into his own in a message of eroticism. ‘Come home and share my bed,’ he encouraged raggedly.
‘I—–’
‘Olivia? Olivia, telephone!’
Her memories of Marcus were interrupted with a suddenness that left her stunned for several seconds. It had all seemed so vivid, so real, just as if it had happened yesterday and not six years ago.
‘Olivia?’ A brief knock was followed by Natalie actually coming into the bedroom. ‘There’s a telephone call for you.’
Olivia dragged herself back from the past with effort, standing up. ‘Do you know who it is?’ She pushed her hair back from her face.
‘Sally Hamilton,’ Natalie supplied in a puzzled voice. ‘And she sounded very urgent.’
Olivia froze as soon as she heard the name of her caller. What on earth could Sally Hamilton want to talk to her about? The girl had seemed pleased to see her this afternoon, and it had been nice to see what a pleasant young woman she had grown up into. But Olivia didn’t want the meeting to go any further than that, and she intended making that clear to Sally.
She picked up the receiver as it lay beside the telephone in the hallway, conscious of Natalie’s curious looks before she went back to join the family in the lounge. ‘Sally, I—–’
‘Oh, thank God you’re there!’ the girl choked before Olivia could say any more. ‘It’s Daddy, he—he’s been in a serious car accident. He—he has head injuries. Olivia, they aren’t sure if—if he’s going to live!’
‘OLIVIA! Olivia, are you still there?’
‘I—Yes,’ she answered dully. ‘I—Did you say your father has been injured?’ She spoke so calmly, in such a controlled voice, almost as if this were all a bad dream and Sally hadn’t just told her Marcus had been seriously hurt.
‘He crashed into a truck.’ Sally was crying quietly now. ‘He was called out to an emergency at the hospital, and he—he crashed on his way back.’
‘I see.’ Olivia’s emotions were numb.
‘Will you come to the hospital?’
The suggestion shocked her out of her emotionless voice. Go and see Marcus? She couldn’t do that! ‘No—–’
‘I need you, Olivia,’ Sally sobbed.
‘Your grandmother—–’ she began.
‘Has completely gone to pieces. It isn’t long since Grandfather died, and this accident on top of that … She’s been sedated. I need to be with someone who loves him as much as I do—–’
‘I don’t love your father, Sally,’ Olivia interrupted sharply.
‘But you did once, you admitted as much earlier today. Oh, Olivia, please!’
‘I can’t, Sally. You know I can’t,’ she said in a distressed voice, her hand tight around the receiver.
‘I thought you cared,’ Sally choked accusingly. ‘I really thought you cared!’ The receiver was put down with a loud clatter.
Olivia sank ino the chair next to the telephone, staring sightlessly at the wall opposite. She couldn’t go to the hospital. What would be the point? Marcus would no more want her there than she wanted to see him. But Sally said he might not even live! Marcus dead? No, she couldn’t even begin to accept that.
Sally’s desolation came back to haunt her too. She was such a child still, and her father was all she had. Olivia couldn’t let her go through this alone.
‘Olivia!’ Natalie exclaimed in a shocked voice as she came out of the lounge and saw her pale face, coming down on her haunches in front of her. ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’
She moistened her numbed lips. ‘Sally’s father has—he’s been in an accident,’ she explained dully. ‘She wants me to go to the hospital and sit with her.’
Natalie frowned. ‘I see—I think.’
Delicate colour darkened Olivia’s pale cheeks. ‘I knew Mr Hamilton years ago,’ she explained.
‘I sensed something this afternoon—–’
‘We worked at the same hospital, that’s all,’ Olivia insisted sharply.
Natalie squeezed her hand as if she understood. ‘I’ll tell the family that you’ve had to go and see a friend who’s in hospital,’ she said gently.
‘Thank you,’ she accepted gratefully, going up the stairs to get her car keys.
‘I hope he’s all right,’ Natalie encouraged softly as Olivia came back down the stairs. ‘I’ve met him a couple of times, he’s a nice man.’
Olivia didn’t answer her, not at all sure that she had ever thought Marcus a ‘nice’ man herself. She had been deeply attracted to him, but that hadn’t stopped her knowing of the coldness about him. But even though she hadn’t seen him for six years the thought of him dying still filled her with horror. She had been young, had loved him with an innocence that couldn’t help but be hurt by such a coolly contained man.
She wasn’t familiar with the hospital he had been taken to, and it took her several extra minutes to locate it, several more minutes to ascertain that Mr Hamilton was still in the examination room and that his daughter was in the waiting-room.
Sally was a forlorn figure sitting alone in the corner of the room, but she looked up hopefully as the door opened, bursting into loud relieved sobs as she ran across the room into Olivia’s arms.
‘It’s all right,’ she soothed the girl softly. ‘It’s all right, Sally.’
‘I knew you’d come!’ Sally clung to her. ‘I just knew you wouldn’t let me down!’
Then she had known a lot more than Olivia did! Even as she parked the car outside in the hospital car park she had been having second thoughts as to the sensibility of this visit. There was always the possiblity that Marcus might not remember her—after all, she had meant little in his life, but then again if he did remember her, seeing her again could upset him. And if he was as ill as Sally said he was then that wasn’t going to help him at all. She also had to admit, to herself at least, that not all her concern was for Marcus’s sake; she had no idea how she was going to feel about seeing him again after all this time.
‘Has there been any more news?’ she prompted gently.
Sally shook her head, blowing her nose noisily before wiping her tear-stained cheeks. ‘None. I’ve been sitting here for hours—well, almost two,’ she amended. ‘It just seems longer. And I haven’t seen the doctor since I signed the form for Daddy to go into surgery.’
‘You mean Mar—he’s being operated on right now?’ Olivia gasped.
‘Yes,’
