The Midwife's Secret Child

Raimondo had been drawn like a moth to the flame of that conversation.

‘So, you have seen Lighthouse Bay?’ he’d asked, unable to stop himself.

‘Yes, I have been to two weddings there, now. This wedding in the church and one on the beach. Both very beautiful.’

His colleague had appeared mildly curious that he too had seen the place. Again unable to help himself, he had asked about Faith and the answer had stunned him.

‘Yes, I met many people. And yes!’ There had been an amused glance. ‘In fact, I remember Faith, the bridesmaid, and her little girl—so cute.’

He had not known she had a daughter. ‘So, she’s married then?’

‘No, Mr Puritan. She has a daughter without a husband. The child looked about four or five.’

So he’d come.

And on his first sight of Faith, the woman he’d never forgotten but whose charisma had endured as if she were a distant enchanted dream, he’d felt the swell of an emotion he shouldn’t have. Here he was, sitting on the sandy bed of an ancient river, forty-five metres below the earth’s surface, listening to her so-charming voice as it caressed his ears and wishing he had never left.

That voice was still as restful and as calming. She was as beautiful as he remembered, with her slim but curved body poured into that ridiculous T-shirt and so tight jeans. It proved difficult to resist the urge to slide his fingers through the damp earth and find her hand to take in his, as he had when she’d brought him on a private tour of this place.

His empty hand could even remember the warmth and softness of her small fingers interlaced with his from all that time ago. How could that be? He didn’t know. What he did know was that he had not planned well.

A week would not be long enough.

He knew that now from his first sight of her, the way his whole being had come alive from what felt like a deep sleep. And that was without the added possibility that they shared a child.

Faith. He’d lost her and her conviction in the goodness of others and perhaps he would find both again in this place of dark caves and far oceans. He’d forgotten so much about her and he wanted to learn it all over again.

Which would require some negotiation with the life he’d left behind. And his need to encourage his twin brother away from his obsessive focus on the business after losing his family. Raimondo’s busy life suddenly seemed far less important than it should, compared to what was happening at Lighthouse Bay.

But that was for later.

He realised the story had finished, the cave silent for those few seconds after a well-told tale, and then soft questions broke out.

Faith answered them quietly then concluded, ‘Okay then. Lights on. Those nearest the entrance can start to crawl back and congregate in the next cavern. I’m sure those waiting will be glad to see us. When we make our way back to the main paths and under the rail again, I’ll do one more head count then you’re free to wander. Just drop your helmets and headlamps back at the shop when you’re finished.’

‘What if we get lost?’ The comedian.

‘You’ll be on the main path. And they’ll switch the spotlights on and off in the cave when it’s shutting, so you’ll know when we are about to close. In about four hours.’ There was a smile in her voice, one he remembered too clearly, and the group laughed.

‘I’m used to the dark now,’ someone said and the person next to them snorted.

He waited. He knew she would be the last to leave this cavern deep in the earth in case someone became lost or panicked. So he waited with her. As he should have waited before.

Six years! She’d been so young, beautiful, excited and as attracted to him as he’d been to her—the two of them like two silly moths mesmerised by the moment—grounded in an airport cocoon of wild weather and overwhelming fascination increased by the improbability of any future. Once he’d finished his business in Sydney he’d be flying home to Italy, her back to her seaside town and her beloved midwifery. She’d been barely twenty and he eight years senior and should have known better.

But they’d talked until their mouths were dry. Been amazed by the rapport that had sprung between them as if reunited friends from childhood. How could that be? From opposite sides of the world?

From a past life, Faith had said, and he’d hugged her to him for the endearing ridiculousness of that statement.

Though, once she’d laid her head against his chest, it was then that everything had spun out of control. For two full days until his brother had grounded him with familial duty, then he knew their love castles were built on dreams he couldn’t follow. Could never follow. A truth he’d left her with. But was that all he’d left her with?

CHAPTER THREE (#u5f79a074-63af-5b7a-9b8b-0f3bce7bdb6b)

FAITH WATCHED THE headlamp lights disappear one by one. Damn, she’d missed her chance to send him first.

She tried telepathy.

Go!

She urged the man beside her to move off with the others but he obviously wasn’t picking up the vibe. She couldn’t go until he had, it was her way, and she broke the silence between them as the last lamp disappeared under the curtain of rock.

‘I need you to go now, please.’

He didn’t say anything, just moved forward and crawled away from her.

Faith took a moment to breathe deeply and centre herself, and here in the arms of the earth on the soft sand of millennia was a good place to do it.

Okay. She’d get them all back to the safety of the walking path and then they could talk. She didn’t have to pick up Chloe until two p.m., just before work, when preschool finished. So she had a couple of hours to discover why Raimondo had returned to rattle her composure and her world.

She wondered what her aunt would say when she told her Chloe’s father had arrived, far too many years too late.

Twenty minutes later she left the group at the boardwalk and her job was done.

Except one of the participants didn’t stay behind and she could feel the heat from Raimondo’s body as he walked beside her to the exit of the cave. His arm swung beside her arm and she tucked her fingers in close to her body so she didn’t accidentally knock his hand.

Out in the bright sunshine Faith stopped on the path and the man beside her stopped too. She lifted her head and met his gaze steadily. ‘So why are you here?’ She’d done nothing wrong.

His eyes were that deep espresso brown of unfiltered coffee, dark and difficult to see to the bottom of the cup or, more to the point, to the bottom of his heart.

‘I have come because I heard you had a child.’ His cadence was old-fashioned, she remembered that, formally stiff, but it was a way of speaking she’d found incredibly sexy when she’d been young and silly, in its translated whimsy of sentence structure.

Then his words settled over her like the damp leaves had settled over the forest floor. Thick and stealing the light. He had heard?

She blinked. Pushed back his heaviness. ‘I wrote you that. At the beginning and at the end of my pregnancy. Five years ago.’

‘No. I did not see this.’ He shook his head emphatically, but his face stilled and suddenly expression fled to leave an inscrutable mask of blank shock. ‘Madonna.’ A quiet explosive hiss.

‘Chloe, not Madonna,’ she offered with just a little tartness in her voice. She frowned at him. Trying to understand. ‘I wrote twice.’

Again he said, ‘No.’

He shook his head but he must have seen the truth in her eyes because his face softened slightly as he looked at her. The silence stretched between them until he said softly, ‘Then it is as I suspected? You had a child that is mine?’

Unfortunate words if he wanted her to continue this conversation. ‘No.’ She watched him blink. Good.

He’d relinquished that role by his disinterest. ‘You fathered a child who is mine.’ She amazed herself with the steadiness and calmness of the answer while her heart bounced in agitation in her chest. ‘Her name is Chloe and she is almost five. Chloe Fetherstone.’ She needed time to think and her feet moved her forward. He reached out and caught her hand, not tight but with an implacable hold she couldn’t shake off without an undignified tug.

She stopped and glanced pointedly at his big fingers on her wrist. ‘Let go. I need a minute.’ She wasn’t the timid junior midwife who’d fallen for him years ago. She was a single mother, a senior midwife, a responsible niece to a woman she admired and who had been the rock this man should have been.