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Amy hesitated. ‘I don’t exactly have an appointment, but I’m here to see Dr Lincoln Adams.’
The cop looked down at the list in his hand and stared at her. ‘This isn’t exactly the time for social calls.’ His eyes narrowed suspiciously, ‘Dr Adams, he’s a neonatologist, isn’t he?’ He nodded towards her stomach. ‘What do you want to see him for? You haven’t had your baby yet—shouldn’t you be seeing an obstetrician?’
Amy sighed. The sun in Mendocino Valley was strong. She could feel it beating down on the pale skin at the parting in her red hair. A parting she usually always kept covered—too bad she’d forgotten her sunhat. She swallowed nervously. Trust her to get the cop who was smarter than the average bear.
She fumbled around her bag, looking for the bottle of water she had been drinking in the cab. Two hours in a cab with no air-conditioning with the heat so strong you could practically see it rising from the ground. Four hours in a train beforehand that had been packed with tourists. This trip had been a nightmare. There was no way she wasn’t getting to see Lincoln.
She pulled her tunic from her sweating back. At least the sea winds around her were giving some relief.
‘Ma’am?’
The cop was getting annoyed. She could sense that good cop had retreated and bad cop was hovering near the door.
‘Here.’ She pulled out a battered envelope from her bag containing her medical notes. ‘Give these to Lincoln Adams, he’ll see me.’
The cop rolled his eyes. ‘Dr Adams is currently looking after the First Daughter. He won’t see you or anyone else.’ He pointed in the direction of a cluster of reporters as he handed the notes back to her. ‘Nice try, though.’
Amy felt a wave of panic wash over her as her baby gave a few anxious kicks. This heat was really starting to get to her. What if Lincoln wouldn’t see her? What if he refused to look after her baby when it was born? What if didn’t even remember her?
The blood rushed to her cheeks. Surely he hadn’t forgotten her? How could he possibly forget those six months spent on the Amazon aid boat? She couldn’t forget a single minute. The hours they hadn’t spent working, they’d spent in his bed—and neither of them had been sleeping.
Trouble was, even though she remembered every minute of their time together, did he? She’d heard sneaky rumours that Lincoln had had a long line of female friends on his Amazon trips. Was it possible she had been just another pretty face to him? Had she just been a summer-long fling?
Six months with the most gorgeous man on earth. A man who hadn’t cared about appearances. He hadn’t been looking for a designer-clothed, styled woman, piled with make-up. Which was just as well since her luggage had gone astray at Iquitos airport in Peru and hadn’t arrived until two weeks later. She’d spent the first two weeks with her hair pulled back in her solitary hair bobble, wearing pale blue or green surgical scrubs and paper knickers. Just as well her breasts hadn’t been big enough to really need the support of a bra.
She looked downwards. Things had certainly changed in the last six years. In more ways than one. Her extended stomach was definitely evidence of that.
Her hands went back to guarding her stomach. Her precious bundle. Her one and only chance of motherhood. Was it so wrong to want the best man in the land to look after her baby? More than that, someone she trusted. Someone she’d seen battle the odds to help a baby survive. Someone who refused to take no for an answer.
She wanted that. She wanted that for her baby—her son. Lincoln was the best neonatologist she’d ever worked with. If anyone could help her with an early delivery, it was him.
Her eyes drifted upwards. The cop was dealing with someone else now and looking more and more agitated by the minute. The sun was obviously getting to him too.
She looked around her. Security was everywhere. And no wonder. If reports were to be believed, the President, the First Lady and the First Daughter were currently in the hospital at the top of the hill. So how was she going to get in there?
Amy took a deep breath. ‘Officer, officer!’
The cop scowled at her and walked back along the cordon. ‘You again. What do you want?’
‘You never let me finish,’ she panted as she pushed her stomach out as far as she could. ‘Lincoln Adams—he’s my husband. So you have to let me in to see him.’
Where had that come from?
Amy was starting to feel light-headed. She really needed a seat. Oh, boy. She was definitely going to be caught out now. The cop squinted at her, ‘You do know I’ll radio up and check, don’t you?’ It was almost as if he could read her panicking mind and was giving her a last-minute opportunity to give up the madness, admit that she’d lied and retreat—never to be seen again.
But Amy was determined. She would see Lincoln, no matter what. She would get him to look after her son, no matter what. She drew herself up to her whole five feet five inches and stared him straight in the eye. ‘Can you tell Dr Adams that his wife, Amy Carson, is here?’
‘Different names, huh?’ The cop eyed her suspiciously as he lifted his shoulder to speak into the radio attached to the front of his protective vest.
Amy’s hands rested on the steel grating in front of her. Her eyes drifted across the nearby ocean. It was beautiful here. But the Californian heat seemed to be suffocating her. She could feel the sun beating down, making her itchy and scratchy. In fact, her whole body felt itchy. She pulled her smock top away from her body in an attempt to get some air circulating.
She blinked. A wave of nausea swept over her. Her head was beginning to spin. Suddenly watching the boats bobbing up and down in the cove didn’t seem like such a good idea. The momentum of the waves was making her feel worse, her legs turning to jelly, and little patches of black had appeared at the edge of her vision…
‘Ma’am! Ma’am, are you okay? Quick! Someone get me an ambulance!
* * *
‘Dr Adams!’
The voice cut across the emergency department like a siren. Lincoln spluttered his coffee all down the front of his scrubs and onto his open white coat. He glanced at the cup of lukewarm coffee. His first since yesterday and he wasn’t going to get to drink it. He tossed the cup in the trash and turned towards the voice.
James Turner. Head of the President’s security detail. Not again. This man was beginning to haunt his dreams—both at night and during the day.
But something was wrong. He had someone—a woman—in his arms. Linc strode towards him as James Turner unceremoniously dumped the woman on top of a gurney behind one of the sets of curtains. Beads of sweat dripped down his forehead and nose. Linc wondered if he’d managed to change out of his obligatory black suit at all since he’d arrived in Pelican Cove.
‘I think I found something belonging to you, Dr Adams.’
‘To me? I don’t think so.’ Lincoln shook his head and moved over to the gurney.
‘Really?’ James Turner raised an eyebrow. ‘You mean you don’t recognise your own wife?’
‘My what?’
‘I knew it. Another scam artist. It’s ridiculous the lengths some of these reporters will go to. Don’t worry, I’ll get rid of her.’
Linc moved nearer the woman on the gurney. Her head and body were turned away from him but from the back the curly red hair looked like someone else’s. Someone he’d known five years ago. Only then she’d spent most of the time with it tied up in a ponytail, not spread across her shoulders and back, like it was now.
He leaned closer, then started. Yip. That definitely was a very pregnant abdomen. At least six months. His eyes flickered to her face. Pale skin, flawless, almost translucent, with a faint sprinkling of freckles across her nose. And she was out cold. And James Turner was trying to pull her upwards, obviously thinking she was faking.
‘Stop!’
This time his voice was every bit as loud as James’s had been.
The cold, hard stare he was getting used to met him again.
‘Get your hands off her.’ Lincoln walked around to the other side of the gurney. He had to be sure. He had to be sure his eyes were not deceiving him.
No. They weren’t. This was Amy Carson. This was his Amy Carson. The one he’d spent six hot, sweaty months with on the Amazon aid boat. Spending the days looking after a range of newborn ailments and spending the nights lost in the sea of her red hair. And he could absolutely authenticate it was her natural colour. This was definitely Amy Carson. The same one that had asked for help only forty-eight hours ago.
