HE STAYED THERE for two days and two nights, terrified that if he left something else might happen.
Her blood-sugar readings came back to normal relatively quickly. But still she didn’t wake up.
The staff was great. He still had a job to do, so they would bring him charts to sign along with cups of tea and snacks. Joe brought him in a towel and a fresh pair of scrubs with a pointed nod, so he used the shower in the bathroom attached to Viv’s room so he wasn’t too far away.
Lien was still unwell too. It was unlikely she’d be able to resume duties anytime soon. That didn’t stop her wheeling her IV down the corridor and coming in to speak to them both, clutching a sick bowl in one hand.
Ron had been as good as his word. Viv’s bloods had been fast-tracked and after a quick consultation with another expert they’d started her on an alternative medication. Right now, Duc would try anything.
It was late at night. Duc had pulled in a more comfortable chair so he could sleep next to her bed. It was the kind that could recline and even though the nurses could do it in the blink of an eye, it always took him about five minutes to figure it out.
Just as he finally managed to push it back there was a little moan from the bed.
He froze. And spun around.
It was the first sign of anything from Viv in two days.
He leaned forward, grasping her hand again. ‘Viv, it’s Duc. Can you hear me?’
Nothing. His eyes went to the monitor, willing the heart rate to speed up to give him some kind of sign that she was listening, that she was hearing him.
But it just continued to blip along.
Frustration gripped him and all the while he told himself to remain calm. It was something.
After hovering over her bed for an age, he finally settled down into the chair beside her bed. ‘I’m here, Viv,’ he said quietly. ‘Whenever you need me, I’m here.’
Sleep finally claimed him but he woke in the early hours of the morning. He sat straight up, wondering what had woken him. It was dark outside with only a smattering of stars in the sky. He frowned, straining to hear any noise in the corridor outside. Had it been one of the nurses? A phone perhaps?
He pushed the chair forward, planting his feet on the floor.
There was a noise, a groan again and he was instantly on high alert. ‘Viv?’
Her nose was wrinkled. ‘Headache,’ she croaked.
‘Brilliant!’ he shouted, leaning over and gathering her up in his arms. Her body was still weak, and she didn’t return the hug. He pressed the nurse call button.
‘You have no idea how worried we’ve all been,’ he breathed. ‘I am so, so sorry.’
It was almost like she wasn’t really processing his words. ‘Headache,’ she repeated as she sagged back into the pillows.
The nurse appeared at the door, her eyes wide. ‘She’s awake?’
He nodded. ‘Just. Can you get Viv something for a headache?’
The nurse nodded and disappeared, coming back a minute later with a glass of water with a straw and a couple of pills.
‘Let’s try these first.’
Duc wound the bed up and helped Viv adjust her position so she could take a tiny sip of water. She coughed and spluttered. She still hadn’t really opened her eyes.
He tried to move into doctor mode and ask a few standard questions, but her replies were distinctly groggy.
He knew her body was hydrated because of her IV, but she still hadn’t drunk any fluids in two days.
After a minute or so she held out her hand for the tablets and swallowed them awkwardly. Her eyes closed immediately.
Duc wanted to shake her, to make her try and talk again, to see what else he could do. But the nurse shot him a warning look. ‘Our patient needs rest. Take it from someone who’s had malaria.’
He pushed himself to give her a smile. She was right. He knew she was right. But so much was bubbling inside him right now.
She headed for the door. ‘I don’t suppose there’s any point in me trying to persuade you to spend the night in your own bed now that she’s woken up?’
He shook his head. ‘None at all.’
She shook her head too, giving him an amused smile. ‘Didn’t think so.’
Her head was fuzzy. And not a good kind of fuzzy. Somehow this felt like the worst hangover on the planet; in fact, she’d never actually had a hangover this bad.
And she was tired. Really, really tired. This didn’t feel normal.
She turned around in her bed, wondering why she couldn’t get comfortable. The sheets were stiff. So was the pillow. Had Duc changed her bedding?
Her eyelids flickered open. White. Everywhere. That wasn’t right. She’d grown used to the pleasant washed-out red of the walls in Duc’s house.
If she had the energy she’d sit up. But she didn’t.
Then she saw Duc in a chair next to her. Why would he be sitting by her bed? He looked terrible.
She didn’t even need to speak because his eyelids flickered open and he jerked then leaned forward, grabbing her hand. ‘Viv, you’re awake. How are you feeling?’
Now she really couldn’t make sense of things at all. ‘Wh-what?’ was all that came out.
Her joints ached. She looked down. These weren’t her PJs. She wrinkled her nose as she realised she was wearing a hospital gown. She pulled it away from her body. ‘What?’ she asked again.
‘You haven’t been well,’ Duc said quickly, his face grave. ‘You have malaria. We think you got bitten while helping at the accident—you had short sleeves that day.’
Malaria? ‘But I take the meds...’
His hand was still touching hers. It was almost like he didn’t want to let go.
‘I know,’ he said, then shook his head. ‘But for some reason they’ve not worked. They’re doing some special bloodwork to find out more.’
He looked at her seriously. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? The night sweats? The headaches? Was there anything else?’
She honestly couldn’t remember right now. Plus, right now this felt like a bit of a lecture.
‘I need to sleep,’ she said firmly, closing her eyes and curling on her side again. Next time she woke up she’d complain about these sheets and the hospital gown...
It was four days before Viv was anything like normal again. She was cranky, and constantly tired. It had to be expected. She still couldn’t seem to get her head around the fact she’d contracted malaria.
All the hospital staff kept popping in. Joe was a constant, as was Duc, with an occasional visit from Lien, who was still suffering from her hyperemesis gravidarum. Ron had even dropped in on a few occasions, bringing tea and sitting down to chat.
She still couldn’t believe this had happened to her. Now, in hindsight, she remembered having an itch on the back of her arm. But she’d never even thought to look at it in the mirror. She’d been too busy. There had been too much else going on.
Too much Duc...
Today she’d managed to persuade him to let her go back and sleep in her own bed. At least, that was how she still thought of it. But he’d insisted on carrying her the whole way.
She hadn’t been amused.
She’d also had to promise that people could come in and ‘check’ on her. It seemed no one was listening when she insisted she was a nurse and could look after herself.
The bungalow was a lot tidier since the last time she’d been here. ‘What happened to all the boxes?’ she asked as Duc carried her through the main room.
He had the good grace to look sheepish. ‘Mai Ahn. When you collapsed, I took you straight across to the hospital and stayed with you. I kind of forgot we’d been in the middle of things. But Mai Ahn came and asked if she could do anything to help and offered to take the boxes to goodwill for me.’
Of course. They’d been in the middle of emptying out his parents’ things. She remembered the emotions on his face. How final it all must have seemed to him.
‘Sorry,’ she muttered.
‘What?’ he looked surprised. ‘What have you got to be sorry for?’
She waved her hand. She couldn’t look at him right now. It seemed that now she’d woken up, all the emotions she’d kept locked away these past few months were fighting to get out now. It seemed that being sick had used up all the firm reserves she normally had.
If she looked at Duc, with his floppy hair and soft brown eyes, she would crumble.
‘I think I need to leave,’ were the words that came out.
‘As soon as I feel better. I think I need to leave.’
‘What?’ His voice was incredulous.
She concentrated on her hands. ‘This isn’t working out—not for me, Duc.’
‘But I thought you liked it here?’
‘I do. I mean I did.’
Her hands had never looked so interesting.
‘Viv, talk to me. Tell me what you mean?’
How could she do that? How could she tell her best friend that their relationship could never be the same again—at least, not for her?
From the instant she’d stepped off the plane and seen him again, things had changed between them.
It was nobody’s fault.
Neither of them understood the change, but they’d crossed a line for Viv. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t ignore the spark of attraction she felt for Duc now.
She’d never felt so connected to a person, or a place.
‘I can’t st-stay. Not here. Not now.’
He thumped down on the bed next to her. She closed her eyes. She could smell him. The familiar scents she associated with Duc. The laundry detergent he used for his clothes. How many times had she cuddled him, or lain with her head against his shoulder breathing that in?
He swung his legs up on to the bed so he was sitting parallel with her. She could almost hear his brain spinning, trying to find words. She knew him. Sometimes she thought she knew him better than he knew himself.
She took a deep breath. ‘You’ve done well, Duc. This place is great. You’ve sorted things out. You can go back now. You can go back and be the surgeon you’ve always wanted to be.’
There was a long pause. ‘You think that’s what I want to do?’
‘I know that’s what you want to do. You should live the life you want.’ Her voice started to shake a little. ‘You should be happy.’
‘What if I told you that’s not what makes me happy?’
She jerked, and automatically turned to face him, cursing herself for letting down her guard.
His brown eyes were fixed straight on her. Sincere.
‘Viv, what if I told you that it might have taken me a number of years to figure out, but the thing that makes me happy is you.’
She felt herself start to shake. She shook her head. ‘No. No, it’s not, Duc.’
His voice was steady. He reached over and intertwined his pinkie with hers. She wanted to pull her hand away, but the warmth from his skin seemed to hold her there.
‘Viv, I’m sorry. I never really tried to walk in your shoes. I never really understood what your life must be like. You always seemed so independent, so self-sufficient, as if it was what you wanted, what you needed. I just didn’t think any further than that. I didn’t look deep enough when I should have.’
She didn’t know quite where this conversation was going. ‘What do you mean?’
He ran his other hand through his hair. ‘I thought we told each other everything. I thought we were best friends. But when I look back, I’ve not been the friend that I should have.’ This time it was his gaze that dropped to their intertwined pinkies. ‘I let you down. I should have realised—I should have understood.’
She could feel herself starting to panic—she couldn’t quite follow where he was going with this. ‘What do you mean?’
‘All those bad boyfriends. All the no-hopers and ratbags. The one guy you went out with who was actually nice—Archie? Remember him?’
She felt herself shudder. She still couldn’t understand what this conversation was about. Archie. Yes, of course she remembered him. The electrician from Bristol. A lovely guy, good-natured, hard-working and hopelessly devoted with a good sense of humour. She’d dumped him after a few months. Archie had been nice. Archie had been safe. Archie would have looked after her. There wasn’t a single bad thing she could say about him.
She nodded without speaking.
‘You ran, Viv. You ran so fast you practically sprinted. Because Archie could have offered you an attachment. Love.’ He bit his bottom lip. ‘A home. But you couldn’t do it. You couldn’t cope. And everyone you picked after that? They could offer none of those things. I didn’t see it at the time. I didn’t understand. But you deliberately went for guys like that because they would never make you form an attachment. You didn’t need to invest your heart in them. It was like you predetermined every relationship. And I think you did it without even realising why.’
Her skin prickled as he spoke. There was something so achingly familiar about some of the things he was saying. She actually felt nauseous. She wanted to be indignant. She wanted to automatically shout and deny every part of this. But too much of it was making her feel uncomfortable. Too much of it sounded so close to the truth that it made her stomach hurt.
And it seemed that Duc didn’t know when to stop. ‘You run, Viv. You run because it’s easier than stopping to find out if love and home are actually worth the heartache.’
Now she snapped and snatched her hand away from his. ‘Not all of us had the life you did, Duc. Not all of us had Khiem and Hoa.’ It was cruel to bring them up when only a few months before they’d been snatched away from their son, but it seemed like now it was time for no holds barred.
‘But when do you stop running, Viv? When do you stop and catch your breath? When do you take the time to look around and decide if someone and somewhere might actually be worth the risk?’
She could almost hear his heart in those words. There was a pleading tone to his voice.
‘I could have lost you. I invited you here. You contracted a disease that’s endemic to my country. I invited you to a place that could have killed you. I’ve spent the last few days scared to breathe, Viv. Scared that every breath might be the last one with you by my side. I had no idea. No idea what I had. And every idea about what I might lose.’
Her heart gave a little flip. Where was this going? She wanted to speak. She wanted to say something. But all the words were just gummed up in her mouth.
‘You taught me about here. You let me learn to love being a doctor again. Not a surgeon, a doctor. You made me realise just what I’ve got here. Not just a building, but the people too. I can’t imagine leaving. I can’t imagine ever working anywhere else.’ He took a deep breath. ‘But I will. If you want me to.’
She frowned. ‘What?’
He took a few moments. ‘I want you to be happy, Viv. And if staying here isn’t something you can contemplate, then tell me where you want to go, and I’ll come too.’
She shook her head. ‘What are you talking about?’
He pointed to his chest. ‘Me.’ Then pointed at hers. ‘You. We have to give this a chance. We have to give us a chance. We have to see if this, us, is meant to be.’ He reached over and gently touched her cheek. ‘Let me show you what home can be.’
Maybe it was the way he said the words. Or maybe it was some of the stuff he’d said before, but every hackle went up at the back of her neck.
Her stomach plummeted. This was so not what she wanted to hear. He felt sorry for her. It was like he was still in doctor mode. ‘You can’t fix me, Duc.’ She shook her head and tried to stop the tears forming in her eyes. ‘Even if all the stuff you think about me is true, I’m scared to form relationships, I’m scared to take a chance on a home. I’m not your charity project. You don’t get to feel sorry for me. And what you never get to do is...’ she lifted her fingers in the air ‘...fix me.’
The very thought repulsed her. This wasn’t what she wanted. In every tiny splintered dream she’d imagined what they could become to each other, and this wasn’t it.
Duc gave a bewildered smile and shook his head. ‘I don’t want to fix you, Viv. That’s not why I’m here. You don’t need fixing. You’re perfect just the way you are.’
‘So what are you trying to say?’
He fixed his deep brown eyes on hers. ‘What I’m asking for is permission to love you.’
She froze. Was that really just what he’d said?
‘But...but you pulled away. You didn’t want us to go down that path. You pulled away as if it was the worst thing you’d ever thought of. As if kissing me was the worst thing you’d ever done. Then you made an excuse about us just staying friends.’
He let out a wry laugh. ‘Really? You thought I didn’t like kissing you?’ He looked incredulous. ‘Viv, when you’re wrong, you’re so wrong it’s scary.’
She scowled as he used one of her own expressions, mimicking her Scottish accent.
‘Viv, I’ve thought about kissing you from practically the moment you stepped off that plane in those denim shorts and that tied-up shirt. From the second you wrapped your arms around me at the airport something changed. At least, for me it did. Every casual hug or brush of your hand just seems to set me crazy—in a good way. I spend my life sniffing for that orange-blossom scent from your shampoo, wondering where you are. You sent my blood pressure skyrocketing in your “interview” outfit. As for that red dress?’ He shook his head again, his smile reaching his twinkling eyes.
‘I have no idea why we didn’t go down this road before. Maybe we just both weren’t ready. Maybe we weren’t at that point in our lives. Maybe we needed to both find our feet a little. But now? Now, Viv? I’m ready if you are. Just say the word. Because I want to love you, Viv. I do. I want us to try and be together. More than anything in this world. More than this place. More than the other hospitals. I want to try with me and you. So, just say the word. Say that you’ll give us a chance. It can be anywhere in the world. I’ll follow you anywhere you want to go, Viv. Just tell me that you think we’re worth a chance.’
She was stunned. This conversation had started in a very different way. She wasn’t quite sure how after all this time Duc had just managed to say a million things at once.
‘You have no idea—’ his voice was lower, more gravelly ‘—what it felt like to see you collapse. To see you lying in that hospital bed. I lost my mum and dad this year, Viv. The thought of losing you too? I couldn’t handle that. I can’t handle losing the person I need most. I’m not crazy. I know I’m not crazy. But things have changed between us. We both know that. So let’s take this, let’s grab it with both hands and see where it takes us. We’ve got to be worth a try, surely, Viv.’ He lowered his voice even more. ‘I know I want to, with all my heart.’
A single tear slid down her cheek. She looked over at him. Now she saw it. Now she saw the fact he hadn’t slept properly in days. The lines around his eyes.
She took a deep breath. ‘It’s not your fault I got sick. That’s life. I was taking precautions, but I did go out to the accident in short sleeves. I didn’t think about it—and I didn’t notice any mosquito bite. That’s my fault, not yours. But—’ she locked gazes with him ‘—you haven’t really told me how you feel about me, Duc. You say you want to try—but why do you want to try?’
He looked confused for a moment.
She held out her hands. ‘This place is... different too. For me, that is. Maybe it is an age and stage thing, but I finally feel as if I’ve found a place I can fit in. I can be me. I like the people. I like the patients. The only thing that stops me wanting to stay here is you.’
He looked shocked. ‘Why?’
She shook her head. ‘You can’t stay because it seems like a good idea. You can’t stay because you think I want to. You dreamed of being a surgeon. Is that dream still there? Because if it is, in a few months you’ll start to be miserable and unhappy. You won’t want to be here, and it will affect everyone around you.’
He shook his head. He looked out the window across to the hospital. ‘I’d never taken the time I’ve had here to look at things. You know what surgical teams are like? It’s a back-stabbing competitive world. I thought that was how I wanted to live my life. But after a while I realised just how much more of a doctor I can be here. I’m still adjusting. But there’s so much work to be done that I don’t want to stand still. I want to keep this place moving and make sure we’re doing all we can. This is a job of a lifetime, Viv—at least, for me. I know you’ve moved about. I know you might still want to. You asked me how I really feel about you? I love you. I think I might always have loved you. If this place doesn’t make you happy...’ he put his hand to his chest ‘...and I don’t make you happy, then I want you to know that I will always love you, I will always be here, I will always be your best friend. And...’ he slowed down ‘...you will always have a home here, with me.’
She started to sob. She couldn’t help it, and Duc moved, wrapping one arm around her shoulders and pulling her close.
‘I love this place,’ she said between sniffs as she laid her hand on his chest. ‘But I love this place because it’s got you in it. It is you. Everywhere I look I’m reminded of you. I couldn’t be here if you weren’t. You drive me crazy, do you know that? You kissed me in the kitchen and then pulled away. Do you know what that did to me? What that did to my heart? I thought it might break in two.’
He kissed her head. ‘I’m sorry, Viv. I was mixed up. I thought I’d crossed a line and ruined everything between us. I thought you’d hate me.’
Her hand thumped against his chest. ‘How can I hate you when I love you, stupid? The guy who’s been my everything for the last ten years. The one person I’m honest with and tell all my dark family secrets.’ She fingered the chain at her throat.
‘The one man to buy me jewellery just because it matched my eyes. And when you kissed me...you turned my world upside down. A kiss between friends isn’t supposed to feel like that. Isn’t supposed to steal the breath from your throat and turn your legs to jelly. Isn’t supposed to leave your heart racing so much you can’t sleep at night.’ Her fingers were brushing the skin at the base of his neck. He looked down at her with those dark eyes. She could see the sparkle. Feel the sizzle in the air between them again.
She moved her fingers more slowly. ‘And this? This electricity that constantly buzzes between us? How are we ever supposed to get any work done in future? How will any patients ever get seen if we both work here?’
She couldn’t help the teasing tone in her voice. Her heart was so full she couldn’t breathe again. Duc loved her. He said he loved her. Could the world ever be this perfect?
He changed position, tilting her chin up to his. ‘So, this is us. This is really us.’
It was like he was just making sure.
She nodded.
But he kept going as a sexy smile appeared on his face. ‘No pulling back. No changing minds?’
‘No pulling back, no changing minds,’ she repeated with a smile on her face, then she sighed as he jumped off the bed and headed to the doorway. ‘Duc, are you ever going to kiss me? Or am I going to have to die waiting?’
‘Oh, I’m going to kiss you, I’m just making sure we’ll not be disturbed.’ He smiled as he turned the lock on the door and joined her back on the bed. He slid his arms around her waist. ‘Now, where were we?’
‘Right here,’ she said as her lips touched his.