Christy McKellen - Mills & Boon Showcase

‘Point-blank refused to let me take her. Insisted on seeing you first,’ the paramedic said with raised eyebrows and admirable restraint, considering the way Ben was glaring at him. ‘Tried to get her to call you from hospital but she wasn’t budging.’

‘That’s right,’ said Ben’s aunt in a surprisingly strong voice. ‘I’m not going anywhere until my favourite great-nephew promises to look after my shop.’

‘Absolutely,’ said Ben, without a second’s hesitation. ‘I’ll lock it up safely. Now, c’mon, let’s get you in the ambulance and—’

His aunt Ida tried to rise from the gurney. ‘That’s not what I meant. That’s not good enough—’ she said, before her words were cut short by a little whimper of pain.

Sandy shifted from sodden sandal to sodden sandal. Looked away to the intricately carved awning. She felt like an interloper, an uninvited witness to Ben’s intimate family drama. Why hadn’t she stayed at the beach?

‘Don’t worry about the shop,’ said Ben, his voice burred with worry. ‘I’ll sort something out for you. Let’s just get you to the hospital.’

‘It’s not life or death,’ said the paramedic, ‘but, yes, she should be on her way.’

Ida closed her eyes briefly and Sandy’s heart lurched at the weariness that crossed her face. Please let her be all right—for Ben’s sake.

But then the older lady’s eyes snapped into life again. They were the same blue as Ben’s and remarkably unfaded. ‘I can’t leave my shop closed for all that time.’

The paramedic interrupted. ‘She might have to lie still in bed for weeks.’

‘That’s not acceptable,’ continued the formidable Ida. ‘You’ll have to find me a manager. Keep my business going.’

‘Just get to the ER and I’ll do something about that later,’ said Ben.

‘Not later. Now,’ said Aunt Ida, sounding nothing like a little old lady lying seriously injured on a gurney. Maybe she was pumped full of painkillers.

Sandy struggled to suppress a grin. For all his tough, grown-up ways she could still see the nineteen-year-old Ben. He was obviously aching to bundle his feisty aunt into the ambulance but was too respectful to try it.

Aunt Ida’s eyes sought out Kate, who was now standing next to Sandy. ‘Kate? Can you—?’

Kate shook her head regretfully. ‘No can do, I’m afraid.’

‘She’s needed at the hotel. We’re short-staffed,’ said Ben, with an edge of impatience to his voice.

Ida’s piercing blue gaze turned to Sandy. ‘What about you?’

‘Me?’ Was the old lady serious? Or delirious?

Before Sandy could stutter out anything more, Kate had turned to face her.

Her eyes narrowed. ‘Yes. What about you, Sandy? Are you on holiday? Could you help out?’

‘What? No. Sorry. I’m on my way to Melbourne.’ She was so aghast she was gabbling. ‘I’m afraid I won’t be able to—’

‘Friend of Kate’s, are you?’ persisted the old lady, in a voice that in spite of her obvious efforts was beginning to tire.

Compelled by good manners, Sandy took a step forward. ‘No. Yes. Kind of... I—’

She looked imploringly at Ben, uncertain of what to say, not wanting to make an already difficult situation worse.

‘Sandy’s an...an old friend of mine,’ he said, stumbling on the word friend. ‘Just passing through.’

‘Oh,’ said the older lady, ‘so she can’t help out. And I can’t afford to lose even a day’s business.’

Her face seemed to collapse and she looked every minute of her seventy-five years.

Suddenly she reminded Sandy of her grandmother—her mother’s mother. How would she feel if Grandma were stuck in a situation like this?

‘I’m sorry,’ she said reluctantly.

‘Pity.’ Ida sighed. ‘You look nice. Intelligent. The kind of person I could trust with my shop.’ Wearily she closed her eyes again. ‘Find me someone like her, Ben.’

Her voice was beginning to waver. Sandy could barely hear it over the sound of the rain drumming on the awning overhead.

Ben looked from Sandy to his aunt and then back to Sandy again, his eyes unreadable. ‘Maybe...maybe Sandy can be convinced to stay for a few days,’ he said.

Huh? Sandy stared at him. ‘But, Ben, I—’

Ben held her with his glance, his blue eyes intense. He leaned closer to her. ‘Just play along with me and say yes so I can get her to go to the hospital,’ he muttered from the side of his mouth.

‘Oh.’ She paused. Thought for a moment. Thought again. ‘Okay. I’ll look after the shop. Just for a few days. Until you get someone else.’

‘You promise?’ asked Ida.

Promise? Like a cross-your-heart-and-hope-to-die-type promise? The kind of promise she never went back on?

Disconcerted, Sandy nodded. ‘I promise.’

What crazy impulse had made her come out with that? Wanting to please Ben?

Or maybe it was the thought of what she would have liked to happen if it was her grandmother, injured, in pain, and having to beg a stranger to help her.

Ida’s eyes connected with hers. ‘Thank you. Come and see me in the hospital,’ she said, before relaxing with a sigh back onto the gurney.

‘Right. That’s settled.’ Ben slapped the side of the ambulance, turned to the ambulance officer. ‘I’ll ride in the back with my aunt.’

A frail but imperious hand rose. ‘You show your friend around Bay Books. Settle her in.’

Sandy had to fight a smile as she watched Ben do battle with his great-aunt to let him accompany her to the hospital.

Minutes later she stood by Ben’s side, watching the tail-lights of the ambulance disappear into the rain. Kate was in the back with Ida.

‘Your aunt Ida is quite a lady,’ Sandy said, biting her lip to suppress her grin.

‘You bet,’ said Ben, with a wry smile of his own.

‘Isn’t she the aunt who...?’ She held up her hand. ‘Wait. Let me remember. I know!’ she said triumphantly. ‘The aunt who ran off with an around-the-world sailor?’

Ben’s eyes widened. ‘You remember that? From all that time ago?’

I remember because you—and the family I fantasised about marrying into—were so important to me. The words were on the tip of her tongue, but she didn’t—couldn’t—put her voice to them. ‘Of course,’ she said instead. ‘Juicy scandals tend to stick in my mind.’

‘It was a scandal. For these parts anyway. She was the town spinster, thirty-five and unmarried.’

‘Spinster? Ouch! What an awful word.’ She giggled. ‘Hey, I’m thirty and unmarried. Does that make me—’ she made quotation marks in the air with her fingers ‘—a spinster?’

‘As if,’ Ben said with a grin. ‘Try career woman about town—isn’t that more up to date?’

‘Sounds better. But the message is the same.’ She pulled a mock glum face.

Ben stilled, and suddenly he wasn’t joking. He looked into her face for a long, intense minute. An emotion she didn’t recognise flashed through his eyes and then was gone.

‘That boyfriend of yours was an idiot,’ he said gruffly.

He lifted a hand as if he was about to touch her, maybe run his finger down her cheek to her mouth like he’d used to.

She tensed, waiting, not sure if she wanted him to or not. Awareness hung between them like the shimmer off the sea on a thirty-eight-degree day.

He moved a step closer. So close she could clearly see that sexy scar on his mouth. She wondered how it would feel if he kissed her...if he took her in his arms...

Her heart began to hammer in her chest so violently surely he must hear it. Her mouth went suddenly dry.

But then, abruptly, he dropped his hand back by his side, stepped away. ‘He didn’t deserve you,’ he said, in a huskier-than-ever voice.