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‘We should hear soon,’ she told them. ‘I was thinking tea if anyone wants one. You might like coffee, Marty. Or is Matt on duty? Because the baby will be too premmie for Braxton so they’ll all have to be flown to Retford.’
He didn’t answer, too busy studying her face, so many questions in his eyes she had to turn away and wipe her face again before greeting Hallie.
‘And you must be Nikki,’ she said, holding out her hand to the teenager. ‘I’ve got some clothes of yours I should have returned earlier.’
‘Keep them,’ Nikki told her. ‘Mum bought me new ones anyway.’
She spoke brightly but her face clouded over at the thought of her mother.
‘How is she? Will she be all right? And the baby?’
‘Everyone will be fine,’ Hallie announced, and the certainty in her voice not only made Emma smile but also eased some of the hard edges of the grief that had struck her so suddenly.
‘I’ll organise the chopper to take them both to Retford,’ Marty said. ‘We’ll take a PICU nurse and can take Mac too.’
He looked at Hallie.
‘Good idea,’ she said. ‘We’ll wait until we’ve seen Izzy then Nikki and I can take Mac’s car to Carrie’s, spend the night there, and drive down to Retford in the morning.’
Emma shook her head.
‘You’re some organised family, aren’t you?’ she said, and Hallie laughed.
‘We had to be,’ she said. ‘We had eight kids with us at one stage. How many with your lot, Marty?’
He counted them off on his fingers.
‘Steve, me, Izzy, Lila and Liane—that’s five, hardly any at all.’
‘And more trouble than all the rest put together,’ Hallie said sternly, but Emma saw the twinkle in her eyes and wondered if that group—her last lot of foster children—had maybe been her favourite.
* * *
Marty knew he had to leave, but the sadness and the sheen of tears he’d caught on Emma’s face made him want to comfort her—to hold her, even, though that could never be. If ever there was a woman who needed commitment it was Emma.
‘Let’s get up to Theatre. Both mother and baby should be cleaned up by now and we can all say hello before I have to fly them away.’
He led the way, hoping Emma would follow and he’d have a chance to speak to her while Hallie and Nikki spent a few moments with Izzy.
But it was not to be.
When they all trooped into the small recovery room where Izzy lay pale but smiling, and Mac was hovering protectively over a humidicrib inhabited by quite a robust-looking baby, Emma was nowhere to be seen.
He left the family there, knowing he had work to do, knowing too that a PICU nurse would be accompanying them on the flight so there’d be no need for Emma.
Yet wanting to see her, find out about that awful sadness he’d read in her lovely eyes…
It’s none of your business, he reminded himself as he headed for the base. An ambulance would bring his passengers out there, and he had to be fully prepared for the flight.
Extra fully prepared for he’d be carrying precious cargo—family cargo.
Family…
* * *
Emma had watched them all go off to see Izzy and the baby but she couldn’t follow, because, although her tears no longer flowed, she didn’t want the misery she’d been feeling to taint the delight of a new birth—even if it was a premmie one.
So she walked home, and even found a smile when she saw the light burning at the top of the front steps, welcoming her back.
Home.
She nodded to herself, aware that this old house, with its high ceilings and large airy rooms, the warm family kitchen and the untidy garden with its mango trees, had become just that—a home.
And that being the case, she decided as she climbed the steps, she had to stop thinking about Marty Graham. He wasn’t for her, they both knew that, so if she wanted a man in her life—for the boys’ sake and to free up her father—she’d have to start sifting through the available men in the town.
She walked inside, checked the boys in their beds, and read the note her father had left on the kitchen table. Carrie had driven him home and taken Molly and Mandy home with her. Boys quiet all night, had fun at the barn dance, talk in the morning.
It was a comforting note, but the fact that he’d had fun then had had to come home to mind her children, drove home the need for her to find a man—or a housekeeper.
A housekeeper who could kick a football maybe?
She made a cup of tea, having failed to make one at the hospital, and took it with her to the front veranda, where she settled on the top step to look out at the sleeping town.
So far she’d met three available men, the meetings engineered by helpful friends or colleagues. There was the engineer, Rob Armstrong—a nice enough guy but she kind of suspected he might be holding a torch for Joss, and although Joss was happily married, he’d shown absolutely no interest in her, Emma.
