LITMIR.BIZ

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have indeed, he thought, three times to be exact.

      ‘Yes,’ he replied with the smile still in place, and went on to explain with his glance on her so-far silent companion, ‘I was out on an emergency call.

      ‘And how are you this morning, Laurel?’ he said easily, wondering if she was anaemic or something of the kind to be wearing that sort of jumper in the heat of summer.

      ‘Much better, thank you,’ she said flatly, and he sighed inwardly.

      He turned to Elaine. ‘I was called to the village hall where the Women’s Institute are having a meeting and found their chairlady with a suspected heart attack.’

      ‘Oh! No!’ Elaine exclaimed. ‘That would be Maisie Tate. Poor Maisie!’

      ‘Yes, it was,’ he replied, and thought he couldn’t imagine her companion having much interest in the ills and ailments of the Willowmere villagers. There was an aloofness about her today and he was curious to know what lay beneath it as he never could resist a challenge.

      ‘And so what do you think of our beautiful village?’ he asked Laurel.

      ‘I thought that you were a newcomer too,’ she commented dryly, while comparing his clear-cut attractiveness to the wavy dark hair and fashionable stubble of Darius, who’d not wanted her any more because he’d seen the scarring and been revolted…

      It wasn’t a situation that would ever occur with this man, she thought with a rush of blood. There would never be an occasion when he saw her minus clothing and…where had such an idea come from anyway?

      He was smiling at the comment and she thought how likeable he was as he said, ‘I am a newcomer in one way, yet I feel as if Willowmere has always been part of me. Sometimes we find the place of our dreams and are given the opportunity to live there and that is what I intend to do when I’ve found a house.’

      There was no mention of a woman in his life, Laurel noticed, which was incredible, but the odds were that there would be one tucked away somewhere, or relegated to the past for some reason.

      ‘I must go,’ he said, unaware that she was surmising about his love life. ‘I have a few visits to make and am already late after the callout to Mrs Tate.’

      ‘Yes, of course,’ Elaine said, and to Laurel’s horror she went on, ‘Would you like to come over for dinner one evening so that I may show my appreciation for the way you looked after my niece yesterday?’

      Ugh! Laurel thought, taken aback at the suggestion and its implications. It made her appear to be some sort of helpless, clinging vine, just as she’d been when they’d met at the station and afterwards. But she wasn’t usually like that. It was just unfortunate that David Trelawney had been an observer of her moments of weakness.

      If she was taken aback, so was he, she thought, seeing his surprise, but he soon recovered his poise and said politely, ‘Er…yes…I’d love to.’ He glanced warily in her direction. ‘But please don’t feel that you owe me anything for yesterday. It was just a matter of common politeness.’

      As Elaine nodded understandingly Laurel thought wistfully that it would be, wouldn’t it? The time was gone when she attracted admiring looks, or handsome men asked her out to dinner.

      ‘When would you like to come?’ Elaine was asking.

      He gave a wry grimace. ‘I’m free most nights. I spend most of my time house hunting or dreaming of renovating an old house I’ve seen.’

      ‘And where would that be?’ she questioned curiously, while Laurel stood by silently once more.

      ‘It’s a derelict building in one of the fields beside Willow Lake.’

      ‘Ah! I know the one. It’s called Water Meetings House. Why that one, though, when there are lots of nice properties in the area? It would need huge restoration work to make it habitable again. It’s been like that for years.’

      ‘Mmm, I know, but I do have my reasons,’ he said, and without questioning him further Elaine returned to the subject of dinner.

      ‘So how about one night next week?’ she suggested. ‘Say Friday when there is no surgery the following day?’

      ‘Yes, fine,’ he replied. ‘What time?’

      ‘Sevenish, if that’s all right.’

      He nodded and with a wave of the hand drove off.

      As his car disappeared from view Laurel groaned openly and Elaine said, ‘I know what you’re thinking. That it is unkind of me to invite David to dinner when you want to keep a low profile, but Laurel, I’m not match-making. He is a stranger in the village, just as you are, and we in Willowmere are renowned for our hospitality.’

      ‘I’m sorry,’ she said contritely as the moment of gloom disappeared. ‘The last thing I want is to become a me, me, me sort of person. Self-pity is a form of selfishness.’

      ‘It can be,’ Elaine agreed gently, ‘but not in your case. And now let’s take you home and put you to bed for a couple of hours and I guarantee that as each day passes you are going to feel more ready to face the world, and whatever you think of Willowmere you couldn’t be recuperating in a better place.’

      ‘You might be right,’ Laurel said with spirits still lifting as she thought that it was more likely to be the village’s inhabitants than its peace and fresh air that were going to help her take a hold on life again.

      Yet as she looked out of her bedroom window before going to bed that night and saw a golden sun setting on the skyline, with the lake glinting in the distance amongst the drooping willows that had given it its name, it didn’t all feel quite so strange as it had the night before.

      Within minutes of placing her head on the pillows she slept and for once there were no smoke and flames turning her dreams into nightmares.

      Beth called at Glenside Lodge for a chat in her lunch hour the following day and as the three of them relaxed over coffee she said, ‘James must be feeling that it is one departure after another at the surgery. First it was Anna and Glenn going to work in Africa. Then Georgina and Ben had a blissful reunion, which resulted in them remarrying and her giving birth to Arran in the spring, so she is going to be missing for quite some time too, hence David’s most welcome appearance, and now I’m about to try a new slant on village shopping. You will be most welcome in the practice, Laurel, if you can sort something out with James, but are you happy that it might only be temporary?’

      ‘Yes, it would suit me fine,’ she replied. ‘I’m rather at a crossroads in my life at the moment, so it would give me a short breathing space before I make up my mind what I want to do and where I’m heading.’

      Elaine was nodding in silent agreement. Laurel was improving physically, but it was the mental scars that worried her. Her niece had been a bright and trendy twenty-five-year-old when it had happened, totally dedicated to the career she’d chosen and enjoying life in the big city when she hadn’t been working, but now all of that had gone.

      Her interest in the village surgery had been lukewarm when she’d taken Laurel there, as had been her interest in life in general, but she wasn’t going to sit by and let her stay in the doldrums. Her beautiful girl still had a lot to offer to those needing health care and to the man who would one day love her for who she was.

      Willowmere in summer was a bright haven of colour. The new life that had come bursting through in fields and gardens in the spring was now established in abundant growth. Trees along the riverside, some of them hundreds of years old, were in full leaf, providing a background of fresh greenery against the flimsy craft of the canoe club as they sailed along on practice days, and bird life of every kind imaginable was to be found in cottage gardens and in the park that ran parallel with the river.

      The charm of the village attracted walkers and visitors from miles around and as the days passed Laurel was aware that the Hollyhocks

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