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  A Summer of Promises

  Pelican Beach Doctors, Volume 2

  Emily Forbes

  Published by Emily Forbes, 2020.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  A SUMMER OF PROMISES

  First edition. January 3, 2020.

  Copyright © 2020 Emily Forbes.

  ISBN: 978-1393864509

  Written by Emily Forbes.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  A Summer of Promises (Pelican Beach Doctors, #2)

  A SUMMER OF PROMISES | EMILY FORBES

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

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  Further Reading: All I Want For Christmas

  Also By Emily Forbes

  About the Author

  This book is for all the Aunts in my family. From my Mother's aunts, to mine and my children's.

  Fel and Nancy, you may see a little bit of yourselves in this story adn although the Conga-line didn't make it this time, Fel, there's always another story to be told.

  Emily Forbes is an award-winning romance author. She has written over 30 books for Harlequin Mills & Boon and has twice been a finalist in the Australian Romantic Book of the Year Award which she won in 2013 for her novel Sydney Harbour Hospital: Bella's Wishlist.

  You can get in touch with Emily at [email protected] or visit her website at www.emily-forbesauthor.com

  A Summer of Promises © 2020 Emily Forbes

  First North American Edition 2020

  First published UK and Australia Wedding at Pelican Beach © 2007 Emily Forbes

  Cover credit: Selfpubbookcovers.com/LadyDeath

  Reproduction or use of this work, except for use in any review, in whole or in part in any form by electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented is forbidden without the permission of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, businesses, locales or events is entirely coincidental.

  A SUMMER OF PROMISES

  EMILY FORBES

  CHAPTER ONE

  ‘Not again!’ Zac Carlisle looked in the direction discreetly pointed out by his colleague, Dr Lexi Patterson. The trail of disaster left behind by Bob Leeming, the recently 'let go' Human resources manager, apparently had one more sting in its tail. A sting that was about five feet nothing and wearing little more than a cropped top and some sort of hip-scarf covered with hundreds of little gold coins, which were jangling as she leant on the nurses' counter, hips swaying to a beat only she could hear.

  'A belly dancer? The hospital is falling apart, we're desperate for a nurse and he takes on a belly dancer?'

  'Shh,' was Lexi's helpful reply. 'She'll hear you.'

  And it seemed the belly dancer had heard. She turned around, grinning, and the wattage of her smile made him forget about the fact she was the most inappropriately attired nurse he'd ever seen. Until Lexi smothered a giggle beside him and he came to his senses. A gypsy, that's what she was. A gypsy sent to take his already crazy work life one step closer to hell.

  'I've gotta run, I need to collect Mollie, but I'll call later,' Lexi said as she waved a greeting in the belly-dancing gypsy's direction then left, leaving him to send the new disaster packing. 'Have fun!’

  The new disaster was walking towards him, holding out her hand, her grin lighting up her face—how could a smile that huge fit on a face that petite and fine-featured, a face like a china doll's?

  'I take it you're Dr Carlisle.'

  He'd thought she was English—the nurse he was expecting was coming from the UK—but beneath the rounded vowels lurked an Australian accent. She waggled her proffered hand a little, prompting him to shake it. He did, reluctantly taking her tiny hand in his own—surprised at the firmness of her grip—then releasing it as quickly as he could. A woman who had him thinking about china dolls, gypsies and belly dancers was not a woman to be trusted. 'I'd ask your name but I'm afraid you're going to tell me it's Eva Henderson.’

  'No.'

  'No?' His luck had changed and Bob Leeming hadn't thrown another disastrous employee in his path?

  'Actually, yes, it is, but I prefer Evie.' She laughed. 'And I wanted to see if you'd brighten up if you didn't think I was about to start working here. But I gather I am the problem?’

  She slipped a hand onto her half-naked hip, just above the scarf-thing which he saw was tied over a barely-there skirt, and although he kept his gaze firmly on her face there was such an expanse of perfect creamy skin on show it was not without effort he resisted a peek. She was tapping her foot, but with impatience or still to the invisible beat she'd been moving to when he'd first seen her he couldn't tell.

  'Bob Leeming took you on?'

  'You're not going to tell me there's a problem, are you? I mean, I know he's left, but I'm here, and....well, I need the job.' Large, dark eyes were staring up at him, framed by lashes that were indecently thick and sooty-colored. He'd like to think the gaze was pleading but he had a bad feeling the mood was more one of confidence. She knew he couldn't send her packing.

  'Funny, you don't look like you've come dressed to work.' He was aiming for sarcasm but he just sounded as exhausted as he felt.

  'It's the country, I figured we could be more casual here and— ' She broke off and patted him on the arm. Presumably she'd seen the look of utter panic that had swept across his face at her announcement—things were every bit as bad as he'd guessed. 'I'm joking. Really. I don't start until tomorrow. I just dropped in to visit someone and to finish off my paperwork. See, I am responsible. I'm a day early.'

  'I didn't say you were irresponsible.'

  'You didn't need to.' Her tone was as merry as his was glum. 'You might just as well have yelled it across the room. It would have fit nicely into the same sentence as "belly dancer"—I think that was the word you used.’ She laughed again. 'Sorry, I'm talking too much, I must be nervous.’

  'I don't know why you would be. You seem to have made yourself perfectly at home in around ten minutes flat.' Maybe in the next five minutes he'd get a handle on this meeting. Right now he was trying to ignore the thought that Eva-Evie, he corrected himself- was the most extraordinary case of walking, talking confidence he'd ever seen. And just his luck, she'd landed slap bang in the middle of his already enormous pile of problems. 'Who were you visiting? You're not from here.'

  'Letitia.’

  'My patient Letitia?'

  'You're her GP?' She considered this for a moment, then looked him up and down without any attempt to be discreet and added, almost to herself, 'Yes, I guess you are.'

  He nodded, words seeming less and less possible by the second.

  'She's my sister-in-law and— Oh.'

  'What?' He looked around for the source of her surprise. 'She's your sister-in-law and what exactly?'

  'What exactly?' She took his hand in hers again and shook it with great enthusiasm as she talked. '"What exactly" is that we're going to be neighbors.’

  'Neighbors?' He was reduced to repeating her last words.

  'I've moved into Jake and Letitia's house so I can look after their girls when they go to the city for Lettie's surgery. She mentioned how weird it was to live next door to
her GP but, as we all know, that sort of thing is par for the course in the country.'

  'This is hardly the country.' He'd recovered his powers of speech at least. 'And you are hardly a country girl. At least, not from any country I've ever been in,' he muttered.

  'Correction. I am a country girl. Jake and I grew up in Wagga Wagga.'

  'New South Wales? I thought you were English?' But that would explain her curious accent, he could definitely hear an Aussie twang.

  'Nope, just been living there.'

  He was having trouble keeping up with her conversation, a situation he was unfamiliar with. Her state of dress, or undress, was off-putting. And she was still grinning at him. No wonder he was having trouble concentrating. 'Are you always this cheerful?'

  She nodded. 'Don't worry, it's not contagious. At least, not unless you kiss me, then you'd have a terminal case of cheer.’ She laughed, apparently confident she'd silenced him for good this time, and, waggling her fingers at him in a wave, positively sashayed out of the department and along the corridor. Leaving him very, very worried that if this was Evie when she was brand spanking new to a place, just what would she be like once she'd settled in?

  As he watched her almost dance down the corridor he could feel the tenuous grip he had on everything start to slip. But how could a woman who was about as big as Lexi’s eight-year-old niece Mollie pose any sort of threat to the future of the hospital? Well, any more of a threat than it was already under. Why could he still feel the imprint of her tiny hand on his palm?

  The questions were coming faster than he could mentally articulate them.

  Why would any woman—a soon-to-be-employee to boot—run around a hospital in a be-coined, jangling hip-scarf? And just how long would it take him to get the image of her swaying hips, curving up to a tiny waist, out of his mind?

  'Dr Carlisle!’

  Zac, with one hand on his office door, felt his heart sink at the sound of his name being called. The heavens were conspiring to ensure he never got on top of the administrative nightmare his life had become of late. Thanks to an emergency last night, he hadn't even been able to check Evie's qualifications like he'd meant to.

  Now it was only eight a.m. and he'd already been there for two hours, delivering a baby who wasn't meant to arrive for another three weeks.

  Turning, he suppressed a sigh but couldn't muster a smile.

  'Yes, Doris?'

  Doris tutted at him. 'You know I wouldn't bother you if it wasn't necessary.'

  His smile came of its own volition. 'I know, Doris but I haven't switched my pager on and I'm not officially here, yet you manage to track me down.' He tugged at his tie, still unfamiliar attire for him, but he wore it because he couldn't be sure when there'd be an impromptu visit from a certain government department hell bent on dismantling the hospital, brick by brick. First impressions counted and with a tie on, he rationalized, he had an armor. Of sorts.

  'Better than a bloodhound, I know. Lisa and Bruce called through.' She named two of the local volunteer ambulance officers.

  'They're bringing in a teenager with complications and they're not sure what they're dealing with. ETA five minutes.'

  'Schoolies' week?'

  'A fair bet, I'd think.'

  'Bloody kids.' He was striding towards the emergency department. 'When are they going to learn that descending on a small seaside town intent on killing themselves isn't the smartest way to mark the end of their school lives?'

  Doris was trotting at his side, making a fair attempt of keeping up without actually running. 'They're teenagers. In their minds that makes them invincible.’

  He pushed open the doors to the emergency department and stopped in his tracks. Doris, not having any warning, bumped squarely into his back and let out an 'Oomph' of surprise before scooting past. He scarcely registered. He only had eyes for Evie.

  Except he'd stopped short because he hadn't been sure it was her. Deep in conversation with another nurse, she hadn't seen him.

  She was dressed in a crisp white nurse's shirt, tucked into a pair of navy trousers, no coins around her waist today. Her dark waves were pulled back and secured tightly at the nape of her delicate neck into some sort of bun. The image wasn't nearly as disconcerting as the belly dancer of yesterday and he was conscious of a moment of disappointment.

  Then she looked up and flashed her gypsy smile at him, letting him know his abruptness yesterday hadn't shaken her confidence.

  Please, he prayed silently, let her confidence be justified. An over-confident, incompetent nurse—could there be any worse fate for him?

  'Good morning,' she sang out, moving towards him with lithe grace. 'I was getting the run-down from Libby—,' She broke off as the screech of a siren was heard in the distance. 'Shall we?' She motioned to the external door and they fell into step, exiting the department through the automatic doors out to the ambulance bay.

  Judging by the siren, the ambulance was almost there and he had no idea what to expect from their patient, and even less from the nurse meant to be assisting him. 'Are you equipped to deal with this?'

  Had she bristled? He didn't care if she had. He had a department to run and if he, as one of the senior staff members, had no time to indulge his own ego, he sure as hell wasn't about to make room for hers.

  If she had bristled, she didn't take the bait, merely nodded, adding, 'Of course,' in an unflustered tone.

  Evie wasn't about to start an argument with Dr Carlisle. She needed this job, and she didn't have time to cater to the ego of Mr Big Shot Country Doctor. That wasn't why she was there and she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of pulling her up.

  But, if he'd been trying to needle her, he let it drop. Maybe he was just checking, nothing more. Besides, she liked him. First impressions counted, although this morning he looked even more disheveled than yesterday. She risked a sideways glance up at him, assuming he wouldn't notice as he seemed somewhat distracted. He towered over her, a shadow of a beard darkening his jaw, and Evie wondered what time his day had started as it didn't look like he'd had time to shave. His thick brown hair was longer than conventional—was it intentional or was he overdue for a haircut?

  His grey eyes were solemn and he reminded her of a big shaggy bear, grumpy after a long hibernation, in need of some company, perhaps in the form of a great big belly rub. And she was great at belly rubs. First, though, she'd get rid of that ridiculous tie which he obviously felt uncomfortable in, and—

  The shaggy bear's voice broke into her thoughts. 'Today, Nurse Henderson.'

  Oops.

  She didn't even bother with a reply, just hotfooted it next to him as the ambulance screeched into the bay. Zac threw open the rear doors before the driver had turned off the engine and inside the ambulance Evie could see a second officer leaning over the patient.

  Zac greeted him. 'Morning, Bruce, what have we got?'

  Bruce climbed out of the ambulance and Zac pulled the stretcher towards him, watching as the legs unfolded to support its weight.

  'Seventeen-year-old male, complaining of chest pain and stomach cramps. Heart rate 140 and irregular, resps 50 but settling with oxygen,' Bruce replied as he took charge of the stretcher.

  The patient had an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose and Evie could see a saline drip running into his arm. A portable oxygen cylinder and a drip stand were attached to the stretcher.

  'Apparently he had hallucinations of some sort and became aggressive and then confused.' Bruce continued to talk as he pushed the stretcher through the hospital doors. 'We're assuming he's been drinking and has perhaps taken drugs or a mixture of drugs. We're told he vomited, but the kids aren't telling us much more so we're working blind.'

  'What's wrong with these kids? Does someone have to die before they'll see sense?'

  'At least one of them thought to call us, but it would help to know what we're dealing with.' Bruce's tone was calm in contrast to Zac's frustration.

  Evie hurried alongside the stretch
er, guiding it to a stop inside the first examination cubicle. Fortunately, the emergency department was empty at this hour of the day and she didn't waste time drawing the curtains—she wanted to start treatment. The patient was in a bad way. Very bad.

  'What's his name?' she asked Bruce, not bothering to introduce herself. There'd be time for that later and if he was going to fuss he could read her ID tag.

  'Stewart.'

  Evie leant over the boy, shaking him gently by the shoulder.

  'Stewart, can you hear me? You're in the hospital.' She pulled up his eyelids as she spoke and that got his attention. He lashed out at her, knocking her arm away. She wasn't hurt but cursed herself for not reacting faster.

  Stewart pulled off the oxygen mask and continued to thrash about, swearing and yelling. His pupils were dilated, his breathing shallow and rapid.

  'Grab his arms, he needs restraints.' Evie caught Stewart's left arm, just before he managed to rip out his IV line. 'My money's on crystal meth,' she said as she clung to Stewart's arm with all her strength, gratefully aware that Bruce had pinned Stewart's other arm.

  'Pardon?' Zac's voice came from the foot of the stretcher, where he was trying to hold Stewart's flailing legs. Stewart was doing his best to connect and, despite his size, Zac was struggling to contain him.

  'Crystal meth, methamphetamine—you know, ice, speed. He's got all the right symptoms of an overdose.'

  'Do you know that, or is it something you've seen on a TV show?'

  Evie decided to ignore the jibe. It wasn't her fault she knew more than he did. 'I know you don't know me, but I know what I'm doing.' She let go of their patient's arm as Libby finally tied a restraint around his wrist, fixing him to the stretcher. Replacing the oxygen mask on Stewart's face, she continued, 'I'm from London. This is like a common cold there.'

  He looked at her a fraction longer through narrowed eyes, his expression unsure. She didn't have time to go into further detail. She needed to take a blood sample and drawing blood from an eighty- kilogram moving target wasn't easy. Libby had fastened the other straps and fortunately Stewart gave up the struggle once he was restrained.