A Doctor, A Nurse: A Christmas Baby

‘I was in high school when you were running around in nappies.’

‘So?’

‘I got married while you were still in primary school.’

Nash’s gaze flicked to her left hand. No ring. No telltale white mark. ‘So?’

‘I’ve been divorced longer than you’ve been a doctor.’

He smiled at her. ‘You’re available, then?’

She shot him an impatient look. ‘Nash don’t you think you should be playing with women your own age?’

He reached across the table and picked up her hand. ‘Maggie from ICU, you look better than any woman I’ve ever met.’

She could feel herself blushing beneath his intense gaze. She was drowning in the warmth of his tropical island gaze and her pulse hammered where his thumb drew slow circles at her wrist.

Damn it all—she would not be flattered by his easy words. She wasn’t going to get involved with a man ten years her junior. Especially one who dated for sport and made her breathless with just one look. That would just be plain dumb. And she wasn’t that hard up for company.

Maggie removed her hand. ‘I’m going to do you a favour, Nash Reece. I’m going to turn you down. And you should be grateful. Men like you need a woman like me—’

‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,’he interrupted.

She smiled. ‘A woman who’ll say no. Too many yes-women make Nash a spoilt boy. You’ll thank me for it one day.’

He chuckled. ‘I doubt it.’

She crunched up her paper bag and screwed the lid back on her empty drink bottle and then stood. ‘Yeah well, your wife will.’

Nash really laughed then. He had no intention of ever marrying. And women had tried. Man, had they tried. Country girls, yearning for an escape from the outback had tried, city girls wanting to snare a doctor had tried. But he had a career plan carefully mapped out that did not involve weddings, and nothing was more important to him than that.

‘Wife? Nope. Not me. Besides, I’m already married. To my career. I’m on a path.’

Maggie was surprised to see a suddenly serious side to the flirty man who’d charmed himself into the seat opposite. He was once again the serious doctor from this morning. She wondered how many women got to see beneath the playboy exterior to the goal-driven man. ‘And yet you have time to date?’

Nash grinned again. ‘I do allow myself some diversions. Come on, Maggie. You know you want to.’

She shook her head, even though he was right. She did want to. It was crazy—but she did. Still, she knew enough about Nash Reece in a handful of minutes to know that one date would never be enough. ‘Denial is good for the soul.’

‘Denial sucks.’

He reminded her again of a child seeking instant gratification and she laughed. Yes. Yes it did. ‘Goodbye, Dr Reece.’

Nash watched her turn away, the creamy skin of her neck exposed as she twisted, pulling her shirt across her chest. ‘I’m gonna keep asking,’ he called after her.

She stopped and looked back at him as his silky promise stroked insidiously along her pelvic floor. ‘There’s a shock.’

Nash chuckled. ‘I’ll be seeing you around, Maggie from ICU.’

They were the same words he’d used that morning and they had a preternatural foreboding to them. ‘Don’t count on it.’

He worked in A and E. She worked two floors up in ICU. As far as hospitals went they were totally different worlds. And after today she had no intention of letting him into hers. Ever.

CHAPTER TWO

THE NEXT DAY was her day off but Maggie found herself at the hospital anyway. She was actively involved in Radio Giggle and volunteered there regularly. In fact, she’d been on the original committee that had pushed for its establishment after seeing the success of Radio Lollipop during her stint at Great Ormond Street in London.

Maggie had seen their humble service expand over the years from a handful of people launching the first two-hour broadcast to a band of volunteers that worked tirelessly, promoting the healing power of play.

Radio Giggle volunteers actively engaged children throughout the hospital in a variety of entertainment, from helping with the shows, requesting songs and hearing themselves on the radio through to bedside crafts, games and other activities for those children unable to make it to the studio.

In fact, anything that could be done to help make a child’s stay in hospital a little less frightening and a lot more fun, Radio Giggle were on it.

It wasn’t her usual day to volunteer but Ross Calvin, Giggle’s programme manager and only paid employee, was off sick today and had rung to ask her if she could take his place. Maggie hadn’t hesitated. Not being able to have her own children had been a huge blow, but hanging out with these kids helped to fill the gap.

Five-year-old Douglas Werner, a long-term inpatient, was the first person she saw when she entered the Radio Giggle office.

‘Dougy.’ She smiled and crouched down accepting the little boy’s enthusiastic cuddle.

‘He’s been asking for you.’

Maggie looked up to see fifteen-year-old Christine Leek, a cystic fibrosis patient and another regular in the Radio Giggle studio. ‘Well, here I am,’ she said, giving the little boy a quick rib tickle and laughing at his endearing shriek.

‘Guess what?’ Christine spoke over the top of Doug. ‘Ross said I could conduct the interview today all by myself.’ She looked over Maggie’s shoulder. ‘Have you seen him yet?’

Maggie watched while the painfully thin teenager shifted from foot to foot, her lip pulled between her bottom teeth. Christine was a blossoming DJ who wanted a career in community radio and spent every possible minute with the Radio Giggle organisation. ‘I’m afraid Ross is off sick today.’

‘Oh.’

Maggie couldn’t bear to see her so crestfallen. ‘You can still do it, though,’ she reassured her. Christine’s face lit up like a fireworks display and Maggie felt her heart contract.

‘Really?’ she squeaked.

‘Of course.’ Maggie laughed. ‘You know your way around the dials better than I do.’

They went through to the brightly painted studio and for the next half an hour Maggie and Christine worked out their music schedule with the requests they had in from the previous day. Christine was an eager helper, pulling out all the CDs they needed and stacking them in order, which was just as well as Dougy had commandeered Maggie’s lap.

He sat imperiously, his IV pole supporting his lifesaving fluids close by, well used to adults indulging him. He leant his colouring book against the console and Maggie chatted to him, accepting the crayons he gave her and colouring where he pointed. Meanwhile she juggled Christine’s questions and those of the volunteers as they wandered in and out on their way to the various wards in their bright Radio Giggle T-shirts.

Maggie knew the outside play area would be full of kids over the next couple of hours as those who could came down to see how a real radio show was run. They usually put callouts to their bed-bound friends and families and took part in the activities organised by the volunteers.

At four o’clock the programme got under way. Maggie and Dougy stayed in the studio and let Christine run the show. Dougy knew he had to be quiet and while he had his colouring book he was happy to sit without talking on Maggie’s lap and draw. Radio Giggle never pretended to be a professional outfit, given that the shows were largely run by kids, but it never hurt to strive for excellence.

Maggie rubbed her face against his blond curls and inhaled the hospital-soap smell as she dropped a kiss against his scalp. Dougy had been born prem to a drugaddicted mother and had developed necrotising enterocolitis, necessitating the removal of a large portion of his non-viable bowel.

He’d been very ill for the first year of his life and had been transferred from NICU to PICU at three months of age for ongoing management. He now had short-gut syndrome, which meant he didn’t have enough bowel length to absorb his food and had to be fed intravenously through a permanent line.

He’d been in hospital virtually all his life due to his condition and he made regular appearances in PICU with various infections which, due to his compromised immune system, usually knocked him for six. His last stay had been a few months ago during winter for bilateral pneumonia.