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It was what they’d all been hoping the consultant wouldn’t have to do. Amy Renwick had been born twelve weeks premature, and scarcely a month later she’d been diagnosed with necrotising enterocolitis. The condition wasn’t uncommon in premature babies—their intestines were frequently insufficiently developed to handle digestion—but generally it could be controlled with antibiotics. In Amy’s case, however, the antibiotics hadn’t worked. Mr Brooke had thought he might only have to drain the infected fluid from her stomach, but, from the length of time he’d been in Theatre, it looked very much as though that solution hadn’t proved to be an option.
‘Is Mrs Renwick here?’ Brianna asked, and the staff nurse nodded.
‘She’s in the parents’ restroom—very upset, of course—but her family’s with her.’
And they’d been a tower of strength over the past few weeks for Naomi and her husband, Brianna thought as she lifted a file from the nurses’ station. Not all of their parents were so lucky. Some families lived too far away to provide emotional support, while other families simply couldn’t deal with the constant up-and-down pressures of having a very premature baby.
And sometimes the people, the person, you were so sure you could depend on let you down, she thought with a sudden, unwanted, shaft of pain.
‘You OK, Brianna?’
The staff nurse was gazing uncertainly at her, and Brianna manufactured a smile.
‘You’re the second person to ask me that today, and I’m fine,’ she replied. ‘I’ve just got a bad attack of Monday blues, not helped by the imminent arrival of this blasted auditor—’
‘Who, if I’m not very much mistaken, has just arrived with Babbling and Rita,’ the staff nurse warned in an undertone. ‘And, if that is him, he looks scary. Good looking in a designer-suited, high-powered sort of way, but most definitely scary.’
Quickly, Brianna glanced over her shoulder, and in that split second her world stood still. Dimly, she heard their NICU consultant introduce the man at his side as Connor Monahan, but she didn’t need the introduction. The six-foot-one rangy frame, the thick black hair and startling blue eyes, the expensive city suit and equally top-of-the-range laptop that he was carrying…It was the man she hadn’t thought about—had refused to allow herself think about—for the past two years, and the file she’d been holding slipped from her nerveless fingers and landed on the floor with a clatter.
From beside her she heard Chris’s small gasp of surprise at her unusual clumsiness, saw Mr Brooke’s glare of irritation, but what pierced her to the core as she quickly retrieved the file then straightened up was the way the familiar blue eyes had flashed instantly from recognition to anger. How those same blue eyes were now boring deep into her, tearing her heart apart just as it had been torn apart two years ago.
‘I can assure you my staff are not normally so clumsy, Mr Monahan,’ she heard Mr Brooke declare, and saw Connor shake his head dismissively.
‘Accidents happen,’ he replied, ‘and, please, everyone, call me Connor. I’m not here to judge anyone. My visit to this hospital is merely as an observer, to find out how a hospital like this serves its local community.’
‘Yeah, right,’ Chris muttered. ‘And like we don’t all know that he’s been sent in to find out which department should be closed, so he can give up on the “let’s all be friends” routine. And, oh, Lord, Mr Brooke is now insisting on introducing everyone,’ the staff nurse continued, rolling her eyes heavenwards. ‘What’s the bet he won’t remember half our names?’
Brianna didn’t care if the middle-aged consultant did or not. She was too busy keeping her eyes fixed firmly on the file in her hand, wishing she was anywhere but here, but, out of the corner of her eye, she could see the inexorable approach of a pair of mirror-bright black shoes, could smell an all-too-distinctive sandalwood aftershave, and she sucked in an uneven breath, willing this moment to be over.
‘And this is Sister Flannigan,’ Mr Brooke announced when he drew level with her.
‘Sister Flannigan,’ Connor repeated slowly, and Brianna winced as she reluctantly raised her head to look up at him.
Never would she have imagined anyone could put quite so much sarcasm into her surname, but Connor just had.
‘She’s only been with us for two years,’ Mr Brooke continued, clearly completely oblivious to the atmosphere, ‘but since then she’s become an indispensable member of the team.’
At any other time Brianna would have savoured the praise from the portly consultant, who never gave anyone any, but not today, not when she saw Connor’s left eyebrow rise.
‘So, you’ve been living here in Cornwall for the last two years, have you, Sister Flannigan?’ he said with deliberate emphasis, and Brianna clasped the file in her hands even tighter.
Don’t, she wanted to say. Please, don’t. Not here, not in front of everyone. But she couldn’t say anything, not with her boss listening, not with Rita’s eyes darting avidly between her and Connor, her mind clearly already whirring away with speculation.
‘Yes, I’ve been here for two years,’ she muttered, ‘and now if you’ll excuse me…’
‘Oh, absolutely not,’ Connor declared, his voice ice-cold and implacable. ‘In fact, I insist you stay.’
Had he always been quite so tall, so intimidating? she wondered as she involuntarily took a step back. Of course he had. He couldn’t possibly have grown since she’d last seen him, and he’d always possessed an air of authority and power, and yet she felt transported back in time to the little country mouse she’d once been, and she hated feeling that way.
‘I’m afraid you really will have to excuse me,’ she said, putting as much defiance into her voice as she could muster. ‘I have babies to attend to, and I also need to talk to the mother of one of our patients. Her daughter has just undergone major surgery—’
‘From which we are hopeful she will make a full recovery,’ Mr Brooke interrupted. ‘Of course, the next few days will be critical, as I will explain to Mrs Renwick myself.’
Which is exactly what I don’t want you to do, Brianna thought unhappily. Of course, all operations carried risks, but not for nothing had the nursing staff in NICU nicknamed their consultant ‘Babbling’ Brooke. Brilliant surgeon though he might be, he would persist in constantly—and at great length—giving parents the worst-case scenario possible, terrifying them witless in the process. Megan would have handled Naomi Renwick so much better, but Megan wasn’t here.
‘It would be no trouble for me to talk to Mrs Renwick, Mr Brooke,’ she said desperately. ‘I could go now—’
‘Not running away from me, are you, Sister Flannigan?’ Connor said, and she bit her lip savagely.
Had she been the only one in the unit who had heard the unspoken word again in his comment? She hoped she was, she prayed she was.
‘Of course not,’ she replied. ‘I just…I know Mrs Renwick very well…I’m her daughter’s primary carer—’
‘And I’m her daughter’s surgeon, and head of this department, so I will speak to her,’ Mr Brooke interrupted with a finality that told Brianna there was no point in arguing. ‘Now, Connor, I’m sure our ward clerk will be only too happy to let you examine more of our files—’
‘Which I’m sure would be absolutely fascinating,’ Connor interrupted, ‘but I’m only going to be in St Piran’s for the next six weeks so what I’d like to do in NICU, over the next few days, is interview all of your staff individually. Form an idea from them of how they think they fit into this unit, what their duties are, gain the bigger picture, if you like.’
Six weeks? Brianna thought, glancing from Connor to Mr Brooke with ill-disguised horror. Connor was going to be in the hospital for six weeks? Even if he only spent a few days in NICU, it was going to be a few days too many and Mr Brooke clearly thought the same.
‘I really don’t see why there’s any need for you to interview my staff when I can give you the bigger picture immediately,’ he said. ‘Sick babies come in here, my nursing staff and I attempt to make them better. End of story.’ Brianna could have kissed the consultant, but Connor merely smiled the smile of a man who had no intention of having his intentions thwarted.
‘I still want to speak to your staff,’ he insisted evenly. ‘My interviews will take no longer than half an hour, and after that I will simply be a silent observer. In fact, I doubt you’ll even notice I’m here.’
I’ll notice, Brianna thought, desperately praying their consultant would feel the same but, to her dismay, he had clearly become bored with the conversation and simply shrugged.
‘Fine—whatever,’ he said. ‘Just don’t get in my way, or the way of my staff. So, who do you want to interview first?’
Connor made a show of glancing over the assembled nurses, but Brianna knew who he was going to choose, just as she knew Connor knew it, too.
‘I’m sure Sister Flannigan and I will find a lot to talk about,’ he declared with a smile that didn’t even remotely suggest it would ever reach his eyes. ‘Mr Brooke, do you have an office or room I could use as a base while I’m here at the hospital?’
He wanted to use NICU as his base? Even when he was assessing other departments he would keep returning to NICU as his base? No, Brianna thought desperately, dear heavens, no.
‘I’ll get Maintenance to clear out the nurse unit manager’s office for you,’ the consultant replied vaguely. ‘It’s not in use at the moment, but there are confidential files in it that will have to be secured, so in the meantime you could use the nurses’ staffroom if you want.’
Connor nodded.
‘Sounds good to me,’ he said.
It didn’t sound good to Brianna, and neither did the way Connor shadowed her all the way out of the ward and down the corridor as though he was convinced she might bolt. And she would have bolted, she thought, if she hadn’t known that a pair of five-foot-two-inch legs could never have outrun the six-foot-one-inch legs of the man at her side.
‘Would you like some tea, coffee? ‘ she said, walking quickly over to the kettle as soon as they entered the staffroom, desperate to delay the inevitable for as long as possible. ‘There’s some herbal tea here, too, though I can’t vouch for it being drinkable, and hot chocolate—’
‘So, is it still Brianna Flannigan,’ he interrupted, ‘or did you change your Christian name as well as your surname?’
She stared at the cork board which one of the nurses had affixed to the wall above the kettle and cups. Postcards from far-away places were pinned to it, along with old birthday cards and congratulation cards, and there was also a whole array of cartoons that should have been funny but she had never felt less like laughing.
‘I…I kept my Christian name,’ she muttered, mechanically switching on the kettle and spooning some coffee into a cup, though she didn’t really want anything. ‘Flannigan was my mother’s maiden name.’
‘But not yours,’ he said. ‘You do realise I could get you fired for working at this hospital under a false name?’
He could, she knew he could, but suddenly she didn’t care. Suddenly she felt cornered, and defeated, and wearily she turned to face him.
‘OK, get me fired,’ she said. ‘If that’s what you want to do, then go ahead and do it.’
‘Of course that’s not what I want!’ he exclaimed, tossing his laptop onto the nearest seat. ‘What do you take me for?’
I don’t know, she thought as she gazed up into his cold, rigid face. I don’t know because I feel like I don’t know you any more, and I’m wondering now if I ever did.
‘Look, can we sit down?’ she said. ‘You standing there—looming over me like some spectre of doom—isn’t helping.’
With a muttered oath he sat down, and, after a moment’s hesitation she abandoned the kettle and took the seat opposite him.
‘You really were determined I wouldn’t find you, weren’t you?’ he said, his blue eyes fixed on her, daring her to contradict him. ‘Changing your surname, moving to a one-horse town in the back of beyond in Cornwall.’
‘Connor, it wasn’t like that—’
‘Wasn’t it? ‘ he interrupted, his voice dripping sarcasm. ‘So how—exactly—would you interpret it?’
‘I wanteds…’ Oh, but this was so hard to explain, and she wanted to explain, for him to understand. ‘I just wanted…’ Her voice broke slightly despite her best efforts to keep it level. ‘Some peace. All I wanted was some peace.’
‘And to get that you had to walk out on me?’ he said incredulously. ‘Walk out without a word?’
‘I left you a letter,’ she protested, and saw his lip curl with derision.
‘“I need to be on my own for a while,”’ he quoted. ‘“I need some space, some time to get myself together”. That’s hardly an “I’m leaving you, and I’m never coming back”, dear-John letter, is it? ‘
‘Connor—’
‘You applied for this job without telling me, didn’t you?’ he said. ‘You applied for it, and got it, and yet you never said a word to me about what you were planning to do.’
She swallowed hard. ‘Yes.’
‘So that’s why you only ever took three hundred pounds out of our joint bank account,’ he declared, fury deepening his voice. ‘You didn’t need any more money because you had this job to come to.’
‘Yes,’ she whispered.
‘Why, Brianna, why?’ he demanded, thrusting his fingers through his black hair, anger, hurt and bewilderment plain on his face. ‘I thought we were happy, I thought you loved me.’
‘Things…things haven’t been right between us for a long time, Connor,’ she replied, ‘you know they haven’t—’
‘That’s nonsense,’ he retorted, and she clasped her hands together tightly, desperately trying to find the words that would make him understand.
‘I was going under, Connor,’ she cried. ‘After what happened—you wouldn’t talk to me, you wouldn’t let me talk, and I knew—if I didn’t get away—I was going to slide further and further into the black pit I’d fallen into, and if I kept on fallings’ She took an uneven breath. ‘I was scared—so scared—that I would never be able to get myself out again.’
‘And me—what about me?’ he exclaimed, his blue eyes blazing. ‘Two years, Brianna, it’s been two years since you left and in all that time you never once lifted the phone to tell me you were OK, never once even sent me a scribbled postcard to say you were alive.’
‘I was going to write, to tell you where I was,’ she declared defensively, but had she really been going to? It wasn’t something she wanted to think about, far less face. It was enough of a shock to see him sitting there in front of her. ‘Connor—’
‘You left your phone behind, the house keys, the police wouldn’t help me—’
‘You went to the police?’ She gasped, her eyes large with dismay, and he threw her a look that made her shrink back into her seat.
‘What the hell did you expect me to do? Did you think I’d simply stay home in our flat, night after night, watching TV, thinking, Well, I expect Brianna will come back eventually? Of course I went to the police. I thoughts…’ He closed his eyes for a second, and when he spoke again his voice was rough. ‘I thought you might have done something…stupid, but they said as you’d left a note, and your parents knew you were safe, it wasn’t a police matter but a domestic one.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured. ‘I didn’t realise—I never imagined you’d go to the police—’
‘Can you imagine how that made me feel?’ he said, his lips curving into a bitter travesty of a smile. ‘When the police told me your parents knew where you were, but I didn’t? I went back to Ireland, to your parents’ farm in Killarney, thinking you might have gone there, and, when I discovered you hadn’t, I begged them to give me your address, even your phone number, so I could at least hear your voice, know you truly were safe, but they wouldn’t give me either. They said you’d made them promise not to tell me anything, that you would contact me when you were ready.’
‘I’m sorry, so sorry,’ she repeated, willing him to believe her. ‘I didn’t…’ She shook her head blindly. ‘I wasn’t thinking clearly, not then. I just…’
‘Had to get away from me,’ he finished for her bitterly, and she bit her lip hard.
‘Connor, listen to me—’
‘Every time I heard on the news that a body had been found in some secluded spot I feared it was you,’ he continued as though she hadn’t spoken. ‘Every time someone was pulled out of the Thames I thought, Please, don’t let it be Brianna, but, as time went on, God help me, I sometimes…’ He took a breath. ‘Sometimes I hoped it was you because at least then the waiting would be over. All I needed…all I wanted^was to know you really were safe, and yet you denied me even that, Brianna.’
‘I would have called you, I would have talked to you,’ she said, her voice trembling, ‘but I knew talking to you wouldn’t help, that you wouldn’t listen.’
‘How can you say that?’ he demanded angrily. ‘Of course I would have talked, of course I would have listened!’
‘You didn’t before when I needed you to,’ she said before she could stop herself. ‘All you ever did was cut me off, change the subject, or you’d ask me…’ She swallowed convulsively, hearing the tears in her voice, and she didn’t want to cry…she so didn’t want to cry. ‘You kept asking me what was wrong, and I thought I’d go mad if you asked me that one more time because it was so obvious to me that everything was always going to be wrong, that it was never going to be right.’
‘You’re not making any sense—’
‘Because you’re not listening, just like you always don’t,’ she flared. ‘Whenever I try to talk to you, you never ever listen.’
‘Well, I want to talk now,’ he countered. ‘To talk properly with no lies, deception or half-truths, only honesty.’
She knew he was right, but talking honestly meant resurrecting everything that had happened, meant having to face it again. She hadn’t forgotten, she never would, but over the past two years she’d managed to come to a kind of acceptance, and to talk about it now…She didn’t think her heart could take that, and she shook her head.
‘Connor, this isn’t the time, or the place.’
‘Then when, Brianna?’ he exclaimed, and there was such a lacerating fury in his blue eyes that she winced. ‘When will be the time, or the place?’
She wanted to say, Never—nowhere. She wanted even more to say she wished he had never come, had never found her, but she didn’t have the courage.
‘I don’t know,’ she said wretchedly. ‘I don’t—’
She bit off the rest of what she had been about to say. The door of the nurses’ staffroom had opened, and Megan’s head had appeared hesitantly round it.
‘I’m really sorry,’ the paediatric specialist registrar began, glancing from Brianna to Connor, then back again, ‘but I’m afraid Brianna is needed in the unit.’
Brianna was hurrying towards Megan before she had even finished speaking, but when she reached the door she heard Connor clear his throat.
‘We have to talk, Brianna, and talk soon,’ he said.
She thought she nodded, but she couldn’t be sure. All she knew was she had to get away from him, and she was halfway down the corridor before Megan caught up with her.
