The Heart Surgeon's Proposal Read online

  ‘And Callum?’ she asked, but Phil was sound asleep, a small smile of contentment lingering on his face.

  Maggie rolled over so she was curled against his body, though a sheet, two blankets and an eiderdown separated them, and went quietly off to sleep herself.

  Callum stayed a fortnight, spending most of his time locked in conference with hospital officials and insurance officers, making it exceedingly clear the unit staff would not accept anything less than complete exoneration in the tragic death of the baby.

  ‘You’ve got to see something of Australia while you’re here,’ Phil told him, late in his visit, on one of the rare occasions he, Maggie and Cal were eating dinner together at home. ‘You can’t go back to England without seeing anything of the country.’

  ‘Not this time,’ Cal said. ‘But I’ll take a month’s leave when I come out for your and Maggie’s wedding, and do some travelling then.’

  ‘Wedding?’ Maggie said.

  Cal smiled at her.

  ‘Don’t tell me he hasn’t asked you yet! He was like that as a small boy—always putting things off because he felt there had to be a perfect moment to do or ask whatever it was. Of course, there’s never a perfect moment.’

  ‘I think there are,’ Maggie said stoutly, thinking of the whispered ‘Oh, love’ she still carried in her heart.

  ‘Don’t tell him that,’ Cal groaned. ‘You’ll never get him up to the mark.’

  ‘Have you ever thought Maggie might not want me?’ Phil said.

  ‘Drivel! Of course she wants you. Even Minnie knows she’s head over heels in love with you.’

  The little dog, hearing her name, came to sit at Callum’s feet.

  ‘Don’t you, Min?’ he added, and Maggie was grateful his attention had been diverted as she knew her cheeks would be scarlet with embarrassment.

  Phil did know she loved him—she’d told him so—but she wasn’t going to let his brother bully him into doing something he didn’t want to do.

  ‘Love’s just a word that has different meanings in different contexts,’ she told Callum. ‘Some love is transient, ephemeral—not strong enough to build a relationship on, let alone a marriage. Marriage is about for ever and the love you need for that is gut-deep.’

  Then, embarrassed by the conversation, she stood up.

  ‘I’ve got to go back up to the hospital for a while,’ she said, knowing Phil would insist on walking up with her. ‘When you boys finish arguing you can stack the dishwasher.’

  Phil was on his feet before she reached the door.

  ‘You can’t walk up there in the dark on your own. Callum can stack. I’ll come with you.’

  Maggie smiled to herself, partly because she’d been right in her prediction but also because there’d been so much going on, and with Callum in the house she and Phil had spent very little time together.

  ‘I’m OK,’ she said to him, when they were walking out the gate. ‘I understand where things stand between us. Even if you do love me, we want such different things from marriage it would never work, so don’t let your brother bully you into doing something you don’t want to do.’

  She was holding his hand because it seemed a natural thing to do, and she felt his response in the pressure of his fingers.

  ‘It’s hard, Mags,’ he said, drawing her closer, their hands still clasped together. ‘Hard because what Callum said is true—I do put off important things, thinking there should be an optimum moment. And what you said is true about knowing where things stand—or it was true, up until the time I went away. That’s when I realised how much you meant to me. Far more than any dream of a picture-perfect home, or some image of a stay-at-home wife. I went to see Callum as a barrister who would help us with the court case and ended up seeing him as a brother, because suddenly it was important to me that I had a family—that I understood family as you understand it.’

  He stopped and turned towards her.

  ‘It was important for me to learn what family meant, because I knew I didn’t have a hope of persuading you to marry me if I was still vague about the concept. And if I didn’t understand it, then I’d lose my wise, passionate and, oh, so compassionate Maggie.’

  He paused and brushed a kiss across her lips.

  ‘I had to learn that home and family are about people, not places—that it’s the people and the love they share that makes a family complete, that makes any place they dwell in home. For some reason I’d let my fantasy tarnish the love I feel for my own family, and let it blind me to the love the members of it have for me.’

  He paused again, to kiss her once more, but also to draw breath because he hadn’t finished all he had to say.

  ‘But I know the difference now, Mags, between fantasy and reality. You’re reality—you and me. That’s reality. But I needed to leave you—to be away from you—to realise just how much I love you. Love you gut-deep—I couldn’t have put it any better.’

  She looked up into his face, and saw the plea in the way he stood, and read anxiety in his eyes.

  They were near the main road now, the footpath too brightly lit for them to see the stars. The air was redolent with petrol and diesel fumes, and the only music was the roar of traffic, the occasional squeal of brakes and the occasional blare of a car horn.

  ‘Is this the perfect moment you’ve been looking for?’ Maggie teased, and Phil let out a huge sigh of relief, gathered her in his arms and kissed her soundly.

  ‘Woohoo!’ a young voice cried, and two teenagers skirted around them.

  ‘I love you, Mags. Will you marry me?’ Phil asked, and Maggie snuggled close to him again and nodded.

  ‘No, I need to hear the words,’ he said, so Maggie looked up at him and said just one word.

  ‘Yes.’

  ISBN: 978-1-4603-5825-2

  THE HEART SURGEON’S PROPOSAL

  First North American Publication 2005

  Copyright © 2005 by Meredith Webber

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