Marion Lennox - A Special Kind Of Family

‘You know I’m not looking for a relationship,’ he said flatly, and she almost fell off the couch.

‘Excuse…excuse me?’ she tried to say-but it turned into a choking cough. He was watching her from the far side of the room like she was a ticking bomb.

It took her a couple of minutes to recover. He didn’t move.

‘Some doctors,’ she said at last, when she could finally talk, ‘would have fetched their patients a glass of water when that happened. Especially after last night. I might have impaired lung capacity from smoke inhalation.’

‘If that’s a possibility you’d better go home. With Charles.’

‘Why do you want to get rid of me?’

‘I told you. I’m not-’

‘In the market for a relationship. I heard you. I’m here as a doctor, not a mistress.’

‘You kissed me.’

‘So I did, you big oaf,’ she snapped. ‘And you kissed me back. Last night was truly horrible and we were both terrified and we’re all alive and I was so thankful that I would have kissed Marilyn. In fact, I seem to remember that I did kiss Marilyn.’

‘Not like you kissed me.’

‘Not being Marilyn, you’d know how?’ she snarled, and he blinked.

‘Um…’

‘Look, let’s get this on a professional basis and keep it there,’ she snapped. ‘I’ve been asked to work here as a doctor. I believe there’s room for both of us in this town. Is there not?’

‘I haven’t advertised for help. You didn’t ask-’

‘I ought to have asked.’

‘So you concede that at least?’

‘Of course. But I’m desperate. I need a home for Marilyn.’

‘She’s not even your dog.’

‘She is,’ she said and swung off the examination couch and stood tall. ‘Look, I’ve jolted you out of your comfort zone…’

‘You haven’t…’

‘But I’ve been jolted further,’ she snapped again. ‘It was me who crashed into a river, who almost killed myself, who saved Marilyn, who helped save Martin, who spent all last night trying to figure how I could get my life back and suddenly realising I don’t want it back. You’re doing good in this town, Dominic Spencer, and I want to share it. How selfish is it of you not to let me?’

‘Selfish…’

‘Yes, selfish. This is a fantastic set-up. You’re telling me I can’t stay?’

‘You’ll be gone in a week.’

‘I believe the contract Graham is drawing up is for six months. Am I so appalling?’

‘No, but-’

‘But what?’ she demanded, exasperated. ‘What’s the worst that can happen? Graham tells me you have an outreach patient population of over eight thousand. Surely you can spare the odd patient or two. And if you’re worried I might hit on you, surely you’re old enough to fend me off. In fact, consider me fended.’

‘I don’t know whether I can work with you,’ he said, goaded. ‘Can’t you understand that? The way I feel…How can I risk it? I need to stay as I am. My work’s important to me. My kids are important to me. You mess with my head.’

‘And you mess with mine. So maybe we need to sort it. Tell me you’re not the least bit interested in me, or you’re in love with Tansy, or you swore celibacy until Armageddon. Just say it and then forget it. And I will, too. End of story. Professional colleagues and nothing more.’

He stared at her, seemingly baffled. She gazed calmly back.

The phone rang.

He didn’t want her.

She watched him speak into the phone, as she saw his body tense and stay rigidly turned away from her…

I’ve lost, she thought bleakly. Where do I go from here?

‘Where’s the crash?’

Despite her confusion, despite feeling humiliated to her socks, she picked up on what he was saying.

‘How many? Hell, okay, I’m on my way. Stay calm, mate, you’re the first on scene and you have to cope. Make sure everyone’s breathing-concentrate on getting muck away from their mouths and noses, and make sure no one’s slumped so they’re restricting their air flow. I’ll be with you in minutes. Go.’

His phone was back in his pocket and he hauled the door open.

She knew what she’d heard. A car crash. Multiple casualties.

‘Do you need help?’ she demanded.

‘No,’ he snapped.

He strode two steps out the door, and then stopped. Took a grip. Saw sense.

‘Yes,’ he said, without looking back. ‘There’s been a head-on collision two miles on the other side of town, just past my place. That was a local farmer. Four injuries, and from the sound of it they’re bad. The ambulance is fifty miles away. Yes, I might need help. I’d appreciate it if you came.’

HE SHOULDN’T focus on anything but the task ahead. But after a fast call to the police and to the ambulance service, with two miles between them and the crash site there was room for more.

Erin was staring straight ahead. He’d hurt her, he thought. He’d watched as her features had flattened, from eager, laughing, even maybe seductive, to humiliation and anger.

Her impulse to stay here, made in hours, was nuts.

She was just like his mother.

The thought slammed home and it hurt. He only vaguely remembered his mother, but what he remembered was flatness and apathy. Except for the times she’d arrived home ‘in love’.

‘Oh, Dom, this is wonderful, this is different, this will totally transform our lives.’

And it always did. The fragile security they achieved in between his mother’s romantic attachments-a place to call home, school routine, belongings-was cast to the wind as they followed one loser after another.

Even at seven he’d remembered saying desperately to his mother, ‘How can you be in love after only one night? How can you decide to move without even thinking about it?’

He glanced across at Erin and saw that was exactly where she was. She was all for throwing the old life away and starting the new, just because it was exciting, different and wonderful.

It wasn’t wonderful, he told himself grimly. She’d wake up and realise what was important-Charles, her parents, her career. And he’d be responsible.

‘You always mess things up for me.’ Hell, where had that come from? His mother’s voice, sobbing from the past. ‘He’d want me if I didn’t have you. Don’t whine, Dominic, we’ll find somewhere else to live and next time be smarter. Just stay in the background. I don’t know…disappear.’

He had. He’d ended up in foster-care-thank God, with Ruby-and his mother had never come back for him.

Impulsive decisions were for fools. Relationships sucked. Love at first sight was for idiots.

He glanced across at Erin and he felt his gut clench. He had no intention of making her miserable. But the way he felt about her…

He might even imagine himself in love with her. But if he did…if he stayed round her for much longer…it’d just make everything worse.

The accident was about half a mile past Dom’s home. They passed his house, going at speed. Erin glanced fleetingly at the driveway and Charles’s car was still parked in front.

‘Call him,’ Dom said before she could say anything. ‘Frank said we have multiple casualties. If Charles is another doctor and he’s prepared to help…’

‘You must really be desperate,’ Erin muttered, but she used her cellphone and waited for Charles to answer.

Charles’s phone rang through to the message bank. Odd. And what was he doing, still there?

It couldn’t matter. Dom had rounded the last bend and the crash was in view.

It looked shocking. Horrific.

A purple kombi van was on the wrong side of the road. It looked as if it had hit a sedan, then spun, so the sedan had smashed full on into the kombi’s side.

The sedan was a crumpled mess. The trunk had torn open. Baggage had been thrown out onto the road. A child’s doll was lying on the verge, looking like a small, dreadful corpse.

A guy in khaki overalls and boots bigger than Erin’s was holding a little girl in his arms. The child was sobbing uncontrollably, screaming for her mother.

‘That’s Frank, the farmer who called us,’ Dom said. ‘Hell, we’ll need some local help as well. Ring Graham.’

He hit the brakes and was out of the car, clicking onto a number and tossing her his phone before Erin could respond.

Okay. First things first, follow orders, but there was no way she was calmly sitting in the car making phone calls. She was out of the car as well, running toward the wreck as Dom hauled gear out of the trunk.

‘Car smash, two miles out of town past Dom’s place,’ she snapped as Graham answered. ‘Dom and I are here. We’ve called the ambulance but we need more help.’

‘I’ll have the boys there in minutes,’ Graham said, and Erin thought fleetingly, The man’s been up all night and here he was, helping out again. Local communities at their best. But then she stopped thinking. She was at the wreck now, and what she saw…

It was a family sedan. The van was higher than the sedan and the front of the sedan was wedged right under the van’s chassis.

Dom was already working. They only had access on the left side. The door of the car had been hauled open. Dom was half in, working on whoever was closest.

‘I got the little girl out ’cos she was screaming,’ Frank called hopelessly from behind them. ‘I don’t know what-’

‘Just take care of her,’ Dom called. ‘It’s okay. We’ll deal with this.’

It wasn’t okay.

The woman closest to them was in her thirties or early forties. She was staring straight ahead, whimpering in shock and fear.

‘Sharon, hey, it’s okay, let’s get you out,’ Dom said and she turned her face a little.

‘D-Dom.’

So Dom knew them. That made it…worse.

A vicious gash ran down the side of Sharon’s head from just above her ear. She had the look of someone just returning from unconsciousness, Erin thought. Dom was mopping blood from around her mouth. Erin reached through from the front and took her wrist. Her pulse was thready and her complexion was sickly blue.