‘It’s so beautiful round here, isn’t it?’

‘Mmm,’ Lucas murmured, with a faster beating pulse as his glance took in the slender stem of her neck rising smooth and sun-kissed. He’d been hurt in mind and body, he thought, but Jenna was beautiful and untouched—which was how it should be.

She was observing him with questioning eyes above the sparkling liquid in the glass and, twirling the stem of it between her fingers, she commented, ‘You’re miles away.’

He shook his head. She was wrong. He was exactly where he wanted to be.

Dear Reader

Welcome to the first of my books where coast and countryside combine to bring you the beautiful Devon village of Bluebell Cove. A place where doctors and nurses in the medical practice look after the health of the local folk and share their joys and sorrows, and in return have the respect and support of their patients when it is their turn to need a friend.

I live in a village in the Cheshire countryside myself, and it never ceases to amaze me how close is the bond between those who live here. When one of them hurts they all hurt. When one of them rejoices they all rejoice.

In WEDDING BELLS FOR THE VILLAGE NURSE a bubbly young nurse finds the man of her dreams in Bluebell Cove. But not without first having to break through barriers created by disillusion and disenchantment.

If you have enjoyed reading about the folks there, do look out for their stories in books two, three and four. They’ll be coming along shortly.

So do let’s keep in touch, dear reader, as I write and you read about golden beaches, clotted cream teas, and romance in Devon—glorious Devon!

Abigail Gordon

Wedding Bells for the Village Nurse

By

Abigail Gordon

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Abigail Gordon loves to write about the fascinating combination of medicine and romance from her home in a Cheshire village. She is active in local affairs, and is even called upon to write the script for the annual village pantomime! Her eldest son is a hospital manager, and helps with all her medical research. As part of a close-knit family, she treasures having two of her sons living close by, and the third one not too far away. This also gives her the added pleasure of being able to watch her delightful grandchildren growing up.

Recent titles by the same author:

COUNTRY MIDWIFE, CHRISTMAS BRIDE*

A SUMMER WEDDING AT WILLOWMERE*

A BABY FOR THE VILLAGE DOCTOR*

CHRISTMAS AT WILLOWMERE

COUNTRY DOCTOR, SPRING BRIDE

A SINGLE DAD AT HEATHERMERE

*The Willowmere Village Stories

FOR MY NIECE NICOLA AND HER DAUGHTER CHLOE, FAR AWAY IN TEXAS

CHAPTER ONE

WHEN Jenna Balfour looked out of the window of the taxi as it cruised along the coast road on a Sunday afternoon in midsummer it was there down below, beautiful and changeless. A strip of golden sand where Atlantic breakers, white edged and powerful, forever staked their claim, and today, as was often the case, surfers were there to challenge them with boards at the ready.

It had been her favourite place while she’d been growing up and nothing had changed while she’d been studying nursing at a London college. Every time she’d been home on vacation she’d gone down to the beach to surf within minutes of arriving home.

But all that had changed. She hadn’t seen the house on the headland where she’d been brought up and the beach below for two years—ever since she’d insisted she wanted some time out to see the world before falling in with her mother’s wishes for her to join the local practice that Barbara Balfour ran with brisk efficiency.

Her father had understood how Jenna had felt. A retired solicitor who’d had a practice in the nearby town, he was easy to talk to and treated his bubbly only daughter, who had eyes blue as the sea below and hair the colour of corn at harvest time, with a whimsical affection.

Her mother rarely had time for family discussions and preferred results to rhetoric. Both father and daughter had cause to think that the practice came first, family second, with her, and for the main part they accepted it in the knowledge that Barbara Balfour was held in high esteem by patients and staff alike.

Eventually there had been a row, a big one, with Keith Balfour in the middle trying to keep the peace between the wife and daughter he loved, but it hadn’t worked and Jenna had gone to follow her dream in angry rebellion instead of with her mother’s blessing.

She’d regretted it as soon as she’d gone, but her mother wasn’t the only one with a mind of her own and she’d stayed away until the day that a phone call from her father had wiped out all the anger and she’d found herself getting an early flight home from the French town where she’d been doing some bank nursing.

He’d sometimes rung her for a chat, but his tone on that occasion had been serious, and she’d listened to what he had to say in shocked amazement. Her mother had been forced to take early retirement from the practice that was her life’s blood because of severe rheumatoid arthritis.

‘She needs two sticks to get around and it is difficult because her hands are so swollen. Sometimes we use a wheelchair,’ he’d said.

There had been silence while Jenna had digested that and then she’d said slowly, ‘Was this coming on when Mum was so keen for me to join the practice as soon as I’d qualified?’

‘She’d seen a rheumatologist, yes, but wasn’t expecting such a fast deterioration and now in spite of the fact that you quarrelled she needs you, Jenna, though she won’t admit it.’

‘Yes, of course,’ she’d said immediately, thinking tearfully that her mother being the needy one would be a first. ‘Give me a couple of days to sort things out at this end and I’ll be with you as soon as I can.’

‘Shall I tell your mother you’re coming?’

‘It’s up to you, Dad. Do what you think best. She’s never been keen on surprises, you know.’

‘She’ll like this one,’ he’d promised reassuringly, and that had been it.

And now in a few moments she would be back in the place that was so dear to her heart. The countries she’d visited had been interesting. She wouldn’t have wanted to miss the experience, but the grass wasn’t always greener on the other side of the fence, she’d found. It had been more a case of her wanting to stretch her wings a little before returning to her beloved Devon.

There was no car on the drive when the taxi turned onto it and her heart missed a beat. Her dad knew she was coming even if her mother didn’t, so where were they?

As she put her key in the lock of a front door that had weathered many a storm in its exposed position, the phone rang and when she picked it up her father’s voice came over the line in a whisper.

‘Ah, Jenna, you’ve arrived,’ he breathed. ‘I haven’t told your mother you’re coming home. I wanted it to be a complete surprise. When she suggested that we drive out into the countryside for a cream tea this afternoon I couldn’t very well drop it on her at the last moment, knowing what a stickler she is for everything being cut and dried.

‘We are in the tearooms now, waiting to be served. It’s quite a long drive back, so it could be a couple of hours before we return, but it will at least give you time to get settled before the two of you meet.’

‘Er yes, I suppose so,’ she said weakly into the anticlimax. ‘I’ll see you later, but what do we do if Mum doesn’t want the joyful reunion bit?’

‘I suggest we worry about that when it happens’ were his parting words.

It had taken just a matter of minutes to make herself a coffee and a sandwich, then she went upstairs to unpack. As she crossed the landing the door of her parents’ bedroom was open and they were all there, the aids to mobility that were the lifesavers of those who had very little of it.

How could it all have changed so suddenly? she thought dejectedly. Her mother had always seemed invincible, nothing ever pierced her armour of capability, but something had, a creeping painful illness that was attacking her freedom of movement and the amazing energy she’d always had.

In her own room, overlooking rocky cliffs that descended to the seashore, there was comfort to be had. It was exactly as she’d left it, with her surfboard propped up in the corner, and as she stroked it lovingly it seemed to be just the thing to take away the hurt of arriving to an empty house with so much worry on her mind.

A summer sun was beating down and the sea was so blue she gave in to temptation. Deciding there was no need for a wetsuit, she fished out a bikini and once she’d changed into it tucked a towel under her arm. With sandals on her feet she picked up the surfboard and after locking the door behind her began to walk down the road that led to the beach.

She usually clambered over the rocks as a more speedy way of descending but today, wanting to savour every moment of her return, she used the slower and more sedate pathway.

‘Hi, Jenna, where’ve you been?’ a male voice cried as she hit the beach. ‘Haven’t seen you in ages.’

It was Ronnie, one of the lifeguards out on patrol, and as he came loping across she laughed up at him, the reason for her being there forgotten in the pleasure of the moment.

He was a muscular thirty-six-year-old, married with a wife and children he adored, living in a cottage at the other side of the bay, and always had a cheery greeting for Dr Balfour’s daughter when she came surfing.

‘I’ve been taking some time out,’ she told him, ‘and am now back for good.’

‘Great!’ he enthused. ‘We’ve been short of glamour on the beach since you went.’

‘Yes, I’ll bet,’ she joked, ‘and where is everyone on a sunny day in the height of the holiday season?’

She’d seen a few surfers in the water when she’d been looking through the window of the taxi, but now there was only one and he was on the point of coming out, carrying his board as he strode towards them.

‘They’ve all gone to the opening of a new theme park not far away,’ he replied, ‘or disappeared earlier on fishing trips.’

Out of the corner of her eye Jenna saw that the man who had just come striding out of the surf had stopped beside a folded towel and was now drying himself briskly. As she observed him she thought with a body like that he put Ronnie’s bronzed biceps in the shade.

He was half-turned away from them and she registered a thatch of dark hair, flat and glistening wet against his head, and hands with long supple fingers holding the towel. The vivid scar that she’d noticed across his chest as he’d moved in their direction was no longer visible, but there had been time for her nurse’s practised eye to observe that it was red and jagged as if from a recent injury.

‘Not good about your ma, is it?’ Ronnie was saying sympathetically.

‘No,’ she replied glumly, taking her glance off the man with the scar and feeling that until she’d seen her mother for herself she didn’t want to talk about it.

‘Cheer up, Jenna,’ the amiable lifeguard said, sensing a drop in spirits. ‘How about a kiss to celebrate your return?’

She was smiling again. Ronnie was a tease. ‘You’ll have to get down on your knees and beg,’ she told him.

He obeyed with a bellow of laughter and, planting a butterfly kiss on the top of his head, Jenna left him there and began to move towards the water.

The solitary surfer had finished drying himself and as he turned to pick up his board they almost collided as they came face to face.

‘Sorry,’ he said abruptly.

‘It’s OK,’ she told him easily, meeting the dark hazel gaze that was also part of the package with a sudden feeling of breathlessness and weakness of the knees.

He would be a tourist, she could bet on it, she was deciding, while at the same time registering that there was no responding cordiality in his expression. So with that thought in mind she sidestepped him and proceeded towards a joyful reunion with the pounding Atlantic breakers.

When she turned he’d gone and so had Ronnie. She had the beach to herself and in a moment of wild joy Jenna walked into the oncoming tide with surfboard at the ready.

She could have stayed there for ever, but a glance at her watch said that soon her parents would be back and the moment she was dreading would be upon her.

Had the young blonde in the bikini been the Balfours’ prodigal daughter? Lucas Devereux pondered as, with feet slapping wetly against the stone of an old causeway, he walked to where he’d parked his car.

He’d heard the lifeguard greet her and the name had fitted, as had the flippancy she’d displayed. He’d wondered a few times how a daughter could leave her mother in the state that she had been in during her last months as head of the practice and flounce off to do her own thing.

Keith had been there for Barbara, of course, and he was much easier to get on with than his wife. She was a very strong character, while all her husband asked for was peace, and from what he’d heard the man didn’t get much of that.

They’d met the other day in the post office and the retired solicitor had told him that their daughter was coming home, that it was going to be a surprise for her ailing mother, and he would be obliged if Lucas didn’t mention it to anyone else.

He’d replied grimly that being involved in the affairs of others was not his forte, far from it, and that no one was going to get to know of Jenna Balfour’s return from him. No doubt if it had been her on the beach they would find out soon enough. In the close community of Bluebell Cove news got around faster than the speed of light.

As he drove inland from the beach the whitewashed wall of The Tides practice loomed up in front of him with its tubs of summer flowers at the entrance and a long wooden bench for those who preferred to wait their turn outside—weather permitting.

When he’d been discharged from the hospital where he’d been employed ever since qualifying and had ended up as a patient after an incident that had almost cost him his life, he had been persuaded by his friend Ethan Lomax to move into community health care work for a while in a coastal suburb of Devon that was blessed with golden sands and backed on to fertile countryside.

On doing so, he had rented a property called The Old Chart House just a few doors away from the surgery and it was there that he was heading with his expression just as sombre as it had been earlier when he’d seen the girl that he’d surmised might be the Balfours’ daughter.

Just as that family were going through a sticky patch, so was he, and the only person who knew about that was Ethan, who had taken over as senior partner in the local practice when the redoubtable Barbara had been forced to let someone else take the reins.

His friend had visited him in hospital a few times after the incident that had nearly killed him and had made him feel like turning his back on medicine for ever. He’d been performing a routine operation, serious enough but not normally life threatening, when the patient, a woman in her thirties, had gone into shock and died almost immediately on the operating table. There had been no response to resuscitation and he’d had the unpleasant task of telling her husband the tragic news.

The man had gone crazy, his outrage outweighing his grief, and as Lucas was turning away he’d lunged at him with a knife that he’d produced from somewhere and slashed him across the chest. The thin hospital gown he had been wearing had been no protection and the wound was life threatening.

Afterwards, on several of his visits, Ethan had mentioned casually that there could be a place for him here in Bluebell Cove if he so desired, in quieter, less stressful surroundings than those of a big hospital.

At the time he hadn’t been even remotely interested. The future had loomed like a black abyss with no sense or reason in it. But as his body had slowly healed he had accepted grimly that surgeons at the hospital where he saved lives had given him back his, and he was going to have to drag himself up out of the black void.

In the end he’d listened to what Ethan had to say with regard to life in a place like Bluebell Cove being lived at a slower pace, and his friend’s comment that surgeons of his standing were few and far between when he’d said he was thinking of giving up medicine.

He’d taken indefinite leave from the hospital in the nearby town where he’d been the top cardiovascular surgeon for the past five years and so far it was working out all right because he had fallen completely under the spell of Bluebell Cove. So much so that he was in the process of buying The Old Chart House and turning part of it into a private heart clinic which would fill the time when he wasn’t helping out at the surgery. But the nightmare that had brought him there still tormented him in the long hours of the night and on awakening.

On the outside he still gave off an aura of cool competence, but underneath there was hurt and disillusion and the fear that he would never again be the man who had always taken life by the horns, had known where he was going, what he was aiming for—that sort of confidence was now in short supply.

The one thing that his friend hadn’t taken it upon himself to offer advice on was Lucas’s broken engagement to Philippa Carswell, who had worked with him in the cardiac unit at Hunters Hill Hospital.

It had occurred just before the attack on him and he’d never mentioned it since, but there’d been a drawn, pinched look about him afterwards. At the time it had been thought by some that the broken engagement had affected his work and had led to the death of the patient on the operating table which had triggered off the savage attack on the hospital’s top heart man.

But while Lucas had been fighting for his life enquiries had shown that as usual his work had been faultless, and that the demise of the woman undergoing heart surgery had been due to a massive embolism that had blocked the main pulmonary artery and caused sudden death.

Jenna was framed in the open doorway as her father helped her mother slowly and painfully out of the car. She wanted to run to her and hold her close, but caution was holding her back. They’d parted on bad terms, for one thing, and for another it was rare for her mother to be at a disadvantage in a situation. She doubted she would take kindly to this one—a gentle approach was called for.

When Barbara straightened up on the drive supported by the two sticks that Jenna’s father had mentioned, she looked up and saw her, and Jenna felt her throat go dry as the moment took hold of the three of them.

Her mother’s face was slack with surprise and the colour was draining from it as she said, ‘Jenna! Where have you come from?’

‘Just across the Channel, Mum,’ she said softly as she walked towards her.

‘Why didn’t you let me know what was happening to you, for goodness’ sake? I would never have gone if I’d known.’

Barbara’s smile was wintry. ‘I’m not used to pleading. I couldn’t use my fast-approaching immobility as a means of tying you to me.’ She turned to her husband, who so far hadn’t spoken. ‘You are behind this, I suppose, Keith?’

‘Yes,’ he said stoutly, ‘and don’t tell me that you’re not pleased.’

There was no reply forthcoming to that. Instead she asked Jenna, ‘So how long are you here for?’

‘As long as you need me. I’m home for good.’

Her mother’s face was crumpling. ‘Even though I’m still a bossy and cantankerous woman? I don’t deserve you both.’

‘We’ll say hear, hear, to that, won’t we, Jenna?’ Keith joked, gazing at the two women in his life and smiling his relief.

One day he would tell Jenna what it was that had driven her mother through all the years when they and the practice had been in two very separate compartments of her life, theirs being the smaller. But in the meantime Barbara needed to be inside and resting after their drive across the downs on the cliff tops and into the countryside.

The sun was setting like crimson fire on the horizon as Jenna gazed down onto the beach later that evening. Her mother was asleep and her father contentedly watching television.

She had helped Barbara to undress and assisted with her toiletries, and when she had finally settled against the pillows her mother had taken her hand into her own swollen one and without any words of endearment had said simply, ‘I will sleep better tonight not having to wonder where you are and if you’re safe.’

Knowing that such a comment coming from her was the nearest she might ever get to ‘I love you’, Jenna had kissed her gently on the brow and said, ‘Don’t disturb Dad if you need help in the night. Call me, yes?’

‘Yes,’ her mother had replied obediently and they’d both dissolved into laughter at the reversal of their roles, and the moment of shared amusement was another first.

And now the night was still young and there were lots of folk on the beach and in the sea, out to enjoy every moment of the waning day. Ronnie must have been right, she decided. Their absence in the afternoon had been because there had been something special on.

‘I’m going for a stroll,’ she told her father on returning to the sitting room.

‘Sure,’ he said easily. ‘I will most likely have gone to bed by the time you get back so I’ll see you at breakfast, beautiful daughter.’ With a twinkle in his eye, he added, ‘I thought sometimes that you might bring the man of your dreams back with you one day.’

‘No chance. I met one or two nice guys, but Mr Right wasn’t amongst them. I think he’s still on the drawing board,’ she said lightly, and for a moment the man with the amazing attractiveness and closed expression that she’d seen on the beach came to mind.

There had been no mention of the practice since she’d arrived home, Jenna was thinking as she walked slowly along the road that led inland from the seashore, and when there was, what was she going to say?

There might be no need to say anything if the surgery was fully staffed, and how would she feel then—disappointed? That kind of thing was in Ethan Lomax’s hands now. He was senior partner and would be the one she needed to talk to if she wanted to work there.

She’d always wanted a career in nursing and having had her time out was ready to put to use the skills and knowledge that she’d acquired during her training. Most of the friends she’d made during that time had gone into hospital situations but, Jenna thought whimsically, they hadn’t had a mother who’d been the best G.P. for miles around and had wanted the same kind of dedication from her daughter.

The local pub was just a few doors away from the surgery and when it came into sight she saw that all the tables and chairs outside were occupied by those who had been tempted out by the mellow night.

Someone called across to her. She waved but didn’t linger and carried on walking past the surgery towards The Old Chart House, which had been empty the last time she’d seen it.

A guy was cutting the lawns at the front of it with a powerful machine and even with his back to her she recognised the stance of him as the surfer she’d met that afternoon.

As the memory was taking shape he swung the mower round to face the front and it was as before, a meeting of glances.

‘Hello, there,’ he said. ‘We met earlier on the beach, if I’m not mistaken.’

‘Yes,’ she replied, and having no wish to give the impression that she’d seen it as a memorable occasion commented, ‘I’m surprised to find this place occupied. It has been empty for a long time.’

‘So I believe,’ he replied, resting his arms on the handle of the mower. ‘I rented it originally, but when I decided to stick around I wanted living in Bluebell Cove to be a more permanent thing, and have heard only today that my purchase of the property has gone through.’

‘Wow!’ she exclaimed. ‘It’s a lovely house. Congratulations!’

‘What for?’ he asked dryly. ‘Buying a house that is far too big for me?’

‘So you live alone?’

‘Yes, where do you live?’ As if he didn’t know.

‘With my parents at the moment in the house on the headland called Four Winds.’

So he was right, Lucas was thinking. This was the Balfour girl, having changed the bikini for a blue cotton sundress that matched her eyes.

There might have been a time when he would have warmed to her attractions but after Philippa the mighty ocean not far away would freeze over before he made that mistake again. From what he’d heard this one had an eye to the main chance too, leaving her mother in the state she’d been in when he’d made the acquaintance of the staff at The Tides practice.

He had no family and envied those who had in whatever shape or form. His father had died while he’d been at medical school fifteen years ago, and as an only child he’d been very protective of his mother until she too had succumbed to inoperable cancer.

Philippa Carswell had been his second in command on the cardiology unit at Hunters Hill Hospital, with hair the colour of fire and the passion to go with it. He’d been in love with her and had believed she’d returned his feelings.

As well as being physically attracted to her, he’d admired her determination to get to the top of her profession, until he’d discovered that she had intended him to be a casualty on the way.

But she’d reckoned without friendship. He’d always had a good relationship with fifty-year-old Robert Dawson, head of the hospital trust at Hunters Hill, and one night when the two men had met up for a meal, which they did occasionally, his friend had warned Lucas that Philippa wanted his job and had told him that she would do anything to get it.

He might have doubted the truth of it coming from anyone else, but not from Robert, who was the soul of integrity. When he’d challenged her about it she’d laughed in his face and commented that all was fair in love and war.

It had been war all right from that moment on, and realising she’d gone a step too far she’d packed her bags and gone to work in America, leaving him with a jaundiced view of the opposite sex, beautiful ones in particular.

Discovering that he’d been just a rung on the ladder of her ambition had been the first life-shattering thing to happen to him, but the next had been far worse and he was always going to carry the scar from the stab wound he’d received that day.

It was one of the hazards of being a doctor, one he could have done without, but he’d forgiven the culprit and was trying to get on with his life in the slower, less fraught kind of way that Ethan had described by holding a twice-weekly heart clinic at the practice where the other man was in charge. He was also intending to open up a private consultancy shortly, in the house that was now his.

It was all very different from the life he’d envisaged for himself. With Philippa gone and the cut and thrust of the cardiac unit at the hospital no longer at his elbow all the time, whether he was going to be happy in it remained to be seen, but no doubt, as it always did, time would tell.

While his thoughts had been somewhere else Jenna had been observing him warily, keen to know who he was but not about to ask. She sensed something in his manner and as she’d never met him before until today it was strange. Her curiosity was increasing by the second.

It was not to be satisfied, however. He wasn’t quite as aloof as when they’d met on the beach, but no name or any other item of information was forthcoming from him. Only one thing was sure, he’d bought The Old Chart House so she would be seeing him around and that was a thought not to be treated lightly.

‘Bye for now,’ she said breezily into the silence that had fallen between them. ‘I hope you’ll be happy in your new home.’

‘Thanks,’ he replied, taken aback at receiving good wishes from a stranger, and as if he had to justify himself for some reason he went on, ‘I’m not sure about that, but I do admit that I’ve fallen in love with this place, the house, the beach, and the green fields of Devon stretching as far as the eye can see.’ His voice hardened. ‘Those kinds of things don’t change.’

‘Er, no,’ she agreed, not sure what to make of that, and turning to go back the way she’d come, she left him with a casual wave of the hand.

When she’d gone he stood without moving, staring grimly into space. What on earth had possessed him to start chatting to her? If she was out to scrape an acquaintance she’d chosen the wrong man. He might have been a fool once, but twice? Never!

When she awoke early the next morning Jenna could already hear the laughter of children down below and the deeper tones of parents, signalling that the tide was out. Further along on the headland someone had lit a fire and she could smell bacon cooking.

If only her mother was in better health she would be content, she thought as she watched them from her window. Their reunion had been less stressful than she’d expected and if she would let her help instead of hanging so tightly onto her independence she, Jenna, could combine a part-time job somewhere with looking after her.

As she was clearing away after breakfast she heard a familiar voice on the terrace where her parents were sitting in the sun, and when she went outside Ethan Lomax observed her in surprise.

‘Jenna!’ he exclaimed. ‘Have you come back to us, or is it just a visit?’

‘I’m back,’ she told him, smiling her pleasure at the sight of the good-natured doctor who had taken her mother’s place. ‘I haven’t discussed it with Mum and Dad yet as I only arrived yesterday, but I would like to combine looking after her with some sort of part-time nursing somewhere.’

‘I can manage…’ her mother started to protest.

Ignoring the protest, Ethan was smiling and saying, ‘You need look no further if you want a job. We need a part-time practice nurse to help with morning surgery, and for a couple of afternoons to assist Lucas in the cardiology clinic.’

‘Lucas! Cardiology clinic!’ she exclaimed. ‘Who might he be? And how long has the surgery been able to offer that kind of thing?’

‘Since a friend of mine needed a change of scene,’ he said with a smile. ‘So are you interested?’

‘Of course I am!’ she hooted, ‘just as long as Mum and Dad agree.’

‘You already know my views regarding you joining the practice,’ her mother said.

Her father commented gently, ‘It’s all right by me, but I don’t want you to feel that now you’re back you’re being hemmed in with our affairs, Jenna. You’ve got a top degree in nursing, remember.’

‘Yes, I know,’ she replied, ‘but a nurse is a nurse is a nurse wherever he or she may be. My stepping into that role here has been delayed, but I always intended to join the practice one day if there was a place for me. We Balfour women have to stick together.’

The saying of that sentiment would have stuck in her throat at one time, she thought, but there was something so sad in seeing her mother defeated by illness that she’d meant every word.

Ethan was checking his watch. ‘Must go,’ he said, ‘or they’ll be thinking at the surgery that I’ve got lost. So are we sorted, Jenna? You’re interested in coming to join us?’

‘Yes. Definitely.’

She would have agreed to sweep the streets, or empty waste bins, if it would have resulted in the same degree of happiness she was seeing on her mother’s face.

‘Call in this afternoon for a chat if you get the chance,’ he said as she walked to the gate with him. He lowered his voice. ‘It must have been a shock when you saw your mother. She was fine when you left, wasn’t she?’

‘Yes, she seemed to be,’ she told him sombrely. ‘I had no idea, and needless to say she didn’t tell me what was going on. That isn’t her way.’

‘I know,’ he agreed, ‘and it isn’t always the best.’

When he’d gone her father said by way of explanation, ‘Ethan calls every morning on his way to the surgery to make sure we’re all right. He’s a good guy.’

It was late afternoon before Jenna got the chance to call in at the practice and when she went through the main doors into Reception she was gripped by a feeling of unreality. This had been her mother’s domain and now here she was, another Balfour about to become part of The Tides practice.

There was a new face behind Reception and as Jenna moved across to explain why she was there, the door of a consulting room opened directly behind her. As she swivelled round, there he was again, the mystery man, surfer, property owner, and what else—patient, doctor, medical sales rep?

The questions crowding her mind were soon answered as with a swift glance in her direction he said to the elderly man about to depart, ‘I want to see you again next week, Mr Enderby, and if in the meantime the fast heartbeat or breathing problems return send for me immediately and we’ll take it further. The ECG you’ve just had didn’t show any cause for concern at the moment, but do remember that my heart clinic is here for your benefit.’

‘It was probably me getting so worked up about losing my sheepdog that caused me to be the way I was,’ the elderly farmer said awkwardly. ‘I’d had Jess for a long time.’

‘So maybe it wasn’t surprising, then,’ he said with a sympathetic smile, and Jenna thought that it must just be her that he couldn’t take to. Yet why should this stranger want to get to know her? He might be living alone but there was nothing to say that he didn’t prefer it that way, or wasn’t already spoken for.

George Enderby halted in his tracks when he saw her standing there and exclaimed, ‘Jenna! How long have you been back in Bluebell Cove, my dear?’

‘Since yesterday,’ she told him with a wide smile.

‘And are you staying?’

‘Yes, I am, Mr Enderby. I’m going to be working mornings here and will be helping with the new heart clinic on two afternoons.’

‘That’s good news. I feel better already.’ He chortled and went slowly on his way, leaving her to adjust to the fact that the man on the beach was the Lucas person, the celebrity who was involved with the practice.

He was a new face there, just as the receptionist seemed to be, and she, Jenna, would be another when she joined the staff. Though she wouldn’t be a new face to everyone. To most folk she would be Barbara’s daughter.

Only that morning Ethan had referred to a cardiologist who had his own clinic there, and this just had to be him with a dark suit and smart shirt and tie replacing the swimming trunks of their first meeting and the sports shirt and shorts that had been his attire on the second.

The elderly farmer had gone and now the receptionist was on the phone to a patient and the man observing her with cool dark eyes said, ‘I’m presuming that you are Jenna Balfour here to see Ethan. He said to look after you if he wasn’t back from an urgent home visit he’s been called out on, but I’m sure that the receptionist will be only too pleased to make you a cup of tea when she comes off the phone.’

His tone implied that he didn’t want the responsibility of looking after her and she told him frostily, ‘I’ll be fine, thanks just the same. It seems as if you have quite rightly decided who I am, so how about introducing yourself?’

‘Lucas Devereux,’ he said evenly, ‘recuperating in the countryside and involving myself in medicine at a slower pace.’

She held out a smooth ringless hand and said, ‘Pleased to meet you, Dr Devereux.’

He hesitated for a second then took it in a firm clasp and instead of greeting her in a similar fashion merely said, ‘Nice of you to say so.’

The receptionist had replaced the phone and he didn’t waste a second in saying, ‘And now, if you will excuse me, I have a patient waiting.’

‘Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘I’ll go and seek out someone that I know after I’ve introduced myself to this lady.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘JENNA! So you really are back! I didn’t believe Ethan when he told me he’d seen you this morning,’ Lucy Watson cried when she opened the door of the nurses’ room to her knock.

‘Hello, Aunt Lucy’ she said, hugging the sparse frame of her mother’s only friend and confidante. ‘Dad phoned to ask me to come home because of how Mum is, and I came as soon as I could. I had no idea what was going on behind the scenes when I went away or I would never have gone, and now that I’ve seen her I’m appalled.’

‘Yes, I’m sure you are,’ her mother’s friend said consolingly. She had been senior practice nurse for almost as long as Barbara had been in charge of the coastal medical centre. ‘I told your mother countless times that she should put you in the picture, but we both know what she’s like. Barbara will choke on her own pride one of these days.

‘But enough of the past. Let’s talk about the present. Ethan tells me that you’re going to join us part time and spend the rest looking after your mother. That is really good news. Your father has been coping wonderfully but Keith needs some help, so who better than his lovely daughter who is also a nurse?

‘Any problems will come from your mother’s side of the arrangement. She is so used to dealing with the sick and suffering that becoming one of them herself has been hard to accept, as you can imagine. What sort of a welcome did you get?’

Jenna smiled. ‘Reasonable enough. We actually had a laugh together.’

‘Wow!’ Lucy exclaimed. ‘Seriously, though, be patient with her, Jenna. Her life has changed unbelievably.’

‘I’m not short on patience,’ she said soberly. ‘One needs it in plenty to be a nurse. It’s my mum who has always been short on it, at least where Dad and I are concerned.’

The other woman sighed. ‘Yes, I agree, but knowing your father, Keith won’t let you take on too much of the burden. The situation is that now Barbara needs a woman’s care. The fact that you are home and will be around and are about to join us here at the practice is wonderful news.’

‘That’s what I thought,’ Jenna said wryly, ‘but I’ve just had a lukewarm reception from the cardiologist who is now part of the practice and Ethan wants me to assist him with his clinic on the two afternoons that he’s here. We’ve already met briefly on two occasions and I get the feeling that he disapproves of me for some reason so he won’t be laying down the red carpet for his new assistant.’

Lucy smiled. ‘Don’t be put off by his manner. Lucas Devereux is quite something in the medical world in these parts. Until recently he was top cardiologist at Hunters Hill Hospital and we couldn’t believe it when he agreed to move here at Ethan’s suggestion. It seems that the two of them are friends from way back.’

‘Even so, why lower his sights to that extent if he was top dog at The Hill?’

‘Some guy went berserk and attacked him when one of his family died during an operation that he was performing, and Lucas nearly lost his life as well.

‘I’ve also heard tales of a broken engagement round about that time, so it’s not surprising that he isn’t full of the joys of spring, or should I say summer.’

Before Jenna had time to digest the distressing facts that Lucy had just passed on to her, Ethan’s voice could be heard outside in the corridor. A moment later he appeared, smiling his pleasure to see her there, and she thought that here was a man who was always the same, no matter what life dealt out to him, and he’d had his own share of ups and downs in the not so recent past.

‘I’ve just spoken to Lucas,’ he told her, ‘and he says that the two of you have already met.’

‘Yes, we bumped into each other on the beach yesterday, and when I went for a stroll yesterday evening he was cutting the grass outside The Old Chart House, which he told me now belongs to him.’

‘Hmm, that is so,’ he said. He turned to Lucy. ‘Do you mind if I take Jenna away from you for a little while?’

The elderly practice nurse was smiling as she told him, ‘Of course not, Dr Lomax. Knowing that she’s back and is joining the practice has brightened my day.’

‘So are you really ready to come and join us here at The Tides?’ Ethan asked when they were seated in the office at the back of the surgery building.

‘Yes,’ she said firmly, ‘if you’re sure that you want me on the staff, but as I said this morning I want to help look after my mother too.’

‘Of course you do,’ he agreed, ‘but you are going to need some life away from the house, Jenna. You are young and bright and will liven up this place. The patients will love you and so will the staff.’

‘Oh, yes?’ she said doubtfully, with the memory of Lucas’s critical appraisal still very clear.

Ignoring the comment, he said, ‘So how about mornings, eight-thirty until twelve, and Monday and Thursday afternoons assisting Lucas in the heart clinic? Do you think you could manage that with your mother to care for as well?’

This is the moment to say I can manage the mornings but not the afternoons, she was thinking. Did she want to work in such close contact with Lucas Devereux?

‘I can certainly manage the mornings,’ she told him. ‘Mum is always up early. I can see to it that she is bathed and dressed before I leave and Dad will organise their breakfasts. Could I give the afternoons a trial before I commit myself on that?’

‘Yes, of course,’ he said easily. ‘I haven’t mentioned it to Lucas yet so a trial it shall be, say, for a couple of weeks, and then we’ll have another chat.’

Unaware that he was the subject of their conversation, Lucas had just seen his last patient on their way and was thinking about his meetings with Jenna Balfour. Why couldn’t he have been more pleasant, he thought, instead of giving in to an insane urge to put out her light for no other reason than someone had extinguished his own?

When he’d seen her frolicking around with the lifeguard on the beach the day before, his lip had curled at the spectacle, but who was he to criticise the light-hearted actions of others because his heart lay heavy as a stone?

Taking his jacket off a hanger behind the door, he picked up his case and went into the outer corridor just as Jenna, having finished her chat with Ethan, was saying goodbye to Lucy.

‘Tell your mum I’ll pop round for a while this evening if she feels up to it,’ she was saying. ‘Give me a ring if she’s not, Jenna, and I’ll come some other time.’

The girl with hair like sunlight was smiling, but there was something wistful in her expression as she said, ‘Mum has always been happy to see you, Aunt Lucy.’

There were tears on her lashes as she gave the elderly practice nurse a parting hug and when she turned to go she found Lucas observing her once again with the unreadable dark hazel gaze that was becoming familiar.

At the main door of the surgery he was close behind and held the door for her to go through. She quickened her step to get away from him and he surprised her by saying, ‘So what arrangements have you made with Ethan?’

She came to a halt and turned slowly to face him, surprised that he was aiming the question at her instead of the head of the practice, in the light of his previous manner. Suddenly her pent-up resentment of his attitude towards her came to the fore and she said, ‘I’m not sure that you would want to hear it.’

Dark brows were rising as she went on, ‘It is quite clear that you disapprove of me, though heaven knows why as you hardly know me. Yet I suppose it is possible to feel an immediate aversion to someone right from the moment of meeting. That being so, maybe Ethan would be the best person to explain what his plans are for me.

‘I’m told that life has not been kind to you of late and I’m sorry to hear that,’ she told him without pausing for breath. ‘I saw the scar when we were on the beach and felt the injustice of it when I discovered from where it came. As for the inward hurts that come from broken relationships I’m sure that they too must be very painful, though I haven’t had that sort of experience myself.’

‘Have you quite finished?’ he asked dryly.

‘Er, yes,’ she said hurriedly, as the verbal floodgates that had opened suddenly closed. ‘And do please forgive me for being so intrusive. I don’t know what came over me. Feel free to tell me to mind my own business.’

Before he could reply she began to walk quickly towards the seashore and home, and it wasn’t until she reached the headland that she stopped for breath and stood cringing at the thought of how she’d behaved.

She couldn’t believe that she’d let someone she hardly knew get to her to such an extent. Maybe it was because she was desperate for him to like her…and he didn’t.

She hadn’t looked back. If she had she would have seen a grim smile on his face as he thought that she’d managed to refrain from saying, ‘Don’t take your misfortunes out on me,’ but it was quite clear that she’d thought it and who could blame her?

Lucy had come as promised and as she watched Jenna wandering restlessly from room to room in the warm summer night she said, ‘I’ll see to Barbara when she’s ready for bed if you want to go out.’

‘Would you, Aunt Lucy?’ she said gratefully. She was desperate to speak to Lucas Devereux again before the day ended, knowing that she wouldn’t be able to sleep if she hadn’t apologised for her incredible outburst. If he hadn’t liked her before he must detest her now, she kept telling herself, and not without good reason.

The same crowd as the night before was outside the pub as she went past but she hardly noticed them. She was praying that when she reached his house he would be there.

He was and when he answered her ring on the doorbell Lucas was wearing paint-splashed jeans, a shirt in a similar condition, and was holding a paintbrush. As he stepped back to let her in she said with the same kind of rush as when she’d said her piece the first time, ‘I’ve come to apologise.’

‘There is no need,’ he said levelly. ‘You are entitled to your opinion.’

She was observing him slack-jawed. Was this the sardonic stranger who had never been out of her thoughts from the first moment they’d met and was now climbing down off his pedestal?

‘It is generous of you to say so,’ she said gravely, ‘but none of us know when life will change for the better or for the worse. When I thought about it afterwards I realised that I must have sounded extremely smug and preachy.’

‘Forget it,’ he insisted in the same flat tone. He pointed to a can of paint. ‘What do you think of white for the paintwork in the hall? Everywhere in this place is so drab and dark colours are so depressing.’

‘Er, yes, you can’t go wrong with white,’ she said awkwardly, with the feeling that she’d stepped on to some sort of roller-coaster that was going in the wrong direction.

It was more nerve-racking to be on good terms with Lucas Devereux than bad. Had the man any idea how attractive he was? He made all other guys she’d ever met seem pale by comparison, but if she was going to have to work with him it would be a case of keeping her mind on what she was there for, and wondering what it would feel like to be in his arms would not be on the agenda.

She’d walked up from the headland in the summer dusk and now the daylight had finally gone. The moon was dominating the heavens in a cloudless sky and conscious that she’d interrupted what he’d been doing Jenna said, ‘I must go. I’ve left Aunt Lucy with my mum so she’s all right, but I don’t want to be away too long.’

He didn’t comment but gave her a strange look and then took her by surprise again by saying, ‘If you’ll hang on while I change my clothes, I’ll walk you home.’

‘There’s no need,’ she said hastily. ‘I know the way. I’ve done it a thousand times.’

‘Nevertheless, I am not going to let you walk home alone,’ he told her decisively. ‘Make yourself comfortable on the sofa in the sitting room. I will be just a couple of minutes.’

He was as good as his word. She sensed that he always would be and would have scant patience with anyone who wasn’t.

They’d been walking in silence for a few moments and out of the blue Lucas asked, ‘So where is your lifeguard friend tonight?’

Jenna swivelled to face him, eyes widening in surprise at the question ‘You mean Ronnie?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, if that’s his name.’

‘He will be down on the beach, or with his wife and family, I would imagine, but why do you ask?’ He didn’t reply and as light began to dawn she exclaimed in slow surprise, ‘Ah! I see! When we were larking about yesterday you came to the conclusion that there was more to it than just a laugh between friends, which was rather presumptuous on your part, don’t you think?

‘Ronnie has lived here all his life, just as I have. We were in junior school at the same time, though he was on the point of leaving when I started as there is a few years’ difference in our ages. He knows me best from me being on the beach. I’ve always used it a lot, and I’m godmother to one of his children.’

‘All right!’ he protested. ‘I get the picture, and you are correct in pointing out in a roundabout way that it is none of my business.’

He wasn’t going to tell her that he was piqued because she was turning out to be different from what he’d expected, that he’d wanted her to be the laughing blonde in a bikini flirting with the handsome lifeguard, because it fitted in better with his present jaundiced views on beautiful women.

Next he’d be discovering that Jenna Balfour hadn’t really deserted her parents when she’d been needed—the kind of criticism he’d heard from some of the village folk who thought highly of her mother’s years of devoted care for the patients at The Tides.

They’d reached the headland. The lighted windows of Four Winds were shining out in the darkness and she said gravely, ‘Thank you for walking me home, Lucas, but before you go, can I ask you a question?’

‘Of course,’ he told her smoothly, half expecting what was coming next.

‘Do you always make a snap judgement on meeting someone for the first time?’

‘In my work, never!’ he replied, then, as Philippa drifted into his mind, he went on, ‘But I was guilty of that kind of thing not so long ago and paid a high price for my gullibility with regard to a beautiful woman. I apologise for letting my first glimpse of another equally beautiful woman cause me to form what now seems to be the wrong opinion, if that is what you want me to say?’

‘Only if it is really meant,’ she said coolly. ‘We haven’t got off to a very good start, have we? If we are going to be working together we need to clear the air so that when Ethan passes on to you his suggestion that I assist you in your Monday and Thursday afternoon clinics you will have had time to decide if you are prepared to be in such close proximity to me.’

‘It will depend on if you’ve had any experience of cardiology nursing more than anything else,’ he said dryly. ‘Have you?’

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘I’ve worked on a coronary unit in France, but when Ethan suggested that I assist in your clinic I asked that I might give it a trial first.’

‘For what reason? You’ve just said that you have some experience.’

‘You were the reason. I sensed your antipathy towards me.’

‘And how do you feel about that now?’

She was smiling. ‘Better, I think, because it seems that you might be human after all.’

The sardonic smile was back. Most nurses he’d worked with had treated him with reverence and respect. But here was a free spirit amongst the nursing fraternity who wasn’t all that keen to work with him and there were all the ingredients of a challenge in that.

‘So I’ll see you on Thursday afternoon, then?’ he questioned as they stood looking down at the foamtipped waves lapping onto the beach in the moonlight.

‘Er, yes, if you’re going to agree to what Ethan wants.’

‘I’ve known him a long time. Ethan Lomax is a good friend,’ he told her sombrely. ‘He saved my sanity when he persuaded me to move to Bluebell Cove. His plans for the practice will be my top priority as long as I am involved in it so, yes, I’m going to agree to you working with me.’

‘Who is assisting you now?’

‘No one as yet. Today’s clinic was only the second one and we were still looking for a nurse. You appeared at just the right time,’ he told her, and hoped that she realised he was speaking from a medical point of view. As far as he was concerned, there would never be a right time for anything more personal.

As he walked back to his own place Lucas was thinking that from what he’d seen of her so far there appeared to be nothing devious about the beautiful Jenna Balfour, and added to that she had the personality, and hopefully the nursing experience, that he would require from her in the cardiology clinic.

For the first time in ages he was actually feeling cheerful as he climbed the stairs to the drab main bedroom of his newly acquired property, but he knew it wouldn’t last. He was surrounded by too many dark shadows and broken dreams.

‘Do you want to take the car?’ Keith asked when Jenna came downstairs the next morning looking trim and competent in the dark blue dress of the practice nurse that Lucy had brought for her the night before.

‘No. I’ll walk,’ she said. ‘You’ll need the car if you have to take Mum anywhere. The first chance I get I’ll sort out some transport of my own. Which reminds me, is my bike still in the outhouse?’

He smiled. ‘Yes, knowing how much you used to love the thing, I’ve taken great care of it while you’ve been away.’

She gave him a hug and her mother, seated nearby, nodded approvingly at the idea of Jenna cycling to the practice instead of walking. A feeling of rare contentment had come over her when she’d seen her daughter dressed for the surgery, and some of the pain of her own limitations had disappeared.

There’d been a lot of time to fill since she’d had to hand the practice over to Ethan, and she thought frequently that if she had to do it all over again, these two who loved her unconditionally would be first of all her priorities.

A promise she’d made way back to another loved one, long gone, had driven her through the years to a greater degree than she should have allowed it to, and now she was praying that she hadn’t left it too late to be the wife and mother she should have been.

Ethan was Lucas’s nearest neighbour, residing in a recently erected detached house that the builder had been inspired to grace the front of with an assortment of attractive pebbles from along the coastline.

It was only a few yards from the practice, which was a bonus as he and his wife had recently separated and the close proximity to his job made coping with the break-up a little easier. But nothing was going to take away the hurt of being apart from his children, Kirstie, eleven, and Ben, thirteen. They were living abroad with Francine, their French mother, and although he had access to them, the life of a busy G.P. didn’t allow for long absences from the practice.

The two men valued each other’s friendship and rarely mentioned the women who had once been in their lives and were now part of their pasts, but each was aware that the inward hurts of broken relationships were still there, and for his part Lucas was only too happy to be there for Ethan should he need him to help with practice matters.

Both at a loose end, they went to the pub that evening and as they chatted Lucas found the opportunity to question his friend about Jenna’s addition to the staff.

‘She’s a great girl,’ Ethan enthused, ‘and Barbara will be on cloud nine to know that another member of her family has joined the staff of The Tides. Jenna is going to work mornings and if you are agreeable will assist you in your clinic two afternoons a week.’

‘That sounds fine,’ he said immediately, omitting to mention that he’d already heard about it from the nurse in question. ‘When is she due to start?’

‘Tomorrow morning,’ Ethan informed him, ‘which will mean that instead of just having the faithful and very experienced Lucy at one end of the scale, and young trainee Maria at the other, we’ll have three practice nurses, which we’ve needed for some time.’

‘Sounds good,’ Lucas commented, and wanting to satisfy his curiosity further asked, ‘So why didn’t Jenna come into the practice when she graduated?’

‘She wanted some freedom away from her mother. There was a big fallout because she wouldn’t toe the line and off she went. But she would never have gone if her mother had told her how increasingly difficult it was to keep going with the rheumatoid arthritis progressing as it was. Some of the locals who feel Barbara Balfour can do no wrong were very critical of Jenna at the time, but those who knew and liked her understood.’

‘I see,’ he said dryly, as another of his suppositions went by the board. Yet he’d been half expecting it ever since he’d got to know the golden girl better.

As Lucas went for his paper the next morning to the busy general store at the far side of the surgery, Jenna was cycling towards him in the early morning sun, a smiling vision in her nurse’s uniform.

‘Hello, there!’ he said as she stopped beside him. ‘I’d forgotten that you are about to join the fray. How does it feel?’

‘Scary,’ she told him wryly. ‘I wasn’t exactly the most popular person around here when I went away. It would seem that a lot of people knew that Mum wasn’t coping, but no one thought to tell me, and of course Mum hid it from me, though I was so wrapped up in my own plans I wasn’t entirely blameless.’

‘So your father didn’t say anything?’

She smiled. ‘Dad less than anyone. He wanted me to get away for a while for reasons that I won’t go into, but not so much that he didn’t send for me when he thought it was time I knew what the situation was.’

The smile was still there and Lucas was surprised when she went on to say, ‘You see, I was brought up with one and a half parents.’ And before he had the chance to comment further she placed her foot back on the pedal and prepared to ride the last few yards to the practice with a parting comment of, ‘I’ll see you on Thursday afternoon, Lucas, if you still want me at the clinic.’

‘It is Ethan’s decision that you work with me, and you might find it hard to believe…but I don’t bite.’

She was already moving off so he didn’t know if she’d heard the last bit, and he thought grimly if that was what she thought, he’d asked for it by being so smugly critical of someone he’d had no yardstick to measure by. There was Philippa, of course, who’d betrayed him, but to compare Jenna with her just because she was beautiful would be an insult that she didn’t deserve.

The morning was going too quickly. Lucy had greeted her with open arms, and Maria, the young trainee practice nurse, who was Ronnie’s eldest daughter, had flashed her a shy smile when Jenna had presented herself at the the nurses’ room.

Ethan had popped in for a moment to greet her in his usual pleasant manner and she’d felt that at least there was no criticism here. They were her friends, and even Lucas had been pleasant when they’d met unexpectedly outside the busy little store.

She’d watched while Lucy had treated the first few patients and noted that they were more concerned about their health than the fact that there was a newcomer amongst the practice nurses. When Lucy needed to go to the storeroom for supplies she said, ‘I’ll leave you to see to the next patient, Jenna. Maria will help you out with any surgery routine that you’re not sure of.’ And off she went.

In line with that comment the teenager went out on to the corridor where patients waited to be seen and came back to report that Mrs Waterson was there.

Jenna groaned inwardly as she picked up the patient’s records and saw that she’d come for a three-monthly B12 injection to keep anaemia at bay. Mildred Waterson had been a great admirer of her mother and rightly so as Barbara had treated her for various illnesses over the years, all of them serious, and she’d always made a good recovery due to her care. With everyone else Mildred was vinegary and critical and that side of her nature became evident the moment she saw Jenna smiling across at her as she entered the room.

‘So you’re back, I see,’ she said. ‘Waited until your mother had gone first, though, didn’t you, and now they’ve taken you on in the surgery. Well, I’ll wait for my injection until Lucy comes back from wherever she’s gone, if you don’t mind.’

‘Of course I don’t mind, Mrs Waterson,’ Jenna said quietly. ‘She will only be a moment. Do take a seat.’

‘Fine,’ she snapped. ‘I will. And how is your mother?’

‘As well as can be expected. I am working mornings mainly so that I can be with her in the afternoons.’

‘Yes, I should think so,’ was the acid reply.

At that moment Lucy appeared and immediately picking up on the atmosphere said smoothly, ‘Isn’t it lovely to have Jenna with us, Mildred?’

‘Mrs Waterson would prefer you to give her the injection, Lucy,’ Jenna said quickly, before any other bad vibes were put on display.

The elderly nurse said calmly, ‘Yes, fine, but in future there will be three nurses in attendance, Mildred, and it will be a matter of which one is free.’

The next patient was George Enderby, the elderly farmer who had been to Lucas’s heart clinic, and to Jenna’s relief there was a twinkle in his eye when he saw her standing there.

‘Hello, Jenna,’ he said heartily. ‘I saw you the other day, didn’t I, when I’d been to see that campanologist fellow?’

‘You’ve got that a little bit wrong, Mr Enderby,’ she told him. ‘Dr Devereux is a cardiologist.’

‘So what do those others do then, go camping?’

‘No, they are the bell ringers. The people in the bell tower who turn out for Sunday church services, weddings and funerals, and now we’ve got that sorted out I see that you’re here for a dressing on your leg, so if you’ll roll up your trousers we’ll have a look at it.’

The twinkle was still there in his eye as he did as she’d suggested and she said laughingly, ‘You were teasing, weren’t you? Wanting me to think you didn’t know that Dr. Devereux is a cardiologist.’

‘I might have been, yet it was worth it if it made you smile. But, then, you’d just had Mildred Waterson in here, hadn’t you? And with regard to the heart man, what a treat to have somebody like him here for us folks. The only thing is that his skills could be wasted in a place like this. I wonder what made him leave Hunters Hill Hospital to come and work in Bluebell Cove?’

‘I’m sure there must have been a good reason,’ she replied, as a vision of the awful scar across his chest came to mind, and she started to wonder what the effects of a physical attack and the failed romance she’d heard about could have had on him.

CHAPTER THREE

WHEN Jenna left the practice at the end of the morning Lucas was in the garden once more, and after glancing quickly across to where she was mounting her cycle he didn’t attempt to make any eye contact, but what he had seen in that brief glimpse was enough to tell him that she wasn’t as happy as she’d been when they’d met outside the store earlier, and he wondered what could have made her look so downcast.

He wasn’t to know that although the farmer’s good-natured teasing had taken away some of the hurt that Mildred Waterson’s acid tongue had inflicted, the pain of being judged unfairly by some was taking away the pleasure of being back in Bluebell Cove.

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