Healed by Her Army Doc

by Meredith Webber

  Was she saying what he thought she was? Angus hesitated, wondering if he could put it to the test.

  Nothing ventured, he reminded himself.

  ‘So, if I asked very nicely, would you come to dinner with me?’

  ‘Is that you asking, or asking if you can ask?’

  She smiled as she said it and Angus took it as a small victory.

  He laughed.

  ‘I could say pretty please, but someone my size talking like that would be making a joke of it, and I’m not joking. I’d like to see you again, see you socially, nothing heavy or complicated, just a “‘getting to know you” kind of arrangement.’

  He wasn’t really holding his breath, but studying the cherub on the grave gave him a chance to watch Kate’s face more surreptitiously than staring at it. He could almost see the argument going on in her head, read it in the shadows in her eyes—more grey today—reflecting the sea?

  ‘Okay,’ she finally said, turning to face him, ‘but it will be dependent on Blake and when he wants to do a debrief.’

  She didn’t smile and something about the set of her face suggested she was pushing herself to accept.

  Because she’d been a loner for a long time?

  Because whatever had made her that way had left her scarred?

  He was surprised to find that it hurt him to think of Kate hurting—scarred by something that had changed her so much.

  ‘I’m flexible,’ he said, ‘and as I’d like to be part of the debrief we can make it before or after—whatever works.’

  She stood up and stretched, her long, lightly tanned legs mesmerising him, her body reminding him—

  Nothing heavy or complicated, he reminded himself.

  ‘Are you walking on to Coogee?’ she asked, and he shook his head.

  ‘Then we might as well walk back together.’

  Without waiting for a reply, she reached out a hand to pull him to his feet, and as he grasped it he wondered just how hard it would be to keep things light between them. Whatever magnetic force that had taken them to that dry bed in Cabin Thirty-Two—whispered to him by one of the staff as they saw the last of the injured and shocked guests off in the helicopter three years ago—was still alive and well between them. Or it was on his part, anyway.

  * * *

  The debrief, held late in the afternoon, eventually came to discuss whether the train driver should have been airlifted out immediately it was discovered there could be internal bleeding. The patient’s falling blood pressure had suggested that scenario, and although holding onto him until they’d known the condition of the passengers in the car hadn’t made any difference to his outcome, had the bleeding been worse, it could have been fatal.

  Discussing it rationally, without the pressure of the emergency situation, was one of the ways they could improve their actions in the field, and was one of the important parts of the debrief.

  ‘I think we were right to wait,’ Kate said, although she’d been the one who’d asked for immediate evacuation. ‘He was relatively stable and we had the IO line open if he’d needed massive doses of drugs or blood products. The ambulance attendants had started fluid resus and he had a distal pulse. The internal bleeding could have been from a tear to his carotid from the seat belt crossing his shoulder, or damage to an internal vein or artery from the lap-band of the seatbelt. There was no palpable swelling in his abdomen to suggest a lap-band tear and his trachea showed no signs of deviation so if there was bleeding from the carotid it wasn’t affecting his airway.’

  ‘Yet you suggested lifting him sooner?’

  Kate smiled at Blake.

  ‘Don’t we always think the patient we’re tending is the most important? Besides, it made minimal difference. The car was already out from under the road train and it was only a matter of minutes before you’d have ascertained if either of the occupants was alive. By the time we had Mr Grosvenor in the chopper you were able to tell us to take off.’

  ‘Thankfully,’ Blake said, and after a short general discussion the meeting broke up with Blake’s usual reminder of the availability of a counsellor should any of them want to talk.

  ‘Does he always beat himself up over what happened?’ Angus asked as they walked out of the hospital.

  ‘That wasn’t exactly beating himself up,’ Kate protested. ‘He’s just determined that we should be the best we can, and it’s only by going over the things we did—or sometimes didn’t do—that we can improve.’

  ‘But he had to hold the helicopter until he knew there were no survivors in the car,’ Angus said. ‘Anyone would.’

  Kate stopped at the always open gates into the hospital and looked out over the shops and restaurants that lined the front to the ocean beyond.

  ‘Are we going to continue to discuss this all through dinner?” she asked, and caught the surprise on Angus’s face.

  He held up his hands in mock surrender.

  ‘Sorry, I get carried away.’ There was a little pause before he half smiled and admitted, ‘Actually, I’m incredibly nervous about this dinner.’

  Kate grinned at him.

  ‘Snap,’ she said. ‘I think the last time I felt this way was when I was fifteen and a boy I liked at school asked if I’d go to the pictures with him.’

  ‘And did you?’ Angus asked as they walked on. ‘Go to the pictures with him?’

  ‘I did,’ Kate said, ‘and we had popcorn and a milkshake and I got such a shock when he put his arm around my shoulders, I spilled the milkshake all over my dress. He did walk me home but he never asked me out again.’

  ‘First dates!’ Angus said, a small smile flirting around his lips.

  ‘Tell me about yours,’ Kate said, as they reached the promenade and turned to walk along it.

  ‘Fifteen, and when I tried to kiss her, Michelle slapped my face.’

  ‘Michelle?’ Kate gasped. ‘The Michelle you were going to marry? You went out with her from when you were fifteen?’

  Guilt that she might have caused the break-up of such a long-standing relationship filled her chest, leaving her breathless as she waited for his reply.

  ‘Why not?’ Angus said, confirming Kate’s worst fears.

  ‘Well...’

  What to say?

  Did people still do that? Go out with each other exclusively from the age of fifteen?

  ‘Did you go out with other people in between?’ she asked, desperately hoping it had been an on-and-off relationship from the beginning.

  ‘Off and on, both of us, but somehow we always ended up back together,’ Angus said, sounding as unemotional as someone discussing the weather.

  They’d been together fifteen years—she knew he’d been thirty when she’d met him—then had broken up after—

  One night of madness...

  Only it hadn’t been madness, well, not to her. It had been as natural and necessary as the air she’d breathed.

  The memory still felt that way.

  But now the conversation, harmless as it had seemed at first, had erected a barrier between them, a wall of stupid, residual guilt as palpable as glass.

  * * *

  Angus wondered what she was thinking. They’d been chatting amiably enough and now even he, who wasn’t always attuned to nuances in conversation or tension in the air, realised something had shifted.

  Because he’d only ever seriously dated Michelle?

  Surely not!

  Time for a conversation change.

  ‘Where’s good to eat?’ he asked, and when Kate looked blankly at him he added, ‘Well, you’re the local.’

  ‘The bistro at the lifesavers’ building,’ she told him. ‘There, on the rocks at the end of the beach.’

  ‘The place beside the swimming pool in the rocks?’

  ‘That’s it,’ she said, picking up speed as they headed to
wards it.

  Escaping him or the conversation?

  But the beauty of the night caught him, pushing away the awkwardness he’d felt. A pale half-moon had appeared just above the horizon, and its silvery light turned the unusually calm ocean into a sea of mercury.

  ‘It’s unbelievable—the beauty of the ocean,’ he murmured, and she stopped and turned so they stood beside each other to admire the view.

  ‘It is,’ she said, and took his hand, squeezed his fingers. ‘Thank you for reminding me. Living here, it’s easy to take it for granted.’

  He looked down at her, at the dark hair that curled around her head like a cap, at neat brows and long eyelashes. Had she felt his gaze that she looked up, and her lips were right there?

  He touched her cheek, lightly, and sensed her hesitation, then whatever it was that had flared between them on the island sent colour to her cheeks as she lifted her lips to meet his.

  The kiss was slow, exploratory really, but it loosened something deep inside him that had been tight for a long time. Her lips were soft and warm against his, and her skin smelt of the beach, and sun, and flowers he couldn’t name, and of a woman he’d kissed three years ago...

  They turned and walked again, closer now, her hand in his, and the silence sat more easily between them.

  But it didn’t stop the doubts raging in Kate’s head.

  This was stupid, getting closer to Angus when all the physical stuff that had thrown them together once before was obviously still there between them...

  The physical stuff that had led where it had...

  It was only dinner!

  And if dinner led to another dinner—even a date?

  Led further?

  How fair would that be, getting involved with him and not telling him.

  She should tell him.

  And just what would that achieve? Quite apart from the pain she could feel just thinking about talking about it, how would it affect him?

  Wouldn’t it hurt him too?

  And if it didn’t—

  No, she couldn’t tell him—couldn’t talk about it—not without bringing up those traumatic days and the agony of grief that had followed them.

  The pain that still hit her when she saw a small child—

  ‘—heard a word I’ve said?’

  She turned to the man who was causing her so much confusion.

  ‘Sorry, miles away.’

  And thinking unhappy thoughts, Angus decided, seeing sadness in her eyes as she’d looked up at him.

  ‘Well, that’s okay, because it wasn’t very interesting chatter anyway,’ he said, but her distraction reminded him of the ‘loner’ tag she had at the hospital. Wasn’t that why he was hanging around Bondi? To see if he could find out what had changed her?

  Not that it was any of his business, but he’d liked the Kate he’d met at the island, and maybe he could find her again beneath the shell she’d built around herself.

  Oh, yes? a voice in his head taunted. You want to see more of her for purely altruistic reasons? To find out why she’s changed? Nothing to do with the attraction you feel towards her? The physical attraction you felt back then, that’s still there between you? The attraction you’d like to follow up on? Have a bit of a fling?

  Except instinct told him that Kate wasn’t a ‘just a fling’ kind of woman. A woman he could enjoy and walk away from.

  Yet, if he’d hurt her in some way? If his actions had somehow contributed to the change in her personality, shouldn’t he make an effort to sort things out?

  And a fling would do that? that voice in his head said mockingly, and he pushed all the useless thoughts away and concentrated on his guest.

  ‘That rock pool looks fantastic. Someone was telling me there are people who swim here all year round.’

  ‘Not me!’ Kate assured him. ‘I rarely go into the ocean until November when it’s warmed up enough that I don’t turn blue with cold.’

  And just like that, things were easy between them again.

  They were shown to a table by a window, far enough from other diners that they could talk freely, Kate asking him about his last posting, which he glossed over with a shrug and as few details as he could get away with.

  Ordering dinner made a natural break in the conversation, so when that was done, he diverted the conversation back to her.

  ‘And you?’ he asked. ‘Why surgery?’

  For a moment, it seemed as if she might not answer, then she turned from the contemplation of the darkness beyond the window and looked directly at him, so he could see her face and read every expression on it.

  ‘I liked the surgical work we did during training and then thought I’d follow up, but general surgery isn’t as easy as it sounds and I’m determined to do well at it.’

  ‘Why?’ he asked again.

  She frowned at him, although he was sure she knew full well what this question meant.

  He leaned forward and touched one finger to her chin, a silent prompt.

  ‘I wanted to do it for myself, to prove to myself I can be the best—or the best I can be.’ She hesitated, then sighed as if she’d decided it was easier to get it all out than for him to keep prompting her. ‘My parents were both high-fliers—lawyers—disappointed when I chose to study medicine instead of law. They’d wanted me to join the family firm, take it over in time. So, I felt I’d let the family down—failed.’

  She looked out at the ocean again, remembering.

  ‘I slightly redeemed myself by getting engaged to a lawyer then failed again by breaking off the engagement for what they felt was something trivial. Apparently, their marriage had survived many an affair! Other stuff happened, and I began to believe I was the way they saw me—a failure.’

  She turned back to him, and he could read the determination in her face as she continued.

  ‘I decided then I needed to do something for myself, something worthwhile that I could be good at, succeed at. Not for my family—I rarely hear from them now—but for myself. To regain my self-esteem.’

  Angus studied this woman he knew but didn’t know. There’d been a power in her words that told him they were true, but what could possibly have hit her so hard she’d believed herself a failure? Her family had started it, but the ‘other stuff happened’ was the real clue.

  Would she tell him?

  He reached out and grasped her hand. Gently squeezed her fingers, knowing he wanted her to, guessing she wouldn’t.

  CHAPTER THREE

  ‘WHAT ARE YOU doing here?’ Kate demanded, coming across Angus at the hospital gate the evening after their dinner.

  ‘Waiting for you,’ he said, giving her a peck on the cheek. ‘Alice said you started work at seven so shouldn’t be much later than seven coming home. What appalling hours.’

  He’d linked his arm through hers and with her heart racing and her nerves tightening right through her body, she knew she should pull away—casually, of course.

  But her arm didn’t move, so she concentrated on the conversation, managing, she thought, to sound quite calm when she said, ‘I’m often far later than this. I’m on call to the ED, and a patient who needs stitching invariably comes in as I’m sneaking off home.’

  ‘That wouldn’t have mattered,’ Angus replied. ‘I had the paper to read while I waited and that was only after I’d checked out the fish and chip shops. Fancy fish and chips on the beach?’

  More fizzing going on inside her, which was just plain ridiculous!

  Or was it?

  Surely she could just enjoy the moment, whatever the moment might bring. Wasn’t that what Alice had been trying to tell her?

  ‘Sounds great,’ she said, and relaxed, letting her body rest close to his as they walked down to the front and the fish and chip shop he’d chosen.

  ‘Why this one?’ she asked,
although she knew it was the best.

  ‘Longest queue,’ he said, grinning at her in such a way her insides turned to mush.

  ‘I should phone Alice,’ she said as they waited at the end of the queue.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ve already told her I was taking you out to dinner.’

  ‘Fish and chips on the beach—you call that dinner?’ Kate teased.

  She was startled when he turned to her and said quite seriously, ‘Well, I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hang around, so I can’t waste too much time on the preliminaries.’

  And just in case she hadn’t caught his meaning, he kissed her lightly on the lips—a kiss that came and went so quickly she was left wondering if she’d imagined it.

  Except that her body knew she hadn’t. It had reacted with a quiver of excitement that brought her nipples to peaks and produced an ache of longing between her legs.

  They inched forward in the queue, Angus chatting to the woman in front of them, Kate’s mind in a whirl.

  If he wasn’t going to hang around, surely she could go along wherever this led, enjoy it while it lasted? And with a clear conscience about not telling him because it wasn’t a ‘relationship’ but just a fling. And a flingee could have as many secrets as he or she liked, surely?

  The idea of a fling, of seriously considering it, sent a tremor through her body, settling deep into the pit of her stomach, while a warmth began to envelop her.

  Angus’s arm brushed against hers, stirring up more chaos in her body, and strangely enough making her smile.

  It would be fun, she realised.

  Risky but fun.

  A light touch on her arm...

  Worth the risk...

  * * *

  They sat on a seat on the promenade to eat their dinner, not wanting sand in the chips, but after eating they took off their shoes to walk on the beach, hand in hand, replete, and content, for the moment, just to be together. But in the shadows at the far end, where the rocks began, he turned her so they faced each other, drew her close with his free hand, and this time kissed her properly.

  His lips were hard and firm against hers, insistent, demanding, so her lips opened to him, his tongue invading the softness of her mouth, tasting her as she tasted him, teeth clashing as he dropped his shoes and used both arms to bind her tightly to him, her body pressed to his so she felt the shape and strength and heat of him, filling her with a need—an ache—to know more, feel more, be one with him.