LITMIR.BIZ

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CHAPTER ONE

      ‘SO...YOU’RE GOING after all, then?’

      Dr Bethan Monroe didn’t need to look at her grandmother to know she was disappointed. She’d heard it in her voice. But what was she to do?

      ‘I have to, Nanna.’

      ‘No, you don’t. Not with him. Not with a Brodie.’

      Bethan groaned out loud. It really was quite childish, this feud her nanna had against that family. Okay, maybe not the whole family, but most definitely against one of them in particular. Thankfully the one she was seeing today was not her nanna’s arch-nemesis—rather, he was his grandson.

      ‘I do!’ She stepped over to the kitchen table, snatched up the not insignificant pile of final demands in her fist and waved them about. ‘Because if I don’t then you lose the house. We had the phone cut off last week for a whole day!’

      Her exasperation wore off instantly when she noted the discomfort on her beloved grandmother’s face.

      She softened her tone. ‘Grace is in school now. I can work again and pay my way.’

      She’d missed it. Incredibly so. Being a doctor was her calling and, though she’d loved being a stay-at-home mum whilst her daughter grew to school age, she felt a real yearning to get back into the consulting room. It had always been the plan that she would take this break, but she’d not known how difficult it would be alone.

      ‘But surely there must be other posts you could apply for? Somewhere further afield? In Glencoe or Fort William?’

      Perhaps there were. But they lived here now. In Gilloch. And she didn’t want to be that far away from her loved ones. Not any more. Grace was growing up fast, and she didn’t want her nanna to miss any of it. Commuting for hours each day simply wasn’t on her agenda.

      Living in Cornwall had been wonderful, but that was in the past now. She’d returned to her proper home three years after Ashley had died. Back to the place she had been born. And it felt right. Coming home.

      ‘This job—right here in the village—it’s a gift in itself! I’ll be able to get home whenever I’m needed. Say, if there was an emergency.’

      She couldn’t help but feel guilty once again as she thought back to when Ashley had died. For weeks she’d sat by his bed—keeping him company, holding his hand, reading to him, never missing a minute—and then one day she’d been called into work. There’d been an emergency—a train derailment—and all hands had been needed on deck.

      And Ashley had died alone. She’d received the call at work, from a neighbour who’d had a key and had promised to keep an eye out. She’d not been able to get home quickly enough. Had got caught in endless traffic jams, delayed by lights and drivers who hadn’t seemed to know which pedal the accelerator was.

      She’d just wanted to get back to Grace. Pick her up from the childminder and hold her close against her heart before making that final walk into their bedroom, where Ashley had lain. She’d vowed never to be that far away ever again.

      ‘It’ll be okay, Nanna.’

      Mhairi sank shakily into a seat by the table, adjusting the woven scarf at her neck. ‘You have more faith than I. What that Angus Brodie put me through...’

      ‘I know.’

      ‘He ruined my life. I don’t want to see another Brodie man ruin yours.’

      ‘I might not even get the job.’

      But she hoped she would. ‘Brodie man’ or not. They needed this! She’d only been back a few months and their financial situation was getting more dire. They couldn’t live off Ashley’s life insurance for ever.

      This was about a job. Employment. That was all. It was a business transaction—not an affair of the heart. It wasn’t going to be anything like what had happened between her nanna and Angus Brodie. Those had been different times back then. It was the past. And Bethan didn’t feel she was ready for another relationship yet. She was over the raw pain of Ashley’s death, yes, and she worried something rotten about raising Grace without a father figure around, but did that mean her heart was on the open market?

      No. Not yet.

      She kissed her nanna’s soft, downy cheek and sat beside her at the kitchen table, one eye on the clock. ‘We’ll be okay.’

      Nanna covered Bethan’s hand with her own, more gnarly, liver-spotted one. ‘I’m just so used to having you here now. I worry he’ll hurt you, like Angus did me. But I’m just being a worry-wart, that’s all.’

      ‘It’s in the past. Where it should belong. Let’s look positively to the future. I’m a strong woman. I can handle myself and any Brodie male who even tries to cause me trouble.’

      ‘Even handsome ones? That grandson of his... I’ve seen him about. I’ve seen how the young women of this village look at him. Like they could eat him alive!’ Nanna smiled with reluctance.

      ‘Even the good-looking ones.’ She held her nanna’s hand and squeezed it reassuringly.

      Her grandmother smiled. ‘I suppose I can’t persuade you to become a sheep farmer instead?’

      Bethan pretended to consider it. ‘I’m not sure I’m an open-air kind of girl. Besides, wouldn’t that be a waste of all my education?’

      Nanna mock-doffed her cap. ‘I don’t know where you get it from. Your father loved to fish before he became a stablehand, and your mother enjoyed to sew...’

      Bethan nodded. ‘I do enjoy suturing.’

      ‘Och, it’s not the same and you know it!’

      She got up from the table again and took the red bills from where Bethan had left them and went to switch on the kettle. She let out a heavy sigh, as if resigning herself to the fact that she was going to lose this battle of wills today.

      ‘Okay...let’s take a look at you.’

      Bethan stood up, straightening her navy trouser suit and making sure her cream blouse was crease-free. ‘Will I do?’

      ‘He’d be a dunderheid to turn you down, lass.’

      ‘Good.’ She checked her watch. ‘I’ll be late. Will you be all right?’

      ‘’Course I will. I’ve looked after myself for nearly twenty years—I think I can probably manage the next hour or so. Besides, I’ve had a few orders come in for the shop, so I need to get those bagged up.’

      ‘Okay. Well...wish me luck?’

      ‘Good luck, lassie.’

      Bethan gave her a quick hug and one last look that she hoped conveyed that everything would be all right, and then she picked up her briefcase and headed out of the door.

      Nanna wasn’t the only one who was doubtful about expecting a Brodie to take her on. She’d probably been the most surprised when a letter had arrived, inviting her for an interview with a Dr Cameron Brodie. But the past was the past and she herself had no argument with the Brodies. Clearly Dr Cameron Brodie didn’t have a grudge either, or she wouldn’t have been invited for the interview.

      Nanna’s part-time job—dying her own rare wool skeins to sell in an online shop—barely covered the bills, and in the last three months sales hadn’t been good. They’d struggled—and struggled hard. But now, with Grace having started school full-time, Bethan had become free to get herself a proper job again.

      She’d really missed work. She’d come home to start their lives afresh, and nothing could beat being a mother, but her whole heart had always wanted to care for others. There was something about being a GP that spoke to her. The way you could build a relationship with patients over years, so they wouldn’t be strangers.

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