Dating the Millionaire Doctor (9 page)

Rob offered to stay on with Glenda. He had things to do in town and was happy to wait, if Jake came back later in the afternoon to pick them both up. That should have left Jake free to return to the lodge, but the Combadeen hospital was short-staffed, and once she'd heard the story of Glenda's hand, once Glenda told her what Jake did for a living, the local doctor grabbed him and held.

‘If you're an anaesthetist I'd like some solid advice,' she said, so firmly he had nowhere to go. ‘I can't get Glenda into see a specialist before the end of the month, yet I can't have her in this level of pain until then. If she'd told me…'

It seemed she hadn't. Discharged from hospital, Glenda had made perfunctory follow-up visits to the city outpatients and then had simply ceased complaining.

‘Neuropathic pain's horrible,' Dr. Susie Fulton said gently to Glenda, still fixing Jake with a gimlet eye. He wasn't escaping on her watch. ‘But anaesthetists are better at diagnosing it than family doctors. So can you bear Dr. Hunter examining you fully, so he can tell us what he thinks is going on? That way I can care for you until we get you some specialist help.'

‘Jake
is
specialist help,' Glenda said stoutly. ‘He's Dr. McDonald's son.'

‘Charlie McDonald?' The plump little country doctor straightened and beamed. ‘Charlie's son? Oh, my dear, have you come home?'

‘No,' Jake said shortly. ‘This is not my home.'

But as he examined Glenda with a lot more care than he'd done the night before, as he gave solid advice, and then finally as he drove back to the lodge, the phrase kept playing in his head.

Had he come home?

Of course he hadn't. This could never be home.

Why not?

It didn't make any kind of sense. This was the place his mother hated.

‘The walls closed in on me in that place,' she'd told him. ‘Everyone knew everyone else's business. You couldn't get away. Your father was everyone's best friend. Everyone thought he was their own property. Everyone thought I was their property. It's claustrophobic—people clutching you, needing you, you can't imagine.'

He could imagine. Doreen had clutched him, and as soon as Glenda arrived at the hospital she'd done her own clutching. Then the local doctor. Even Rob…

‘Great that you were here,' he'd said. ‘You know, if you were to consider staying, this valley needs doctors more than it needs rain.'

It was as though he was being hammered. Too much had happened too fast. And on top of the myriad emotions he was feeling towards a family he felt he no longer knew, he'd made love to a woman who'd twisted his heart.

Was it only two days ago that he'd met her?

Disturbed, and tired beyond bearing, he pulled the car over to the verge and closed his eyes. He desperately needed to sleep. A power nap would keep him going, and it'd also clear his mind. He'd used this technique often during his career, when things were closing in on him, seemingly too
difficult. He'd simply stop, clear his mind of everything, sleep a little and, when things percolated back, the white noise would be gone and only the urgent issues would stay.

He lay back in the car seat, letting everything fade. Maybe he slept for a little. When he opened his eyes a flock of white cockatoos had landed in the paddock beside the car. They were screeching and wheeling like something in an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

And yes, things were clearer.

No matter the pressures mounting on him, he didn't belong here. No matter that it had been his father's home, it wasn't his home. The screeching of these unfamiliar birds cemented it.

But Tori…

Tori was different. The thought of her was front and centre in his mind, still right where she'd been when he'd gone to sleep. She was one special woman.

The white noise was the claustrophobia of this environment, of the needs of this valley. That had to be removed. It had nothing to do with him. Tori was separate.

Maybe they couldn't be separated.

Well, if not… He had no place here. His life, his work, his future were in Manhattan. The past two days had changed nothing.

Except he might have fallen very hard for a woman called Tori.

 

Tori rang the hospital as soon as she woke. ‘Things are fine,' Susie told her. ‘Doreen's already in Melbourne North Western. She's seen a cardiologist and they're putting a stent in later this afternoon. It seems a relatively straightforward block and amazingly there looks to be little long-term damage. He thinks she'll be fine. Glenda's still here. Jake told me your suggestion about the hand therapist, and she's with
her now. Jake's lovely, by the way. Glenda says he was your five-minute date. How about that?'

She blushed. Nothing was secret in this valley.

‘He's nothing to do with me.'

‘No, dear, but if you could have him be something to do with you I'd very much appreciate it,' Susie said briskly. ‘The valley needs someone like him so much, and his father's reputation has gone before him. People would trust him.'

‘He lives in the States.'

‘He has houses here,' Susie pointed out. ‘So if you could think of any way to make him stay…'

‘Suse…'

‘Just saying,' Susie said and laughed. ‘Is he home with you now?'

‘No.'

‘He should be soon, then. Rob's got a couple of things to do in town. The arrangement is that Jake'll bring back the car at five and pick up Rob and Glenda, so that gives you a whole lot of time all by yourselves. So see what you can do, my dear. I've been advertising for a partner for years. If you can do it with one five-minute date I'll be very pleased indeed.'

She chuckled and disconnected. Tori stared at her phone as if it was poison.

 

The valley gossips had been at it already.

No one knew about last night. All they knew was that she'd walked out of a five-minute date, and she was sharing a house with Jake. Yet already… Already…

She felt her cheeks flush. Jake would hate it. She hated it.

She would not have last night sullied by gossip.

So move on, she told herself. Move on fast. Jake was on his way home. She needed to be out of here.

Make another phone call.

‘Yes, of course,' she was told by a women whose sympathy
was matched with the efficiency of six months' post-bushfire organisation. ‘You've been almost the last one left living up on the ridge. There're three homes left in our relocatable village. You can take your pick.'

Feeling more and more panicked, Tori decided she could sort her gear later. She gathered Rusty and headed out the drive.

She turned out the stone entrance—and almost hit Jake coming in.

She stopped. It was only courteous. She had to say goodbye.

She'd made love to this man. What had she been thinking?

She knew exactly what she'd been thinking.

He climbed out of the car and she was caught again by how good he looked. Yes, his pants were creased and when she looked closely there were a couple of grass stains on his shirt. He needed a shave. His hair needed a brush.

He looked incredibly hot.

He climbed out and smiled at her and hot didn't begin to describe it. He made her heart turn over.

‘Where are you going?' he asked, peering in her passenger-side window and Rusty practically turned himself inside out in order to reach him. Tori pressed the window button, the window slid down and Rusty was in Jake's arms in a flash. Jake submitted to being licked, and even laughed as the little dog squirmed his ecstasy in finding his friend.

His friend. Her friend. This man was seriously, seriously sexy.

‘I'm going to see my new home,' she said, frantically attempting to firm something inside her that felt very much in need of firming.

‘Can I come with you?'

Could he come? Um, no. Um, not wise.

But Rusty was licking his nose again, he was laughing and what was her head doing, saying no? Of course he could come. She could no sooner deny this man than fly.

‘Of course,' she said, and he opened the door and climbed in. Uh-oh. Where was her escape plan now?

‘You don't have anything else to do?' she asked, half hopeful.

‘I need to be back at the hospital at five to collect Rob and Glenda. That's four hours.'

‘You don't need to sleep?'

‘I've slept.'

‘You've slept?'

‘For at least an hour. Any more is for wusses,'

‘Right,' she said, thoroughly disconcerted, and restarted the engine and headed down the valley to her new home. With her man beside her.

Her man who wasn't her man. A Manhattan doctor.

Jake.

 

The relocatables were set up as a village. From a distance they looked like rows of shoeboxes lined up side by side.

Even from the road Tori could see there was no use checking out the three she'd been offered and choosing between them. They'd be exactly the same.

‘What is this place?' Jake demanded, staring around in dismay.

‘Home,' Tori said resolutely, heading for Shoebox 86. The key was in the door. She pushed it open and bit back a gasp of dismay.

Home?

Not.

She'd need to make it home fast, she thought, or the resolution she'd decided on would fail her. Somehow what had happened last night had seemed the catalyst for moving on, but now… Staying near Jake any longer seemed dangerous. This was the sensible option.

But this was
beige
. And Jake was still here.

So… She'd use him again, she thought. She'd use his energy.

‘We need to shop,' she said briskly, but Jake wasn't listening.

‘You can't stay here. It's like a budget motel.'

‘It's better than a budget motel,' she snapped. ‘It's new and it's comfortable and it's mine.'

‘So what will you do here?'

‘I've been offered a job in a pet clinic on the outskirts of the city.'

‘Was that what you were doing on the ridge?'

‘My father and I ran a horse clinic,' she said, ‘with a small-animal practice on the side. There were scores of horse studs on the mountain. There's not a lot of horses up there now, though, and there won't be for years, so it's pets only.' A furrow appeared between her eyes and she shrugged. ‘No matter. Last night showed me I can move on and I will.'

She was looking around, taking careful assessment. ‘But you're right, I can't live here like it is now,' she said. ‘I need to go shopping.' She glanced at her watch, hesitating. ‘I should have come alone, but we have time before you've promised to pick up Glenda. If I wait until after then I won't have stuff today, and I need this place to be cheerful tonight.'

‘You're not staying here tonight?'

‘I am,' she said, flatly and definitely, and then she smiled, taking the sting from her words. ‘Today's the first day of the rest of my life. Do you want to come shopping?'

Did he?

‘There's—'

‘Time,' she said, refusing to be deflected by his dismay. ‘There's a great Asian trading centre a couple of miles from here. I reckon I could get all I need there and more.'

He stared at her, stunned. The difference between the Tori of now and the Tori of yesterday was, quite simply, extraordinary. What had happened between them last night had
shaken his world, but for Tori it seemed to have marked a turnaround, transforming her from grief-stricken victim to woman about to embark on her new life.

‘We should have brought the two cars,' she said, but cheerfully, as if she wasn't very sorry. ‘You're welcome to stay here and wait. Or are you happy to watch me shop?'

She smiled and there was determination behind the smile. She might be transformed, he thought, but the grief was still with her. She was moving forwards, with shadows.

And the least he could do was come along for the ride.

‘Shopping's my favourite thing,' he lied.

‘Really?'

‘No, but it's like hard work. I can watch it being done for hours.'

She chuckled, a lovely rich chuckle that had the power to transform this stark little apartment into something else. Tori's home.

Bleak as a great man's house without a fireplace in it.…

The words came from…where? He hardly recalled the analogy, so why should they spring to mind now, dredged from literature or a play he'd once seen?

But he knew why they'd come. A house without Tori in it seemed the same. Unthinkable. She had the power to light from within, and that's just what she was doing as she grabbed her bag and jingled her car keys.

‘Rusty's due for a nap. I bought him a doggy chew so he'll be happy enough staying here. You want to drive or will I?'

‘I will,' he said faintly. ‘I kind of like the challenge of driving on the left—and you should save your energy for shopping.'

S
O SHOP
she did, while he stood back and watched in something akin to awe. She shopped with professional purpose.

Quilts, cushions, rugs, curtains, blankets, jugs, vases, wall hangings… There was little hesitation; she simply saw an item, beamed, picked it up, stuck it in her trolley, and when her trolley was full she used his arms instead.

‘You're not leaving much time—or room—for milk and bread,' he managed, muffled under rugs, and she balanced another rug on top and steered him towards the door.

‘I can get milk and bread after we've taken Rob and Glenda home.'

‘You're definitely leaving the lodge tonight?' he asked, and she started unloading onto the register and tried to locate her purse among pillows.

‘Of course,' she said absently. ‘That's what this is about. I need to get my own place but I don't want to live with beige. It's only one step better than grey, and I'm not going there ever again.'

‘It'd be good if you stayed at the lodge a bit longer,' he said diffidently, but she'd handed over her money, her hands were free and she could respond now with her full attention. She turned and faced him square on, frivolity gone.

‘Good for whom?'

‘You need to rest.'

‘I wouldn't rest if I went back to the lodge. We both know that. Not with you around.'

The cashier, a bored teenager with lavender spiked hair, looked suddenly less bored.

‘Well, maybe lack of rest has its advantages,' he ventured, fighting an adolescent urge to blush—but Tori shook her head.

‘Any more than one night and I might get the wrong idea. No strings, Jake. You don't seriously want them, do you?'

‘I…' How had they got here, so fast. ‘No.' Was there any other possible response?

‘There you go, then.' She was piling stuff back into his arms, tucking a pillow under his chin. ‘Press down or we'll have pillows all over the car park. Can you manage?'

‘Yes, of course.

‘Then we're finished,' she said. ‘Let's go.'

 

Conversation finished. She steered the talk onto inanities while they drove back to her new home and unloaded.

He'd never seen colour used to such effect. Within fifteen minutes the drab little relocatable had become home. Outside it was still a shoebox but inside it was the sort of shoebox a man might walk into and smile, because it looked exactly what his vision of Tori's home should be.

Even Rusty approved. He'd been staring dolefully at the door when they arrived, lying on the beige carpet. Now he was snuggled between two crimson and sky-blue cushions, with a purple throw-rug wrapped snugly around his injured lower half. He looked approving, Jake thought.

He approved as well.

‘It'll take me a while to organise the curtains,' Tori said, glowering at the beige Venetian blinds. ‘These might give us privacy but if anyone thinks I'm looking at them for more
than a night they have another think coming. Now…' She glanced at her watch. ‘Half an hour. I need flowers.'

‘Flowers?'

‘There's a flower farm half a mile from here. You want to come?'

Watch Tori buy flowers or stay here and wait? Of course he wanted to come.

Rusty decided to come this time, so he drove them both to the flower farm and she bought half a dozen daffodils and then two dozen tulips and then about a hundred gerberas in about three minutes, and then she decreed she was finished.

The word sounded too stark.
Finished.

She had such courage, he thought, as they loaded the car and set off again. She was amazing. And more and more the thought of her staying in that sterile little relocatable—despite her additions—was almost unbearable.

But her face was set, determined, as though she'd made a decision and nothing was about to deflect her. She felt his glance and met his gaze and smiled, but he knew the smile was an effort.

He was leaving for New York. He couldn't help her. Even if he could, that'd mean getting involved—and he didn't do involved.

Did he?

Lots of things had to be thought through, he mused, fighting confusion. But in the meantime there should be something he could do. There must be some way he could help her.

And suddenly there was. They were driving past a farm gate, and a sign, roughly scrawled on a piece of tin propped against the mailbox, made him take his foot off the accelerator. Then, as the idea took hold, he braked, pulled the car onto the verge and stopped.

‘Um, why are we stopping?' she demanded.

‘We've forgotten something both you and Rusty need.' He was backing into the driveway and finally she saw the sign.

Golden Retriever Puppies. Ten Weeks Old.

‘We don't—' she gasped.

‘Yes, you do,' he said, and somehow he knew enough of this woman to realise his gut instinct was right. ‘You had four dogs. You and Rusty have had six months by yourselves, and that's long enough. I have colleagues with dogs and I know how big a part of their lives they are. And I've met golden retrievers. They smile. You live in a place where pets are welcome—yes, I saw the sign—so why not?'

Then, as he saw her face, a mixture of distress and despair, he cut the engine, tilted her chin with his finger and said, ‘Tori, you need something warm and alive and new, something not scarred by what's gone before. If Rusty hates it…if you hate it, then okay, but I do want you to think about it.'

She still looked distressed. He hesitated, unsure what to say, unsure what his feelings were. Last night this woman had moved him as no one had ever done. If he had longer… If it was possible, maybe she'd even penetrate the armour he'd built up around himself.

But for now, he couldn't leave her like this. Despite the colour and the flowers, he couldn't leave her in her strange little relocatable. Relocatable… Even the name seemed wrong.

This woman needed a home. Home was a strange concept for Jake, who'd always regarded home as where he could crash with least effort, but there was something about Tori that said home was much more.

‘Last night changed things,' he said softly. ‘They say men can take sex as it comes, and maybe they're right, most of the time, but they're not talking about what we had last night. It's bound me to you in some way I can't begin to figure. It made me feel like part of you is part of me. Whether that's dumb
or not, that's the way you make me feel. Our lives don't connect. Not now. Not yet. But I can't walk away and leave you and Rusty without something of me.'

He glanced again at the sign. Maybe this was a cop-out, he thought, but for now it was all he could do. Anything else scared him stupid. ‘So can I buy you and Rusty a puppy?' he asked again. ‘From me to you.'

‘So we get to hug a puppy in the middle of the night instead of you,' she whispered, in a voice that wasn't quite steady.

‘Instead of nothing,' he said, and he heard bleakness but he couldn't help it. He hesitated, and then, because it seemed right, he kissed her, gently on the lips, and forced a smile. ‘Though you can pretend it's me if you like. I hear golden retrievers make great tongue kissers.'

‘Eww!'

He grinned. The distress on her face faded and the tension between them lessened a little. The kiss seemed to have made things better. It had made them seem…friends as well as lovers?

Friends
instead
of lovers.

Tori was smiling a little now, but she was chewing her bottom lip, looking at the sign, looking at him, looking at the sign again. Focusing on a puppy.

It was no small thing, he thought, to lose three beloved dogs and then to move forwards.

‘Should I call him Jake?' she asked, and he blinked.

‘Jake.'

‘Big and warm and a bit shaggy.'

‘Hey!'

‘It fits.'

‘I don't believe I'm shaggy.'

‘You could be,' she said. ‘If you loosened up a little. If you forgot to be a Manhattan millionaire.'

‘I'm not!'

‘Rob says you are.'

‘Rob talks too much. I'm just—'

‘A doctor doing his best,' she said, laughter fading. ‘And your best has been wonderful. You saved Doreen's life last night. In a way, you've saved Glenda's. You're wonderful.'

The depth of sincerity in her voice was unmistakable.
You're wonderful.
He'd never been given such a compliment—by such a woman. And suddenly the light kiss he'd just given her was no longer enough. He desperately wanted to kiss her again—only this time deeply and long—but she was looking at the sign again, and there was a furrow between her eyes that told him her focus was no longer on him.

He had to back off.

‘I guess…' she said slowly. ‘I'm not working yet. It'd be a good time to get a pup. And it could really help Rusty.'

Okay, forget the kiss. Concentrate on what was important. ‘It'd be a great time to get a pup, and I'd love to buy one for you.'

‘I'd pay,' she said quickly.

‘No,' he said, and he tugged her round to face him again. ‘Manhattan millionaire, Tori. My gift.'

She smiled, a little bit wobbly but a smile for all that. ‘If he's from a Manhattan millionaire, then he should have a diamond-studded collar.'

‘He'd think it was girlie.'

‘Then,' she said, her smile widening as she climbed out of the car, ‘let's see if they have a girl. Jake might need to become Jackie. A golden retriever who doesn't sniff at diamonds. Jake or Jackie. Let's see what they have.'

 

She didn't choose a Jake. She chose a female and she chose a runt. Or Rusty chose a runt and Tori agreed.

He might have known. There were six pups as big as one another, as energetic as one another, as healthy as one another. There was one bigger than the rest, a male who obviously
spent his life trying to round up his litter mates, growing more and more exasperated as his siblings didn't do what he wanted. And then there was a tiny female who tried gamely to join into the family romp and got knocked over every time. Rusty went straight to her, nose to tail, tail to nose, and they started, tentatively, to play.

‘We nearly put her down,' the breeder told them, as Tori scooped up the pup in one hand and Rusty in another. ‘My husband wanted to—she's such a runt—only she kept on fighting for her place at a teat and she has such courage that I couldn't bear to. But she's not right,' she confessed as Tori snuggled her under her chin. ‘Her left ear is weird. It sort of sticks up when it's supposed to flop. And her tail's supposed to be long and feathery and I can tell already that it's not. The older she's getting the worse it's looking. If you want her, she's cheap.'

Neither of them was thinking of money. Jake watched Tori snuggle the little girl to her; he watched her with two dogs in her arms, and he felt great. This was going to work.

Then he got distracted. The biggest pup had been tearing round in circles. He had his litter mates rounded up, but then one of his sisters made a break for it. He darted after her, the others scattered and he had to start the whole process again. He practically beamed as he proceeded to bounce around the circle again.

He didn't know dogs. His mother had hated them, and now he spent his life at work. A dog was out of the question. But he watched Tori cuddle her two and he thought… He thought…

‘Would you like two pups?' he asked her. ‘I think the round-up guy's great.'

Tori's arms were full of wriggly dog. For a runt the little one had plenty of bounce, and Rusty was wriggling, too. They were practically turning inside out to reach each other.

‘Two,' Tori gasped. ‘Are you trying to drown me?' She sank onto the floor and was pounced on by a sea of pups. ‘Oh, Jake, I shouldn't even think about one.'

She was half laughing, half crying. This was a huge thing for her, Jake thought, as he watched her hug armloads of pups. She'd lost three dogs in the most dreadful of circumstances, and she'd lost so much more. For her now to move on… To learn to love again…

‘It feels like a betrayal,' she whispered but she hugged her runt closer.

‘Grief has to let you go sometime,' Jake said softly. ‘What did Auden say? Stop all the clocks? They did stop for you, Tori, but now they need to start again. Nothing is worth stopping the clocks for the rest of your life. And if that means loving again…'

‘Says the man who doesn't do loving.'

‘How did—'

‘I can guess,' she whispered, smiling up at him through tears. ‘I'm guessing your parents stuffed you so badly you've never got over it. So why don't you get a pup?'

‘I work fourteen hours a day,' he said shortly. ‘I can hardly leave one of these guys in a corner of the operating room while I work.'

‘I guess you can't,' she said sadly, but then a tiny smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. ‘As opposed to me. I'm a vet. I could take these guys to work. I could manage two dogs.'

‘Not three?' He was still eyeing the round-up king, circler extraordinaire.

‘Can you imagine that guy in my shoebox?' she demanded, following his gaze. ‘My yard's the size of a pocket handkerchief. Even one's stupid. Maybe I shouldn't…'

Okay, he needed to focus. Forget the round-up king, he told himself, and he crouched among the puppies so he was right in front of her.

‘It would be my pleasure to buy one of these pups for you,' he said. ‘Please let me.'

Her gaze met his. Her eyes were glimmering with unshed tears, but she was trying to smile.

‘A birthday gift?'

‘When's your birthday?' he demanded, stunned.

‘Today.'

‘You're kidding!'

‘Sort of,' she admitted. ‘But that's what it feels like. My birthday. Like yesterday was one life and today's the beginning of another. Jake, last night…'