Brought Together by Baby

As Frazer, Rick, Robert and their entourage rushed down the corridor to the lifts, Gus offered up a plea for the baby’s survival. Moved by the tragedy, he thrust his hands into the pockets of his scrub trousers and paced the small office, too on edge to wait patiently. He was on the point of returning to Reception to question Kathleen when his boss returned.

An inexplicable shiver of dread rippled through him at the uncharacteristically bleak expression in Robert’s eyes as he entered the room and closed the door behind him.

‘Sit, please,’ he invited.

Gus did as he was asked, but instead of moving round the desk to take his own chair Robert stood beside him, once more resting a hand on his shoulder. Rather than reassuring him, the gesture increased Gus’s unease. A dark premonition chilled his blood.

‘What is it, Robert? Have I done something wrong?’ he asked, unable to bear the electric silence another moment.

‘No. No, of course not,’ his boss responded, sounding weary and resigned. ‘Gus, there’s something I must tell you …’

Holly Tait finished the scheduled observations and wrote the information on her six-year-old patient’s chart. The little girl had returned from Theatre less than twenty-four hours ago following an operation to remove her infected appendix. Understandably, she was still very sore. Holly checked the chart to see when the next medications were due, her disobedient gaze straying to the signature of the A&E doctor responsible for the girl’s admission.

Gus Buchanan. Pain lanced through her, but Holly knew that hers, unlike her patient’s, was a pain no medicine could cure. She’d transferred from the A&E department to the Children’s Ward in January, hoping that removing herself from Gus’s presence would be the first step in the healing process. It hadn’t worked. Now it was June, and she still couldn’t get him, what he’d done, or the barrage of conflicting emotions out of her mind. Even reading his name or seeing his handwriting twisted the knife that pierced her heart. And it hurt as much as ever.

Sensing she was being watched, Holly looked up and saw Sister Erica Sharpe’s formidable form standing in the ward’s office doorway. Erica beckoned her and Holly nodded her understanding. She hung the chart on the bed and ensured her young charge was comfortable before walking towards the office, wondering if they had a new admission to contend with. It had been a busy day, with several new patients coming in, and they had little space left for any more beds.

As Holly approached Erica remained in the doorway, hands planted on ample hips. She could be anywhere between fifty and seventy years of age—no one knew, and asking was out of the question. Erica had been part of the hospital since its transformation from a small cottage hospital to the well-equipped regional infirmary it had become, growing over the years in proportion with the way Strathlochan itself had expanded.

Erica had a fearsome reputation—Sharpe by name and, on occasion, sharp by nature—and even the most senior consultants had been known to quiver in their boots when on the receiving end of her displeasure. Student nurses approached her ward with awe and trepidation. Holly smiled, remembering her own scary first meeting with Erica. Several years on and she had huge respect for the woman who gave everything for her patients and under whose impressive bosom beat a heart of gold.

‘Come in, Holly,’ she invited, her sombre expression and the look in her eyes making Holly feel uneasy.

Inside the office Holly faltered, surprised to see Gina Adriani, one of her closest friends, sitting there. A fellow staff nurse, Gina had worked with her in A&E before leaving the previous summer to take up a position at Strathlochan’s new multi-purpose drop-in centre. Just married and blissfully happy, today Gina looked uncharacteristically pensive and pale.

‘Hello! What are you doing here? Have you come to do some real work?’ Holly joked, trying to shake off a sudden sense of foreboding.

‘No, not that.’

Gina didn’t return her smile and Holly’s apprehension increased. ‘What is it?’

‘Sit down, my dear,’ Erica advised, nudging a free chair closer to Gina’s.

‘What’s going on?’ Holly asked again, glad for the seat as her legs now felt too wobbly to hold her.

Erica never called anyone ‘my dear’ unless there was bad news. Holly’s imagination ran wild and fear took hold. Had something happened to Seb, Gina’s husband? Or to their mutual friends Rico and Ruth?

Before she could voice her anxiety Gina took her hand. ‘I wish there was some better way to tell you.’

‘Tell me what?’ Holly’s chest tightened as alarm increased. ‘Gina?’

Her friend sucked in a breath. ‘There’s been a terrible road accident. Holly, it’s Julia. She’s been fatally injured.’

Holly reeled, suddenly feeling as if she was dreaming. She groped for words, which at first would not come.

‘Wh-What about the baby?’ She somehow forced the question past the fear and shock that clogged her throat. ‘It’s not due until next month.’

‘Julia was brought in by air ambulance and is in Theatre now. A specialist team is doing everything possible to save the baby,’ Gina explained, but the words failed to quell the terror building within.

‘Oh, my God.’

Holly sagged in the chair, her fingers tightening reflexively on Gina’s as Erica rested an arm around her shoulders. Both women were talking, but Holly didn’t hear a word: her heart was racing, every manic beat reverberating in her ears. As the horrific news sank in a range of mixed emotions and unanswered questions chased themselves through her head, and a cry of distress welled within her as she zeroed in on one thing.

One person.

Whatever else had happened, however much he’d hurt her, and however badly things had gone wrong, there was only one person she could think of now and only one place she needed to be.

‘Gus,’ she whispered, her voice raw with the pain searing through her. ‘I have to go to him.’

CHAPTER TWO

HOLLY didn’t care whether hospital rules discouraged running in the corridors. The only thought pounding in her mind as she raced out of the Children’s Ward was to reach Gus as soon as possible.

‘I don’t know how the accident happened,’ Gina said, keeping pace beside her. ‘We had a phone call asking us to come in and give what support we could. I came to you … Seb went to find Gus.’

‘Thank you.’

However conflicted her feelings, however strong the sense of betrayal, and however angry, hurt and upset she was with him, she couldn’t bear the thought of Gus’s grief. It was a relief to know Seb was with him. On the darkest and worst of days, when part of her had wanted to lash out at Gus, to hurt him as much as he’d hurt her, she would never have wished something this awful to happen.

Rather than wait for the lift Holly pushed open the door to the staff stairway, footsteps echoing as they hurried down two flights to the floor below. As they emerged into the wide corridor and approached the double doors of the operating suite their pace slowed and Gina rested a hand at the small of her back.

‘Holly, I’m worried about you.’

‘Worry about Gus and the baby,’ she requested, her voice shaky. ‘Not me.’

‘I know how you feel, hon, but …’

As the anxious words trailed off Holly acknowledged that, although her best friend had some understanding of the situation, no one—not even Gina—knew the true extent of her feelings, because she’d worked so hard for so many months to hide them. She had presented an outward image of calm serenity to the world … one that belied the terrible pain, loss and the sense of betrayal that ripped her to shreds.

Before Gina could utter another word Holly opened the door and headed towards the waiting area. There were several people inside—Seb, a theatre representative, Frazer and Rick from the air ambulance, a policeman … and Gus. It was to the latter that her gaze was instinctively drawn.

Dressed in A&E scrubs, he stood apart from the others and a little ache settled inside her at how symbolic that was, how characteristic of the man she had come to know. A man who had been so alone and who found it so hard to let anyone get close to him. She’d breached that reserve and for a brief while had found the man within. And had fallen in love with him. Before everything had gone so spectacularly wrong.

She hadn’t set eyes on Gus for weeks: a deliberate ploy but an unsuccessful one, because she hadn’t stopped thinking about him for a moment. Anger and humiliation churned inside her, as did the fire of resentment and jealousy, and the hurt that never went away. She’d tried to convince herself she hated him—she certainly hated what he’d done—but she despaired of the part of herself that missed him and cared about him. Now, like someone parched with thirst stumbling on a fresh oasis, she greedily drank in the sight of him.

An inch or two under six feet, he wasn’t the tallest man in the room, but to her he was the most impressive, the one who immediately held her attention. Even in the unflattering scrubs he looked heart-stoppingly handsome and intensely masculine. His thick dark brown hair was mussed—a result, she knew, of his characteristic habit of running a hand through it when he was stressed—and the way a few defiant strands flopped rakishly across his forehead was so familiar and endearing it brought a sting to her heart.

Her first instinct was to rush to him and hug him, needing both to comfort and be comforted, but as if he sensed her presence he turned to look at her. One glimpse at the stony mask on his unusually pale face and the distant expression in his smoky green eyes halted her in her tracks. Instinctively she shrank back.

That he was ravaged by shock was evident. But his pain also pained her, because it drove home again the way he’d publicly rejected her and chosen Julia … and how the two people she should have been able to trust most had hurt and betrayed her, leaving her the broken-hearted object of hospital gossip. Withdrawing into herself, she had wrestled with the stark contradiction and confusion. She remained filled with pain and bitter regret, yet a part of her couldn’t stop caring about him.

Instinctively she clung to Gina’s hand, allowing her friend to guide her to some nearby chairs to sit down. The tension in the room was palpable, and Holly tried to put her own feelings aside and assess what was happening. Frazer and Rick were in conversation with the policeman, giving their accounts, she assumed, of events at the scene of the accident. As for Gus, he was now talking with the woman from the operating room, and as Holly listened it became clear that his request to access Theatre had been refused. Moved to protest on his behalf, Holly stood up again, her legs trembling as she took a step forward to voice her own opinion.

‘Surely Gus has a right to be in there?’ she argued, all too conscious that the man in question was looking at her once more.

Gus stared at Holly in surprise. He hadn’t expected such staunch support from her, but here she was, planting herself firmly in his corner, and there was no doubt her indignation was genuine.

‘This is a difficult situation for both of you,’ the theatre administrator responded, calm and yet firm, looking from Holly to Gus. ‘But I’d ask for your patience. The specialist team are doing all they can to ensure the baby’s survival. As soon as they are free to talk to you, one of the consultants will give you all the information you need.’