‘It’s just the baby practising for its big day.’ She smiled. ‘Honestly, I’m fine.’
‘You’re positive?’ he pressed.
‘Absolutely.’
‘If they get stronger, or start coming—’
‘More regularly, I know, I know.’ She gave him a very wide smile. The sun was up now and he could see her tan and her freckly face. She really did have an incredible smile... ‘Well, thanks anyway,’ she said.
‘No problem.’
She turned to walk along the beach, in the direction he was going, and as he started to walk behind her, he half watched her to make sure she didn’t stop again, but she seemed fine now. Dressed in white shorts and a white tight-fitting top, she was curves everywhere, and Ben felt a touch awkward when her head turned around.
‘I’m not following you—I live up there,’ he explained.
‘Good!’ She slowed her pace down. ‘Where?’
‘In the units at the end.’
‘Since when?’ she asked.
‘Since the weekend.’
‘We’re neighbours, then.’ She smiled. ‘I’m Celeste Mitchell, I live in Unit 3.’
‘Ben, Ben Richardson—I’m at number 22.”
‘You’re at the quiet end, then.’ Celeste rolled her eyes.
‘Are you sure about that?’ Ben said, raising an eyebrow. ‘It certainly hasn’t been quiet the last two nights. Fights, parties...’
‘That’s nothing compared to my neighbours,’ she retorted.
They were there now, at the row of one-bedroom units that were a bit of an eyesore in such lovely setting. No doubt one day a developer would come in and swoop up the lot of them and build a luxury complex or a hotel, but for now they were just an old and rather rundown row of units that offered cheap rental and beach access—and were filled with backpackers looking to settle for a few weeks and the occasional regular tenant, which Celeste obviously was.
As they walked past her unit, it stood out from the rest—the little strip of grass at the front had been mowed and there were pots of sunflowers in the small porch.
Clearly this was her home.
‘Thanks again for your concern.’ She grinned. ‘And if you need a cup of sugar...’
He laughed. ‘I’ll know where to come.’
‘I was going to say you’ll have to go next door. The doctor just put me on a diet.’
He laughed again and waved goodbye. Heading up to his unit, he let himself in, put on the kettle and peered around the gloomy interior before heading for the cranky shower, wondering if it would spurt hot or cold this morning.
He hoped her flat was nicer than his. It was an odd thought to pop into his head, but he just hoped it was, that was all. It was certainly as neat as a pin on the outside—maybe her husband had painted it. And hopefully she had nicer furniture than his landlord had provided. Still, that wouldn’t make up for the noise...
Coming out of the shower, he could hear his neighbours fighting again and for Ben the auction couldn’t come soon enough.
He made some coffee and smiled again as he spooned in sugar.
She didn’t need to be on diet—she was curvy, yes, but she was pregnant. He thought of that lovely round bottom, wiggling up the beach in front of him, and just the image of her, so crystal clear in his memory, startled him, so that he immediately turned his mind to more practical thoughts.
Her blood glucose was probably high. She’d be around seven months or so...
He forced himself to push her out of his head, and wouldn’t let himself give her another thought—till he drove out of his garage, feeling just a touch uncomfortable in his slick four-wheel drive, and saw her watering her sunflowers and waving at him.
He waved back—reluctantly. Ben didn’t like waving to neighbours or, despite what he had said, dropping in for sugar, or popping over for a chat. Had she not appeared in pain, he’d have kept right on walking, have kept himself to himself—which was just how he liked things to be.
Whoosh!
As he drove past, Celeste could feel her cheeks redden even as she, oh, so casually waved.
He. Was. Gorgeous!
Gorgeous! Well over six feet and broad, his legs were as thick and as solid as an international rugby player’s, and that longish brown hair flopping over his eyes as he’d stared down at her on the beach already had her wanting to run her fingers through it. As for those green eyes...why the hell didn’t they have doctors like that where she worked?
Then she stopped being twenty-four and single and remembered she had sworn off men for the next decade at least. Also, she was, in a few weeks, going to be a mum.
Funny, but for a moment she’d forgotten. Talking to Ben, chatting as they’d walked, for a moment there she’d forgotten she was pregnant, had just felt like, well, a normal woman! Which she was, of course—there was nothing more womanly or normal than pregnancy. But this morning she’d been one who’d fancied and blushed and said all the wrong things in the face of a very sexy man. Celeste had assumed, though she’d neither read nor been told it, that the ‘fancy’ switch remained off during pregnancy—that you went into some sort of hormonal seclusion, where men were no longer attractive and you didn’t flirt or even look twice. And for six months it had been that way...
Would stay that way, Celeste told herself firmly.
Not that she needed to worry. A deft kick from her baby reminded her that she had no choice in the matter—she was hardly a candidate for romance!
CHAPTER TWO
‘CELESTE, WHAT ARE you doing here?’ Meg, the charge nurse, shook her head as Celeste handed her a return-to-work certificate as she joined the late-shift emergency nurses to receive handover.
‘I’m fine to work. I saw my obstetrician again yesterday,’ Celeste explained.
Meg scanned the certificate and, sure enough, she had been declared fit, only Meg wasn’t so sure. ‘You were exhausted when I sent you home last week, Celeste. I was seriously worried about you.’
‘I’m okay now—with my days off and a week’s sick leave...’ When Meg didn’t look convinced Celeste relented and told her everything. ‘My glucose tolerance test came in high, that’s what the problem was, but I’ve been on a diet for ten days now, and I’ve been resting, doing yoga and taking walks on the beach. I feel fantastic—some people work right up to forty weeks!’
‘Not in Emergency,’ Meg said, ‘and you’re certainly not going to make it that far. How many weeks are you now?’
‘Thirty,’ Celeste said, ‘and, as the doctor said, I’m fine.’
Which didn’t give Meg any room to argue and, anyway, here wasn’t the place to try. Instead she took them through the whiteboard, giving some history on each of the patients in the cubicles and areas. ‘When the observation ward opens, Celeste can go round there...’
‘I don’t need to be in Obs,’ Celeste said, guilty that they were giving her the lightest shift, but Meg fixed her with a look.
‘I don’t have the resources to work around your pregnancy, Celeste. If your obstetrician says that you’re fine for full duties and you concur, I have to go along with that—I’m just allocating the board.’
Celeste nodded, but no matter how forcibly Meg said it, Celeste knew she was being looked out for as far as her colleagues could—and for the ten zillionth time since she’d found out she was pregnant she felt guilty.
Finding out she was pregnant had been bad enough, but the fallout had been spectacular.
Her family was no longer speaking to her, especially as she had steadfastly refused to name the father, but how could she? Having found out that not only was her boyfriend married but that his wife worked in Admin at the hospital she worked in, even though no one knew, would ever know, guilt and shame had left Celeste with no choice but to hand in her notice. Then, just as it had all looked hopeless, she had found out that she been accepted at the graduate emergency nursing programme at Bay View Hospital, which was on the other side of the city.
She hadn’t been pregnant at the time of her application and the polite thing to do might have been to defer—perhaps that was what had been expected of her—but with such an uncertain future ahead, a monthly pay cheque was essential in the short term, and, as a clearly single mother, more qualifications wouldn’t go amiss. Also, moving away from home and friends would halt the endless questions.
It was lonely, though.
And now her colleagues were having to make concessions—no matter how much they denied that they were.
‘Cubicle seven is Matthew Dale, eighteen years old. A minor head injury, he tripped while jogging, no LOC. He should be discharged, Ben’s seeing him now.’
‘Ben?’ Celeste checked.
‘The new registrar. He started this morning. Here he is now...’ Meg waved him over. ‘What’s happening with cubicle seven, Ben?’