Maggie Kingsley - The Stranger's Secret

“I don’t need anybody. I’ll be all right.”

“You won’t—and I don’t just mean simply tonight. Jess, you’re going to be in plaster for a minimum of eight weeks. You might just be able to do your surgeries, but how are you going to do any home visits or night calls when you can’t drive?”

“It’s not your problem,” she pointed out.

“Of course it’s my problem,” he shot back. “There’s only one thing I can do. I’ll have to stay.”

“Stay?” she echoed faintly.

“And not just for tonight,” he fumed. “I’m going to have to stay with you until you get a replacement.”

Dear Reader CONTENTS Cover Dear Reader Title Page CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN EPILOGUE Copyright ,

I moved to the far north of Scotland ten years ago and have never regretted it. It’s beautiful, remote—some people would say it’s lonely—but I’ve never found it so. It occurred to me recently that almost all of the “incomers” I’ve met since moving here have been running away from something. An unhappy marriage, a job they disliked, a situation they could no longer face.

It was this thought that inspired me to create the island of Greensay, and the mysterious Ezra Dunbar. He’s a man with a past, who seems to have no future until he meets the local family physician, Jess Arden, and then…

Well, I just hope you enjoy discovering how Ezra finds his future as much as I enjoyed writing about it!

Maggie

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Cover

Dear Reader Dear Reader CONTENTS Cover Dear Reader Title Page CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN EPILOGUE Copyright , I moved to the far north of Scotland ten years ago and have never regretted it. It’s beautiful, remote—some people would say it’s lonely—but I’ve never found it so. It occurred to me recently that almost all of the “incomers” I’ve met since moving here have been running away from something. An unhappy marriage, a job they disliked, a situation they could no longer face. It was this thought that inspired me to create the island of Greensay, and the mysterious Ezra Dunbar. He’s a man with a past, who seems to have no future until he meets the local family physician, Jess Arden, and then… Well, I just hope you enjoy discovering how Ezra finds his future as much as I enjoyed writing about it! Maggie

Title Page The Stranger’s Secret Maggie Kingsley www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

EPILOGUE

Copyright

‘ARE you all right?’

The driver of the dark blue Mercedes wasn’t simply a maniac, Jess decided, opening her eyes slowly, only to close them again when a searing pain shot down her leg. He was a gold-plated, top-of-the-class idiot as well. How on earth could she possibly be ‘all right’ after he’d just driven at breakneck speed round the corner of the single-track road straight into her car?

‘I really don’t think you should try to move,’ the deep male voice continued with concern when she eased herself gingerly back from her steering-wheel. ‘You might be injured.’

‘Of course I’m injured,’ she muttered through clenched teeth. ‘My right leg’s fractured.’

‘It may simply be jarred—’

‘I’m a doctor and, believe me, it’s fractured.’ And if I’m not very careful I’m going to burst into tears, Jess realised with dismay when a cool, firm hand suddenly enveloped hers.

She didn’t need this. She really, really didn’t need this. Five minutes ago she’d been congratulating herself on having got through all her afternoon home visits early. Had even thought she might actually have time to attack her mounting paperwork before the start of her evening surgery, and now…

‘Are you in pain anywhere else?’ the male voice said quickly as a sob came from her. ‘Your chest, neck—’

‘Look, do you suppose you could stop playing doctor for a moment and concentrate on getting me out of here?’ she asked as the fingers which had been taking her pulse moved to her throat.

‘Wouldn’t it be more sensible if I called for an ambulance?’

Good grief, the idiot was using the tone she always adopted when she was dealing with a difficult child. If she’d been fit enough she’d have hit him.

‘There isn’t any ambulance,’ she said tightly. ‘At least not today. It’s down in the garage, having an overhaul.’

‘Then another doctor—’

‘There isn’t another doctor on Greensay, only me.’

‘I still don’t think—’

‘No, you obviously don’t, do you?’ she retorted, fighting back her tears. ‘Because if you had thought you wouldn’t have been driving like a maniac, and if you hadn’t been driving like a maniac I wouldn’t—’

‘Be in this mess?’ he finished for her awkwardly. ‘Look, I’m really sorry. I needed a few things from the shops—’

‘And you thought they might disappear unless you drove at eighty miles an hour?’

A low, husky chuckle was his only reply, and she turned towards the sound and tried to focus.

He was a tall man. That much she could see in the pale January moonlight. A tall man in his mid-thirties with deep grey eyes, thick black hair and a beard.

And she knew him.

Not to speak to. Nobody on the island knew him yet to speak to. But she’d seen him last week, walking along the beach the day after he’d moved into Sorley McBain’s holiday cottage. Walking as though he had all the cares of the world on his shoulders.

‘You’re the drug dealer,’ Jess murmured. ‘The one who’s lying low until the heat’s off.’

‘The drug…?’ His fingers reached swiftly for her wrist again.

‘That’s what Wattie Hope reckons at any rate. Or an axe murderer who’s come to Greensay to dispose of the dismembered bits and pieces of your ex-wife.’

He sat back on his heels, his grey eyes glinting with amusement. ‘I see. And you—what do you think?’

‘I’m just wondering if your car is as much of a write-off as mine.’

‘No, but, then, I don’t drive a sardine can,’ he replied, gazing critically at her beloved little hatchback. ‘Surely if you’re the only doctor on the island you should have chosen something more substantial to drive.’

‘Look, could we just stick to the point?’ she returned acidly. ‘Is your car driveable?’

‘The front bumper’s bent, and the offside light and indicator are smashed, but apart from that—’

‘Then you can drive me to the Sinclair Memorial in Inverlairg.’

The man’s black eyebrows snapped down. ‘I really don’t think—’