She had grieved, though, in the privacy of her own room, shedding huge, silent tears for the man who’d been so fair and so kind to her all her life.
He’d been her best friend, a rock when Laura had been born, and without his support she wouldn’t have been able to train. True, her mother had looked after the baby, but it had been her father who’d encouraged her and supported her financially, bought her a car and paid the running expenses and paid for everything Laura had needed.
They’d turned one end of the house into a separate annexe, giving Jo and her baby privacy but easy access for babysitting, and with their help she’d built herself a career of which she was proud.
Then suddenly, without warning, he’d gone, leaving Maurice, and James Kalbraier, to cope with the practice. Maurice had cut down his hours, taken on another doctor, Mary Brady, and concentrated on nursing Betty for the last few years of her life.
And now Jo’s mother was talking about going out to dinner with Maurice.
Jo considered the idea, and decided it was a good one. They’d both loved their spouses, but they were gone and Maurice and Rebecca were still alive.
Yes. It would do them both good to get out. Who knows, they might—
‘Supper!’
‘Coming!’
She took her wine glass through into the kitchen and put it down by the sink. ‘Mmm, smells good. Have you called Laura?’
‘Well, I did yell, but she’s got that music on so loud…’
‘I’ll get her,’ Jo said with a grin, and ran upstairs. She banged on the door which was vibrating gently with the music her daughter was listening to, and opened it a crack. ‘Supper, darling.’
‘OK.’ The noise vanished, and the silence was deafening.
‘You really shouldn’t have it on so loud,’ she began, but Laura laughed and skipped past her, flitting down the stairs and running through to her grandmother’s kitchen, ignoring the predictable lecture.
‘Hi, Grannie, what’s for supper—? Oh, yum! Can I help?’
Jo smiled and followed her through more slowly. She wasn’t a bad kid—just a little loud, with questionable taste in friends. She supposed she could send Laura to the independent school her mother kept offering to pay for, but that would mean travelling to school, no convenient buses and after-school homework clubs, and her friends would be scattered far and wide.
This way, questionable though some of them might be, they were nearby, and when Jo was working that was very important.
‘We’ve got a panto rehearsal tonight,’ Laura reminded her as she joined them at the table. ‘Will you test me on my lines?’
Jo laughed humourlessly. ‘Just so long as you don’t try and test me—I haven’t had time to look at them since before Christmas.’
‘Mother! Roz will skin you alive!’
‘Don’t I know it! I’ll try and have a quick scan through after supper—perhaps Grannie will test you.’
‘Of course I will, darling. How’s it going?’
Jo laughed. ‘It was awful before Christmas. We’ll see if anyone has spent the last couple of weeks learning their lines or if they’ve all switched off and forgotten what little they did know. I suspect the latter.’
‘Based on personal experience?’ her mother said sagely, and Jo gave a rueful chuckle.
‘You guessed. Oh, well, there’s time.’
‘Have they got anyone else for the chorus yet?’ Laura asked, tucking into her casserole with huge enthusiasm.
‘I don’t know.’
‘You ought to ask Dr What’s-his-name—what is his name? The new guy?’
‘Latimer—Ed Latimer. I doubt if he’d be interested.’
‘You could ask,’ she suggested round a forkful of carrots.
She could—but she didn’t want to. She didn’t want Ed Latimer any nearer her than he had to be, for any more time than was absolutely necessary. He was too disturbing, too masculine. Too male. Just—too much.
She finished her meal in silence, listening with half an ear to Laura and her mother chattering, then she loaded the dishwasher and excused herself for a quick shower before the rehearsal. The water was warm and silky and sensuous, sliding over her naked skin and making her aware of herself in a way she’d almost forgotten.
Her mind turned to Ed again, and she closed her eyes and moaned softly. Why? She’d spent years fending off flirts, and none of them had even so much as ruffled the surface of her peaceful existence.
And now Ed Latimer had come strolling into her life, his hands shoved casually into his pockets, all testosterone and laughing eyes, and her self-control was lying on the floor, belly-up and grinning like a submissive dog!
‘This is awful! What on earth’s the matter with all of you? Two weeks off and you’ve all keeled over and died!’
There was a chorus of feeble protest, and their hard-pressed producer threw down her script and stalked into the kitchen. Jo met Laura’s eyes and smiled encouragingly, then went into the kitchen after Roz, closing the door quietly.
‘Roz?’
‘It’s like this every year! I don’t know why I do it! They screech through by the skin of their teeth, just about pulling the thing together by the final dress rehearsal—sometimes not even then! This is the thirteenth year, you realise that? I knew we ought to give it a rest, but they wouldn’t listen. It’ll be fine, they all said, and now look at them! Corpsed, the lot of them, the second you take their scripts away! Well, that’s it. They’re not having their scripts again, any of them, and they can just manage with the prompt!’
Jo soothed Roz’s ruffled feathers and gave her time to settle down. ‘Perhaps we ought to have our break early and let everyone calm down a bit—the urn’s hot now. Why don’t I make a big pot of tea and open the biscuits and we’ll try again in a little while?’
Roz stabbed her hands through her hair and gave a stifled scream. ‘They drive me nuts,’ she confessed.
‘You love it.’
‘I know. I must be a masochist.’
They shared a smile, and Jo filled the teapot while Roz poured milk into the cups. ‘We still need another man for the chorus—I don’t suppose your new doctor wants to get involved?’ Roz asked her.
She slopped the tea into a saucer and splashed her hand. ‘Damn,’ she muttered, and put down the pot. ‘I don’t know—why don’t you ask him? I expect he’ll be too busy.’
‘Would you ask him for me, as you’ll see him?’
And, just like that, she was forced into a corner from which there was no escape.
‘Hi, there.’
Shivers ran up Jo’s spine and made her hair tingle against her scalp. She turned, groping for a smile that wasn’t completely idiotic, and forced herself to meet Ed’s eyes. ‘Hi, there, yourself,’ she said, and was very proud of the fact that her voice only croaked the tiniest bit.
‘How are things? Any imminent obstetrics for me?’
‘Sorry.’ She shook her head and smiled a more natural smile. ‘They’re all hanging on till their due dates.’
‘Even your lady the other night?’
‘Even her. Sorry. I’ve got an antenatal class at the hospital in a minute—I’ll ask them if they want to get a wriggle on for