did mean you personally,’ he told her, equally direct. ‘It is you I wanted—or was you.’
‘And having seen me, you’ve changed your mind?’ The words were a challenge, one he could see repeated in the blue eyes for all she hid them behind those revolting glasses. ‘Too tall? Too thin? Wrong sex, although the Elizabeth part of my name must have been something of a clue?’
‘You’re pregnant.’
He spoke before he could consider the implication of his statement, and as her face flushed slightly and her eyes darkened with some emotion he couldn’t read, he knew he’d made a mistake.
A big mistake!
‘So?’
The word was as steely as the thrust of a well-honed sword, but as he struggled to parry the thrust she spoke again.
‘Pregnancy is a condition, not an illness, as I’m sure you know. I have worked through the first thirty-two weeks and I intend to continue working until the baby is born, returning to work …’
The fire died out of her and she reached out to support herself on the filing cabinet behind which her ‘condition’ had originally been hidden. The air in the alcove had thickened somehow, and though he knew you couldn’t inhale things like despair and sadness, that was how it tasted.
‘Actually—’ the word, her voice strong again, brought him back to the present ‘—a trip away right now might be just what the doctor ordered. I presume if you’re setting up a neonatal unit you already have obstetricians and a labour ward so my having the baby there wouldn’t be a problem. As far as this unit is concerned, we have visiting paediatricians who are rostered on call, plus there’s a new young paediatrician just dying to take over my job, so it would all fit in.’
The steel was back in her voice and he wondered if it came from armour she’d built around herself for some reason. She’d shown no emotion at all when she’d talked about her pregnancy, no softening of her voice, just a statement of facts and enquiries about obstetric services.
Neither did she wear a wedding ring, although handling tiny babies she probably wouldn’t …
‘Well?’
Liz knew she’d sounded far too abrupt, flinging the word at him like that, but the idea of getting away from the turmoil in her life had come like a lifeline thrown to a drowning sailor. She was slowly learning to live with the grief of Bill’s death, but Oliver’s continued existence in a coma in this very hospital was a weight too heavy to carry, especially as his parents had banned her from seeing him.
Oliver’s state of limbo put her into limbo as well—her and the baby—while the unanswerable questions just kept mounting and mounting.
Would Oliver come out of the coma? Would his brain be functioning if he did? And would he want the baby?
She sighed, then realised that the man had been speaking while she was lost in her misery.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, and this time heard him asking about passports and how soon she could leave the country.
‘Right now, today!’ she responded, then regretted sounding so over-eager. ‘To be fair, I’d need a week or so to bring my replacement up to date. She’s worked here before, which is why she wanted to come back, so it won’t take much. And it’s not as if I won’t be coming back—you’re talking about my setting up the unit and getting it running, not offering a permanent placement, aren’t you?’
The man looked bemused, but finally he nodded, though it seemed to her that his face had hardened and the arrogance she’d sensed within him when he’d first spoken had returned.
He didn’t like her—not one bit.
‘There is no one with whom you should discuss this first?’ he asked.
Liz shrugged.
‘Not really. Providing I leave the unit in good hands, the hospital hierarchy won’t complain, and as you’ve probably already discussed your idea of staff swapping with them, they won’t be surprised. And this first trip shouldn’t take long, anyway. It will be a matter of organising space, equipment and staff. It’s not as if you’ll be taking in babies until those are all in place.’
Now he was frowning. It had to be the pregnancy. He obviously wasn’t used to pregnant women working. Well, it was time he got used to it.
The silence stretched, so awkward she was wondering if she should break it, but what could she say to this stranger that wasn’t just more chat? And though she certainly hadn’t given that impression earlier, she really didn’t do chat.
Relief flooded her as he spoke again.
‘Very well. I will be in touch later today with a date and time for our departure. I have your details from the HR office. In the meantime, you might make a list of equipment you will require. My hospital is the same size as Giles, and I would anticipate the unit would be similar in size to this one.’
The words were so coldly formal Liz had to resist an impulse to drop a curtsey, but as the man wheeled away from her, she gave in to bad behaviour, poked out her tongue and put her thumbs to her ears, waggling her fingers at him.
‘He’d have caught you if he’d turned around,’ her friend Gillian said, before taking up what was really worrying her. ‘And what on earth are you thinking? Agreeing to traipse off to a place you’ve never heard of, with a strange man, and pregnant, and with Oliver the way he is, not to mention leaving all of us in the lurch?’
Liz smiled. The sentiments may have been badly expressed but Gillian’s concern for her was genuine. Could she explain?
‘You know Oliver’s family won’t let me near him,’ she began, ‘and Carol is the perfect replacement, and she’s available so no one’s being left in the lurch. That said, what is it you’re most worried about—the pregnancy, the strange man, or that I’ve never heard of this Al Tinine?’
‘It’s the decision,’ Gilliam told her. ‘Making it like that. It’s totally out of character for you. You took months mulling over doing the surrogacy thing—could you do it, should you do it, would you get too attached to the baby? You asked yourself a thousand questions. And while I know you’ve been through hell these last few months, do you really think running away will help?’
Liz shook her head.
‘Nothing will help,’ she muttered, acknowledging the dark cloud that had enshrouded her since Bill’s death, ‘but if I’m going to be miserable, I might as well be miserable somewhere new. Besides, setting up a unit from scratch might be the distraction I need. I love this place, would bleed for it, but you know full well the staff could run it without much help from me, so it’s hardly a challenge any more.’
‘But the baby?’
Gillian’s voice was hesitant, and Liz knew why. It was the question everyone had been wanting to ask since the accident that had killed her brother and put his partner in hospital, but the one subject they hadn’t dared broach.
Liz shrugged her shoulders, the helplessness she felt about the situation flooding through her.
‘I’ve
