Reunited by Their Secret Daughter
Auteur
Emily Forbes
Lezers
19,3K
Hoofdstukken
12
CHAPTER ONE
‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR LILY! Happy Birthday to you!’
Chloe Larson blinked back tears as Lily blew out the candles on her birthday cake. She couldn’t believe she had a three-year-old daughter.
She pulled the candles from the cake and picked up the knife. ‘Shall I help you cut it up?’ she asked.
‘I want Granny to help me,’ Lily said.
Chloe tried not to be hurt. Ever since Chloe had found out she was pregnant at the age of twenty-four and had chosen to be a single mother, her own mother had been supportive. Chloe knew she couldn’t have raised Lily without her help, and she tried not to mind when Lily turned to Susan as easily as she turned to Chloe, but sometimes she wished that life had been different.
She held back a sigh as she passed the knife to her mum. There was no point in wishing for something that wasn’t to be.
‘Make a wish, Lily,’ Susan said as she guided her granddaughter’s hand to slice through the rainbow cake.
‘Don’t touch the bottom, Lil,’ Chloe’s brother Tom prompted.
Lily carefully lifted pieces of cake onto pink paper plates. ‘Uncle Tom gets one first,’ she said as she handed cake to her guests. ‘When will Uncle Guy get here?’
‘You saw him this morning, Lil. He’s working tonight. We’ll have to save him a piece.’
‘Can you take me for another ride now, Uncle Tom?’ Lily asked as she put a final piece of cake aside for Guy.
Chloe’s brothers had given Lily a pink bike, with streamers dangling from the handles and a set of stabilisers on the back, for her birthday and Lily had spent most of the day riding up and down the driveway with Tom close behind.
‘Sure.’
At twenty-one, Tom had plenty of energy, despite his job as a paramedic, and he doted on Lily as all Chloe’s family did. Chloe knew how lucky she was. People said it took a village to raise a child, and Chloe was grateful to her mother and brothers for their support. And to her girlfriends. She had a lot to be thankful for.
‘Come and watch me, Granny.’
Lily skipped outside followed by Tom and Susan, leaving Chloe inside with two of her best friends.
‘Okay, who will join me in a glass of wine or a G&T? Esther?’
‘Wine, please,’ Esther replied as Carly, who was in the early stages of pregnancy, said, ‘No wine for me, but I wouldn’t say no to another piece of cake.’
‘What would you wish for, Chloe, if it was your birthday?’ Esther asked her when she returned with the wine and Carly cut more cake. ‘How about your own happily ever after?’
Chloe looked sideways at Esther. The three women had been friends since they’d undertaken their midwifery training at the Queen Victoria together, and along with Isabella, who was currently overseas, the four of them had formed a tight-knit unit and sometimes Chloe was sure they could read each other’s minds. But surely Esther wouldn’t have guessed that Chloe was wishing for a different life?
‘I’m already happy,’ Chloe replied. She always insisted that she was happy with her life. She’d made a choice and she didn’t regret it, even if it hadn’t always been easy.
‘How about satisfied, then? Couldn’t you do with a white knight to come riding into your world?’
That was the trouble now that Carly and Esther had each found their perfect match and were deeply in love—they were both soon to be married and wanted everyone else to have their own happily ever after. But serious relationships were not for her; in her experience they only led to heartache. She’d be happy for Esther and Carly—she was happy for them—and she’d be a supportive friend, but she wouldn’t make the mistake of believing she could have her own happily ever after again. She’d been in love once before and it hadn’t ended the way she’d hoped.
‘I’m fine,’ she insisted.
Her life was busy and she was rarely alone even if she was sometimes lonely. Her days were spent either at work in Accident and Emergency at the Queen Victoria Hospital where she was surrounded by patients and colleagues or at home with her daughter. Home was her childhood house where Chloe’s youngest brother, Tom, and her mother also lived. Chloe had never moved out, although that had been her intention. She’d finished school and stayed home while she completed her nursing and then midwifery training but her unexpected pregnancy had derailed her plans and here she was, three years later, still living in her mother’s house.
It sounded depressing, it sounded as if she hadn’t achieved a great deal, but she paid rent and her share of the bills. She was a flatmate in a sense, not a free boarder. Plus she had a good relationship with her mother and Lily benefited from having family around—she loved her granny and her uncles. The arrangement suited everyone and Chloe was happy enough. She couldn’t deny that sometimes she wished for companionship, and yes, sometimes she wished for more sex too, but she didn’t believe in one-night stands and she didn’t believe in people’s ability to maintain long-term monogamous relationships so she was caught between a rock and a hard place. It would take someone pretty special to make her believe in happily ever after again. She thought she might have missed her chance at finding her ‘one.’
‘How long since you’ve been on a date?’ Esther asked.
‘It’s been a while,’ she admitted.
‘Can you be more specific?’ Carly asked with a smile.
‘November.’
‘November! It’s already March!’
‘I know. But everyone is busy over Christmas and then, in the middle of winter, I can’t be bothered going out.’
‘Maybe you should try online dating,’ Carly suggested. ‘At least that way you can start the process from home. You can peruse the menu in your pyjamas, so to speak.’
But Chloe had heard too many bad stories about online dating. She wanted to feel that spark of attraction from seeing someone in the flesh. She knew that existed. It had happened to her before. She didn’t want to flick through online sites judging people on their photoshopped looks or their fabricated profiles and she certainly didn’t want people judging her anonymously. She shook her head.
‘You should think about it, Chlo,’ Esther said. ‘I’d love you to bring a date to my wedding.’
Esther had told her on numerous occasions she was welcome to bring a guest but Chloe couldn’t imagine where she’d find someone she wanted to be her ‘plus one.’
‘I could ask Harry if he knows anyone or maybe you’ll meet someone at the wedding,’ Esther said before turning to Carly. ‘Or maybe Adem has some nice single friends?’
Chloe’s blood ran cold at the idea of being paraded around to all the single men. ‘I know you mean well, but I’m okay on my own. Really.’
Esther and Carly both looked a little sheepish. ‘Sorry. You know we love you and we just want you to be happy.’
‘I am,’ she insisted again. ‘Don’t say anything to Harry or Adem on my behalf but I’ll let you know if I change my mind about a date. Okay?’
Maybe she should take a date with her, even if it was just someone to provide a shield, some protection, if necessary. But she had no idea where she would find such a person.
Chloe put Lily’s favourite bedtime story book down and wriggled carefully out of her daughter’s bed, trying not to disturb her. She pulled the covers up and took a moment to watch her sleeping.
Lily was the spitting image of her at the same age. Her riot of strawberry blond curls fanned across the pillow framing her round face. A scattering of freckles ran over her nose, little dark spots on her pale skin. She had one arm thrown up beside her head and Chloe knew there was a graze on her bony elbow and another one on her knee. She reached out and touched one of Lily’s curls. Chloe had always hated her own hair, especially as a teenager, and the minute she could afford to she had bought a straightening iron and had dyed her hair blond, but now she loved her daughter’s strawberry curls. Chloe still dyed her hair, although she had given up straightening it except on occasion. Straightening her hair took time and that was a luxury she didn’t have much of any more.
The only differing feature between her and her daughter at the age of three was the colour of their eyes. Chloe’s were dark brown, Lily’s were grey, and in Chloe’s opinion Lily’s were far more striking especially in contrast to her pale auburn curls.
She searched her daughter’s face looking for any resemblance to the man who had fathered her. She liked to think there was something of him in Lily but as more time passed it was becoming harder to remember all the little details. Lily definitely had her father’s grey eyes but she couldn’t see those while Lily slept. She wondered if Lily ever wished that her father was around. Was something missing in her life? She seemed happy enough and she had good male role models but was that the same thing?
Chloe knew it wasn’t. Chloe and her younger brothers had been raised by their mother after their father had died when Chloe was seven. Chloe loved her mum and she knew she’d done a brilliant job raising three kids on her own but that had never stopped Chloe from missing her father. Lily had never met her father; maybe that would be enough to stem those feelings of loss, but Chloe doubted it. It might not matter to Lily now but what about when she got older?
She wondered for the thousandth time what had happened to Lily’s father. To Xander.
To the man who had captured her heart in the Australian outback four years ago.
He had looked like a blond Nordic god and she’d known from the moment she’d met him that he was damaged, wounded, but he was gorgeous, irresistible, and she’d been certain she could handle him. She’d been on a study exchange with the Australian flying doctor service and hadn’t been looking for anything more than a holiday romance.
Initially everything had been fine. Manageable. On paper, their affair looked perfect. She was young and footloose and Xander had just been through an acrimonious divorce. Neither of them had been looking for anything serious and they’d both been happy to have a light-hearted liaison, something to satisfy their mutual physical attraction and desires. Their time together had lasted less than four weeks. That was all the time she had left in Australia. It was enough time to have some fun but not long enough for heartache.
At the end of the month she hadn’t been ready to leave but she figured she’d forget about him in time. A holiday romance wasn’t meant to be for ever. She missed him but she figured she’d get over it.
She would focus on her career, on getting a contract with the Air Ambulance Service, and Xander Jameson would become part of her past. A memory to take out and relive from time to time.
But she hadn’t expected the emptiness that gnawed away at her. The ache that felt like a lump of lead in her chest. She’d never fully given her heart to anyone—in her experience men had a wandering eye and had trouble staying faithful, and she protected her heart zealously, careful not to give it away—but Xander had caught her by surprise.
She certainly hadn’t planned to fall in love. In her experience love didn’t last. Her parents’ marriage had crumbled under the weight of her father’s infidelity and Chloe’s one semi-serious relationship at the age of twenty-one had suffered the same fate. In her experience falling in love only led to heartache. But that didn’t stop it from happening to her.
She hadn’t counted on meeting Xander.
And she hadn’t counted on falling pregnant.
She had been back in London for a month before she realised. At least that situation explained her unexpected feelings. She wasn’t in love, she told herself, just overwhelmed by a flood of hormones.
She tried to contact Xander—she knew it was the right thing to do—but he’d disappeared.
She’d wanted to find him; despite her strong views on serious relationships and their longevity she let herself get carried away with a fantasy, creating all sorts of happily ever afters in her mind, and part of her hoped for a miraculous happy ending even though she knew there were no such guarantees.
She only realised when she was trying unsuccessfully to find him how little she really knew about him. They hadn’t spent much time talking about anything important. She knew he’d grown up in Adelaide in South Australia but he had no social media identity and his work colleagues had either been unable or unwilling to give her any useful information. Her letters had been returned to sender, unopened. He seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth.
But she had never stopped wondering if her life would have been different if she’d found him.
Would he have wanted to make them a family?
He had told her his marriage had ended because his wife had wanted children and, although he’d never voiced the words, Chloe took that to mean that he didn’t.
She’d been relieved in a way not to find him. What would he think of Lily? She was glad she hadn’t had to find out. The decisions about her pregnancy were hers alone to make and her dreams of a happily ever after remained just dreams.
Once Lily was born she’d had no time to continue her search and she’d doused the flames of her dreams and focused on the job of raising her daughter. But she’d never forgotten him.
She sighed.
How could she forget him when she was reminded of him every day? Every time she looked into her daughter’s eyes.
She’d tried to forget and she’d tried to convince herself she hadn’t been in love with him. If anything, her experience with Xander was just more proof that everlasting love was not meant for her.
She had her daughter, her miracle, her precious Lily. That would have to be enough.
She left Lily’s night light on and the door ajar as she slipped out of the room while her mind continued to wander. If she’d realised the consequences of their affair would she have been more cautious?
She loved her daughter and she had absolutely no regrets about having her. She was always going to keep the baby—her mum had raised three kids with minimal help and Chloe knew she could raise one. She had never considered giving Lily up. She had no regrets about the choices she had made but she did sometimes wonder about a different future.
Maybe the fact that Esther and Carly were both about to settle down and join the ranks of the happily married was making her reassess her own life. Maybe she did need to get out on the dating scene. Maybe she would like some company. Now that Lily was three maybe Chloe’s life would calm down, perhaps she would get some time to herself, a day that wasn’t all consumed by motherhood and her career. Perhaps there would be some time for her to have a social life beyond an occasional drink or dinner with Carly and Esther. Nothing serious—casual dating would be fine. She wasn’t going to dream of anything more than that. She and Lily were fine on their own and she wasn’t prepared to settle for anyone ordinary. It was better to be single than to be with someone who wasn’t perfect for her. And for Lily.
Still she wondered if Xander could have been that person.
She had been on a few dates since Lily had been born but no one had lived up to her memory of Xander. She was sensible enough to realise that her memory may have altered over the years. She was remembering all the good things, looking at him through rose-tinted glasses, but he couldn’t be perfect. Four weeks just hadn’t been long enough for her to get annoyed by his flaws.
But what if she had found him?
Where would they be now?
She shook her head. She couldn’t survive on ‘what ifs.’ Even if she’d found him, he might not have been the person she wanted him to be. They’d had amazing chemistry but who knew if that would have been enough to sustain a happy, long-term relationship. She was certainly none the wiser.
She was sure there was a simple explanation to Xander’s apparent disappearance but, whatever it was, she’d never been able to find him and now, here she was, almost four years later, still single, and Lily was still without a father.
Should she let her girlfriends set her up? Chloe wondered as she hurried through A&E to fetch another bag of saline. Was that the answer?
The idea of going on a date wasn’t completely unappealing but the logistics of it wasn’t as simple. Most days after a long shift at work and then coming home to a toddler, she barely had the energy for housework. She couldn’t imagine having the energy to get ready and dressed up for a date.
She returned to the treatment cubicle and her patient, pushing all thoughts of dating aside.
‘All right, Penny, this should help you feel better,’ she said as she connected the bag of saline to the drip.
‘Can you tell me again what the doctor said is wrong with me?’ Penny asked.
‘You have a condition called hyperemesis gravidarium,’ Chloe told her as she updated Penny’s chart. ‘It’s a medical term for severe morning sickness that unfortunately doesn’t just hit you in the morning. I know you feel awful and while it can be serious it’s not life-threatening and it will pass.’
‘When?’
‘It’s usually much better by about halfway through your pregnancy.’
‘That’s another three months away,’ Penny groaned, and reached for the bowl and proceeded to vomit again. She’d presented to A&E in the late afternoon, badly dehydrated, having vomited all day.
Chloe held Penny’s hair back from her face and took the bowl from her when she finished, swapping it with a cool, damp flannel.
‘Is there anything I can do to make it stop?’ Penny asked.
‘Some expectant mums find that drinking your food instead of eating it can help,’ said Chloe. ‘Making shakes and smoothies for example and a diet high in protein and carbohydrates is better than a fatty diet. Ginger and vitamin B6 can also help.’
Scans had shown that Penny was pregnant with only one baby and blood tests hadn’t detected a virus or anything else untoward. She had low blood pressure and a rapid pulse but the nausea and dehydration were the main concern.
‘Does the vomiting harm the baby?’
‘Vomiting itself isn’t harmful but it is important not to ignore the symptoms. If you’re unable to keep food down, then you’re not getting the nutrition you need and neither is the baby and sometimes this can cause a low birthweight. You do need to take care of yourself.’ Chloe didn’t want to frighten Penny unnecessarily but it was important to stress that she needed to monitor her condition. ‘A lot of pregnant women with this condition find they need regular fluid top-ups to combat the dehydration. Anti-nausea medication as well and, very occasionally, hospital admission. I’m going to give you the details for the Early Pregnancy Unit here at the hospital. It’s open every day during office hours. That’s the place to go if you’re feeling unwell. You’ll get seen faster than here in A&E and you’re less likely to pick up any bugs. I think you should pop in there for a check-up in the next day or two as they will be able to suggest some strategies to help you through this.’
Chloe pulled a notebook from the pocket of her scrubs and wrote down the phone number and details for the EPU as well as the scientific term for Penny’s diagnosis. As she tucked it into Penny’s bag the A&E manager stuck her head into the cubicle.
‘Chloe? The air ambulance has called for a midwife. Can you go with them?’ Shirley asked. ‘I’ll reassign your patient.’
Chloe nodded. ‘Penny’s notes are up to date. She’s all set for the moment.’
Chloe was one of three midwives who worked with the Air Ambulance Service on an as-needed basis. The service had their base on the top floor of the Queen Victoria Hospital with a rooftop helipad, and Chloe had applied for a position at the hospital specifically to work with the service. She loved the work and wished she could do it full time but that would mean doing general nursing and not midwifery. She didn’t want to give that up so this was the compromise; she felt it gave her the best of both worlds.
She threw her gloves into the bin and hurried to the lift, not wanting to waste time. Protocol dictated that the crew would aim to take off within four minutes of receiving a call.
She got out one flight before the roof and stepped into the pair of orange overalls that were handed to her. She zipped them up over her scrubs and ran up the stairs and out onto the roof. She jogged across to where the helicopter sat on the helipad, its rotors turning. She ducked her head instinctively even though she wasn’t tall enough for the blades to hit her and climbed into the chopper and took her seat. Neil, one of the two fire officers on deck, slid the door closed behind her.
She reached up and unhooked a helmet that was hanging above her head. She tugged the elastic band that tied her unruly curls into a ponytail lower down on her neck so she could pull the helmet on. Sitting opposite her was Rick, one of the service’s paramedics.
She hadn’t been called for a job in over a month and she felt the familiar thrill of nervousness and anticipation as she fastened her helmet strap and reached for her harness. She worked quickly, not taking the time to glance at the other seat where one of the doctors would be sitting, as she knew the pilot was waiting to lift off.
‘Chloe, this is Dr Alexander Jameson.’ She slid one arm into her harness as she heard Rick introduce her to a new doctor. ‘He’s covering for Eloise while she’s off after her knee surgery.’
Chloe felt a shiver down her spine and her heart rate increased even as she told herself she’d misheard. She must have misheard. She’d been thinking about Xander and must have imagined Rick had said his name because why would he be here? She kept her head down, taking longer than usual to click her harness together.
‘He’s just come down from Wales.’
Chloe breathed out. He was Welsh. Not Australian. It wasn’t him.
But when she lifted her head she was looking directly into a pair of familiar grey eyes.
It was him.
Xander.
Her vision blurred as everything around her shifted. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to clear her vision, but when she opened them she found Xander still looking straight back at her.
His eyes ensnared hers and held her motionless and she felt the air rush from her lungs as if she’d been punched in the stomach.
She stared at him. At the helmet that covered his head but not his perfect oval face with its angular, high cheekbones. At his full lips that were outlined by designer stubble and at his forehead that was slightly creased. She remembered that expression; so often serious, he usually looked either like he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders or was deep in thought.
She wanted to reach over and smooth the crease from his brow.
His grey eyes, which still held a trace of sadness, were wide, framed by thick, dark blond lashes, and they stared straight into her soul.
How could she have forgotten how gorgeous he was?
She was immediately transported back to a hot Australian day, to the first time she saw him. He had the same effect on her today as he’d had then. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t think. She couldn’t stop staring at him. From the moment she’d first laid eyes on him almost four years ago she’d fallen hard and she could feel herself tumbling again.
How could she have forgotten the intensity of her feelings?
She felt light-headed, dizzy, and was grateful that she was already sitting down.
She had spent months trying to find him. Months thinking of all the terrible things that could have happened to him and here he was, apparently fit and well, sitting in her chopper.
