Storm Haven

CHAPTER TWO

MARTIN recovered consciousness before the plane touched down at Cairns.

For Nikki it was a weird journey. She felt as if she had been snatched from her nice, safe existence, and only part of that feeling was due to flying to Cairns. She watched over her patients while she tried hard to avoid thinking of Luke Marriott.

‘He’s nice, isn’t he?’ Lisa whispered as she stirred from her drugged sleep and found the strength to speak.

‘Who?’ Nikki asked. She knew already whom Lisa was talking about.

‘The new doctor. He…he saved my life.’

Nikki shook her head, but part of her acknowledged the truth of Lisa’s words. His presence might not have saved Lisa’s life but it had probably spared her legs, and as for the boy she was with…

Nikki checked Martin for the hundredth time and noticed with satisfaction the lessening of his unconsciousness. He stirred just as they touched down, his eyes flickering open and gazing upwards in dazed confusion.

‘You’re safe,’ Nikki told him gently. ‘You and Lisa crashed the car. Lisa’s here with you. She’s OK. We’re taking you both to hospital.’

It was all he could cope with hearing. His eyelids lowered and he slept.

At Cairns Nikki was suddenly redundant. Forewarned, there were ambulances and doctors waiting as their flight landed. Martin’s condition was less serious now than they had feared, so Nikki could slip into the background. She was content to do so. By now the cumulative effects of two sleepless nights were showing. It was five in the morning and she was close to exhaustion.

Someone showed her to a sparsely furnished room at the hospital. All Nikki saw was the bed. Somehow she shed her clothes, slipped between cool sheets, and seconds later was asleep.

Nikki woke to heat. There was a big ceiling fan in the bedroom but she’d been too tired to think of turning it on. Now the temperature in the room had risen to the point of discomfort. Nikki opened her eyes, looked automatically at the wristwatch on her arm and sat up with a start. Midday.

Midday! It couldn’t be. She stared again and shook her wrist. The daily flight up to Cooktown-her only means of getting home-left at eleven a.m. Now… now she was stuck here for another twenty-four hours whether she liked it or not.

She flung back her sheet in distress. Someone should have woken her. They knew the routine. The staff here knew she had a flight to catch. Then a knock on the door made her dive back for the modesty of her bedclothes. The door opened and a smiling face appeared. It was Miss Charlotte Cain, a young surgeon whose friendship with Nikki dated from medical school.

‘Hi, Nikki,’ Charlotte smiled. ‘Welcome to the day.’ The white-coated young doctor looked down at her watch and her smile widened. ‘I can’t say good morning any more, that’s for sure.’

‘Charlie, what on earth were you doing letting me sleep?’ Nikki demanded angrily. ‘You knew I had a plane to catch.’

‘I’m only following orders,’ Charlotte grinned. ‘I hardly dared do anything else.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Just that Luke Marriott rang from Eurong early this morning,’ she told the bemused Nikki. ‘He rang to find out how his patients were-his patients, mind-I think you’ve suffered an insurrection in your absence. When we reassured him as to Martin and Lisa’s condition, he turned his attention to you. He said you weren’t to be woken. He told us he didn’t expect you back in Eurong until tomorrow. We are to pass on instructions to you to get some rest. Go shopping, the man said. I am informed everything is under control at Eurong and you are not required. An autocratic male, is our Mr Marriott. Not a man to deny, I’d say.’ Charlotte sat down on the bed, raised her eyebrows at her friend and grinned. She had the look of someone who was enjoying herself hugely.

‘Mr Marriott…’ Nikki stared up at Charlotte in confusion. ‘So the man really is a surgeon?’

‘One of the best,’ Charlotte said simply. ‘As your young Martin can testify. He’s fully conscious and showing no signs of permanent damage.’ Charlotte shook her head. ‘I wish I could operate like that.’

‘I don’t understand.’ Nikki folded her sheet more closely about her and stared up at her friend.

‘What don’t you understand?’

‘Anything,’ Nikki wailed. ‘But especially I don’t understand why someone with Luke Marriott’s skill and training accepts the job as my locum. It doesn’t make sense.’ She looked desperately at her friend. ‘Make sense of it for me, Charlie?’

Charlotte shook her dark hair. ‘I can’t,’ she admitted. ‘We were all amazed when you contacted us last night and told us who was operating. Luke Marriott resigned from this place two years ago. We thought he’d gone overseas but no one heard. And then he springs up with you in Eurong-in the nick of time, as far as I can gather.’

In the nick of time…It had certainly been that. But why?

‘Did anything happen?’ Nikki asked slowly… ‘I mean, why did he leave here to do locum work?’

‘Who knows?’

‘There must be something,’ Nikki frowned. ‘Did something dreadful happen? Was there a lawsuit or medical mistake that would make him give up surgery?’

‘Didn’t you ask for details of his past when you employed him?’ Charlotte asked, amused. ‘Surely an outstanding lawsuit would have to appear on his curriculum vitae?’

‘I didn’t ask for his curriculum vitae,’ Nikki snapped, and then at the look on her friend’s face she changed her tone. ‘I checked he was currently registered and left it at that. Honestly, Charlotte, I was just so tired I thought anyone would do, as long as they were qualified and registered. I mean, I wasn’t going to leave the town.’

‘You mean you were going to do your usual trick of employing a locum and then doing the work yourself,’ Charlotte said drily. ‘For heaven’s sake, Nikki-’

‘Leave it, Charlie,’ Nikki said brusquely. She looked up, saw the fleeting look of hurt in her friend’s eyes and immediately regretted her words. ‘Look, Charlie, it’s just that…’

‘It’s just that if you stop working then you have time to think,’ her friend retorted. And then a sudden smile flashed over her face. ‘Well, you and Luke Marriott should get on famously. Two workaholics and only enough work for one. Dear, oh, dear…’

‘So tell me about him,’ Nikki demanded, anxious to get the conversation away from herself. ‘Why on earth is he acting as a locum if he’s so darned clever and conscientious? He looks like…’ She thought back to Luke Marriott’s disreputable appearance, and the sudden memory of naked legs appearing from under his scanty hospital gown made her almost gasp. ‘He looks like a bum to me,’ she said unsteadily.

‘Well, he’s not a bum.’ Charlotte shook her head vehemently, frowning. ‘I suppose we’re talking of the same Luke Marriott? I don’t think I’ve ever seen the man without imported, tailored suits and amazingly expensive silk ties.’ She looked at Nikki. ‘What’s your Luke Marriott like?’

How to describe naked legs and laughing blue eyes…? Nikki couldn’t. She opened her mouth and tried but the words stuck. And then Charlotte laughed.

‘OK,’ she smiled. ‘That’s our Luke you’re thinking of. I know Luke Marriott. There’s not many men who could make you look like that, Nikki Russell, but Luke Marriott has to be a good bet. He hasn’t changed, then.’

‘Hasn’t changed…?’

‘Luke Marriott was the most gorgeous male within jet-plane distance of this hospital,’ Charlotte said firmly. ‘He had every junior nurse, some senior ones, and a few female doctors besides, making fools of themselves every time he walked past. He’s broken more hearts than I care to name.’ She peered at Nikki. ‘Not yours yet, sweetie?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Nikki snapped, and to her annoyance found herself flushing.

‘No.’ Charlotte stood up abruptly. ‘I’m not being ridiculous. Nikki, it’s five years since Scott-’

‘I don’t want to talk about Scott.’

‘I know,’ her friend said grimly. ‘You don’t want to remember Scott. Well, that’s never going to happen if you don’t ease up on work and start enjoying yourself a bit more,’ Charlotte said bluntly. She looked at her watch. ‘Hey, your new locum ordered you to shop,’ she smiled. ‘And I have the afternoon off. When was the last time you went clothes shopping, Dr Russell?’

‘I don’t need clothes,’ Nikki snapped. ‘I can use this afternoon at the library. I need to study, Charlie.’

‘The medical library is closed on Wednesday afternoons,’ her friend grinned. ‘Now isn’t that a shame? And you haven’t a text with you-and I’m damned if I’ll lend you a single one of mine.’

‘Charlie-’

‘Nikki Russell, you must have more money than you know what to do with. Your parents left you that fabulous house, and you have a perfectly sound income from a too busy medical practice. And I don’t see a single sign of frivolous spending. Those jeans you were wearing last night were years old. Now either you come shopping with me or I’ll personally ring the airport and cancel your flight home tomorrow.’ She put her hands on her hips. ‘Coming, Dr Russell?’

Nikki sighed. Well, maybe she could do with some new jeans…‘If you’re not doing anything…’ she said reluctantly.

‘I’m doing something all right,’ her friend grinned. ‘I’m spending the afternoon with my closest friend to spend someone else’s money. There’s nothing I could enjoy more.’

‘I have to telephone Amy.’

‘There’s a telephone beside your bed,’ her friend told her. ‘You have fifteen minutes, Dr Russell. And then you’re coming shopping, whether you like it or not.’

Jeans weren’t what Charlotte envisaged when she said shopping. Charlie dragged her friend from one shop to another and there wasn’t a pair of jeans in sight.

‘Honestly, Charlie,’ Nikki expostulated. ‘This stuff is crazy.’ The shop Charlie had pushed her into was up-market and exclusive, dealing in everything from beautiful imported shoes and designer fashions to the most indulgent of lingerie. Nikki fingered the soft Swiss cotton of the dress her friend had just discovered. The frock was lovely, light and soft, with swirling green pastels which lit the brilliant red of Nikki’s hair. ‘I wouldn’t wear this in Eurong. It’d be wasted.’

‘Maybe yesterday you wouldn’t have worn it,’ her friend grinned. ‘But today…today Luke Marriott is your new locum. I wouldn’t be seen dead in anything less than this dress if Luke Marriott was in the vicinity. Honest, Nikki-’

‘Charlie, I am not the least bit interested in Luke Marriott,’ Nikki snapped.

‘You’re lying,’ Charlotte said simply. ‘My grandmother would look twice at Luke Marriott. And she’s been happily married to my grandfather for fifty years!’

‘Charlie-’

‘Look, just try it on,’ Charlie pleaded. She thrust the dress into Nikki’s hands and pushed her towards a changing-room. ‘You could even wear this to work-with a nice white coat over the top. It’s time you gave the bachelors of Eurong their money’s worth. I bet you charge top rates even when you wear your mouldy old jeans.’

Half laughing, half exasperated, Nikki gave in. She was fond of Charlie-in fact Charlotte Cain had been a true friend for a long time. It wouldn’t hurt to humour her. And these clothes-she fingered the soft cotton with a trace of regret-these clothes could join the rest of the things she had put away five years ago. Her mother’s jewellery. Her cosmetics. Her contact lenses. She looked up to her face and grimaced at the too heavy glasses. She knew she was being stupid wearing these but they were a defence against something she no longer wanted.

They were a defence against the likes of Luke Marriott. Unbidden, the thought of Nikki’s new locum flashed before her and it was all she could do not to rip the dress she was trying on from her back. The thought of him produced something that was close to panic.

This was crazy. There was no need for her to panic. Luke Marriott obviously had problems of his own and a three-week stint as her locum was hardly going to change either of them. Her panic was inexplicable and needless.

Nikki forced herself to concentrate on the dress. It was pretty, there was no doubting that. It fell in soft folds around her slim form, catching the colour of her eyes and highlighting her brilliant hair. She should get her hair cut, she thought crossly. There was too much of it. Or maybe she should just tie it back into a severe knot. She shoved her glasses back on and opened the curtain. Charlie and the shop assistant were both waiting.

‘Oh, Nikki, it’s lovely!’ Charlie exclaimed delightedly. ‘Don’t you like it?’

‘It’s OK,’ Nikki agreed reluctantly. She fingered the fine cotton. ‘It feels good.’

‘And so it should.’ Charlotte took her by the shoulders and spun her around. ‘It really makes you look like…well, like you ought to look. Apart from those glasses.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with my glasses.’

‘Why do you wear them all the time?’ Charlotte demanded. ‘You know you only need them for reading.’

‘I’m more comfortable with them on.’

‘But you used to wear contact lenses.’

‘Well, I don’t any more,’ Nikki snapped. ‘I’ll take this off.’

‘You’ll buy it?’

‘If you think I ought to,’ Nikki said flatly.

The shop assistant had been watching the proceedings with interest. ‘It does look pretty,’ she said. ‘But have a look at it in the full-length mirror before you buy it. There’s one just around the corner here.’

‘I don’t need to.’

‘Yes, you do,’ Charlotte said, her voice firm. ‘Go and look, Nikki.’ Then she reached forward towards the objects on Nikki’s nose. ‘And look without these awful glasses!’

‘Charlie-’

‘Can you see without them?’ Charlotte demanded.

‘Yes, but-’

‘Then look without them.’ Charlotte firmly removed the offending articles and thrust her forward. ‘Now go and look at what you should be, Nikki Russell!’

Nikki was propelled firmly forward by the shop assistant. The assistant had obviously taken Nikki’s lack of interest as a personal challenge. She stood next to Nikki, chatting cheerfully at Nikki’s image in the mirror.

‘It looks so good, miss. You should wear that colour all the time. Green really suits you.’ She smiled up at her reluctant client. ‘And your friend’s right. You shouldn’t wear those glasses.’

Nikki stared at her reflection and a part of her cringed. She wanted no part of this. To be beautiful… Scott had told her she was beautiful…

‘I’ll get changed now,’ she said firmly.

‘You will take it?’ the assistant said anxiously.

‘Oh, yes.’ Nikki grimaced. Charlotte would give her no peace unless she did, and her friendship with Charlotte was important. Speaking of Charlotte… She looked around. Where was her friend?

‘Charlie?’

‘Your friend must have slipped out.’ The assistant frowned. She looked around the shop, visions of shop-lifting clearly flashing through her mind. People who distracted the shop assistant and left were a worry. Surely not. These two women seemed…well, classy.

But Charlotte had gone.

And then Nikki parted the curtain to her changingcubicle and realised with horror that something else had gone as well. All her clothes. Everything. Her sandals. Even her glasses…

The shop assistant was right behind her. Seeing what Nikki had seen, she gave a nervous but relieved giggle. ‘Oh, dear,’ she offered. ‘Your friend seems to have… to have taken all your clothes.’

‘Charlie…’ Nikki’s voice was an angry wail. What on earth was her friend playing at?

‘I’m back.’ It was the cheerful voice of Charlotte coming back in the door from the street. ‘Missed me?’

‘Charlie, where are my clothes?’ Nikki asked softly. Her tone was low and dangerous.

Charlie grinned, unperturbed.

‘I put ‘em in a rubbish bin,’ she confessed blithely. ‘Actually I put ‘em in about five garbage bins. I put your jeans in one. I put your shirt in another. One sandal per bin. I wish I’d been able to get your knickers and bra. But you will be sensible and buy some more of those, won’t you, sweetie?’

‘Charlotte!’

‘Well, you were going to buy new clothes,’ her friend said innocently. ‘You said you were. And you’d never choose to wear those old things when you have lovely new clothes, now would you?’ Her face assumed an expression of innocence. ‘You weren’t buying these just to humour me, now were you, Nikki?’

It was so close to the truth that Nikki gasped. She opened her mouth to say something and then couldn’t think of a thing to say. Finally she closed her mouth again and contented herself with glaring.

‘That’s better,’ Charlie said. She turned to the shop assistant. ‘You know, this girl has nothing now but the clothes she’s standing in. I think we need at least a couple more outfits.’

The sales assistant choked on shocked laughter. ‘Oh, yes, miss,’ she breathed. She turned to Nikki. ‘We have the loveliest linen suit that you’d look smashing in.’

‘Wheel it out,’ Charlie said firmly.

‘Charlotte, where are my glasses?’ Nikki said awfully, and her friend threw up her hands in mock-fright.

‘Beats me,’ she laughed. ‘Either Mall Litter Bin 36 or Mall Litter Bin 39. Or was that your left sandal?’ She shrugged.

‘Charlie…’

Her friend put her hands on her hips. ‘Nikki Russell, you are my very best friend.’ She smiled, then her face grew suddenly serious. ‘You have been vegetating in Eurong for the past five years with no one to appreciate how lovely you really are. Now I find that one of the most eligible males I know is working as your locum. I’m damned if I’ll let you go home wearing those glasses. I’d be failing in my friendship if I did. Now try this suit on, Nikki Russell, and let’s have no more nonsense.’

‘Charlie, I am not the least interested in Luke Marriott.’ It was almost a wail.

‘Well, that’s fine,’ her friend said simply. ‘All I’m ensuring is that Luke Marriott is interested in you.’

It was a still angry Dr Russell who climbed from the plane at Eurong airstrip the next day. The wind was hot and blustery. The dress Charlotte had chosen hung coolly on Nikki’s slim body, fluttering in the breeze. It felt soft, pleasant and frightening. Nikki’s legs were bare apart from simple crystal-green sandals. Her hair wisped around her face, no longer held back by the rigid frames of her glasses. Nikki’s fingers kept moving self-consciously to her face, but there was no dark shield to hide her. She felt strange, and frighteningly exposed.

‘It’s only until I reach home,’ she muttered to herself. ‘I can change immediately.’ If only she had more glasses…

The pilot had come around to help her from the cabin. As she thanked him he reached down on to the floor and retrieved a package the size of a small suitcase.

‘This is for you too, Doc,’ he grinned. ‘A Miss Cain sent it out to the airport last night. Said we weren’t to give it to you until now.’

Nikki looked down at the package and her lips tightened. The package was emblazoned with the logo of the shop she had visited the day before. She had refused to buy anything more than the dress she was wearing, but she knew already what would be in the parcel. Everything Charlotte had pleaded with her to buy, she imagined.

‘I suppose these are all paid for,’ she said icily, and the pilot grinned as though he too was in on the plot.

‘They’re bought on approval,’ he said.

‘Well, here.’ Nikki thrust the package at him. ‘I don’t approve. You can take them right back.’

‘Not me, Doc.’ The pilot backed off with his hands held up in negation. ‘I promised Miss Cain that they’d stay in Eurong for a least a week. If you don’t want them after that, she says I can bring ‘em back.’

‘But-’

‘You wouldn’t have me break a promise,’ he smiled.

‘Yes.’ Nikki put the parcel down on the tarmac and glared.

His grin deepened and he shook his head in mocksorrow. ‘Tut-tut. What a thing to say. Now, I’m sorry, Doctor, but undermining my moral values is something I don’t hold with. Have it here in a week if you want it returned.’

‘Fine,’ Nikki snapped. ‘I will.’

‘Now, Doc…’ Pete was looking anxious and Nikki sighed and relented. It was no fault of the pilot’s that she had such a scheming friend.

‘Sorry, Pete. It’s just that I’m feeling managed.’

‘Yeah, she looks managing, that Miss Cain.’ The pilot looked behind her across the runway. ‘And speaking of managing…is this your new locum?’

Nikki spun around. She’d been expecting Beattie to meet her, but striding across the tarmac was Dr Luke Marriott. He was walking swiftly towards them, carrying a parcel in his arms.

It was all Nikki could do not to gasp. The change in the man was extraordinary. Instead of the disreputable vagrant of two days ago, this man was well-dressed, arrogant and assured. It showed in his stride, in his immaculately tailored linen trousers and quality open-necked shirt-and in the way his eyes dropped approvingly over Nikki’s figure.

‘Well, well, well.’ He whistled soundlessly as he neared them. ‘A veritable transformation…’

‘You should talk,’ Nikki said abruptly, and then flushed. Her eyes fell away. She didn’t know how to react to this man.

He grinned. ‘Didn’t you like my coating of prawns, bait and blood?’ he smiled. He looked up to the pilot. ‘Thanks for bringing her back.’

It was as if he were a parent thanking the air hostess for looking after a child. Nikki’s flush deepened and she felt anger mounting within her.

‘Couldn’t Beattie come to collect me?’ she asked ungraciously.

‘You don’t approve of the substitute?’ he demanded, his eyes still laughing. He motioned down to the parcel in his arms. ‘Beattie and Amy are involved in a most important function at Amy’s kindergarten. They said they’d meet you at home. Speaking of Beattie, she asked me to send this down to Cairns.’ He handed it over to the pilot. ‘Can I leave it with you? The address is on the label.’ Then he turned back to Nikki. ‘Shall we go?’

‘Fine.’ Nikki turned away but the pilot stopped her.

‘You’ve forgotten your parcel, Doc,’ he said apologetically, looking down at the bulky package still at Nikki’s feet. He looked from Luke to Nikki, obviously relishing the undercurrents he was sensing.

‘Leave it here until next week,’ Nikki snapped. ‘I don’t want it.’

‘I’m not doing that,’ the pilot said definitely. ‘This building is open to heaven knows who. You’ll have to take it.’ He turned to Luke. ‘Can you take it for Doc Russell?’

Luke nodded and held out his hands to accept it. ‘I get rid of one and I’m given another. What is it?’ he asked curiously.

‘I gather our Doc Russell went shopping yesterday,’ the pilot grinned.

‘As per instructions.’ Luke Marriott smiled and the smile made Nikki’s heart give a sickening lurch. ‘Very good, Dr Russell. I’m glad to see you can follow orders.’

‘Excuse me,’ Nikki said icily. ‘I thought I was the general practitioner and you were the locum. Or was I mistaken? Since when has the locum given orders to his employer?’

Luke’s smile only deepened. ‘For three weeks, you said, I was the general practitioner and you were out of work,’ he told her. ‘And that’s the way it’s going to be.’

‘Over my dead body,’ Nikki said savagely; and then wished she hadn’t. Both Luke and the pilot obviously found it enormously amusing.

‘Come on, Nikki Russell,’ Luke Marriott said kindly, in the voice of one humouring a fractious child. ‘Let’s take you home.’

‘Dr Marriott…’

‘It’s Mr Marriott,’ Luke told her. ‘I thought your friends in Cairns would have told you that. But you can call me Luke if you like.’

Nikki stood almost speechless. The ground was being swept from beneath her feet. She felt as if every foundation she possessed was cracking. ‘Luke Marriott, I don’t know what the hell you’re playing at…’ she started.

‘I’m not playing at all.’ Luke raised his free hand in acknowledgement and farewell to the pilot, tucked Nikki’s parcel under his arm and started walking towards the hangars. In the distance Nikki saw her car parked, waiting. He glanced at his watch. ‘In fact, I’m late.’

‘Late?’

‘For afternoon surgery,’ he informed her blandly. ‘I have patients booked.’

‘My patients!’

‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘They’re mine. You’re not wanted for three weeks, Dr Russell. You can take yourself off to your texts or sleep by the swimming-pool for all I care. But you’re not working.’

‘But-’

‘Beattie has explained things to me,’ Luke went on blandly. ‘She tells me you’re set on passing this exam and it’s my responsibility to see that you do. And I’m one to take my responsibilities very seriously.’

‘I’m not your responsibility…’

‘No. But your practice is. For the next three weeks, Dr Russell, you are not wanted.’