An Unexpected Proposal

Both George and Andrew would be retiring in the next five years so it was important to put strategies in place for that eventuality. Thomas had been an excellent start. The practice was building back up again and Madeline hoped that it would be thriving when George and Andrew hung up their stethoscopes.

‘Quiet day?’ Madeline asked.

‘Forget that!’ said Veronica, her blue eyes sparkling merrily, ‘tell me all the gossip. I want to know everything!’

‘I went to an international general practitioners’ symposium, Veronica. No gossip to tell.’

Veronica rolled her eyes. ‘In London, Madeline, London! Don’t tell me you didn’t take my advice?’

Madeline smiled. ‘About the rebound sex?’

Veronica nodded her head vigorously. ‘Those English lads love Aussie girls.’

‘Ah, it’s not really me, Veronica.’

‘Well, of course it’s not,’ she said exasperatedly. ‘That’s the point. Simon dumps you just before a six-week overseas working holiday. It’s perfect for rebound sex. Anonymity. Perfect.’

Madeline smiled at Veronica’s grab-life-by-the-balls attitude and envied the younger woman. She herself was more tiptoe through life cautiously. One-night stands, rebound sex…she’d been with one guy for ten years. And, besides, their split was just temporary.

‘I didn’t really fancy anyone,’ she said lamely as Veronica continued to look at her expectantly. Now, if Marcus Hunt had been there…

‘Madeline,’ Veronica sighed.

‘Hey, no one offered either,’ she said defensively.

‘I don’t reckon that helped,’ said Veronica, tapping Madeline’s ring with the end of her pen.

Madeline looked down at the two-carat diamond. It had been part of her hand for four years, and even if it was really over between them, she wasn’t ready to take it off yet. And truth was, it did keep men away. If she counted Simon, that was four people she’d loved and lost, and she wasn’t sure she would be capable of ever loving again. She felt emotionally frigid. Her heart buried in a block of ice.

She glanced at her watch. It was five. ‘Why don’t you go home? It’s time. I’m going to do a bit of catching up, I’ll lock up on my way out.’

‘OK, I get it, I get it. Mind my own business,’ Veronica grumbled good-naturedly as she gathered her stuff. She gave Madeline a quick peck on the cheek and left.

Alone, Madeline walked around the surgery, absently re-familiarising herself with the tastefully decorated waiting area. She checked the appointment book and whistled out loud, recognising quite a few of her regulars. It was going to be a busy Tuesday! Her colleagues had insisted she didn’t start work again until then, to fully recover from her jet lag.

Madeline felt the odd restlessness again and found it difficult to concentrate on the book. She yawned—she was tired but it was still too early for bed. She wandered into her office and sat in her chair. She picked up the various drug company ‘toys’ she kept on her desk to amuse children and opened her drawers, checking she had plenty of prescription pads and stationery.

The checks done, she sat back in her ergonomically designed black leather swivel chair and her tired mind drifted to Marcus Hunt. She saw the flecks of paint in his hair and heard his wicked laugh, and her nipples hardened at the image of his sheer masculine beauty. She’d never met a man who’d had such an instantaneous effect on her. Marcus Hunt was potent. Marcus Hunt was lethal.

Madeline’s gaze fell on the framed photo of Simon. Something else she hadn’t been able to bring herself to dispose of just yet. She remembered Veronica’s pursed disapproving lips. It was all right for her. She’d spent her teens and twenties having a good time, experimenting with men and life, secure in the arms of a loving family. Madeline had spent them reeling from one tragedy to another while trying to study hard and be there for Abby, too. Simon had stuck by her side through all of it.

She traced her fingers over his face. So he wasn’t skater boy but he had a nice smile and despite everything she still loved him. They’d been together for ever—since they’d been twenty. You couldn’t just wipe that love out overnight. And she’d be damned if she’d let some inexplicable attraction to a bit of rough derail her conviction that the split with Simon was just temporary.

She heard the bell ding over the door and was pleased at the distraction. She thought it would probably be George back from his house call so she was surprised to see young Brett Sanders looking as white as a ghost, supporting his very grey, very sweaty mother.

Madeline hurried over. ‘Mrs Sanders, what’s wrong?’ she demanded, quickly assessing the woman’s cool, clammy skin, breathlessness and racing pulse.

‘It’s her indigestion,’ said Brett. ‘I wanted to take her to the hospital but she said she was fine and that you were closer. But she got worse in the car…’ He trailed off, his voice cracking with fear and unshed tears.

‘It’s OK,’ Madeline soothed, sitting Mrs Sanders down next to the emergency trolley near the front desk. It was basic, holding just oxygen, an ambubag, some adrenaline mini-jets and a portable defib unit. She quickly assembled a face mask and placed it on her patient’s face, cranking up the oxygen. She hoped it wasn’t too little too late. Mrs Sanders was in a lot of pain and it was extending down her left arm.

‘Brett, go and ring the ambulance on the phone at the desk. Triple zero.’

Even at seventeen, people in a panic could forget the number that had been drummed into them since they could talk. And Brett Sanders was about as panicked as she’d ever seen anyone.

‘Tell them that your mum is having a heart attack. OK, Brett? Do you understand?’

He looked at Madeline, alarmed, and she thought he was about to cry. ‘Brett.’ Madeline shook him. ‘I can’t leave your mother. You must do it now.

You’ve done so well. I need you to do this.’ Her voice was calm but firm.

He got up and made the call, while Madeline took Mrs Sanders’s blood pressure. Suddenly, the woman let out a pained moan, clutched at her chest and lost consciousness. Madeline knew immediately without having to feel for a carotid pulse that the woman was in cardiac arrest. With Brett’s help she dragged the obese Mrs Sanders onto the floor, rolled her on her side and cleared her airway.

‘Brett, run next door. There is a doctor there called Dr Hunt—get him. Go now, Brett—now.’ Madeline knew from experience that CPR was much easier with two people. She just hoped he’d be able to see past their earlier confrontation. The youth took one look at his mother and fled.

Madeline dragged the recently purchased semi-automatic external defibrillator off the trolley, switched it on and followed the electronic voice prompts. She ripped open Mrs Sanders’s blouse, buttons flying everywhere, cut open her bra with scissors from the trolley and slapped the two defib pads in the right positions on her chest.

While the machine analysed her patient’s heart rhythm, Madeline assembled the mask-bag apparatus and hooked it up to the oxygen to deliver mechanical breaths to Mrs Sanders as soon as the machine had analysed the heat rhythm.

‘Shock not recommended,’ the electronic voice announced. ‘Commence CPR.’

Madeline was in the middle of chest compressions when Marcus and Brett came through the door.

‘What happened?’ he demanded, shirt flapping wide.

‘Fourteen, fifteen,’ Madeline counted out loud with each downward compression of the sternum. She passed him the bag-mask and was grateful that he expertly took over the respirations, holding the mask and the patient’s jaw with the practised ease of an anaesthetist.

‘Myocardial infarction. She’s arrested. The ambulance is on its way.’

They worked together as a team. Marcus gave one breath to Madeline’s five compressions, stopping every two minutes for the defib to analyse the rhythm again.

‘Shock recommended,’ the voice said after nearly ten minutes.

Madeline almost cheered. They’d gone from an unshockable rhythm to one the defib deemed it could help. Had she moved from asystole into VF? Were they making real headway with their CPR?

Madeline checked they were well clear of Mrs Sanders’s body before she pushed the shock button.

‘Brett,’ she said, ‘why don’t you go and wait for the ambulance outside? They’ll be here soon.’ The poor kid had seen enough today and was barely holding it all together. He didn’t need to see how his mother’s body would jump as the current arced through her chest.

‘I don’t want to leave her.’ The boy’s voice cracked with emotion he was desperately trying to keep in check.

‘Brett,’ Marcus said calmly, ‘we have everything under control here.’ He gave a reassuring smile. ‘You can be a bigger help by greeting the ambulance and guiding them to us.’

Brett nodded miserably and left reluctantly.

‘Stand clear,’ said Madeline in a loud voice as they both backed away from the patient, making sure no part of them was touching Mrs Sanders in any way.

Madeline hit the green ‘deliver shock’ button and they both watched as the patient’s chest bucked with the electricity. The machine told them to wait as it reanalysed.

‘We need IV access,’ Madeline said, slightly puffed from the exertion of depressing the patient’s sternum. Her arms were beginning to ache.

‘Shock not recommended,’ the defib pronounced.

‘Intubation gear, too,’ said Marcus, as he resumed his position at Mrs Sanders’s head.

She admired his skill but found herself wishing he’d do up his buttons. ‘What? No eye of toad or wing of bat, Dr Hunt? No magic wand?’ she taunted unreasonably, going back to her compressions. It was bitchy and uncalled for, given his willingness to help after she had called him a quack, but puh-lease! How could she even be thinking about his barely dressed body at such a time?

‘Too late for that now, Maddy,’ he stated, his lips tightening. Her gibe might have been amusing at another time but he too was way more distracted than he should have been by how her skirt had ridden up, exposing a generous length of thigh, and the way the silk of her blouse pulled tautly, sliding seductively over her pert breasts with each downward compression. There was a time and a place and this was definitely not it!

Madeline heard the sirens wailing somewhere close by and breathed a sigh of relief. Locked in this battle with Marcus to save Mrs Sanders’s life seemed deeply intimate and she was pleased that other health-care professionals would soon join them and break the connection.

The two ambulance officers were there within the minute and Madeline explained what she knew and the four of them worked together. One of the ambulance team worked on intravenous access while Madeline and Marcus continued CPR. The other drew up first-line drugs.

‘We need to intubate,’ said Marcus when the machine recommended no shock again.

The officer handed him a laryngoscope and Marcus inserted the cold heavy metal into the patient’s mouth as he manoeuvred her head with his other hand. The light on the instrument shone down her throat and Marcus angled it around slightly until he could visualise the white vocal cords.

‘Size eight endotracheal tube, please.’

Marcus skilfully inserted the plastic airway into the trachea and removed the mask from the bag-mask apparatus, connecting the bag to the top of the tube and squeezing oxygenated air into the lungs. The paramedic tied the tube in place.

The machine reanalysed again and everyone moved back as it recommended a shock and Madeline pushed the green button. They moved back in and Marcus felt for a pulse.

‘Got one,’ he said.

There was no time for congratulations. ‘Let’s load her and go,’ said the paramedic who had established the intravenous access. They swapped the defibs for one of theirs, which had a full-screen cardiac monitor attached, and Madeline helped load their patient onto the trolley as Marcus continued to administer breaths.

Madeline noted the tachycardia, relieved that they had got Mrs Sanders back, but she was having runs of VT and Madeline knew that her condition was still critical and unstable. They had her ready for transport quickly and Madeline put her arm around Brett who was silent and pale, obviously shocked by everything that had just happened.

‘Come on, son,’ Marcus said gently, passing over the bag to the paramedic. ‘You can ride up front.’ Brett nodded absently, following his stretchered mother like a zombie.

‘I’d like to ride in the back with her—is that all right?’ Madeline asked the paramedics, who gave her a nod. If she arrested again, another pair of hands would be helpful.

‘I’ll follow in my car,’ said Marcus.

She turned to face him and took an abrupt step back, not realising how close behind her he was.

‘There’s no need,’ she said, trying not to sound ungrateful. After all, she couldn’t have done it without him. Now the immediate emergency was over, the ebb of the adrenaline that had surged through her system was making her nauseous. Combined with her jet lag, she was shaking badly.

He put his hands gently on her shoulders and frowned at their trembling. ‘Are you OK?’ he asked, applying slight pressure to her shoulders.

She looked into his face and then wished she hadn’t. She felt absurdly close to tears. She didn’t want this man to be kind to her. She wanted him and the unsettling feelings she felt when she was near him to go away.

‘I’m fine.’ She shrugged her shoulders and his hands fell away.

Marcus lifted his hand and tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, which had loosened from the tight knot at the nape of her neck. Madeline pulled back as the urge to lay her head against his chest took hold.

‘Dr Harrington,’ one of the paramedics called. ‘Coming,’ she replied, and stepped away from Marcus on shaky legs.

CHAPTER TWO

MADELINE was sitting in the family waiting area with Brett when Marcus finally tracked her down. On their arrival the hospital staff had efficiently taken over. After briefing them, Madeline had left to call Mr Sanders. She hated that part the most. Talking to shocked families in grave situations always made her feel helpless.

She was feeling really weary now, staring blankly at the opposite wall, her eyes gritty again. Marcus pushed a steaming cup of coffee towards her face. She blinked, staring at him, unseeing at first until her body pulsed betrayingly and recognition dawned. Overwhelming tiredness made her irritable.

‘I told you there was no need to come,’ she said, ignoring the coffee. Didn’t he have a child to get back to?

‘Take it, Maddy,’ he ordered in a soft voice which nonetheless brooked no argument. The pungent aroma of coffee hit her and her stomach growled. Madeline realised she hadn’t eaten since breakfast on the plane. She took the polystyrene cup.

He handed Brett a cold can of soft drink and sat down beside her. They drank in silence, Madeline desperately trying to quell the frisson of awareness just sitting next to Marcus was causing. Their arms occasionally brushed and she was awake again. Fully, completely awake.

Pull yourself together, she lectured herself. He is unavailable. So are you, or you will be again soon anyway. And you’re going to squash this man like an ant on Monday—you don’t want to be lusting after him as you’re giving him his marching orders. The thought kept her focussed and a smile curved across her full mouth and glittered in the emerald depths of her eyes.

She imagined the look on his face as she handed him the notice of eviction. The fantasy was marred by a sudden pang of guilt. They may not see eye to eye on treatment methodologies but he was an actual doctor and obviously very skilled, and had helped her tonight without question, despite her previous hostile threats.

‘Plotting my demise, Maddy?’

His low growl in her ear caused a riot of sensations to surge through her. Startled that he could so accurately read her thoughts, she turned to face him, composing her features to disguise her inner turmoil. ‘How did you guess?’ she parried lightly.

‘Maddy, Maddy.’ He laughed and stroked the dark stubble on his jaw. ‘Don’t ever play poker.’

Madeline followed the caress intently, sidetracked by sudden wanton thoughts of his stubble brushing against her skin. Her nipples hardened and as she watched him his eyes widened and his hand stilled at her blatant arousal.

She stared for an age, caught in his intense blue gaze. The bustle of hospital life continued around them, oblivious to the sexual energy arcing between them.

‘Dr Harrington.’

A young nurse interrupted. Madeline blinked and looked at her in a slightly disorientated fashion. ‘Y-yes?’

‘Mrs Sanders has just gone up to Intensive Care.’

‘Oh,’ said Madeline, pulling herself together, ‘Thanks, I’ll go right up.’

The nurse’s attention, however, had strayed to Marcus. She was smiling at him, an invitation in her eyes. Marcus winked at her and Madeline rolled her eyes. Thank goodness she’d never been a slave to her hormones. How did people get things done? Stay focussed? Function?

She left him to it, taking Brett up to see his mother and waiting with him until his father arrived, leaving shortly after. She was surprised to see Marcus lounging at the nurses’desk, waiting for her, but was unsurprised to hear the tinkle of laughter as two more nurses fell under the skater boy’s charm.

‘I’ll give you a lift home,’ he said, straightening as she approached.

‘I’ll catch a taxi,’ she threw over her shoulder as she walked past him.

‘Don’t be silly, Maddy,’ he said, in a voice that made her feel like a disobedient child. ‘You look exhausted. Do you know how long it’s going to take to get a taxi on a Saturday evening?’

She stopped walking and sighed. He was right and she was tired, so very tired. What could it hurt? She nodded her assent. He raised his eyebrows at her, obviously not having expected such easy capitulation, but she was just too exhausted to care.

A few minutes later Madeline eyed the fire-engine red MG convertible doubtfully. ‘This is yours?’

‘Yes,’ he smiled lazily.

‘Hocus-pocus pays, huh?’ she gibed.

‘What did you expect me to drive?’

She looked him up and down. He was still in the same clothes—buttoned this time. She could see the paint in his hair and remembered him flying up off the concrete wall, his skate-board attached to his feet. ‘Something old and beat up,’ she said.

He threw back his head and laughed—a rich, throaty noise that weakened her knees. ‘You are a shrew,’ he stated. ‘Get in, Maddy.’

She obeyed meekly, fearing that her knees wouldn’t support her for much longer. She sank into the well-worn soft leather of the bucket seat.

‘Not much room for a child seat in here, Dr Hunt.’

He laughed again. ‘The name is Marcus.’

‘Maybe…but I’m going to call you Dr Hunt,’ she mimicked his earlier words and he laughed again.

‘Touché, Maddy. Touché.’

They rode with the top down and, apart from Madeline giving him the directions to her house, they drove in silence. The steady purr of the engine and the caress of the warm night air against her skin lulled Madeline to sleep.

Marcus took the opportunity to study her and felt a stupid little flutter somewhere in the vicinity of his heart. She was utterly gorgeous. Completely intriguing. The diamond on her finger mocked him and he almost sighed out loud. Pity. He lived by a strict code—no attached women, no matter how much his body insisted.

He pulled the car up outside her apartment block in the valley and switched off the engine. He didn’t want to wake her but felt compelled to touch her at the same time.

‘Maddy,’ he said quietly, lightly stroking her cheek. She wiggled and murmured something unintelligible.

‘Maddy,’he said, louder this time, and watched with regret as she opened her eyes. She sat up abruptly and Marcus’s hand fell away.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, embarrassed. ‘I didn’t mean to fall asleep.’

He shrugged. ‘You were tired.’

They were quite close in the car and even in the dim light Madeline knew that something was happening inside her that had never happened with Simon. Marcus dominated the small space—his blatant sexuality too big for such close confines. This wouldn’t do at all.

Oh, God! She was so confused. She needed a sleep! She was losing control of the situation completely. He rode a skateboard. He had a child. OK, that didn’t mean he was married but he had responsibilities.

She cleared her throat. ‘Anyway…thank you…for before. After the way I carried on I’m surprised you came.’

He shrugged. ‘I would never ignore a medical emergency. Some things are bigger than petty differences.’

‘Still, I think I owe you an apology.’ ‘Accepted,’ he said, half bowing in the small space. ‘Does this mean my imminent eviction is not on the cards?’

‘It means seeing that you are a real doctor and you came to my aid and gave me a lift home, I guess I can tolerate you. But I’m a sceptic through and through, Dr Hunt. It’ll take more than good CPR technique to convince me.’

He laughed. ‘Ah, a challenge. I do so like a challenge.’ She shivered at the intimate promise in his words. This was crazy—he had a child and she was still wearing her engagement ring. She needed to put this conversation back onto even ground. ‘I’d better go, I’m keeping you from your family.’

‘Well, that would be difficult given I don’t have any.’ Her heart did a crazy leap. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I saw you earlier today in the skate park with a little boy. I thought…’

She had seen him earlier? Interesting… ‘He was my child? No. He’s my nephew. My sister lives here in Brisbane and Connor’s a mad keen skater. I promised I’d take him to the park on the weekend. Not married. Not in a relationship. No kids.’

He smiled at her and she thought, Free agent. No wife or girlfriend. And no child. ‘I’m sorry. You seemed really close, I just automatically assumed…’

‘Yeah, I guess we’re pretty close. He’s a great kid.’

‘How old is he?’

‘Six. When Nell, my sister, moved to Brisbane for her work I decided to follow. Connor’s father took off when he was a baby and I know what it’s like to grow up without a father.’

‘What happened to your dad?’ she asked, curious despite telling herself not to be.

‘He and my mum divorced when I was five. He was kind of absent really. He married again and sort of forgot about us for large periods of time.’

‘So now you’re Connor’s father figure?’

He laughed. ‘Let’s just say stable male role model.’

She wrinkled her nose. ‘Ah, a man afraid of the F word. How unusual.’

He grinned. ‘I’m not afraid. I just prefer being an uncle. I like being fun Uncle Marcus. But he’s pretty full on. I’m glad when I can hand him back. I like my life a little too much to tie myself down to something like that permanently.’

‘You make it sound like a death sentence,’ she chided.

‘Let’s just say—once bitten, twice shy.’

So there was something in his past. ‘Ouch,’ she joked. ‘Sounds painful.’

He shuddered, thinking about it. ‘It was.’

Madeline yawned despite her interest being piqued. The weariness had returned with gusto. ‘I’d better go. Thanks for the ride.’

He captured her gaze and the wrong kind of ride came to mind. Trying desperately to evict it from his brain, he cleared his throat. ‘Any time,’ he said.

Her hand stilled on the handle. Had she imagined the innuendo? She opened the door, exited the car and turned to face him. ‘Goodbye, Dr Hunt,’ she said, emphatically shutting the door.

His laughter followed her as she walked away on wobbly legs.

Madeline arrived at the hospital the next day just before lunch. She entered the main foyer, past the line of die hard smokers braving the midday sun, and into the blast of cool air. Madeline inhaled deeply, re-familiarising herself with the sterile smell found in hospitals the world over. She loved that smell and felt a pang of regret that she was no longer a part of the hospital system.