Fiona McArthur - Midwife in the Family Way

The silence lengthened and she tumbled into speech. ‘I tried to get Louisa to join us before,’ she said, ‘but she seemed happier focussed on the catering rather than being a part of the group in her loss.’

He didn’t answer, didn’t help the silence with his own attempt to lighten the awareness between them, until even the way they moved in perfect synchronisation towards the wide wooden steps that led onto the porch stretched her nerves. She’d never met anyone like him.

Politely, Gianni paused to allow her to precede him up the steps. He should say something but he could think of nothing except the way he was aware of her every movement and sway of her hips. Heat flowed between them as she slid past his body, and even though they didn’t touch his flesh prickled. His eyes were drawn again to the swing of her slim hips. Hips that enticed as easily as his breath eased in and out. It was the sun raising both their temperatures, he told himself sternly.

The house was a large, many-gabled country home with a stained-glass-edged front door that led to a central hallway. It was dim and cool inside, to his relief, and the scent of furniture oil and eucalyptus grounded him.

He glanced into high-ceilinged bedrooms that led off the hallway and the old-fashioned furniture looked warm and welcoming. Like everything in this town.

She must have seen his look. ‘The doctor’s surgery and clinic rooms are in the back of the house and have a separate entrance,’ Emma said. ‘Visiting medical and nursing staff can stay here and Louisa caters for them.’ Then they came to the back half of the house. ‘This is the heart of the home—Louisa’s kitchen.’

Louisa, a round dumpling of a woman with soft pillow breasts that many a tiny child had snuggled into, stood at the old stone sink and stared out the window, a dishcloth lying still in her hand against a cup.

She had the look on her face he’d seen too many times in his work, the grief for a loved one passing, Gianni thought with a rush of sympathy. The look he had seen so frequently in Samoa after the tsunami. Grief that stayed with him late in the night and never allowed his own demons to settle.

Emma crossed the room and rested one hand on the cup in case she startled Louisa into dropping it, and the other arm she slid around the little woman’s waist.

‘You okay?’ Emma’s voice was melodic, caring and made the twists in his belly ache harder. He watched her hug Louisa softly in sympathy and Louisa turned her lined face so she could rest her head against Emma’s shoulder for a moment.

He could almost taste the comfort the older woman gained. Who was this Emma Rose, compassionately maternal to a woman three times her age? He wondered what had happened in this young woman’s life to give her such wisdom beyond her years. It was better to think of this than his whimsy for a hug himself.

But the glimpses of Emma’s effect on him had been enough to warn him she was far too dangerous for hugging. Dangerous in a way he hadn’t been susceptible to for too many years. In ways he didn’t want to be susceptible to ever again.

‘I’ll be fine.’ Louisa sighed and Gianni saw the effort she made to smile. ‘I’m just thanking the Lord for the last five years, and the twenty years as his friend before that. He was a good man.’

Emma squeezed her shoulder one more time and then stepped away. ‘I know it. And he loved you dearly, as we all do. Is there something we can do for you?’ Gianni saw her glance back at him and even that brief acknowledgement was enough to make his belly tighten.

But this Emma was a woman from the other side of the world. A side of the world he was leaving tomorrow. He’d need to remember that.

‘Bless you both. No.’ The Yorkshire accent seemed broader as Louisa jollied herself back into efficiency. ‘I’ll come out and sit in the shade with you, though, and enjoy the company of Ned’s family and friends.’

‘Your family and friends,’ Emma corrected gently.

‘Aye, of course,’ she said, and sighed.

Together the three of them moved out to the lawn and Gianni walked on Louisa’s other side so that she was drawn into the group under the tree and settled in a comfortable chair.

Gianni watched as she was fussed over and one of the women handed her a baby to nurse. Instantly Louisa was diverted. He looked at Emma who unobtrusively nodded with satisfaction.

He liked it that she was pleased the older woman was comforted. The feel of these people made him think of the best times he’d had as a child. Times he and his brother had escaped to play with the happy-go-lucky village children where such a sense of support and warmth had been unburdened by the responsibility of being part of the most important family. Carefree. Like Emma made him feel. He needed to put distance between them. Even a little would help prevent his fingers from stroking her cheek because he could imagine the silk beneath his fingers too vividly. ‘Perhaps you’d like a glass of punch, Emma?’ Gianni indicated the clothcovered table under the tree.

‘I’ll come with you.’ Emma glanced down at Louisa, who had buried her nose in the baby’s hair. ‘Louisa is settled.’

‘Well done,’ he said quietly as they walked away. ‘The innocence of children is precious and a comfort even in terrible times.’

‘That’s true,’ Emma said, looking up at him. ‘Is that what you see often in your work?’

He had no idea why he would talk of something he never mentioned. He shrugged and ladled a glass of punch, watched her take a sip and found himself talking to distract himself from her mouth. ‘I have seen many families suffer great losses but the safe delivery of one child can restart hope and life like nothing else.’

‘Angus said you began working with the rescue forces not long after he did.’

‘If not for Angus, I wouldn’t be here. Did he tell you he pulled me from an earthquake’s landslide? I’d been buried two days and all others had given up.’ Did he tell you I had been on a road to wasting my life before that?

She smiled gently, her eyes intent on his face. ‘Yes, but very briefly. Did you think he would tell me much?’

Gianni laughed, but without relief. ‘No. I suppose not. We do tend not to speak of what we see. And he spoke of his work even less than I do now.’

‘Which comes at a cost as tragic memories accumulate,’ she said with great insight. She returned to the thing he wished she’d forgotten. ‘Two days buried would give a lot of time for thought.’

‘Hmm.’ A long time to regret things in the past. He’d almost come to peace with those memories but perhaps they were covered under the new ones he’d collected.

She tilted her head and he felt her concentration not as curiosity but like balm to his hurts. ‘I like to think good comes of everything. Even something that seems horrible at the time. What good came of that, Gianni?’

He was distracted by the way she said his name. Softly, rolling the vowels as if savouring the strangeness of them. He supposed his name was strange in this place of Jacks and Johns and Joes. But she was waiting and he needed to think of his answer.

Normally he would have ignored such a question, not that it had been asked before, but for this Emma, strangely he found he could answer honestly. ‘It was a long time ago but, yes, it changed my life and created a need to do something useful. Like Angus did. I had been given back my life and I would not waste it again.’

She smiled at him. ‘Had you been so useless before?’

He thought of the fast cars, the wild and thoughtless men and women he’d peopled his life with after Maria’s death, but that was in the past and another tragedy—though one without a good result. ‘I fear so.’ His voice lowered as the memories returned. Memories he had to banish every time he was confronted with a similar event. ‘Lying there, unable to move, barely able to breathe as I listened to those around me grow silent, made me swear that life was too precious to waste.’