A Very Single Woman

by Caroline Anderson

  Or want one.

  Her body was calling her a liar, all her senses at full alert as she followed him through the scented, dusky garden, but she ignored the clamouring. There was no way that some physical reaction was going to come between her and her carefully mapped-out future. She had a plan, and she was going to stick to it. First, though, she had to move into a house and get it ready for the arrival of a child. That was all that mattered, all she could let herself think about.

  And Nick, for all his long, lean legs and sexy grin, was a very long way down her list of priorities.

  Helen was so deep in thought as they approached the house that for a moment she was unaware of the pandemonium that was breaking loose at the entrance to the drive. Nick, though, was wide awake and broke into a run. She followed him, to find him crouched down on the edge of the pavement beside an elderly lady, who was clutching her chest and trying desperately to speak.

  ‘Doctor—you’ve got to help me, Doctor!’ She gasped for breath.

  ‘Take your time,’ he said calmly, but she was flustered and panicky. The crowd was growing, a slim woman from across the road coming over to kneel down beside him.

  ‘Anything I can do?’ she asked, and Nick shook his head.

  ‘It’s Peter,’ the elderly woman gasped. ‘I don’t know what’s happened to him, but there’s blood everywhere and I don’t know what to do! You’ve got to help me!’

  ‘Don’t worry Mrs Emanuel, I’ll get the car and we’ll go straight there.’ He turned and looked up at Helen. ‘I don’t suppose you could keep an eye on Sam, could you? I’ll be as quick as I can.’

  ‘You’ll need me,’ she said in a low voice. ‘Mrs Emanuel needs someone to talk to.’

  ‘I’ll look after Sam,’ the woman from across the road chipped in, and Nick looked up and smiled in relief.

  ‘He’s inside. Could you take him home, Linda? That would be great. Thanks. I’ll pick him up later.’ He stood up and turned to Helen again. ‘Stay with her. I’ll get the car and tell Sam what’s happening. Linda, can you come with me?’

  He sprinted back up the drive, disappearing into the house with Linda for a moment before coming out still at a run. Seconds later his car was there beside them, and Helen was helping Mrs Emanuel into the front seat. She dived in behind her, and without ceremony Nick shot off up the road towards the Emanuels’ house.

  ‘Oh, hurry, Doctor!’ Mrs Emanuel said desperately, wringing her hands. ‘He’s going to bleed to death!’

  ‘Where’s the blood coming from?’ he asked, and she shook her head.

  ‘I don’t know. He’s cut himself somewhere in the workshop. I do wish he wouldn’t go out there, I begged and pleaded with him not to, but now he’s on the warfarin…’

  Helen nearly groaned aloud. Warfarin, of all things—an anti-clotting drug, commonly used after strokes and heart attacks to prevent their occurrence. And poor Mrs Emanuel had left her husband bleeding like a stuck pig. She must be worried sick. Helen leant forward slightly and put her hand reassuringly on Mrs Emanuel’s shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze. Thin, wizened, frantic fingers clutched her own, grateful for the support.

  How much longer? Helen thought. They must be nearly there, Mrs Emanuel had run from her house to Nick’s.

  Just as she was just beginning to wonder at the elderly woman’s stamina, Nick screech to a halt outside a neatly kept little bungalow. By the time Helen had her seat belt off, he was already out of the car and on his way round to release Mrs Emanuel. Helen followed them as they both hurried into the house, through the front door which had been left hanging open. They found Mr Emanuel collapsed on the floor in the kitchen, blood everywhere, as he weakly tried to staunch the bleeding from his injured hand.

  ‘It’s all right, Mr Emanuel,’ Nick said reassuringly. ‘I’m here now, let me have a look at it.’

  As he released the pressure on the wound, the blood spurted across the kitchen and Mrs Emanuel sagged against Helen with a shocked cry. Nick was there instantly, applying pressure in exactly the right place, snapping instructions out to Helen.

  ‘Get me a clean cloth—and phone the ambulance. Tell them we’re at 32 Sadlers Way, and tell them to bring plasma expander. He’s got an arterial bleed and he’s very shocky.’

  Helen could see he was shocky; it was obvious from his pallor, the moist glisten of his skin, the slight tremble in his hands. His wife, also, was in shock. Helen put an arm around her and hugged her while she reached for the phone. ‘What’s the number for the ambulance station?’ she asked.

  She stabbed in the numbers as he rapped them out, and quickly gave all the details of the casualty. Directions were harder, and she had to relay them from Nick, but finally she was able to put the phone down and reassure them that the ambulance was on its way.

  ‘Oh, thank God,’ Mrs Emanuel said fervently. ‘Doctor, tell me he’s going to be all right.’

  ‘He’ll be fine, Doris,’ Nick promised. ‘Once the ambulance gets here and they get some plasma expander into him to replace lost fluids and get him to hospital so they can stop this bleeding, he’ll be fine. Helen, can you help me? I want to get a line in. At the very least we can get some saline into him here while we wait.’

  Helen found a giving set in his bag, and knelt beside him on the blood-streaked floor.

  ‘You’ll have to do it, I can’t let go of this,’ Nick said quietly. ‘In the other arm, I think. You might find the vein a bit elusive, he’s lost quite a bit of volume.’

  She was lucky and got the line in quickly, attached it to the first bag of saline and squeezed it in, then attached another bag and hung it on the front of the kitchen cupboard, while Mrs Emanuel watched worriedly.

  ‘I can’t imagine what he thinks he was doing, messing about in that workshop playing with his chisels,’ she said with a touch of asperity. She sounded cross, but Helen knew it was just her way of dealing with her worry. People often seemed cross when they were just actually hugely relieved.

  ‘Can’t do a damn thing any more without her worrying about me,’ Mr Emanuel muttered from his position on the floor. ‘Such an old fusspot.’ But it was said with a great deal of affection, and Mrs Emanuel began to cry—not noisily, just a soft, quiet sobbing as the tears slid down her wrinkled cheeks.

  ‘You’re an old fool, Peter,’ she said tearfully, reaching out to hold his hand, the one that Nick didn’t have a death grip on. ‘Just promise me, promise me you won’t do it again. If I hadn’t been here, you might have bled to—’ She broke off, too overcome to speak, and pressed her fingers to her mouth. Helen pulled up the kitchen chair and pushed her into it, so that she could sit beside her husband, holding his hand and comforting him until the ambulance arrived.

  It wasn’t long before they heard the sound of the siren, and then Peter was whisked away, plasma expander already being pumped into him by the ambulance crew. Doris was at his side, looking pale but a little more confident now, and as the doors closed behind them and the ambulance drove away Nick turned to Helen on the front path and gave her a cockeyed grin.

  ‘Sorry to get you working quite so early on in your contract,’ he said ruefully, and she returned his smile.

  ‘That’s all right—but how come she came to you? I thought you didn’t do house calls in the evening?’

  ‘We don’t—but what was I suppose to do? Leave him to bleed to death? She knew I’d come.’

  ‘Naturally,’ she said with a smile. ‘I take it he’s a patient?’

  Nick nodded. ‘Yes—has been for years. He had a stroke two years ago, and he’s prone to clotting, hence the warfarin.’ He looked at Helen thoughtfully. ‘I’m afraid it hasn’t done your interview dress a great deal of good,’ he added, and Helen looked down at herself and sighed.

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘You can’t possibly go home like that,’ he went on. ‘At the very least, you need a shower and a change of clothes, and I have no idea what I’ve got that might fit you. I don’t suppose you’ve got anything wit
h you?’

  She shook her head. ‘I didn’t intend to get covered in blood, oddly enough,’ she said with a slight smile.

  He ran his eyes assessingly over her, and shrugged. ‘If you turn the bottoms up, my jeans might be all right, and I’m sure I can find you a T-shirt or sweatshirt or something. Come on, let’s go back and get washed and changed. It’s nearly ten.’

  It was, and night had fallen while they’d been in the Emanuels’ house. ‘I’ll make your car all messy,’ she said in dismay, but he just laughed.

  ‘No messier than I will, and I’m going to go in it, you can be sure of that. It’s one reason I have leather seats—they wipe clean.’

  Leather seats? She hadn’t even noticed but, then, she’d hardly been concentrating on the interior of his car in the kerfuffle. They went back into the house where a kindly neighbour was cleaning up the mess as well as she could, and packed up Nick’s bag before taking their leave.

  Moments later they were back at his house, and he picked up the phone, spoke briefly to Linda, the neighbour who’d kindly had Sam for him, and then ushered Helen down the hall. ‘Here,’ he said, opening a cupboard and thrusting a warm, fluffy towel at her. ‘Use the bathroom—I’ll dig you out some clothes and leave them by the door. Hopefully they’ll fit. What about your dress—is it dry-clean only, or shall I put it in cold water to soak?’

  She gave a wry smile. ‘I have no idea. I’ve only just bought it. I’ll look at the label in a minute—I won’t be long.’

  She was, though, because the hot water felt so wonderful she just stood there while it poured down on her and revelled in it. She heard Nick tap on the door and tell her the clothes were there, and reluctantly she shut off the taps, wrapped herself in the lovely soft towel and opened the door.

  There was no sign of him, but she could hear another shower running further down the hall. She picked up the clothes—old, worn jeans as soft as butter, and a floppy shirt in a lovely sandwashed fabric that felt wonderful to the touch.

  She put her own underwear back on and tugged on the jeans, wondering how they’d fit, but they were fine. Snug on the hips because, of course, he had such a neat, cute bottom…She sighed and dragged herself up short. Forget his bottom, she told herself sternly. Don’t think about him wearing the jeans, about the fabric touching his skin, moulding to his shape. You’ll go mad.

  She fastened the stud and slid up the zip, then pulled a face. The waist was too big, but he’d put a belt there, too, and once she’d put it on and turned the hems up they were fine. The shirt, of course, was huge, but she didn’t mind that. She rolled up the cuffs, looked at herself in the mirror and smiled.

  Gone was the sophisticated, elegant woman of earlier. This woman looked as if she’d be at home barefoot and puttering around a kitchen—preferably a kitchen like Nick’s—which, of course she would.

  Part of the time, anyway. She imagined herself in there, children underfoot, and caught her breath.

  No! What on earth was she doing? She almost tore the clothes off again, and only the state of her dress prevented her. They’re just clothes, she told herself crossly. They don’t change you.

  Just make you who you really are.

  With a growl of disgust she scooped up the dress and yanked open the door, to surprise Nick who was standing outside, one hand poised to knock.

  ‘Oh, you’ve got them on—they look fine. How are the jeans?’

  ‘Snug on the bottom, loose on the waist,’ she said, and something shifted in his eyes.

  They tracked down her, but the shirt covered her to mid-thigh and concealed her from his gaze. ‘They’re a bit long,’ he said unnecessarily.

  ‘They would be. I’m five feet eight, you’re probably—what? Six two?’

  His mouth kicked up in a twisted smile. ‘Something like that. Come and have a drink.’

  She did, noticing as she followed him that his hair was still wet, the dark brown strands towel-dried and combed for once, not shovelled into place by his fingers. She wondered how long it would last.

  Not long. Sam was back by now, perched on a stool in the kitchen, picking at the lemon chicken and complaining it was cold.

  ‘You were invited to join us,’ Nick said, shooing the cat off the worktop and scooping the nearly empty cartons into the bin. ‘I’ve put some on a plate for you in the fridge—you can heat it up in the microwave if you’re hungry.’

  ‘Is Mr Emanuel all right?’ he asked, and Nick nodded.

  ‘Hope so. He cut himself in the workshop on a chisel.’

  Sam eyed the bloody dress wadded up in Helen’s hand, and pulled a face. ‘Gross,’ he said, and she grinned.

  ‘Absolutely. I had to borrow your dad’s clothes.’

  ‘They’re a bit big,’ Sam said unnecessarily, and she chuckled.

  ‘I had noticed,’ she said drily. ‘Still, beggars can’t be choosers.’

  ‘Are you a beggar?’ Sam said, eyes wide.

  Helen nearly laughed aloud. At least he looked as if it was only a remote possibility. ‘Not exactly. I’m a doctor.’

  ‘I know that,’ Sam said scornfully. The microwave pinged and he took his food out and hitched himself up at the breakfast bar again.

  ‘Mind that, it might be very hot in places,’ Nick warned, and slid a glass of water across the counter to him. ‘Helen, what can I get you to drink?’

  She looked at her watch. It was ten-thirty, and she had an hour’s drive ahead of her. ‘Coffee, please—nice and strong. I need to stay awake.’

  ‘Don’t tell him strong, he makes it like mud, everybody says so,’ Sam said through a mouthful of lemon chicken.

  She met Nick’s laughing, rueful eyes and arched a brow. ‘Just normally strong?’ she said hopefully.

  ‘Real or instant?’

  ‘Instant’s fine. I ought to be getting on.’

  ‘You could stay,’ he said, and she had a sudden unheralded vision of herself in his arms.

  She felt the heat rising, warming her throat, easing over her cheeks. She cleared her throat and turned away, making a production of sitting on a stool by Sam. ‘I don’t think so. I’ve got a lot to do if I’m starting on Monday, but thanks anyway.’

  ‘You could see the room at the practice in the morning,’ he suggested, and she was almost tempted, but then she shook her head.

  ‘I’m sure I can imagine it. I’ll come back on Sunday afternoon, if that’s all right, and get settled in. I may need some time off, of course, in a little while, so I can move up here properly—will that be all right?’

  ‘Fine. Whatever. I’m just so grateful for the help now. I was beginning to wonder what on earth I was going to do for the next few days.’

  ‘Send them all home with their ingrowing toenails and their insomnia because they drink too much tea last thing at night. Most of them don’t need to see you, anyway,’ she said with her usual blunt humour.

  He laughed softly. ‘You’re so right. If only just the people who were truly sick came to us, we could save the country a fortune and provide a much more efficient service.’

  ‘I’m going to bed,’ Sam said, sliding off the stool and heading for the door.

  ‘Night, sport,’ Nick said, and Sam raised a hand casually as he walked out. No goodnight kiss, no hug, Helen thought, but maybe he imagined he was too old, or maybe Nick didn’t encourage it, or maybe it was because she was there.

  She drank her coffee, trying hard not to think about Nick struggling to bring up a child alone and play the part of both parents. It could be done. Lots of people did it—she was going to do it herself, and make a success of it.

  So why, then, was she feeling sorry for this big, gentle man with the laughing eyes and the sexy little bottom and a smile to die for?

  She needed to get out of there, to go home to her bed and breakfast so she was up in time to talk to the estate agents tomorrow—and, above all, she needed to be out of his company before she said or did something silly that she’d regret.

 
She put her mug down, only half-finished, and stood up. ‘I must go. I won’t be home till midnight as it is,’ she told him, and he nodded.

  ‘Drive carefully,’ he said, his voice low and soft, almost as if he cared, and she found herself wishing he did, that she could dare to have a man like Nick caring for her.

  But she couldn’t, and she wasn’t even going to allow herself to think about it.

  ‘Could I have a bag for the dress?’ she asked, and he pulled an old supermarket carrier bag out of a dispenser inside one of the cupboards and handed it to her.

  ‘I’ll see if I can find out about the agents for Mrs Smith’s house tomorrow,’ he promised. ‘I’ll give you a ring. Have you got my home number in case you’ve got a problem over the weekend?’

  She shook her head, and he scribbled it down on a sticky note and handed it to her. ‘Here.’

  Then suddenly there was no more to say, so she put her shoes on, the heels ridiculously high with the soft old jeans and floppy shirt, and found her car keys in her bag.

  ‘I’ll see you on Sunday,’ she said, and as she walked to her car, she could feel his eyes on her. She slid behind the wheel and glanced up at him, but the light threw shadows across his face and she couldn’t read his expression.

  He lifted a hand in farewell, and as she drove off she experienced a sudden, unheralded pang of loss, almost as if she missed him already.

  How ridiculous! Of course she didn’t miss him! He was a colleague. A workmate. A fellow professional.

  Of course she didn’t miss him.

  CHAPTER THREE

  NICK phoned Helen at ten o’clock on Saturday morning, to tell her the name and number of the estate agent, and then for some reason he didn’t end the call. Not that he seemed to have anything in particular to say, except that Mr Emanuel was all right and recovering well in hospital, and he told her a little more about the room in the surgery which would be her temporary home. Then he seemed to grind to a halt, and to fill a slightly awkward silence, she said, ‘I’ll wash your jeans and shirt and bring them back with me on Sunday.’