‘If fifteen-year-old girls can manage it, you can. It’s not brain surgery.’
‘I’m not a fifteen-year-old.’ He was grasping at straws here. ‘And I’ve just had my appendix out.’
‘Fifteen-year-olds who’ve just had Caesareans manage it. How big are babies compared to an appendix? Toughen up.’
He stared at her and she stared right back. She smiled. He thought he sensed sympathy behind her smile, but her smile was still … implacable.
She’d given him his marching orders.
He was holding his niece. His.
Maggie was holding the door open; she was still smiling but she was giving him no choice.
With one more despairing glance at this hard-hearted nurse, at the crackling fire, at the sleeping dogs, at a domesticity he hardly recognised, he accepted he had no choice.
He walked out into the night.
With … his baby?
She shouldn’t have done it.
The door closed behind him and Maggie stared at it like it was a prosecutor in a criminal court.
Maggie stands accused of abandoning one defenceless baby …
To her uncle. To a doctor. To her landlord.
To a guy recovering from an appendectomy.
To a guy who was capable of driving from Sydney to the valley, to someone who was well on the way to recovery, to someone who was more than capable of looking after his baby.
His baby. Not hers.
This was not her problem. She was a professional. She cared for babies when they needed her medical intervention, and she handed them right back.
She’d done enough of the personal caring to last a lifetime.
She gazed down into the glowing embers of the fire and thought, My fire.
It had taken so much courage, so much resolution, so much desperation to find a house of her own. Corella Valley had practically no rental properties. She had so little money. It had taken all the courage and hope she possessed to gird her loins, approach Blake at the funeral and say, ‘I’m looking after your dad’s dogs; why don’t you let me take care of your house until you put it on the market? I’ll live in the housekeeper’s residence and I’ll keep the place tidy so if you need to use it it’ll be ready for you.’
The feeling she’d had when he’d said yes …
Her family still lived less than a mile away, on this side of the river. She was still here for them when they needed her—but she wasn’t here for everyone when they needed her. She was not ‘good old Maggie’ for Blake. This baby was Blake’s problem. Blake’s niece. Blake’s baby, to love or to organise another future for.
If she’d responded to the desperation in his eyes, she’d have a baby here, right now. A baby to twist her heart as it had been twisted all her life.
Eight brothers and sisters. Parents who couldn’t give a toss. Maggie, who spent her life having her heart twisted.
‘Of course you’ll stay home today and look after your brother. Yes, he’s ill, but your father and I are heading for Nimbin for a couple of days for the festival … You’re a good girl, Maggie.’
Two guitar-toting layabouts with nine kids between them, and Maggie, the oldest, the one who had cared for them all.
She did not need any more responsibility, not in a million years. She had two dogs. She had her own apartment, even if it was only until Blake sold the property.
She was not taking Blake’s baby.
And on the other side of the wall, Blake settled the sleeping baby into a cocoon of bedding he’d made in a tugged-out bureau drawer, then stood and stared down at her for a very long time.
Even in two hours she’d changed. Her face had filled out a little, and the signs of dehydration were fading. She’d been stressed since birth, he thought. She was sleeping as if she was intent on staying asleep, because being awake was frightening and lonely and hard.
He was reading too much into the expression of one sleeping baby. How did he know what she’d been through? How could he possibly guess?
This little one was nothing to do with him. As soon as the river went down he’d hand her over to the appropriate authorities and let them deal with her. But until then …
Maggie should take her, he thought. That was the reasonable plan. A trained midwife, accustomed to dealing with babies every day of her working life, was a far more suitable person to take care of a little one as young as this.
But there was something about Maggie that was implacable. Not My Problem. The sign was right up there, hanging over her head like a speech bubble. Said or not, it was what she meant and it was how she’d acted.
She’d sent him home with his niece.
His niece.
He watched her sleep for a while longer. Ruby, he thought.
His niece?
He didn’t feel like he had a niece. He didn’t feel like he had a sister. He’d only seen his sister that one appalling time, when she’d been little older than Ruby. The moment had been filled with sounds enough to terrify a six-year-old, two women screeching at each other, his father threatening, the baby crying and crying and crying.
He remembered thinking, Why don’t they stop yelling and cuddle her? He’d even thought of doing it himself, but six was too young to be brave. He’d wanted a cuddle himself. He’d been scared by the yelling and far too young to cope with a baby.
Was he old enough now?
He didn’t feel old enough.
He looked down at the tightly wrapped bundle and thought of the tiny feet, facing inwards, needing work to be aligned. He could do that. He was an orthopaedic surgeon. Fixing twisted limbs was what he did.
Not the rest.
Maggie was just through the door. A trained midwife.
The phone rang and he picked it up with relief. It’d be Maggie, he thought, changing her mind, worrying about a baby who should rightly be in her charge.
It wasn’t. It was Miriam, doing what she’d promised. ‘I’ll ring you when I’ve finished for the day,’ she’d told him. ‘You don’t mind if it’s late? You know I’d like to be with you but the board meets next week to appoint the head of ophthalmology and I need to be present to be in the running.’
Of course he’d agreed. They were two ambitious professionals, and a little thing like an appendectomy shouldn’t be allowed to get in the way of what was needed for their careers.
A
