ER Doc's Forever Gift

She closed her eyes, drew a long breath before opening them to stare at him with something he thought might be embarrassment creeping into her face. ‘I am ungrateful, aren’t I? Thank you for doing the lawns. I deliberately went cycling yesterday so I didn’t have to do them, and that’s unheard of.’

His stance instantly softened. ‘You’d have been better off now if you had got the mower out.’

‘I’d still have gone for a ride, and I’d probably still have been distracted by...’ Her voice petered out as shock overtook that embarrassment.

‘By?’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

‘I think it does if it was a big enough distraction to send you off the road.’ She’d glanced at him twice when Anna had asked how the accident happened.

Those full, tempting lips clamped shut.

‘What was it?’ It couldn’t be anything personal because they didn’t have a history, not one that spanned even a week. He wouldn’t count that night and the loud music. But he hadn’t been able to forget her since then. Maybe he should be counting it. Ah ha. Was that it? ‘You’re still annoyed that I didn’t instantly turn the music down that night?’

‘Not at all.’ Her eyes were fixed on something over his shoulder, giving nothing away. Because she had been thinking about him while pedalling up the road?

Yeah, right. Get a life, Harry. If that’s the best you can come up with you need to get out of here.

‘It must’ve been another shock for you when I turned up at your accident site, swinging down on a rope from the helicopter.’ If she had been distracted by him while cycling that would’ve felt weird to her. He tried to recall what she’d said, the expression on her face, but only came up with her anxiety and pain. No, he’d got it all wrong. So why was she looking everywhere but at him?

‘Believe me.’ Her head lifted, her shoulders pulled back until pain must’ve struck and she let go again. ‘My crash had nothing to do with you.’ Her composure wasn’t working. Colour streaked her cheeks, those eyes he was coming to enjoy watching were widening and blinking as if batting away the truth. ‘But yes, I was surprised when I saw you unhooking from that rope.’ Colour rose again in her cheeks and down her neck.

Laughter rolled up his throat and blistered the air between them. ‘I bet you were. Your worst nightmare coming to save you.’

She swallowed. ‘Your words, not mine. I was relieved that it was someone I knew. Okay, I didn’t—don’t—know you, but we had met, and it helped. Nothing to do with the medical side of things, though you were excellent, by the way.’ Now she wasn’t shutting up and would she ever regret that.

Harry interrupted. ‘I’m putting the mower away. Then I’ll come take your pulse and check your breathing.’ And if they were fast? Would that mean she wasn’t improving, or she was reacting to his touch? In reality it was his pulse that needed slowing.

‘Don’t bother. I’m going back to bed.’

Bed. If ever there was a word with too many connotations. But Sienna didn’t blink, blush or look as if she’d made a mistake. Back under control? He hoped not. ‘No problem. Just assure me you’ve taken your meds and are feeling as well as can be expected.’ He could dampen down the heat that began expanding through his groin the moment she’d come out to blast him for doing her lawns. If she disappeared inside. If he concentrated really hard. Hard. Wrong word.

‘I’m doing everything I’m supposed to, thank you, Dr Frost.’ Turning her back on him, she hobbled back inside her apartment.

Harry couldn’t help himself. She wound him up something terrible. ‘I’ll look in later to make sure you’re okay and prepare a meal for us. Anything you don’t like, Doc Frosty?’

‘Harassment from neighbours,’ she threw over her shoulder.

The laugh that shot up his throat and over his lips was sudden and real. Damn it. He liked this woman. Frosty, feisty, annoying. None of those attitudes had put him off—instead they had ramped up his interest so much it could become dangerous.

Time to start ringing around people he knew and try harder to find a job that would take him away from here at the end of this contract.

A couple of hours later his phone rattled off a tune just as he was about to head across to Sienna’s with a meal of steak, fries and salad to share. The tension that had been building since he’d left her earlier disappeared the moment he saw the caller ID.

‘Hi, Lance. What’s up?’

‘Much the same as last time we talked. I’d swear the kids are growing a centimetre a day. Soon they’ll be patting me on the head and asking if I’ve eaten my greens. What about you? Fallen out with those Kiwis yet?’

‘Not through lack of trying.’ Aussies and Kiwis loved to hate each other, but put a third party between them and they were always allies.

‘This isn’t because you’ve found someone of the opposite sex to keep your bed warm and other things on the go for longer than a day?’

‘Not likely. No, I just like the country.’ And his neighbour. But Sienna wouldn’t budge from here. So? He wasn’t asking her to. ‘What’s this about? You don’t usually ring for a chat.’

Lance grumped, ‘It’s been a while since we shot the gap over a beer.’

‘Eighteen months. Your wedding anniversary.’ His mate had found his perfect match. They’d have no issues about not wanting the same things for themselves and their kids.

‘One in a million, I know.’

The love in Lance’s voice stilled Harry’s heart, turned him a little green. What was that like, knowing someone put you first most of the time, cared what happened in your day? Didn’t want to hold you responsible for everything the world threw up?

Lance’s tone changed to serious. ‘Have you got your next position lined up yet?’

‘Funny you should ask. There’s a bit of a drought at the moment. Not that I’m too bothered. Something always turns up somewhere.’

‘I might be able to help.’ Lance hesitated, then, ‘It’d mean coming back to Melbourne.’

No surprise there. Lance was based in his home town. ‘I can do that for a short stint.’ He’d returned to Melbourne twice to fill in at emergency departments, staying with Lance and his family, while avoiding his parents except for an occasional meal on the South Bank.

‘Yeah. I figured.’

Got it. Not for a few weeks. ‘How long?’

‘Melbourne General needs an ED head of department for at least twelve months.’

The city was right up there on his list of great places. It only had one fault. His parents lived there. But he needed a job, and twelve months was better than eight weeks here and three months someplace else. Huh? Since when? He liked moving around. Yes, but not all the time. It was becoming a bit of a drag living out of a pack. Not literally, but with the limited contents he found more and more he missed having personal possessions around him. None of his favourite books to indulge in, having to wear the same old clothes week in, week out, not even his squash racket for when he suddenly felt like banging around a court. When had this started? His gaze drifted in the direction of the adjacent apartment. Not in the last week, surely? Not since the advent of Doc Frosty? If that was the case then he needed out of here quick smart. ‘Tell me more.’

He got a brief outline before Lance said, ‘I’ll email the details tomorrow. But what’s your gut reaction?’

Did he want this job? A job with no end date? In Melbourne? He wouldn’t be able to avoid his folks forever. They’d want more than dinners. Did that matter? His mother couldn’t belittle him any more, couldn’t blame him for the roof leaking or the company not doing so well. Instead she and Dad could go on handing out the blame to each other as they’d started doing the day he walked down the front path never to return. As for Celia, she was long gone, living the high life in Sydney with some other poor sod to boss around.

‘You tryin

g to think up reasons to say no?’ Lance asked.

‘Yes. And no. I need to read the conditions and think this through.’ Not that Lance wouldn’t make sure everything was good to go. It was just—Hell, he didn’t know what was holding him back, especially when he needed to find another job soon. Yes, he did. Melbourne. His parents. Sienna. Huh? What did she have to do with any of this?

‘I recognise stalling tactics when I hear them.’ Lance didn’t hold back. ‘Thought you’d put all that behind you.’

‘I have.’

‘So what’s the “but”?’

‘None of yours.’ But this was his mate on the other end of the call. The man who’d helped him set up a flat after he left home, who’d stood by him when his parents had a very public spat at his graduation. There wasn’t much Lance didn’t know about him. ‘It’s not the past that’s a problem. It’s the future.’ There. He’d said it out loud. Now he waited for the roar of laughter.

It didn’t come. ‘At long last.’

‘Don’t go getting ideas of me settling down with a woman and kids and the picket fence.’ He didn’t like the taste of that. Too cloying. ‘It’s more about stopping moving all the time, finding one place to set up home. I can still take jobs in different locations, but having a place to call my own to return to is starting to appeal.’ He could still remain single, unfettered.

‘Melbourne won’t be that place, will it?’