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“Of course,” Chessa said. “I’ll bring you some lemonade in a few minutes.”
As he was preparing the grill, she came out with a glass and an apologetic shake of her head. “There was no answer, but I left a voice mail.”
“Thank you. Luckily I brought some prawns with me, just in case. Feel free to stay and eat with us, if you’d like.”
She smiled. “Thanks, but if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll head back to my flat. Do you need anything else?”
“No, I think we’re good.”
Twenty minutes later he had the briquettes going while Cora and Pete—worn out from a rough-and-tumble game of tug of war—lounged in a hammock strung between two gum trees, the dog’s chin propped on his niece’s shoulder. Both looked utterly content. Rescuing Pete had been the best thing his brother had ever done for his daughter, unlike a lot of other things since his wife’s tragic death. In fact, the last four years had been a roller coaster consisting of more lows than highs—with the plunges occurring at lightning speed.
He went in and grabbed the package of prawns and some veggies to roast. Just as he started rinsing the shellfish, the front door opened and in came his brother. Bleary, red-rimmed eyes gave him away.
Perfect. Lucas already knew this routine by heart.
“Was our cookout tonight?” his brother asked, hands as empty as Lucas’s stomach. “I forgot.”
His molars ground against each other as he struggled with his anger and frustration. Was this what love and marriage ultimately led to? Forgetting that anyone else existed outside your own emotional state? Felix had a daughter who needed him, for God’s sake. What was it going to take to make him look at someone besides himself? “Cora didn’t forget.”
His brother groaned out loud then mumbled, “Sorry.”
“I’m just getting ready to throw it all on the barbie, so why don’t you get yourself cleaned up before you go out there to see?”
The first two steps looked steady enough, but the next one swayed a bit to the left before Felix caught himself.
“Tell me you’re not drunk.”
“I’m not.”
“Can you make it to your bedroom on your own?” The last thing Lucas wanted was for Cora to come in and see her father like this, not that she hadn’t in the past. Many times.
Felix scowled. “Of course I can.” He proceeded to weave his way down the hallway, before disappearing into one of the rooms—the bathroom.
Looks like you’re spending the night on your brother’s couch once again, mate.
Lucas had impressed on Cora the need to call him if her father ever seemed “not himself.” The pattern was bizarre with periods of complete normalcy followed by bouts of depression, sometimes mixed with drinking. Not a good combination for someone taking antidepressant medication.
He made a mental note to ask Felix if he was still taking his pills, and another note to make sure he arrived at work…on time! As he’d found out, it was tricky getting Cora off to school and then making the trek to the hospital, but if the traffic co-operated it could be done.
Otherwise that hard-won peace treaty would be shredded between pale English fingers.
Strangely, he didn’t want that. Didn’t want to disappoint her after he’d worked so hard to turn things around between them. Didn’t want to lose those rare smiles in the process. So yes. He would do his damnedest to get to the hospital on time.
And between now and then he’d have to figure out what to do about his brother. Threaten him with another stint in rehab? Take away his car keys?
He cast his eyes up to the ceiling, trying not to blame Melody for allowing his brother to twine his life so completely around hers that he had trouble functioning now that she was gone.
Lucas never wanted to be in a position like that. And so far he hadn’t. He’d played the field far and wide, but he still lived by two hard and fast rules: no married women and no long-term relationships. As long as he could untangle himself with ease the next day, he was happy. And he stuck to women who felt the same way. No hurt feelings. And definitely no burning need to hang around and buy a house with a garden.
Finishing up the veggies, he faintly caught the sound of the shower switching on, the poof from the on-demand water heater confirming his thoughts. Good. At least Felix was doing something productive. He opened the refrigerator, pulled out the ale in the door and popped the top on every single bottle. Then he took a long gulp of the one in his hand, before proceeding to pour the rest of the contents down the drain, doing the same with every other bottle and then placing the lot in the recycle bin. If the beer wasn’t here, Felix couldn’t drink it, right?
Not that that stopped him from going out to the nearest pub, but at least that took some effort, which he hoped Felix didn’t have in him tonight.
Lucas went outside and loaded the prawns into a cooking basket and set it over the fire, then arranged the vegetables next to them on the grate. Cora’s empty glass of lemonade was next to his full one. She was still sprawled on the hammock and it looked like both she and Pete were out for the count. If only he could brush off his cares that easily, he might actually get a full night’s sleep.
But maybe tonight would be different. He’d learned from experience that the fold-out cot in the spare room was supremely uncomfortable. He was better off just throwing a quilt over Melody’s prized couch and settling in for the night there.
And he would wake up on time. He absolutely would.
And he’d arrive at work chipper and ready to face the day.
He hoped.
Something was wrong with Lucas.
He’d come through the doors of the MMU with a frown that could have swallowed most of Melbourne. She’d arrived at work armed with a smile, only to have him look right past her as if she didn’t exist.
Ha! Evidently she’d been wrong about his reaction. Because there was nothing remotely resembling attraction in the man’s eyes today. In fact, his whole frame oozed exhaustion, as did the two nicks on the left side of his strong jaw. He’d muttered something that might have been “G’day.” Or it might just as easily have been “Go to hell.”
She was tempted to chase him down and ask about his evening, but when she turned to do so, she noticed that the back of his shirt was wrinkled as if he’d…Her gaze skimmed down and caught the same dark jeans he’d worn yesterday.
Her stomach rolled to the side. The staff all had lockers, and the last time he’d come in like this he’d used the hospital’s shower and changed into clean clothes. That’s probably what he was headed to do right now.
The evidence pointed to one thing. That he’d spent the night with “Cora” or some other woman.
The trickle of attraction froze in her veins.
None of your business, Darcie.
Just leave the man alone. If she made an issue of this, they would be back where they’d started: fighting a cold war that neither one of them would win.
But why the hell couldn’t he drag himself out of his lover’s bed in time to go home and shower before coming to work?
Unless he just couldn’t manage to tear himself away from her.
An image emerged from the haze that she did her best to block. Too late. There it was, and there was no way to send it back again—the one of Lucas swinging his feet over the side of the mattress, only to have some faceless woman graze long, ruby fingernails down his arm and whisper something that made him change his mind.
She shook her head to remove the picture and forced herself to get back to work.
Just as she did so she spied one of her patients leaning against the wall, her hands gripping her swollen belly. Margie Terrington, an English transplant like herself, had just come in yesterday for a quick check to make sure things were on track. They had been.
At least until now. From the concentration on her face and the grey cast to her skin, something wasn’t right. Darcie glanced around for a nurse, but they were still tending to the morning’s patients. Darcie hurried over.
“Margie? Are you all right?”
Her eyes came up. “My stomach. It’s cramping. I think it’s the baby.”
“Let’s get you into a room.”
Alarm filled her. No time to check her in or do any of the preliminaries. This was the young woman’s second pregnancy. She’d miscarried her first a little over a year ago, and she was only seven months along with this one. Too soon. The human body didn’t just go into labor this early unless there was a problem.
Her apprehension grew, and she sent up a quick prayer.
Propping her shoulder beneath Margie’s arm, they headed to the nearest exam room. One of the nurses came out of a room across the hall, and Darcie called out to her. “Tessa, could you come here?”
The nurse hurried over and got on the other side of their patient.
“Once I get her settled, can you see if you can find Lucas? He arrived a few minutes ago, so he might be in the lounge or the locker area. Let him know I might need his help.”
“Of course.”
The patient was sweating profusely—Darcie could feel the moisture through the woman’s light maternity top. Another strike against her. If she had some kind of systemic infection, could it have crossed the placenta and affected the baby? A thousand possibilities ran through her mind.
Pushing into the exam area, the trio paused when Margie groaned and doubled over even more. “Oh, God. Hurts.”
“Do they feel like contractions? Are they regular?” They finally got her to the bed and helped her up on it.
“I don’t know.”
Tessa scurried around, getting her vitals, while Darcie tried to get some more information. What she learned wasn’t good. Margie had got up and showered like normal and had felt fine. Forty minutes later she’d got a painful cramp in her side—like the kind you got while running, she’d said. The pain had grown worse and had spread in a band across her abdomen. Now she was feeling nauseous, whether from the pain or something else, she wasn’t sure. “And my joints hurt, as if I’m getting the flu.”
Could she be?
As soon as Tessa called out the readings, the nurse went out to get the patient’s chart and to hunt down Lucas.
“Let’s get you into a robe and see what’s going on.”
“Wait.” Margie groaned again. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
Grabbing a basin, she held it under her patient’s mouth as she heaved. Nothing came up, though.
“Did you eat breakfast?” Darcie started to reach for a paper towel, only to have Lucas arrive, chart in hand. He took one look at the scene and anticipated what she was doing. Ripping a couple of towels from the dispenser, he glanced at her in question. “What’ve you got?”
“This is Margie Terrington from Southbank. She’s cramping. Pain in the joints. Nausea.”
“Contractions?”
“I’m not sure. I’m just getting ready to hook her up to the monitor.”
He tilted his head. “Theories?”
“None.” She laid a hand on the young woman’s shoulder. “Are you up to telling Lucas what you told me?”
Even as she asked it, Margie’s face tightened up in a pained grimace, and she gave a couple of sustained breaths, dragging air in through her nose and letting it out through her mouth. A second or two later she nodded. “Like I told you, I took a shower this morning. Then I started getting these weird sensations in my side.”
“What kind of weird?”
“Like a pulled muscle or something.” She stiffened once again. She gritted out, “But now my whole stomach hurts.”
“Where’s the father?” Lucas asked.
“He’s at work. I—I didn’t want to worry him if it’s nothing.”
Lucas frowned. “I think he should be here.” He glanced at Darcie. “Can you get her hooked up while I ring him?”
If anything, Margie looked even more frightened. “Am I going to lose this baby too?”
Darcie’s heart ached for the woman, even as her brain still whirled, trying to figure out what was going on. “Let us do the worrying, love, can you do that?”
“I think so.” She wrote her husband’s phone number on a sheet of paper and handed it to Lucas.
While he was gone, Darcie got Margie into a hospital gown and snapped on a pair of gloves. Then she wrapped the monitor around her patient’s abdomen. Wow, she was really perspiring. So much so that it had already soaked through the robe on her right side.
And her abdominal muscles were tight to the touch. “Are you having a contraction right now?”
Margie moaned. “I don’t know.”
She started up the machine and the first thing she heard was the quick woompa-woompa-woompa-woompa of the baby’s heart. Thank God. Even as that thought hit, a hundred more swept past it. A heartbeat didn’t mean Margie’s baby wasn’t in distress, just that he was alive.
She stared at the line below the heart rate that should be showing the marked rise and fall of the uterus as it contracted and released. It was a steady line.
Placing her hand on Margie’s abdomen again, she noted the strange tightness she’d felt before. But it seemed more like surface muscles to Darcie. Not the deep, purposeful contraction of a woman’s uterus.
Lucas came back and glanced at the monitor. “Your husband’s on his way.”
“Thank you.” Another moan, and her hands went back to her stomach.
Lucas sat next to the bed and held the patient’s hand, helping guide her through the deep breathing.
“She’s not contracting.” Darcie’s eyes were locked on the monitor where a series of little squiggles indicated that something was happening, but it was more like a series of muscle fasciculations than the steady rise and fall she would expect to see. Could she have flu, like Margie suspected?
“When did you start sweating like this?”
Lucas’s voice drew her attention back. He eased Margie’s robe to the side and stared at the area where moisture was already beading up despite just having been exposed to the chilly air of the ward. Strange. Although Margie was perspiring everywhere—Darcie gave a quick glance at her face and chest above the gown—there was a marked difference between her moist upper lip and her right side, where a rivulet of liquid peaked and then ran down the woman’s swollen belly.
“I don’t know. An hour after my shower? Right about the time I started to hurt.”
He peered at her closer. “You said you took a shower. Did you feel anything before or after it? A sting…or a prick maybe?”
A prick? Darcie stared at him, trying to figure out where he was going with this.
“No.”
“Where did the pain start exactly?”
Margie pressed her fingers right over the area that was wet from perspiration.
He muttered something under his breath then glanced up at Darcie. “I need to make a quick phone call.”
