A Secret Shared... (14 page)

‘You’re kidding.’ Wendy’s father’s words were an explosion of disbelief. Minutes earlier they’d been facing evacuation to Perth with no promise of any real improvement at the end of it. Now they were being promised...dolphins?

‘I’m not joking.’ Jack met his disbelief head on. ‘I would never joke about Wendy’s tummy.’ Then, as the man veered between distrust and hope, he put a hand on his shoulder. ‘I’m an oncologist,’ he said. ‘Treating problems like Wendy’s is what I do. I can see what’s wrong on the X-rays and I know how to fix it.’ He glanced again Wendy, and the look Wendy returned was that of a kid older than her years. Be honest, Kate pleaded silently, and he was.

‘This isn’t a long-term cure,’ he said. ‘Wendy, you know you still have cancer. But I can make you better for now. What do you say, Wendy? Will you let me make you feel better?’

‘Yes,’ Wendy whispered, and because she was a polite child she added a rider. ‘Yes, please.’

* * *

It sounded easy but it wasn’t easy. Even sedated, the involuntary retching continued. The steroid took time to work, and there was a real risk of dehydration and exhaustion simply making her body shut down.

But she wasn’t ready to die yet. If they were lucky, Kate thought as the night wore on, blockage wouldn’t be the cause of death. She could have a few good weeks courtesy of the steroid, and if the fates were kind she could simply drift peacefully away.

That was what Jack was fighting for. Time, but more than time—a chance for her parents to be able to say goodbye to their daughter without the gut-wrenching awfulness of watching their daughter’s distress.

Kate stayed as Jack administered dexamethasone subcutaneously. She didn’t doubt him. His skill as he injected the steroid was matched only by his gentleness. He gave haloperidol for the nausea and she watched with him until the retching stopped, until the little girl’s body finally relaxed into sleep, until the steroid had a chance to start working.

Even then he wouldn’t leave. She would have taken over—it was simply a matter of keeping the little girl’s airway clear, keeping the obs up—but when she offered, Jack shook his head.

‘I’m physician in charge,’ he growled. ‘If Louise is happy to care for Harry...’

‘She is.’

‘Then you have patients to treat in the morning and I don’t. Go to bed, Kate, and leave Wendy to me.’

She didn’t want to leave.

There was no need for her to stay. Wendy was asleep. Her parents were asleep, too, on the armchairs just through the door, but she knew the slightest noise would rouse them.

They slept, however, because they trusted Jack to take care of their daughter.

She could do the same.

But...but...

She didn’t want to leave...him?

‘Bed,’ he said gently, and he raised a hand and ran his finger lightly down her cheek. It was a feather touch, the slightest of caresses that should have meant nothing but in truth meant everything.

‘Jack, thank you...’

‘It’s my job.’

‘You came here to be treated yourself.’

‘I brought Harry for treatment.’

‘Treatment here is for the whole family,’ she said. ‘That’s what you and Harry are. A family.’

‘And what about you, Kate?’ he asked softly. ‘Where’s a family for you?’ And then he smiled, that warm, endearing smile that made her heart do back flips.

‘That’s not a question to be answered tonight,’ he said. ‘Tonight’s for sleeping. But in the morning...next month...next year... You’re too precious a person to stay alone. I won’t let that bastard scar you for ever. But go to sleep, my Kate. Let’s worry about tomorrow tomorrow.’

* * *

She left and Jack was left with the sleeping Wendy. The night stretched on. Every now and then Wendy stirred and Jack checked, making sure her breathing was secure, keeping her safe.

Why? It was a question he asked himself often as an oncologist. Many of his patients were facing inevitable death. Why prolong it?

Because life was good.

He’d always believed it—sort of—but tonight that belief was suddenly intensified. Why?

Because he’d touched Kate’s face? Because he’d seen the change in her expression that said she trusted him, and there was hope in that look.

So many factors were coming into play. He had the long night to think about them, and think about them he did.

The unhappiness of his parents’ marriage, pushing him to turn into himself.

The loss of his little sister.

Harry’s dependence.

A man could lose hope, he thought, but as he watched the gentle rise and fall of Wendy’s chest, he knew that the opposite was true.

Hope was all there was, he thought.

And trust.

Kate trusted him. For some reason the thought was almost overwhelming. It was a gift beyond measure.

Not to be taken lightly.

Not to be rushed.

The night wore on. As the first rays of a breaking dawn showed through the curtains, Wendy’s sleep settled. The tension on her face faded. He felt her tummy and listened and heard unmistakeable bowel sounds.

Things were moving. The steroid was starting to do its job.

She’d have time.

How much time?

Did it matter? he thought. A day, a month, a year, a lifetime. He’d take everything he could get and make it good.

Was this about him or Wendy?

Both of them, he thought, tucking the bedclothes back around the little girl’s body. Right now he felt almost a part of her.

‘Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved with mankind.’

Donne’s words... He’d heard them, he’d even said them to himself as he’d fought for patient after patient over the years, but now they seemed clearer.

He was fighting for Wendy. He was involved.

He was involved with Harry in a way that couldn’t be undone.

He wanted to be involved with Kate.

And isolation? The desire to stand apart so he couldn’t be hurt? Where was that now?

Dissolved, he thought, or maybe it had never existed. Maybe it was something he could never achieve because Beth had always been there, and then Harry, and his patients like Wendy.

And Kate...

He wasn’t sure where to take this.

‘But I will try,’ he told the sleeping Wendy. ‘For your sake. For all our sakes. Life’s too short and too precious. For now let’s get out there and play with some dolphins. Let’s let ourselves love. Let’s give everything we have.’

Wendy stirred again but this time it wasn’t a movement of discomfort. It was just a child stirring in normal sleep.

‘You stay well,’ he told her. ‘For as long as you have. Let’s grab life with both hands, Wendy, girl. While we can.’

CHAPTER TEN

W
ENDY
RECOVERED
,
AND
something had healed inside Kate as well. For some crazy reason she felt she’d recovered with her.

But maybe this recovery was just like Wendy’s, she told herself. Wendy’s cure was short term. She was splashing in the dolphin pool, lying in a rubber ring, being pushed around the pool by the dolphins, weak but happy. She seemed to be soaking up every moment of this respite, and maybe that was because it
was
a respite. They all knew her cancer was waiting in the wings, pushed back for now but still there.

Maybe Kate’s distrust was still there as well, but some time during the night of Wendy’s illness she’d put it aside.

Jack was here now. She was trusting him.

She was loving him?

There was a question.

To all the world he was simply another parent. After the night with Wendy he’d reverted to being Harry’s guardian, Harry’s carer, Harry’s playmate. But things had changed with him, too, she thought. He’d relaxed in his relationship with Harry. He no longer seemed reserved. Harry was turning into a normal little boy. He was still quiet but maybe he’d always be quiet. He was gaining in confidence, the strain had gone from his eyes and he seemed confident of his world again.

‘I read on the internet about tame dolphins,’ he told Kate at the end of a session where he’d pushed his injured leg to the limit, so much so that Kate had called a halt and made him slow down. ‘It says it’s really cruel to keep them in enclosures.’

‘There are people who think that,’ Kate said gravely. They were sitting in the shallows, watching Hobble and his mates toss balls to each other. ‘They’re the ones who say we should let nature take its course. We could open the gates now, Hobble and his mates would be free—but the experts tell us that with their background and their injuries they’d be dead within weeks. There are people who say that’s better than them being in captivity. I don’t know. What do you think?’

She was talking to Harry as she would to an adult. Jack sat in the shallows beside them and listened. This was what Harry wouldn’t get if he went to live with Helen, he thought. Helen treated her kids as kids. Helen and Doug had brought them up on baby talk. Beth and Arthur had explained scientific theories to Harry before he could talk back.

‘I don’t want them to die,’ Harry said cautiously. ‘But the internet said it’s wrong for humans to treat them as play things.’

He was seven years old. Jack blinked. This kid astonished him more and more.

As did Kate. He waited for her to say it was silly. After all this was a defence of everything she worked for, but instead she gazed out at the dolphins and took her time to answer.

‘I’ve thought about that,’ she said at last. ‘A lot. I studied this place carefully before I came to work here. I’m not sure whether my decision is right but here’s the premise I’m working on.’

Premise... It was a big word for a seven-year-old but Harry didn’t blink. He knew the word. He was a scientist at seven.

And Jack felt a sudden swell of pride that had nothing to do with the fact that this was his nephew and Beth’s son and he was his guardian. It was everything to do with Harry as a person.

It’d be a privilege to raise this kid, he thought, and then he caught Kate’s glaze. She smiled and he thought, She knows what I’m thinking.

Drat, he didn’t do emotion.

He was doing emotion now.

‘My thinking is that these dolphins have been saved,’ Kate said. ‘It’s very hard to see an injured or orphaned dolphin and not help it. The argument for and against saving them is hard, and I and the people who work here don’t have control over it. All we do is take rescued dolphins and care for them. And caring for them means not letting them get bored. We’ve given them a ginormous enclosure but that’s not enough. In the wild these guys would surf and catch fish and swim for miles. So we figure they need toys. That’s what you are. A toy.’

‘A toy?’ Harry asked, fascinated.

‘Exactly.’ She beamed. ‘You may think you’re lucky getting to play with the dolphins but think of it from the dolphins’ point of view. Every day we give them a different set of toys to play with. One of them’s called Harry.’

Harry thought about it. He thought about it deeply, his small face a picture of concentration.

Kate said nothing.

She really was the most restful of women, Jack thought. She really was...

Um, no. Not yet. There was no way he could rush what was becoming blindingly obvious.

This was too precious to rush.

‘So it’s like giving Hobble a toy train,’ Harry said—cautiously. ‘Only instead of a toy train you’re giving him a Harry.’

‘Exactly,’ Kate said, and beamed some more. ‘We cover you up with a blue skin suit so you can’t damage the dolphins with sunscreen. We give you the rules and we let the dolphins play with you. And they know that every blue-wrapped gift is different. They figure it out. Watch how they treat Sam and his swimming—they know he’s strong in the upper body, they know he loves to swim. See how they react to Susie jumping up and down. They seem to jump, too. Watch how they nudge Wendy round the pool in her water ring. They never frighten her. Watch how they tease you, every day trying to make you swim faster. I don’t think it’s cruel to let them play with you, Harry. I think they love it.’

‘But they’re still stuck.’

‘They are still stuck,’ she agreed. ‘They’ve all been permanently injured in some way and there’s nothing we can do to fix that. So they’re stuck like Sam’s stuck in his wheelchair, but there are so many ways they can still have fun, just like Sam still has fun.’

Silence. Harry considered some more, and finally his grave little face cracked into a smile.

‘I think they need their toy called Harry again,’ he said, and chuckled and tossed a ball out onto the water, whooped as dolphins leapt to catch it and headed out into the water to join them.

Leaving Kate and Jack together.

They sat in more silence for a while. They were watching Harry and the dolphins, only they weren’t just watching. There were so many undercurrents...so many things waiting to be said.

‘That pretty much describes you,’ Jack said at last, feeling he was walking on eggshells. But he wanted to get close to this woman. It was so important...

‘What does?’

‘Injured and stuck.’

‘I’m not...’ But she faltered and looked away.

Time to probe, he thought. Dared he?

‘What would happen if the gates opened and you were free?’ he asked, feeling like this was eggshell territory.

‘I’d be terrified,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve been there. This suits me.’

‘For ever?’

‘For as long as I can stay hidden.’

‘When a dolphin’s cured, you do open the gates.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘But you don’t think you’ll ever be cured?’

‘Maybe not. You think I’m a coward?’

‘I don’t think anything of the kind, but I do think you could use help. Like you’re helping everyone else.’

‘I’m happy as I am.’

He motioned out to Hobble. ‘So if he had the choice—fix his scarring and join his mates out to sea or stay here for ever—what do you think he’d choose?’

‘It’s a big world out there.’

‘And dangerous. But for him to swim for miles, catch his own fish, do his own thing...’

‘I’m doing good here,’ she snapped.

‘Yes, you are, but the boundaries are still there and they worry you.’

‘I have enough to keep me occupied.’

‘What about me?’ he asked into the stillness. ‘I’m on the outside, Kate.’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘I mean I think I’m falling in love with you.’

She drew in her breath and stared out to sea for a while. Refusing to look at him. ‘You just want a mother for Harry.’

‘That’s not true, and you know it.’

‘It has to be true, Jack. I’m not in the market for a relationship.’

‘Neither am I,’ he said softly. ‘But, Kate, the way I feel about you...I’ve never felt this way before. I’ve been running scared, too. My parents’ relationship left me soured, thinking isolation was the way to go. That’s how it’s been all my life, holding myself contained. I never took a risk like you took with Simon. All my girlfriends have been just that—friends. I don’t think I’ve ever hurt anyone. The women I’ve dated have all valued their independence as well. But you... Suddenly that independence doesn’t seem so important. In fact, it seems crazy to want it. Loving you might entail risks but wouldn’t the risks be worth it?’

She did turn to face him then, her eyes troubled. ‘Jack, don’t.’

‘Why not?’ he asked gently. ‘Why not say it like it is?’

‘Because it’s too...pat,’ she retorted. ‘I can’t believe it. Independent Jack Kincaid, having his pick of beautiful women, never committing, then suddenly landed with his orphaned nephew. I know you’ve fallen in love with Harry. I also know how much Harry will change your life—unless you find someone else to share the loving. Who else but Kate? Kate, who’s been blackmailed all her life to love, whether she wants it or not.’

There was silence at that. He didn’t know where to take it. How to change a woman’s faith in the world? How to even begin?

The problem was that no matter how attracted he was to her, Harry was in the equation as well. The vision of a home with Harry and Kate was a thousand times more appealing than a home with just Harry.

A thousand times easier? Kate would make Harry a great mother. She understood him. Was part of his subconscious wanting that?

‘See,’ Kate said bleakly. ‘You can’t deny it.’

‘I think I can,’ he told her. ‘Kate, I should have fought for you years ago. You’re the most beautiful, the bravest, the best...’

‘But you didn’t,’ she threw back at him. ‘Because you didn’t have Harry.’

‘No,’ he admitted. ‘And Harry’s changed me. I hardly understand what that change is all about either. I agree I’m struggling. But what I feel for you...’

‘Needs to be tempered with sense. What you’re struggling with is a good dose of panic at being a single dad.’

‘I don’t think I am,’ he said, looking out at Harry. ‘I want to do this.’

‘Then do it,’ she said. ‘And in a year or so come back and see me—if you still want to.’

‘You’ll still be in your enclosure?’

‘Leave it,’ she said roughly, rising to her feet. ‘Let it be, Jack. I’m happy here and it’s taken all my life to get this happy. Please don’t mess with it.’

‘I won’t,’ he said, and he didn’t rise to stand by her. He let her be, even if it nearly killed him. ‘It’s your call, Kate. You’re right, my life is being turned upside down. All I know is what I feel. How can I trust that? I’m not sure I can, but I need to try. Let me know if you do, too.’

‘I’m fine as I am,’ Kate said.

‘I’m sure you are,’ Jack said. ‘But I’m also sure you’d like to be free. But the way you’re feeling...asking you to love me might be asking you to go from one enclosure to another and I’d never do that to you. Just know that if you ever want it, Harry and I will be waiting for you. Waiting to be free together.’

* * *

There was a lot there for a woman to think about—almost too much. Luckily the rest of the day’s sessions were straightforward. The dolphins did their stuff, the kids didn’t push injured limbs too far, the day was gorgeous, the mums and the dads were happy—all was right in her world.

Except Jack loved her.

What was wrong with that?

It scared her witless. It made her want to run.

Why?

Because a part of her—a really big part—said giving in to love left her exposed, as she’d been for most of her life. Love was gossamer chains that, when tugged against, became spiked steel.

Maybe she was being stupid, she conceded. She was comparing the love Jack was offering to the suffocating love of her parents—and to what Simon called love, the love of greed and cruelty.

But still...it was too much of a coincidence, she told herself, and she knew it was true. Jack had been left to care for his injured nephew. She’d formed a bond with Harry. Jack knew, or at least he must guess, how much she’d love to care for such a child as her own, and Jack needed that commitment. Because if she committed, he wouldn’t have to.

Her parents had loved her because they’d needed her. Simon had ‘loved’ her because he’d wanted control and money. And here was Jack, who needed a mother for his child.

But it was more than that. She could trust Jack.

How? She didn’t know, but there was somehow a deep sense that seemed to be working by instinct, that watched him up the beach now as he dug holes with his nephew, that said here was a man she could trust with her life.

But there was another part of her, the part that had been on the run for years, the part that had been battered and broken by a dreadful marriage, and that part said she was a fool. Had she learned nothing?

If Jack had come to her without Harry then...

No. Not even then. Trust had to be absolute, and how could she ever leave herself vulnerable?

She wanted to head somewhere and weep.

She wanted to lay it all out in front of Jack and let him tell her it was nonsense.

Instead, she bounced in the water and cheered on her little clients, and as she worked with each of them she thought of the shocking paths that had brought each of them here. Life was cruel. Random.

You had to protect yourself, she thought, and suddenly Maisie was lunging down the beach, through the shallows to reach her like, beaching herself on her mistress like she’d found her very own island. She was landed with an armful of soaking golden retriever. Maisie wriggled and licked and dripped and Kate thought this was the kind of treatment Maisie reserved for her very neediest of patients.

So why her? Why now?

Because she needed her. She hugged back and if she sniffed back a tear it was hidden in the fur of soaked dog. Finally she pulled away, and smiled and looked back to where Matilda Everingham was using her one good arm to try and keep a ball out of Hobble’s reach.

Matilda was recovering from a car accident. This place was helping her recover.