Or was she just making excuses for him the way she did during those long, dreary months after he’d gone off to medical school in Boston, leaving her to fend for herself?
And if she were to speak up, how could she explain who she was to the man who’d once been the love of her life—without being totally humiliated? And if he apologized for not recognizing her, would anything change other than the red blotches on her cheeks?
A long-buried ache rose through her chest at the mortifying truth. Of all the responses she’d imagined from him, this was not one of them.
But what had she expected? Had she harbored the notion that he might one day see her again, rush into her arms and tell her how much he’d missed her? Plead for her forgiveness and offer to marry her?
He’d married a doctor from his medical class and had a child with her. That was how much he’d missed her! Meanwhile, she was acting like a lovesick schoolgirl, an angry lovesick schoolgirl.
One part of her wanted to jump into his arms—the other part wanted to punch his lights out. And then there was the part of her that wanted Neill Brandon the teenager she remembered so well....
When she had learned that Neill was returning to Eden Harbor to take over his uncle’s medical practice, she’d decided to avoid any contact with him if possible. She’d accepted that she’d probably run into him at some point between his arrival and her departure—when she left for her new job in Portsmouth. Yet, she could hardly have imagined that their first encounter would be such a disaster.
It was just her rotten luck that because of a nursing shortage in Emergency, she’d taken this extra shift today. Now all she could do was wait for this embarrassing scene to end.
The sooner she got Morgan Brandon moved to her inpatient room, the better. This was one scene she didn’t intend to repeat. Ignoring the man and his daughter, she contacted Admitting to learn that Dr. Fennell had made arrangements and the room was ready. “Dr. Brandon, if you like, I’ll take Morgan to her room while you complete the paperwork in Admitting.”
“Thanks so much.” He moved around the stretcher, his arm brushing hers, sending tiny shock waves reverberating over her skin. She stepped away from him.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“You didn’t,” she said, fighting to control the sudden awareness snapping through her.
How could she still feel anything for Neill? Hadn’t those lonely months and years accomplished anything? Those desperate weeks when she’d had to face the fact that Neill Brandon wasn’t coming home had exposed her to a kind of fear she’d never experienced before.
Forcing back the memories, she studied the drip chamber on the intravenous as if her life depended on it—anything to keep her eyes from his. Yet she couldn’t block out his words, spoken so gently to his daughter, words filled with love. Hearing them, she remembered another child.
A child who had lived only fifty-two hours.
Unable to bear it any longer, she made another quick note and closed the chart. “I’m going to transfer your daughter now.”
“Morgan, you’re going to be okay. I’ll see you in a few minutes,” he said.
His voice drew her like a moth to a flame to the man who had once held her heart. Not fair. Totally not fair.
She felt the urge to touch him, to be in contact with him, his skin on hers. Nothing had changed. Years after he’d dumped her, he’d returned to her life and the fantasies were beginning all over again.
What is the matter with me?
Is this what having no man in your life did to you?
Not if I can help it. Time to take back control.
And she knew just where to start. Her grip on the stretcher was strong and uncompromising as she unlocked the brakes, tucked Morgan’s chart under the corner of the mattress and moved toward the door.
Hitting the door pad, she waited impatiently for it to swing open, and then strode out into the corridor, pushing the stretcher ahead of her.
Look on the bright side. At least the dreaded first contact with him is over.
She turned the corner and headed toward the elevator. And wasn’t it just as well that he hadn’t recognized her? No need for awkward “how have you been?” chatter. No going back over the past twelve years and dredging up old memories that still held the power to inflict pain. But most of all, no empty excuses required.
She was free to go ahead with her plans, confident in the belief that the worst was over. She could look forward to her job in Portsmouth and her new life.
CHAPTER TWO
AS SHERRI APPROACHED the outpatient clinic nurses’ station the next morning, her mind was made up: from now on she’d refuse any shifts outside the clinics she normally worked. Now all she had to do was finish her shift in the outpatient clinic and then she was off for a couple of days.
She was going to Portsmouth to look for a place to live and to meet with the members of the nursing department she’d be working with in her new job. During the interview a few weeks ago, she’d discovered that she and the nursing coordinator shared the same approach to risk management, a key function in modern hospitals. She might even go to Bangor tomorrow and buy something special for the trip. Just thinking about her new job and the potential it held for a career in nursing management excited her.
Seeing Neill with his daughter, being aware of how focused he was on his life now, had made one thing clear. Neill Brandon had moved on; he had made decisions in life to meet his own personal goals. And so should she. When she’d told her friend Gayle Sawyer about meeting Neill, Gayle had been shocked to learn he hadn’t recognized her.
Gayle’s take on the situation was that the sooner she resolved her feelings around Neill, the easier it would be for her to move on with her life. In Gayle’s mind, there were unfinished issues between them. What Gayle didn’t seem to get was that Sherri had moved on. She wasn’t interested in resuscitating an old relationship. Neill’s presence in her life would be fleeting and of no real importance in the end.
After work yesterday, Sherri had dropped into her mother’s house before going home to her condo. Colleen had been preoccupied with the fact that her son, Ed, was about to be paroled and what that would mean in their lives. With her mother’s attention on Sherri’s older brother, it wasn’t difficult to talk about seeing Neill again. Her mother had been curious about the incident, but Sherri had convinced her that everything had gone well, that they had been perfectly civil with each other. Nothing more.
Her mother didn’t know that Neill was her baby’s father. Even back then, her mother’s attention had been on Ed, who’d just been jailed for drug smuggling. Sherri didn’t want to give her mother any more reason to worry.
Sherri’s husband, Sam, had died five years ago. She’d let her mother assume that her baby had been Sam’s. He’d been in love with Sherri for years, and when she’d met him again in Bangor, they’d started dating. When she could no longer hide the fact that she was pregnant, she’d confided in him what had happened. He proposed to her that night. Feeling she had no other option, she’d accepted.
Sam wanted to be a father very much, and was delighted to have her son carry the Crawford name. She was so grateful for everything he had done for her, and it seemed the right thing to do under the circumstances. He’d supported her by telling everyone that the baby was his. He’d even gone along with fabricating a story about the date she’d conceived. But all of the small lies and minor fabrications had been unnecessary in the end when her son died only hours after he’d been born.
Sam’s parents and his brother