Harlequin Medical Romance December 2015, Box Set 1 of 2 (28 page)

But the kiss was still with her, all around her, enveloping her in its sweetness.

‘Hugo's back at work and he's probably forgotten all about it,' she told Hamster. ‘Men are like that.'

Hamster whined and put a paw on her lap.

‘With one exception,' she told him generously. ‘And by the way, if Hugo thinks he's taking you back to that boarding place while he's away, he has another think coming. You're staying with me for Christmas.'

Because she didn't want to be alone?

The question was suddenly out there, insidious, even threatening.

She did want to be alone, she told herself. That was what this whole locum bit was about. She'd been cloistered since birth. She needed to find herself.

She didn't need Hugo.

‘And he doesn't need me,' she told herself, rising and heading indoors, not because she wanted to but because it was sensible and a woman had to be sensible. She had the remnants of a snake bite and a cut hand to take care of. Medicine... That was what she was here for, and that was what she needed to focus on.

‘And nothing else,' she told herself as she passed the tree in the living room with Ruby's stack of origami gifts.

She hoped Ruby was having a happy sleepover with her friend tonight.

‘But that's nothing to do with me either,' she told Hamster and she took a couple of deep breaths and poured herself a glass of juice for her bedside, because a woman had to be sensible.

‘That's the new me,' she told Hamster as she headed for her bedroom. ‘Sensible R Us. I'm Dr Pollyanna Hargreaves, with the frivolous name, but there's nothing else frivolous about me. I'm here to focus on medicine and nothing else. I will not think about Hugo Denver. Not one bit.'

* * *

She lied.

She went to bed and lay in the dark and all she could think of was Hugo. All she could feel was Hugo. His kiss enveloped her dreams and she tossed and turned and decided that snake bite venom was insidious.

It had turned one sensible doctor into an idiot.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

P
OLLY
WOKE
AND
rain was thundering on the roof. It wasn't a shower. This was a deluge.

In Sydney—in fact in any house or hotel she'd ever stayed in—she hardly heard the rain. At most it was a hushed background whisper. Here it was crashing so hard on the iron roof she figured she could sing Christmas carols out loud and no one would hear.

Why not? She did.

Ruby heard her. Two bars into ‘Silent Night' there was a scratching on the door. She called, ‘Come in,' and Ruby flew in to land on the bed beside her. Hamster arrived straight after. He was wet. Very wet. He leaped onto her bedcovers and shook and Polly yelped and Ruby gave a tentative giggle. A very tentative giggle.

‘Is he...is he okay?' she stammered.

Polly surveyed the dog with disgust. He appeared to have taken a mud bath or six.

‘He appears okay. Is there a problem?'

‘He's scared of thunder. He was outside jumping in puddles when the last bit of thunder came. We got scared.'

‘Where's your uncle?' Hamster's wetness was soaking her feet. So much for a nice invalidish sleep-in, she thought, and resigned herself.

‘He's over at the hospital.'

‘Why are you home?'

‘There was thunder in the night. I got scared too, so Talia's mum rang Uncle Hugo and he came and got me.'

So even if they'd indulged in a night of molten passion they would have been hit by kid-interruptus, Polly thought, and then snagged her errant thoughts and shoved them in the place in her brain marked ‘Inappropriate'.

‘It's raining a lot,' Ruby said, snuggling into Polly's bed as if she had every right to be there. ‘Uncle Hugo says it's raining even in Sydney but it'll stop by Christmas so that's okay. And we're leaving first thing in the morning as long as you're better. But he says you're almost better anyway. He says I can stay here with you this morning. He says you have to stay in bed until at least ten o'clock. He says Hamster and I can make you toast but we can't make you coffee because I'm not allowed to use the kettle yet.'

‘Your Uncle Hugo is bossy.'

‘Yes,' Ruby said happily. ‘I like it. My mum wasn't bossy. One day I had to make her a cup of tea and I burned myself. See my scar?' She held up a wrist, where a scar showed the burn had been small but significant. ‘Uncle Hugo said Mum shouldn't have asked me but he said she only did 'cos she was sick. But he's not sick so he's allowed to be bossy.'

‘And he's at the hospital?'

‘Mr Millard's cow got bogged.' Ruby was right under the covers now, nudging Hamster's rear end with her feet. The dog was heaving up and down but grinning his dopey Labrador smile, thunder forgotten. ‘And Mr Millard pulled it out with a rope but he fell over when it came out fast. He broke his arm and Uncle Hugo has to put plaster on it. But Polly, I've been looking at our presents and worrying. We won't have a Christmas tree at the beach. Uncle Hugo says it doesn't matter but I think we need one.'

‘You definitely need one. You can take mine,' Polly offered.

‘But what will you and Hamster have?'

‘We'll chop down a gum tree.'

‘With an axe?'

‘Yes.'

‘Uncle Hugo won't let you use an axe.'

‘Uncle Hugo's not the boss of me.'

‘He just doesn't want us to get burned,' Ruby said worriedly. ‘You might hurt yourself.

‘I can take care of myself. I'm a grown-up.'

‘My mum was a grown-up and she didn't take care of herself. She died.'

There was no answer to that. Another clap of thunder rumbled across the valley. Hamster turned into a quivering mess; Polly and Ruby had to hug him and then the whole bed was pretty much a quivering and soggy mess and Polly decided convalescence had knobs on and she might as well get up.

‘You would like to take my Christmas tree?'

Ruby looked through to the living room where the sparkling silver tree shimmered with its party lights on full. ‘I don't want you not to have one,' she said longingly, ‘but you aren't allowed to use the axe.'

‘I'll let Uncle Hugo wield the axe,' Polly conceded. ‘But we need more decorations. You're not going to leave me with nothing.'

‘We could buy more tinsel.'

‘Nonsense.' She was in her element here. Interior decorating had been bred into her—her mother had been making hotel rooms into Christmas-themed fantasies for ever. ‘Let's leave the silver tree as it is—we'll pack it tonight for you to take. Then we'll concentrate on Tree Two. Plus making this house Christmassy for me and Hamster. Let's go.'

* * *

By two in
the afternoon the inhabitants of Wombat Valley were mostly hunkered down. The weather forecast was dire. Leaving the house meant a soaking. Most minor ailments could be put in the worry-about-it-after-Christmas basket, so the population mostly stayed put.

Which meant Hugo didn't call on Polly for help.

Though maybe he should have, he thought as the day went on. The agreement was that she'd join him in the afternoon so she'd get used to the place and he could assess her work...

Except he had assessed her work and it was excellent. She'd given last night's anaesthetic with skill. On her tour of the place she'd moved seamlessly between patients, chatting happily, drawing them out without them realising it. Underneath the chat there were carefully planted medical queries, and skilled responses to the replies. She was good.

More, Polly's reputation had already spread through the Valley. She was the Doc-Who'd-Been-Bitten-Saving-Horace. Horace wasn't particularly popular but he was a local, and Wombat Valley looked after their own.

So she was already accepted. She already knew her way round the hospital. She could have another full day of rest.

Minding Ruby?

He did feel a bit guilty about that, but he'd assumed Ruby would stay at Talia's until midday so he hadn't worried about calling anyone in. And Ruby was quiet. She did her own thing. The monitor was on. He could be home in a heartbeat if he was needed.

He just sort of happened to wander past the monitor a lot.

‘They sound like they're having a ball,' Joe told him. Joe was catching up on paperwork at the nurses' station. The whole hospital seemed as if it was snoozing, and in the silence Polly and Ruby's voices could be heard clearly.

He'd told Polly about the monitor. She'd know whatever she was saying could be overheard but it didn't seem to be cramping her style.

‘The flour looks great. No, sprinkle some more on, Ruby, it looks like snow. Hamster, no! It's snow, you idiot, not flour. Oh, heck, it's on your nose—no, don't lick it, it'll turn to paste—no, Hamster, noooo...'

‘Uh oh,' Joe said, grinning. ‘When my kids sound like that I go in armed with a mop. You want to go home and check?'

‘I should...'

‘Should what?' Joe said, and eyed him speculatively. ‘Think of something else to do? You've been thinking of other something elses to do for the past two hours. Don't you need to pack?'

‘I've packed.'

‘Then don't you need to go home and spread a little flour?' His brows went up. ‘But Dr Hargreaves is there, isn't she? A woman in your living room.'

‘With my niece,' he snapped.

‘She's gorgeous,' Joe said.

‘Ruby's cute.'

‘I didn't mean Ruby and you know it. Polly's gorgeous. We're lucky to have her.'

‘Yes.'

‘But you're going away tomorrow.' His nurse administrator's eyebrows were still raised. ‘Not having any second thoughts about going?'

‘Only in as much as Polly needs care.'

‘Care?'

‘She's diabetic.'

‘And I have a bung knee. We can commiserate.' Still the speculative look. ‘So why don't you want to go home now?'

Because I might want to kiss her again.

Because I do want to kiss her.

Neither of those thoughts he could say aloud. Neither of those thoughts he should even admit to himself.

Polly...a wealthy socialite, a woman who was here for two weeks while he was away, a woman who...

Made Ruby chuckle.

A woman who made him want to pick her up and carry her to his bed.

A woman who he wouldn't mind protecting for the rest of her life.

Whoa...
How to go on a hundred-mile journey in four days. He didn't know her. She was so far out of his league...

But he was there. He wanted her.

‘Go home,' Joe said, watching his face, and Hugo wondered how much of what he'd been thinking was plain to see. ‘Go and spend some time with her. Heaven knows, you could use a friend.'

‘I have friends.'

‘None like Polly,' Joe retorted. ‘And isn't that just the problem? I'd go nuts without my Hannah, but for you... My Hannah's already taken and there's a limited dating field in the Valley. And now you have Pollyanna right in your living room.' He paused as Polly's infectious chuckle sounded through the monitor. ‘Hannah or not, wow, Doc, I'm almost tempted to head over there myself.'

‘I'll go when it stops raining.'

‘Like that'll happen,' Joe said morosely. ‘Forty days and forty nights... This is setting in bad. But it's not raining women, not on your parade...'

‘Joe...'

‘I know; it's none of my business.' Joe held up his hands as if in surrender. ‘But she's there, she's gorgeous and you have no reason not to be there too. Go on, get out of here. Go.'

* * *

He went. Of course he went—there was no reason not to.

It was wet and it was windy. He opened the front door and was met by a squeal of protest.

‘Uncle Hugo, noooooooo!'

‘Uh oh,' said another voice and he stared around in amazement. The other voice said, ‘Maybe you could shut the door?'

The door opened straight into the living room. The living room was...white.

Very white.

‘We may not have thought this through,' Polly said.

She was sitting on the floor threading popcorn onto string. Or she had been threading popcorn. She was now coated in a cloud of flour. It was all over her hair, over her face and nose, over the floor around her.

Over Hamster.

Ruby was closest to the door. She seemed to have escaped the worst of the dusting.

‘You made it blow,' she said accusingly as he finally closed out the gale.

‘Flour?' he said, and his niece sent him a look that put him right in the dunce's corner.

‘It's snow. We made a nativity scene. See, we've made everything out of pods from the banksia tree, even the camels, and we got really wet looking for the right banksias, and then we spent ages getting everything dry so we could put them up along the mantelpiece and we put flour over the bottom to look like snow only Polly said I probably put too much on, but it looked
beeeyootiful
but now you've opened the door and you've ruined it.'

And her voice wobbled.

She really was fragile, Hugo thought, bending down to give her a hug. Last year had been tragedy for Ruby, and it still showed. She expected calamity.

‘This isn't ruined,' he said gently. ‘It's just flour.'

‘It's snow to make Polly feel better when we're not here.'

‘And Polly loves it,' Polly said and then she sneezed as if she needed to accentuate the point. ‘Ruby, it's still great. Look what we've done, Dr Denver. All we need you to do is chop down a tree.'

‘With an axe,' Ruby added. ‘I wouldn't let Polly do it on her own.'

‘Very wise,' Hugo said faintly, looking round his living room again.

At chaos.

His mother had kept this room perfect. ‘The Queen could walk in unannounced and I'd be ready for her,' his mother used to say and she was right. His mother might even have made Her Majesty remove her shoes and leave the corgis outside.

‘It was wet,' Ruby said, noticing his sweep of the room and getting in first with her excuse. ‘Polly needed something to do.'

‘And now she has something else to do,' Polly decreed, using Hamster as a lever to push herself to her feet. ‘In case you haven't noticed, Dr Denver, you seem to be dripping on our snow and our type of snow, when dripped upon, makes clag. So I suggest you stop dripping and start helping thread popcorn while I clean up your mess...'

‘My mess?'

‘Your mess,' she said and grinned. ‘Walking in on artists at work...you should know better.'

‘I'm glad I didn't,' he said faintly and he looked around at the mess and he thought for the first time in how long...this place looked like home.

What was better than this? he thought.

What was better than Polly?

* * *

He chopped down a Christmas...branch?...while the girls admired his axe technique. They all got wet, but what the heck; he was beyond caring. The branch dripped as he carried it inside but there was so much mess anyway that a little more wouldn't hurt. Then he cooked while they decorated.

He cooked spaghetti and meatballs because that was his speciality. Actually, he had three. Macaroni cheese was another. He could also do a mean risotto but Ruby didn't like it, so to say their menu was limited would be an understatement. But Ruby munched through raw veggies and fruit to stop him feeling guilty and Polly sat down in front of her meatballs and said, ‘Yum,' as if she meant it.

They now had two Christmas trees. Ruby had declared Polly's silver tree was too pretty to take down until the last minute so there was a tree in each corner of the living room. There was ‘snow' on every flat surface. There were strings of popcorn and paper chains and lanterns and Polly's amazing gift boxes, plus the weird decorations and nativity figures they'd fashioned out of banksia pods.