A Mother by Nature

‘Robert Ryder. Have you met him yet?’

Adam shook his head. ‘No. Perhaps I’ll track him down, see if I can observe. Might be interesting.’

‘I’m sure he won’t mind, he’s very approachable. How about that tea now?’ she added as they arrived back at the nursing station by her office. But then the phone rang and it was A and E to say that there was a patient on the way up, a frequent visitor who had suffered yet another serious asthma attack and was now stable but needing observation.

‘Can you hang on?’ she asked him, explaining the case briefly to him. ‘I really need to see to this child, he’s a regular. Or you could help yourself to tea. You’re more than welcome.’

‘I’ll pass. I’ll go and meet the rest of the paediatric team about the hospital, and make a nuisance of myself elsewhere. I might go into the orthopaedic theatres and have a nose around, introduce myself to Ryder and see if I can observe Karl’s op, as I said.’

She felt a pang of what could only have been regret. ‘OK. Maybe next time,’ she suggested, and could have kicked herself for sounding like a breathless virgin. Ridiculous. She was too busy to have tea with him anyway! ‘Have a good day,’ she added with a smile.

‘I’m sure I will—and thanks for the guided tour. I’ll see you tomorrow, no doubt.’

Anna watched him go out of the corner of her eye as she scanned the ward for the most suitable place to put young Toby Cardew, and she suddenly realised that she was looking forward to the next day for the first time in ages.

Gone were the blues she’d felt that morning, replaced by a shiver of anticipation. Adam was apparently unencumbered by a wife, the fact that he had children already was hardly a turn-off to a paediatric nurse and, anyway, the more the merrier.

You’re getting ahead of yourself, she cautioned as she went to sort out a bed for Toby. Just because you think he’s attractive and he asked about your marital status, that doesn’t mean it will go any further—and, anyway, he might have terrible habits. Why did his wife leave him?

She might have died. Perhaps he’s suffering from intractable grief, her alter ego suggested.

Funny. He didn’t look like a man suffering from intractable grief. He just looked tired round the eyes, and, if she hadn’t been mistaken, he’d been interested in her. She hadn’t been mistaken. She knew that look. She’d had plenty of practice at intercepting it over the years.

Too many years, too many times, too many near-misses. The trouble was, the older she got the more likely that the men of her age would be already settled in a permanent relationship—at least, the ones worth having!

Maybe this was one time when she wouldn’t have to fend the man off. Maybe this time the advances, when and if they came, would be welcome. Goodness knows, it’s about time, she thought.

‘Who was that?’

Anna looked round at Allie Baker, her staff nurse and second in command, and wagged a finger.

‘You’ve got one of your own,’ she told her friend.

Allie grinned. ‘I know, and I wouldn’t swap him for the world. I just thought whoever that was was rather gorgeous. So who is he?’

‘Adam Bradbury, our new paediatric orthopaedic surgeon.’

‘I didn’t know we had an old one.’

‘We haven’t,’ Anna replied with a smile, checking forms on the clipboard at the end of the vacant bed. ‘It’s a new post. He’s going to be doing developmental problems and post-traumatic reconstruction, that sort of thing, as well as working with the oncologists on bone cancers and the neurologists on spina bifida and so on. I gather he’s rather clever.’

Allie grinned. ‘And he’s got your name on him.’

Anna smiled self-consciously. ‘I don’t know. I hope so. He’s got three kids and no wife.’

‘Oh, my God.’ Allie looked at her in horror. ‘Three kids?’

Anna shrugged. ‘I like kids.’

‘You’d have to, working with them all day and going home to them at night. Maybe they’re teenagers and nearly off his hands. Maybe they live some of the time with his wife.’

Anna laughed and pushed Allie out of the way gently. ‘I’ll tell you if I ever get a chance to find out. In the meantime, I’ve got things to do and you’re holding me up. Toby Cardew’s coming back.’

Allie rolled her eyes. ‘Not again? Whatever this time?’

‘I have no idea. This attack was quite severe, I gather. His parents are going potty trying to find the trigger. Their house must be so clean! Mrs Cardew spends hours a day mopping it down.’

‘Maybe it’s not the house. Maybe it’s school, or something on the journey, or a kid he sits next to?’

‘They’ve addressed all that. Maybe one day it will fall into place—it’s probably something really obvious that they’ve overlooked.’

The squeak of the A and E trolley alerted them to the new arrival, and Anna went to greet him. ‘Hello again, young man,’ she said with a smile of welcome, and patted his hand reassuringly. ‘Can’t stay away, can you? Must be our wit and charm that keeps you coming back.’

The boy gave a weak grin, and his mother shot Anna a tired, slightly desperate smile. ‘Sorry to be a nuisance,’ she apologised, but Anna brushed her words aside.

‘Don’t be silly,’ she said briskly. ‘That’s why we’re here, and we’re always pleased to see a familiar face. Right, let’s have you in bed and make you comfortable, shall we?’

They quickly shifted young Toby across onto the bed and settled him, then left him to rest. Allie made Mrs Cardew a cup of coffee, Anna went to give Karl his pre-med and it only seemed like five minutes before the boy was back from Theatre, his arm cast in a back slab to allow for swelling and with the hand raised.

He wouldn’t be running around for a few days at least, Anna thought, and wondered if Adam had observed the operation. No doubt she’d find out tomorrow.

A tiny surge of what felt like adrenaline ran through her, and she caught herself looking at her watch and counting the hours until she’d see him again …

CHAPTER TWO

ADAM was due to start the day with a clinic, followed by a ward round to meet the new admissions on whom he’d operate that afternoon. He’d gone back to the ward and checked the notes yesterday evening, and had been foolishly disappointed to find that Anna had gone.

Pity. He’d wanted to tell her about his part in Karl’s operation, and discuss what they’d done.

Strictly business, of course. Still, he’d see her today.

That lock of hair that kept falling forward and curving round her cheek was plaguing him. He’d been having fantasies about it all night—which was crazy because he always had fantasies about dark hair spread across his pillow in a fan, and hers was short and red. Dark red, admittedly, but red for all that, and far too short to fan satisfactorily.

Still, he wondered how it would feel sifting through his fingers …

Like silk. It was soft, heavy hair, essentially straight, with just enough bounce to curve under and curl around the pale pearly shell of her ear …

Damn.

He scooped the post off the floor in the lobby and scanned through it, grinding to a halt at the telephone bill. It was the final bill for the old house, and it took his mind off Anna and her attributes very effectively.

He opened it with grim resignation, but even his wildest expectations were exceeded by its stunning proportions. Helle must truly have spent all day, every day, on the phone to her family and friends in Denmark.

He shook his head in despair, and ran upstairs to her room, rapping loudly on the door. ‘Helle? Get up now. I want to talk to you immediately.’

There was a shuffling noise, and the door opened to reveal his hapless young au pair, her hair on end, her eyes blurred with sleep, dragging on a dressing-gown.

‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, looking puzzled.

‘This is the matter,’ Adam said tightly, brandishing the thing under her nose. ‘The telephone bill. It runs into four figures, Helle, and it’s not even a complete quarter. I want you downstairs dressed in five minutes, and you’d better have a damn good explanation or you’ll be packing your bags and catching the next flight home.’

‘Good,’ she said miserably, and burst into tears. ‘I want to go home. I hate it here.’

You’re a sucker, he told himself as he opened his arms and comforted the young woman while she cried. She was little more than a child herself, and it was a lot of responsibility. He should have talked to her more, been kinder to her, instead of expecting so much.

‘Come downstairs,’ he said more gently, easing her out of his arms. ‘We’ll have a cup of tea and talk about it before the children get up.’

She nodded and sniffed, scrubbing her nose on the sleeve of her dressing-gown. ‘I’ll get dressed.’

‘Good idea.’

He ran back down, put the kettle on and glanced at his watch. It was still only six-thirty, and he wondered if Anna was up yet or if she worked nine to five to cover admissions and pre- and post-ops. If she worked shifts and was on an early she’d be on her way there now. If not, she might still be in bed, her hair tangled round her face, her lashes like crescents on her cheeks, her mouth soft with sleep—

‘You need a life, Bradbury,’ he growled, and banged two mugs down on the worktop just as Helle came into the room.

She hovered apprehensively in the doorway, and he waved her in. ‘Come in, sit down, I’m not going to bite you. I just want to know what’s going on.’

She sat but, being Helle, she couldn’t just sit. She played with the salt, she shredded a paper towel that had been left on the table, tearing it systematically into tiny strips while she waited for the axe to fall.

‘Talk to me. Tell me all about it,’ Adam said softly, sliding a mug across the battered old pine table, and she looked up, her eyes like huge pools filling yet again.

‘I’m just lonely—I want my mum. I’m homesick. I thought it would get better, but then you said we were moving and I had to say goodbye to all my friends, and I thought, how will I cope in a new place?’

A tear fell, splashing on her hand, and she scrubbed it away and went on, ‘It was hard before, when my friend Silke was just round the corner. Now it’s impossible. I don’t know anybody, and the children are at school and there’s nothing to do, and I just sit and cry—’

‘So you ring your mum.’

She nodded miserably. ‘I’m sorry, Adam. I didn’t realise it would be so expensive.’

‘It’s as much as your wages,’ he pointed out, not unreasonably.

‘But some is you,’ she defended with truth, and he shrugged.

‘A little. Perhaps the first hundred pounds.’

She swallowed. ‘May I see it?’

He handed her the bill—the itemised section that ran to page after page—and she studied it in silence and handed it back.

‘Are you going to send me home?’

‘Do you want to go? Do you really want to go? Are you so unhappy? I don’t want you to be unhappy, Helle. It doesn’t help anyone—not you, not me, and certainly not the children.’

She nodded and sniffed. ‘I do want to go. I’ll miss the children, but I’m so lonely. It wouldn’t be so bad if you had a wife, it would be another woman to talk to. It’s different—I can’t talk to you like I could to a woman.’

Nothing would be so bad if he had a wife, he thought defeatedly, including his own loneliness, but it was out of the question. Lyn’s defection had scarred them all, and there was no way he was going there again.

‘I’ll ask my mum,’ Helle went on, miserably shredding another paper towel. ‘Maybe she’ll pay the phone bill.’

‘Never mind the phone bill. Just do me a favour and stay until I can get someone else, and then I’ll forget the bill—OK? Only stay off the damn phone in the daytime, please, until you go home. Deal?’

He wouldn’t understand women if he lived to be a hundred, he thought as Helle burst into tears. He found her an unshredded piece of kitchen roll and watched as she hiccuped to a halt and blotted herself up.

‘Deal,’ she said finally.

‘Good. Now, do you suppose you could get the children up in time for school today, please?’

She nodded. ‘I’ll wake them now.’

He ate a piece of toast, kissed the children hello and goodbye in one and left for work, his mind on his afternoon list. He had yet to meet the other members of his firm, the registrars and house doctors that were allocated to him in this new speciality that the Audley Memorial had set up.

Most hospitals had one or two consultants who tended to handle the paediatric work. It was unusual to find a post dedicated to it, and he was looking forward to the challenge. He understood they would take referrals from other hospitals within the region once his post was established—it would become the local specialist centre for paediatric orthopaedics, centralising treatment in Suffolk and making it more accessible for patients and their families.

That meant better visiting arrangements, which in turn meant happier patients getting better quicker. He approved of that.

Adam parked his car in the staff car park, then crossed it and palmed the door out of the way and caught himself all but running down the corridor to the ward. Idiot, he thought crossly. She’s probably not even there yet—and if she is, she’ll be busy.

She was. She was taking report, and he went into the kitchen and put the kettle on and made two mugs of tea. She wouldn’t be long.

‘Tea,’ he said, thrusting a mug at her, and Anna took it gratefully and drank it too fast, almost scalding her mouth. It was delicious—almost as delicious as him—and nearly as welcome.

‘I needed that. How did you know?’ she said with a smile as she drained it, and he gave a chuckle and made her another one.

‘I wanted to go through the notes of my afternoon list with you,’ he said over his shoulder as he stirred the teabag round. ‘I think you know some of the patients.’

She nodded. ‘Sure. Shall we go into the office?’

‘Have you got time?’

She grinned at him. ‘One of the nice things about this job is being able to delegate most of it! Come on, I can spare you ten minutes. The notes are in there still.’

She settled down in her chair, her knees propped up on the edge of the desk, her uniform trousers protecting her modesty. ‘Tell me about Karl first,’ she prompted, trying to concentrate on something other than his long, lean legs stretched out across the floor in her office and the casual way he slouched against her desk.

‘Karl? Oh, the lad yesterday. Robert let me assist—it was interesting. We plated it. When we got in there it was quite obvious that the bone had made no attempt to heal. The main reason seemed to be that it had rotated out of alignment, so we had to break the ulna as well to correct the rotation so we could line it all up properly. We plated both just to be on the safe side. It should be a better shape than it was before, anyway, so in a strange way it might have done him a favour. How is he now?’

‘Bit groggy. Quieter than yesterday, I gather. I think he had quite a good night. Was it very traumatic to the tissues?’

He shrugged. ‘Fairly. I would expect it to be quite sore for a day or two. It was obviously quite a nasty break—I had a look at the earlier plates. It seems likely that he tried to do too much too soon and twisted it out of position inside the cast. By the time it was noticed, it was too late.’

‘That’s what you get for trying to fix an active young hellion conservatively,’ Anna said with a smile. ‘They need everything screwed together because they all want a quick fix.’

‘Everybody wants a quick fix,’ he said with a sigh. ‘I think my au pair’s going to want a quick fix. I confronted her with the phone bill this morning and she announced she wanted to go home. I bribed her by offering to forget the phone bill if she’d stay until I’d got a replacement.’

‘And?’

He shrugged. ‘She says she’ll stay—for now, at least.’

Anna felt a pang of sympathy. ‘Was it horrendous?’ she asked, and he rolled his eyes.

‘Try four figures.’

Anna’s jaw dropped. For the life of her she couldn’t conceive of finding time to build up a phone bill that huge, never mind having anyone she wanted to talk to that much!

Well. Maybe that wasn’t true—not any more. She could imagine curling up in the evening and having long, cosy chats to this man—

‘Let’s talk about your afternoon list,’ she said, dragging herself back to earth hastily. ‘Who have you got that I know?’

‘A baby with congenital club foot? David Chisholm. I think he’s been in here. He’s about eighteen months.’

Anna thought for a moment. ‘David—yes, he has. I remember him. He’s had a couple of ops already to let out the short structures on the inside of the legs. He was very bad—worst case I’ve seen, I think, not that we’ve had that many. I thought they’d got quite a good result?’

Adam nodded. ‘That’s right, but he needs another op because he’s grown and the feet are turning in again.’

‘Aren’t they splinting it?’

He nodded again. ‘Yes, but it’s not keeping up. I’m going to release the tendons again—it’s fairly rare, of course, so you don’t tend to get that much practice at this sort of thing, but we’re learning new ways of dealing with it. Sadly, it’s never going to be quite normal, of course, and I haven’t met the parents yet so I don’t know what their expectations are.’

‘High, I think. Most parents’ expectations are high. They think we can sort out everything.’

‘Well, I’ll certainly try my best, but I’m only human,’ he said with a wry smile, and her heart hiccuped. Only human’s fine by me, she wanted to tell him, but she was being silly again.

One smile! she thought crossly. One smile and you keel over and submit! You’d make a good dog.

Anna tried to pay attention—she really did—but it was hard. In the end she was rescued by the arrival of a new admission, and she went to deal with him and escaped from the intoxicating and mind-bending cosiness of her office. She was busy for the rest of the day, rushed off her feet for most of it, and by the end of it she was feeling ragged.

Then Adam walked onto the ward, still in Theatre scrubs, and her heart did that silly thing all over again and she wanted to kick herself.

‘Hi,’ he said, his voice soft and low. Shivers ran down her back, and she forced herself to ignore them.

‘Hi, yourself,’ she said with what she hoped was a friendly smile and not an infatuated drool. ‘How was your list?’

‘OK. A couple are in SCBU, but you should have the rest. How’s little David?’

‘Sick and sore, I think. Well, probably more uncomfortable than sore. His mother’s with him, but she’s pregnant again and she’s finding it quite wearing. I keep sending my nurses to rescue her so she can go and have a cup of tea, but she won’t let me.’

‘Is she staying all night?’

Anna nodded. ‘Yes. She needs to rest, but she won’t leave him till he settles.’

‘Can I have a quick look?’ he asked.

‘Sure. He’s over here.’

They went over to the baby and his mother and, as Anna had expected, the little boy was propped up against her shoulder, grizzling gently, and she was rubbing his back and making soothing noises. They weren’t working.

‘Hello, Mrs Chisholm,’ Adam said, hunkering down to her level and smiling at her with that special smile. ‘How are things?’

‘Oh—hello, Doctor. I’m so glad you’ve come. Not too bad. How was it? Have you been able to do it?’

‘It was OK,’ he said reassuringly. ‘I’ve managed to get quite a bit of length on the tendons, so we were able to get his feet into a more normal position in the casts. He’ll be a bit miserable for a day or so, but we’re giving him plenty of pain relief so he’s not really hurting. Once the first few days are over you’ll find he’s walking much better. May I have a look?’

She held the little boy out, and Adam took him and straightened.

‘Hello again, young man. Can I have a look at your feet?’ he said softly, his smile gentle. The baby rested sleepily against him with a little whimper, and Adam soothed him automatically before laying him down in the cot.

His movements were sure and practised, Anna thought. You could tell he was a father. His hand brushed the baby’s head, smoothing back the damp, ruffled hair that clung to his brow, and quickly he scanned the boy’s legs with his eyes.

‘I’m checking the colour and warmth of his toes and that the dressings you can see through these windows in the casts aren’t showing signs of leaking of the wounds,’ he explained. ‘Perhaps you could keep an eye on that for us, as you’re here. It’s possible the legs might swell after a little while, but we’ll keep a constant check, and if you notice anything different, perhaps you could tell us.’

She nodded. ‘Of course.’

‘He looks fine at the moment,’ he went on, raising his voice over the baby’s unhappy protests. ‘I’m pleased. He seems a bit grizzly, though. Perhaps he’s not that comfortable. We’ll give him something to settle him.’

‘I think he needs to sleep,’ Mrs Chisholm said, ‘but every time I put him down he cries, and I don’t like to disturb the other children.’

‘Don’t worry about the other children,’ Anna hastened to assure her. ‘He won’t cry for long. He’s dead beat. He’ll go off in seconds if you can just bear to let him cry.’

‘I just feel so mean,’ she said, clearly torn.

‘Perhaps you should go and get something to eat and leave him quietly alone for a little while and try it,’ Adam suggested. ‘You might find he drops off if you aren’t here to cuddle—it’s not worth staying awake then.’ The smile robbed his suggestion of any criticism, and she nodded wearily.

‘I could murder a cup of tea and a leg stretch, and probably something to eat, actually. I was going to wait until my husband came back and go then, so David wasn’t on his own, but are you sure he’ll be all right?’

‘Of course he’ll be all right,’ Anna assured her firmly. ‘We’ll look after him. If he doesn’t settle in a minute I’ll get someone to cuddle him till you’re back, but you’ve got to look after yourself and the other baby.’

She nodded again. ‘OK. Thanks.’

They watched her go, and she was hardly out of the ward before little David stopped grizzling and started to relax into much-needed sleep.

‘Peace at last,’ Anna said with a soft chuckle, and covered the little boy lightly with his blanket. ‘He’ll be all right now. Do you still want to give him something?’

Adam shook his head. ‘Not if he doesn’t need it. I’ll write him up for something in case he wakes in the night and is distressed. What are you doing now? Got time to look at my others with me?’

She glanced at the clock on the wall and groaned. ‘Not really. Apparently, it’s time to go home and I still haven’t finished. Do you need me with you to look at your other patients?’

‘I wouldn’t mind, but it isn’t necessary. Anyway I suspect they’re all asleep. Are their parents here?’

‘Yes, all of them. I’m sure they’d love to see you and ask you about the operations.’

He nodded, pursed his lips for a moment as he, too, glanced at his watch, and then he shrugged. ‘I’ll go and see them. You don’t have to stay, I’m sure I can find my way around.’

‘I’ll show you where they are and leave you to it. I have to hand over to Allie. Those two beds there,’ she told him, pointing, ‘and that one in the far corner. OK? Shout if you need help. Allie will sort you out.’

‘OK. Thanks. See you tomorrow.’

His smile warmed her. Reluctantly, she dragged herself back to her other tasks, handed over and left the ward with only a handful of backward glances.

She went home, put the kettle on while she changed into jeans and a comfy sweater, and sat down with her feet up and a cup of tea in front of the TV news. It didn’t hold her attention. It couldn’t even begin to compete with that sexy smile and the smoky green eyes that were beginning to haunt her every waking moment.

What made him so different? Nothing obvious. Over the years she’d been out with several men, most of them very pleasant, most of them perfectly nice.