The Marry-Me Wish

by Alison Roberts

  A tangle of limbs and hands and lips. An almost desperate fumbling that only stilled when David’s lips found hers and Anne could abandon any rational thought and simply fall into the kiss.

  It wasn’t enough. Not this time. And they both knew it. When David eased back and took her hand and began to lead her towards the house, Anne was more than willing to follow him.

  ‘We need a shower,’ he told her. ‘We’re very dirty.’

  ‘Mmm.’ They both knew they weren’t going to be using separate showers. It was just as well Anne was as fit as she was, she decided, otherwise her legs couldn’t possibly have kept her upright and walking in step with David. Not when everything inside seemed to be turning into the most delicious liquid imaginable.

  This wasn’t simply about sex.

  As much as David wanted—no, needed—to make love to Anne, he knew that physical intimacy was only part of a much bigger picture.

  And if he hadn’t realised that as he led her into his house and up the stairs to his newly renovated en suite bathroom, he knew it as soon as he’d finished undressing Anne and taken her into the tiled shower with its multiple jets that surrounded them both.

  Rivulets of muddy water trickled away from a body that had changed surprisingly little after the pregnancy. Her breasts were a little larger maybe and her stomach was still soft and generous, but when David soaped his hands and drew her closer to clean off the remaining dirt, her skin still felt like silk. The curves were familiar and delicious. He crouched to rub the engrained mud from her knees, loving the feel of her body beneath his hands but knowing that caring for her like this—making her clean and, later on, feeding her—was just as compelling as any physical fulfillment that could be on the agenda.

  Maybe this was a mistake but he was lost in the wonder of being here at all. Being with Anne. Being allowed to care for and touch the woman he loved.

  Would always love.

  Anne tipped her head back, feeling the warmth of the water on her neck and back and the delicious slide of soapy hands on her skin. It should have been embarrassing having her muddy knees rubbed clean, but David’s hands were moving upwards now. Caressing her inner thighs. Slipping behind to cradle her bottom as he stood up and pulled her closer.

  His lips felt cool in comparison to the warmth of the shower but they still burned wherever they touched, just like his hands did. On her breasts and neck and mouth. Anne had been trying to return the favour of being washed but the sponge that foamed with shower gel slipped from her hands in the end. She needed everything she had to cling to David and stay upright.

  ‘I want you,’ he said simply, his mouth moving against hers.

  ‘I want you, too.’

  ‘It’s too soon, isn’t it?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ She could feel the hardness that was David wanting her, pressing against her. ‘No, I’m sure it isn’t.’ She pressed back, desire so urgent it was unbearable.

  David groaned, lifting her. Easing her back so that she was supported against tiles warmed by the rain still falling around and over them.

  He was being cautious. Careful. It was Anne’s turn to groan then. She wrapped her legs around him and begged for more, hanging on for dear life as her words unleashed the kind of passion she remembered so well. A kind she knew she would never find with anyone else.

  It was blinding. A lightning bolt that was over too fast for either of them. So David wrapped them both in fluffy towels and took her to his bed and this time they made love slowly and gently. Retracing maps they both knew but wanted to rediscover in exquisite detail. This time David produced protection, even though Anne was sure she hadn’t started ovulating again yet and was at no risk of pregnancy.

  ‘Better safe than sorry,’ David murmured.

  A tiny comment soon lost in pleasure of each other’s bodies but it surfaced again later, as Anne lay in David’s arms and let him decide what food he was going to have delivered to the house as soon as possible.

  Would she be sorry if she found she was pregnant with David’s child?

  If only she could answer that question. Because if she could, she wouldn’t be feeling so lost right now.

  As though she was standing at a crossroads, knowing that the next steps she took would determine the direction she would have to take for the rest of her life. But she was lost and couldn’t find anything that resembled a compass.

  She wasn’t alone.

  David was here at the same crossroads. Was history going to repeat itself and have them choose different directions or was it possible that their hands and hearts could stay linked as they moved forward?

  Only one thing seemed certain. The time allowed to stay at the crossroads was limited.

  And the clock had already been ticking for weeks now.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHOICES.

  They could be both a blessing and a curse.

  ‘I had no idea goldfish came in so many colours.’

  ‘Neither did I.’ David bent down to peer into the tank in front of Anne. There was a huge variety of fish suitable for a garden pond. Big ones, little ones, shiny and speckled. The colours ranged from fluorescent orange and yellow to a deep red. Brown, even.

  ‘How on earth are you going to choose?’

  ‘That’s why I dragged you along. Look, even the fins are different shapes. That one’s all frilly. Must be a girl fish.’

  The pet shop salesgirl, busy with a nearby tank, smiled as she overheard the exchange.

  ‘It’s your pond,’ Anne told him. ‘You get to choose.’

  ‘There wouldn’t be a pond if it wasn’t for you. You choose.’

  Anne turned her head, caught by something in David’s tone. A note that suggested this was about more than fish. Not that the salesgirl would have picked up on it but, then, she knew nothing of their history.

  Or how things had changed in the last couple of weeks since they had begun sharing a bed again. A choice had been made then too but so far neither seemed to be ready to really talk about the implications of what was happening. If they did, more choices would have to be made and there was a very real risk of their rediscovered intimacy vanishing in a puff of smoke that would leave them both burned.

  Was that what was underlying David’s insistence that she make the choice about the fish? Because the time was coming when she would have to make a rather more personal choice? A choice that was so huge it was terrifying.

  To be with David or to be alone.

  To be a mother or to continue the career she loved unchecked.

  A flash of panic made her break the eye contact with him. Anne stared into the tank again but she wasn’t seeing a single fish.

  Why was she so afraid? That she would make the wrong choice? Or that she couldn’t make it at all? Given how much she knew she loved this man, that choice should have been easy. She loved the way he looked. Her heart skipped a beat every time she saw him when they’d been apart for a while. She loved the sound of his voice. His smile. His dedication to his job and his ability to do it so well. Most of all, she loved the way he cared about her. Even now, when she was feeling so fit and well again, he still kept an eye on how much rest she was getting and that she was eating good food. She knew that if she wobbled in any way, he would be ready to scoop her into his arms and make sure she would be all right.

  What woman in her right mind would let someone who cared about her like that leave their life? The choice should be a no-brainer. She could choose to be a mother and give David the family he wanted so badly and that would be enough to keep them together, quite probably for ever.

  Except it wouldn’t be enough, would it?

  Why not? Was her career that important to her? And if it was, why had she made life so tough for herself over the last year by having babies for Julia and Mac?

  The fish swam happily amongst the oxygen weed and rocks but still Anne couldn’t focus.

  Love… That was why she’d tipped her life upside down and had those babies.
Real, unconditional, forever kind of love. The kind she had for Jules. The kind Julia and Mac had for each other.

  Mac had wanted a family. Julia had known she couldn’t give it to him and had taken herself away to give him the chance to have that family with someone else. Mac had crossed the world to find her again because being with Jules was more important. It had been his love for her that had been more important than anything else.

  Did David feel that way about her? If he did, then anything would be possible. The memory of the way he had carried her in his arms to safety that day by the river was enough to make her believe he might but if he did, why was it her that had to make a choice?

  She didn’t want to. She didn’t want to risk losing what they had. Even if it was only for a few more weeks, she couldn’t bring herself to pre-empt whatever was coming.

  ‘I can’t choose,’ she said aloud, finally. Oh, Lord, was there a note of desperation in her voice? ‘It’s a big pond. Can’t you take some of each colour?’

  David gave a huff of laughter. ‘That’s so like you, Annie. All or nothing.’ He turned away from the tank. ‘Maybe I’d better get you out of here before you start looking at the kittens.’

  ‘How’s the work on the house going, David?’

  ‘Almost done, thank goodness.’ In a rare lull in emergency department activity, David had found time to not only eat his lunch but to be enjoying a cup of surprisingly good coffee from the espresso machine in the staffroom.

  ‘Looking good?’

  ‘Amazing. It’s exceeded all expectations.’ He smiled at the registrar and she smiled back, the eye contact lingering just long enough for David to get the message before she turned to use the coffee machine.

  The young doctor was pretty. He knew she was good at her job. He also knew she was doing her emergency department rotation as part of her general practitioner training. She was heading for a career as a family doctor so it could be part time when she might have her own family to factor into her life.

  That should have been enough on its own to have made her a blip on David’s radar, never mind the fact that she was clever and attractive. He searched hopefully in that instant of eye contact but a heartbeat was as long as it took.

  No blip. Not even a glimmer of one. He had absolutely no interest in this woman.

  Dammit!

  What was it about Anne Bennett that eclipsed other women to such a degree they couldn’t even glimmer, let alone shine?

  A woman who couldn’t even compromise on the colour of fish, let alone juggle the idea of a career and a family. So black and white. All or nothing.

  It was ridiculous. Couldn’t she see that she was shooting herself in the foot as far as a meaningful relationship went? He loved her, for God’s sake. She was shooting them both in the foot. David frowned at his coffee as a disturbing thought occurred to him. Was he guilty of the same sin?

  He’d been prepared to walk away from Anne once before because he couldn’t have it all. He’d left himself with nothing, hadn’t he? Well, he’d still had his career, of course, but had that been enough?

  ‘So…’ The registrar sat down at the table opposite David. ‘You’ll be going on the market soon, then?’

  ‘Sorry?’ Good grief, was she asking if he was planning to be available for a new relationship?

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘The house? With it being finished? Wasn’t that the plan?’

  ‘Oh…yes.’ It had indeed been the plan.

  The house was finished. So was the garden, right down to the pond with its baby waterlilies and a rainbow of fish. Anne’s cottage was finished, too. She was going there this afternoon, in fact, to check on the final touches. David had asked her to walk there via the hospital so he could come and see it as well. He was due to finish at 3 p.m. and a leisurely stroll home would be nice.

  He wanted to see the cottage. Not to make sure that the workmen had done a good job but because he wanted to see whether he could pick up any vibes that maybe Anne wasn’t so excited at the thought of moving back to her own home.

  That maybe she would rather stay where she was.

  With him.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ he said aloud into the silence. ‘About selling the house.’

  ‘But aren’t you due to leave soon? You’ve got that flash job in London to go to, haven’t you?’ The young doctor’s eyes were shining. ‘I’d love to go and work in London. It would so exciting.’

  ‘Mmm.’ David smiled back in an attempt to catch some of the excitement his junior colleague was emanating.

  It should be exciting. All of it. That the house and garden were looking fabulous enough to command a quick, easy sale at a top price. That he had a prestigious position waiting for him in a world-renowned hospital in the one of the most wonderful cities on the globe.

  And…he didn’t want to go.

  He’d been given a choice only that morning. They wanted him to stay on here, in a senior consultancy position. Only a step away from Head of Department and they’d intimated that taking that step would only be a matter of time.

  His best intentions—the ones he’d had when he’d come back here—to tie up loose ends and move on with his life had been derailed. He only had himself to blame but there it was. Those intentions hung on one end of a balance and the rekindled romance with Anne hung on the other end.

  Where was Anne?

  Right in the middle. Depending on which way she moved, the balance would shift and the choice would be easy. Or, if not easy, at least clear.

  Maybe he was standing there in the middle as well. Right beside her. He had his own choices that he could make and therefore influence the balance himself. He could decide that being with Anne was more important than having a child.

  It was more important. There was a principle here that was far bigger than making babies. It was to do with the whole feeling of family. Of loving someone enough for what they wanted or needed to be more important than what you wanted yourself. Was the fact that he and Anne had been pulling in directions different enough to have snapped their relationship once already enough evidence that the kind of love they had wasn’t a lasting kind?

  He simply didn’t know. He desperately wanted to find out and that was what the last weeks with Anne had been about. They were closer than they’d ever been in so many ways but he didn’t feel any closer to knowing the answer to what the future held.

  Choices still had to be made. And soon.

  Just before 3 p.m. the quiet spell in the emergency department ended dramatically with the arrival of first one and then another ambulance coming from the scene of a multi-vehicle pile-up on the motorway. The trauma bays were already full and every available staff member occupied with the assessment and treatment of the injured people when a third ambulance pulled into the loading bay. Arriving right behind the stretcher that was unloaded from the vehicle was Anne.

  ‘Status 1,’ the paramedic confirmed the call that had prompted David and a senior nurse to be waiting out here to meet them. ‘Ten-year-old boy who was thrown from a car and then trapped when the vehicle rolled. Chest injuries. Increasing respiratory difficulty. Query pneumothorax.’

  ‘Check Resus 1,’ David instructed the nurse. ‘Make sure that patient is on the way to CT and the area is clear.’

  This little boy was clearly not stable. The tendons on his neck were standing out in his struggle to breathe and the trace on the ECG monitor sitting on the end of the stretcher was showing a sprinkling of abnormal heartbeats.

  ‘Need a hand?’

  David was reaching to push the button to open the automatic doors. Thinking ahead to what he would need around him in the next few minutes when they’d transferred this child to the bed in the well-equipped resuscitation area. A chest drain kit, intubation gear, bag mask, X-rays. A central line maybe.

  He blinked at Anne as the doors slid open in the wake of her offer to assist.

  Was it because she’d been away from work and so engrossed in projects that had no
thing to do with medicine that he hadn’t made such an instant, obvious connection?

  This child was critically ill with major chest trauma.

  Dr Anne Bennett was a specialist paediatric cardiothoracic surgeon. The best possible person to take over this case.

  ‘Sure.’ This was definitely a no-brainer. This was what Anne did. Who she was. Why did this action of stepping back to let her take over give him the briefest flash of something that felt like…disappointment?

  The patient who had been occupying the resus area they were heading for was being wheeled out as they came in but the woman was conscious and cried out as she saw the small figure on the stretcher.

  ‘Daniel! Is he…? Will he be…?’ Her words became choked by sobs and she covered her face with her hands. ‘Oh… God…’

  David stepped closer to the departing bed. ‘We’re going to take the best care of him that we can,’ he assured the woman, who was presumably Daniel’s mother. ‘Try not to worry. He’s lucky that he’s got the best specialist available right here.’

  ‘On the count of three,’ Anne was saying, ahead of him now and pulling a paper gown over her clothing as she spoke. ‘One…two…three.’

  The small body was lifted to the bed and remnants of clothing cut clear. One doctor was in charge of the airway and had an ambu-bag hooked onto the overhead oxygen supply, ready to cover the boy’s face and try and squeeze oxygen into his lungs.

  ‘Saturation’s right down.’ A nurse checked the clips over one of Daniel’s fingers. ‘Eighty per cent and dropping.’

  ‘Blood pressure’s dropping too,’ came another voice as new figures appeared on the bank of monitors. ‘Systolic down to 93.’

  ‘Run of V tach,’ someone else warned as an alarm on the cardiac monitor sounded. ‘Okay, back into sinus.’

  Anne unhooked her stethoscope from her ears. ‘Flail chest,’ she reported. ‘No breath sounds on the left side. I need a chest drain kit, please.’

  The sterile kit was unrolled onto a trolley by the time she had pulled gloves on.