It didn’t matter how attractive Vicky was…

Or any other woman, for that matter. It didn’t matter how good it felt to have her hand wrapped around his arm, knowing that the contact was giving her the support she needed. It didn’t matter that he could smell the hint of flowers and musk drifting from her skin, or that her long blond hair was like spun gold against the dark fabric of his suit. It didn’t matter that the last hour had made him feel more alive than he had in several years and that he was actually looking forward to sharing a meal with her.

As the common idiom went, he’d been there and done that already, and had the scars on his heart to prove it.

Dear Reader,

A while ago I was lucky enough to spend a week in Cumbria, in the northwest of England. As I was revisiting places I first came to know when our children were small, I found I was looking at them in a completely different way.

Suddenly, the quaint little market town of years ago was growing and becoming the background for a whole new cast of characters working in and around Denison Memorial Hospital. This book is the third in a series of stories about those characters, and I hope you enjoy them.

Perhaps along the way I can give you a taste of what it was like to live surrounded by such magnificent scenery and the inimitable Cumbrian people. I will certainly be going back again.

Happy reading!

Innocent Secret
Josie Metcalfe

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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CONTENTS

COVER

Dear Reader

TITLE PAGE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

COPYRIGHT

CHAPTER ONE

‘DO YOU take this man to be your lawful wedded husband?’

Vicky Lawrence heard the time-honoured words drifting towards her, and with them knew that a dream that she’d treasured for nearly half of her life was finally over.

She’d loved Nick ever since she was twelve years old but he’d never looked at her the way he was looking at Frankie, the woman who was making her promises to him.

She didn’t begrudge him his happiness—how could she when the two of them looked as if they’d been made for each other?

Still, she wouldn’t be human if she didn’t feel a pang of regret for what might have been. She’d believed all her Christmases had come at once the day he’d proposed to her, and the months when she’d been busily planning their perfect wedding had been the happiest of her life.

She still didn’t know what had changed, or why, or even when. All she did know was that when Nick had sat her down with that serious look on his face and confessed that he wanted to break their engagement, she couldn’t have been more delighted.

It should have hurt to find out that he’d fallen passionately in love with a fellow GP working in the unit that was part of Denison Memorial Hospital. The fact that she knew and liked Frankie as a colleague should have made her feel betrayal, not gratitude.

Yet here she was, standing surreptitiously at the back of the room so that her presence wouldn’t cast a shadow over the proceedings, and she hardly felt a qualm.

She’d searched around inside her heart, almost like probing at a painful tooth with her tongue, and had barely raised an ache, but if she’d admitted as much to any of the people in the room they wouldn’t have believed her.

‘Are you all right?’ had been the most frequent question she’d heard over the last few weeks, accompanied by a look of such cloying pity that she’d wanted to scream.

‘I’m fine,’ she’d been saying with a bright smile when what she’d wanted to say had been, ‘I couldn’t be more delighted that Nick fell in love with Frankie because it saved me from making a monumental mistake.’

However, the world and his wife had cast her in the role of broken-hearted waif and wouldn’t look beyond to see that there was something far more important than Nick’s defection filling her mind.

‘Are you all right?’ murmured yet another voice as someone came to stand just behind her, and the soft burr of his Scottish accent told her who it was without needing to see him.

This time her reaction to the question was very different. This time the voice was the one that, over the last couple of months, had begun to fill her mind and heart with more desperate longing than she’d ever felt for Nick. She hadn’t realised that she’d had little more than an adolescent crush on her long-time hero until she’d learned about the real thing. There was no comparison.

‘I’m fine,’ she whispered over her shoulder, looking up almost six inches into the sombre, handsome face of GP Joe Faraday and straight into the changeable hazel of his eyes. It was her usual reply, honed over the last roller-coaster weeks and, as usual, she could tell that she hadn’t been believed.

Sometimes she didn’t even believe it herself. It wasn’t quite as easy as that to let go of something that had been the bedrock of her existence for half her life.

She took another long look at the handsome man now slipping a wedding ring on the finger of his petite new wife. She’d dreamed of him doing that to her one day, but he’d never have worn that same look of utter devotion as he did with Frankie, neither would he have thrown a cheerful smile of resignation at ten-year-old Katie’s whispered interruption.

She sighed, knowing that Nick was doing the right thing, knowing that they had both made the right decision.

Not that any amount of certainty was going to make the next few weeks any easier to bear. That was one of the penalties of living in such a place as Edenthwaite. It was a caring community with most of its members connected by blood or work, but that also meant that the world and his wife had heard at least one version of the story currently going the rounds.

Unfortunately, most of them were determined to see her in the role of jilted bride-to-be and were treating her as if she’d suddenly turned into eggshell porcelain.

Wondering just how long it would be before life returned to normal, she sighed again and was startled to feel the warm weight of a decidedly masculine arm encompass her shoulders.

‘We don’t have to stay,’ Joe murmured, his voice a deep rumble close to her ear that sent a sharp shiver of awareness right through her.

For a moment Vicky was lost in the sensation of quiet strength and concern, then the irony of the situation washed over her. This was Dr Joseph Faraday standing with his arm around her, the most reclusive man she’d ever met. Over the six months or so since she’d started work at Denison Memorial she didn’t think he’d glanced in her direction more than half a dozen times, even when they’d been on the ward together, and as for speaking…Even when she’d gone out of her way to help him in the aftermath of his injury it had been rather like dealing with a grumpy hedgehog.

‘We don’t have to?’ Had she heard right?

‘The invitation to the reception was informal,’ he reminded her. ‘If you’d prefer, we could have a meal somewhere other than Edenthwaite.’

For a moment Vicky was tempted, so very tempted. She’d been waiting for months for the man to notice her…really notice her. She’d never expected that the distance Joe maintained between himself and the rest of the world would be breached by her own apparent misfortune. And the informality of today’s celebrations was deliberate so that friends and fellow members of staff would be able to slot in their attendance around shift times.

‘I can’t,’ she murmured, hoping her frustration wasn’t too evident. She’d been trying to find a way through the barbed wire of Joe’s defences for so long and now she was going to have to turn him down. Or was she?

‘It was just a suggestion,’ he began, starting to withdraw, but she turned impetuously towards him, catching hold of his suit sleeve to stop him turning away.

‘Joe, don’t you see? I have to go, otherwise the gossips will have even more to talk about. But I don’t have to stay long.’

She had that prickly feeling that she was being watched. Past his broad shoulder she caught sight of several interested faces turned in their direction and wanted to groan. It wasn’t her imagination. Everyone seemed to be watching her every move. It felt almost as if she were living in a goldfish bowl.

‘Just long enough to show your face?’ he asked quietly, his expression somewhere between wary and understanding.

She nodded.

‘And then you can escape with a clear conscience?’

She nodded again and was gifted with a glimpse of a surprisingly mischievous smile.

‘In that case, let’s hope it’s a very short reception line,’ he muttered with a quick glower at two of the more inquisitive ladies sitting in front of them.

Vicky knew that their hushed conversation wouldn’t have carried to the pair—she and Joe were far too aware of the perils of unwary conversations to risk it. However, she had noticed that the pair seemed to have spent almost more time looking back at her and her companion than they had at Frankie and Nick.

Hopefully, they hadn’t been watching when he’d put his comforting arm around her shoulders. That was an unexpectedly sweet memory which she didn’t want tainted by any gossip.

‘I now pronounce you man and wife,’ the registrar declared, the words breaking through her scrambled thoughts. Even though she knew everything had changed for the best, she’d been dreading this moment and found herself staring with an awful sort of fascination as Nick turned to Frankie and took her in his arms.

So eager, she thought with a strange little ache around her heart. He obviously didn’t need anyone to tell him that he could now kiss his new bride, and with such passion, too. When it had been her, he’d barely done more than brush her lips with his.

What would it be like to be kissed like that? To have a man pour his heart and soul into—?

‘Vicky?’ The deep voice at her elbow was accompanied by a gentle hand at her cheek, turning her to face him. His hazel eyes were dark with sympathy. ‘You don’t have to watch,’ he said softly. ‘No one would have blamed you if you hadn’t come at all. You could have made certain you were on duty instead.’

His gentle concern was like a balm to her spirits, reminding her that he didn’t know the real reason why she’d been willing to release Nick from his promise. Very few people did. Even Nick didn’t know the full story. To ease his conscience she’d had to tell him that she was falling in love with someone else, but had deliberately withheld the name of the man. That was something only she knew.

‘No, I couldn’t have stayed away,’ she said softly as bride and groom walked past them on their way out, closely followed by two ecstatic bridesmaids. ‘If I hadn’t come, it might have cast a shadow over their day, with people wondering where I was and if I was nursing a broken heart.’

‘So here you are with all flags flying, daring the gossips to do their worst.’

‘Not quite,’ she admitted with a shudder as they waited their turn to leave, grateful for the happy buzz of conversation that left them free to talk more easily. ‘It was bad enough when everyone was cooing over our engagement and wanting updates on the wedding preparations. To be honest, I’m dreading the reception.’

‘Not any more. Remember? We’re only staying long enough to say our congratulations and then we’re out of there.’

He took her hand and looped it over his arm in an almost courtly way as he ushered her out of the door. The sudden lift that the gesture gave to her spirits was something she hadn’t expected. It was almost as if he was making himself her escort…her protector.

‘This way, please,’ called a voice, and they turned simultaneously to find themselves caught in the flash of a photographer. ‘Lovely! Thank you,’ the young man called, and turned as if to pursue his next quarry.

Although the weather was dry and bright, March in Cumbria was still far too cold for a lengthy posing session and within ten minutes they were all on their way to the nearby hotel where the reception was being held.

Joe wasn’t happy.

There were far too many people in here for his liking, and as for the volume of noise…What it would be like by the time everyone had a drink or two inside them didn’t bear thinking about.

Over the last few years he’d grown accustomed to dealing with humanity on a one-to-one basis. The largest concentration was the shifting numbers of colleagues he might find in the staff lounge at the start of the day.

Joe was seriously tempted to cut and run but then the small hand she’d placed on his arm tightened its grip slightly—almost as if Vicky knew what he was contemplating—and he knew he couldn’t do that to her.

He knew she wasn’t really his responsibility. She was a native of the area after all, and should have plenty of family and friends who could keep her company.

Except she’d seemed determined to go through it alone.

He’d only intended sticking his nose through the door to say he’d been to the ceremony, but when he’d seen her standing all alone at the back of the room, so valiant in her solitude, something had prompted him to approach her.

It had been an uncharacteristic thing for him to do—he hadn’t been dubbed ‘that Scots recluse’ without cause—but there had been something about the stiff way she’d been holding her slender shoulders that told him she was suffering, and if there was one thing he understood…

Not that it was a hardship to spend time in her company. It wasn’t.

Vicky Lawrence was a bright, beautiful young woman with a natural inclination towards caring for people. It wasn’t even restricted to her nursing either. He’d been quite surprised by the way she’d insisted on spending time with him in the immediate aftermath of his recent shoulder injury.

Granted, the dislocation had caused a fair degree of trauma to the joint and the residual bruising was still restricting the range of movement. At first he’d believed that it had just been the fact that she’d been the first on the scene after the accident had happened that had sparked her interest. But that didn’t explain why she had still been volunteering to take over the more awkward household chores several days later.

There had been something far too intimate about the thought of beautiful young Vicky changing the sheets on his bed or sorting his laundry. He’d been relieved to tell her that his cleaner took care of those tasks, but he hadn’t been able to dissuade her from collecting his shopping or providing him with a fresh sling at intervals no matter how grumpy he’d been.

Now she needed a little support, although in her case it was emotional rather than practical. Still, if he looked on this interlude as some form of payback, it should make his penance easier to bear—that, and the prospect of leaving for a quiet meal as soon as they’d said their piece. It shouldn’t take long and the prospect of spending an hour or so in her company was something he could even look forward to.

Joe helped her out of her coat and folded it over his arm in preparation for a quick getaway then surprised himself by noticing the quiet elegance of the dark sapphire dress she wore. He wasn’t usually aware of women’s fashions but couldn’t help but see the way the fabric draped fluidly over her slender body, accentuating both her height and the unexpectedly mature curves usually hidden by her uniform.

What on earth was he doing? Ogling the poor girl when he was supposed to be keeping her company at a traumatic time? He dragged his eyes away to scan the room rapidly filling with smiling family and friends. Several were looking questioningly at the two of them standing together and that dratted photographer was already at it again, seemingly more fascinated with Vicky than the new bride. Still, he hoped no one had witnessed his lapse.

Not that fellow GP Jack Lawrence was looking any too pleased to see his little sister in his company, but divided loyalties would keep him out of their hair. As best man to his long-time friend Nick he would have little opportunity to take care of Vicky himself.

Anyway, it was only for one afternoon. He could bear the inquisitive glances and the whispers, knowing that they would soon be over.

What he wasn’t quite so sure of was whether he would want this enforced closeness to end.

There was something unexpectedly pleasant about being part of a couple again, even if it was just a temporary thing and just for appearances’ sake. It certainly couldn’t be anything more than that. The girl must be almost young enough to be his daughter, for heaven’s sake. What was she…twenty-one? Twenty-two? Impossibly young when compared to his own thirty-seven, even if he had been interested in any sort of a relationship.

No, today he would act as a buffer for her, and then tomorrow would be back to normal. He’d had his chance at happy-ever-after and for a while it had been everything he could have wished. He was resigned to his solitude now, no matter how much his body might appreciate Vicky’s charms.

‘Ready?’ he murmured with a slightly gruff edge to his voice. He was surprised and strangely pleased when she immediately took hold of his arm again, her hand feeling somehow right as it curved around the muscles of his forearm.

He heard her draw in a deep breath and blow it out in a steady stream, as though steadying herself for the ordeal ahead, then she looked up to meet his eyes.

‘Ready,’ she agreed with a determined nod and a tightening of her grip, and they set off towards the small group clustered around the newly-weds.

‘Congratulations, Nick,’ Joe said, shaking the man’s hand. He was determined to ignore the little voice that wondered whether he’d looked that happy on his wedding day.

‘I hope you’ll both be very happy,’ Vicky added with every semblance of meaning the words.

Joe found himself watching her closely as she spoke to Frankie for a moment, wondering if she was just very good at putting on a front. To his surprise, he couldn’t tell. Surely she should have been showing some animosity towards the woman who had stolen her fiancé’s affections? As far as he could tell, she seemed to genuinely like the other woman and really wished her well.

Surely she wasn’t that shallow? This was the girl who had pined after her older brother’s best friend for at least a dozen years, culminating in their fairy-tale engagement just a few months ago. Could she really switch off her feelings so quickly? Was she the sort of person who no longer wanted something once she had it in her grasp?

He didn’t like to think so, not when she’d been the only one to awaken the protective instincts that had lain dormant since he’d lost Celia.

Vicky turned to speak to Nick, and Joe thought he might have part of his answer. She was smiling and chatting with the ease of an old friend, but only he knew that her hand had tightened like a tourniquet around his arm.

He covered the slender fingers with his own, hiding the tension-whitened knuckles from view. Unfortunately Nick noticed and there was wary speculation in the glance that went from one face to the other and back to their joined hands.

Joe could hardly snatch his hand away, neither was this the time or the place to make explanations. All he could do was look the man in the eye and dare him to make anything of it. Only time would show that this was just a performance he and Vicky were putting on for the occasion.

Except…

There was something in Nick’s expression that gave him a jolt. Something that looked almost like approval when he looked from one to the other of them. Something that made Joe suddenly desperate to retreat as far and as fast as he could into the confines of his own safe world.

He wasn’t interested in a relationship, and that was the end of the matter.

It didn’t matter how attractive Vicky was—or any other woman for that matter. It didn’t matter how good it felt to have her hand wrapped around his arm, knowing that the contact was giving her the support she needed. It didn’t matter that he could smell the hint of flowers and musk drifting from her skin or that her long blonde hair was like spun gold against the dark fabric of his suit. It didn’t matter that the last hour had made him feel more alive than he had in several years and that he was actually looking forward to sharing a meal with her.

As the common idiom went, he’d been there and done that already, and had the scars on his heart to prove it.

He was just about to make their excuses when Frankie grabbed Nick’s arm, her face suddenly pale and clammy as she hurried towards the nearest bathroom.

‘Oops! Sorry, folks,’ Nick said with a slightly strained chuckle before he followed her. ‘Graphic illustration of the fact that morning sickness isn’t confined to mornings.’

The realisation that Frankie was already pregnant brought the swift stab of painful memories and Vicky’s hastily smothered gasp told Joe that she hadn’t known about the pregnancy either.

At least the spreading ripple of understanding laughter meant that people had overheard Nick’s devious way of announcing his impending fatherhood. That should take people’s minds off the fact that he and Vicky were leaving so soon.

‘I think that’s our signal to fade into the woodwork,’ he suggested quietly, but she didn’t say a word.

He escorted her towards the door, wondering why she suddenly felt so fragile beside him, and had to glare at the overzealous photographer when he wanted to take yet another picture of Vicky. She certainly wasn’t in the mood to have a camera pointed in her direction and Joe actually had the strange impression that if he moved too fast she might shatter into a thousand fragments.

Her movements were quite wooden as he helped her into her coat and she was moving almost like a sleepwalker as he ushered her out of the hotel and into his car.

He waited for her to fasten her seat belt but she just sat in the dark silence of the car, staring blindly out of the windscreen.

‘Vicky?’ he prompted. ‘Seat belt?’

‘Hmm?’ The expression she turned on him was somehow dazed and he had to repeat the reminder before she began to fumble her compliance.

‘Let me,’ he offered, speaking softly and moving slowly to take the catch from her, feeling as if he were dealing with an injured animal.

He wanted to take her hands in his and try to persuade her to talk about what had brought this on, but now was neither the time nor the place.

Knowing that any one of the people they’d just left could emerge from the hotel to see them sitting together in his car, he started the engine and set off out of the car park.

Obviously they were going to have to abandon the idea of going out for a meal. Vicky wasn’t in any fit state to cope with the niceties of public dining. The only option was to take her home, but whose?

It wasn’t far to the place where he’d had his painful run-in with the escaped bullocks and, just past it, the fork in the road that demanded a decision.

One way led to the renovated farm labourer’s cottage she’d told him about when she’d been trying to distract him from the pain of his dislocated shoulder; the other led to the small stone-built farmhouse which was more a refuge than a home to him.

The thought of inviting anyone into his safe haven made him uncomfortable, but the thought of delivering Vicky to a solitary evening felt equally wrong.

Anyway, he temporised as he accelerated away from her turning, she needed to eat and he had no idea what she’d have in her kitchen. At least he knew his fridge could supply the essentials, thanks to Vicky’s persistence. And there was a wry, pleasing irony that he would be feeding her with the food she’d chosen and bought for him.

‘We’re here, Vicky,’ he said as he pulled into the small enclosed yard to one side of the house.

He wasn’t surprised when she didn’t comment but his understanding turned to concern when she didn’t react when he opened the door beside her.

The harsh brilliance of the safety light, activated by their arrival, flooded the interior of the car and painted its silent inmate with unforgiving accuracy.

She looked as perfect as a marble statue, but when had marble statues ever had silvery tears trickling down their cheeks?

‘Come on, Vicky. Out you get,’ he encouraged as he reached across her to release her seat belt. He had to stretch his shoulder some way beyond what was comfortable to reach it, but that hardly mattered when Vicky was in such misery.

She didn’t even seem to realise that she was crying as he let them into the house through the back door which took them straight into the kitchen.

It wasn’t the first time that he’d been grateful for the enveloping warmth of the Aga cooker. He didn’t even bother taking her coat off as he grabbed a chair and settled her in it as close as possible to the warmth.

For just a moment he stood there looking at her, feeling completely at a loss.

He hardly knew the woman, for heaven’s sake. What on earth was he supposed to do or say to help her, to bring her out of this?

‘Tea,’ he muttered, reaching for the kettle and putting it on the hob to boil. ‘If in doubt make a pot of tea.’

He was out of his depth here, and didn’t mind admitting it. The psychiatry he’d learned during his training was enough to tell him that Vicky’s mental state was no steadier than her physical one. All he could think to do was bury himself in the familiar ritual of pouring milk into the waiting mugs while he waited for the tea to steep.

Did she take sugar? He didn’t even know her well enough for that small detail, had never bothered to notice such a thing when they’d been in the same room. Whether she did or not, she was having some. She was borderline shocky and the sugar boost would give her body something to fight with.

‘Here.’ He crouched beside her chair and wrapped her icy hand around the chunky handle. ‘It’s hot, but see if you can sip it.’

She barely acknowledged him and the way those silent tears continued to slide down her cheeks, one after another, caused something unfamiliar to tighten inside his chest.

‘Please, Vicky.’ Joe reached up to cup one damp cheek in his hand and turned her to face him. ‘Please, drink some of the tea. You need it.’

As though waking from a nightmare, she focused on his face and blinked, almost as if surprised to see him there.

‘Joe?’

He’d never heard her voice sounding so lost and alone. He might not join in with the banter that usually characterised any gathering of staff at Denison Memorial, but he couldn’t help having noticed that this strikingly beautiful young woman had a bright bubbly personality to match. It almost hurt to see her looking so…so defeated.

‘Drink,’ he urged, cupping one hand around hers where she held the steaming mug in a white-knuckled grip and lifting it towards her mouth.

‘Don’t.’ With a shake of her head she resisted, her brows drawing into a frown as she tried to pass the mug to him. ‘I don’t need that. I need to know…’

She had to pause when her lips began to quiver uncontrollably. He saw her press them firmly together and heard the deep breath she drew and held as she fought for control.

‘What do you need?’ he asked gently. ‘Is it something I can get for you? Something to eat?’ He wasn’t a brilliant cook but anything short of cordon bleu and he’d give it a go if it would take that expression out of her eyes.

She shook her head. ‘Oh, Joe, it’s nothing like that,’ she said with a hitch in her voice. ‘I just need to know why.’

‘Why?’ And he’d thought he’d been all at sea before. She’d completely lost him now. ‘You mean, why did Nick marry Frankie? But you know—’

‘Not that,’ she broke in almost impatiently. ‘I know he married her because they fell in love. Because he loved her more than he ever loved me…’

‘Ah, Vicky, don’t do this to yourself,’ he begged, feeling panic-induced sweat prickling between his shoulder-blades.

He really didn’t want to be having this conversation. What did he know about what she was going through? He and Celia had met in their teens and there had never been anyone else for either of them, right up to the day she’d died.

‘No, Joe, I need to know,’ she insisted with a spark of her former energy. ‘I know we both did the right thing to call off our wedding and I really hope they’re happy but…but I need to know what’s wrong with me.’

‘Wrong with you?’ he said, more lost than ever. Would he ever unravel the Gordian knot of a woman’s thought processes? ‘But there’s nothing wrong with you.’

‘There must be,’ she said adamantly, with a sad droop to a mouth now bare of any lipstick. ‘Otherwise I’d be the one expecting his baby rather than Frankie.’

‘You…’ He gave up. Did she want to be pregnant? Surely not, without a marriage in her near future. With her engagement so recently broken she wouldn’t even have a close relationship to rely on.

‘He’s only known Frankie for a matter of weeks, Joe,’ she barrelled on suddenly, as though the words and the emotions behind them wouldn’t be contained any longer. ‘They’re married now, but they obviously didn’t bother to wait before they went to bed because she’s already expecting his baby. So what was wrong with me? He was engaged to me for nearly six months and he never gave me anything more than a kiss and a hug.’

CHAPTER TWO

TWO days later Vicky still couldn’t believe what she’d said, and to have said it to Joe!

Just thinking about the embarrassment of it made her go hot and cold, but at the time her thought processes had been so scrambled that she’d had no idea that she was going to make such a momentous revelation.

She groaned silently, her thoughts still scurrying around in her head in spite of the fact that she’d been trying to keep busy to switch the thoughts off. As if it wasn’t bad enough that she must be the only twenty-six-year-old virgin in Edenthwaite, she had to go and tell Joe, the one man whose opinion of her really mattered.

How was she going to face him again? It had been difficult enough putting up with all the sympathetic murmurs of her colleagues when they’d found out about Nick and Frankie. If they discovered that her adolescent crush on Nick had prevented her from indulging in the flings her colleagues seemed to flit in and out of, she’d probably never live it down.

Could she trust Joe not to say anything?

She could hardly bring herself to think about it, let alone hold a conversation begging for his discretion.

‘Vicky. Phone call for you,’ called one of the juniors, beckoning her from the other side of the ward, and she hurried across to the desk. There were several sets of lab results she’d been chasing up ever since she’d come on duty and they’d promised to phone them through as soon as they were ready.

‘Hello. Vicky Lawrence speaking,’ she said crisply, but when she waited for a reply all she could hear was the faint crackle of an open line. ‘Hello? Is there anyone there?’

When there was still no answer she shrugged and put the phone down. ‘Who was it, Sue? Did they say what they wanted?’

‘Sorry, Vicky.’ Sue shook her head. ‘It was a man and he wanted to speak to you. I don’t know any more than that.’

‘A man?’ The person she was waiting to speak to was definitely not a man, so perhaps it hadn’t been the lab results. ‘Oh, well. They’ll just have to try again.’

‘They will, if it’s important,’ Sue agreed. ‘Let’s hope it isn’t anything complicated and that they don’t phone back in the middle of the patients’ lunch.’

Vicky groaned. It wasn’t often that they had so many who needed individual help with their meals, but the last few days had been dreadful. For some reason there had been an overflow from the geriatric ward into her general one. Now she was trying to cope with one gentleman who was flat on his back with both legs in traction and a woman in her sixties whose years of a strict vegan diet had left her with multiple fractures in a collapsed spine, rendering her all but immobile.

Apart from them, there was a man in his late fifties who had been born with Down’s syndrome. Although Owen was physically capable of feeding himself, he still required constant supervision if the food was actually going to be consumed while it was hot. At least his broken leg was keeping him in one place at the moment. His elderly carers had warned that once he was mobile again he was quite likely to go wandering off at any time.

‘And won’t that be just what I need to brighten my day,’ Vicky muttered as she tried to juggle the number of patients requiring individual attention against the staff available for the task. ‘And some time during all that, the staff have to go for their lunch-breaks, too!’

Her calculations were interrupted by the phone and she reached out to lift the receiver without taking her eyes off her little chart.

‘Hello. Sister Lawrence, General Ward,’ she said automatically, more than half of her mind on possible permutations that would get the job done. Would she need to ring around for some temporary help, just until the older patients were able to move into their proper domain?

It was several seconds before she realised that no one had spoken since she’d answered the phone.

‘Hello?’ she prompted, but once again there was just that faint crackle of an open line. ‘Is there someone there?’

Although there wasn’t a sound from the other end, for some reason she just knew that there was someone there, someone listening to her.

The hairs on the back of her neck felt as if they were standing on end, almost as if a cold draught had blown across her, but she knew that was nonsense in a modern building like this.

‘I’m sorry, but I haven’t got time to waste,’ she said, firmly squashing the sneaking feeling of unease. ‘If you’re not going to speak I’ll have to put the phone down.’

She started counting silently, determined to carry out her threat on the count of five. She’d only got as far as four when she heard a single whispered word before the connection was abruptly broken.

She was sitting there, staring at the receiver still clasped in her shaking hand, when a familiar baritone voice nearly had her jumping out of her skin.

‘Vicky? What on earth’s wrong with you?’ Joe demanded when she’d shrieked and dropped the phone. He picked it up from the floor and put it to his ear before he deposited it where it belonged.

Whether he was checking to see if there was someone still on the line or whether the thing was still working, she didn’t know.

She was trembling all over now, and it wasn’t because Joe had startled her.

‘Are you all right?’ he demanded, so she knew she must be looking as shaky as she felt. ‘Is there something I can do or would you rather I came back later?’

‘No!’ she said hurriedly, suddenly far more worried that he might leave than that his presence might be an embarrassment. She’d been dreading this first meeting, after her blurted revelation, but that phone call had really given her the creeps. ‘No, Joe, please, don’t go.’

‘What’s the matter? Aren’t you feeling well?’ He perched one hip on the corner of the desk, bringing those changeable hazel eyes almost down to her level. The clear concern in them was like a balm to her jangling nerves.

‘I’m all right, except…except for that weird phone call. And I don’t think it was the first one.’ Now that she thought about it, there had been something similar yesterday, too.

‘Weird? How was it weird? Who was calling?’

‘I don’t know who it was.’

‘So, what did they want?’ He was patience itself but that didn’t do anything for her agitation.

‘I don’t know what he wanted,’ she retorted snappishly. ‘The first couple of times he didn’t say anything at all but this time—’

‘Whoa! What do you mean, the first couple of times?’ he interrupted sharply. ‘What’s going on here? It can hardly be a disappointed suitor—there hasn’t been time since your engagement to Nick. Wait a minute! You’re not telling me you’re being stalked, are you? How long has this been going on?’

‘No! Of course I’m not being stalked,’ she countered dismissively, then paused, feeling sick.

It was crazy to even think about it in a place like Edenthwaite, but suddenly she found herself wondering if the idea made sense. Had there been too many ‘silent’ calls over the last few days for it to be an accident?

‘Oh, Joe, I don’t know,’ she admitted in a small voice. ‘Perhaps I am.’

‘Hey, Vicky, take it easy.’ He reached for her hand, and when he tucked it warmly and firmly between his she suddenly had the crazy feeling that Joe was going to keep her safe. ‘Now, take a deep breath and tell me what’s been going on.’

‘There hasn’t really been anything going on except for a few phone calls, and they could have been anything. I didn’t even know it was a man calling until this last time, when he spoke.’

‘So, where were the calls coming from? Inside the hospital through the internal switchboard or from outside? What was the reception like? Could the caller have been using a mobile perhaps? And his voice—did you recognise it? Did it sound local or did it have a different accent?’

‘He only said one word. My name.’ She shuddered at the memory of the strangely menacing whisper, or was her imagination working overtime to make it sound menacing?

‘Your name?’ he prompted keenly. ‘Did he say Vicky or Sister Lawrence?’

‘Neither. He said Victoria. And could you let me answer one set of questions before you ask another? Were you Sherlock Holmes in another life?’

He chuckled ruefully and gave her hands a squeeze. ‘Sorry, but one idea leads to another. Can you remember what you said when you answered the phone? Did you give the caller your name, or just the name of the ward?’

The way he’d kept hold of her hand and the gentle smile that softened the usual sombreness of his face made her feel warm inside, but Vicky fought off the distraction to replay that last phone call in her mind.

‘I think it was an outside line,’ she said slowly, mentally sorting through her impressions. ‘There was a sort of hollow crackle that you don’t get with the hospital lines, so I would automatically say, “Sister Lawrence, General Ward.”’

‘And he said…?’

‘Nothing at first. It was only when I told the caller that I was too busy to waste time and I was going to put the phone down that he spoke, and then he hung up.’

‘And the other times?’

‘I hadn’t really noticed them,’ she confessed. ‘It was only this time that made me realise that the other “nobody there” phone calls could have been from the same person.’

‘Did he say anything else or make any noises?’

‘Just my name,’ she said with a renewed shiver.

‘And how did he say it? What tone of voice did he use? Was it normal volume or whispered?’

‘Not exactly a whisper, more like…Victoria.’ She tried to give it exactly the same stress that he had, in the same singsong way. ‘But I didn’t recognise his voice and I couldn’t really say whether he had a local accent or not.’

Those changeable hazel eyes of Joe’s were dark with concentration and she could tell that he was going over everything she had told him. She knew it was stupid but she really wanted him to be able work it all out, to be able to come up with a simple answer to what was going on.

‘Has anyone else taken one of these calls for you?’ he asked suddenly, his gaze almost too analytical for comfort.

‘Anyone else?’ She frowned as she tried to work out the significance of the question. When it struck her she was devastated at the implication and dragged her hand away from him to leap up from her seat. She refused to let herself dwell on the pang of loss she felt when the contact was broken between them. What was the point of physical contact when there was suspicion between them?

‘You mean, can anyone corroborate my story or am I making the whole thing up?’ she glared down at him, lounging so nonchalantly on the corner of the desk as though he hadn’t just accused her of fabricating a stupid lie. What on earth would be the point? It wasn’t as if she lacked a social life, in spite of the fact that her wedding hadn’t taken place. ‘Do you think I’m inventing it to get the sympathy vote now that I’ve been left on the shelf? What kind of misfit do you think I am?’

‘Calm down, Vicky,’ Joe ordered, grabbing for her hand as she stomped past him for the second time, trying to control her rising temper by striding up and down in the restricted space. ‘That’s not what I meant at all. I was only wondering if he’d said more than your name so another person might have picked up on an accent or something.’

‘Oh.’ She hung her head and blew out an exasperated breath while she gathered up the courage to meet his gaze. ‘I’m sorry, Joe. That was unfair of me, especially when you’re only trying to help. It’s all probably a lot of fuss about absolutely nothing but…but I’ve got to admit it’s got me a bit spooked.’

‘With good reason. By all accounts this sort of thing is happening far too frequently these days. The statistics probably don’t show the full extent of the problem because most women are afraid to say anything for fear of being ridiculed.’

‘And then I turn on you,’ she said apologetically. ‘Will you forgive me?’

‘Of course. Or should I say, provided you promise to let me know if it happens again?’

Vicky’s independent streak made her want to insist that she could deal with the problem herself, and that if the incidents didn’t escalate from the present level, she would probably be able to. But that wasn’t what Joe wanted to hear.

Anyway, could this be an excuse for her to keep in contact with the elusive man?

‘I promise, Joe, on condition that you let me cook you a meal to say thank you.’

‘Thank me for what? You already did more than your share after I had that argument with the bullock. All I’ve done is promise to listen.’ He seemed quite uncomfortable with her suggestion, his cheeks going an endearing shade darker.

‘And you took care of me when I fell apart after the wedding,’ she reminded him, determined that she wasn’t going to let him off the hook even if it meant bringing up that embarrassing loss of control again. ‘Now, where’s it going to be? Your place or mine?’

The sound of a throat being cleared startled both of them. Joe was the only one who seemed relieved by the interruption. Vicky was cross, especially as she was certain he’d been about to agree.

‘Can I help you?’ she asked crisply when she turned to face the man standing in the doorway to the office.

For just a second there was something unsettling in his expression as he looked at Joe but then he slid into a pleasant smile as he held out his hand.

‘I came to show my face. Grant Naismith, locum,’ he said. ‘I sent a patient into the hospital last night and thought I’d combine a visit to check up on her with a look around. Actually, I think we might have met before,’ he said when he turned to Vicky. ‘I believe we trained at the same hospital.’

Vicky conceded that they must have been there at the same time, but silently she couldn’t say she remembered him particularly. But, then, she hadn’t been interested in anyone else but Nick in those days.

He held Vicky’s hand just a little longer than he should have and his pale grey eyes were leaving her in no doubt that he liked what he was seeing. It was a shame she didn’t feel the same way about him and just seeing him standing beside Joe was enough to tell her why.

He might be nearly the same height as Joe—about six inches taller than her own five feet six—and his face might be prettier than Joe’s rugged taciturnity, but there wasn’t the same instinctive attraction towards the man of absolute integrity and hidden strength that she knew Joe to be.

‘Which patient did you send in?’ She used the pretence of needing to check the screen on the computer to put a little more distance between them. She had to behave in a professional manner towards him even though she was exasperated with him. If he hadn’t arrived at that precise moment she was sure she could have persuaded Joe to let them spend the evening together.

‘Mrs Frawley.’ He mentioned the name of the nearby practice for which he’d been standing in as locum.

‘No. We haven’t got her here. What was wrong with her?’

‘She’s an elderly lady and she was in a lot of distress when I saw her. According to her notes she’s got a history of heart problems.’

‘If she’s elderly, she’s probably gone to Geriatric,’ Vicky pointed out. She was hoping to hurry him on his way before Joe decided to leave without agreeing to her suggestion.

‘I tried there first but they said you were taking their overflow at the moment.’

Vicky tapped in another code to cross-check and couldn’t find any reference to a Mrs Frawley, until she checked the last option.

‘I’m sorry, Dr Naismith, but Mrs Frawley didn’t survive the journey to hospital. She’s listed as dead on arrival.’

There was a brief flash of emotion in his pale grey eyes before it was swiftly hidden behind lowered lids.

‘Not a good start,’ she heard him say under his breath, and found herself sympathising. It couldn’t be easy, feeling you’d let down a colleague when taking care of his patients. ‘Are there any formalities I need to comply with, as I was called out to her, or will the hospital have done the certification? I haven’t been in this position before.’

‘If you like, I’ll take you down to Records and show you how our system works,’ Joe offered, and Vicky had to stifle a growl of frustration.

Now she wasn’t going to get the chance to speak to him alone, and who knew how long it would be before they had the chance to spend any time together? She certainly wouldn’t sink to using this telephone pest as an excuse, no matter what the temptation.

Joe ushered Grant Naismith out into the corridor but at the last second looked back over his shoulder to murmur, ‘Seven o’clock at my place, but you’ll have to bring the ingredients.’

The couple of hours Vicky spent preparing the meal with Joe and then sharing it in the informality of the warm farmhouse kitchen were everything she could have wished.

They had worked together as seamlessly as though they’d done the same thing dozens of times before. Even their conversation had felt comfortable, with topics ranging from music to art and books before finally degenerating to the perennial topic of the Denison Memorial.

It’s almost as if we’re an old married couple, she thought as she began to pile their plates together. Then he passed her a handful of cutlery and when his fingers brushed hers she could have sworn that she heard the crackle of electricity in the air.

The knives and forks fell onto the plate with a noisy clatter and she hastily grabbed them and turned towards the sink to hide her flaming cheeks.

‘Sorry about that. I must be getting clumsy in my old age,’ she muttered as she plunged them into the hot soapy water.

‘You’re probably tired. Why not leave the dishes and go home for an early night? Anyway, you did most of the cooking so I should be on clean-up duty.’

‘You helped with the preparation, too,’ she pointed out as she attacked the remnants of the marinara sauce with a scouring pad. ‘Besides, I don’t like leaving without finishing the job properly.’

Finally she realised that if she was taking delight in something as mundane as sharing the washing-up with Joe, it was definitely time she was on her way.

Even then, she couldn’t stop the little leap of pleasure when he walked her out to her car or the way he watched her driving away. It certainly satisfied that hungry place inside her that wanted nothing more than that he should…

That he should what?

Notice her? See past the end of his nose? Realise that she was the woman he’d been waiting for?

‘Right!’ she scoffed aloud. ‘He’s barely done more than wish you a polite good morning in the last six months and suddenly, on the strength of a roadside rescue and a home-cooked meal he’s going to take another look at you? Get a life!’

Vicky was still muttering under her breath when she swung her front door open, juggling an armful of uniform brought home for washing and a bag of groceries that had developed a rapidly growing split in one side.

The first thing she saw in the darkness as she reached out for the light switch was the winking red indicator on her answering machine.

It was so rarely used that she was almost excited by the event, dropping her burden just inside the door to press the replay button. Because all her friends knew where she worked, they were far more likely to ring her at the hospital. In fact, very few of them knew her home number as the new directory hadn’t been updated since she’d moved into her little cottage and had the phone connected.

The little indicator told her she had two messages, but when the first played through without a word being spoken, a shiver of dread skated up her spine.

She reached out to stop the machine but it had already clicked to the second message and an awful fascination froze her in her tracks as she heard the same voice break the silence of her cosy home.

‘Victoria.’

It was the same voice. That same hateful singsong. But this time it was worse. This time it wasn’t a call to the hospital where anyone could contact her. This time, whoever it was had discovered her private number and it felt almost as if they’d actually invaded the cottage.

Vicky was still staring at the baleful red eye when the phone rang, the sudden sound startling her into a shriek.

It rang again and for the first time in her life she was actually afraid to answer it. It was almost a relief when the machine switched on to answer it for her, but she cringed when the silence began to stretch out without a word being spoken.

She was convinced that it was her tormentor again but Joe’s deep voice broke the fraught silence.

‘Vicky, it’s Joe. Joe Faraday. I just wanted to make sure you got home safely. Give me a call when—’

‘Oh, Joe, thank goodness it’s you,’ she gasped when she’d managed to grab the handset and put it to her ear. Her hand had been trembling so much she’d nearly dropped the thing.

‘Vicky? Are you all right?’ The concern was so clear in his voice that it actually helped her to gain a little control.

‘There were two messages when I got back…on my answering machine,’ she blurted disjointedly.

‘Not bad news, I hope. Who was it? Jack? Nick? The hospital?’

‘It was him, Joe,’ she said, the eerie way the man had pronounced her name echoing inside her head.

‘Him? You mean the voice on the phone at the hospital? How did he get your home number?’

‘Why don’t you ask me some questions I can answer for a change,’ she said as a hint of hysteria crept into her voice. ‘I don’t know how he got it. All I know is that there were two messages. One silent one and the other one…’ She shuddered.

‘Just your name, again, or something more this time?’ he prompted quietly, his voice deep and steady, something to cling to in the midst of her panic.

‘Just my name,’ she confirmed, ‘but why is he doing this, Joe? It was bad enough when he was phoning me at work, but this…’

She drew in a shaky breath as she dragged trembling fingers through her hair. She’d left the blonde length loose to tumble over her shoulders this evening, hoping that Joe would notice. That had been a complete waste of time, and now seemed totally irrelevant in the face of what had been happening at home in her absence.

‘Joe, what if…’ The sudden thought was terrifying. ‘What if he knows where I live? Can he find out my address now that he knows my phone number?’

‘I honestly don’t know, Vicky,’ he admitted. ‘As for the calls, if it was just a matter of changing your phone number, it would be relatively easy. The fact that he’s being a nuisance at work isn’t quite so easy, especially as so many calls come through automatic exchanges. If it was the old-fashioned telephone operator we’d have some sort of control.’

The way he’d slipped into saying ‘we’ instead of ‘you’ hadn’t escaped her. It was strange how much comfort she could draw from something so simple.

‘As for knowing where you live…’ Joe’s voice drew her back to the unpleasant speculation. ‘In a place as small as Edenthwaite, he wouldn’t have to ask very many people before he found someone who could give him directions.’

‘This is one of those times when it’s definitely a disadvantage to have been born locally,’ she complained. ‘All too often I have patients coming in who insist on telling me in great detail about something that happened in my childhood, or even my parents’ childhood.’

‘That’s one of the penalties of being in such a “public” profession. Everyone knows about the local doctors and their families.’

‘And they’re only too happy to gossip when we get ourselves into mischief,’ Vicky agreed.

‘They must have had plenty of practice with Jack around, or did he do most of his roistering after he went away to train?’

The conversation continued for several minutes before Vicky caught sight of the time.

‘Oh, Joe, I’m sorry. I’ve kept you up and you’ve got to be at the surgery early tomorrow.’ She couldn’t be sorry about the time they’d spent together, even if it had been at opposite ends of the telephone.

‘I’m hardly so old and decrepit that I’ll fall apart if I miss an hour’s sleep,’ he objected. ‘Anyway, I don’t mind. It’s worth it to hear you sounding more relaxed. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

It sounded almost like a promise and Vicky’s heart was feeling immeasurably lighter when she finally put the phone down.

It wasn’t that she needed a man in her life to validate it. She had grown strong and self-reliant in the years that she’d pined hopelessly after Nick, concentrating on her career and making her own way in the world.

That didn’t mean that she couldn’t appreciate the fact that Joe was concerned for her safety. As he’d suggested, she made a point of checking around the cottage to make sure that all bolts and locks were fastened securely.

‘Tomorrow, I’ll change my number,’ she muttered decisively. ‘And I’ll make some enquiries about the new laws about stalking.’

Part of her didn’t want to believe that it was really happening. That same part was trying to tell her that by simply changing her number she would put whoever-it-was off, and she’d never hear from him again.

Unfortunately, the more rational half knew that this was unlikely. The calls had started several days ago and had already escalated from silent calls at the hospital to a verbal one at her home. It might only be one word, just her name, but there was something about the tone of the man’s voice that made her feel uneasy.

Remembered scraps from a programme she’d glimpsed on television told her that many stalkers were satisfied just to observe. It was the ones whose observations grew into a need to make contact and from thence into total obsession that had her listening for noises outside her cottage.

It was a good job she’d already eaten her meal. The nervous cramping of her stomach would have left her with little appetite now. The trouble was, with nothing urgent to do and a busy day ahead, the only logical thing was to go to bed.

A leisurely bath was out of the question. She would feel far too vulnerable to relax. Even climbing into bed and pulling the covers right up to her nose didn’t make her feel totally safe, no matter that the cottage was securely locked.

It was only when she remembered Joe’s final words—a promise that all she needed to do was phone him and he would come to her—that she was able to unwind enough to fall asleep.

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