A Baby for Eve. Maggie Kingsley

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СКАЧАТЬ blonde hair flying about her shoulders, and Tom shook his head.

      ‘Surely you know royalty always rides in the back behind the chauffeur?’ he replied.

      ‘But I’m not royalty,’ the little girl pointed out, and Tom smiled the smile Eve knew could charm the birds off the trees.

      ‘Today you are,’ he said, helping Tassie up into the Range Rover. ‘So, where to, ma’am?’

      ‘Smugglers’Inn, as quick as you can, driver,’ Tassie declared with an imperious air that was completely ruined when she dissolved into a fit of giggles.

      ‘That was kind,’ Eve murmured, as she got into the front seat, and Tom slipped into the driver’s seat beside her.

      ‘It’s only manners to open a door for a lady,’ he replied, and Eve shook her head.

      ‘I meant it was kind of you to be so nice to Tassie.’

      ‘She’s a nice kid.’

      ‘Not everyone sees that,’ Eve observed, then managed a smile when Tom stared at her curiously. ‘Do you honestly remember where everything in Penhally is, or do you want directions for The Smugglers’?’

      ‘I haven’t forgotten anything about Penhally,’ he said abruptly, then grimaced as a slight frown creased Eve’s forehead. ‘Sorry. An hour back in the place, and already I’m defensive. No, I don’t need directions,’ he added as he drove out of the car park and turned left. ‘The Smugglers’ is at the top of Mevagissey Road.’

      Odd, she thought as he drove north, that he should remember that. They’d never been to the inn when they’d been younger. It had been too expensive for them when he’d just qualified as a doctor and she’d just finished her nurse’s training, and yet he’d remembered where it was. What else did he remember? she wondered, but she didn’t want to go down that particular memory lane. It was fraught with too many dangers, too many complications.

      ‘How long have you lived in London?’ she said, deliberately changing the conversation. ‘I mean, I thought you were still in the States,’ she continued as he glanced across at her, ‘but you gave Lauren a London address.’

      ‘I haven’t lived in the States for the past ten years,’ he replied. ‘I have a flat in London now, and an apartment in Lausanne overlooking Lake Geneva.’

      ‘Sounds—’

      ‘Posh?’ he finished for her dryly, and she shook her head at him.

      ‘Lovely—I was going to say lovely,’ she said, and Tom shrugged.

      ‘They’re just places I stay in between trips, not proper homes. Homes have people you love in them. Wives, children.’

      Don’t ask, she thought as she stared out the windscreen at the trees flashing by. Trees that were beginning to lose their leaves under a sky that was as blue as only a Cornish sky could be. She didn’t need to know, and it was better if she didn’t, but she couldn’t help herself.

      ‘You’re not married, then?’ she said, glancing across at him.

      ‘Nope,’ he replied, braking slightly to avoid the rabbit that had dashed out in front of them. ‘Never found anyone prepared to put up with the kind of erratic work patterns my job demands. At least, not for any length of time.’ His green eyes met hers. ‘What about you?’

      She shifted her gaze back at the trees.

      ‘No, I’m not married.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Tom, are you planning on coming back to Penhally to stay, or…?’

      ‘I’m only here until Monday. I have things to do—sort out—then I’ll be off again.’

      A surge of relief engulfed her. Monday. This was Saturday. She could cope with that. If she should accidentally meet him again tomorrow, she’d be pleasant and friendly, talk about everything and nothing. She’d managed to keep silent for all these years so she could keep quiet for one more day because what good would it do to tell him? Telling him wouldn’t change anything, alter anything, make it less painful.

      ‘Eve?’

      He was staring curiously at her, and she managed to smile.

      ‘I read in a magazine a while back that you’d been made head of rescue operations at Deltaron,’ she said. ‘You must be very pleased.’

      ‘Yeah, well, it’s certainly a whole different ball game when your desk is the one the buck stops on. What about you?’ he asked. ‘Still nursing?’

      She nodded.

      ‘I actually just started work in Penhally last month,’ she said. ‘Before that I worked in Truro and Newquay, but Alison—the girl you don’t know whose wedding you were just at,’ she added, and saw Tom smile, ‘is pregnant so I’ve temporarily taken over her position as practice nurse in the Penhally surgery.’

      ‘Which means if she comes back after her maternity leave, you’ll be out of a job,’ Tom observed.

      ‘Not for long,’ she said briskly. ‘There’s a big shortage of nurses in the UK so I’ll get something else pretty fast.’

      ‘But you’d rather work here, in your home village.’

      It was a statement, not a question, and her lips curved wryly.

      ‘Well, you always did say I had no imagination.’

      ‘Did I say that?’ He shook his head. ‘God, I had a big mouth when I was twenty-four, didn’t I?’

      ‘Uh-huh,’ she replied, and he laughed. ‘Actually, although you don’t know Alison or Jack,’ she continued, ‘you do know Jack’s father. It’s Nick Tremayne.’

      ‘Nick Tremayne, the doctor?’ Tom declared.

      ‘The very same,’ Eve answered. ‘He’s the senior partner in the Penhally surgery now, and my boss.’

      ‘Are you telling me I’ve just been to the wedding of the son of somebody I went to med school with?’ Tom groaned. ‘God, but now you’ve made me feel old.’

      Eve chuckled. ‘Do you remember when we thought anyone older than forty was decrepit?’

      ‘And anyone over fifty might just as well be dead.’ He nodded. ‘Shows how little we knew, doesn’t it?’ His eyes met hers again. ‘Eve—’

      ‘Are we almost there yet?’ Tassie chipped in from the back of the car. ‘I’m starving.’

      ‘In other words, quit with the talking,’ Tom said ruefully, ‘and drive faster.’

      ‘Something like that.’ The little girl giggled and, as Tom grinned across at Eve, and her own lips curved in response, her heart contracted.

      No, she told herself. No. The past is past, nobody can ever go back, and if you allow yourself to be sucked back into his world he’ll only hurt you again, and this time you might not survive.

      ‘What’s СКАЧАТЬ