Kate Hardy - The Baby Doctor's Desire

‘Yell if you need a hand.’

Judith nodded, and left his office, feeling sick to her stomach. He was married. Married. She’d even seen him with his wife. So why, why, why did she still feel that pull towards him?

Maybe she should apply for a transfer. Not to the Hampstead Free: she wanted to get a job on her own merits, not just because her father was the obstetric director there. Or maybe this pull of attraction between Kieran and her would stop. Please, please, make it stop soon, she begged silently. Before either of us says or does something we’ll regret.

When Judith had finished examining Rhiannon and had done a second ultrasound, she was sure that it was uterine retroversion. She explained the condition. ‘Did you have anything like this with your last baby?’ she asked.

Rhiannon shook her head. ‘Not a bit of it. To be honest, because it’s my second, I wasn’t so worried about getting a dating scan done or anything. But I’ve felt so weird, this last day or so…My baby’s going to be all right, isn’t it?’

‘I’m pretty sure it’ll be fine. But I should warn you, there’s a risk of miscarriage if we don’t get your uterus back in the right place.’

‘How are you going to do that?’

‘We’re going to try and let gravity help you, first of all,’ Judith said. ‘So it means you’ll be in for a couple of days.’

Rhiannon closed her eyes. ‘I was hoping this wouldn’t happen.’ She sighed. ‘I’ll just have to ask the childminder to keep Livvy a bit longer for the next couple of days—and nag Greg to get home from work a bit earlier. What if the gravity thing doesn’t work?’

‘We can manipulate your uterus, very gently. It shouldn’t hurt, though it might feel a little bit uncomfortable. I should warn you that again there’s a small risk of miscarriage, but it’s very, very small.’

‘Leave it and I might lose the baby; fix it and I might lose the baby.’ Rhiannion sighed. ‘Not much choice, is there? I’m in your hands.’ She paused. ‘Um, is this very common?’

‘Not that common. But don’t worry, our consultant’s very experienced.’ And drop-dead gorgeous.

Judith settled Rhiannon into the ward, inserted a catheter and showed Rhiannon how to do the knee-chest positioning which would, with any luck, help her uterus move back to the right position.

Kieran was at lunch by the time Jude had finished—she wasn’t sure if she was more relieved or disappointed. It meant she didn’t have to face him—didn’t have to struggle to ignore that magnetic pull—but it also meant she didn’t have the chance to apologise. Because he was right: she had snapped at him. And he hadn’t put a foot wrong. He’d found her sore spot all right—the fear she wasn’t really good enough to do her job—but he’d encouraged her, not laughed at her or despised her for it.

True, he’d said nothing at all about his wife, but that wasn’t any of her business. And he’d been the perfect colleague. Patient with the mums, happy to spend time explaining things to the dads, good-humoured with the staff, approachable if you needed a second opinion.

On a professional level, at least, she owed him an apology. She nipped into the hospital shop, bought him a box of chocolates and had just finished scribbling a note to him when he walked into his office and saw her by his desk.

‘Hello,’ he said quietly.

Lord, his voice. The slightest trace of a posh accent. It sent ripples of longing down her spine.

But she had to stay in control. ‘I was just leaving you this.’ She screwed up the note and shoved it in her pocket, then handed him the chocolates. ‘To say thanks. You were right about the retroverted uterus.’

‘That’s very sweet of you, but there’s no need. You’d already picked most of it up,’ he said.

‘Not just that. I wanted to say thanks for the pep talk.’ She flushed. ‘And, um, sorry for snapping.’

Kieran shrugged. ‘No problem. We all have our bad days.’

‘Yes.’ She should leave. Now. But she couldn’t. She was stuck there, watching his mouth. Watching the heat in his eyes. Wishing that things were different. That he was single.

The air felt thick and static—if she reached out, she was sure an electric current would sizzle between them and light up the room.

Then he spoke. ‘Jude, are you busy tonight?’

‘What?’

‘I wondered if you’d like to come out for a drink.’

Was she hearing this right? He was asking her out? ‘With you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Just you?’ she checked.

He frowned. ‘Yes.’

Oh, God. He really was asking her out. And if he’d meant it in the platonic sense, he’d have asked some of the others, too. This was one on one. Just the two of them. How she wanted to say yes. But no way could she accept. Not when she knew he was spoken for. ‘You must be joking,’ she said through gritted teeth.

His frown deepened. ‘What?’

‘I don’t know what kind of women you normally associate with—’ apart from his wife ‘—but I don’t do affairs.’

‘I wasn’t asking for an affair.’ Though he was thinking about one right now, Jude was sure. Colour slashed across his cheekbones and his voice sounded slightly slurred. ‘I just thought we could have a drink together. Maybe dinner. Get to know each other a bit.’

She folded her arms. ‘And how would your wife see that? Forget it!’ She looked at him in utter disgust, then walked out of his office, not bothering to slam the door behind her. He wasn’t worth it.

Kieran stared after Judith in shock. Wife? What wife? He wasn’t married!

Then he remembered Margot’s comments. If the midwife had told Jude he’d bought two tickets, maybe Jude had jumped to the conclusion that he was married. But surely she’d seen Tess with him at the fundraiser? OK, Tess had a different father, her skin was paler than his and she’d inherited her father’s blue eyes while he’d inherited his father’s dark eyes, but surely there was enough of a family resemblance for Judith to have seen it?

Or maybe not. He was about to go after her and explain when the phone rang. By the time he’d sorted out the problem, Jude was nowhere to be seen. He finally caught up with her during her teabreak. Luck was with him, because she was on her own.

‘Jude, we need to talk,’ he said.

She shook her head. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘I’m not married. The woman you saw me with at your fundraiser—’

‘Don’t tell me—she’s your sister?’ Jude folded her arms. ‘That’s what they all say. Sister, best friend—there’s always some cover story.’

Kieran stared at her in disbelief. He was telling the truth! Tess was his sister. How could Jude possibly think he was the kind of man who’d cheat on his wife? Hell. He’d seen what it had done to his mother when his father had cheated on her. He’d barely started school and he’d had to listen to his mother crying, night after night, when his father was late home. By the time he was six, he’d learned to make scrambled eggs so he could coax some food down her. When his father had finally left her for good, a month or so later, he’d watched his mother collapse in on herself. And it had only been meeting Martyn Bailey that had changed her life. Changed his, too, because at last he’d had a proper father, one who had actually been there to encourage him and teach him things. And, when he was ten, he’d had the kid sister he’d always wanted, too.

Well, he wasn’t going to crawl. If Judith could misread him that much, a relationship with her would be a nightmare. One he could well do without. Given time and enough cold showers, he’d be able to snap the attraction between them.

Wouldn’t he?

‘Suit yourself,’ he said coolly, and left the room.