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‘Check your emails?’ she repeated, the red lips widening into a smile. ‘Out here we have to take into account the vagaries of the internet, which seem to deem that at least one day in four nothing works. The big mistake most people, me included, made was thinking wireless would be more reliable than dial-up. At least with dial-up we all had phone lines we could use.’
Neena paused then added, ‘Are you really a doctor?’
It was an absurd conversation to be having with a stranger in the middle of the night, and totally inhospitable to have left him standing on her top step, but there was something about the man—his size maybe?— that intimidated her, and she had the weirdest feeling that the best thing she could do was to send him away.
Far away!
Immediately!
‘And what company? Oh, dear, excuse me. The exploratory drilling company, of course. They’re staying on. I’d heard that. And they’ve sent a doctor?’
It still didn’t make a lot of sense and she knew she was probably frowning at the man. She tried again.
‘But shouldn’t you be reporting to the site office—not that it would be open at this hour. Who sent you here?’
He shrugged impossibly broad shoulders and pushed damp twists of black hair off his forehead.
‘Nothing is open at this hour. Believe me, I’ve tried to find somewhere. A motel, a pub, a garage—even the police station has a sign on the door telling people what number to phone in an emergency. And it’s not as if it’s that late—I mean, it’s after eleven, but for the pub to be shut on a Friday night! Finally an old man walking a dog told me this was the doctor’s house and I should try here.’
‘It’s the rock eisteddfod,’ Neena explained, then realised from the look of blank incomprehension on his face that it wasn’t an explanation he understood.
‘The Australia-wide high-school competition—singing and dancing. Our high school was in the final in Sydney last week. In fact, they came second, and as most of the parents and supporters weren’t able to travel to Sydney for the final, the school decided to put it on again here—but of course Wymaralong is too small to have a big enough hall, so it’s on tonight down the road in Baranock.’
Disbelief spread across the man’s face.
‘Baranock’s two hundred kilometres away—hardly down the road.’
She had to smile.
‘Two hundred kilometres is nothing. Some of the families with kids in the performance live another hundred kilometres out of town so it’s a six hundred kilometre round trip, but they’re willing to do it to encourage their children to participate in things like this.’
‘You’re not there!’ Mak pointed out, totally unnecessarily, but the smile had disturbed something in his gut, making him feel distinctly uncomfortable. Or maybe it was the heat. He hoped it was the heat.
Whatever it was, his comment served to make her smile more widely, lending her face a radiance that shone even in the dim lighting of the front veranda.
‘Someone had to mind the shop and take in stray doctors. So, if you can show me some identification, I will take you in, and tomorrow we can sort out somewhere for you to stay.’
‘Did I hear you say you’re taking in a stranger?’
A rasping voice from just inside the darkened doorway of the old house made Mak look up from the task of riffling through his wallet in search of some ID.
‘Haven’t you learnt your lesson, girl?’
The girl in question had turned towards the doorway, where a small, nuggety man was now visible.
‘I knew you were here to protect me, Ned,’ she said. ‘Come out and meet the new doctor.’
‘New doctors let people know they’re coming and they don’t arrive in the middle of the night,’ the small man said, moving out of the doorway so Mak could see him in the light on the veranda. A tanned, bald head, facial skin as wrinkled as a walnut, pale blue eyes fanned with deep lines from squinting into the sun, now studying Mak with deep suspicion.
‘I’ve explained to Dr Singh there should have been an email, and I wasted an hour trying to find some accommodation in town. Here, my hospital ID from St Christopher’s in Brisbane—I’m on study leave at the moment—and my driver’s licence, medical registration card and somewhere in my luggage, a letter from Hellenic Enterprises, outlining my contract with them.’
The woman reached out a slim hand to take the offered IDs, but it was Ned who asked the question.
‘Which is?’
A demand, aggressive enough for Mak, exhausted after an eleven-hour drive made even more tortuous by having to change a flat tyre, to snap.
‘None of your business, but if you must know, I was about to explain to Dr Singh that the company has asked me to work with her to evaluate the needs of the community as far as medical practitioners and support staff are concerned. The company realises having their crews and now some families of the crews here is putting an extra strain on the town’s medical resources and the powers that be at Hellenic are willing to fund another doctor and possibly another trained nursing sister, should that be advisable.’
‘Realising it a bit late,’ Ned growled. ‘Those lads have been out there a full year.’
‘But more are coming, Ned, and we will need to expand the medical service.’ The woman spoke gently but firmly to the old man then turned to Mak. ‘We’re hardly showing you the famed country hospitality, putting you through the third degree out here on the steps. Come inside. You’re right about there being no one in town tonight, but even if there had been, there are no rooms to be had at the pub or in either of the motels.’
She paused and grinned at him. ‘Kind of significant, isn’t it—coming on to Christmas and no room at the inn? But in Wymaralong it’s been like that all year. The crews from the exploration teams and the travellers that service the machinery have taken every spare bed in town. You can stay here tonight, and tomorrow Ned can phone around to see if someone would be willing to take you in as a boarder.’
‘Which you are obviously not,’ Mak said, following her across the veranda and into a wide and blessedly cool hallway, rooms opening off it on both sides.
She turned, and fine dark eyebrows rose while the skin on her forehead wrinkled into a tiny frown.
‘Obviously not what?’
‘Willing to take me in as a boarder.’
‘No, she’s not!’ Ned snapped, following behind Mak, right on his heels, ready, no doubt, to brain him with an umbrella from the stand inside the door if he made a wrong move.
The woman’s lips moved but if it was a smile, it was a wry one.
‘You can have a bed for the night,’ she repeated. ‘Tomorrow we’ll talk.’
Then she waved her hand to the left, ushering Mak into a big living room, comfortably furnished with padded cane chairs, their upholstery faded but looking homely rather than shabby. Low bookshelves lined one wall, and an old upright piano stood in a corner, its top holding a clutter of framed photographs, while set in front of every chair was a solid footrest, as if the room had been furnished with comfort as its primary concern.
And the air in here, too, was cool, although Mak couldn’t hear the hum of an air-conditioner.
‘Have a seat,’ his hostess offered. ‘Have you eaten anything recently? Ned could make you toast, or an omelette, or there’s some leftover meatloaf. Dr Stavrou might like that in a sandwich, Ned. And tea or coffee, or perhaps a cold drink.’
Mak looked from the woman to Ned, who was still watching Mak, like a guard dog that hadn’t let down its guard for one instant.
‘A cup of tea and some toast would be great and the meatloaf sounds inviting, but you don’t have to wait on me. If you lead me to the kitchen and show me where things are, I could help myself.’
‘Not in my kitchen, you can’t. Not while I’m here,’ Ned growled—guard dog again—before disappearing further down the hall.
Now her visitor was sitting in her living room, Neena stopped staring at him and recalled her manners.
‘I’m Neena Singh,’ she said, introducing herself as if there was nothing strange in this near-midnight meeting, although suspicion was now stirring in her tired brain. She recalled something the man had said earlier. ‘If you’re on study leave, why are you here? Surely you’re not studying the problems of isolated medical practitioners.’
‘No, but it’s not that far off my course. I’m finishing a master’s degree, and my area of interest is in improving the medical aid offered by the first response team in emergency situations. I imagine in emergency situations out here you’re the first response—you and the ambos. In major situations the flying doctor comes in, but you’d be first response.’
She couldn’t argue, thinking of the number of times she’d arrived at the scene of a motor vehicle or farm accident and wished for more hands, more skilled help, more equipment and even better skills herself. Anything to keep the victims alive until they could be properly stabilised and treated.
‘Do you work in the emergency field?’
The stranger nodded.
‘ER at St Christopher’s.’
‘And the company plan is what? For you to work with me to gauge the workload in town or will you work solely with the work crew out on the site?’
‘Not much point in working out on site when I need to find out how the additional population—now the men are here permanently they’ll have family joining them—affects the medical services of the town,’ he said, looking up at her so she saw his eyes weren’t the dark brown she’d expected but a greenish hazel—unusual eyes and in some way uncannily familiar.
Like Theo’s?
Futile but familiar anger tightened her shoulder-blades, and the suspicion she’d felt earlier strengthened. She tried to shrug off the anger and the suspicion. The man’s name was Greek, so maybe there was a part of Greece where people had dark hazel eyes…
He was still talking—explaining something—but she’d lost the thread of the conversation, wanting only to escape his presence—to get out of the room and shake herself free of tormenting memories.
And to think rationally and clearly about the implications of the man’s arrival in town!
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I should have offered earlier. You might want to use the bathroom, freshen up. It’s across the passage, turn left then first door on the right.’
Getting rid of him, if only for a short time, would be nearly as good as escaping herself, but he didn’t move.
‘Thanks, but I did avail myself of the facilities at the service station. The rest rooms weren’t locked—they even had a shower in there, so I took advantage of that as well.’
‘Most outback service stations provide showers—for the truckies,’ Neena said, imparting the information like a tour guide. If escaping the man’s presence wasn’t possible, then neutral—tour-guide—conversation was the next best thing. Later she could think about personal issues. ‘This is sheep and cattle country and the animals are trucked to market, plus, of course, all our consumer goods have to be trucked in.’
‘And products for the farmers—stuff like fencing wire,’ Mak offered helpfully, wondering why the woman was so ill at ease in her own home. Or did she know who he was? That he was family? Unlikely Theo would have mentioned him. ‘I have an Uncle Mak who disapproves of me’ was hardly the kind of conversation that would lure a woman into bed.
‘Yes, it did sound pathetic, didn’t it?’ Neena said, a slight smile playing at the corners of her lips. ‘But I’d lost track of the conversation. I was dozing in front of the TV when you arrived and my mind was still halfasleep. I gather you want to work with me, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s fantastic because I can learn from you. You’ve no idea how often I wish I had more skills in first response stuff. Oh, I get by, but there are so many new ideas that it’s hard to keep up.’
Mak wished they’d kept talking about trucking. Neena’s honest admission that she hadn’t been listening to his conversation, followed by such an enthusiastic acceptance of his presence made him feel tainted and uneasy—unclean, really, for all he’d showered. And when she’d smiled—well, almost smiled—his gut had tightened uncomfortably, but he was fairly sure he could put that aside as a normal reaction to such a beautiful woman. It was the deception bothering him the most, but he could hardly announce now that he was really here to suss her out.
‘I’ve made you toasted sandwiches with the meatloaf.’
Ned marched in, bearing a tray which he set down on a small table beside Mak’s chair. ‘And there’s a pot of tea, but don’t you go thinking you can have a cup, Miss Neena. You’re sleeping bad enough as it is. I’ll make you a warm milk if you want something.’
Mak smiled as Neena hid a grimace.
‘No, thank you, Ned. I drank some milk earlier, as you very well know, and how can I have a cup of tea when you’ve only put out one cup?’
‘You’d drink it from the pot if you got desperate enough,’ Ned muttered as he made his way out of the room, pausing in the doorway to add, ‘I’ve put clean sheets on the bed in the back room.’
A quick frown flitted across Neena’s smooth brow.
‘Does the back room have rats and cockroaches or is it just as far away from your room as it can possibly be?’ Mak asked, and won another smile from his hostess.
‘It’s certainly not the best spare room in the house,’ she admitted. ‘And Ned does get over-protective. But I don’t think there are rats or cockroaches.’
‘Even if there were, I doubt it would worry me,’ Mak said. ‘It’s a long drive and I’m tired enough to sleep on a barbed-wire fence. In fact, if it’s okay with you, I might take my tray through and have the snack there. That way we can both get to bed.’
She turned away but not before he saw a blush rise in her cheeks. Surely not because he’d mentioned both of them getting to bed—it was hardly suggestive, the way he’d said it…
‘Through here,’ she was saying, and, tray in hand, he followed her, noting the bathroom she’d talked about earlier on the right then another two doors before they reached the end of the passage and the back room.
‘Oh, dear,’ she murmured as she opened the door and looked in, then turned back and ran her gaze over him from head to toe. ‘I’d forgotten about the bed in here. You’ll never fit.’
And over her shoulder Mak saw what she meant for Ned had put sheets onto a rather small—perhaps child size—single bed, and even from the doorway, Mak could feel the heat emanating from the room.
‘I heard him say he’d sleep on a barbed-wire fence,’ the gravelly voice reminded them, and looking through a French door on the other side of the room, Mak saw Ned standing on the veranda.
On guard?
‘Well, he can’t sleep here. Honestly, Ned, sometimes I wonder if your main aim in life is to frustrate me. Come this way,’ Neena added to Mak. ‘There’s a double bed that should take your height, if you sleep crossways, in the next bedroom, and that bedroom has an air vent as well. I’ll get some sheets.’
She opened another door.
‘I’ll have it made up by the time you get your gear out of the car, and as far as I’m concerned you’re welcome to stay here. This is the doctor’s house after all.’
She was doing it to get her own back on Ned, Mak realised that immediately. He also realised it would give him an ideal opportunity to really get to know her!
So why did he feel uneasy?
Because of the deceit? Or because on first impression this woman was nothing like the manipulative gold-digger he’d envisioned?
‘You don’t have to put me up.’ It was a token protest, brought on by the uneasiness, but she waved it away.
‘Of course I don’t, but sometimes I get very tired of being bossed around by every single person in this town. Sometimes I’d like to be allowed to make my own decisions. Now, get your things—you know where the bathroom is. I’ll put some fresh towels in there.’
She whirled away, opening a cupboard near the back room, pulling out sheets and towels.
‘Leave the sheets on the bed, I’ll make it up,’ Mak told her, and she silenced him with a glare.
‘Don’t you start,’ she warned, marching back down the hall, slipping past him into the bedroom.
Mak set the tray down and left her to it, wondering just why the town would be so protective of her. Okay, so it was hard to get doctors to serve in country towns and the further outback you went the harder it became, but…
Maybe it was her pregnancy.
The phone was ringing as he re-entered the house, silenced when Neena must have answered it. He heard her say, ‘I’ll be right there,’ and the click of a receiver being returned to its cradle.
‘Bed’s made,’ she said, passing him in the passage. ‘Towels in the bathroom.’
And she kept walking.
Dumping his bag, Mak followed her.
‘You’re going out on a call,’ he said as his long strides caught up.
She nodded but her pace didn’t slacken as she crossed the veranda and ran lightly down the steps—running when being back out in the hot night air immediately sapped his energy.
