Chapter 5
It had been one of those days.
Oliver Dawson wanted nothing more than to retreat to his favourite place in the world – the old, slightly ramshackle summer house that had been tucked into the cliffside at the bottom of the garden, just beside the steep, overgrown steps that led down to the beach.
The semicircle skeleton of iron and wood had long since been taken over by roses and jasmine and honeysuckle, and at almost any time of the year there was a glorious perfume.
The built-in seating was wide enough to be used as a bed and if the cushions were well past their use-by date, it didn’t matter a bit.
Not when the view was so compelling. Mile after mile of sea.
A view that pulled you into its enormity and made everything else irrelevant.
A place of complete relaxation. No pressure. No disappointments. No expectations at all, just a blessed nothingness. Exactly what he needed after a day like today.
Not that he was complaining, of course. Having a crisis appear from nowhere and demand so much skill and concentration that he was left feeling drained was precisely the kind of thing that had drawn him to neurosurgery in the first place.
It had been fifteen-year-old Tyler this afternoon.
The innocent victim of a gang-related drive-by shooting, he’d had surgery for his head injury two days ago.
Routine surgery. All it had needed had been a bit of debridement and a careful check to make sure there was no major damage.
And there hadn’t been. Tyler had been incredibly lucky.
When he’d had a seizure completely out of the blue that afternoon, Oliver had been paged instantly.
He’d arrived to find the boy’s level of consciousness had deteriorated, and there were other ominous signs, like the one-sided drift when he was asked to hold his hands palms upwards and close his eyes.
The diagnosis had been obvious. A post-op bleed happening just behind the surgery site had been an emergency that couldn’t wait a minute longer than absolutely necessary.
A theatre had needed to be found and staffed.
They’d had to lift the bone flap, excavate the clot, find the source of the bleeding and make sure it stopped.
It had been a battle with a time limit, and the tension had made the case all the more exhausting to end a day with.
All the more satisfying that it had appeared to have been successful, but Oliver wouldn’t be completely satisfied until he was sure that Tyler hadn’t been left with any lingering neurology, and it was still too soon to tell.
That meant that some of the tension was still with him.
The buzz of the race against time was still there too.
He might be absolutely drained but Oliver was still far too wired to relax.
He needed the summer house. Maybe a good workout in the gym first, to get rid of the kink in his neck and the ache in his back and to burn off the last of the adrenaline he could still feel coursing through his body.
He knew exactly what he needed to do in order to centre himself again because it was a well-practised and cherished routine.
Having parked his luxurious but entirely practical BMW sedan in the garage complex, Oliver opened the front door of his house, threw the keys into the antique beaten silver bowl on the hall stand and then stopped dead in his tracks.
He could hear music.
Country music.
He actually closed his eyes for a long, long moment. In the comfort to be found in anticipating his wind-down routine, he had completely forgotten how much things had changed in his home.
His mother was still in the early stages of rehabilitation and coming to terms with any new limitations she would be left with. He couldn’t just greet her in passing, knowing that she understood that he would be back to spend time with her when he’d dealt with any aftermath of his demanding job.
And that was only the thin edge of the wedge of change.
Bella was living there. She had been there for a week now.
And she was the only person who could possibly be responsible for the sound of Johnny Cash wafting from the conservatory.
Part of Oliver wanted nothing more than to block his ears and ignore the sound, but he knew it was impossible.
Just as impossible as ignoring the fact that Bella Graham was living in his house.
If he’d had the slightest inkling of how pervasive her presence would be, he would have somehow talked his mother into hiring another nurse.
He only had himself to blame, didn’t he?
He’d been entranced by the instinctive people skills Bella seemed to possess and then he’d been overwhelmed by a sense of relief that a way forward, albeit temporary, had been found.
One that was making his mother happier than he had seen her for a long, long time, which was extraordinary, given what she was having to deal with now.
He’d thought it wouldn’t impinge on his own life at all.
His own wing was virtually self-contained and he could eat out instead of using the main kitchen facilities.
Surely Bella wouldn’t be on duty twenty-four-seven, so he probably wouldn’t encounter her very often when he popped in every day to check on his mother.
How na?ve had he been?
Bella’s presence was like… a sound or a scent or something. It trickled into and lingered in spaces she hadn’t even entered. It bubbled and fizzed in odd corners with an effervescence that was disturbingly refreshing. It made his mother happy, so he was quite prepared to tolerate it.
But Johnny Cash?
Not acceptable. On any level.
* * *
Lady Dorothy had finally nailed The Electric Slide.
Bella was grinning from ear to ear as she held up her hand. ‘High-five,’ she commanded. ‘You are a legend.’
How many seventy-something women would be prepared to high-five someone? Bella’s grin widened even further as her palm made contact – gently – with Lady Dorothy’s.
How many would be determined to learn to line dance, for that matter?
Or be prepared to throw herself into rehabilitation with the kind of guts that her private patient was demonstrating?
This was already the most rewarding job she’d ever had and if Lady Dorothy kept up the kind of progress she’d made in the last week, Bella’s plans to head overseas in six months’ time wouldn’t need to be disrupted at all.
‘Let’s do it once more,’ Lady Dorothy said. ‘So I don’t forget by tomorrow.’
‘No worries. Some more Johnny Cash?’
‘No. Let’s have that “Achy Breaky Heart” again.’
The smooth tones of Billy Ray Cyrus filled the conservatory, and Bella took her place beside Lady Dorothy.
‘Okay… Step right. Cross behind with the left foot. Right foot out. Stomp left and clap.’ Bella made her clap extra loud to make up for the fact that Lady Dorothy wasn’t allowed to risk injuring the healing joints in her fingers.
She even added a ‘Woohoo!’ as they turned to face the next wall and do the short routine again.
Only they both stopped before the next step right.
Staring at them from the door of the conservatory was Oliver.
‘Hello, darling.’ Lady Dorothy raised her voice to be heard over Billy Ray. ‘You’re just in time. Come and join us.’
Bella could see the balloon over Oliver’s head that had Not in this lifetime printed inside it.
‘Please,’ Lady Dorothy said. ‘It’s not really line dancing when there’s only two of us.’
The request was sweet but Bella could detect the determination not to accept ‘no’ for an answer. What had Oliver said about his mother having a core of reinforced steel?
Come to that, what had Lady Dorothy said about her son needing to be shaken up a little? To be forced to have some fun?
And what better fun was there than line dancing?
‘Come on.’ Bella tried her most winning smile. ‘You’re a brain surgeon. This will be a doddle.’
‘It’ll only take a couple of minutes.’ Lady Dorothy was sounding firmer now. ‘I want to show you how good my balance is getting.’
‘I’ll watch from here.’
‘Oh, don’t be so stuffy, Oliver,’ Lady Dorothy said. ‘It’s fun.’
Bella hid her smile as she saw Oliver’s chest heave in a long-suffering sigh before he discarded his jacket, loosened his tie and rolled his sleeves up.
‘Five minutes,’ he growled. ‘I’ve got a workout to get to.’
This was obviously something that was so far out of Oliver Dawson’s comfort zone Bella almost felt sorry for him.
But it would do him good, she decided. He might be a brilliant surgeon, and he definitely loved his mother, and that was all very commendable, but there was no denying that he was stuffy.
He needed shaking up and she was just the woman to do it.
Bella beamed at Oliver. ‘Follow our steps. We just turn three hundred and sixty degrees and do this little routine at each turn. Ready? Okay… Step right, like this…’
* * *
This was torture.
Demeaning and ridiculous. He should have just put his foot down and excused himself instead of being sucked in by the plea in his mother’s face. Hadn’t he grown up enough to realise that pleasing himself was more important than pleasing a parent?
Apparently not.
It wasn’t the best mindset to be in for following the directions of a girl who seemed to have life organised to deliver precisely what would please herself more than anyone else.
She was just so damn… joyful.
She wasn’t required to wear a uniform in this new position of hers and right now she was wearing some rather tight-fitting jeans and a white top that looked like it belonged to a gypsy.
All ruffles and elastic, including a tight line under her breasts and a ruffle around the neckline that did nothing to hide her cleavage.
She didn’t have to confine her hair either, but at least it was half-up and not that uncontrolled cascade of curls that had made his fingers itch the first time he’d seen it.