Melting the Argentine Doctor's Heart / Small Town Marriage Miracle (31 page)

‘Stop it, Daniel.’

The sound of her voice brought his head up. Daniel’s heart gave an almighty lurch when he saw her standing in the doorway. She was wearing a thick towelling robe and he knew without having to be told that she wasn’t wearing anything under it. Heat scorched along his veins and he cursed soundlessly. He couldn’t afford to dwell on thoughts like that when he had to make sure that Emma didn’t come to any harm.

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ he said, his voice sounding unnaturally gruff as he tried to work out how to salvage the situation.

‘Of course you do.’ She came into the room and stood in front of the table. ‘You’re sitting there, wallowing in
guilt because of what happened last night, and it’s so typically arrogant of you.’

‘Arrogant?’ His brows shot skywards and he looked at her in surprise.

‘Yes.’ Resting her hands on the edge of the table she bent so that she could look straight into his eyes. ‘You didn’t coerce me into bed, neither did you have your
wicked way
with me. I made love with you because I wanted to. If I hadn’t wanted to, it would never have happened. Is that clear?’

‘Yes.’ He was so stunned by her forthright approach that he couldn’t think what else to say but Emma didn’t seem to expect him to say anything.

‘Good. The last thing I need is you thinking that I’m holding out for a reconciliation.’ She gave a sharp laugh. ‘Last night was fun and I enjoyed it but that’s as far as it went. It certainly wasn’t the start of something more.’

‘That’s how I feel too,’ Daniel said thickly. Even though he knew he should be relieved that she felt this way, he couldn’t help feeling hurt that their love-making had meant so little to her.

‘It seems we’re in agreement, then.’ She gave him a cool little smile and went to switch on the kettle.

Daniel finished his coffee in a couple of quick gulps and excused himself. Emma was making toast when he left the kitchen, acting as though everything was completely normal, and maybe it was for her. Maybe she’d had a string of lovers in the past few years, men she had enjoyed the odd night of passion with. She’d mentioned her boss, hadn’t she? Richard something-or-other. Maybe he was one of them, although there could
be a long line of past and present suitors for all he knew. Although he hated the idea, what right did he have to criticise how she lived her life? The truth was that he had forfeited any rights where Emma was concerned five years ago. She was free to do whatever she wished.

The thought was so agonising that Daniel knew he had to get out of the house before he made a fool of himself. Unhooking his coat off the peg, he let himself out of the front door. His car was parked in the drive so he got in and started the engine. When he reached the main road, he headed towards Harrogate purely because it was somewhere to aim for. He wasn’t heading
to
somewhere but away from a place where it was too painful to be. The trouble was that no matter how many miles he put between himself and Emma, it didn’t stop him thinking about her, definitely didn’t stop him wishing that things could have been different.

Emma managed to maintain her composure until she heard Daniel’s car driving away. She sank down onto a chair, feeling sick and shaken by what had happened. She had known the moment she had seen him sitting at the table that he had regretted what had happened the night before. It had been pride that had helped her deal with the situation, pride plus the fear of what might happen if he realised how much it had meant to her.

She bit her lip, overwhelmed by a sudden feeling of dread. Making love with Daniel had been everything she could have wished for but she wasn’t foolish enough to think that it had meant anything special to him. Maybe he had desired her but that was all it had been. Whilst
she had tried to convince herself that it would be the ideal way to draw a line under the past, she doubted if Daniel had viewed it that way. He hadn’t needed to because he had got over her a long time ago. There was no way that had he been celibate for the past five years, and last night she had been just another in a long line of women willing and eager to give him pleasure.

The thought of Daniel making love to all those other women was incredibly painful, so Emma tried not to dwell on it. There were just two weeks left of her stay and after that she would return to the life she had built for herself. It had taken her a long time to get over Daniel the last time and she couldn’t bear to think that she would have to go through that kind of heartache again, so she would make sure he didn’t gain any kind of hold over her. And that meant there must never be a repeat of what had happened last night.

Daniel was snatching five minutes’ break in the middle of what had turned out to be an extremely busy Monday morning surgery when Emma knocked on his door.

‘Ruth said you didn’t have a patient with you at the moment,’ she explained as she came into the room.

‘I was just taking a breather,’ he replied, hoping he sounded calmer than he felt.

He had managed to stay out of her way for the remainder of the weekend. It had been almost midnight when he’d got back to the house and she’d been in bed. There’d been no sign of her when he’d got up that morning either, although he hadn’t lingered. He had skipped breakfast and come straight to the surgery, making do
with a cup of coffee to tide him over. If he’d had his way he would have avoided seeing her for the rest of the day too, but obviously that wasn’t to be. Now all he could hope was that the decision he’d made yesterday to behave calmly and professionally around her for the next couple of weeks would see him through.

‘It has been busy,’ she agreed evenly. Closing the door, she came over to his desk and handed him a file. ‘Would you mind taking a look at this for me? I’m afraid it’s got me stumped.’

‘Of course.’ Daniel took the file and quickly read through the patient’s notes. His brows rose when he noted how many times the man had visited the surgery in the past two months. ‘Alistair Grant is either an extremely sick man or he’s a complete hypochondriac. You could fill a textbook with the variety of symptoms he’s presented with recently.’

‘Exactly.’ She leant across the desk and selected a sheet from the file. ‘Uncle Jim sent him for a whole battery of tests last month and they all came back clear.’

‘Hmm.’ Daniel placed the file on the desk, trying to ignore the leap his heart gave when her hand brushed his as she passed him the test results. Ruthlessly, he battened it down, refusing to allow himself even the tiniest leeway. He was going to treat Emma as a colleague from now on, even if it killed him!

‘Does he seem genuine to you?’ he asked, sticking determinedly to the matter under discussion.

‘It’s hard to say.’ She grimaced. ‘I only met him today so I don’t have any real idea of what he’s like as a person.’

‘So he hasn’t lived in Avondale all that long?’

‘No. Apparently he moved here three months ago.’

‘And almost immediately began visiting the surgery on a regular basis.’ Daniel frowned as he picked up the patient’s file again and flicked through it. ‘How come we don’t have any notes from his last GP?’

‘He’s been working abroad ever since he left university. He told me that he assumed his notes would be still at the practice his parents use but they’ve been unable to find them. Ruth has contacted the university to see if they were transferred to their medical centre but so far she’s not heard back from them.’

‘That’s a shame. It would have been helpful to see if he had a history of visiting his GP on a frequent basis.’

‘It would. To be honest, it’s not a situation I’ve come across before. Most people who are undergoing surgery have been seen by several doctors before they reach us. That tends to weed out any malingerers.’

‘Would it help if I had a word with him?’ Daniel offered. ‘I’m not saying I’ll be able to tell if he’s making it up, but it might deter him if he knows we’re dubious about the claims he’s been making.’

‘Would you mind? I’d hate to make any hasty assumptions about his credibility and overlook something serious.’

Daniel heard the relief in her voice and immediately stood up. He would do anything to help her, he thought as he followed her to the door. He sighed as they walked along the corridor together. If only he’d thought about that on Saturday night. Making love with Emma may
have been wonderful, but it had caused problems for him if not for her. She might be able to chalk it up to experience but he certainly couldn’t. Just for a second his head reeled as he recalled how sweetly responsive she had been when he’d held her in his arms before he forced the thought to the deepest, darkest reaches of his mind. He couldn’t afford to think about that or he wouldn’t be able to function!

Alistair Grant was sitting in the chair exactly where Emma had left him. A thin young man in his late twenties with sandy-coloured hair and a pale complexion, he cut a rather pathetic figure. Emma smiled at him as she went into the room.

‘I’m sorry to have left you sitting here, Alistair. This is Dr Kennedy. He would like to have a word with you to see if he can get to the root of your problems.’

‘I hope somebody can.’ Alistair stood up to shake hands. He sat down heavily again as though he didn’t have the strength to remain on his feet for very long. Propping himself against the edge of the desk, Daniel regarded him thoughtfully.

‘You seem to have been through the mill recently, Alistair. I’ve read your notes and you’ve had a lot of distressing symptoms in the last few months, it appears.’

Emma took her seat behind the desk, leaving it up to Daniel to take the lead. She had to admit that the case had her stumped and she would value his help. She listened attentively while he asked Alistair how his health had been in general over the past year.

‘I was fine right up until a few months ago,’ Alistair
assured them. ‘I never had anything wrong with me before that apart from the odd cold.’

‘Dr Roberts told me that you’ve been working abroad. Were you ill while you were there or did it all kick off when you came back to England?’

‘When I moved to Avondale, actually. I’d only been here a couple of weeks when I started feeling really rough—tired and as though I had no energy. Then I started with all these aches and pains, the headaches, etcetera.’

He sounded really despondent and Emma frowned. If he was making it up then he was extremely convincing. By the time Daniel finished talking to him, she could tell that he was as perplexed as she was.

‘I have to admit that it’s got me baffled, Alistair. I know you’ve had a whole range of tests done, but I’d like to send you for more blood tests and see what they show up. Where were you working when you were abroad, by the way?’

‘South Africa was the last place but I’ve been all over in the past few years—India, China, various parts of Africa. I’m a civil engineer so I go wherever the job takes me.’

‘Are you working here at the moment?’ Emma put in.

‘Yes. I’m overseeing the building of a new wind farm. We’re due to start in a couple of weeks’ time so I’ve been doing a lot of the ground work beforehand.’

‘I imagine there was opposition to building a wind farm around here,’ Daniel suggested.

Alistair sighed. ‘There was. It’s taken years to get
the go-ahead and there’s a lot of folk who still aren’t happy about it. One of the local farmers in particular has caused us a great deal of trouble—dumping loads of manure and old oil drums in the middle of the track to block our access, that sort of thing. Last week he even warned some of the men off with a shotgun. When we called the police, he claimed it was all a misunderstanding and that he was out shooting rabbits.’

‘It can’t be easy, dealing with that kind of behaviour!’ Emma exclaimed.

‘It isn’t, although it wouldn’t be so bad if I felt a bit more up to it,’ Alistair stated ruefully.

‘Well, let’s hope we can get to the bottom of this as soon as possible,’ Daniel said encouragingly. ‘Bearing in mind where you’ve been working recently, I’d like you screened for some of the more obscure tropical diseases as well. It could be that you’ve picked something up overseas and that’s what’s causing the problem. We’ll arrange for a blood sample to be sent to the School of Tropical Medicine in Liverpool and see if they can come up with any answers.’

Emma printed out a form for bloods to be taken at the hospital, adding a request for samples to be sent straight to Liverpool. She handed the form to Alistair who thanked her rather wearily and left. She frowned as the door closed behind him. ‘I don’t think he’s making it up, do you?’

‘No. It didn’t seem like it to me either,’ Daniel agreed. ‘Let’s hope something shows up in the next lot of tests because it’s very puzzling.’

‘Fingers crossed.’ She reached for the button to buzz
through her next patient, not wanting to appear as though she was keen to detain him. However, he was way ahead of her.

‘Let me know when the test results come back, will you?’ he asked as he strode to the door.

‘Of course.’

Emma summoned a smile but it was galling to know how eager he was to avoid spending any time with her. He had stayed away from the house all day on Sunday, only returning when he’d been sure that she would be in bed. She had heard his car turn into the drive well after midnight and had hurriedly switched off her lamp, afraid that he would think she was waiting up for him.

It was obvious that Daniel was keen to avoid a repeat of what had happened on Saturday night. She was too but for a different reason. She was afraid of getting emotionally involved but that wasn’t something he would worry about. Daniel simply didn’t want any complications in his life. Maybe he
had
told her that she was more beautiful than any woman he had ever known but talk was cheap: actions said far more. And he had proved beyond any doubt that he didn’t care a jot about her.

T
HE
week wore on and Daniel found to his dismay that he couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened between him and Emma. It wasn’t so bad while he was working, he could focus on his patients then. However, when he was on his own, that was when the real problem started.