Harry St Clair: Rogue or Doctor? (11 page)

‘Nah.’ Bernie grinned. ‘My cuz has a car and he’ll take us when she goes into labour.’

Harry shook his head. ‘You can’t wait until she’s in labour.’ He turned to Bonnie and mouthed, ‘Talk some sense into them, please.’ Out loud, he said. ‘We’ll see what we can arrange.’ And left Bonnie to it.

‘What’s up his jumper?’ Bernie said as Harry walked away.

‘Apart from being up all night at an emergency, he wants what’s best for Tameeka and your baby, that’s all.’ Inside, Bonnie was fuming. What a lot of angst for nothing.

If they sent Tameeka too early she’d get homesick and come home again anyway. Then they’d have a devil of
a time getting her back to Alice Springs for the actual birth. Bonnie dealt with these issues all the time on outreach clinics. Heavy-handed tactics weren’t helpful at all.

Didn’t he realise it was a terrifying thing for the young woman to be sent to a large town on her own to give birth? Well, Bonnie would do what was necessary to smooth that path and hopefully it wouldn’t all backfire in her face. Life might have more facets of frustration with Harry than she’d anticipated.

Harry walked away and he could feel the rigid set of his shoulders as he fought panic.

Everything had been going along fine until he’d realised Tameeka was exactly the same length of time into her pregnancy as his wife had been when she’d died. Thirty-five weeks.

That awful paralysing fear had grabbed him by the throat and he’d wanted to put the young woman on a plane and get her to safety. Get her off his hands. Away from his responsibility. Let Alice Springs deal with her birth and she and her baby could come home well.

Which was ridiculous. Tameeka might not go into labour for another four weeks. Bonnie was right. But he also knew a person who feared the natural process of birth should not be caring for pregnant women. And that included him.

Needless interventions, like sending pregnant women away too early, didn’t help anyone. The inherent dangers if she came back and refused to leave again, increased risk of car accidents from multiple trips and postnatal
depression from a lonely stint away from her family all had to be weighed up.

He didn’t know what the answer was. Except now he was wishing he hadn’t come.

A
T THE
end of the first week, Bonnie waited for the Sounds of Silence Dinner bus in the reception area with all the tourists. She doubted she’d have arranged it so soon except that when Clint had been flown out by the RFDS, Donna had given Harry and herself the tickets they couldn’t use. And the porter loved the bottle of Scotch that Donna had said Clint wasn’t going to open now.

It felt odd to be dressed up to eat on a sand dune but Vicki and Steve had been adamant it added to the ambiance of the evening. Even odder when she reminded herself who her dinner companion was.

When Harry arrived in dark trousers and a white shirt stark against his tan, the other women waiting swivelled to admire him, and Bonnie smiled wryly as she watched them compare the two of them. Just like in Bali.

‘You look gorgeous,’ Harry said, and the way his eyes lingered reminded her how accomplished he was at beaming light at her. She remembered how she’d thought of him as a lighthouse the first time she’d seen him.

Funny how she forgot about the competition in an instant and even forgot how well she knew this man. Actually, she forgot about everything except the powerful
way he could draw her in like a merman to his shipwrecking rocks. Watch those rocks, she told herself.

That day he’d come over to talk to her at the swimming pool seemed so long ago and such a convoluted dance they’d been in since then. So much for not being one of his harem of admirers.

At least he didn’t turn it on at work.

Or maybe she had a force field when she was with a patient because after that first day or two she could separate the two then, helped immeasurably by that not-so-little issue of trust that she didn’t have with him now.

But tonight she could feel herself weaken. Pathetic woman. ‘Well, thank you, you’re looking debonair yourself.’

Harry’s fingers rested on her elbow as he steered her out to the arriving bus and the warmth of his possession ran up her arm. It was happening again. Waves of awareness tingling in her skin, heat, low and hard in her belly. Lordy, yes, this man made her know she was alive.

He leant down and spoke into her ear so the others couldn’t hear. ‘What’s the chance you get through this night without a call out?’

It was hard to listen when she was feeling so intensely. It felt so good to be hip to hip again. Too good to have his hand on her skin and his face near hers.

She pulled back, needing to make a play for some distance. ‘Fair to poor. But I’m going to enjoy the moments I do get. My friend in Darwin has been talking about this dinner since she did a stint here.’ Now she was babbling. There had to be a happy medium.

He ushered her up the steps of the bus and into a window seat. His hip was against hers as the bus took off on the ride out to the dunes, the excited chatter of their dinner companions a hum around them.

Bonnie felt Harry’s leg near hers, like on the bus on the day of the bike ride, but she was pretty sure she wasn’t going to end up naked in his arms like she had that day. She blushed. She had better not. It would be a lot harder to hide the damage from a repeat performance of gullibility.

She looked desperately out the window towards the orange and red hues of near sunset. There was the Rock, she thought with relief, and hung on to that magnificent vision like a lifejacket.

Bonnie breathed in the sheer magic like an antidote. Slowly she gained a measure of stability. The sight filled her head until she could shift aside Harry for a moment and the issues they had, and just savour Mother Earth at her most majestic.

‘Gorgeous,’ she said as she turned back to Harry and found him watching her, studying her profile as if he couldn’t understand something, and she felt her neck heat as she resisted the urge to give in and blush.

‘Have I got a smut on my nose or something?’

He laughed without humour. ‘Not that I can see.’

Bonnie frowned at him. They couldn’t do this. Work together and continue the level of awareness they generated between them. She opened her mouth to broach the idea of strategies for managing that when she reminded herself they were surrounded by other people.

Funny how the world seemed to narrow down to just the two of them when she was with Harry.

In the end it didn’t matter because the bus jerked to a halt, out in the middle of the desert between the two great icons of central Australia, the single massive of Uluru and Kata Tjuga, the huge collection of enormous boulders that made up the Olgas.

As she stepped off the bus Bonnie didn’t know which way to turn, to watch the sun reflected against the rock or setting behind the Olgas, and the choice was an aweinspiring dilemma.

Harry gestured to the silk rope and suggested she follow the guests up the incline to the top of the dune where a tuxedoed waiter stood with silver tray of champagne in crystal glasses.

The setting was beyond anything she’d expected. ‘Thank you,’ Bonnie said, and took a half-full glass from the man and slowly turned to admire the full view from the top of the dune. She crossed to the bar and at her request the waiter filled her glass with soda water. Harry did the same and she smiled at him. ‘Trying to get into my good graces?’

‘Not fair for just you to be on call.’ She’d never said he wasn’t thoughtful but she’d prefer if he made it easier to keep her distance and not harder.

They turned back to face the Rock. Neither spoke as the chiselled face of the massif grew more shadowed with wrinkled stone and signs of weathering in gold and different pinks that seemed to glow brighter. Too beautiful. As a backdrop, the dark velvet red of the desert, with sparse desert oaks interspersed up and down the rolling mini-dunes, blushed with its own radiance.

‘Kangaroo, crocodile or Tasmanian salmon.’ The
waitress offered tiny hors d’oeuvres with cress on crackers, and Bonnie blinked as the spell was broken.

She glanced at Harry, suddenly more composed. She did feel better. More grounded and relaxed with him. She could do this without making a fool of herself.

The idea of eating a wallaby wrinkled her nose, but crocodiles often ate humans so it seemed fair to return the favour. ‘Thank you.’ She glanced at Harry, darkly handsome as he watched her, and she pretended she wasn’t perturbed by his study. Hers was a front but a fairly good one.

‘After luwak coffee I’ll try anything.’ Bonnie took a serviette and biscuit with crocodile meat and nibbled at the edge of it. See, she could even allude to a previous time. She was strong. It was quite an act not to drop crumbs or her lass but her composure held.

Her juggling must have looked a little dangerous because Harry collected another serviette for her with a smile.

‘Maybe we should take turns, and the other person can hold the glass, like an old married couple.’

Harry using the
M
word. Good grief. And he didn’t look happy about it. She glanced away. ‘There’s a few of those here. Lucky things, to be travelling round together. Clint and Donna should be here. They’d fit right in.’

He didn’t quite wrinkle his nose but he turned his shoulder to block out the concept of happily married couples. ‘Let’s move to a spot with a bench so we can sit and just relax to enjoy the view.’

Harry’s aversion to marriage and happy couples was getting a bit old actually. Bonnie had no problem enjoying the history of the other couple. They found a spot on
a rustically weathered log and as Bonnie emptied her hands she spotted Iris, her silver-haired, fly-swallowing lady from the first day, and waved.

Harry lifted one eyebrow as Iris bustled across, all chiffon and pearls, dragging a twinkle-eyed gentleman, and when she arrived she even kissed Bonnie’s cheek.

‘Hello, there, dear.’ Iris was glowing. ‘How lovely to see you.’ She glanced over her shoulder at her beau. ‘Fergus is a widower. We met last night. We had such a wonderful time that Fergus asked me to come with him again tonight.’

Bonnie shook the man’s hand. ‘That’s lovely, Iris. Hello, Fergus. This is Harry, the doctor I work with.’

‘Harry.’ Fergus smiled and they shook hands too. Bonnie pointed to the tray as it went past held by a smiling waitress.

‘Have you tried the crocodile?’

Iris giggled. ‘I said to Fergus, if I can eat a fly I can eat a crocodile.’ She glanced affectionately up at the elderly gentleman who looked down at her with an amused air. ‘He thinks I’m silly.’

‘Och, that’s no’ true. I think you’re a sweet wee gasbag and a lot of fun. Now, let’s leave these young ones to enjoy their evening while I whisper sweet nothings in your ear.’

Iris waved and Bonnie couldn’t help the grin on her face as she watched them walk away. ‘That’s great. A gorgeous Scotsman. She was so sad when I met her earlier in the week.’

‘You’re a softy. Care about each person, don’t you?’ Harry said. ‘Really wish them well. Anyone and everyone.’
He shook his head at the concept, pretended he didn’t subscribe to it too. ‘Not everyone is like that.’

She drained her glass. ‘I know for a fact you care, so don’t give me that. I’ve seen you in action in Bali. The kids on the bikes, that first night we met. Even the people here.’ She stared at him. ‘It’s what we do, Harry. Why we do it. Coming back to medicine might help you find the large part of you that’s missing.’ She felt the wall go up.

‘So I’m guessing you like it here.’ Harry changed the subject and she mentally shrugged. It was still like being in a minefield, talking to him.

‘I’m enjoying myself. I’d like more midwifery, but apart from the antenatal visits for the women from the settlement, as you’ve already said quite strongly, labours need to be shipped out. So I won’t see much of that. But I’m enjoying the diversity.’

‘Steve and Vicki do a good job.’ They took two more hors d’oeuvres as they went past and conversation gave way to pleasure in the view.

She nodded and sighed happily over the sunset that grew more spectacular by the second, and without looking at him tried for some history that wouldn’t upset him. ‘So, tell me how you know Steve?’

He put his glass down. ‘We grew up together, in Darwin. Went to the same schools, same group of friends, got married in the same year.’

He’d even mentioned his wife. That was a first. ‘So your wife was from Darwin too?’

‘No.’ He stood up and looked at the bar. ‘Do you want a soft drink? I think I’ll get one.’ Slam. End of conversation.

‘Sure.’ She stood up herself. ‘I might go and chase the waitress for another one of those crocodile biscuits.’

Bonnie circulated among the other guests, Iris introduced her around, she spoke to the wait staff she’d seen in the Desert Pea accommodation and avoided looking for Harry.

When they were called through the silk rope again from the top of the dune down to where the tables were laid out in the desert below, he appeared beside her in time to be her dinner companion, along with six other people at their circular table.

She wasn’t sure she’d have been so efficient. ‘I thought you might have preferred to sit next to someone less nosy.’

He touched his own nose. ‘You’re not nosy. I’m just out of practice answering to anyone.’

‘That’s your right. Sorry if I upset you, Harry.’ She chose her seat and tucked her bag under her chair.

He waited until she was seated, then sat down and they shared the sight of the vastness of the Olgas in front of them across the stretching desert. ‘You haven’t a mean bone in your body, Bonnie. Let’s just enjoy the night.’

Bonnie chose to admire the snowy cloth and the silver cutlery and the glasses that shone in the candlelight. Much better than feeling patronised, and a little irritated, even isolated below the stars that slowly appeared out of the darkening night sky, which was ridiculous. Other people introduced themselves, so there were other people apart from Harry here, she must remember that. This was getting old too.

She joined in the introductions that followed, appreciated
the revelry as the champagne the others were drinking, even if she wasn’t, relaxed her dinner companions and loosened their tongues. It seemed they had a party of couples towing their caravans around Australia at their table.

‘Been on the road for three months,’ one of the husbands said with a grin, and his wife rolled her eyes. One of the other women giggled.

‘We’re in our fifth month,’ another commented, and Bonnie listened in awe as they spoke of the places they’d seen and the unexpected adventures they’d found. She couldn’t imagine being with one person for months on end in a vehicle. She certainly couldn’t imagine Harry doing it, but by the end of a long dinner and their companions, at least, draining the replenished red and white wine, she could see the fun of it.

Later that night, when the bus dropped them off, even Harry found himself returning to the staff quarters more relaxed than he’d expected.

He heard Bonnie say, ‘I had a ball.’

And it was actually easy to say, ‘Me too.’

He could see Bonnie still smiling over the risqué comments that had followed them off the bus and suddenly he didn’t want the night to end. Didn’t want to lose the connection they’d built up over the evening. A connection he hadn’t felt since Ubud, which, of course was his own fault.

‘Fancy a pot of tea? Don’t know about you but the evening seemed to end a bit suddenly for me.’

‘Sounds good.’ Bonnie looked up into the sky, searching for newly identified constellations, not so easy to see with all the lights around them. Out in the desert
they’d extinguished the lights, the darkness had opened the whole sky to them, and it was a sight she’d never forget.

She spun around as she tried to identify the stars. ‘It was much easier when the astronomer pointed them out.’

She sounded plaintive, and Harry smiled to himself. Her eyes had been brighter than any of the stars they’d seen tonight. She’d been so excited to learn the names of the constellations and individual celestial bodies when the stargazer had told stories and myths from the past. He remembered how she’d been interested in the stars that night at Jimbaran.

‘Come inside before Security decides you’re up to no good.’

Bonnie turned her head and waved at the man with his torch who was circling the building. ‘I reckon he’d recognise us from the other night, but okay.’