Twins for Christmas Read Online Free PDF Page B

recognised the link between them. An acknowledge ment that Kate knew more than anyone else because she’d been there that night. She had seen him in a space no one else here would dream he could ever be in.
    He’d let her share that space then. Would he let her in again?
    ‘What I don’t know,’ Kate said cautiously, ‘is why you stopped doing this. Why you had to leave.’ She swallowed hard. ‘Was it because of me?’
    That shocked him. He was holding his gloves over the rubbish bin, but he forgot to let them go. ‘Good God, Katie! Why on earth would you think that?’
    He’d called her Katie again. It was a struggle to keep her tone light. To give a shrug that belied her history of painful agonising over this.
    ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said quietly. ‘You’d never taken any notice of me. Not in—um— that   way. And then we had that amazing night. But you creep out of my room hoping that I’m still asleep and—’
    The flush of colour would have been welcome on his pale face if it hadn’t been due to embarrassment. ‘ Weren’t   you?’
    ‘No. I pretended to be, because it was obvious you didn’t want to talk to me.’
    ‘I—’
    ‘And then,’ Kate rushed on, ‘I get to work to find you’ve gone. Resigned. Vanished. Can you blame a girl for thinking that you’d gone to rather extraordinary lengths so that you didn’t have to see her again?’
    The quiet sound he made was almost a groan. Rory dropped the gloves into the bin and caught Kate’s shoulders.
    ‘Don’t ever think that,’ he said softly. ‘You have no idea how important it was. How often I thought about that night.’
    ‘As often as   I   thought about it?’ Kate’s voice caught. ‘I don’t think so, Rory.’
    There was a moment’s silence as they stared at each other. There were too many questions hanging in the air between them. So much that was a mystery. But one thing was clearer now.
    He hadn’t been avoiding   her.   Kate knew with a certainty that gave her a new sense of peace that she had had nothing to do with his decision to leave. That the decision had been made well before she’d met Rory that night.
    And he remembered their time together.
    It had been important.
    A glimmer of something like joy flickered within Kate, but then Rory’s gaze dropped. To her belly.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.
    ‘I’m not,’ Kate responded steadily.
    His gaze flicked up. ‘Really?’
    She drew in a deep breath. How could she tell him she already loved these babies because of the way they had been conceived? Because she’d known for a very long time that she would never love another man the way she loved their father?
    She couldn’t tell him. Not when he was ‘sorry’. Sorry that he’d made a mistake in allowing it to happen.
    The faint glow of joy was snuffed out. Perfect timing for someone to come close enough for them both to be distracted.
    ‘Could I ask you both to help mop up in the cubicles?’ Judy asked. ‘There’s a woman next door to your mother, Dr McCulloch, who needs a head wound sutured. There’s nobody available from Plastics, and if anyone could do a job that won’t leave too much of a scar it would be you.’
    Rory didn’t seem to notice the compliment. ‘Is my mother still asleep?’
    ‘Yes. Quite peacefully, and her temperature’s still dropping.’ Judy’s smile was openly admiring as she turned to hurry away again. ‘Fabulous job there with Michael. Just like the old days.’
    Rory said nothing, but Kate kept pace with him as he headed in Judy’s wake.
    ‘She’s right, you know.’
    ‘Is she?’
    ‘You stepped back just the way you left. In a blaze of glory.’
    Rory stopped just in front of the double doors that led from the resuscitation area back to the main department. The halt was so sudden Kate almost bumped into him. Her belly brushed his hand.
    ‘What on earth are you talking about?’
    ‘The last case that day. Don’t you remember? The toddler with