Baby Shock for the Millionaire Doc
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Marion Lennox
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14
PROLOGUE
SHE HAD TO give this baby away.
At two in the morning, sleep deprived to the point of illness, this final decision was tearing her apart.
It was the only one available.
Baby Lily, six weeks old, had been released from hospital a week ago, but no matter what Misty tried, she wouldn’t settle. Misty was the sole doctor for Kirra Island, but in the last few days there’d been no time for medicine. No time for the islanders.
There’d been no time for anything.
Misty had abandoned almost everything to be with her tiny niece. She’d crooned and rocked and slept in snatches of no more than an hour. Her grandmother had rocked her back and forth in her wheelchair until she swore she was wearing wheel ruts in the kitchen’s linoleum. Both women had put everything they knew into caring for this tiny bundle, and all the time, Misty’s nephew, seven-year-old Forrest, was hunched under his bedclothes, knowing—no matter what he was told—that somehow this was All His Fault.
Forrest was turning into an Eeyore, Misty thought dismally. Just the way she’d always been.
Tigger and Eeyore. That’s what their mother had nicknamed her two daughters, after the happy go lucky tiger and the doleful donkey in A.A. Milne’s beloved Winnie the Pooh. Misty’s older sister, Jancie, had been Tigger, out for a good time, no matter what. Misty had been Eeyore and now Forrest was turning into an Eeyore, too. A little boy who never expected anything good to happen.
Twelve months ago, Misty had finally gained custody of Jancie’s son and she’d sworn she’d give him a childhood where he could be happy.
Well, Jancie had done her best to see that wouldn’t happen. Her sister’s anger at losing custody of her neglected little boy had been off the scale. In what must have been an act of pure defiance, she’d fallen pregnant again almost as soon as she’d been released from her latest stint in prison. Thus here was Misty, forced again to handle the consequences. Forced to take care of this tiny newborn.
But Misty’s capacity to care had reached its limit. She was the sole doctor for Kirra Island’s six hundred permanent residents. Her grandmother, wheelchair bound after years of struggling to control her diabetes, did her best to help, but there were times where Misty had to help her. And Forrest...how was she to give him any sort of happy childhood?
To keep this little one, Misty’s only choice would be to give up her career to care for them all. Sadly that couldn’t be an option. There was no other doctor willing to work on Kirra Island and besides, she was broke—Jancie’s legal and medical fees had seen to that. She’d be raising them all in poverty.
As she struggled with these choices, in her head she could hear her sister’s mocking voice and, before hers, their mother’s.
For some reason she’d been remembering a childhood morning. Seven-year-old Misty had been awake, dressed in her second-hand uniform, desperate to go to school. For Misty, school had always been a sanctuary, but as often happened, her mother refused to take her.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Misty, stop whining. What does it matter if you miss school? You’re not my conscience. I’m taking my headache back to bed.’
For as long as she could remember, that’s what she’d felt like, her mother’s conscience. Misty had been Eeyore, spoiling her mother’s fun—and as Jancie got deeper and deeper into trouble, her sister’s, too.
In her arms Lily gave a protesting mew and Misty looked down at her sister’s baby with exhausted eyes. She was close to the edge. There had to be lightness somewhere.
But maybe it was here.
On her desk sat her sister’s computer. It had taken a couple of local computer geeks some time to break into it, but now she had access, complete with internet history.
She was looking at history from almost a year ago, and there it was. There he was.
Doctor Angus Firth
Thirty-two
Runner up in the Gold Coast Surf Championships
She was looking at colour photographs of a lean, ripped surfer, sweeping in on cresting waves. His body had been glistening from surf and sun—and probably sun oil? His sun-bleached, wavy blond hair was a bit too long, but not long enough to hide gorgeous blue eyes.
Doctor Angus Firth, surfer from Melbourne, was riding waves with skill and looks good enough to catch the eye of professional media photographers. He was concentrating, but he’d obviously been relaxed enough to see the photographer and he’d given him a wicked, teasing grin. Like, I can do this and enjoy myself, too?
Attached to the photograph was a newspaper report extolling his skill, discussing how sheer bad luck had robbed him of the championship.
But Jancie’s internet searching hadn’t stopped with surfing. Misty had found social media searches, searches of academic records, career background. The files were a compilation of fact after fact.
And dating from the following weeks there’d been searches of accommodation bookings. ‘She’s hacked into all sorts of places,’ the computer experts had told Misty. ‘Wow, even there!’
There had been a booking at a luxury hotel near the Gold Coast Surf Championships. Easier to find had been another booking by Jancie, at the same time, for the same hotel. There’d then been timetables of the championship event and then a spreadsheet of appearances, of restaurant bookings, of so much.
And then there’d been ovulation charts, neatly documented. For such an irresponsible woman, Jancie had sometimes been extraordinarily clever.
So tonight, while Lily fitfully slept and complained, Misty had scrolled on, reading and rereading all the information Jancie had collected on Angus Firth.
So what was there? No responsibilities as far as she could see. A family background of wealth and privilege. A medical career, but seemingly not one he took seriously.
Was he like Jancie, another Tigger?
And it seemed Jancie had plotted to meet him. Ten months ago, her planned campaign was all mapped out in her sister’s internet history. It seemed Dr Firth had serious family money and Misty could almost see Jancie’s plan to hit him for support payments in the future.
But the future was now. If all this evidence proved he was indeed Lily’s father... If Lily indeed had a living parent...
Maybe that support could happen straight away?
‘Enough,’ she told Lily, as the tiny creature in her arms decided that she’d had enough, too, and opened her mouth and wailed. ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart, but it’s time for this Eeyore to share, and if this man is indeed your dad... Forrest needs a chance to be a carefree kid and maybe even I could use a sliver of a chance at being Tigger.’
Then she looked again at the photograph of the blond, carefree, surfer-cum-doctor. ‘So, Dr Angus Firth,’ she said out loud, ‘have I got a surprise for you.
