The Doctor's Longed-For Family

by Joanna Neil

  The truth, though, was that nothing had changed. Deep down she knew that she still loved him. She yearned for him, longed for him to tell her that it was all a mistake. He had not meant to hurt her. He loved her, too.

  She wanted to see him, but she wasn’t ready to face him yet, so she did the next best thing. Back at the cabin she switched on the laptop computer and accessed his website, touching her finger to the screen where his image appeared.

  ‘This is Matt Calder’s website. I hope you tuned in to the TV show this weekend, any of you ladies out there who are worried about the problem of infertility. I wanted to show you that there are all kinds of solutions, but if you missed the show, there’s a section here on the website that might be of some help to you.

  ‘Or you could drop me a line with your questions or comments. On that note, we haven’t heard recently from that feisty lady, Dr Abby Byford. She has her finger on the pulse of what’s going on in the medical world. What do you think, Abby? Did I touch on the right issues? Did the programme go too deep, or not deep enough? Speak to me.’

  Abby mulled things over. Was he baffled by her disappearance? Or had he realised what it was that had made her run for cover? Did he know that she had gone away somewhere to lick her wounds?

  All in all, she suspected that he knew exactly what was going on. After all, he was astute enough to be able to work things out. He was a thinker, a man who took issues by the throat and dealt with them there and then. He didn’t pussyfoot around.

  Wasn’t that why he had arranged for her to have the surgery, why he had pushed for her to get it done right away? He didn’t deal in uncertainties. He simply cleared the path of any debris and moved on to the task in hand.

  When his sister had been missing, he’d set out to find her, and he’d put things in motion to continue the search. When Abby had told him about her problem, he had taken action. And then he’d gone on to do what he could for other people.

  Had she misjudged him? It was all a question of trust, wasn’t it? Perhaps that was the lesson she had yet to learn.

  Her fingers strayed to the keyboard. Was she doing the right thing? Not so long ago, everything had seemed pretty clear-cut to her, but now she wasn’t so sure.

  ‘I’ve always wondered,’ she wrote, ‘why people are so fascinated with watching the difficulties and dilemmas that others go through, but I think I have the answer now. It’s because we learn something from them…either what to do, or how to cope, or simply how to comfort others in their distress.

  ‘My question to you, Dr Calder, would be to ask how you come by your information, and how you decide whether or not to use it. Do you ever feel that you’re treading on toes in your efforts to broadcast your message to the world? Isn’t it some kind of a betrayal to take the outpourings of emotionally vulnerable women and use them to further your cause?’

  Then she hit the button and sent her message into the ether. Let him do with it what he would.

  Abby was feeling stronger with every day that passed. As she opened her eyes to each new dawn, she wondered what the future would bring. Out by the lake, she practised skimming pebbles over the water, something her father had taught her to do as a child.

  She smiled. Her parents lived some distance away, and she hadn’t seen them in a while. Perhaps she would go and visit when she took her next summer break. In the meantime, she would give them a phone call and catch up on the goings on in their neighbourhood.

  By early afternoon she was thinking about making her way back to the cabin. Would Matt have posted a reply? He would have finished his work at the hospital by now, and perhaps he would be ready to access his website.

  Only as she stared about her, shielding her eyes from the sun, a tall figure came and blocked her view. She saw long legs encased in dark chinos and a shirt that was crisp and fresh and open at the neck. She had to tilt her head back to see his face, but even with the glare of the sunlight behind him casting shadows over his face she knew that it was Matt.

  ‘Hello, Abby.’

  He came and sat down beside her and she stared at him in open-mouthed astonishment. ‘Matt? How did you know where to find me?’

  ‘It took a bit of working out, but you weren’t at the cottage, and you weren’t answering your phone, so I guessed that you had gone to ground somewhere. When you sent a message to the website I guessed you had access to a computer from somewhere, but I still couldn’t figure it out. I went back to the clinic, and the nurse told me you left by taxi, so the next thing was to contact the taxi firm and find out where they had taken you.’

  He made a wry face. ‘I did use a bit of subterfuge at that stage, because I said you’d had surgery and we were concerned for your well-being.’

  ‘As you can see, I’m fine.’

  ‘Yes. You look good.’ His gaze moved over her. ‘I was worried about you, though, and I missed you. I couldn’t understand why you didn’t wait for me to come and bring you home from the clinic…until I saw what you wrote on the website.’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘And now I’m not entirely sure.’ He reached for her hand and enclosed it within his. ‘I think you felt that I used you as some kind of pawn in my own game, but it wasn’t like that. I hoped you would know me better than to think I was capable of something like that.’

  She smiled at him. ‘I’ve come to realise that myself. I think I just needed to hear you say it.’

  He tilted his head on one side and looked at her. ‘I’m not like your ex-boyfriend, Abby. I’m not devious, or grasping, or wanting things for my own ends. I’m a doctor because I care about people and I want to do the best for them. What you said to me about not being able to have children, about the sense of loss and the unbearable feelings that it causes…you’re not the only one to have that emotional uncertainty. I’ve heard it so many times in my role as a doctor. I’ve even heard it from my own sister.’

  She stared at him. ‘From Amy?’

  ‘Yes. She used to suffer from endometriosis until she had treatment. She thought she wouldn’t be able to conceive, and it was a terrible time for her and for all of us who cared about her.’

  ‘I overreacted,’ she said. ‘I can see that now, but I needed this time alone so that I could work things out for myself.’

  ‘I wish you had confided in me.’ He put his arms around her and held her to him. ‘I can’t bear the thought of you going off on your own and suffering this way. We should be able to work things out together. Always.’

  ‘Always? You didn’t feel able to tell me what was going on when you first heard that your sister was missing. I felt as though I was pushed out, as though you didn’t want to share your troubles with me.’

  ‘That’s because I wasn’t sure what was going on. I didn’t want to worry you. I should have told you, I realise that now. From now on we’ll talk things through and work out our problems together.’

  ‘Will we?’

  ‘We will, I promise you.’

  She looked up into his blue eyes and saw the sun reflected there. His gaze promised hope and contentment and infinite togetherness.

  ‘I love you, Abby. I want to be with you for ever and a day. You don’t ever need to doubt me, because you’re everything I could ever want.’

  Her heart leapt at what he was saying. More than anything she wanted to believe him, but would he feel the same way if he was to discover that her surgery had been a failure? Had his motivation been entirely for her well-being, or had part of it been to do with the fact that he, too, wanted to have children of his own one day? Somehow she couldn’t quite find the words to question him about that.

  Instead, she murmured, ‘Are you quite sure?’ She plucked at a blade of grass, and then looked up at him once more. ‘Only there were these rumours—about you never wanting to settle down, that you were having too much fun as a single man.’

  He laughed. ‘I shall have to have words with my family on that score. They think because I’m on TV and I get all this fan mail tha
t I actually enjoy the attention and have my pick of whoever is out there.’

  He shook his head. ‘Nothing could be further from the truth, in fact. I learnt a long while ago that people identify with me on TV. I got into it by chance because the press came along when I was helping an accident victim and I answered their questions and helped everyone to make sense of what was going on. It was a kind of overnight fame and I thought it was a flash in the pan, but it turned out that it wasn’t.’

  ‘So you don’t crave the single life?’

  ‘I don’t. Especially not now. Ever since I first met you I’ve been intrigued by you, Abby. I think about you all the time and I want to be with you.’ He hesitated. ‘That’s why I thought perhaps we could be married. Only you didn’t seem so keen on the idea.’

  She looked at him in surprise, and also in wonder. ‘I don’t recall that you ever mentioned marriage. You said something about living together.’

  ‘No, that’s not what I meant at all. I want to make this a true commitment, a statement to the world that you and I are going to be together for ever.’

  ‘And if there are no children?’

  He sucked in a breath. ‘Oh, Abby, is it true? I’m so sorry.’ He pulled her up against him, hugging her tightly as though he would never let her go. ‘I asked Mr McNulty about the surgery but he wouldn’t tell me anything. Patient confidentiality, he said. I’m so, so sorry.’

  She looked at him and saw the compassion in his eyes. ‘I know that children are important to you,’ she said huskily.

  ‘Yes…But I suppose…I imagine we can find a way around that. And there’ll always be Jacob and Sarah to take on outings, or there will be family barbecues where we can all have fun together. It won’t be so bad.’

  ‘Won’t it?’

  ‘No. We’ll make it work somehow, even if we have to borrow a couple of kids.’ He chuckled, and she thumped his arm playfully.

  ‘I’m being serious about this.’

  He sobered. ‘I know. It’s a blow, but it’s not the end of the world and we’ll sort something out. We might even be able to try IVF.’

  She was silent, and he tilted her chin so that she was looking up at him. ‘I love you, Abby,’ he said, planting a kiss on her lips, ‘and I want to marry you. Will you have me?’

  ‘Oh, yes, please,’ she murmured, and kissed him back. The kiss went on for quite some time, and when they finally came up for breath she said in a roughened voice, ‘Oh, by the way, about the surgery…it was actually a success. Mr McNulty said I shouldn’t have any problems from now on. They tested the patency of the Fallopian tubes before they brought me round, and everything was fine. I have to have a check-up in a couple of months, but he doesn’t foresee any problems.’

  His mouth dropped open in surprise. ‘You were kidding me? You let me think that it wasn’t possible.’ He gave a ragged laugh. ‘You little witch, I’m going to kiss you senseless for that. Just you see…’

  It was a long, long while after that before either of them wanted to see the light of day once more, but eventually Abby snuggled into the crook of his arm and they both looked out over the gently rippling water of the lake.

  ‘Did you post a reply on your website?’ she asked.

  He nodded. ‘I said more or less what I said to you, that many women feel the same way about this issue of fertility and that the comments don’t come from anyone in particular.’

  ‘Hmm. You called me a feisty lady.’

  He gave a rueful smile. ‘It’s what you are. I noticed that right from the first. You don’t give up no matter what, you say what you think, and above all you face up to what life throws at you. The only difference now is that we’ll face up to it together.’

  She turned to hug him close. ‘I love you,’ she said softly. ‘I don’t think I’ve told you that before, have I?’

  He gently nuzzled her throat. ‘No, you haven’t. Do you want to tell me again?’

  ‘I do. I definitely do.’ She wound her arms around him, and kissed him soundly on the mouth. He wound his arms even more firmly around her, his hands caressing her soft curves and turning her blood to flame, making her body tremble with need. Neither of them surfaced until much, much later. And in the following month, people who wanted to contact Matt via the Internet found a message that read:

  ‘Welcome to Matt Calder’s website. For those of you looking for my daily diary, I’m afraid I’ll not be with you for the next few weeks. Instead, I’ll be walking down the aisle of my local church with my wonderful bride, Abby. Then, after a lovely reception with family and friends, we’ll be setting off for a blissful honeymoon, somewhere exotic, where the surf rolls in over golden beaches and we can sip pina coladas until the sun goes down.

  ‘But I promise…I’ll be back….’

  All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all the incidents are pure invention.

  All Rights Reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Enterprises II BV/S.à.r.l. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, storage in an information retrieval system, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.

  ® and TM are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.

  First published in Great Britain 2007

  Large Print edition 2008

  Harlequin Mills & Boon Limited,

  Eton House, 18-24 Paradise Road,

  Richmond, Surrey TW9 1SR

  © Joanna Neil 2007

  ISBN: 978-1-4603-5604-3