She helped him finish his breakfast then took him upstairs to clean his teeth, ever conscious of the minutes ticking away. Mornings were always hectic and today she needed to be at the surgery early as she had two patients booked in for fasting cholesterol tests. As soon as Theo had finished, she hurried him out to the car, quickly strapping him into his seat before fetching his lunch bag from the kitchen. Fortunately the good weather had held and there was no need to worry about coats, which saved another precious few seconds. It was just gone seven-thirty when she backed off the path of the tiny cottage she rented on the outskirts of the town and she breathed a sigh of relief. She’d be well in time for her first appointment after she’d dropped Theo off at the nursery.
She headed into Bride’s Bay, taking the road that skirted the headland as it was the quickest route. There were already a number of cars about, no doubt tourists intent on making the most of the bank holiday weekend. She slowed down to let a top-of-the-range four-by-four turn into a narrow track leading to the cove. From the look of its paintwork the vehicle had never been off-road before and she smiled to herself as she pictured the state of the track’s rutted surface. It wouldn’t look quite so pristine after it had driven down there!
Emily rounded the bend then had to slow once again when she encountered a car parked on the grass verge. There were a couple of vehicles coming the other way so she waited for them to pass. She pulled out to overtake, automatically glancing at the car as she drew alongside. The driver had the window down and she had a clear view of him, so clear that for a moment she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Just for a second her brain seized up, the thoughts all jammed up like logs in a river: Ben. Here. Sitting in that car.
Her foot pressed down way too hard on the accelerator and she roared past, and the sound of the engine broke the spell. Emily bit her lip to stem the cry that threatened to emerge. She didn’t want to frighten Theo but she could feel it building inside her until it felt her head was ringing with it. What did Ben want? Why had he come here? Did it have anything to do with Theo and if it did, how did she feel about that?
She took a deep breath, forcing the panic to subside to a level she could deal with. She had no idea what the answers were to any of those questions but she intended to find out.
‘Have you got a minute, Tom?’
Emily summoned a smile as she popped her head round the consulting room door, but the tension that had been building inside her all morning was making her feel sick. It had been too busy to find out what Ben was doing in Bride’s Bay before now and the uncertainty had been very hard to deal with. She knew that she wouldn’t rest until she’d found out some answers.
‘Of course. I just need to type up these notes and I’ll be right with you.’
Tom Bradbury gave her a quick smile before he returned his attention to the computer screen and Emily did her best to curb her impatience. She went over to the window, concentrating on the view across the bay in the hope that it would calm her, but it didn’t work. What did Ben want? Why had he come to Bride’s Bay when it was the last place she would have expected to see him? He had made his position perfectly clear when she’d been to Paris to see him, so clear that she’d been left under no illusion that he didn’t want anything more to do with her. So why had he come here when he must have known their paths would cross?
‘Right, all done.’ Tom spun his chair round and grinned at her. ‘It’s been mad this morning, hasn’t it? I had hoped that folk would have better things to do than worry about their ailments with the bank holiday coming up, but no such luck.’
‘It doesn’t work that way,’ Emily told him, knowing that she couldn’t just leap in and start demanding answers. She had to lead up to the subject, make it appear that it was of little consequence otherwise Tom would suspect something was wrong. That was the last thing she wanted. She’d told no one who Theo’s father was, neither her family nor her friends knew he was Ben’s son. She wasn’t sure why she had kept it a secret but she’d felt it was better if nobody knew the truth. And there was no reason why she should change her mind at this point… was there?
She took a quick breath as yet another question tagged itself onto all the others and hurried on. ‘With us being closed this afternoon as well as Bank Holiday Monday, a lot of people will have decided to make an appointment just in case.’
‘You mean in case their cold turns to flu or their tickly cough to pneumonia?’ Tom laughed. ‘I never thought of that. Obviously, I’ve got a lot to learn about being a GP.’
‘You seem to be coping well enough,’ Emily assured him and he grinned.
‘Thank you. I shall take that as a compliment. Anyway, what was it you wanted to see me about?’ He looked enquiringly at her and Emily’s mouth went dry. All of a sudden she couldn’t remember a word of her carefully rehearsed speech.
‘I… erm… um.’
‘Tom, darling, have you finished yet?’
She looked round when her friend Hannah Morris, another GP at the practice, came into the room, feeling a pang of something very much like envy strike her when she saw Tom’s face light up. There was no doubt at all how he felt about Hannah or she about him and Emily couldn’t help envying their closeness. It must be wonderful to have someone you could share your innermost feelings with… the way she’d once thought she could share hers with Ben.
‘Yep. I just need to take these notes through to the office and that’s it.’ Tom stood up. ‘I’m glad that Simon decided to cancel evening surgery. It’s such a glorious day that I have to confess I don’t feel like working.’
‘It’s a good job we aren’t working,’ Hannah stated, smiling up at him. ‘Ben just phoned. Apparently, he’s already here.’
‘But I thought he wasn’t arriving until this evening!’ Tom exclaimed, mercifully missing Emily’s gasp. Any hopes she may have harboured about being mistaken had just been shot right out of the sky. It definitely had been Ben in that car and now she needed to find out what he wanted.
‘Me too, but it seems he decided to get an early start and drove through the night.’ Hannah shrugged. ‘He sounded a bit uptight, to be honest. I think he needs this break more than he’s letting on.’
Emily frowned as she listened to the conversation. So Ben had come to Bride’s Bay for a holiday? Was it true or was it an excuse? She had no way of knowing and it was another uncertainty to add to the ever expanding list.
‘I thought that when I spoke to him the other day. He seemed rather… well, on edge, is the best way to describe it.’ Tom suddenly turned and Emily hurriedly smoothed her face into what she hoped was a suitably noncommittal expression.
‘You remember Ben Legrange, don’t you, Emily? He stayed with Simon and Ros a couple of years ago while he was recuperating from some bug he’d picked up while working for Médecins Sans Frontières. I’m sure you were here at the time.’
‘Yes, I was.’ Emily summoned a smile, praying that her friends couldn’t hear the strain in her voice. ‘It was a few months after I’d returned to Bride’s Bay to take up this job, in fact.’
‘Of course.’ Tom smiled at her. ‘Hannah and I have invited him to stay for the weekend. He’s been in London sorting out some problems with the funding for the clinic he’s set up and we thought it would be nice if he had a couple of days on the coast before he returns to Paris.’
‘There’s nothing like a bit of sea air to recharge the batteries,’ Emily agreed as calmly as she could. So that was the explanation. Ben was here for a break; it had nothing to do with her and Theo. The thought should have reassured her but it didn’t. It was painful to know that she and Theo didn’t figure in his life.