Secrets to Keep (47 page)

‘Expecting someone else, were you? I hope I haven’t disappointed you. I did have a very tempting offer to join another practice but I find I’m not ready to leave these parts quite yet. Please take a seat, won’t you?’

Aidy walked the rest of the way over and sat down on the chair before his desk. Mixed emotions were running through her. The part of her that had fallen for Ty was delighted to look into a face she had thought never to see again, but the other part was annoyed. His staying around here was
not
going to help her get over him. And what about the job? She dearly wanted it, but didn’t know whether she could put up with his cold, stand-offish treatment of her any longer.

Ty was leaning back in his chair. Looking up at the ceiling, he began, ‘Well what can I tell you about the job, Mrs Nelson? Your duties would be exactly as they were before. I am going to be making a few changes, though. I am going to be hiring someone else, not only to do community nursing but also to run classes here at the surgery, educating people on hygiene and child care and possibly paying visits to people’s homes to advise them on how to make things better there for themselves.’ Now Ty wasn’t saving every spare penny to put towards escaping this place, he could afford the wage. ‘I do have a person in mind for that job. You know her … Ruth Whelham.

‘I understand you now have basic nursing skills to your credit, Mrs Nelson, so should Miss Whelham have too much to deal with on her own, maybe you’d like to go out on visits on her behalf when there are simple cases to cover?

‘And as I really feel it wouldn’t be fair of me not to offer my patients the very best treatment that’s available, for their particular illness, I’m hoping an expert on natural remedies will agree to educate me so I can make up my mind whether they have merit or not. I’ve taken on a temporary locum to help me until I’m fully recovered again. He’s doing all the house visits and emergency call outs while I take care of the surgeries. I expect people have seen him arrive and wondered who he was. His name is Andrew
Hilton and I am hoping I can work something out whereby I’m able to keep him. It would certainly give me more time to myself. I’m hoping that I’m going to be needing that free time in the future, Mrs Nelson.’

Ty took his attention from the ceiling then and fixed it on Aidy. Lowering his voice to a husky tone, he said, ‘As to the man you’d be working for, Mrs Nelson, I can assure you he is not the man you previously knew, but the one you liked much more when you met him briefly on Christmas Day. A man ready to leave his past behind and take a risk on someone who’d like to have the chance of making a future with him.’ He was smiling as he looked at her. ‘So, is my offer acceptable to you, Mrs Nelson?’

He was leaving her in absolutely no doubt he wasn’t just talking about the job offer, but also his intention of seeing if they had what it took between them to be happy together! Aidy felt a tide of red creeping up her neck. So he hadn’t been in a morphine-induced sleep after all. Maybe he was dozing, but his mind had still been receptive enough to have heard every word she had said to him when she didn’t think he could.

A commotion from outside filtered through to them.

‘That’ll be the patients, anxious to be let into the
waiting room and out of the cold. So, Mrs Nelson … or can I now call you Aidy? What is it to be?’

Aidy needed no time to ponder Ty’s proposal. Eyes shining, she smiled at him, a warm, soft smile full of meaning. ‘Well, Doc, I’d better go and unlock the door and start sending them in, hadn’t I?’