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‘I’m only too happy to have been of help,’ he told her, ‘and if I make us a belated breakfast, do you think you could manage to eat something?’
‘I don’t think so. Please, see to yourself and while you’re doing that I’ll go next door and do some unpacking. My things are still in the cases from when I arrived last night.’ She halted in the doorway and with the unease back in her eyes said, ‘Will you be around for the rest of the day?’
‘Yes, I will,’ he told her firmly, thinking that this young woman’s needs were of more importance than the couple of rounds of golf he’d promised himself later in the day. Also, did he want to see the links again so soon after what he’d been faced with on his earlier visit?
When Helena came back that evening she was very pale but composed. ‘I’ve made the funeral arrangements,’ she told him. ‘There will be just myself.’ After a moment’s hesitation she added, ‘Unless you would care to come as moral support.’
Blake didn’t answer immediately and she said quickly, ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. I’ve already put on your good nature enough as it is.’
‘Of course I’ll support you,’ he told her. ‘I was just wondering when you’d arranged it for as I’m senior partner in a group practice not far from here and if it is in surgery hours I’ll have to find a replacement.’
‘It’s at half past one next Monday,’ she informed him, ‘which gives them time to conduct a postmortem.’
‘Good. That will be between surgeries. One of the other partners can do my house calls.’
‘Thanks, Dr Pemberton. I’ll be really grateful for your company and when it’s over I suppose the best thing would be for me to book a return ticket to Australia.’
‘Were you intending going back?’
‘No. My contract was up. But there’s nothing to keep me here now. I have no job and when the witness protection people come to want the house back I’ll have no home, and in any case I wouldn’t want to be in there on my own.’
‘What kind of nursing were you doing?’ he asked with a degree of interest that surprised him.
‘I did six months in obstetrics and six months in paediatrics. I fancied a change and off I went. I knew nothing about the court case until I got back last night and I was horrified when Dad told me that he’d been in such danger…and maybe still was.
‘He hadn’t been a bit keen for me to come home, but I’d thought it was because I’d let him see how upset I was over him selling our old house. I didn’t know that it was my safety he was concerned about.’
And that makes two of us, Blake thought grimly. The police had better get their act together and get any possible revenge attacks sidetracked now that her father was dead.
This beautiful sorrowing woman was getting to him as no one had for a long time. She was arousing all the protective instincts that had lain dormant ever since he’d lost his wife and son.
At ten o’clock Helena said, ‘Would you mind if I go to bed, Dr Pemberton? It’s been a terrible day and I’m exhausted.’
‘Of course I don’t mind,’ he told her. ‘The bed is made up. Shall I give you something to help you sleep? A mild sedative maybe?’
Helena shook her head. ‘No. I’ll try to manage without.’
She was moving towards the staircase and he said, ‘Just one thing before you go, Helena.’
‘Yes?’
‘The name is Blake. Forget the Dr Pemberton.’
There was weariness in her smile as she told him, ‘I’ll remember that. Goodnight…Blake.’
When she’d gone he sat unmoving, but if his body was still his mind wasn’t. All sorts of thoughts were going round in it. The kind of thoughts that less than twenty-four hours ago would never have had cause to surface.
His reverie was interrupted by the doorbell and as he got to his feet he could see a car belonging to one of the partners in the practice parked at the bottom of the drive.
He sighed. Maxine Fielding was a good doctor. She was also husband-hunting and Blake had a feeling that she saw him as prey. The seas would run dry before he succumbed to her, he kept telling himself, but he was loth to create an embarrassing situation at the practice unless he was forced to.
When he opened the door to her it was clear that in spite of the hour it was a social call, and before he could nip it in the bud she’d seated herself and was telling him that she was gasping for a gin and tonic.
He obliged, with eyes upward raised and ears pinned back for any sounds from above, but all was still until Helena’s voice called from the top of the stairs, ‘I think I will have the sleeping tablet if you don’t mind…Blake.’
Maxine was on her feet faster than the speed of light and, peering up the staircase at the person responsible for the unexpected interruption, she said tightly, ‘And who might that be?’
‘A guest,’ he told her calmly, and to Helena. ‘I’ll be up with it right away, Helena.’
‘So?’ Maxine said when he came back down.
‘Helena is the daughter of my next-door neighbour who died suddenly today. The police called me out when his body was found and I had the unenviable task of breaking the news to her that her father was dead. She is very distraught, needless to say, and I felt that she shouldn’t be alone tonight. Does that satisfy you, Maxine?’
‘I suppose so,’ she said tartly, ‘but I’m not going to stay and chat with someone listening upstairs.’
‘You flatter yourself if you think Helena will be interested in anything we might have to say after the sort of day she’s had.’
‘Nevertheless I’m going,’ she said, ‘and don’t forget we have a practice meeting arranged for after morning surgery tomorrow.’
‘I’m not likely to forget,’ he told her drily. ‘I was the one who arranged it.’
There were three partners at the practice—himself, Maxine, who had come highly recommended from a practice that he’d since discovered had been glad to see her go, and Darren Scott, a young, recently qualified GP.
Darren and Maxine didn’t get on too well as she was always criticising him instead of offering encouragement, and Blake was left to keep the peace. The rest of the staff were a hard-working, contented lot and for most of the time there was harmony.
He’d started working for the police twelve months previously and from the beginning had pledged himself to help those of the public, whether innocent or guilty, who found themselves in a cell because they were suspected of breaking the law.
His duty was to protect them from harming themselves or anyone else, and if a prisoner was taken ill to be there to see that they received proper treatment. There would be no deaths in the cells if he could help it.
His relations with the police were good. They knew they could rely on him to turn up when sent for and that his findings would be meticulously passed on to them.
* * *
When Blake had brought her the sedative Helena said apologetically, ‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t know you had a visitor.’
He smiled.
‘Think nothing of it. Maxine Fielding is one of my partners from the practice. She won’t be staying long and as soon as she’s gone I shall be turning in myself. Remember, Helena, if you need anything in the night you have only to call.’
‘Yes, I know,’ she said gratefully and turned her face into the pillow, wishing that she didn’t look so ghastly and that she wasn’t wearing the shapeless pyjamas.
* * *
Helena cried out in the night and Blake went to her. As he soothed her back to sleep he saw the sedative was on the bedside table. She was a nurse, he thought, and would know that no matter what she took to help her sleep she would awake to desolation in the morning. Clawing her way out of the same kind of black hole that he’d crawled out of every morning for a long time after Anna and young Jason had been killed in a car crash on the school run on a bright spring morning three years ago.
He still had his dark days but time did heal. It wasn’t just a platitude that was trotted out to help the grieving. Gradually the pain eased and if one was lucky only the happy memories remained.
Hopefully that was how it would be for his unexpected visitor, only in her case there’d been fear to cope with, too.
* * *
When he awoke in the morning Helena had gone. She’d found an empty envelope and had written on the back of it, ‘Have gone home. There is much to sort out. Thank you for last night, Blake. I hope I didn’t disturb you too much as I know you have a busy day ahead. Best regards, Helena.’
As she’d been writing the note her face had been burning. She’d known that he’d held her some time during the night, but she’d been too exhausted and traumatised for it to register properly, and in the light of day she hadn’t been able to believe that she’d let her nightmares be soothed away by a man she’d only known a matter of hours. Yet it hadn’t felt like that. It had been as if she’d known him always.
For the rest of the day she tried to keep busy. A police sergeant and a young constable called in the middle of the morning and told her that they were making sure that the newspapers printed an account of her father’s death. That should finally wrap up his connection with the Kelsall case, they told her, and surprised her by saying that it was at Dr Pemberton’s suggestion.
As she tried to force a sandwich down at midday Helena began to wonder about his visitor of the night before. The aggressive-looking blonde with the cold grey eyes had glared up at her as if she’d been about to steal the silver, and she wondered if they were a couple. She hoped not. Blake Pemberton deserved better than that. Much better.
She was humbly grateful that he’d agreed to attend her father’s funeral with her. For the moment she couldn’t think any further than that. But once it was over it would be decision time, and of one thing she was certain—she wasn’t staying in this house.
Maybe she could find something in nursing over here with accommodation thrown in. The authorities in the UK were always saying there was a shortage of nurses. It might be the time to test the water.
* * *
The practice meeting in the late morning was going smoothly enough, with the manager announcing that they were meeting their budget and Blake’s two partners for once not bickering. But it took a downward turn when a letter from one of the two practice nurses was read out, asking that she be permitted to leave at the end of the following week. No reason was given but most of the staff were aware that she’d just found herself a new man, a Welshman, and wanted to move to Wales to be with him.
‘Shall I advertise?’ the practice manager asked, and Blake shook his head.
‘Let’s leave it for a few days,’ he suggested. ‘I might know of a replacement. If nothing comes of it we’ll advertise then.’
It would be one way of keeping an eye on Helena, he was thinking. Purely from a protective point of view…of course. Not for any other reason. She’d felt so fine-boned and vulnerable both times he’d held her close that he knew he would be on edge if she was out of his sight in the weeks to come.
He was worried because she had no one to turn to but himself. Yet wasn’t he in a similar position? But he had a lot more going for him. He had the practice, his job with the police and his own home. In other words, plenty to occupy him…
As they left the meeting to go out on their calls Blake was waylaid by Maxine.
‘Well,’ she said. ‘Has she gone?’
‘If you mean Helena, yes,’ he told her coolly. ‘I’ve left it to her to decide if she wants to come back tonight.’
She was eyeing him dubiously.
‘You’ll have people talking.’
He laughed and her face tightened.
‘Maybe it’s time I gave them something to talk about.’
‘I could help with that,’ she said skittishly.
‘I was joking, Maxine,’ he told her. ‘Anna would be a hard act to follow and I don’t see suitable replacements on every street corner.’
He could tell that had gone down like a lead balloon but she didn’t get a chance to reply as a patient she’d seen earlier was hovering. Relieved to be away from her, Blake set off on his rounds with the intention of making Helena’s house his first stop.
‘Why didn’t you stay for breakfast?’ he asked when she opened the door to him.
She looked awful. There were dark smudges beneath eyes that were red-rimmed with weeping and her face was even paler than the day before.
‘How much sleep did you get?’ he asked, as the doctor in him took over.
‘Some,’ she replied, with her face warming again at the memory of how he’d held her in his arms and comforted her in the dark hours of the night. To cover her confusion she said, ‘I’d like to invite you for a meal to make up for all you’ve done for me, but I haven’t got around to doing any food shopping, and as Dad lived rather frugally there isn’t much in the fridge.’
‘I wouldn’t dream of letting you cook for me,’ he said immediately. ‘You’re in no fit state. But there’s no reason why we can’t eat out. I’ll take you for a meal. It will be one way of making sure you’re managing to get some food down.’
His glance was taking in the uncluttered worktops and a sink bare of used pots. ‘Unless you’re a very tidy person I would guess that you’ve had nothing so far.’
Was he overdoing the caring neighbour bit? he wondered. She’d turned away and was staring through the window. Maybe she was finding him too overpowering.
Yet she was saying, ‘I’d like that. To dine out. It will help to take my mind off everything for a little while.’
He was smiling and Helena thought that this attractive stranger really was doing his best to be supportive, but there was still one thing that Blake Pemberton couldn’t make right for her, even though he’d done his best.
She pointed to the early edition of the evening paper lying on the kitchen table, and as his gaze transferred to it she said, ‘On the inside page.’
Blake picked it up and turned to where she’d said and his eyes narrowed as they focused on a short piece at the top of the page. The police had done as he’d suggested. It said that James Harris, the main witness in a recent gangland trial, had died of natural causes the previous day. That was all, but hopefully it would be sufficient.
It was the kind of scenario that he’d been on the edge of in some of the incidents where the police had asked for his assistance in recent months. Especially in some of the more run-down parts of the city. So it wasn’t all that new to him.
But to this innocent woman who’d come back from Australia, expecting life to be as it had been before, what she’d been met with must seem like a nightmare. Not only was she having to cope with losing her father, she’d been touched by the seamier side of life in the process.
‘I’m still wondering if I should go back to Australia to get away from all this,’ she said, breaking into his thoughts.
‘Yes, but do you want to?’
She’d thought she did, but now she wasn’t sure. If she went back she would never see Blake Pemberton again. Their meeting would end up as just ships that had passed in the night and she didn’t want that. She liked him. Liked everything about him. If that woman from last night was special, it didn’t matter. She would be happy to have him as just a friend.
CHAPTER TWO
‘I DON’T know whether I want to go back or not,’ Helena said into the silence that had followed Blake’s question. ‘There was nothing to keep me there and now there’s nothing to keep me here.’
It wasn’t the moment to mention that there was a vacancy at the practice, but he would bring it up while they were eating tonight, he decided. It would give Helena the chance to be thinking about it while she waited for the funeral to take place.
He had another suggestion that he was going to tag onto it and felt that it might influence whatever decision she came to, but that could wait until that evening, too.
And so he sidetracked the issue by saying, ‘There’ll be time to worry about that when you’ve laid your father to rest. And with regard to tonight, you are welcome to use my spare room again if you don’t want to be on your own in this place.
‘Or, if you want, I’ll come and sleep on the sofa here. But, Helena, do remember that no one, apart from those involved in the witness protection scheme, knows where your father had been moved to. There are no details of where he was living in the piece in the paper, so you should be quite safe here until you decide what to do.’
She nodded, turning away from him again as she did so, and he hoped she wasn’t thinking that he was implying she was making too much of the situation she found herself in.
‘Yes. I know, Blake,’ she said flatly. ‘I’m not usually so reliant on others. It’s just that I can’t seem to gather my wits after finding out from my father what’s been happening while I’ve been away, and then you bringing me the news of his death so soon afterwards. Of course I’ll be all right here. I’ve intruded into your life enough as it is.’
He was wishing that he hadn’t said anything now. In trying to reassure her he’d put her on the defensive. Made Helena feel she was letting everything get out of proportion. He was going to have to tread more carefully. The last thing he wanted was to alienate her at such a time.
‘You haven’t done anything of the kind,’ he assured her and changing the subject, he went on, ‘I’ll pick you up at seven o’clock if that’s all right. There’s a small restaurant not far from here where I dine when I want something special. The food is good and so is the service.’
Blake found he was holding his breath. He sensed that she’d gone into her shell. Was she going to say she’d changed her mind?
