to Em, and she suspected that’s how Ruby felt. Had Oliver set this up with just this goal? She glanced at him and knew her suspicion was right.
The first time she’d met him she’d been awed by his medical skills. Right now, watching him operate on screen, feeling Ruby’s trust growing by the second, that awe was escalating into the stratosphere.
He might not make it as a husband, but he surely made it as a surgeon.
Back on screen, the neurosurgeon was suturing, using careful, painstakingly applied, tiny stitches, while Oliver was carefully monitoring the levels of amniotic fluid. This baby would be born already scarred, Em thought. He’d have a scar running down his lower back—but with luck that was all he’d have. Please …
‘It worked a treat,’ Oliver said, sounding as pleased as if the operation had happened yesterday, and on screen the neurosurgeon stood back and Oliver took over. The final stitches went in, closing the mum’s uterus, making the incision across the mum’s tummy as neat as the baby’s. ‘Rufus was born by Caesarean section at thirty-three weeks,’ Oliver told them. ‘He spent four weeks in hospital as a prem baby but would you like to see him now?’
‘I … Yes.’ Ruby sounded as if she could scarcely breathe.
‘We have his parents’ permission to show him to other parents facing the same procedure,’ Oliver told her. ‘Here goes.’
He fiddled with the computer and suddenly they were transported to a suburban backyard, to a rug thrown on a lawn, to a baby, about six months old, lying on his back in the sun, kicking his legs, admiring his toes.
There was a dog at the edge of the frame, a dopey-looking cocker spaniel. As they watched, the dog edged forward and licked the baby’s toes. Rufus crowed with laughter and his toes went wild.
‘He doesn’t … he doesn’t look like there’s anything wrong with him,’ Ruby breathed.
‘He still has some issues he needs help with.’ Oliver was matter-of-fact now, surgeon telling it like it was. ‘He’ll need physiotherapy to help him walk, and he might need professional help to learn how to control his bladder and bowels, but the early signs are that he’ll be able to lead a perfectly normal life.’
‘He looks … perfect already.’ Ruby was riveted and so was Em. She was watching Ruby’s face. She was watching Ruby’s hand, cradling her bump. ‘My little one … my little girl … she could be perfect, too?’
‘I think she already is.’ Oliver was smiling down at her. ‘She has a great mum who’s taking the best care of her. And you have the best midwife …’
Em flashed him a look of surprise. There was no need to make this personal.
But for Ruby, this was nothing but personal. ‘Em says she’ll stay with me,’ Ruby told him. ‘At the operation and again when my baby’s born. There’s a chance that she can’t—she says no one’s ever totally sure because babies are unpredictable—but she’s promised to try. I hope she can, but if she’s not then she’s introduced me to Sophia, or Isla will take over. But you’ll look after …’ Her hand cradled the bump again as she looked anxiously at Oliver. ‘You’ll look after us both?’
‘I will.’ And it was a vow.
‘Tell me again why I need a Caesarean later—when my baby’s born properly?’
He nodded, closed his laptop and sat back in a visitor’s chair, to all appearances prepared to chat for as long as Ruby wanted. He was busy, Em knew. As well as the promises he’d made her to childmind on Saturday, she knew he already had a full caseload of patients. But right now Ruby was being given the impression that he had all the time in the world, and that time was Ruby’s.
He was … gorgeous. She knew it, she’d always known it, but suddenly the thought almost blindsided her.
And it was more than him being gorgeous, she thought, feeling dazed. She was remembering why she’d loved this man.
And she was thinking—idiotically—that she loved him still.
Concentrate on medicine, on your patient, on anything other than Oliver, she told herself fiercely. Concentrating on Oliver was just too scary.
What had Ruby asked? Why she needed a Caesarean?
‘You see the incision we just cut in Rufus’s mum’s uterus?’ Oliver was saying, flicking back to the screen, where they could see the now closed incision in the abdomen. ‘I’ve stitched it with care, as I’ll stitch you with care, but when your bub comes out, she’ll push. You have no idea how hard a baby can push. She wants to get out to meet you, and nothing’s going to stop her. So maybe she’ll push against that scar, and if she pushes hard enough on very new scar tissue she might cause you to bleed. I have two people I care about, Ruby. I care about your daughter but my absolute priority is to keep you safe. That means a Caesarean birth, because, much as I want to meet your baby, we’ll need to deliver her before she even thinks about pushing.’
‘But if you wanted to keep me really safe you wouldn’t operate in the first place,’ Ruby muttered, a trace of the old resentment resurfacing. But it didn’t mess with Oliver’s composure.
‘That’s right,’ he agreed, his tone not changing. ‘I believe we will keep you safe but there are risks. They’re minor but they’re real. That’s why it’s your choice. You can still pull out. Right up to the time we give you the anaesthetic, you can pull out, and no one will think the worse of you. That’s your right.’
The room fell silent. It was such a hard decision to make, Em thought, and once again she thought, Where was this kid’s mum?
But, surprisingly, when Ruby spoke again it seemed that worry about the operation was being supplanted by something deeper.
‘If I had her …’ Ruby said, and then amended her statement. ‘When I have her … after she’s born, she’ll have a scar, too.’
‘She will,’ Oliver told her, as watchful as Em, waiting to know where Ruby was going with this.
‘And she’ll have it for ever?
‘Yes.’
‘She might hate it—as a teenager,’ Ruby whispered. ‘I know I would.’
‘I’ll do my best to make it as inconspicuous as possible—and cosmetic touch-ups when she’s older might help even more. It shouldn’t be obvious.’
‘But teenagers freak out about stuff like that. I know I would,’ Ruby whispered. ‘And she won’t have a mum to tell her it’s okay.’
‘If she’s adopted, she’ll have a mum,’ Em ventured. ‘Ruby, we’ve gone through what happens. Adoption is your choice all the way. You’ll get to meet the adoptive parents. You’ll know she goes to parents who’ll love her.’
‘But … Fil love her more. She’s my baby.’
And suddenly Ruby was crying, great fat tears slipping down her face, and Em shifted so she could take her into her arms. And as she did so, Oliver’s laptop slid off the bed and landed with a crash on the floor.
Uh-oh. But Em didn’t move. For
