and where she was going to go.

  She had no idea. She was out of options. The tenant in her house was there for the next six months, at least, and there was nobody else she could ask. Not with Saffy.

  She’d have to get onto it first thing in the morning, try and find somewhere to go, somewhere to rent.

  And a job?

  God, it was all so complicated. It had been complicated since the day she’d agreed to have Saffy, and it just got worse. She needed a job, she needed a home and she didn’t need James telling her she didn’t need to work any kind of nominal notice period because he wanted her out of the house.

  He hadn’t said that, to be fair, but it felt like that.

  And then she had a brilliant idea.

  She’d apply for the job. Formally, properly. She’d find herself somewhere to live nearby, somewhere she could keep Saffy, and she’d go down the anonymous donor route, and then James would be close enough to help out if necessary, and she wouldn’t lose his friendship, and it would be fine.

  She just had to get him to agree.

  * * *

  There was no sign of her in the morning, and Saffy’s run was hanging open.

  Unlike Connie’s curtains, which were unusually firmly shut.

  He stood on the veranda and hated himself. It wasn’t his fault that this woman had turned up when she had. It was nobody’s fault. But it was his fault that they’d reached this point, that he hadn’t given Connie a flat-out no right at the beginning so that she’d moved on with her life already.

  And now she’d retreated into a cocoon, and he felt like the worst person in the world.

  He made tea and took it over to the cabin.

  ‘Connie?’

  No reply, just a scuffle and the sound of Saffy’s toenails clattering on the wooden floor as she came to the door.

  ‘Connie? I’ve made you tea.’

  He knocked and opened the door, to find her sitting up in bed, huddled in the quilt and watching him warily. She had her phone in her hands. Looking for a job?

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Of course I’m OK. Put the tea down, I’ll get it in a minute.’

  Go away, in other words.

  ‘Has Saffy been out?’

  ‘Yes. I’m afraid she trashed the quilt cover.’

  He glanced down and saw a crazy pattern of muddy pawprints all over it. ‘It’ll wash,’ he said, although he doubted it, but the quilt cover was the least of his worries. Connie looked awful.

  Tired, strained, her eyes red-rimmed, her back ramrod straight.

  He put the tea down and left her to it, plagued by guilt and unable to change anything for the better.

  * * *

  He’d gone.

  She’d hoped to catch him before he left for work, but he’d been too quick off the mark. Damn. She hadn’t wanted him going to the hospital board before she had a chance to talk to
him about it, so she took Saffy for a quick run, showered and dressed in work clothes and drove to the hospital.

  ‘Anyone seen James?’ she asked.

  ‘He’s not in the ED but he’s around somewhere—want me to page him?’

  ‘Please. Tell him I’m in the ED.’ And hopefully it wasn’t already too late.

  The phone didn’t ring. Had he not taken his pager? No, that wasn’t like him. Just ignored it? Maybe he was in a meeting—with the chief exec?

  He walked in, just as she was ready to give up.

  ‘Connie. Hi. I gather you’re looking for me.’

  ‘Have you got a minute?’

  ‘Sure. I’ll just make sure Kazia’s all right. We’ve got a patient with a head injury waiting for a scan but he’s stable.’

  He stuck his head into Resus. ‘You all OK for a few more minutes?’

  ‘Sure. No change.’

  ‘Thanks, Kaz. Page me if you need me.’

  He turned to Connie. ‘My office, or do you want to get a coffee and sit outside?’

  ‘Your office,’ she said. She wanted this to be formal, in a way. A little bit official. And an office seemed the place to do that.

  ‘OK.’

  He led her in, shut the door and offered her a chair, then sat down opposite her. ‘So. Talk to me.’

  ‘I want the job.’

  He felt his jaw sag slightly.

  ‘Job?’

  ‘Yes. The part-time consultant post in the department. I want to make an official application, and I want you to interview me.’

  He sat back in his chair, fiddling with a pen to give him time, straightening the notepad, lining up the small ring-stained mat he used to protect the top of the desk.

  ‘No,’ he said in the end, because it was the only word that came to mind that wasn’t unprintable.

  ‘No?’ She sat forward, her face shocked. ‘Why no? I’m good, James. Whatever this other woman’s got, I’ve got more, and I’ve thought it through. This is a sensible decision. I want a child, I have a dog already, I can’t work full-time. You said you’d support me in my decision about the baby, and if I’m here in Yoxburgh, that makes it easy for all of us. I understand you don’t want the fatherhood thing, that’s fine, but I’ve thought it all through. I’ll sell the house and buy one here, and I’ll have a stable base, friends in the area—this is just the perfect answer.’