‘Yes.’
‘Are you a complete paragon?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Charles is very…controlled,’ she said. ‘He’d say drinking tea is really sensible right now.’
‘You don’t want tea?’
‘I ought to want tea. It’s very sensible of you to suggest tea.’
‘But you’d rather…’
‘Whisky,’ she said promptly. ‘Failing that, a glass of red. But, then…you probably disapprove.’
‘Work of the devil,’ he said, and loved the look on her face.
‘Sorry,’ she said meekly. ‘Of course.’
‘But if you could make do with some really excellent cognac…’
Her face changed again. She was totally transparent. He tried not to laugh but…she was making him laugh inside. It was an extraordinary sensation.
‘You have cognac?’ she demanded.
‘For medicinal purposes only. Three times a day before meals or three glasses before bedtime. Whichever suits the patient.’
‘Yes please,’ she breathed. ‘This patient needs medicine now.’
So they drank cognac. They also talked shop. Medicine was the easiest, safest thing to talk about.
They’d been to the same medical school, four years apart. How come he’d never noticed her? Mind, his head had been so far into books back then that he might not have noticed.
She was ambitious. She’d been one of the youngest graduates ever and she’d gone into emergency medicine.
‘I love it,’ she said. ‘Pure adrenaline.’
‘But you don’t get to know your patients.’
‘No. No emotional stuff that way.’
‘You don’t like emotional stuff?’
‘I’ve had enough emotion to last me a lifetime.’
‘You want to explain?’ he asked, and she shook her head and stared into the depths of her cognac.
She fell silent. He didn’t mind. He even liked it.
She was a restful woman. Warm and funny, but there were depths he could only guess at.
She’d used the comb he’d found her to good purpose. Her hair was lovely, tumbling around her shoulders in soft curls. More and more he wanted to reach out and touch…Reach out and kiss…
No. No and no and no.
‘I lost my brother and sister,’ she said bluntly, and her bald statement shook him out of his not so appropriate thoughts.
‘How?’
‘They were killed when I was four.’ He had the impression she was trying to figure things out and he could listen or not. ‘Sarah was seven and Connor was nine. Charles’s father was driving. Charles was in the front seat. Charles was nine as well-he and Connor were friends. A truck ran a red light. Sarah and Connor were in the back seat and were killed instantly.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ he said, not knowing what else to say.
‘I was too little to figure it out,’ she said. ‘I just remember people crying. Crying for years, really. And then, every family function since, Charles and his parents have been there.’
Ouch. A psychologist could have a field day with this one.
‘So tonight…they’ll all be distressed,’ she whispered. ‘They’ll be sitting round not knowing what to think. But while you were putting the kids to bed I tried to ring, and Mum was so upset she wouldn’t talk to me. Now Charles will be explaining I’ve had a shock and I’ll come to my senses-he’ll see to it. And my parents will listen to him. They’ll leave me alone to figure things out. On about Easter Sunday Charles will appear again and be reasonable and have a very sensible plan as to what to do with Marilyn. What to do with me.’
Her voice wobbled.
He didn’t get into this sort of emotion. But…as if it had a life of its own, his hand moved to rest gently on her hair.
She put her hand up and covered his.
It was okay. He could do this. It felt…right.
She needed this. He knew it. What he didn’t understand so much was why he felt as if he needed it, too.
The urge for more…to take her in his arms, to kiss her, was still there, but it was supplanted. Comfort was okay. More than okay, actually. The warmth in this tangible link was so strong it left him feeling that something was being forged that was really important.
Something he wasn’t sure existed.
‘Dom,’ she said at last, softly.
‘Mmm?’
She pulled her hand away and maybe it was his imagination but he was sure there was reluctance. She had to move on.
They both did.
‘I reckon Marilyn and her pups would be more comfortable in here by the stove,’ she whispered. Then she tried again and she had her voice back. It made him wonder if the contact they’d had was disturbing her. She’d needed to get back to sensible. Practical. ‘If we popped them in the corner they’d be out of the way. They can’t stay in the hall all Easter. You want to cart them in?’
‘I guess.’
So she sat by the stove and superintended while he made up a dog-bed. Gently he lifted each tiny pup across to the new bed, letting Marilyn see exactly what he was doing. As the last puppy was taken away from her, Marilyn heaved a doleful sigh, hauled herself to her feet and lumbered across to her new bed.
This felt okay, too, Dom thought. He was surrounded by domesticity and for once it didn’t scare him.
He ought to go to bed. He’d been up since dawn and there was no guarantee he wouldn’t be disturbed again during the night.
But he didn’t want to leave the kitchen. He didn’t want to leave Erin.
‘So tell me about you,’ she murmured.
And he thought, no, he should go.
‘Not a lot to tell.’
‘Yeah, there is. You finished med school four years before I did. Were your parents proud?’
‘Ruby stood in the front row at my graduation and cried like her heart was breaking.’
‘Ruby?’
‘My foster-mother.’
‘So your real mum and dad…’
‘Disappeared years ago,’ he said. ‘I haven’t heard from my mother since I was eight. My birth father was arrested for armed robbery six years ago. I read about it in the papers. But I only knew him by name.’
‘Which explains why you take in foster-kids?’
‘Maybe it does,’ he said repressively.
‘Did you always want to be a doctor?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Why?’
He shrugged. And then he thought, Why the hell not? Tell it like it is.
‘We moved towns a lot when I was a kid,’ he said. ‘My mother was…not exactly stable.’ He shrugged. ‘She believed in love at first sight-which meant we followed loser after loser. Finally there was a night…’ He hesitated, then decided there were still places he didn’t want to go. ‘Anyway, it was what the cops call a domestic. The police came, there were neighbours shouting, lots of stuff going on. And in the middle of it all, the doctor arrived. A nice, grey-haired old man who surveyed the mess, then came straight for me. I remember I was hiding under some hydrangeas in the corner of the garden. It was like he knew I had to be there. He came under the bushes, he told me I’d had enough, that he’d take care of my mum from now on, and then he put me in his car and took me to
