Waking Up
with His Runaway Bride
Louisa George
Dear Reader
Thank you for picking up my second Mills and Boon® Medical™ Romance!
This story is set mostly in Atanga Bay, a fictional place north-east of Auckland, in New Zealand’s north island. Along this coastline there are many small townships of thriving communities, each with its own identity and appeal. Since I emigrated to this wonderful country ten years ago I never tire of visiting them.
Atanga is the Maori word for beautiful, and the place I’ve created is indeed that. With gorgeous views, a flourishing community and a sense of peace, it is the place from which Mim draws strength to fulfil her dreams. It is also the place where she retreated to lick her wounds after a failed engagement.
For committed city-dweller Connor, Atanga Bay is a challenge—but meeting his ex-fiancée there provides even more problems.
This story is about letting go of the past and creating a future full of hope despite the odds. At times both Connor and Mim struggle against this, but their journey to love is also filled with fun and laughter.
I hope you enjoy reading this book as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Drop me a line at [email protected] or visit me at www.louisageorge.com
Happy reading!
Louisa x
To Sue MacKay and Iona Jones, writing pals,
roomies and very dear friends. Thank you for your support, advice and laughs.
To my amazing editor, Flo Nicoll. Thank you for your
patience, your wisdom and your belief in me!
This book is for my sister, Liz Skelton. I love you.
CHAPTER ONE
‘NO WAY! I am not trying to impress him. Absolutely not! That would be cheap and tacky, and I don’t do either. How could you think such a thing?’
Mim McCarthy peered down from the top of the wobbly stepladder perched precariously on the desk and laughed at her colleague’s suggestion. Even though she’d hit the nail squarely on the head.
Then she daubed a second coat of paint over the stubborn Tasmania-shaped stain on the ceiling. ‘I just thought it was time to say goodbye to Tassie.’
Skye, the practice nurse-manager, gripped the ladder in one hand and offered up the paint-pot in the other. ‘So it’s totally coincidental that you decided to tart up the admin office on the same day the Matrix Fund assessor arrives?’
‘Okay, you got me.’ Mim raised her brush in defeat as her grin widened. ‘Lord knows why I employed someone almost as devious as me. You’re right, I’ll do anything to get this funding. We need the money to pay for the planned renovations and develop the practice, or …’
‘It’s …?’ The practice nurse did a chopping motion across her throat. ‘Goodbye to Dana’s Drop-In? No, Mim. Never. Your patients wouldn’t let that happen. They need you.’
‘I wouldn’t let it come to that. I’ll sell my soul to the bank manager. Again.’ Mim sucked in a fortifying breath. ‘I’m afraid I’m running out of soul.’
No drop-in centre would mean hours of travel for her community to the closest medical centre and the end of a dream for her. The dream that locked in the promises she’d made to her mum. No way would she give that up.
Mim was anything but a quitter. Doing the hard yards as the quirky outsider at med school had taught her how to fight for everything she wanted. That, and the legacy of her unconventional childhood. She’d learnt pretty quickly to rely on no one but herself. Ever. ‘A quick slick of paint will brighten the place up. And conceal the fact we have a mysterious leak. Pray it doesn’t rain for the next week.’
‘Forecast is good. Nothing but blue skies and late summer sun.’ Skye wrinkled her pierced nose. ‘Good job you bought low-odour paint—wouldn’t want the assessor to be savvy to the ruse.’
‘Well, if you can’t win, cheat.’
Skye frowned. ‘Another famous Dana saying?’
‘Unfortunately. Not quite up there with inspirational go-get-’em quotes, but apt, and very Dana.’
There were plenty of them. In her infrequent sober moments Mim’s mother had been adorable and well intentioned, always spouting wisecracks. Not always about cheating. Some were about love too, about keeping family close. And your dealers closer.
Mim winked at her partner in crime. ‘I know the assessor from my intern days. Dr Singh is a sweetie. This assessment will be in the bag. We’ll wow him with our refreshing approach to community medicine.’
Touchingly loyal, Skye smiled and nodded briskly. ‘If anyone can wow him, Mim, you can. You’ve transformed this place already. You just need a lucky break.’
‘I know. We were bursting at the seams at yesterday’s baby clinic. I think we’re finally getting the message through. And the open-all-hours policy helps.’ Even if her extended days were half killing her. Pride in her achievement of getting the locals to trust the McCarthy name again fuelled her determination.
She brushed her fringe from her forehead with the back of her wrist and stepped gingerly down the ladder. Standing on the desk, she strained up at the white paint patch. ‘Shame everything in life isn’t so easy to gloss over. Now the rest of the ceiling needs repainting.’
‘And the rest of the clinic.’ Pointing to the chipped window-panes and scuffed walls, Skye shrugged. ‘We haven’t time, he’s due in thirty minutes. To be honest, paint is the least of our problems.’
Tell me about it. But she wasn’t about to burden her best mate with the harsh reality of the clinic’s financial problems. ‘We’ve just got to get Dr Singh on side.’
‘Ooh, I do love a challenge.’ Skye placed Mim’s proffered paintbrush on top of the paint-pot, then she rubbed her hands together. ‘Okay. How shall we handle it? You take the bribery? I’ll do the corruption?’
‘No! I’d get struck off! But … on the other hand …’ Mim giggled, then stuck one hand on her cocked hip. She raised the hem of her knee-length skirt to her thigh and wiggled her bum suggestively. A move she’d learnt from her salsa DVD—Spanish, sultry and super-sexy. ‘If we want to influence a man, how about good old-fashioned women’s wicked ways?’
‘Ahem.’
At the sound of the man’s purposeful cough Mim’s breath stalled somewhere in her chest.
Excellent. Just dandy. Sexy salsa? On her desk?
With burning cheeks she dropped the hem, slicked on her most accommodating smile and swivelled slowly to face Dr Singh. Trying desperately to cover her embarrassment. ‘And then, Skye, you shimmy to the left … Ohmygod.’
As she caught a clear view of their visitor her heart stalled along with her lungs. Jolts of awareness and pain and excitement slammed through her veins. Heat and ice clashed in her gut. So not Dr Singh.
She gasped for oxygen and whispered his name on a jittery breath. ‘Connor? Connor. What are you …?’
Framed in the doorway, filling the space, three years older, three years more distinguished in an expensive designer suit, and with three years’ worth of questions simmering behind cool liquorice eyes, stood Connor Wiseman.
Here?
Why?