A Mother For His Child Read online

  She was dead wrong, and his visceral awareness of the fact had tortured him persistently for a long time. For a start, she had the best back view he’d ever seen on a woman. Neat, square shoulders, perfect shoulder blades, glossy dark hair that bounced when she walked…and, oh, that walk…oh, that very female and very sinuously curved behind!

  They sat down, and the walk and the behind and the creamy scoop of skin above the low, curved back of her close-fitting black top were all lost to sight. They were facing each other now, only she had her head tipped forward and, distracted from her equally magnificent front view, he suddenly saw that her eyes were swimming with tears. Had she been crying the whole time he’d been ogling her?

  It didn’t matter. She was crying now. She stopped trying to hide the fact after just a few seconds, picked up the peach-coloured cloth napkin and shook out its overly elaborate folds with clumsy impatience. Her strong jaw jutted.

  ‘I hope this mascara’s waterproof,’ she muttered.

  ‘You OK?’

  He would have reached out to cover her hand with his, but was saved from enacting what she would undoubtedly have considered a slimy gesture by the fact that she was using both hands to dab the napkin against her eyes.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she gasped.

  ‘Good gosh, don’t apologise!’

  ‘I came here with Mark once. They put us at this same table.’

  Oh, lord, of course! It was Mark!

  ‘I was saddened to hear of his death, Maggie,’ he told her at once, his voice dropping. ‘I know Alison wrote to you. We would have come for the funeral, only she was so close to her due date, it wasn’t safe for her to travel so far.’

  She nodded. ‘I knew that, Will. I’m fine. Just let me…’ She waved a hand vaguely, then rested it on the table as she gathered herself together. ‘He was ill for quite a while, and we both had a chance to get used to it. We laid up some good memories. Like fine wine, he said. He was a lot older than me—twenty-five years—so we always…took it in our stride…that I’d be the one left.’

  ‘But not so soon?’ Will suggested gently.

  ‘Not so soon,’ she agreed, looking up at last. Her eyes were pink-rimmed, but her mouth was steady again. Smooth and full-lipped, and no longer pinched. ‘We had a good marriage. Short, but good. He always said it would lay a good foundation for whatever came after, and so far that’s held true. I’m pretty content most of the time.’

  He noticed she didn’t say ‘happy’. Then noticed that his hand was right where he’d resolved not to place it—on top of hers, stroking it gently with his fingertips.

  She noticed it, too. Laughed. Apologised. Pulled it away. She looked…angry. She was good at that. A pair of dark, delicately arched brows descended until they formed a straight line. Her full lips tucked in at the corners. Her blue eyes clouded, and her strong jaw jutted again. He’d seen it all before, many times.

  How come he never knew how to handle it? Never! Where was the easy, confident instinct he usually had with people? Why did he always burn to prove something to her? Normally, he didn’t consider his ego to be that fragile.

  A tiny espresso cup filled with a creamy, pale green liquid arrived. Fennel bisque, the waiter told them—their complimentary appetiser. They hadn’t even ordered their meal yet, but it seemed that the tone of the evening was already set. Will grated a rough sigh between his teeth and saw a long, difficult two hours stretching ahead.

  I’ll bide my time on this, he decided. I won’t cut to the chase right away, and tell her what I’m here for. We’ll just talk. Surely we can manage that!

  From the pocket of her black linen trousers, Maggie felt her pager begin to vibrate against her thigh. She welcomed the interruption, and didn’t quite manage to hide the fact as she pulled the little instrument into view.

  ‘I’m on call,’ she said, her tone dropping into something that could only be described as officious. ‘I must call my service and deal with this. It could be important.’

  ‘Yeah, really?’ Will drawled at her across the table. He leaned back and twisted slightly in his chair, to rest one elbow on the seat-back. ‘Important? And you a doctor? I had no idea…’

  She flushed and apologised. Again.

  Felt like a fool as she managed to extricate herself from the table legs and went in search of a private spot where she could return the call. She’d condescended to him in a way that was ridiculous, considering the fact that he was a doctor himself. No wonder he’d called her on it, with that liquid, mocking tone and those raised brows.

  They’d always, always dealt with each other like this. Never cutting each other any slack. Never giving an inch. Surely that should have changed after such a long interval? It was infuriating.

  Sheltering in a little alcove beside a delicate still-life painting, she took out her cellphone and keyed in the number her answering service gave her. It was the father of the ten-month-old this time.

  ‘We’ve given her the medication,’ he said. ‘But her temperature’s still pretty high. She’s so dry and flushed.’

  Again, Maggie asked some questions, elicited a description of the baby’s symptoms and wasn’t overly concerned. ‘Make sure she gets plenty of fluids,’ she said. ‘And don’t overdress her. Use a damp, tepid cloth to cool her head and her limbs.’

  Many of her phone consults were like this, routine and quick to deal with, snatched moments that punctuated her personal time. She was back opposite Will at the table sooner than she’d have liked. Why hadn’t she taken some time to gather herself together? She might have drawn some tranquillity from that lovely little oil painting of fruit. Too late now…

  They ordered, ate, drank. The meal was delicious and beautifully presented, the setting was gorgeous and their waiter attentive. Respecting her on-call status, she refused more than a half-glass of wine, but the evening itself was intoxicating enough. Will had never shown any doubt about how to keep a woman entertained.

  Distantly, Maggie watched their conversation unfold as blue darkness spread over the mirror-still lake. It wasn’t going so badly now. It was nice. She forgot his promise to ‘explain’ about his lateness, the significant way he’d said, ‘We’ll talk.’ She stopped watching for chinks in his armour, opportunities to catch him out.

  She decided that people did change and grow and mature after all. At last. With hard work. She wasn’t quite the same belligerent, awkward young woman she’d been ten or fifteen years ago, thank goodness. She didn’t have to curl herself into a ball like a porcupine, showing only her spines. She could handle Will Braggett now.

  ‘But you haven’t noticed that that’s exactly opposite to the statement you made five minutes ago!’ she said triumphantly to him, to cap what she considered to be a lively and satisfying exchange.

  He smiled in a lazy way. ‘Know what, Maggie?’ he said. ‘I think you’re even more terrifying than you used to be.’

  ‘Terrifying…’

  ‘Do you ever give a man a break?’ He was still smiling, his eyes liquid and dark. He might have been flirting if he’d been with any other companion. But he wasn’t flirting with her, she was sure of that. ‘No, of course not!’ he answered himself. ‘Maggie Lawless, relentless defender of her own principles.’

  Ouch! The sharp prick of a shattered illusion.

  It was a dismissal far more than a compliment, and she recognised the fact at once. He didn’t deliver the line with a sneer, because charming Will Braggett never sneered. That sexy, kissable mouth wouldn’t have known how. But still his words had the power to make her falter in her tracks and turn right back into that prickly, belligerent porcupine after all.

  ‘Take it as an attack if you like,’ she said crisply. ‘You’re the one who seems to feel you were vulnerable.’

  He shrugged, as if it was far too wearying, and too far beneath his dignity, to cross swords with an intelligent female. His face closed and he covered his mouth for a moment. Was that a stifled yawn?

  ‘Why did you b
other to do this?’ she blurted out, stung by the idea that, beneath his charming façade, he might…actually be bored by her? His problem!

  ‘You could easily have gotten away with coffee, or nothing at all,’ she went on. ‘Instead of this ridiculous meal. I haven’t been in touch with Alison. I didn’t know you were going to be in the area, and even if I had…For heaven’s sake, Will, we’ve never been able to stand each other. Was this an ego thing for you? The one woman you’d never been able to wrap around your little finger, and you couldn’t resist trying one last blast of charm? Get it straight, Will. You don’t impress me. You never have, and one expensive meal isn’t going to change that.’

  She almost stood up and stormed out, then and there. Actually got as far as pressing both hands to the table to propel herself to her feet. At first Will looked shocked at the blunt barrage of her words. This was somehow satisfying to Maggie, but then the shock drained away to leave a grey, tired bleakness she’d never seen in his face before and…

  She dropped back into her seat, falling hard. Not only had she never seen the bleakness, she’d never even considered that he had the depth of character to feel something like that. The gods had smiled upon him since birth, hadn’t they? His parents were successful and well-to-do. He’d topped his classes without visible effort. His divorce from Alison—who was as attractive, bright and successful as he was himself—was surely the only glitch in the glittering, perfect mechanism of his life.

  Poor man, she might easily have drawled, how tragic it must be to have to live such a Camelot-like existence!

  Only this wasn’t the face of a man who’d lived all his life in Camelot.

  ‘Is that really true, Maggie?’ he said, his voice low. ‘Was it as strong as that? You couldn’t stand me? That night at Gerry Berkov’s party when we sat out by the pool and talked, I thought…that we respected each other, at least. You used to get on my case about not treating Alison the way she deserved—about being late to pick her up, forgetting her birthday and not calling her when I said I would—and you were right about that. I was a jerk about things like that when I was twenty.’

  ‘Yes, you were,’ she agreed, masking her dismay with a confident nod.

  ‘And if that’s the sum total of what you feel for me then, yes, tonight has been a complete waste of my time as well as yours. That wasn’t intended as an attack just now. I was teasing you. And I guess I was trading on the fact that there was a little bit more between us than a shallow, trivial sort of dislike. I’ve always respected you. I thought that maybe two worthy and well-matched adversaries could make peace after all this time.’

  ‘Trading on?’ She picked up on the phrase straight away. Ignored that other very interesting phrase, ‘worthy and well-matched adversaries’. ‘What do you want from me, Will? Of course, I should have realised. You said we’d “talk” over dinner. You want something. A favour. But what is it?’

  Her pager vibrated again. With a sound of impatience she pulled it from her pocket, set it on the table and ignored it. A few minutes wouldn’t hurt. She was a family physician, not a microsurgeon or a trauma-team doctor. Real emergencies went right to the hospital in an ambulance. They didn’t call her. She wanted answers from Will before she followed up on her patient.

  But he wasn’t buying that. Watched her hand as she pushed the pager aside while her eyes were still fixed on him. There was a little twist to his lips.

  ‘Aren’t you going to call your service?’ he drawled. ‘Don’t you have to deal with that? Couldn’t it be important?’

  She recognised how exactly his questions parroted her own self-important phrasing to him earlier and saw the smile on his face. A wicked, tempting smile now. Teasing her again? It softened those dark eyes still further. It invited much more than a mere smile in reply. It was seductive, damn it, even when he wasn’t trying! She burned yet again.

  It would have been so refreshing if time had taught her how to act rationally with this man!

  ‘OK. I’ll deal with it,’ she said. ‘And then I want some straight talking from you, Will.’

  ‘You’ll get it,’ he promised. A habitual confidence rang in his tone. It was clear that, whatever he wanted from her, he hadn’t come crawling.

  Once more, she sought the quiet alcove beside the still-life painting to make her call, but this time the outcome wasn’t as simple. It was another case of fever in a child, a fourteen-year-old.

  ‘I’m worried about him, Dr Lawless,’ Kathy Sullivan said. ‘He’s vomited twice, and he feels so hot. He says his joints hurt, and so does his neck.’

  ‘Does he have a rash?’

  ‘I haven’t noticed one. But I’ve kept him in the dark because the light is bothering him, so maybe there is something.’

  ‘Could you check for me, Kathy?’

  ‘Surely, if you’ll wait.’

  ‘I’ll be here.’

  Maggie heard the clatter of the phone and Kathy’s slow, heavy footsteps. She came back a minute or two later. ‘There is a little bit of something on his chest,’ she said. ‘Looks like poison ivy. He was clearing the yard for me yesterday.’

  ‘I’m going to come over and take a look at him. Has he been away on camp or anything?’

  ‘No, not yet. That’s right at the end of summer this year. What is it you’re thinking, Dr Lawless?’

  Meningitis. She didn’t want to say it. Neither did she want to wait. The symptoms were ambiguous, and the disease was most common in children under the age of five, but it was frequently fatal if treatment was delayed.

  ‘Let’s wait until I take a look at him, OK?’ she told Kathy, then put down the phone and hurried back to the table. ‘I need to leave,’ she told Will. ‘I shouldn’t be long, but it can’t wait.’

  ‘Let me come along,’ he suggested at once, already on his feet. ‘I’ll tell the waiter we’ll be back for coffee and dessert. They know I’m staying at the hotel.’

  ‘There’s no need—’

  ‘There is. I want to.’

  He strode off and found their waiter. She didn’t linger, but he caught up to her quickly. It was a warm summer evening, and neither of them needed jackets. In fact, Will had taken off the jacket of his suit and it hung from one finger.

  ‘What’s the problem? What kinds of things do you usually get called out for?’ he asked.

  She sighed. Why did he want this detail? OK, she’d give it to him.

  ‘It varies,’ she answered. ‘Depends on the patient’s circumstances. In a case like this, I’d normally tell the child’s parents to drive him straight to the hospital emergency room, then I’d call the ER to let them know he was coming, but this is a single mother. She’s not well, she doesn’t have much money, she has very basic health insurance cover—no ambulance—and she doesn’t drive. Her brother comes up from Albany every weekend to help her with shopping and stuff. I like her, and—’

  ‘Do you have many patients in that sort of situation in your practice?’

  ‘Some. This little family is one of the best. My heart goes out to the mother and her son every time I see them. They only live a few minutes’ drive from here. Tonight I want to save them an ambulance trip to Wayans Falls if it’s not necessary, and I want to start giving Matthew treatment while we wait for the ambulance to get here if it is.’

  ‘What are you thinking?’

  ‘Some form of meningitis, but it could just be flu and poison ivy. Why are you asking all these questions, Will?’

  She risked a glance at him, and wished she hadn’t. He was frowning, and his mouth was straight and closed. She could have touched him if she’d reached out her hand, asked him with soft concern to tell her what was on his mind…

  ‘Because I’m interested in joining your practice, if you’ll have me,’ he answered calmly.

  It almost knocked the ground out from under her feet.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘BUT you’re an orthopaedic surgeon,’ Maggie told Will blankly. He matched her pace easily as she hurr
ied towards the car. It was parked in the guest parking lot, a minute’s walk from the main entrance.

  ‘Not quite,’ he answered. ‘I changed direction several years ago, before I finished my residency. Switched to family practice instead.’

  ‘Alison never wrote me that. I’d have remembered because…’ She stopped. Because it seemed so unlikely. Family practice wasn’t a prestige medical speciality. He and Alison had both been concerned with prestige.

  She glanced across at him, but it was quite dark now. The long fingers of blue and gold light dancing on the black lake water didn’t make much difference to the thickness of the night here in the shadow of the sprawling hotel, and she couldn’t see his face.

  ‘Alison wasn’t thrilled,’ Will answered carefully. ‘She tended not to advertise the switch.’

  His tone was neutral, but Maggie was left wondering if their divorce had been as amicable as Alison’s smoothly worded card last Christmas had suggested.

  ‘Why?’ she asked.

  ‘I told you, she wasn’t happy about it.’

  ‘No, why did you switch, I mean? It’s…um…not a very common path.’

  He laughed. Oh, she wished she could see his face! What were those wicked dark eyes doing? Glimmering or sparking?

  ‘You mean it’s a very definite drop in status?’ he said.

  ‘That, yes.’ Why deny it? He wouldn’t expect her to. ‘You always cared about status.’

  ‘I thought I did. Shall I say something saccharine? Say that I came to realise I cared much more about people instead? Something like that?’

  ‘Spare me!’ she drawled.

  ‘OK.’

  ‘No, say it,’ she revised. ‘Was that the reason?’

  ‘No, it was the hours that did it. I wanted a life. None of the orthos I knew actually had one.’

  ‘I’m sure many orthopaedic surgeons do,’ she offered primly. ‘It’s a matter of choosing your priorities. And for some, in any case, it’s a question of vocation and they just couldn’t be happy doing anything else.’

  ‘Maybe.’ Will shrugged.