A Baby on Her Christmas List Page 16

  And a father half a world away.

  What the hell had he been thinking?

  ‘Eighteen months old? Really?’ He spoke to the nurse. ‘It looks like he still has signs of mild malnutrition. He needs to go back to the feeding centre, not stay here where he’s probably only going to get sick again.’

  ‘There isn’t room. They discharged him because there’s too many more coming every day.’

  ‘They’ll have to make room. This child needs help and I don’t want a half-hearted effort.’ He turned and smiled at the mother, trying to dredge some hope when there was little. ‘I’m going to have a child. To be a father.’

  He’d never given any personal information to anyone here before, not even to the staff—but the words just tumbled out. Pride laced his voice as his thoughts returned again to Georgie for the umpteenth time that day, along with the familiar sting of regret and yet startling uplift of his heart. Every thought of her brought a tumbling mish-mash of emotions and a fog of chaos. ‘Soon. Very soon.’

  The mother gave him a toothy grin and gabbled something to him, but a high-pitched scream grabbed their attention. A heavily pregnant woman half walked, half crawled into the room, clutching her stomach. She was immediately ushered back out and into the emergency area by two nurses.

  Georgie? Georgie. Of course it wasn’t Georgie. He’d left her to face her biggest challenge alone back at home. How would she cope with the pain of childbirth? Did she have a plan? Why the hell hadn’t he made sure she had a plan? He’d phone her again, at least try to, tonight, and make sure she was okay. That was, of course, if she ever deigned to speak to him again. Her silence had been deafening.

  Unlike the squawk of chattering voices and laughter and screams that filled the room as a huddle of women walked towards the emergency area. He looked up at the nurse for an explanation. ‘The pregnant woman’s sisters, here to help.’

  ‘Great. She’ll need some support.’ He looked back at the boy, then jerked his head up again at another straggle of women walking through the room.

  ‘The birthing attendants. The mother’s mother. Her aunts.’

  ‘Are they going to have a party or something? There’s a lot of them.’

  The nurse beamed. ‘Of course. Family is very important here.’

  As it was to Georgie. And she was going to be alone.

  And that was his fault.

  Watching those people come together to help their sister, to celebrate family in all its messy glory, made his heart clutch tight and he realised that Georgie had been wrong about one thing: he did want the same dream. He’d spent the last nine months trying to fight it with his head, but his hands had worked on her house, her garden, building a home for them all, a home that he loved. His arms had held the woman he adored, cradled her belly holding the baby he so desperately wanted.

  For the first time in years he saw his own needs with startling clarity. He wanted to look forward instead of back. He wanted to be a father his child would be proud of. He wanted a family.

  Hell, Georgie had even got him thinking about his own mother and father. And how much, deep down, he wanted to make some kind of contact with them again. He’d make a start tonight. He’d phone them and tell them they were going to be grandparents.

  He wanted to be part of something good. He wanted somewhere to call home, a community of friends. Someone to love. And to be loved. The same simple dreams as every single person in this camp. He just hadn’t realised it until now.

  Most of all he wanted Georgie, with such a passion it stripped the air from his lungs. But he knew her heart came with a proviso. He had to love her. She wouldn’t accept any less than that.

  He had to love her. Had to? Could he do that? He sat for a moment and that thought shook through him like a physical force. He let her image fill his brain, suffuse his body with so many wild emotions. His throat filled with a raw and unfettered need.

  Man, how he wanted her. He missed everything about her. He wanted her. Dreamt about her, saw her soft beautiful eyes in everyone’s here, her kindness in the gentle touch of strangers, her compassion, her independence that frustrated and endeared her to him. He missed her so intensely it hurt. He needed to touch her, to lie with her, to fight with her. And, of course, to make love to her over and over and over. And such a need and such a want could only amount to one thing.

  He did love her.

  He’d been fighting so hard to protect himself he hadn’t seen the single most important thing that had been happening.

  God. He loved her and he’d walked away. No, he’d run away, afraid of how much she made him feel things. He’d messed up everything and now was it too late to start again? Would she even let him in the house? Would she let him love her?

  Did she love him back?

  He needed to know. He needed to make things right. He needed to go home.

  A scream and a healthy wail echoed through the flimsy walls. New life. New beginnings. Not just for that family in there. But for him. Being here reminded him how fragile life was, and he needed to spend the rest of it with the woman he loved.

  It was time to act. He needed to get back to her. Before Christmas, before the baby came. Before he lost any more time being here instead of there. He stood up and realised that a queue of people had formed, all staring at him in this tin-roofed lean-to in a place, it seemed, even God had forgotten.

  Damn. He’d made too many mistakes and being here was one of them.

  But how the hell to get out of this godforsaken dustbowl and bridge the fifteen thousand kilometre gap to be home in time?

  Christmas Eve...

  ‘Kate? Is that you? Hey, it’s Georgie. From the clinic.’ Georgie gripped the phone to her ear and tried to keep her feelings in check. This part was always the most emotional bit of her job but she wished, just this once, that she could see Kate’s face when she told her the news. Knowing exactly how her patient would be feeling at this moment, she wanted to wrap her in a hug. In fact, wrapping anyone in a hug would be lovely—it felt so long since she’d done that. One month, two days and about twelve hours, to be exact. Not that she was counting.

  And the loneliness was dissipating a bit now, especially when she distracted herself. Which she felt like she had to do most minutes of most hours, because he was always on her mind. Just there. The look on his face as she’d called the whole thing off, haunting her. But it had been the right thing to do. A very right thing.

  ‘Yes?’ Kate’s voice wavered. The line was crackly. ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’ve got the results from the blood test you came in for earlier today.’

  A sharp intake of breath. ‘Yes?’

  ‘So...’ Georgie read out all the numbers, knowing that this gobbledegook would mean the difference between heartache and ecstasy for this couple. ‘So, all that means we have good news. Great news. You have a positive pregnancy test. Looks like you’re going to have a very happy Christmas. Huge congratulations. I know how much this means to you.’

  There was a slight pause then a scream. ‘Oh. My God. Really? Really? Are you sure?’

  Georgie couldn’t help her smile. Her heart felt the fullest it had in a month. Since, exactly, the moment she’d watched Liam disappear from the clinic. ‘Yes. It’s very early days, obviously, and we still have to take one day at a time. But, yes, you are pregnant.’

  ‘Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. Mark will be so thrilled. I know how much he wanted this. We both do. We can’t thank you enough.’

  Georgie ignored the twist in her heart at the thought of how gloriously happy this couple would be, together. Expecting a baby, making a family. Of how much Mark would be involved, and how much his love and concern for his wife always shone through his face.

  It did not matter, she kept telling herself, that she was facing all this on her own. She would be fine and one day, maybe, she’d find a man who wanted her too. ‘Okay, so we need to make another appointment for you for a few days’ time to check the HCG levels are
rising as well as we want them to, which means you’ll have to come in before the New Year,’ Georgie explained. ‘I also need to book you an ultrasound scan...’

  ‘Not long to go for you now?’ Kate asked, after they’d finished the business end of the call. ‘How are you feeling? Excited?’

  ‘Very. There’s just over a month to go and I don’t feel remotely ready. I still have heaps of shopping to do, and I haven’t even thought about preparing my delivery bag.’

  ‘Get your man to spoil you rotten over the holidays, then. Make him do the fetching and carrying while you put your feet up.’

  Familiar hurt rolled through her. Emails had been sporadic. Phone calls virtually non-existent. The only news she got was on the TV or radio. But even then she wished she hadn’t heard anything. Too many people being killed. It was too unsafe. And all this stress just couldn’t be good for the baby, so in the end she’d switched the damned TV off and played Christmas music to calm her down. ‘He’s overseas at the moment. I’m not sure when he’ll be back.’

  ‘That’s a shame. What are your plans for Christmas?’

  ‘Oh, just a quiet one at home.’ She thought about her Christmas tree with the lavish decorations that she’d eventually found the motivation to finish last night. The small rolled turkey she’d bought and the DVDs of old Christmas movie favourites stacked up waiting for her to watch in the evenings. It was going to be an old-style Christmas, just her and Nugget. Not what she’d hoped for. And that was fine. It really was.

  ‘Well, have a good one. Kia kaha.’ Stay strong.

  ‘Yes, thanks. Bye.’ Georgie smiled as she put the phone in the cradle. Broken heart or not, she fully intended to.

  Six hours later she was standing on the deck, adding the final touches to the outside decorations to the jolly and earnest accompaniment of carol singers blasting through her speakers. The deck may not have been quite finished, but the garden looked beautiful, with the candles flickering in the darkness. Liam had been right, the winery garden idea had worked well—just a shame that the edges still needed to be finished off.

  But tomorrow’s forecast was for sunshine and she had no intention of sitting inside when she had such a fairy-tale place to spend the day. The hammock had her name on it, along with a glass of cranberry and raspberry juice, a large helping of Christmas pudding and a damned good romance novel.

  There was just one more string of lights to hitch onto a branch to make everything perfect. Standing on tiptoe, she reached up and tried to throw the lights around the branch.

  Missed. Damn.

  She tried again. Missed again. Stretching forward, she flung the lights towards the branches, the weight of her baby tummy dragging her forward and off balance.

  Stepped out into...air.

  She felt the scream before she heard it, rattling up through her lungs, into her throat that was filled with panic. The one single word that came to her, the only thing she wanted right now. ‘Liam!’

  Then she flailed around like a windmill as there was nothing and no one to stop her fall into darkness.

  Now...

  Pain seared up her leg with even the slightest movement. She was sure she’d broken her ankle—it was twisted at such a strange angle caught in the gap between splintered wood and the garden wall. A bad sprain anyway, too sore for her to put her weight on, and she was too wedged in to be able to lever her big fat belly upwards.

  So she was stuck. Damn.

  And hurting. Double damn.

  And how long she’d lain here calling for help, she didn’t know, but the moon was high in the sky now. Typical that she’d left her phone in the house. Typical that the neighbours had gone to their holiday home by the sea. Typical that it was Christmas and she was on her own. And the music she’d been playing seemed to be on repeat and if someone didn’t turn it off soon she’d go down in history for being the first woman to have been turned clinically insane by Rudolph and his damned red nose.

  And it hurt. Everything hurt. Including her heart, because she felt stupid and sad, here on Christmas Eve, alone and stuck. And for some reason her usually capable mind set had got all mushy and she felt a tear threaten. And more than anything she missed Liam.

  That was it. She loved him and she missed him with every ounce of her being. And he wasn’t here and he never would be. Not in the way she wanted.

  She tried again to wriggle free but her ankle gave way and she didn’t want to put more pressure on it. Thank God it was summer and the night was warm. At least she could be grateful for that small mercy.

  No. She wasn’t grateful, she was angry. With herself, with Liam, with everyone and everything. Was she going to be stuck here all damned holiday? ‘Hey! Anyone? Lady with a baby here. Stuck. Help?’

  Rudolph with your nose so bright...

  ‘Shut up! Please. Someone. Help.’

  Once she’d calmed down a little she tried pulling herself up again. This time she managed an inch. Two...but then nothing more. She was about to call out again when a sudden searing pain fisted across her body. And her feet got wet.

  Her heart hammered just a little bit more. No. Surely not?

  The baby? Now? She pressed a hand to her belly and spoke in the softest voice she could muster. ‘No, Nugget! Don’t you dare make your appearance here. You’ve got five more weeks to cook. You stay exactly where you are.’

  She waited, biting back the pain from her foot. Trying not to cry. Maybe it had been a Braxton-Hicks contraction? Maybe it was all just practice?

  No such luck. More pain rippled across her abdomen, sapping her breath and making her grip tight onto the side of the deck. That one had hurt. A lot. ‘You are just like your father, you hear me? You have lousy timing.’

  How could she have a baby here, when she couldn’t even lift her leg up half an inch? Never mind that it was five weeks early. What was she going to do? Her lips began to tremble.

  No. She wasn’t going to cry. She was going to be fine.

  More contractions rippled through her. Faster and more regular and every time they hurt just a little bit more. Time ticked on and she wanted so much to move, to free herself. To walk, to bend, to stretch.

  And then more contractions came and the night got darker.

  To cope with the pain she tried to conjure up an image of Liam, pretending he was here with her. Pretending he was helping her. Pretending he loved her. Because only that would be enough.

  Think. Think. What could she do?

  She didn’t want to think. She wanted someone to do that for her, for a change. She wanted to be tucked up in bed, her head on Liam’s shoulder, wrapped safe in his arms. She wanted— ‘Owwwww. This is all your fault, Liam MacAllister. I hate you. I hate...youooooww.’

  ‘I’m sorry. Is this not a good time?’

  And now she was hallucinating, because through all this thick soupy darkness and Rudolph on repeat and searing pain she could have sworn she’d heard his voice.

  She decided she was going to go with it. Maybe she was already clinically insane after all. ‘Yes. You bet your damned Christmas socks it isn’t a good time. I’m caught between a deck and a hard place. My foot’s broken and I’m having your baby.’

  ‘Right now?’

  ‘Yes, right now.’ She spoke to the Liam-shaped smudge that appeared so real it was uncanny. And to her endless irritation her heart did a little skipping thing. She didn’t want it to skip. She wanted it to stay angry because that was the only way she was going to get through this. ‘What the hell are you doing here anyway? Aren’t you supposed to be healing the sick? Giving alms to the poor?’

  Then he was there, really right there, with his scent and his capable hands, and he wasn’t panicking like she was, he was talking to her in a soothing, very understanding voice. ‘Let’s get you... Oh.’ His hands shoved under her armpits and he tugged. ‘You’re stuck.’

  ‘Give the man a medal. Yes, I’m stuck. I’ve broken my ankle and Desdemona’s about to make her— Owwwwww.’ Pain ripped
through her again. The contractions were coming faster now. More regular and more intense.

  But he was here. Like some goddamned guardian angel, he was here. For her. He’d come back. For her?

  Or was it just for the baby? She couldn’t think about any of that right now. He was here.

  His voice soothed over her again. ‘You’re going to be fine, really, but I think we need the fire brigade or someone else to help lift you out. I don’t want to hurt you...’

  You already have. ‘No way. No way are you getting those good people out of bed on this special night just to come with their special lifting equipment and heft me out of— Oowwwwww.’

  ‘Contractions are that regular, eh? We’ve got to get you out. How about if I...?’ He put his foot against the wall and heaved her upwards, and if he hadn’t been tugging at her she might have melted into his embrace just for a moment. Just held on tight, just for one solitary moment, to absorb some of his strength and his heat. Just held right on. ‘Twist left a bit...wait...slowly...’

  ‘Whoa. Watch it...’ Then she was somehow shrugged up and sitting on the deck and her foot was throbbing and her stomach contracting and she gripped onto his old T-shirt while sudden enormous pain rattled through her. ‘It hurts, Liam. It all hurts.’

  He grimaced a little, she thought. She could just about make him out. The candles had blown out hours ago and she hadn’t managed to even plug the fairy-lights in. Some other time she might have thought this was romantic. It wasn’t. It hurt.

  But then he pushed her hair back from her face and rubbed his thumb over her cheek and she bit her lip to stop herself from crying because he was here and she wanted him so much. But he didn’t want her.

  He looked right into her eyes. ‘I know, darling. I know it hurts. It’ll be fine. Honestly. It’ll be okay.’

  ‘No, it won’t. This baby can’t come yet, it doesn’t have anywhere to sleep...and I haven’t had my baby shower, I want my party. I want to play games—I don’t want to do this.’

  And I don’t want you here to torment me and be the macho hero and loving father when you’ll go and break my heart a million times over every time I see your face.