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www.millsandboon.co.uk
Table of Contents
Cover Page
Title Page
Dedication
About the Author
Praise for Melanie Milburne:
Dear Reader
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Copyright
I dedicate this book to Joe Tucci and Dani Colvin, who first approached me to be an ambassador for the Australian Childhood Foundation—a position I accepted with great enthusiasm.
Melanie Milburne says: ‘One of the greatest joys of being a writer is the process of falling in love with the characters and then watching as they fall in love with each other. I am an absolutely hopeless romantic. I fell in love with my husband on our second date, and we even had a secret engagement, so you see it must have been destined for me to be a Harlequin® Mills & Boon author! The other great joy of being a romance writer is hearing from readers. You can hear all about the other things I do when I’m not writing and even drop me a line at: www.melaniemilburne.com.au’
Praise for Melanie Milburne:
‘An outstanding read, TOP-NOTCH DOC, OUTBACK BRIDE by Melanie Milburne is a contemporary story that heals the soul and romances the heart. I love Ms Milburne’s style of writing, and kudos to her for another wonderful story.’
—Cataromance
Melanie Milburne also writes for Modern™ Romance!
‘THE FIORENZA FORCED MARRIAGE by Melanie Milburne: insults fly, passion explodes, and it all adds up to an engaging story about the power of love.’
—RT Book Reviews
Dear Reader
One of the most rewarding aspects of being a globally published author is the opportunity it gives me to raise awareness of certain issues that are very dear to me. By purchasing this book you are actively helping me help The Australian Childhood Foundation in their quest to stamp out child abuse and neglect in Australia. I will be donating all my proceeds from this book to the Foundation, and hope that in doing so many children’s lives will be changed for the better.
It has been said that every childhood lasts a lifetime. The memories some children carry from their childhood are not ones any child should be burdened with. Please join me in helping this great cause as it works to educate and advocate for children who have no one else to fight for them.
With best wishes
Melanie Milburne
CHAPTER ONE
IT WAS the third day in a row that someone had parked in Erin’s spot. Not only had they parked there arrogantly, they had done so crookedly, taking up so much space she had to manoeuvre her car into the space near the garbagedisposal unit, which she knew would almost certainly result in a scratch or two on her shiny paintwork.
She rummaged in her handbag for a piece of paper and a pen, and then, glancing around for a flat surface, whooshed out a breath and leaned on the rogue-parker’s bonnet to pen her missive: you are in the wrong spot!
Erin tucked the note behind one of the windscreen wipers and made her way to the elevator. She tapped her right foot impatiently as she watched the numbers light up as it came down from the fifteenth floor. After a ten-hour shift in the emergency department of Sydney Metropolitan, the only thing she wanted was the quiet, safe sanctuary of her apartment. Her ears were still ringing from the shattered cries of a middle-aged mother who had lost her only son to a fatal stab-wound—yet another drug deal gone wrong.
The doors of the elevator glided open and she came face to face with a tall man who was wearing blue denim jeans and a white T-shirt that had a dust smear over the right shoulder. He was carrying an empty cardboard box and he smiled at her crookedly as he stepped out. ‘Moving in,’ he explained with a flash of perfect white teeth.
Erin lifted her chin and gave him a gimlet glare. ‘Is that your car in my parking space?’
Something hardened in his green gaze and his smile flatlined. ‘I was not aware there were designated parking spaces.’
Her chin went a little higher. ‘The numbers are painted on the ground. A blind man could see them.’
One of his dark brows lifted along with his top lip, as if controlled by the same muscle. ‘You must be the woman from 1503,’ he said, rocking back on his heels slightly. ‘I was warned about you.’
Erin felt her hackles rise like the fur of a cornered cat. ‘I beg your pardon?’
His eyes moved over her rigid form with indolent ease. ‘Erin Taylor, right?’
She tightened her mouth. ‘That’s correct.’
He smiled a smile that was borderline mocking. ‘My landlord told me all about you.’
‘Oh, really?’ She affected a bored, uninterested tone.
‘Yes,’ he said, placing the box on the concrete floor. ‘You’re a doctor at Sydney Metropolitan.’
Erin mentally rolled her eyes. Here comes another free car-park consultation, she thought. No doubt he thought he could weasel a flu shot out of her, like one of her neighbours had tried to do as soon as autumn had kicked in last month. ‘Yes, that’s right,’ she said crisply. ‘And right now I am off duty, so if you’ll excuse me?’
‘I’m renting the apartment next to yours,’ he said.
‘How…er…nice,’ Erin said with no attempt to sound sincere.
The man’s lazy smile travelled all the way up to his green eyes, making them crinkle up at the corners. ‘T guess in the interests of neighbourly peace I should move my car.’
‘You should,’ she said, stabbing at the call button to reopen the doors. ‘But don’t use the disabled spot. Mrs Greenaway on level ten uses that.’
‘I’ll try and remember that.’
Something about his tone made Erin feel as if he was laughing at her behind his urbane smile. She gave the call button an even harder jab, trying not to notice how his T-shirt clung to his lean but muscular frame. She had seen a lot of male bodies over the years so it took a particularly good one to make her do a double-take. This one was seriously fit. No spare flesh, just hard, toned muscle on a six-foot-three, maybe six-foot-four-inch frame. His hair was a rich, dark brown, several shades darker than hers, and his skin was the sort that tanned easily. His twelve-plus-hours-since-he’d-last-shaved stubbled jaw had a hint of stubbornness to it, and his blade of a nose, teamed with those penetrating green eyes, gave him a ‘take no prisoners’ air that she found strangely compelling.
The elevator doors pinged open, and Erin stepped in and pressed the button for the fifteenth floor. For the sake of common politeness, she forced her lips into a non-committal smile that didn’t quite make the distance to her eyes. ‘See you around,’ she said.
‘Yeah, no doubt you will.’ He smiled an inscrutable little smile in return.
The elevator doors closed and Erin let out the breath she hadn’t even realised she had been holding. She gave herself a mental shake. The tall, dark, handsome neighbour was certainly a welcome change from the previous tenants: a trio of university students who’d partied non-stop and who, to add insult to injury, had put their rubbish in Erin’s bin when theirs had been full. It had taken the last two weeks to get the smell of cigarette smoke out of her curtains, since the apartments were linked by a common balcony with only a waist-height glass partition to separate them.
As long as the new tenant stayed out of her way and out of her parking space, Erin was sure they would get along just fine.
‘Morning, Erin.’ Tammy McNeil, the triage nurse on duty in A&E, greeted Erin the next morning. ‘How come you didn’t come to the new director’s breakfast meeting? He insisted all the A&E doctors on duty today attend. He wants to meet everyone in person, even the cleaning staff.’
Erin placed her bag in the locker under the desk before she straightened to answer. ‘I had better things to do—like catch up on some much-needed sleep. I’m sure we’ll cross paths sooner or later.’
Tammy perched on the corner of the desk. ‘You don’t look like you had such a great night’s sleep. I know yesterday’s death was rough on you. The mum was a bit over-the-top trying to blame you for not saving her son. Are you OK? You look exhausted.’
Erin hated it when people told her she looked tired; it made her feel tired even when she wasn’t—although last night had been a rough one, she had to admit, even without the drama of the young man’s death. Right until the early hours, she had heard furniture and boxes being dragged across the floors next door, and even though she had put a pillow over her head it hadn’t really helped, for when she had finally drifted off to sleep she had woken several times in an agitated state from some vivid nightmares. It always happened after she had to deal with drug-affected patients. The ghosts from the past haunted her when she was most vulnerable. ‘I’m fine, Tammy,’ she said, reaching for her stethoscope. ‘I’m used to patients and their relatives using me as a scapegoat. It’s part of the job. It’s not as if I have to ever see them again. That’s one of the benefits of working as an A&E doctor: I treat them as best I can and then I leave them to someone else to follow up.’
Tammy gave her a wry look as she hopped down off the desk. ‘Mmm, well, you might have to have a rethink about that after you hear about Dr Chapman’s plan for the department.’
Erin shrugged herself into her white coat, pulling her hair out from beneath the collar and tying it back in a neat bun with an elastic tie she had in her coat pocket. ‘I don’t care what Dr Chapman has planned for the department. He can’t make me work any harder than I do.’ She picked up her name-badge and clipped it to her coat. ‘If he’s anything like our previous director, he’ll realise we’re all doing the best we can and leave us to get on with it.’
Tammy winced. ‘Er…’
Erin frowned at her. ‘What’s the matter?’
A deep, clipped voice spoke from behind Erin. ‘Dr Taylor—a word, please. In my office. Now.’
Erin turned, her eyes widening when she saw the man from the elevator standing there. ‘I’m about to start my shift,’ she said. ‘There are five bays already occupied, waiting for assessment.’
His green eyes were like steel darts pinning hers. ‘There are two other doctors and a registrar on duty. I am sure they are well able to cope without you for five or ten minutes.’
Erin pulled her mouth into a resentful line as she followed him out of the department to the office he had been allocated next to X-ray. He held open the door for her and she swept past him, bristling with irritation.
He closed the door and strode over to his desk, which was in a state of moving-in disarray. ‘Please take a seat,’ he said. ‘I won’t keep you long.’
Erin hesitated for a brief moment. If she sat down it would give him an advantage she didn’t want him to have. He was so tall, standing there looking down at her, making her feel about fifteen years old when she was nearly twice that age. His hard gaze tussled with hers, and she sat like a heavy bag of theatre laundry being dropped. She folded her arms across her chest and swung one leg across the other, in a ‘let’s get this over with’ pose that she knew reeked of insolence, but she was beyond caring.
‘Perhaps I should introduce myself properly since I neglected to do so last night,’ he said.
‘Why didn’t you?’ she asked with a curl of her top lip. ‘You clearly knew who I was given you were “warned” about me.’
Eamon decided against taking the chair behind his desk. Instead he leaned back against the filing cabinet and surveyed Erin Taylor’s pursed lips and flashing, chocolate-brown eyes. She was sitting in a combative pose, every feminine inch of her poised to strike. He decided she would be quite astonishingly beautiful if she would smile instead of scowl. She had clear skin with just a dusting of light brown freckles over her uptilted nose. Her chestnut hair was glossy, and even though she had arranged it into a tight chignon at the back of her head a few escaping wisps framed her heart-shaped face. Her mouth was full, although it was currently pulled tight, and her cheekbones were classic, like a model’s, sharp and high with a hint of haughtiness about them. Her body was slight but unmistakably feminine; her breasts were pushed up by her tightly crossed arms, giving him a clear view of her cleavage, which he was almost certain was unintentional.
He felt a stirring in his groin which took him completely by surprise. Admittedly it had been a while since he had held a woman in his arms, but somehow he couldn’t see Erin Taylor falling into his bed any time soon—although in his head he rubbed at his jaw; there was nothing he liked more than a tough challenge.
‘As you already know, I am Dr Eamon Chapman, the new A&E director,’ he said. ‘You would have received the email about my appointment.’
She didn’t answer; she just sat there staring at him with that recalcitrant look on her face.
‘You would have also received the invitation to a breakfast meeting this morning which apparently you decided against attending,’ he continued.
She sat up even straighter in her chair. ‘It wasn’t compulsory.’
Eamon pushed his tongue into his right cheek as he fought to keep cool. Something about her reminded him of a defiant schoolgirl with little or no respect for authority. ‘No,’ he said. ‘But it would have been polite to inform me you were unable to attend. As you can imagine, this position is a busy and highly demanding one. I would appreciate every member of the team I am directing to be one-hundred-percent committed from day one of my appointment. That includes you, Dr Taylor.’
Erin raised her chin. ‘I worked a ten-hour shift yesterday and a twelve-hour the day before,’ she said stiffly. ‘I give one hundred and twenty percent to this place.’
‘All the more reason for you to be aware of my plans to improve the department,’ he said with equal tension.
Erin felt like rolling her eyes. How many times had some bureaucrat come in with a hot-shot plan to revamp the place? It didn’t matter what fancy plans Dr Chapman had drawn up; within a few months it would be back to double shifts, patients lying in the corridors and ambulances lined up in the street due to the lack of beds. ‘OK, then,’ she said, giving him a cynical look. ‘Why don’t you fill me in now so I’m all up to date?’
He pushed himself away from the filing cabinet and picked up a document from his desk. ‘It’s all in here,’ he said, handing it to her. ‘Perhaps you’ll do me the honour of reading it at your leisure and getting back to me with any questions or suggestions.’
Erin took the document but in the process of doing so encountered his long, tanned fingers for a fraction of a second. It felt like a lightning bolt had zapped up her arm at the brief contact. She tried her best to cover her reaction by casually flipping through the twenty-page document, but the words, although neatly typed, made no sense at all to her. It was as if her brain had shut down. Her body felt hot and tight, as if her skin had shrunk two sizes on her frame. She could feel her face heating under his silent scrutiny, and she shifted uncomfortably in her chair. The air she breathed in contained a hint of his aftershave; it was lemony and fresh, not cloying or overpowering like some she had smelt.
She heard him shuffle through some papers on his desk and looked up to encounter his emerald gaze trained on her. ‘There is another matter I wish to discuss with you,’ he said. ‘I understand a patient died in A&E yesterday.’
Erin hardly realised she had moved but she suddenly found herself sitting on the edge of her chair. ‘Yes, that’s correct,’ she said. ‘He’d virtually bled out by the time he arrived here—he was in grade-four shock and went into asystole. I did his resus by the book.’
‘I’m sure you did, Dr Taylor,’ he said. ‘But a formal complaint has been made by a relative, and as director I am responsible for seeing that it is investigated thoroughly.’
Erin felt her spine give a nervous wobble that travelled all the way down her legs. ‘That resus was textbook EMST, Dr Chapman. I’ve documented the whole episode, and you can watch it on the CCTV as well,’ she said, forcing her voice to remain composed and confident.
‘The mother of the young man who died…’ He glanced at the paper before pinning Erin with his gaze once more. ‘The resus might have been technically correct, when it occurred, but what about its timing? Mrs Haddad maintains that you did not respond quickly enough to her son’s injuries. She said that they were waiting in A&E for more than an hour before he was properly assessed.’
Erin drew in a scalding breath. ‘That is not true! The triage nurse informed me of his injuries and I went straight to him from an asthmatic I was treating. The boy had multiple abdominal stab-wounds and was in hypovolemic shock. I was told that and went straight to the resus bay. I would have seen him within a couple of minutes at most after he arrived. If he was waiting around for treatment, it certainly wasn’t here. Maybe they were hanging about in the waiting room, or outside the department. All I know is that as soon as I was told of his arrival I finished injecting prednisolone to a severe asthmatic, made sure she was inhaling the ventolin nebuliser and supervised by a nurse, and went straight to the resus bay. Three minutes at most.’
Eamon Chapman didn’t speak but continued to look at her with that piercing green gaze of his.
‘You know what some relatives can be like,’ Erin argued. ‘They don’t believe their loved one was involved in something shady. “He’s a good boy” and all that. “Someone else did this to him”. “The doctors didn’t save him”. Blame anyone and everyone except the person responsible.’
Eamon put the paper back down on his desk. ‘I realise emotions run high in cases like this for everyone involved. Mrs Haddad may well withdraw the complaint after legal counsel. But even so there are still some issues that need to be dealt with in A&E. You will become aware of them once you read my proposal for change.’
Erin rose from the chair, holding the folder against her chest like armour. ‘I’ll read it and get back to you,’ she said.
‘You do that,’ he said with a half-smile that didn’t meet his eyes.
She turned on her heel and was almost out the door when his deep baritone voice stopped her in her tracks. ‘By the way, I checked the numbers in the parking area. Unless they are written in Braille, I am very much afraid a blind man could not see them.’
Erin turned back to face him. There was a hint of mockery in his sea-green gaze that made her scalp prickle in annoyance. ‘I’ll speak to the maintenance guy about having them repainted,’ she said with the arch of an eyebrow. ‘Or would you like him to paint arrows, or a big, fat, fluorescent “X” so you know exactly where to park?’
A tiny muscle moved next to his mouth. Erin wasn’t sure if he was fighting anger or a smile; either way, it made him look even more attractive than he had last night. She felt the tiny flutter of her pulse, and a tingling of her flesh that made her breath catch as his eyes held hers.
‘Just my number would be fine, thanks, Dr Taylor,’ he said, and reached for his ringing mobile that was clipped on his belt. ‘Excuse me. I have to get this.’
Erin spun away and closed the door with a sharp click behind her. She strode back to A&E; for the first time in her career she was immensely glad to see an overflowing waiting room.
It wasn’t until Erin was back at her flat with her cat, Molly, on her lap that she picked up the document Eamon Chapman had given her that morning. She absently stroked Molly’s thick fur as she read through the proposal, trying to ignore the sound of the sliding doors opening on the balcony next door. She had heard him come home about an hour after her. It gave her a slightly unsettled feeling to think of him on the other side of the wall. To her annoyance she found her thoughts drifting to what his routine might be: would he shower and change before dinner, or would he watch the news on television, perhaps have a beer or a glass of wine if he wasn’t on call? Would he cook his own dinner or eat out? Did he have a partner? Was there a Mrs Chapman who would lie next to him in bed at night and be folded into his arms…?
Erin pulled away from her wayward thoughts and focused back on the words printed in front of her. So far there had been some sensible suggestions on streamlining triage and reducing the number of minor cases that should have been handled in general practice. The next section was on follow-through care. Her eyes narrowed as she read the plan for A&E doctors to conduct their own ward-rounds on the patients that had come into the hospital via the emergency department. As she read each word, she could feel a tide of panic rising inside her. She wasn’t trained to sit by patients’ bedsides and discuss the weather or their personal lives; she was trained to respond to emergencies, to stabilise patients before sending them on to definitive care. She would never be able to cope with all the names and faces, not to mention the added burden of thinking about patients and their lives outside of A&E. She put them out of her mind once they left the department. She had to, otherwise she would end up too involved, unable to remain at a clinical distance.
Erin tossed the document to one side and got to her feet, dislodging Molly, who gave an affronted miaow before turning her back to lick each of her paws with meticulous care.
The doors of the balcony beckoned and Erin slid them open to look out over the view of Sydney Harbour and the city on the opposite shore. Yachts were out, some with their colourful spinnakers up, looking like one-winged butterflies. Smaller craft bobbed about on the light swell and passenger ferries crisscrossed their way through the water, carrying people home from work or into the city for entertainment or dinner.
She gripped the balcony rail with an iron grip and lifted her face to the breeze, breathing in the salty air, wishing she could be on one of those yachts and sail away into the sunset.
‘You wouldn’t happen to have a cup of sugar, would you?’ Eamon Chapman’s voice sounded from her right.
Erin swivelled her head to look at him, her heart giving a little free fall. He was bare-chested, his legs encased in dark blue denim slung low on his lean hips. Every muscle on his chest and abdomen looked like it had been carved into place by a master craftsman. She had studied anatomy, yet not one of her textbooks would have done Dr Eamon Chapman justice. ‘Um…sugar?’
His mouth tilted wryly. ‘Yeah, that sweet stuff you put in coffee. I forgot to get some when I shopped on the way home.’
Erin brushed a strand of hair that the breeze had worked loose from her chignon away from her face. ‘The shops are only a short walk away,’ she pointed out.
‘So you don’t have any?’ he asked, leaning on the dividing rail with his strong forearms. ‘Sugar, I mean?’
Erin tried not to look at the way his biceps bulged as he leaned his weight on the railing. He was more or less at eye level, which was disconcerting to say the least. This close she could see tiny brown flecks in his green eyes that fanned out from his dark-as-ink pupils. ‘I…I don’t take sugar,’ she said.