Their Double Baby Gift. Louisa Heaton
worry. Have you got the crèche app on your phone?’
The hospital crèche had developed its own app, so that parents could click in at any time during the day and receive updates about their child—whether they’d slept, when they’d eaten or had a bottle, what the child was playing with. There was even an option to access the crèche’s webcam.
Grateful for the fact that Daisy was ignoring Brooke’s embarrassing tears, she tried to breathe. Sucking in a breath and dragging a tissue from her pocket to wipe her nose, Brooke nodded. ‘Yes.’
Daisy was still smiling and bobbing up and down as she gently swayed Morgan, trying to soothe her. ‘You go off to work, then, Mummy. Don’t worry about us.’
Morgan looked sickeningly distressed to be in a stranger’s arms, which was disconcerting for her mother. ‘I’ve never left her before. You’ll call me if there’s any problem?’
‘Of course we will.’
‘Anything at all?’
Daisy nodded, but as Brooke opened her mouth to ask another question she felt a firm hand upon her arm. The man she’d seen before looked down at her with intense blue eyes and said, ‘It’s best to just walk away. Don’t look back.’
Brooke looked up at him hopefully, gratefully, with her ugly crying face still at full throttle, dabbing at her tears and trying to hold on to his words of wisdom. Had he done this, then? Did he know what he was talking about? He’d just come out of the Baby Room, so perhaps he’d just dropped off his own child?
‘Really?’
‘Really. Come on.’
He had a stern, no-nonsense tone to his voice. A voice that was used to issuing commands and having them obeyed without question. It was clear he expected the same from her. He gently draped his hands over hers, forcing her fingers to release the death grip she’d had on the buggy since letting go of her daughter, then took the buggy from her and parked it in the buggy bay. With a guiding hand in the small of her back, he purposefully escorted her to the exit.
Brooke was desperate to turn around and make sure Morgan was okay. She could still hear her baby wailing. Her daughter needed her. But the man blocked her view and ushered her out through the door and into the corridor like an expert collie dog herding a reluctant sheep.
‘But I need to—’
He held up his hand for silence. ‘No. You don’t.’
Brooke stepped away and looked him up and down, irritated that he thought he knew what she needed. Sniffing desperately and wiping her nose with the tissue, she wondered just who this man was, anyway. She’d never seen him before at the hospital. But, then again, she’d never had reason to come to the crèche before and the hospital was a big place. He might work anywhere. He might be a new employee.
Wiping away the last of her tears, she stared up at him. He was a good head taller than she. With very short dark blond hair, longer on top. Piercing blue eyes. Trim. Oozing strength and quiet, confident dominance. That was something that usually rubbed her up the wrong way. Eric had been overbearing. Had tried to control her. It was the kind of thing to send up the warning flags.
‘Look, I appreciate that you’re trying to help me, but—’
‘If they sense weakness it makes them more upset.’
She wiped her nose again for good measure, sure it was now probably as red as strawberry jelly. ‘The babies?’
He gave one curt nod.
‘She’s five months old. The only thing she senses is hunger, tiredness and whether she’s wet or not.’
‘You’d be surprised.’ He began to walk away.
Narrowing her eyes, Brooke followed after him. He was going in her direction anyway. She needed the lift again, to go down a couple of floors to A&E.
She pulled her mobile from her pocket to check the time.
Damn it!
The man got into the lift ahead of her. ‘Which floor?’
‘Ground level.’ She noticed he’d pressed the ‘G’ button, but no other. Frowning, she realised that he must work on her floor. He might work anywhere, though—A&E, the Medical Assessment Unit, Nuclear Medicine, Radiology...
He was looking at her. Looking her up and down. And, sickeningly, she noticed his gaze appeared to be centred on her chest. Men! Feeling her cheeks heat, she stared back at him, trying to make him lift his gaze a good few inches upwards, towards her face.
‘Is there a problem?’
‘You...er...might want to get out of those clothes.’
‘Excuse me?’ He had some front! He’d only just met her!
What is it with men? They do you one tiny favour and suddenly expect you to drop your—
‘You’ve got milk on your blouse, something questionable on your skirt, and you appear to be...’ he smiled and looked away, as if he was preserving her modesty ‘...leaking.’
Leaking? Brooke looked down at herself and instantly felt her cheeks flame with heat. She was indeed in a state. Her boobs had leaked milk—no doubt due to Morgan’s cries—she had a smear of what might possibly be poo at the top of her thigh from the earlier explosion, and there was indeed a smelly, sour milk stain, crusting away on her shoulder.
‘Oh, God...’
She reached into her handbag for wipes, but she didn’t have any. They were all in the nappy bag that she’d left with Daisy down in the crèche. She couldn’t work looking like this! She’d have to put some scrubs on. Making her even more late!
The lift doors pinged open and both she and the military man stepped out and turned left towards A&E. Frowning, Brooke looked at him once again, noting his proud bearing, his march rather than stride, and the fact that they were both most definitely heading towards the same department.
‘Do you work in A&E?’ she asked, curious.
Had she embarrassed herself in front of a new work colleague? Staff did come and go frequently. It was a pressured environment—stressful. Some people couldn’t hack it. But Brooke could. She loved it there.
‘I do.’
‘I work there, too.’
He stopped in his tracks immediately and looked at her, this time with a single raised eyebrow. ‘This is your first day back after maternity leave?’
How did he know that? Unless her friends had mentioned it to him... ‘Yes.’
His eyes widened. ‘You’re Dr Bailey?’
She nodded, surprised that he knew her name. ‘Yes. Who are you?’
He didn’t answer right away, and it took him a moment before he held out his hand. ‘Major Matt Galloway. Jen’s husband.’
She was unaware that her mouth had dropped open. But she numbly reached forward and shook his hand anyway.
She’d meant to call. She’d meant to. Only... Life had got in the way and she’d been struggling to cope herself. Life was harder and busier than she’d suspected it would be with a baby, and she was doing everything alone. Jen’s death three days after she’d given birth to Morgan had made her postnatal blues a lot worse and she’d been grieving herself.
Trying to get herself together just to get dressed and out of the house had seemed an insurmountable task—and then there was the fact that she’d never met Jen’s husband. She’d thought it might be awkward if she just turned up at their house on the other side of London. So she’d put it off and put it off, and when finally she’d thought that she really ought to go and offer her condolences and help so much time had passed she’d just felt that it wouldn’t be right.
It