Kitabı oku: «The Brooding Doc's Redemption», sayfa 2

CHAPTER TWO

MARC wasn’t in the mood for cooking when he got home from an afternoon of house calls. He made himself a salad and ate it listlessly—food nowadays was fuel, rather than a pleasure—then looked up Laurie’s address on his satnav. Her house was totally the other side of the town from his, far enough to justify using the car rather than walking.

When he parked his car outside and walked up the path to her front door, he wished he’d thought to bring her some flowers or something. OK, so this was a work meeting rather than a social event, but it was still being held at her house, and he felt uncomfortable turning up without anything. Then again, would flowers be making the wrong kind of statement?

He shook himself. Oh, for pity’s sake. He needed to be professional about this. But he was horribly aware that this whole situation was throwing him. He was about to walk into just the kind of home he could’ve had if the accident hadn’t happened. A family home. One with children.

But the accident had happened. He had a bachelor pad, not a family home. And he only had himself to blame.

He knocked on the front door. There a brief woof and a ‘Shh!’, and then Laurie opened the door. A chocolate Labrador with a wagging blur of a tail was desperately trying to barge past her. There was a smudge of flour on Laurie’s face and several of her dark corkscrew curls had escaped from the scrunchie she used to hold her hair back. The whole effect was unbelievably cute, and he found himself wanting to tuck the stray curls into place and brush that smudge of flour from her skin.

Which was incredibly dangerous. He didn’t need that kind of contact. Didn’t want it. His heart had been broken, he was still trying to patch it up, and no way was he ever risking any kind of relationship again, other than on a strictly colleagues basis. He even kept his family at a distance nowadays, because it was easier. If he didn’t let himself feel, he wouldn’t hurt.

Misinterpreting his sudden stillness, she pushed the dog back behind her. ‘Sorry, Cocoa’s a bit over-friendly.’ Within a nanosecond, the dog was trying to push past her again. ‘I forgot to ask if you’re OK with dogs. I can put him in the utility room, if you’d rather.’

‘No, it’s fine. I like dogs.’ It had even been part of his and Ginny’s plans. A baby, and then a dog. A house with a garden.

Ginny would’ve loved the old cottage he’d found to rent in the small Norfolk town. She would’ve loved the duck pond on the green, the ancient flint church with its round tower, the gentle undulations of the countryside around them. But because of his own stupidity he had nobody to share it with. Nobody to love. Nobody to love him back.

He pushed the thoughts away and held out his hand for the dog to sniff, then scratched the top of the dog’s head. There was a look of sheer bliss on Cocoa’s face and he leaned towards Marc.

‘He’ll be demanding a fuss from you all night,’ Laurie warned with a smile. ‘Come in. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m waiting for some stuff to come out of the oven, so we need to stay in the kitchen. Can I get you a coffee, or maybe a glass of wine?’

Definitely not wine. That had been one of the causes of his downfall, and he hadn’t touched a drop since the funeral. ‘Coffee would be lovely, thanks,’ he said politely.

‘Come in and sit down.’

It was clearly a family kitchen. There were several paintings held on the fridge with magnets, obviously the work of a young child. And if that wasn’t enough proof, there was a cork board on one wall covered with school notices and photographs of a little girl, varying from babyhood to what looked like about five years old.

Marc couldn’t help thinking how his own child would’ve been eighteen months old now, toddling everywhere and starting to chatter away. A boy or a girl? It had been too soon to tell.

He dug his fingernails into his palms, and the slight pain was just enough to stop him thinking and ripping the scars off his heart.

On the worktop, there was a plate full of cupcakes covered in very pink icing, along with lots of sparkly sprinkles—and there were almost as many on the worktop as there were on the cakes. A pile of washing-up was stacked up next to the sink and a batch of cookies sat on a cooling wire rack next to the oven. Clearly Laurie was in the middle of a baking session.

She followed his gaze when she turned round from the kettle and winced. ‘Sorry, it’s a bit untidy. I meant to clear up properly before you got here, but then Izzy wanted me to read her bedtime story a second time, and—’ She spread her hands. ‘Well, you know how it is with kids.’

Not personally. And he never would now. He didn’t deserve to have a family. ‘Yes,’ he said, as neutrally as he could.

Cocoa sat at Marc’s feet and rested his chin on Marc’s knee; absently, Marc rubbed the top of the dog’s head.

‘Would you like a cookie with your coffee?’ Laurie asked.

‘Thank you. But I hope you didn’t go to all this trouble for me.’

‘No, of course n—’ She winced, cutting the word off as she put a couple of cookies onto a plate. ‘Sorry, that came out the wrong way. I didn’t mean you weren’t worth taking any trouble over. I’m baking because it’s the PTA coffee morning tomorrow. Izzy decorated the cakes.’

Laurie’s little girl. Which explained the sprinkles, and probably most of the mess.

‘Obviously I don’t get a chance to actually go to the coffee morning because I need to be at the surgery for my shift, but I try to do my bit to help. I always make them some cakes to sell, give them a raffle prize and leave them money for some tickets. If they draw my name out, they choose something for me and send the prize home with Izzy.’

Laurie was clearly very involved with village life. Not only was she a GP, she was also a mum who did things to support the local school. Would Ginny have been like that? he wondered. Probably. As a teacher, she would’ve been involved with the school, either because she worked there or because their child went there. Though she would’ve been a bit less chaotic than Laurie. Their house in London had never been as untidy as this.

‘So did you enjoy your first day at the practice?’ she asked.

Work. He could talk about work, he thought gratefully. Not personal stuff. That was good. ‘Fine.’

‘Good.’ Laurie put a mug of coffee in front of him, along with the cookies, then added milk to her own coffee and sat down opposite him. ‘I’ve been thinking about the easiest way to tackle this. I thought we could maybe brainstorm all the different kinds of exercise we can think of, then I’ll list all the people within a five-mile radius who can offer each one, and we can divvy up the calls between us and ask them if they’d be prepared to do a taster session for us.’

‘Sure. That sounds reasonable.’

She looked relieved. ‘Great. One tiny thing: would you mind if I asked you to deal with Neil Peascod? He owns the gym and swim place at the other end of the town.’

‘Do I take it he’s likely to be difficult?’ Marc asked, wondering why she didn’t want to deal with the guy.

‘Not exactly.’ She flushed. ‘He was a bit, um, persistent with me last year. I guess he didn’t like to think that someone might actually say no to him.’

‘He asked you out?’ Then Marc realised how rude that sounded. ‘I apologise. I didn’t meant it to come out like that.’

Laurie didn’t look in the slightest bit offended. She simply laughed. ‘Don’t worry, I’m under no illusions that I’m the next supermodel. I’m thirty years old, I’m a mum, I have lumpy bits, and I have days when my hair needs stuffing under a hat so nobody can see how frizzy it looks.’ She smiled. ‘And I also have days when I look utterly fabulous. But they’re the rare ones. Dog-walking isn’t exactly the time or place to wear a little black dress and high heels.’

At the W-word, the Labrador deserted his post at Marc’s feet, rushed over to Laurie, put his paws on her knee and licked her face hopefully. She rolled her eyes and petted him. ‘No, Cocoa, I didn’t mean now. You know as well as I do that walkies is when I get home from work and before I collect Izzy from school.’

Marc couldn’t help smiling. He liked Laurie. She was warm and bubbly, yet at the same time she was very down-to-earth.

‘Sorry about that.’ When she switched her attention back to him, he noticed just how blue her eyes were. Almost as bright as the forget-me-nots in his garden. ‘Neil. No, he’s not difficult. He just thinks that he’s the answer to a desperate single mum’s problems.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘Yes, I’m a single mum but, no, I’m not desperate, I don’t necessarily need a man in my life to make it complete, and I’m doing just fine, thank you very much.’

She didn’t sound bitter, but as if she was simply stating the facts. Or was that a gentle warning to him? Marc wondered. He’d told her that he was single. Perhaps this was her way of telling him that even if he might be interested, she wasn’t.

‘Noted,’ he said drily. He took a bite of the still-warm cookie. ‘This is very nice.’

‘Thank you. And please don’t let Cocoa con you into sharing with him. They’re bad for his teeth, and he’s very far from being a poor, starving hound.’

The dog looked up at him with mournful eyes, and Marc couldn’t help smiling. ‘Not according to him.’

‘He’s an old fraud.’ She smiled back. ‘Sam said you were interested in sports medicine. Is that what you did in your last job?’

‘It was more of a spare-time thing, really. I worked with the local rugby club.’

‘Oh. Do you play?’ she asked.

‘Not any more.’ Marc found himself volunteering information; he hadn’t expected that and it unnerved him slightly. ‘I was injured.’

‘Knee?’ she guessed.

‘Shoulder. Dislocation, then a rotator cuff tear.’

‘Ouch.’ She looked sympathetic. ‘I’m not surprised you stopped playing. In your shoes, I wouldn’t want to risk doing that again.’

‘Believe me, after three months of doing nothing but triage calls because my arm was out of action, I’d never risk it again.’ And he wished with all his heart that he hadn’t given in to the frustration he’d felt at having to give up the game he loved. Because then maybe he could’ve stopped the chain of events that had wrecked his life and robbed him of everything else he loved.

‘I guess rugby and football probably wouldn’t be the best kind of exercise for our group anyway,’ she said.

‘I’d say no to squash as well,’ he said.

‘Very sensible. And we’ll ban them from jogging. We’re trying to improve their circulation, not give them shin splints.’

‘Or overdoing it in the first flush of enthusiasm and giving themselves a heart attack.’ He looked thoughtfully at her. ‘Badminton’s a possible.’

‘And swimming. As well as low-impact exercise classes and circuit training,’ she suggested.

‘Maybe martial arts—kick-boxing doesn’t have to be fast and furious.’

She smiled. ‘I’ve always fancied trying that one myself.’ She took a laptop from a drawer in the huge pine dresser. ‘Let’s start getting this down.’ The computer whirred and made a couple of protesting noises, and she rolled her eyes. ‘Sorry, this is a bit old. I’m afraid it takes ages to boot up.’

His own was state of the art and would’ve been ready to go by now. As a single mum, Laurie would have to juggle her finances, and a new computer probably wasn’t top of her priorities, Marc thought.

They made a list together. Halfway through it, the timer on the oven beeped.

‘Sorry, do you mind if I sort this out?’ she asked. ‘The topping works best if you do it when the cake’s hot.’

‘I take it that’s for school?’ He grinned.

‘Yes.’ She smiled. ‘But, if you’re good, I’ll make a cake for the surgery later in the week.’

It smelled wonderful, and Marc ignored the fact that this was the first time he’d been interested in food in a very, very long time. ‘I’m good,’ he said. ‘If you can talk at the same time as you do whatever it is you’re doing to the cake, I’ll take over the typing.’

‘Excellent. Thanks.’

Marc surreptitiously watched her as she took the cake out of the oven, pierced the top with a skewer and spooned the contents of a bowl over it. She looked up and caught him looking at her. ‘It’s lemon and sugar.’

The citrus scent made his mouth water. ‘Is this the one Sam told me about?’

‘Yes. It’s his favourite. So, are you going to do some typing or just hoping for cake, like Cocoa is?’

He couldn’t help smiling. ‘I’m typing. Start talking.’

Within twenty minutes they had a good list. They worked through it again and weeded out some of the more unlikely suggestions they’d come up with.

‘This looks good to me. I’ll work my way through it and put in the contacts, and then give you your half of the list tomorrow,’ Laurie said.

‘That’s fine,’ Marc said. ‘And I guess I’d better let you get on.’ Especially as he felt way too comfortable here. And that unnerved him.

She smiled at him. ‘Thanks. Sadly, the washing-up won’t do itself, and it’d be a bit self-indulgent to have a dishwasher when there’s only Izzy and me living here. Are you sure you don’t want another coffee before you go?’

‘I’m sure, but thanks for the offer. See you tomorrow.’

There was something lost about the expression in Marc’s eyes, Laurie thought when Marc had gone. Had he been through a bad divorce? That might explain why he’d come here from London. Maybe she could find a tactful way of talking to him and help him understand that it did get better eventually.

OK, so she hadn’t actually been married to Dean, but the break-up and then sorting out everything afterwards had been tough. The only thing missing had been the fight in court; the rest of the acrimony and guilt had been there.

Just as Marc had left, she’d wanted to put her arms round him, hold him close and tell him not to worry because everything was going to work out just fine. Which was crazy. She barely knew the man. And she certainly wasn’t looking for any complications in her own life.

Then again, she’d been lucky. She’d had people there for her when her own life had hit the skids. And she had the strongest feeling that Marc didn’t. He was a stranger to the area. He could do with a friend. OK, so when she’d come home she’d been far from a stranger—but she knew what that felt like, to need a friend. So it would be mean of her to back off and ignore him … Wouldn’t it?

CHAPTER THREE

ON WEDNESDAY morning, Marc walked into his surgery to find a plate on his desk containing a cupcake exactly like the ones he’d seen in Laurie’s kitchen the previous night, along with a printed copy of the table he and Laurie had made together, detailing the different exercise providers and which of them was going to call each one, with space to scribble notes.

That cake gave him an odd feeling. Was this the sort of thing his own child would’ve done with Ginny, making cakes and decorating them haphazardly and sending him off to work with one? A little thing, made with such love …

He shook himself as he heard a rap on the door, a nanosecond before it opened. Sam, the senior partner, leaned round the door. ‘Morning, Marc. How are you settling in?’

‘Fine, thanks.’ Marc summoned up a professional smile, not wanting Sam to see how much the cupcake had thrown him.

‘I meant to say yesterday, Ruth said you’re very welcome to come to ours for lunch on Sunday. It’s not much fun having weekends on your own and it takes a while to settle into a small country town, especially when you’re used to the city.’

Marc appreciated the overture of friendship but he’d learned that, once people knew about his past, any friendship tended to come tempered with pity. He had quite enough pity for himself without needing it from others. ‘Thanks. That’s really kind of you, but I have a few things to sort out.’

‘Sure. Well, you know where we are if you change your mind. Just turn up.’

‘Thanks. I will.’ Though Marc had no intention of doing so. He didn’t deserve such kindness. Not after the way he’d messed up.

Sam glanced at the cupcake and smiled. ‘Oh, good. I hoped we’d get some of the leftovers from the PTA baking session. Laurie’s cakes are wonderful.’ He laughed. ‘Even if Izzy does put half a ton of sprinkles on every single one.’

Marc carefully sidestepped the subject of children. ‘Laurie and I brainstormed the project last night.’ He waved the table at Sam. ‘She’s added the contact details, and we’re splitting the calls between us.’

‘Excellent.’ Sam looked pleased. ‘I can see you’re going to fit right in. We definitely made the right choice, asking you to join us.’

‘Thank you. I hope I live up to that.’

Marc didn’t get the chance to see Laurie during surgery as she was busy on house calls and, because she worked part time, she finished earlier than he did. After he’d seen his last patient for the day, he looked at his watch. Laurie’s place was on his way home from the surgery. He knew he probably ought to call her first and make arrangements to discuss the project, but he couldn’t resist the impulse to drop in and see her.

And he didn’t want to analyse the reason too closely.

‘Oh, Marc.’ She looked flustered when she opened the front door.

‘Sorry, is this a bad time?’

‘No, but my house is chaos city at this time of day, so I’ll have to ask you to ignore the mess. Izzy’s drawing pictures at the kitchen table. Come in, and I’ll put the kettle on.’ Her smile brightened back into a welcome.

And that was half the reason he was here.

Because that smile drew him. Made him feel that the world was a better place.

Marc followed Laurie into the kitchen, where a little girl was sitting at the kitchen table. Cocoa was sitting patiently by the child’s feet, clearly hoping for a share in the cake that sat on the plate beside her. He wagged his tail at Marc, but didn’t leave his position or break his eyeline from the table.

‘Izzy, this is Dr Bailey. He’s come to work with me at the surgery and he’s just popped in to see me about a project we’re working on together.’

The little girl looked up at him. ‘Hello, Dr Bailey,’ she said shyly.

‘Marc, this is Izzy, my daughter.’

‘Hello, Izzy.’ He looked at Laurie. ‘She’s very like you.’ She had the same wild dark curls, though they weren’t tied back neatly like Laurie’s hair was; and Izzy’s eyes were a deep brown rather than a piercing blue.

‘I’ve got a new friend at school,’ Izzy said. ‘Her name’s Molly. She moved here last week and she only started in our class yesterday. I said she could play with me and Georgia at playtime so she won’t be lonely.’

Taking the new girl under her wing—just as Laurie was taking him under her wing, Marc thought. Like mother, like daughter. ‘That’s very kind of you,’ he said.

‘Me and Mummy made some cakes. Would you like one?’ Izzy asked.

‘No, thank you.’

She nodded sagely. ‘Because you don’t want to spoil your dinner.’

Marc was torn between wanting to smile—he’d just bet that particular phrase came from Laurie—and panicking. He wasn’t used to this. He’d kept himself separate for so long; contact with a child, outside work, spooked him slightly.

‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘But your mum brought some of your cakes into work this morning and I had one then. It was very nice.’

She beamed at him. ‘Did you like the sprinkles?’

No. He’d scraped them off, along with most of the icing; it had been a little too sweet for his taste. ‘They were delicious,’ he said, not wanting to spoil it for her.

‘I like sprinkles.’

He couldn’t help smiling. He’d already worked that one out for himself.

‘Would you like a glass of milk?’

She really was her mother’s daughter—warm, sweet and generous. And it scared the hell out of him.

‘Thank you for the offer but I’m fine, thanks.’

‘Grown-ups normally have coffee or tea, Iz,’ Laurie said, putting her arms round her daughter’s shoulders and resting her face against her little girl’s.

It was just how Marc had imagined Ginny would be with their child, and it sent a shockwave through him. He really, really wished he hadn’t given in to that impulse to call in and see her. If only he’d waited until this evening, or had called her first to arrange a time when Izzy would be in bed …

‘But I’m not allowed to use the kettle. I’m too little,’ Izzy pointed out.

‘I know, sweetheart.’ Laurie kissed her. ‘Do you want to do another drawing for me? I need to talk to Dr Bailey about work. We won’t be long, I promise.’

He was eating into Laurie’s family time, and that wasn’t fair. And seeing Izzy, the love between parent and child—something he’d wanted so badly and would never have now—made him want to back away. Fast.

‘Did you want a coffee, Marc?’ Laurie asked.

‘No, thanks, I’m fine. I only called in because I was passing and I thought it’d be just as quick to drop in as it would be to ring you later.’

He looked nervous, and Laurie didn’t have a clue why. ‘Good idea,’ she said.

‘I wanted to let you know that I’ve had a good response already from the calls I’ve made. But do you have a slot booked on a regular basis in a hall or something, or will our patients need to go to a different place each week?’

‘I thought we’d try and keep everything in the same place, because then there’s less chance of any confusion and also no excuses for not turning up,’ Laurie said. ‘I’m waiting for a phone call to confirm it, but I’m pretty sure we’ve got the village hall on Wednesdays at eight. Sam says we can use the surgery’s waiting room for the talks from the cardiologist, diabetic specialist and nutritionist, if we need to, but obviously it’s not a suitable space for an exercise class. Even a small one.’

‘Great. I’ll call my contacts back to pencil in some dates, then. Oh, and I hope I haven’t stomped all over your toes, but I drafted a letter to the patient group over lunchtime. Do you want me to email it to you, so you can see if I’ve missed anything or there’s something you think needs changing?’

‘That’d be great, thanks. It’s probably easier to send it here than to the surgery. Do you have my email address?’

‘No.’

She scribbled it down on a piece of paper and handed it to him. For a second, their fingers touched, and awareness surged through her; she damped it down swiftly. This wasn’t appropriate. Wrong time, wrong place. And probably wrong man; she didn’t exactly have a good track record in that department.

‘Thanks. I’ll, um, see you tomorrow. And I’ll email you that letter when I get home.’

‘OK.’

‘Bye, Izzy.’ Though he didn’t go over to the little girl or so much as look at her drawing, let alone comment on it.

Not that Izzy seemed upset by it. She was too busy colouring in her picture. ‘Bye bye, Dr Bailey.’ She smiled at him, and Laurie’s heart clenched with love for her daughter.

Was it her imagination, or had Marc gone very, very still?

Imagination, she decided, and saw him out.

But over the rest of the evening, she wondered. Did Marc have children and his divorce had been so acrimonious that he didn’t have access to them? Then again, she had a fairly good instinct about people, and she didn’t think Marc was the unreasonable type that would make any solicitor wary of allowing him access. Maybe it was something else, she thought. Something sadder, because Marc had definite shadows in his eyes.

Just before afternoon surgery the next day, there was a rap on Marc’s consulting-room door. Expecting it to be Sam, he looked up with a smile, and felt his eyes widen as he saw Laurie.

Which was ridiculous. She was his colleague; she’d made it clear that she was perfectly fine being single; and, even if she had been in the market for a relationship, Marc knew he was too damaged to be able to offer her anything.

‘Hi. You OK?’ she asked.

‘Sure.’

She waited, and he sighed. ‘No.’

‘Tough morning?’

He nodded. ‘Something like that.’

She came into the room and sat on the chair his patients used. ‘Want to talk about it?’

‘I can’t dump it on you. Anyway, it’s nearly time for us to see our next patients.’

‘True.’ She looked at him. ‘If you’re not busy tonight, you could come over and tell me then.’

‘Dr Fixit?’ he asked.

‘That’s what I do,’ she said lightly. ‘What you do, too.’

‘Not in this case.’

She reached over to squeeze his hand, and the contact made his skin tingle. ‘Marc, we all get patients where we can’t make everything all right for them. Nobody else would be able to fix it either, so don’t blame yourself.’

Easier said than done. He blamed himself for a lot of things.

And then she gave him that light-up-the-room smile. ‘I could give you my trainee pep talk. Which would be immensely cheeky of me, given that you’re more experienced than I am.’

‘It would,’ he agreed. But that smile had done a lot to ease his soul.

‘Up to you. I’m not busy tonight—well, once I’ve read Izzy a bedtime story or six. So if you want to talk about it, come over.’

‘Why are you asking me?’ He grimaced. ‘Sorry. That was ungracious.’

‘But a fair comment. I’m asking you because I do the same job as you. Unless you have family or friends who do, too, they won’t really get what you’re feeling right now and why. Plus you’re new around here, and could maybe do with a local friend.’

Friendship. That was what she was offering. ‘Thank you.’ He felt incredibly humbled.

She smiled at him. ‘I actually came to say that letter you wrote was perfect. I’ll do a mail merge and send them all off today,’ she said.

‘Great.’ And how ridiculous that her approval pleased him so much. She was his colleague. He knew he was good at his job. He didn’t need approval from her. But it still warmed him. ‘Your daughter’s very like you.’

And why on earth had he said that?

‘The spit of me at that age, but with brown eyes,’ Laurie agreed with a smile.

‘I didn’t mean just in looks. It’s the way she is. Warm and open.’

Oh, now, he really hadn’t meant to come out with that. He didn’t want her thinking that he was pursuing her, the way the gym guy had last year. Because he wasn’t pursuing her. Was he?

Her smile widened. ‘Thanks. I’m trying to give her the best view of life and other people—and I don’t want her to think it matters that she doesn’t have a dad.’

‘Of course it doesn’t.’

Though Marc couldn’t help wondering what had gone wrong with the marriage. He couldn’t imagine anyone being daft enough to let Laurie go.

And that was an even more dangerous thought. Laurie Grant was sweet and warm and chaotic, and she most definitely didn’t need any more complications in her life. Especially a complication like him. ‘My patient’s here,’ he said, gesturing to the screen on his desk. ‘Better not keep him waiting.’

‘No.’ She got up and walked to the door. ‘See you later, maybe.’

Marc couldn’t stop thinking about Laurie all afternoon. And he found himself going over to her place later that evening. Izzy was in bed, to his relief, and Laurie had tidied up. He wondered if she’d done it specially.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I did tidy up in case you came over.’

He groaned. ‘I’m sorry. Did I say that aloud?’

‘No, but it was written all over your face.’

He felt the colour seep into his cheeks. ‘I’m sorry. I wasn’t criticising you.’

‘I know, but it was chaos city here and it’d gone beyond even my mess tolerance levels.’

She made coffee, and ushered them through to her living room. There were pictures everywhere, more even than he could remember Ginny having in their house. ‘So tell me about your patient.’

‘She’s about our age, and had cysts on both ovaries. The surgeon couldn’t save them. And now she wants a baby and can’t have one without help.’ He sighed. ‘I really feel for her.’ Especially as it had ripped the top off his own scars. Elaine Kirby had said how much she wished she’d starting thinking about a baby earlier, instead of leaving it until her career was settled and she’d saved up enough to extend her maternity leave. And how Marc wished he and Ginny hadn’t waited so long either …

‘IVF?’

‘Her husband isn’t keen—it’s not the money, it’s the emotional upheaval and what she’d have to go through physically. And she’s not sure about adoption—even though it’s the being there that makes you a parent, not the biology.’

‘That’s very true.’

He grimaced. ‘Sorry. That wasn’t meant to be a pop at you.’

‘I know.’ She brushed it aside. ‘Poor woman. That’s a tough situation. But you can’t fix everything, Marc.’

‘You try,’ he pointed out.

‘Yes, and I always will. But you have to be realistic. Some things you can’t fix.’

‘I’m sending her for counselling.’

‘Which is exactly what I would’ve done, too.’

‘It doesn’t feel like enough.’

He sounded so miserable. And Laurie wanted to cheer him up. ‘Maybe not now, but these things take time.’ She looked at him. ‘I have an idea. Something that will make you feel better.’

‘Dr Fixit again?’

‘Absolutely.’ And the fact that Marc Bailey was utterly gorgeous … well, that had nothing to do with this. A relationship wouldn’t be a good idea for either of them. But friends she could do. ‘Are you busy on Sunday?’

‘Why?’ he asked, sounding wary.

‘Because,’ she said, ‘you’re new to the area and there’s something special you probably don’t know about but you need to see, and it really has to be this weekend.’

His eyes narrowed. ‘What does?’

‘Something,’ she said softly, ‘that I always came home for at this time of year. Even when we were really busy at the practice in London.’

He blinked. ‘You lived in London?’ He sounded surprised, as if he hadn’t expected that.

‘I haven’t always worked in a small town.’ She smiled to take the sting from her words. ‘I trained in London, and I worked as a GP there after I qualified. I decided to come back home when Izzy was born. It was probably a bit selfish of me, but I needed my family’s support, and I’m glad I made that decision. So, shall I pick you up at nine on Sunday?’