Christmas at Jimmie's Children's Unit Read online

  She’d come in to show him the door-opening mechanism and was so close he could have taken her in his arms right there and then. He could feel her in his arms, feel her curves snug against his body, smell the perfume of her hair in his nostrils. He’d bend his head, just a little, to capture her lips—

  He was losing it! Seriously insane! He had to pull himself together, get sorted, all that stuff.

  ‘Thanks,’ he managed when she turned to look at him, perhaps puzzled by his wooden stance and lack of response.

  ‘No worries,’ she said, then she frowned and looked more closely at him. ‘Are you okay? I know it’s hardly flattering to tell someone they look terrible, but you look exhausted.’

  ‘Car trouble on the way from Melbourne meant I had to drive through the night. One good night’s sleep and I’ll be fine.’

  Clare turned to leave, uncertain whether to be glad or sorry. She’d buoyed herself up to tell Oliver about Emily, using the key explanations as an excuse to knock on his door. The plan was she’d casually offer dinner, and they could sit down in a civilised fashion and discuss the situation, though the problem of quite how she’d bring it up still loomed large in her mind.

  But seeing how tired Oliver looked and finding out why, it was immediately obvious this wasn’t the time to be telling him he had a daughter, especially as he was operating the next morning. What he needed was a good night’s sleep, not a bombshell that was likely to rock his world and quite possibly prevent any sleep at all.

  Part of her was relieved, but the other part aggravated that the telling would continue to hang over her head.

  Then there was dinner—he had to eat…Should she still ask?

  ‘Thanks for explaining about the locks and keys,’ he said as she dithered in the doorway, so conscious of his body she wondered if he could feel the tension building in hers. In her mind his hand reached out for her, touched her shoulder, drew her close. She’d sink against him, feeling her body fit itself to his and—

  The jangling buzz of the outside bell sounded in his flat, shocking her out of the stupid dream. He smiled as she looked at him, ashamed of her thoughts and puzzled by the intrusion.

  ‘Good thing you labelled my bell,’ he added. ‘I ordered a pizza for dinner.’

  As Oliver pressed the button to release the front door lock, using the phone to tell the delivery person to come on up, Clare scuttled back across the landing, all but diving into the safety of her own flat.

  Although as a refuge it was now severely lacking in serenity and peace, given who her neighbour was, and the wayward turns her mind was taking.

  Back when he hadn’t replied to her letters, she’d put him out of her life, swearing never to think of him again.

  But not thinking about him had proven difficult when their child had inherited his green eyes and curving, inviting lips.

  Clare knew she needed a good night’s sleep, but how could sleep come when the huge, insurmountable problem of how to tell Oliver was cluttering up her mind and sitting like an elephant on her chest?

  Earlier, when she’d gone in with the key excuse, she’d decided just coming out with it would be the best. Oh, by the way, my daughter, Emily, is your child.

  But now that seemed impossibly, horribly flippant. She had to find some better way to say it.

  Oliver, there’s something you should know?

  No, that wouldn’t work. She’d lose courage after the Oliver part and ask about his mother or something equally inane.

  Could she begin with self-justification? I did try to contact you; I phoned and wrote, then—

  No, she couldn’t do that because it would mean explaining about Dad dying and even now thinking of that time still hurt too much for her to talk about it.

  Finally, with herculean determination, she lulled herself to sleep, only to wake before dawn, tired, cranky and so uptight she thought her limbs might snap apart as she moved.

  But move she did. Although she’d spent many hours at the hospital the previous week, getting to know the machine she would be operating, now she was anxious to get up to the theatre for one last check.

  She showered and dressed, blotting everything from her mind except work, excited yet slightly apprehensive about her first day as part of the team.

  Slightly apprehensive?

  Understatement of the year, and although she was focusing on work, the other problem set aside, it had to be the thought of working with Oliver that had her twitching like a snake on drugs.

  An image of him flashed across her mind—the now-Oliver with silver streaks in the tawny hair, and fine lines at the corners of his green eyes. More lines forming parentheses in his cheeks when he smiled, his lips still as mesmerising as ever, a pale line delineating their shape.

  Em’s lips!

  But it was better to think of Oliver’s lips than the problem of Emily right now. Thinking about Emily would put her mother into a panic again and a panicking perfusionist was of no use to anyone.

  Unfortunately thinking of Oliver didn’t do her much good either. Look at it this way, she told herself. Yes, it was an unbelievable quirk of fate that had brought them together again, but they’d met as colleagues now, nothing more. Two professionals, working in the same team, working to save the lives of tiny babies.

  Forget the fact you still feel an attraction to the man!

  Forget Emily—well, not Em herself, but the problem she presented right now. Concentrate on work.

  In the kitchen, she turned on the simple pod coffee machine that had been her treat to herself when she’d moved to Sydney, and dropped two slices of frozen fruit loaf into the toaster. Had Oliver found the shops? Did he have food to eat? Coffee?

  The temptation to tap on his door and ask him was almost overwhelming, but it was barely six and their official working hours began at eight so it was likely he was still asleep. Besides, the more times she saw him outside of work hours, the more opportunities she would have had to tell him about Emily, and the angrier he’d be when she did tell him, that she hadn’t told him earlier.

  Did that make sense or was her lack of sleep making her stupid?

  She sipped her coffee, returning to the mental excuse of not knocking on the door in case he was still sleeping.

  An image of a sleeping Oliver popped obligingly into her head—Oliver in boxer shorts, his back bare, lightly tanned, the bones of his spine visible as he curled around his pillow in sleep. An ache started deep inside her, and she left her toast half eaten, the coffee cup still half full, hurrying to the bathroom to clean her teeth, then fleeing her flat which was, she realised, just far too close to Oliver’s for her peace of mind. It was the proximity dogging her, reminding her, teasing at her body. If she moved—

  But how could she when Alex had been kind enough to arrange the accommodation and she already felt settled here?

  Or had done!

  Although if she shifted…? No! her mind shrieked at her. Of course you have to tell him.

  Oliver pushed his bedroom window to open it wider, sure there must be a breeze somewhere in the stillness of the summer morning. Below him the front door clicked shut and Clare strode into view, marching with great speed and determination up the path, then along the street, striding now—exercising or escaping?

  But escaping from what? Not him, surely.

  He laughed at the thought, a mocking laugh, but didn’t leave the window, watching until a slight bend in the road took her out of sight.

  Clare!

  He showered and dressed, reminding himself that both of them had changed in the ten years since the split. Now they were mature adults and could meet and treat each other as professional colleagues, nothing more, though the thought of her with a child niggled at him.

  For one thing, where was the child now? She hadn’t had a child with her and there was no noise coming from next door.

  Clare with a child.

  Why did that hurt him?

  The physical attraction he still felt towards h
er was probably nothing more than an emotional hangover from the past, some glitch in programming, possibly to do with the Italian revelations. And feeling this strong attraction, it was only natural that he’d been on the brink of taking her in his arms yesterday evening, when the front doorbell had sounded.

  Saved by a pizza!

  Think of food, not Clare.

  Rod’s daughter had left some basic groceries in the flat—milk and butter in the fridge, coffee, tea, bread and spreads in the pantry. He’d have to find the supermarket and do some shopping, and until then he could eat at the hospital. In fact, if he left now he could have breakfast there; maybe that’s why Clare had left so early.

  She wasn’t in the little coffee shop in the foyer, nor in the canteen, so he ate a solitary breakfast, then made his way not to the teams’ rooms but to the theatre, wanting to refamiliarise himself with the way Alex had it set up.

  ‘Oh!’

  Clare was there ahead of him and she must have sensed his presence, for the startled expression burst from her lips before he was fully through the door.

  Not that she was unsettled for long, greeting him with a smile—a very professional smile—and a cheery, ‘Good morning, Oliver,’ for all the world as if they hadn’t shared an extremely passionate relationship, albeit ten years ago.

  ‘Do you always begin this early?’ he asked, because two could play the calm and controlled game. She smiled again.

  ‘First-night nerves,’ she told him. ‘I’ve spent a lot of time here in the past week, but I’m still anxious about the machine, which is stupid as it’s exactly the same make of machine as I operated in the States. It’s just that—’

  She stopped abruptly and he saw a faint colour appear in her cheeks.

  ‘Just that…?’ he prompted, hoping professional conversation would halt the disturbances in his body.

  ‘You’ll think I’m barmy, but to me the machines have personalities, maybe idiosyncrasies would be a better word, and until I get to know each one personally I won’t know what to expect.’

  Clare watched him carefully as she explained her unease, and to her surprise, she caught no hint of a smile. In fact, Oliver was nodding as if he understood what she was saying.

  ‘You have so much to think about, with the responsibility for the respiratory and circulatory functions of the lungs and heart. I can understand you wondering if the machine has quirks you need to watch for. You’ve got the oxygenator, the pumps, the filters, the reservoirs and tubing, so many component parts that can go wrong.’

  And now he smiled, sending tremors of remembered delight through Clare’s body, in spite of her determination to remain on strictly professional terms with him.

  ‘But have things ever gone badly wrong for you? Has there ever been a disaster you couldn’t overcome?’

  She found herself smiling back at him, professionally, of course.

  ‘Tubes kinking, the membrane oxygenator failing, the machine turning off automatically when a clot or bubble gets into the tubes? I’ve seen most of the calamities that can happen, and had to cope with a few, but generally the machines, providing they are serviced regularly and checked before every operation, work brilliantly.’

  Oliver heard the pride in her voice and recognised the dedication she had to her profession—speaking of which…

  ‘It still seems a strange choice for someone who had stars in her eyes and an established career as an actor.’

  He saw her shoulders lift in a slight shrug.

  ‘Things happened, Oliver, that changed my goals. I’d done well in science at school, so a switch to that seemed logical.’

  Which would have made sense, only her voice had tightened as she spoke, and he sensed a tension in her body. Or was he fooling himself that he was still so attuned to her he could feel her emotion, sense that she’d told maybe not a lie but certainly not the whole truth?

  ‘Then perfusion.’

  He shook his head, as much at his own imaginings as at her choice of career. But at least her smile was back—a bright smile now.

  ‘If I’d known how much I would love this job I’d never have bothered with anything else. What amazes me is that there are so many jobs out there that no-one even knows about. I mean, the career adviser at my school didn’t mention perfusionist as a career option. In fact, he’d probably never heard of it either. By chance, I met a perfusionist and that was it.’

  ‘So here you are.’ Nice, normal conversation; he’d be able to handle this. Always assuming the attraction he still felt towards her wasn’t obvious to everyone who came in contact with him when she was around.

  She bent her head as she answered, presumably checking some component of the machine, and Oliver found himself studying her, once again imagining he could sense tension in her voice.

  ‘It can’t have been easy, handling training and a child.’

  It was a throwaway remark, the kind anyone might make, yet he saw her tense. No sensing it this time; he actually saw her stiffen.

  Why?

  ‘Mum helped out.’

  Obviously that was the only answer he was going to get, so should he keep the conversation going?

  Might as well; it was awkward enough as it was without silence extending between them.

  ‘How old is she?’

  More silence, then Clare looked up at him.

  ‘She’s nine,’ she said, before returning to whatever she was doing, fiddling with the machine.

  ‘Nine? As in nine years old?’ he muttered as a rage he’d never felt before, not even when his real father had denied him, burnt through his body. ‘You’re telling me you were so desperate for a child you went from me to him, whoever he was? Or were you already seeing him? Cheating on me? Did he offer marriage? Is that what swayed you? And did he offer before or after you announced you were pregnant, eh?’

  Clare had never heard such anger in his voice, yet this was hardly the time to refute his hateful accusations. He was about to operate on a vulnerable infant. He needed to be calm and composed, totally focused on the job, not struggling to comprehend the fact that he had a daughter.

  What’s more, she had to be calm and composed as well! Later she’d get angry. Later she’d tell him…

  Right now, she had to defuse the situation somehow.

  ‘It is none of your business what I did or didn’t do, Oliver, and right now I really need to get on with this.’ She looked up at him again, saw the harsh anger in his face and hated the contempt she read in his eyes. And though her own anger burned at the injustice of his words, she pushed it aside, adding calmly, ‘And you probably want to check out the theatre, although didn’t Alex say you’d worked with them before?’

  For a moment she thought he’d reject the conversational shift, but when he nodded she knew she’d succeeded in tempering the tense emotional atmosphere in the room.

  At least for the duration of the operation!

  ‘I have worked here before.’ Clipped, crisp words, but Clare knew he was turning his focus to work.

  ‘Do we know yet if we have a patient?’ she asked, pursuing professional conversation, although he was still unsettling her, prowling around the perimeter of the theatre, distracting her with his presence when she didn’t need distraction.

  ‘Last I heard about the TGA Alex listed yesterday was that he hadn’t arrived,’ he said, and this time his voice sounded more relaxed—his professional self taking over.

  ‘So we wait,’ Clare responded, determined to match his tone. ‘If Angus is as good at doing a switch of the great arteries as Alex seems to think, it will be exciting to watch him at work. Do you know any more about the patient?’

  Oliver shook his head.

  ‘But you still have more contact with them than I do,’ she added. ‘I usually only get to meet patients when they come into Theatre, although with older children I sometimes do blood collection for autologous blood transfusions should one be necessary. My main contact with newborns is after the op if they go onto
ECMO.’

  Could she really be having this conversation with Oliver, when the echo of his accusations and the spectre of Emily hung in the room like twin thunder clouds?

  ‘Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation—of course, you’re in charge of those machines as well.’

  ‘Terrible necessities,’ Clare said. ‘Some babies need them post-op but they can do so much damage to the organs if we’re not really careful.’

  She continued on about the problems the machine could cause, but Oliver had stopped listening to the actual words, hearing instead the confidence and professionalism in her voice, noticing the tension had lessened.

  Maybe it had never been there. Maybe he’d imagined it!

  Or maybe she was as good as he was at compartmentalising her life. It had taken him a mammoth effort, a few minutes ago, to block out the implications of the age of Clare’s child, but he’d done it, because the baby they were about to treat had to be his sole focus for the next few hours.

  His pager buzzed against his belt and he glanced at the message.

  ‘Looks like it’s all systems go,’ he said, and heard Clare’s pager buzz at the same time.

  ‘Good luck,’ she said, smiling now, no hiding the excitement in her eyes. She was rising to the challenge that lay ahead, totally professional, the adrenaline rush in her veins lighting her up from within.

  So why was he seeing black shadows hovering over her—the shadow of another man, another man’s child? Why was totally inappropriate anger festering inside him?

  ‘Good luck yourself,’ he said, blotting the dark clouds from his mind, repelling the anger from his body. In eighteen years of professional life he’d never allowed his work self to be distracted by outside issues and he wasn’t about to start now.

  And the tension he was feeling at the base of his spine was because he was working with a new team, nothing else.

  Other members of the team breezed in, inconsequential chat filling the air as people went about their allotted tasks while the atmosphere in the theatre seemed to tighten in expectation of the operation that lay ahead.