anxiety on his face.
Abbey wasn’t in her ward. Ryan tracked her down in the children’s ward.
‘Why aren’t you in bed?’ Ryan glowered from the doorway and then relented enough to smile at the little girl in the bed. ‘Hi, Leith. Still feeling better?’
Leith Kinley managed a wan smile. She was a regular here. A chronic asthmatic, she’d been admitted into hospital more times than Abbey could remember, and each time her attacks seemed to worsen.
At the other end of the hospital, Abbey had slept though Leith’s admission last night, but the nurses had told her this morning that Ryan had had a hard time getting her stabilised.
Ryan had been up all night. Abbey wouldn’t have thought it to look at him now. He seemed bright and alert and raring to go.
‘Hey, Leith, I’ve brought another doctor for you to meet.’
Ryan gave Abbey a smile but he spoke directly to the little girl in the bed. Leith Kinley was terrified of her asthma attacks and, as Abbey watched the way Ryan treated her, she knew Ryan was aware of the child’s terror. ‘Leith, this is Dr Steve Pryor. Dr Pryor, this is Miss Leith Kinley and the lady beside her is an escapee from another ward, Dr Abbey Wittner.’
To Abbey’s astonishment and pleasure, Steve Pryor leaned over and solemnly shook Leith’s hand first
Amazing! A locum who treated patients-even child patients-as humans. And greeted them on a needs basis.
Where on earth had Ryan found someone like Steve? ‘Are you ready to go, Abbey?’ Ryan’s dangerous smile twinkled out ‘Or do I have to carry out my threat?’
‘Despite your threats, I’m going nowhere in a hospital gown,’ Abbey said with dignity, and Ryan nodded.
‘Of course not. There’s a dress on your bed. I chose it myself.’
‘You chose a dress…’
‘I mean, from your wardrobe,’ he said sanguinely. ‘Janet was busy supervising milking when I dropped in. You could go and put it on,’ he added politely.
Then Ryan turned back to Leith. Ignoring everyone else, he stooped and took Leith’s two little hands between his bigger ones while Abbey watched, still hornswoggled.
‘Leith, I know last night’s asthma attack scared you. It scared all of us. This morning I’ve been doing some hard thinking about how we can improve matters, and I’ve been talking to your mum and dad.’
This morning. Abbey glanced disbelievingly at her watch. Ryan had been up all night with an asthmatic child. He’d been out to the farm to find her a dress. Then he’d talked to an ill child’s parents and finally found time to meet a new doctor. All this by nine o’clock. Also she’d heard Ryan doing a ward round at about seven.
‘Your mum and dad agree that we need to do something more than just give you medicine,’ Ryan was saying. ‘Leith, we need to improve your lung capacity. Make your lungs bigger, if you like, so you can get more air.’
Leith frowned. ‘How do I do that?’ she whispered. ‘Swimming,’ Ryan said promptly. ‘And, if you agree, your first swimming lesson is this morning. I’m taking Dr Wittner to the beach and, if you like, you can come too. You can have a gentle swim with me showing you what to do to build your lungs, and then I’ll bring you back here.’
‘I can’t go home?’
‘I’ll bring you back to the hospital for lunch and a really good sleep. Then, if your breathing is OK, your mum and dad will take you home tonight. And we’ve agreed that your mum and dad will take you swimming every day for a month. After a month we’ll think about whether it’s doing you good or not.’
Abbey stared. She’d suggested this. First rule for asthmatics was to attempt to increase lung capacity. But Leith had been reluctant to try swimming lessons and Leith’s parents had always been adamant that they hadn’t time.
Something had changed.
Ryan had said Leith’s parents had agreed.
He’d bulldozed them, Abbey decided. He’d bulldozed them in the same way he bulldozed everyone else. He got his own way just by going in with force.
Well, it had worked. And something else had changed. Leith’s reluctance. Leith was looking up at Ryan with a tremulous smile. ‘I can go swimming with you now?’
‘With me and with Dr Wittner. And maybe with Dr Winner’s baby, Jack, and Jack’s grandma. Is that OK?’ Ryan turned to Abbey and pointed to his watch. ‘What are you hanging around here for, Dr Wittner? Be ready in five minutes or face the consequences.’
Ryan’s honeymoon retreat was the kind of paradise Abbey had never dreamed of.
The sign at the end of the beach road simply said ‘Bliss’, the word painted with small black lettering on a cream sign and discreetly tucked in between the coconut palms. Abbey had heard of this place, but had never been here. Few locals had, and for one good reason.
They couldn’t afford it.
From the time Ryan nosed his car into the wide, white sweep of the entrance the place screamed money at its most tasteful.
Reception was vast-a cavern of pale grey marble with great wooden ceiling fans, stirring the warm air straight from the sea, and huge cane chairs and settees with cushions that just begged to be sat on. The whole of Reception was open to the sea breeze, like a vast canopy. On one side was the white sandy road leading into the place. Once up the gracious, curving steps-assisted by doormen who knew just the right welcoming touch-all you could see was the sea.
Sapphire Cove was lovely, and ‘Bliss’ showed it off at its loveliest.
Abbey refused point blank to use the wheelchair Ryan produced. She hopped up the steps on crutches and gazed in awe out to sea as Ryan booked in. Even Reception wasn’t your standard hotel counter. A sleek and beaming lady, immaculately groomed and wonderfully welcoming, tactfully led Ryan to a small cane desk while Abbey and Leith gazed around in awe.
‘You wait until I tell my sister I’ve been here,’ Leith breathed. ‘One of the kids at school said his brother tried to come here and got kicked out. Oh, Doc Wittner, do you think Dr Henry can afford it?’
‘He must be able to,’ Abbey said doubtfully. ‘I wonder where Janet-’
‘They’re waiting for us in our villa,’ Ryan said, appearing at their elbow like a benevolent genie. He looked down at Abbey’s tight face in concern. ‘Are you tired? Would you like me to carry you?’
‘No. Ryan, we can’t… I can’t…’ Abbey gazed around in consternation. ‘Ryan, this place will cost you a mint. I can’t possibly pay you back for this.’
‘Maybe you already have,’ Ryan said gently, and he cupped her chin in his hand and tilted her face, forcing her eyes up to meet his.
‘Abbey, we both practise medicine. You choose to practise here for peanuts, and because of you people like me are free to practise elsewhere for sums of money that would probably seem to you to be obscene. Quite simply, that’s what I earn, Abbey. It isn’t fair but that’s the way it is. As a doctor, you’ve cared for my father for the past four years, and I’m grateful. You work a damned sight harder than I do for a lot less. So shut up now and let me balance the books a little.’
And, without waiting for another protest, he simply swung her up in his arms and headed down the path towards the sea. ‘Come on, then, young Leith. Let’s see if we can hang ten before lunch.’
They didn’t hang ten. Hanging toes over the end of a surfboard here would have meant an immediate bellyflop into the water. Sheltered from open ocean by the Great Barrier Reef, the surf at Sapphire Cove was non- existent.
The water was as calm as a mill pond, but it was far more lovely than any mill pond could ever be. Sparkling blue and stretching on for ever…
The farmer who’d done the milking for Janet had, at Ryan’s request, brought Janet and Jack here straight afterwards. Janet met Abbey with a look of wonder. Abbey’s mother-in-law was so stunned that she was almost ready to enjoy herself. To Abbey’s astonishment, she donned a pair of faded black bathers and was the first to hit the water, whooping with a delight Abbey had never heard from her.
‘Ryan says I’m to enjoy myself or he’ll take you home,’ she told Abbey. She grinned. ‘And he says if you go home you’re headed for a breakdown. So, with a threat like that hanging over my head, what’s a woman to do?’ She abandoned her walking stick at the water’s edge, forgot her arthritic hip and prepared to follow orders to the letter.
