A Child To Open Their Hearts

Ian had had a son.

The boy didn’t look like Ian, he thought. He had the beautiful skin colour of the Fijians but lighter. His dark hair wasn’t as tightly curled.

He was still sleeping, his face nestled against Hettie’s breast. Max could only see his profile, but suddenly...

It was a hint, a shade, a fleeting impression, but suddenly Max saw his mother in Joni.

And a hint of his own children. Caroline, twenty-six years old, due to be married next week to the man she loved.

Christopher, buried three weeks ago.

Christopher, his son.

This little boy is yours...

How could he begin to get his head around it? He couldn’t. Every sense was recoiling.

He’d loathed Ian. Born of gentle parents, raised on this island with love and tenderness... There’d never been a reason why Ian should have turned out as he had, but he’d been the sort of kid who’d pulled wings off flies. He’d been expelled from three schools. He’d bummed around the world until his parents’ money had dried up.

Max thought back to the time, a few years back, when Ian had come to see him in Sydney.

‘I’m broke,’ he’d said, honestly and humbly. ‘I’ve spent the money Mum and Dad left me and I can’t take the lifestyle I’ve been living anymore. I need to go back to Wildfire. Let me manage the place for you, bro. I swear I’ll do a good job. We both know it’s getting run-down and you don’t have time to be there yourself.’

It was hope rather than trust that had made him agree, Max thought grimly. That and desperation. It had been true; the island had needed a manager. But Max had needed to be in Sydney. Christopher had been born with cerebral palsy and he’d lurched from one health crisis to another. Max had been trying to hold down a job as head of surgery at Sydney Central, feeding as much money as he could back into the island’s medical services. Caroline, too... Well, his daughter had always received less attention than she’d needed or deserved.

If Ian could indeed take some of the responsibility...

Okay, he’d been naive, gullible, stupid to trust. That trust was coming home to roost now, and then some. He was having to face Ian’s appalling dishonesty.

But facing this...

This little boy is yours...

His son was dead. How could he face this?

‘You don’t need to think about it now,’ Hettie was saying gently, as if she guessed the body blow she’d dealt him. ‘We’ll work something out.’

‘We?’

‘I love Joni,’ she said simply. ‘I’m not going to hand him over until I’m sure you want him.’

‘How can you love him?’

Her eyes suddenly turned troubled, even a little confused, as if she wasn’t quite sure of what she was feeling herself. ‘He has no one,’ she said, tentatively now. ‘His mother trusted me and depended on me. I was there at his birth.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Maybe...until you’re ready to accept your responsibilities, I can take care of him for you.’

‘My responsibility...’

‘Whatever,’ she said hastily. ‘Until there’s another alternative, I seem to be all he has. He needs someone. He has me.’

‘You’re not saying you’ll take him on?’

‘I’m not saying anything,’ she whispered, and once again her lips touched the little one’s hair. ‘All I’m saying is that for now I’m holding him and I’m not letting go. Oh, and, Max...’

‘Yes?’

‘There are people on the beach,’ she said. ‘Waving. I think rescue is at hand. Time to get back to the real world.’

He glanced around sharply. There were, indeed, people on the beach.

‘Caroline will be overjoyed,’ Hettie told him. ‘Your daughter. Your family.’

And there was something in the way she said it...

He knew nothing about her, he realised. Nothing at all. He was a Lockhart. The islanders, including Hettie, must know almost everything there was to know about him. But Hettie? He knew nothing about her other than she was holding...

His son?

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_27506db4-008a-5f64-8797-8860038ecccc)

THE CORAL CUTS on Max’s legs were treated by his about-to-be son-in-law. Keanu, the island doctor Max’s daughter was about to marry, greeted him with overwhelming relief, but was now insisting Max submit to his care.

It seemed Sam, the island’s chief medical officer, had had to fly out that morning, transporting an urgent case to the mainland. ‘We’re always short on medical staff,’ Keanu told him, ‘so you’re stuck with me. But I think we can get away with no stitches. Now, anaesthetic?’

‘The last thing I need is a general anaesthetic,’ Max growled. ‘And no blocks. I’ve wasted enough of my time here. I don’t intend to lie round, waiting for anaesthetic to wear off. Keanu, leave it. I can clean them myself.’

‘So who’ll explain to Caroline that you can’t give her away because your legs are infected?’ Keanu demanded. ‘Not me. You’ll let me clean them properly.’

So he had no choice. He lay back and thought about biting bullets as Keanu cleaned, disinfected and dressed his cuts.

Thankfully the cuts were on his legs and not his face, he thought. He might still manage to look okay at Caroline’s wedding.

‘You have no idea how relieved she’ll be when she finds you’re here,’ Keanu told him as he worked. ‘She’s been out at a clinic at Atangi but she’s due back any time now. Our wedding plans are all in order and now she has her dad. We were starting to think we’d have to send Bugsy down the aisle in your place.’

‘Bugsy...’

‘The dog,’ Keanu said briefly, inspecting a graze that almost qualified as a cut. ‘This one’s nasty. Hold your breath for a bit, there’s a bit of muck stuck in here.’

Max held his breath. Maybe an anaesthetic wouldn’t have been such a bad idea.

‘Dog,’ he said at last when he could concentrate on anything other than pain.

‘Bugsy, the golden retriever. He’s responsible for us finding you so fast. Hettie left him on the beach. Normally Bugsy would loll around, waiting for her to come out of the water, or go for a swim himself, but he must have figured something was wrong. He came haring up to the hospital, soaking wet. We were already worried about Sefina and Joni. Sefina had discharged herself but we knew she couldn’t go home, so when Bugsy appeared looking desperate, running back and forth to the beginning of the path to Sunset Beach, and we couldn’t find Hettie, we put two and two together and figured we needed to investigate.’

‘You let Sefina discharge herself?’

‘Junior nurse,’ Keanu said grimly. ‘But it wasn’t her fault. Short of holding Sefina by force, which was impossible, there wasn’t a lot she could do when Sefina decided to leave. She let us know as soon as she could, and then Bugsy arrived.’ He hesitated. ‘Bugsy’s a shared dog, devoted to all of us. He officially belongs to one of our fly in, fly out doctors, but Maddie’s on maternity leave right now so Bugsy’s main caregiver is Hettie.’

‘Hettie has...no one else?’