A debt repaid...with love?

Tom Blake helped Tasha Raymond through a heartbreaking loss eighteen months ago—so when she learns he’s been devastatingly injured she’s determined to repay the debt by helping him in return.

Working with the handsome GP stirs up a storm of emotions, but Tasha has no intention of truly getting close. The playboy’s devil-may-care attitude is the last thing she needs! But then the wounded doc’s kindness proves too much temptation for her heart to resist...

“I need to get over the hurt.” Tasha was trying her hardest to keep this conversation grounded. “Like you. You’re improving every day.”

“I’m not talking about physical hurt. It’s the other hurt that stays with us. Watching my father break my mother’s heart... Watching your husband betray you... Watching Emily die...” And then he stopped.

There was a long, long silence. She couldn’t break it. She didn’t know how.

And then... “Tasha, I’d really like to kiss you.”

This was a bad idea. Her head knew it, but somehow tonight she’d passed the point where her head was in control.

The night. The pain she’d just tried to express. His pain.

Tom...

She’d never spoken to anyone as she’d just spoken to Tom. She tried to hide her pain, not put it out there for anyone to see.

Only this wasn’t anyone.

Tom was her friend. He was the man she’d gone to when she was in trouble. He was a colleague, someone who’d helped her, and she could help him back. A man who’d suffered a cerebral bleed.

He was all of those things, but above all he was Tom.

Dear Reader,

I’ve recently moved to a small coastal village where the sand squishes between my toes, where the waves are a gentle background murmur, and where I lie in bed at night and listen to the foghorns of ships as they head off into the unknown. And as I get to know my new home I’m realising that many of its residents are here for a reason. This place can be wild, windswept and awe-inspiring...or it can be calm and breathtakingly beautiful. Either way, it seems a place for healing.

The thought of such healing is what’s inspired Falling for Her Wounded Hero. My heroine has lost her baby, and my hero has suffered life-changing injuries in a surfing accident. They’re both doctors, but they can’t heal themselves. Not alone.

But for the last few months my dog and I have walked my beach, over and over, until I’ve worked out how their strength, their hope, their love and their laughter, combined with the support of their wonderful seaside community, can finally let them find their future.

Enjoy,

Marion Lennox

Falling for Her Wounded Hero

Marion Lennox

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Praise for Marion Lennox

“This is a wonderful book, full of the trademark warmth, soul-searching and cheer Marion Lennox brings to all her books.”

—Goodreads on From Christmas to Forever?

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

Praise

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

THE SURF OUTSIDE his surgery window was calling like a siren’s song. Sunlit waves were rolling in with perfect symmetry. Dr Tom Blake had been watching them between patients, crossing his fingers that his list for the afternoon stayed short.

It did. Cray Point was a small town tucked away on a peninsula on Australia’s south-east coast, and almost without exception its residents loved the ocean. On a day like this, only the most urgent medical problems replaced the call of the surf.

Which meant Tom could surf, too.

‘That’s it,’ he called to his receptionist as he closed his last patient file. ‘We’re out of here.’

‘One more,’ Rhonda called back. ‘A last-minute booking. Mrs Tasha Raymond’s here to see you.’

Tasha Raymond.

A tourist? Something easy, he hoped, and headed out to usher her in.

And stopped.

The woman was sitting at the far side of his waiting room. She was close to thirty, he thought, and very pregnant. She had the exhausted and shadowed look he sometimes saw when pregnant women had too much to cope with—toddlers at home, too many work commitments, or a deep unhappiness at the pregnancy itself.

She was small, five four or five, and fair skinned, with brown curls caught into an unruly knot. She was wearing maternity jeans and an enormous windcheater. The shadows under her eyes suggested she hadn’t slept for days.

And he knew her. Tasha Raymond? He’d met her as Tasha Blake.

‘Tasha,’ he said, and she managed a smile and struggled to rise.

‘Tom. I didn’t think you’d recognise me.’

Fair point. Tasha was his half-brother’s widow but he’d only met her once, at Paul’s funeral four years ago.

He’d attended because he’d thought he should, not because he’d thought he was wanted. His stepmother had made it clear she’d prefer it if he stayed away. He’d gone, though, and had stayed in the background, and then one of Paul’s climbing mates who knew the family background had decided to intervene and introduce him.

‘Tom, I doubt if you’ve met Tasha. Did you know Tasha and Paul were married?’

The news that Paul had died trying to scale Everest had come as no huge surprise. Paul had spent his life moving from one adventure to another, taking bigger and bigger risks along the way. The knowledge that he’d found time to marry had been a bigger shock.

But the slight figure surrounded by Paul’s climbing friends had seemed almost a ghost. He’d told her how sorry he was, but he’d only had time for few perfunctory words.

For of course his stepmother had moved in. Afterwards he’d never been able to figure if her contempt was only for him, or if it had included Tasha. Tasha had been a pale figure huddled into someone else’s greatcoat to protect her from the icy winds at the graveside—and maybe also from her mother-in-law?

There’d seemed little point in pursuing the acquaintance, though. And after giving his condolences he’d left.

Four years ago.

Why was her face etched on his memory? Why was recognition so instant?

The notes in his hand said she was Tasha Raymond. She was obviously pregnant. Had she remarried? Four years was time to have moved on.

Rhonda was looking from Tom to Tasha with bright interest. Rhonda was the world’s worst gossip—well, maybe apart from her twin sister. Tom employed them both. Rhonda was his receptionist and Hilda was his housekeeper. The widowed, middle-aged sisters were excellent at their jobs but to say they were nosy was an understatement.

‘I can manage from here, Rhonda,’ he told her, smiling at Tasha with what he hoped was a brisk, professional nod. ‘You can go.’

‘Oh, but Mrs Raymond—’

‘Mrs Raymond is my late half-brother’s widow,’ he told her. He might as well. Rhonda would have asked Tasha to fill in a patient form and she’d have probably figured her history before he had. ‘I imagine she’s here on family business. There’s no need for you to stay.’

* * *

Rhonda reluctantly gathered her belongings and departed.

Tasha was left with Tom. She felt ill.

What was she doing here?

She knew what she was doing here. She was here because she was desperate. She had to have help.

I can manage alone. It had been her mantra when her parents had been killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan when she’d been in her teens. It had held her up when Paul had died on Everest.

Two days ago it had crumbled.

Paul had been big-boned and muscular, his tall frame made larger by pushing himself to the limits of endurance in every possible physical endeavour.

This man was his half-brother and she hardly knew him.

Tom’s hair was a deep brown, like Paul’s, but sun-bleached at the tips as if he spent time in the surf she could see outside his surgery window. He was taller than Paul, six feet two or three. His blue eyes were creased at the edges and his skin was tanned. He was lean, muscled, taut. Another who pushed his physical limits? Who thought risks were fun?

She couldn’t help it. She shuddered.

She was here because she needed him. Needing another Blake? The thought made her feel ill.

‘Tasha,’ he said softly, and his attention was all on her. ‘How can I help?’

It would have been a shock to see her, she thought. It had been a surprise to meet him at Paul’s funeral. This man and Paul had never been permitted to be brothers.

‘My mother would disown me if she ever caught me talking to that side of the family,’ Paul had told her. ‘Which always seemed a shame. When I was a kid my father took me on a holiday, supposedly just father and son. Unbeknown to my mother, he invited my half-brother, too. Tom’s four years older than me and I thought he was cool. Kind, too, to a kid who trailed after him. But of course Mum found out and hit the roof and as a kid I never saw him again. We met a couple of times later on with Dad, but then we lost touch. In an odd way, though, it’s always seemed like I have a brother. If anything happened to me, Tasha, I reckon you could go to him.’

If anything happened to him. Like being crushed by tons of ice on Everest.

She hadn’t needed Tom then, though, and she’d made a vow. She’d never need anyone again. Not like she’d needed her parents or thought she’d needed Paul. Paul had made her world crumble even before he’d been killed.

So what was she doing now, asking for help from another Blake? Paul and his father had both been charming, undependable womanisers. Why should this man be different?

Because she needed him? Because she’d taken yet another risk and failed.

Her last risk.

‘Tasha?’ Tom’s voice was still gentle, that of a concerned family doctor. Maybe that was the way to go, she thought. She could talk to him as one medic to another.

Only she didn’t feel like a medic. She felt like a terrified single mum who’d just heard the worst of news.

‘Tea,’ Tom was saying, suddenly brisk, and his hands were on her shoulders and he was propelling her back into her seat. ‘You look exhausted. I’m thinking tea with lots of sugar and then take your time and tell me all.’

‘I should have booked for a long consultation,’ she managed, trying to joke. ‘I only booked for standard. You’ll be out of pocket.’

‘Do you think I’d charge?’ His voice was suddenly strained but he had his back to her, putting on the kettle at the little sink behind Rhonda’s desk. ‘You’re family.’

Family. She stared blankly at his broad back, at the tanned and muscled arms emerging from his crisp, white short-sleeved shirt, at the stethoscope dangling casually from his back pocket.

He oozed competence. He oozed caring.

He was a family doctor. This was what he did. There was no reason for her to want to well up and demand a hug and turn his shoulder into a sodden mess just because he’d said the word ‘family’.

She wouldn’t.

But she needed him and the very thought had her terrified.

So she sat on, silent, trying to keep her thoughts in check.

Tom spent time making tea, checking how she had it, measuring sugar, stirring for maybe longer than it needed, as if he sensed she needed time to get herself together. By the time he set the mug into her cupped hands and tugged a chair up before her so he could sit down and face her, she had the stupid tears at bay again. She was under control—or as under control as she could be after the appalling news of two days ago.

‘Now.’ Tom was smiling at her, his very best patient-reassuring smile, a smile she recognised as one she’d practised as a new doctor. Family or not, she was clearly in the category of new client who may or may not have something diabolical going on.

There was a box of tissues on the side bench. He swiped it surreptitiously forward—or not so surreptitiously as she noticed and she even managed a smile.

‘I won’t cry on you.’

‘You’re very welcome to cry if you want. I wouldn’t have minded it you’d cried on me four years ago. That one meeting and then you were gone...’

‘To England,’ she told him. ‘I couldn’t stay here. Paul’s mother blamed—’

‘Paul’s mother is a vituperative cow,’ he said solidly, and Tasha thought of Deidre and thought she couldn’t have put it better herself.

‘She thought I should have stopped Paul trying to climb.’

‘No one could ever stop Paul doing what he wanted to do.’

‘You knew him?’

‘Not much. My mum was happy for me to meet Paul but Paul’s mother...not. When Dad moved on from Deidre as well, it made things even more complicated. Dad was a serial womaniser. My mum coped okay—she got on with her life—but Deidre stayed bitter. She fought Dad’s access to Paul every inch of the way. Dad cared about both Paul and me, but with Paul he ended up sidelined. As we got older Paul and I used to meet a bit. We’d have a drink with Dad occasionally, but after Dad’s death we lost touch. Tasha, you need to drink.’

‘What...?’

He took her cupped hands in his and propelled the mug to her lips. ‘Tea. Drink.’

She drank and was vaguely surprised by how good it tasted. When had she last had tea?

Come to think if it, when had she last eaten?

Great. Collapsing would help no one.

Neither would coming here. She should face this herself.

She couldn’t. She needed... Tom.

‘So tell me why you’re here?’ he asked.

She’d come this far but she didn’t want to tell him. She didn’t want to tell anyone.

Telling people made it real. It couldn’t be real. It had to be a nightmare.

‘Tasha, spill,’ Tom said, in that gentle voice that did something to her insides. It made things settle. It made the battering ram in her heart cease for a moment.

Though of course it started up again. Some things were inescapable.

‘My baby...’ she started, and Tom sat back a little and eyed her bulge.

‘Close to term?’

‘I’m due to deliver next week.’

He nodded, as if it was entirely sensible that a close-to-term pregnant woman had decided to drive to Cray Point just to see him.

She should keep talking.

She couldn’t.

‘Do you have a partner?’ he asked tentatively when she couldn’t figure what to say next. ‘Is the baby’s dad around?’

And finally she found the strength to make her voice work. ‘The baby’s father is Paul.’

‘Paul...’

‘He left sperm,’ she managed. She’d started. She had to find the strength to continue. ‘That last climb...I was so angry with him for going. There’d been two landslides on Everest, major ones. The Sherpas were pulling out for the season, as were most of the climbers, but he still insisted on going. Then he came home that last night before he left, laughing. “I’ve got it sorted, babe,” he told me. “I’ve been to the IVF place and left sperm. It’s all paid for, stored for years. If worst comes to worst you can have a little me to take my place.”’

She paused, searching for the words to go on. ‘I think it was a joke,’ she said. ‘Maybe he thought it’d make me laugh. Or maybe he was serious—I have no way of telling. But I knew...I waved goodbye to him and somehow I knew that I’d never see him again.’

She tilted her chin, meeting his look head on. ‘I was almost too angry to go to his funeral,’ she told him. ‘It was such a stupid, stupid waste. And then Deidre was in my face, blaming me, making nasty phone calls, even turning up at work to yell at me. So I left for England. You know I’m a doctor, too? I took a job in the emergency department in a good London hospital and I decided I’d put Paul behind me. Only then...then I sort of fell in a heap.’

Tasha shrugged. How to explain the wall of despair that had hit her? The knowledge that her marriage to Paul had been a farce. That her judgement was so far off...

She remembered waking one morning and thinking she was never going to trust again, and the thought had been followed by emptiness. If she couldn’t trust again, that excluded her from having a family. A baby. The thought had been almost overwhelming.

‘So you decided to use the sperm,’ Tom said, as if he was following her thoughts, and she felt a surge of anger that was pretty much directed at her naïve self.

‘Why not?’ she flashed. ‘Paul left it to me in his will. I could bring our baby up knowing the good things about Paul, feeling like it knew its dad. It seemed better—safer—than using an unknown donor, so I decided I’d be brave enough to try.’

And then she hugged her swollen belly, and the tears at last welled over.

‘I wanted this baby,’ she whispered. ‘I wanted her so much...’

Wanted. Past tense. The word was like a knife to her heart. She heard it and tried to change it.

‘I want her,’ she said, and her voice broke on a sob, but there was no changing what the scans had shown.

And Tom leaned forward and put his hands over hers, so there were four hands cupped over her belly.

‘Has your baby died, Tasha?’

And there it was, out there in all its horror. But it couldn’t be real. Please...

‘Not yet,’ she managed, and his grip on her hands tightened. I wonder if this is the way he treats all his patients, she thought, in some weird abstracted part of her brain that had space for those things. He was good. He was intuitive, empathic, caring. He’d be a good family doctor.

A good friend?

‘If anything happened to me, Tasha, I reckon you could go to him.’

Paul had been right, she thought. For just about the only time in his life, Paul had been right.

Oh, but laying this on him...

And he was a Blake. He even looked like his brother.

‘Tell me,’ he said, and it was an order, calm and sure, a direction she had to follow no matter how she was feeling. And she took a deep breath because this was what she’d come for. She had no choice but to continue.

‘My baby’s a girl,’ she whispered. ‘Emily. I’ve named her Emily after my grandma. I had to come back to Australia to access Paul’s sperm. I’m Australian and I have Aussie health insurance so I stayed here during my pregnancy. I’ve been doing locums. Everything was fine until the last ultrasound. And they picked it up. She has hypoplastic left heart syndrome. The left side of her heart hasn’t developed. That...that’s bad enough but I thought...well, the literature says there’s hope and there are good people in Melbourne. With the Norwood procedure there’s a good chance of long-term survival. I hoped. But two days ago I went for my last visit to the cardiologist before delivery and the ultrasound’s showing an atrial septal defect as well. And more. Nothing’s right. Everything’s wrong. While she’s in utero, she doesn’t need her heart to pump her lungs, so she’s okay, but as soon as she’s born...’

She took a deep breath. ‘As soon as she’s born the problems will start. The cardiologist says I need to wait as long as possible before delivery so she’s strong enough to face the faint possibility of surgery, but I’m not to hope for miracles. He says she’ll live for a little while but it’ll be days. Or less. The defect is so great...’

Strangely her voice was working okay. Strangely the words didn’t cut out. It was like the medical side of her was kicking in, giving her some kind of armour against the pain. Or maybe it was simply that the pain was so unbearable that her body had thrown up armour of its own.

Tom’s face had stilled. He’d be taking it in, she thought, like a good doctor, taking his time to assess, to figure what to say, to think of what might be the most helpful thing to say.

There wasn’t anything to say. There just...wasn’t.

* * *

Hypoplastic left heart syndrome...

He’d never seen a case but he’d read of it. He’d read of the Norwood procedure, a radical surgical technique giving hope to such babies, but with an atrial septal defect as well...

His hands were still gripping Tasha’s. They were resting against the bulge that was her baby, and he felt a faint movement. A kick...

In cases like this there usually weren’t any outward signs during pregnancy. A foetus only needed one ventricle. It didn’t use its lungs to get oxygen to the body, so while it was in utero there was nothing wrong.

If the experts were right, Tasha was carrying a seemingly healthy baby, a little girl who’d only survive for days after she was born.

This woman was a doctor. She’d have gone down every path. Her face said she had, and she’d been hit by a wall at every turn.

‘Transplant?’ he said, still holding her hands, and he thought maybe it was for him as well as for her. He had a sudden vision of his half-brother as a child, a tousled-haired wild child, rebellious even as a kid. A bright kid who’d tumbled from scrape to scrape. Paul had done medicine, too. Their father had been a doctor so maybe that’s why it had appealed to both of them, but the moment Paul had graduated he’d been off overseas. He’d helped out in some of the wildest places. He’d been a risk taker.

And now he was dead and his baby was facing the biggest risk of all. Being born.

A transplant? Without research it sounded the only hope.

‘You must know the odds,’ Tasha said flatly, echoing his thoughts.

He did. To find a suitable donor in time... To keep this little one alive until they found one, and then to have her fight the odds and survive...

He glanced up at Tasha’s ravaged face and he thought, Where are your friends? Where are your family? Why are you here alone?

And something inside him twisted.

He’d been a family doctor for ten years now. He loved the work. He loved this little community and when his patients were ill he couldn’t help but be personally involved.

But this woman was different.

She was his half-brother’s widow and as such there was a family connection. Her story was heartbreaking.

And yet there was something more. Something that made him want to loosen the grip on her hands and gather her into him and hold.

It was almost a primeval urge. The urge to protect.

The urge to take away her pain any way he knew how.

Which was all getting in the way of what she needed from him, which was to be useful. She was here for a reason. She didn’t need him to be messed up with some emotional reaction he didn’t understand.

‘So what can I do for you, Tasha?’ he asked, in a voice he had to force himself to keep steady. ‘I’ll help in any way I can. Tell me what you need me to do.’

She steadied. He could see her fighting back emotion, turning into the practical woman he sensed she was.

She let go his hands and sat back, and he pushed back too, so the personal link was broken.

‘I need an advocate,’ she told him. ‘No. Emily needs an advocate.’

‘Explain.’

She had herself under control again now—sort of.

‘I’m only part Australian,’ she told him. ‘My dad was British but Mum was Australian. I was born here but my parents were in the army. We never had a permanent home. Mum and Dad died when I was fifteen and I went to live with my aunt in the UK. That’s where I did medicine. Afterwards I took a job with Médecins Sans Frontières, moving all around the world at need, which is when I met Paul. Paul owned an apartment here so Australia was our base but we still travelled. I’ve never stayed still long enough to get roots, to make long-term friends. So now I’m in a city I don’t know very well. I’m about to deliver Emily by Caesarean section and straight after her birth I’ll be expected to make some momentous decisions.’

She faltered then, but forced herself to go on. ‘Like...like turning off life support,’ she whispered. ‘Like accepting what is or isn’t possible and not attempting useless heroics. Tom, I don’t trust myself but Paul said I could trust you. He spoke of you with affection. You’re the only one I could think of.’

And what was he to say to that?

There was only one answer he could give.

‘Of course I’ll be your advocate,’ he told her. ‘Or your support person. Tasha, whatever you need, I’ll be there for you. You have my word.’

‘But you hardly knew Paul.’

‘Paul’s family and so are you,’ he said, and he reached out and took her hands again. ‘That’s all that matters.’

* * *

‘Hilda?’

Hilda Brakenworth, Tom’s housekeeper, twin of Rhonda, answered the phone with some trepidation. She’d just finished making beef stroganoff and was contemplating the ingredients for a lemon soufflé. ‘Make it lovely,’ Tom had told her before he’d left for work. ‘Alice will be here at eight, just in time for sunset. Can you set the table on the veranda? Candles. Flowers. You know the drill.’

She did, Hilda thought dourly. Tom’s idea of a romantic evening never changed. But she was used to his priorities. Medicine came first, surfing second. His love life came a poor third, and the phone call she was receiving now would be like so many she’d received in the past. ‘Change of plan,’ he’d say and her dinners would go into the freezer or the trash.

‘Yes?’ she said, mentally consigning her lemon soufflé to oblivion.

‘Change of plan. I’ve invited a guest to stay.’

This was different. ‘You want a romantic dinner for three?’

He chuckled but Hilda had known him for a long time. She could hear strain in his voice—strain usually reserved for times when the medical needs of the community were overwhelming.

But did a guest staying warrant stress? She needed to phone Rhonda and find out what was going on.

‘I’ll put Alice off,’ he said. ‘She’ll understand.’

No, she won’t, Hilda decided, thinking of the beautifully groomed, high-maintenance Alice, but she didn’t comment.

‘Do you want me to make up the front room?’

‘I... Yes. And could you put flowers in there?’

‘It’s a woman?’

‘It’s a woman called Tasha.’ He hesitated and then he told it like it was. ‘She’s my half-brother’s widow and she’s in trouble. I’m hoping she’ll stay as long as she needs us.’

* * *

Cray Point was a tiny, seemingly forgotten backwater, a village on a neck of land stretching out from Port Philip Bay.

‘It’s one high tide away from being an island, but the medical emergency chopper can get here from Melbourne within half an hour,’ Tom told her. ‘Your Caesarean’s booked in a week and you’re not due for two weeks. We’re both doctors. We can surely detect early signs of labour and get you to the city fast.’

So a couple of hours after she’d arrived she was on the veranda, trying to eat the beautiful dinner Tom’s housekeeper had prepared.

Somewhat to her surprise she did eat. She’d looked at the meal and felt slightly nauseous, which was pretty much how she’d felt since that appalling last consultation with the cardiologist, but Tom had plonked himself down beside her, scooped stroganoff onto both their plates and directed her attention to the surf.

‘It’s too flat tonight,’ he told her. ‘It’s been great all day but the wind’s died and the waves have died with it. That’s the story of my life. I sweat all day trying to finish but the moment my patients stop appearing, so do the good waves. Dawn’s better but once I hit the water I forget what I’m booked for. So I have a great time and come in to find Rhonda ready to have my head on a platter and the waiting room bursting at the seams.’

‘Rhonda...’

‘Rhonda’s my receptionist. She and Hilda—she’s the housekeeper you just met leaving—are sisters. They rule my life.’

‘So no family? No wife and kids?’

‘With my family history?’ He grinned, a gorgeous, engaging grin that reminded her a little of Paul. ‘Paul must have told you about my dad. He did the right thing twice in that he married my mum and then Paul’s mother when they were pregnant, but he never stayed around long enough to be a father. He fancied the idea of his sons as his mates but the hard yards were done by our mums, and while they were raising us he went from woman to woman.’

‘You think that’s genetic?’

He grinned again. ‘I reckon it must be. Dating’s fun but I’m thirty-four years old and I’ve never met a woman I’d trust myself to commit to spending the rest of my life with.’ His smile faded. ‘But, unlike Dad, I won’t make promises I can’t keep. This life suits me. Mum was born and raised in Cray Point and this community nurtured both of us when Dad walked out on her. I left to do medicine but it’s always called me home. The surf’s great and the wind here in winter is enough to turn me into a salted kipper. I have a theory that the locals here don’t age, they just get more and more preserved. If you dig up the graveyard you’ll find old leather.’

‘That sounds like you have nothing to do as a doctor.’

‘Preserved leather still falls off surfboards,’ he said, and the smile came back again. ‘And tourists do dumb tourist things. I had a lady yesterday who rented a two-bedroom house for an extended family celebration and wanted it beautifully set up before they arrived. So she blew up eight air beds. On the seventh she started feeling odd but she kept on going. Luckily her landlady dropped in as she keeled over on the eighth. Full infarct. We air ambulanced her to Melbourne and she should make a good recovery but it could have been death by airbed. What a way to go.’

And for the first time in days—weeks?—months?—Tasha found herself chuckling and scooping up the tasty stroganoff. This man may well be a charming womaniser like his father and brother, but at least he was honest about it, she thought. And that side of him didn’t affect her. Just for the moment she could put tragedy aside.

As she ate he kept up a stream of small talk, the drama of being a small-town doctor in a town where access could be cut in a moment. As a doctor she found her interest snagged.

‘We can’t rely on the road,’ Tom told her as he attacked some lemon soufflé. ‘It floods. It also takes one minor traffic accident or one broken-down car to prevent access for hours or even days. As a village we’re pretty self-reliant and the medical helicopter evac team is brilliant. You sure you don’t want more of this?’

‘I... No.’ She’d surprised herself by eating any at all.

‘We’ll feed you up for the next week,’ Tom said calmly. ‘You and Emily. Did you know there are studies that say taste comes through? This is a truly excellent lemon soufflé. Who’s to say that Emily isn’t enjoying it, too?’

It was an odd thought. Unconsciously her hands went to her belly, and Tom’s voice softened.

‘Cuddling’s good,’ he told her. ‘I bet she can feel that as well, and I know she can hear us talking.’

‘She might...’ Her voice cracked. ‘But the doctor said...’

‘I know what’s been said,’ Tom told her, and his hand reached over and held hers, strong and firm—a wash of stability in a world that had tilted so far she’d felt she must surely fall. ‘But, Tasha, your baby’s alive now. She’s being cuddled. She’s sharing your lemon soufflé and she’s listening to the surf. That’s not such a bad life for a baby.’

It was a weird concept. That Emily could feel her now...

And suddenly Emily kicked, a good solid kick that even Tom could see under her bulky windcheater. They both looked at the bulge as Emily changed position, and something inside her settled. The appalling maelstrom of emotions took a back seat.

She was here overlooking the sea, feeding her baby lemon soufflé. It was true, Emily could hear the surf—every book said that babies could hear.

‘Maybe you could take her for a swim tomorrow,’ Tom suggested. ‘Lie in the shallows and let the water wash over you—and her. She’ll feel your body rocking and she’ll hear the water whooshing around. How cool would that be, young Emily?’

And he got it.

She looked up at him in stupefaction but Tom was gazing out to sea again, as if he’d said nothing of importance.

But he’d said it.

How cool would that be, young Emily?

No matter how short Emily’s life would be, for now, for this moment, Emily was real. She was her own little person, and with that simple statement Tom was acknowledging it.

The tangle of grief and fear and anger fell away. It was there for the future—she knew that—but for now she was eating lemon soufflé and tomorrow was for tomorrow. For now Emily was alive and kicking. She had no need for her faulty heart. She was safe.

And for the moment Tasha felt safe, too. When Tom had suggested staying she’d thought she’d agree to one night, when she could get to know him so she could figure whether she really could trust him to be her advocate. She knew if the birth was difficult and there were hard decisions to be made then she’d need a friend.

And suddenly she had one.

Thank you, Paul, she thought silently, and it was one of the very few times when she’d thought of Paul with gratitude. He had pretty much been the kid who never grew up, a Peter Pan, a guy who looked on the world as an amazing adventure. His love of life had drawn her in but she hadn’t been married for long before she’d realised that life for Paul was one amazing adventure after another. Putting his life at risk—and hers too if the need arose—was his drug of choice.

And as for Tom saying his father’s womanising was a genetic fault...yeah, Paul had pretty much proved that.

But now... He’d died but he’d left his sperm and it seemed he’d also left her a link to a man who could help her. Tom might be a womaniser like his brother. He might be any number of things, but right now he was saying exactly what she needed to hear. And then he was falling silent, letting the night, the warmth, the gentle murmur of the sea do his talking for him.

She could trust him for now, she thought, and once more her hands tightened on her belly.

She could trust this man to be her baby’s advocate.

And her friend?

* * *

By the time dinner ended Tasha looked almost asleep. Tom had shown her to his best spare room and she hit the pillow as if she hadn’t slept for a month. As maybe she hadn’t.

Tom checked on her fifteen minutes after he’d shown her to her bedroom. He knocked lightly and then opened the door a sliver. He’d thought if she was lying awake, staring at the ceiling, he could organise music or maybe a talking book.

She was deeply asleep. Her soft brown curls were splayed out over the pillows and one of her hands was out from under the sheets, stretched as if in supplication.

She hadn’t closed the curtains. In the moonlight her look of appalling fatigue had faded.

She looked at peace.

He stood and looked at her for a long moment, fighting a stupid but almost irresistible urge to stoop over the bed and hold her. Protect her.

It was because she was family, he told himself, but he knew it wasn’t.

Impending tragedy? Not that either, he thought. In his years as a country doctor he’d pretty much seen it all. Experience didn’t make him immune. When this community hurt, he hurt, but he could handle it.

He wasn’t sure he could handle this woman’s hurt.

And it wasn’t being helpful, staring down at her in the moonlight. It might even be construed as creepy. Like father, like son? He gave himself a fast mental shake, backed out and closed the door.

He headed to his study. Tasha had handed her medical file to him diffidently back at the surgery. ‘If you’re going to be our advocate you need to know the facts.’

So he hit the internet, searching firstly for the combination of the problems in Emily’s heart and then on the background of the paediatric cardiologist who had her in his charge.

The information made him feel ill. He was trawling the internet for hope, and he couldn’t find it.

He rang a friend of a friend, a cardiologist in the States. He rang another in London.

There was no joy from either.

In the end he headed back out to the veranda. This was a great old house, slightly ramshackle, built of ancient timber with a corrugated-iron roof and a veranda that ran all the way around. It was settled back from the dunes, overlooking the sea. The house had belonged to his grandparents and then his mother. It was a place of peace but it wasn’t giving him peace now.

This child was what...his half-niece? He’d scarcely known Paul and he’d only just met Tasha. Why should this prognosis be so gut-wrenching?

He couldn’t afford to get emotional, he told himself. Tasha needed him to be clear-headed, an advocate, someone who could stand back and see the situation dispassionately.

Maybe she should find someone else.

There wasn’t anyone else—or maybe there was, but suddenly he knew that even if there was he wouldn’t relinquish the role.

He wanted to be by her side.

Her image flooded back, the pale face on the pillow, the hand stretched out...

It was doing his head in.

It was three in the morning and he had house calls scheduled before morning’s clinic.

‘That’s the first thing to organise,’ he said out loud, trying to find peace in practicality. At least that was easy. Mary and Chris were a husband-and-wife team, two elderly doctors who’d moved to Cray Point in semi-retirement. They’d helped out in an emergency before and he knew they would now.

‘Because this is family,’ he said out loud, and the thought was strange.

The woman sleeping in his guest room, the woman who looked past the point of exhaustion, the woman who was twisting his heart in a way he didn’t understand...was family?

CHAPTER TWO

Eighteen months later...

THE SURF WAS EXTRAORDINARY. It was also dangerous. The wind had changed ten minutes ago, making the sea choppy and unpredictable.

The morning’s swells had enticed every surfer in the district to brave the winter’s chill, but a sudden wind change had caught them by surprise. The wind was now catching the waves as the swell rolled out again, with force that had wave smashing against wave.

Most surfers had opted for safety and headed for shore, but not Tom. There were three teenagers who hadn’t given up yet, three kids he knew well. Alex, James and Rowan were always egging themselves on, pushing past the limits of sensible.

As the wind had changed he’d headed over to them. ‘Time to get out, boys,’ he’d told them. ‘This surf’s pushing into the reef.’

‘This is just getting exciting,’ Alex had jeered. ‘You go home, old man. Leave the good stuff for us.’

They were idiots, but they were kids and he was worried. He’d backed off, staying behind the breakers while he waited for them to see sense.

Maybe he was getting old.

He was thirty-six, which wasn’t so old in the scheme of things. Susie was coming to dinner tonight and Susie was gorgeous. She was thirty-seven, a divorcee with a couple of kids, but she looked and acted a whole lot younger.

If she was here she’d be pushing him to ride the waves, he thought, instead of sitting out here like a wuss.

He glanced at the kids, who were still hoping for a clean wave. Idiots.

Was it safe to leave them? He still had to walk up to the headland before dinner, to take this week’s photograph for Tasha.

And that set him thinking. He’d promised the photographs but were they still needed? Was anything still needed? She didn’t say. He tried to write emails that would connect as a friend, but her responses were curt to the point of non-existent.

Maybe he reminded her of a pain that was almost overwhelming.

Maybe he was doing it for himself.

For Tom had stayed at Tasha’s side for all of Emily’s short life and it still seemed natural to keep tending her grave. In the few short days he’d helped care for the baby girl, she’d twisted her way around his heart.

But if Emily’s death still hurt him, how was Tasha doing? She never said.

Suddenly, lying out behind the breakers, overseeing idiots taking risks, he had a ridiculous urge to take the next plane and find out.

Which was crazy. He was Tasha’s link to her baby, nothing more, and she probably no longer wanted that.

But then he needed to stop thinking of Tasha.

A massive swell was building behind him, and the wind was swirling. He glanced towards the shore and saw the wave that had just broken was surging back from the beach. It was almost at a right angle to the wave coming in.

But the teenagers weren’t looking at the beach. They were staring over their shoulders, waiting for the incoming wave.

‘No!’ He yelled with all the power he could muster. ‘It’ll take you onto the reef. No!’

The two boys nearest heard. Alex and James. They faltered and let the wave power under them.

But Rowan either hadn’t heard or hadn’t wanted to hear. He caught the wave with ease and let its power sweep him forward.

It was too late to yell again, for the outgoing wave was heading inexorably for them all. For Tom and Alex and James it was simply a matter of head down, hold fast, ride through it. For Rowan, though... He was upright on the board when the walls of water smashed together.

The reef was too close. Rowan was under water, caught by his ankle rope, dragged by the sheer force of the waves.

He was on the reef.

Tom put his head down and headed straight for him.

* * *

There was no email.

Every Sunday since she’d returned to England Tom had sent an email, and there wasn’t one now.

At first she wasn’t bothered. Tom was a lone medical practitioner. Things happened. He’d send it later.

He didn’t...and so she went to bed feeling empty.

Which was stupid.

It had been eighteen months since Emily’s death. She’d left Australia as soon as the formalities were over, desperate to put the pain behind her. She hadn’t had the energy to head back to her work with Médicins Sans Frontières. Instead she’d taken a job in an emergency department in London and tried to drown herself in her job.

Mostly it was okay. Mostly she got to the end of the day thinking she could face the next.

And Tom’s emails helped. He sent one every Sunday, short messages with a little local gossip, snippets of his life, his latest love interest, any interesting cases he’d treated. And at the end he always attached a photograph of Emily’s grave.

Sometimes the grave was rain-washed, sometimes it was bathed in sunshine, but it was always covered in wildflowers and backed by the sea. He’d promised this on the day of the funeral and he’d kept his word. ‘I’ll look after this for you, Tasha. I’ll look after it for Emily and I’ll always make sure you can see it.’

It hurt but still she wanted it. She usually sent a curt thank you back and felt guilty that she couldn’t do better.

For Tom had been wonderful, she conceded. He’d been with her every step of the way during that appalling time.

It had been Tom who’d intervened when various specialists had decreed Emily needed to be in ICU, saying that spending time with her mother would decrease her tiny life span. Tom had simply looked at them and they’d backed off.

It had been Tom who’d organised discreet, empathic photographers, who’d put together her most treasured possession—an album of a perfect, beautiful baby being held with love.

It had been Tom who’d taken her back to Cray Point, who’d stood beside her during a heartbreaking burial and then let her be, to sit on the veranda and stare out at the horizon for as long as she’d needed. He’d been there when she’d felt like talking and had left her alone when she’d needed to be alone.

And when, three weeks after Emily’s death, she’d woken one morning and said she needed to go back to London, she needed to go back to work, he’d driven her to the airport and he’d hugged her goodbye.

She’d felt as if leaving him had been ripping yet another part of her life away.

But his emails had come every Sunday, and he was seemingly not bothered that she could hardly respond.

‘So what?’ she demanded of herself when there was still no email the next morning. ‘Tom was there when you needed him but it’s been eighteen months. You can’t expect him to photograph a grave for the rest of his life.’

Could she move on, too?

And with that came another thought. The idea had seeped into her consciousness a couple of months ago. It was stupid. She surely wasn’t brave enough to do it, but once it had seeded in her brain the longing it brought with it wouldn’t let her alone.

Could she try for another baby?

What would Tom think? she wondered, and her instinctive question was enough to make her stop walking and blink.

‘Tom’s not in the equation,’ she said out loud, and the people around her cast her curious glances.

She shook her head and kept going. Of course Tom wasn’t in the equation.

‘It’s good that the contact’s finally over,’ she told herself, but then she thought of Emily’s grave at Cray Point and knew that part of her heart would always be there.

With or without Tom Blake.

CHAPTER THREE

Six weeks later...

TODAY HAD BEEN an exhausting shift in the emergency department of her London hospital. The hospital was on the fringe of a poor socio-economic district, where unemployment was rife and where the young didn’t have enough to do. The combination was a recipe for disaster and the disasters often ended up in Tasha’s care.

She’d had two stabbings this shift. She was emotionally wiped—but, then, she thought as she changed to go home, she wanted to be emotionally wiped. She wanted to go home exhausted enough to sleep.

She’d hardly slept for weeks. Why?

Was it because the emails had stopped?

It was her own fault, she thought. She hadn’t made it clear she was grateful, because a part of her wasn’t. Tom’s emails were a jagged reminder of past pain. She didn’t want to remember—but neither did she want to forget.

And now Tom had obviously decided it was time to move on. She should be over it.

Could she ever be over it? She stared at her reflection in the change-room mirror and let her thoughts take her where they willed. How to move on?

Part of her ached for another baby, but did she have the courage?

‘Tasha? You have visitors.’ Ellen, the nurse administrator, put her nose around the door. ‘Two ladies are here to see you. They arrived two hours ago. They wouldn’t let me disturb you but said as soon as you finished your shift could I let you know. I’ve popped them into the counselling room with tea and biccies. They seem nice.’

‘Nice?’

Emergency departments saw many tragedies. Often family members came in, days, weeks, sometimes months after the event to talk through what had happened. Ellen usually pre-empted contact by finding the patient file and giving her time to read it. It helped. For doctors like Tasha, after weeks or months individual deaths could become blurred.

But Ellen wasn’t carrying a file and she’d described them as nice, nothing more.

‘It’s personal,’ Ellen said, seeing her confusion. ‘They say it’s nothing to do with a patient. They’re Australian. Hilda and Rhonda. Middle-aged. One’s knitting, the other’s doing crochet.’

Hilda and Rhonda.

She stilled, thinking of the only two Australians she knew who were called Hilda and Rhonda.

‘Shall I tell them you can’t see them?’ Ellen asked, watching her face. ‘I’m sure they’ll understand. They seem almost nervous about disturbing you. One word from me and I suspect they’ll scuttle.’

Did she want them to...scuttle?

No. Of course she didn’t.

For some reason her heart was doing some sort of stupid lurch. Surely something wasn’t wrong? With Tom?

It couldn’t be, she thought. He’d be safe home in Cray Point with his latest lady. Who? He’d mentioned his women in his emails. Alice? No, Alice had been a good twelve months ago. There’d been Kylie and Samantha and Susie since then.

The Blake brothers were incorrigible, she thought, and she even managed a sort of smile as she headed off to see what Rhonda and Hilda had in store for her.

But they weren’t here to tell her about Tom’s latest lady.

* * *

‘A subarachnoid haemorrhage?’ She stared at the two women in front of her and she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘Tom’s had a subarachnoid haemorrhage?’

The women had greeted her with disbelief at first—‘You look so different!’

‘I’m wearing scrubs,’ she’d told them, but they’d shaken their heads in unison.

‘You look prettier. Younger. Though that time would have made anyone look old.’ They’d hugged her, but then they’d moved onto Tom.

These two women had formed a caring background during her time in Cray Point but now they seemed almost apologetic. Apologising for what they were telling her.

‘It was the surf,’ Rhonda said. ‘A minor accident, he said, just a cut needing a few stitches, but then his neck was stiff and he got a blinding headache. He collapsed, scaring the life out of us. We had to get the air ambulance and the doctors say he only just made it.’

‘But they say he’s going to be okay,’ Hilda broke in, speaking fast. Maybe she’d seen the colour drain from Tasha’s face. ‘Eventually. But it did some damage—the same as a minor stroke. Now he’s trying to pretend it’s business as normal but of course it’s not.’

‘What happened?’ Tasha asked, stunned.

‘It was the first of the winter storms,’ Hilda told her, sniffing at the idiocy of surfers in general and one surfer in particular. ‘The surf was huge and of course people were doing stupid things. They were surfing too close to the rocks for the conditions and he hit his head—a nasty, deep gash. Mary and Chris...did you meet them? They’re the medical couple who help out sometimes. They stitched his head and tried to persuade him he needed a scan but would he listen? And that night... Well, it was lucky I decided to stay on, though cleaning the pantry was an excuse. He’d put off having his latest woman for dinner so I thought he must be feeling really ill. And he was toying with his meal when all of a sudden he said “Hilda, my neck... My head...” And then he sort of slumped.’

‘There was no loss of consciousness but by the time the ambulance arrived he couldn’t move his left arm or leg,’ Rhonda told her. She took a deep breath and recited something she must have learned off by heart. ‘His scans showed a skull fracture and infarct in the right lentiform nucleus corona radiata.’

‘That’s in the brain,’ Hilda said helpfully, and Rhonda rolled her eyes. But then she got serious again.

‘Anyway, the air ambulance was there fast and got him to Melbourne. They operated within the hour and they’re saying long-term he should be fine. He spent two weeks in hospital, protesting every minute. Then they wanted him to go to rehab but he wouldn’t. He says he can do the exercises himself. So now he’s back in Cray Point, pretending it’s business as usual.’

‘But it’s not,’ Hilda told her. ‘He has left-sided weakness. He’s not allowed to drive. The doctors only let him come home on the condition he has physio every day but of course he says he’s too busy to do it. He should concentrate on rehab for at least two months but will he?’

‘He doesn’t have time,’ Hilda told her. ‘And I was dusting in his study and he’d requested a copy of the specialist’s letters and I just...happened to read them. Anyway the specialist’s saying there’s a risk of permanent residual damage if he doesn’t follow orders. But Mary and Chris have a new grandbaby in Queensland, their daughter’s ill and they had to go. There’s no other doctor to help.’

‘And of course it’s winter in Australia.’ Rhonda took over seamlessly. ‘No doctor will take on a locum job in Cray Point in winter. We know he advertised—we weren’t supposed to know that either but...’

‘Hilda saw it on his study desk?’ Tasha suggested, and Hilda flushed and then smiled.

‘Well, I did, dear. But of course no one answered, and the oldies in Cray Point are still getting ill and he knows how much they need him. He cares too much to let us look after ourselves. So he’s hobbling around, still working. The night before we left there was a car crash and out he went. It was filthy weather and he was crawling into the wreckage to stop bleeding...’

‘And then we had to leave.’ Up until now Rhonda had sounded resigned, full of the foolishness of men, but suddenly her voice wobbled. ‘You know we’re both English? We married brothers and moved to Cray Point thirty years ago but our parents stayed here. Last week our mam died and our dad’s in a mess so we had to drop everything and come. Including abandoning Tom. We’ll take our dad home with us but first there’s his house to be sorted, immigration, so much to do...’

‘But we’re worrying about Tom all the time,’ Hilda told her. ‘We know he’s not coping. It’ll be weeks before we can get back, and who’s to boss him around? He’ll push himself and push himself. We have one district nurse and no one else. Cray Point’s in real trouble. And then in the middle of last night Rhonda sat up in bed and said, “What about Tasha? She’s family.”’

The word seemed to echo around the counselling room.

Family.

‘I knew nothing about this,’ she said faintly, and Rhonda nodded.

‘Well, of course you wouldn’t. He doesn’t talk to anyone about it, and of course he worries about you. We all do. He’d never bother you. Tasha...dear, it seems really unfair to ask, but Hilda knew your address...’

‘From Tom’s desk?’ She couldn’t help herself but she won a couple of half-hearted smiles.

‘Well, yes, dear,’ Hilda agreed. ‘Though of course I didn’t go looking. I just happened to have seen it on a certificate he left out for me to post to you. So we knew you were living in a hospital apartment and I remembered which hospital. So we thought we’d just come and let you know...’

‘Because he needs someone,’ Rhonda told her. And then she paused and told it like it was. ‘He needs you.’

To say Tasha’s mind was in overdrive was an understatement. She’d just finished a frantic shift. Normally it took hours to debrief herself, to rid herself of the images of the various crises bursting through the ambulance doors, but suddenly all she could think of was Tom.

The sudden end to contact hadn’t been because he thought she should move on. It had been because he was in trouble himself.

‘W-what about Susie?’ she stammered. The thought of Tom needing her was such a switch that it had her unbalanced. ‘Can’t she help?’

And the two women snorted in unison.

‘One thing Dr Tom Blake can’t do and that’s choose a woman who’s any use,’ Rhonda declared. ‘She’s hardly been near him since his accident. And she’s not a doctor or even a nurse. How can she help? You’re a doctor, dear. That’s why we’re here.’

‘You want me to go?’ Even saying it sounded wrong.

But both women were trying to smile. Their smiles were nervous. Their smiles said they didn’t hold out much hope but they were like headlights, catching her and holding her. She couldn’t move.

‘Could you?’ Hilda sounded breathless.

‘Is it possible?’ Rhonda whispered.

She stood and stared at the two rotund little ladies. They stared back, their eyes full of hope. And doubt. And just a touch of guilt as well.

Tom...

He needed her.

She didn’t want to go.

Why not?

She could go. She knew she could. There’d been an intake of brand-new doctors only last week and there was crossover from the last lot. Her shift could be covered.

She could walk out of her barren little apartment within an hour.

But to go to Tom...

She didn’t want to go back to Australia. Australia was full of memories of her little girl, her little fighter who’d lived just seven days. How could she go back to the place of all that pain?

But there was more to this than grief, she acknowledged. Her reaction wasn’t all about not wanting to be where Emily had lived and died, and she had the courage to acknowledge it. She’d never avoided thinking about Emily and, to be fair, Tom had had a hand in that. He’d been with her all that time.

It was Tom who’d made sure she’d shared every precious moment of Emily’s tiny life. It was Tom who’d sat by her, fielding well-meaning professionals, admitting those who could help, firmly turning away those who couldn’t.

There had been so much support. There had been so much love.

For Tom had loved, too. ‘She’s my niece,’ he’d told her when she’d been so exhausted she’d had to sleep but the thought of closing her eyes on her little girl had been unbearable. ‘You sleep and I’ll hold her every single moment. And I promise I won’t sleep while you’ve entrusted her to me.’

He’d just...been there. She could hardly think of Emily without thinking of Tom.

And then, after Emily had died...

Being bundled back to Cray Point. A simple, beautiful ceremony on the headland because she couldn’t think where else was right. Then sleeping and sleeping and sleeping, while Tom picked up the threads of...being Tom.

Which included his women. Alice was there, vaguely resentful of Tasha’s presence. And then Alice was no longer around and Tasha knew it was partly because of her.

She’d said something to him—apologised—and Tom had grinned. ‘Don’t fuss yourself, lassie,’ he’d told her. ‘Alice knows I don’t take my love life seriously. The whole town knows it.’

So he was like Paul. That was the thought that was holding her rigid now.

He was lovely, kind, gentle, caring.

He went from woman to woman.

He’d just suffered a cerebral bleed from a surfing accident. He was yet another man who took crazy risks...

The Blake brothers spelled trouble. She didn’t want to go anywhere near him, but she owed him so much.

She thought of him now, the image that was burned into her mind. Waking up from sleep and finding him crooning down to her little daughter.

‘Surfing’s awesome,’ he’d been telling her tiny baby. ‘The feel of cool water on your toes, the strength of the wave lifting you, surging forward... Feel my fingers as I push under your toes. Imagine that’s a wave, lifting you, surging... That’s right, our Emily, curl your toes. You have such a tiny life, our Emily, but we need to fill it with so much. I wish I could take you surfing but feel the power under your toes and know that surfing’s wonderful and you’re wonderful and I hope you can take all this with you.’

And Tasha found herself blinking and Hilda gasped and glared at Rhonda, who grabbed a handful of tissues from the counselling table. Tasha suddenly found she was being hugged. ‘Dear, no,’ Rhonda gasped. ‘We shouldn’t have come. We never should have asked. Tom will be okay. Cray Point will survive. Forget it, sweetheart, forget we ever came.’

Somehow she disengaged from their collective hug. Somewhere she’d read a research article that said hugging released oxytocin and oxytocin did all sorts of good things to the body. It made you more empathic. It made you want to connect more with your fellow humans.

With Tom? She’d be playing with fire.

Why? Because he was like Paul? He wasn’t. Not really. She’d stayed with him for a month and there’d never been a hint that he was interested in her...that way.

Besides, she was older, wiser, and she knew how to protect herself.

And this time she didn’t need Tom. Tom needed her, and Rhonda and Hilda were waiting for an answer.

And in the end there was only one answer she could give. No matter what Tom’s personal life was like, what he’d done for her had been beyond price.

And then the idea that had been playing at the edges of her mind suddenly, unexpectedly surfaced. The idea had been growing, like an insistent ache, an emptiness demanding to be filled, a void it took courage to even think about.

She could still scarcely think about it but if she went to help Tom she’d be returning to Australia, where an IVF clinic still held Paul’s gift.

She’d agonised over using Paul’s sperm last time, but in the end it had come down to thinking her baby could know of its father. This time the tug to use the same sperm was stronger. Another baby would be Emily’s brother or sister.

And suddenly that was in her heart, front and centre, and she knew what her answer would be.

‘Of course I’ll go,’ she told them swiftly, before she had the time to change her mind. Before fear took over. ‘It’ll take me a couple of days to get there but I’ll do it.’

‘Oh, Tasha,’ Hilda breathed.

‘But don’t tell him,’ Rhonda urged. ‘He won’t let you come if you tell him. He’ll say he’s fine. He’ll fire us for contacting you.’

‘I’d like to see him try,’ Hilda declared, but she sounded nervous and Tasha summoned a grin.

‘Okay,’ she told them. ‘I won’t warn him. But he’d better not be in bed with Susie when I get there.’

‘I wouldn’t think so,’ Hilda declared, though she didn’t sound absolutely certain.

‘Sure,’ Tasha said, but she didn’t feel sure in the least.

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