operated on a fourteen-year-old boy in the early hours of this morning,’ Alex said abruptly. ‘He and his brother got collected by a drunk teenager who lost control of his car last night. The brother died instantly. We did our best with Sean but we knew by this morning there was no point in continuing life support. There were potential organ recipients in the wings. I was talking to the parents again as I was arriving here. My registrar tells me they’ve just decided to have the ventilator switched off…and they’ve agreed to donate Sean’s organs.’
‘Oh…’ Susie didn’t know what to say. How glib had she been in considering that his day might have been stressful? Nobody could have missed the pain in his voice when he’d relayed his sympathy to the parents of that boy. Alex cared about his patients. A lot. How much of his mind and heart were unavoidably involved elsewhere at present? Beside a bed in an intensive-care unit where a family was gathered to say a final farewell to a child they should not be losing.
For the second time Susie was trapped by her eye contact with Alex. This time—incredibly—it seemed even more powerful. This wasn’t any kind of surface inspection, however. Perhaps he was trying to gauge the effect his words had had. Did Susie understand why he might have been so horrified at the sight of his daughter having been transformed into a teenager in the space of a few days? That these years were enough of a minefield for any parent to contemplate, let alone someone in Alex’s position who got to see the worst of what could happen?
Of course she understood. And she could respect anyone in the medical profession who cared that much about his patients. But Stella was his daughter. His only child. On top of what was almost always a difficult life stage, she was having to deal with things that, fortunately, most teens didn’t have to face. A life- threatening illness. Stella was…special, and if a line in the sand was being drawn, Susie was not about to allow herself to get tugged onto Alex’s side. She didn’t know this man. Maybe he was clever enough to know how to manipulate people around him.
That could also explain why he had gone over the top when confronted by Stella’s apparent misbehaviour.
Susie dampened the warmth that had started to thaw her opinion of Alex. She looked away, helped by the change of scenery as the track veered to the edge of the forest and afforded another spectacular view of the horseshoe-shaped bay to their right.
‘Who’s Melanie?’ she enquired eventually, her curiosity getting the better of her and providing a means to end another awkward silence.
‘Another patient. An only child. She’s ten and she had her surgery this morning. We discovered her brain tumour was inoperable. Unless we can shrink it with chemo, it’ll be a very short space of time before it invades her brain stem. She’s not doing as well as I’d like post-op, either.’
The first of the eco-cabins came into view on their left. On short stilts to protect their inhabitants from some of the wildlife and made from well-weathered timber that blended into the surrounding rainforest, they looked like dolls’ houses. Small and inviting. A fantasy that was a world away from the grim reality Alex had been relating.
Two of the cabins looked half-derelict, with their windows unglazed and no netting around the verandas, but the third was clearly inhabited. A red-and-white canvas chair stood beside a table made from half a barrel. An old couch with brightly coloured cushions dominated the rest of the space, and the barrel top and veranda railing were decorated with shells and driftwood. A windsong made a tiny sound in appreciation of the puff of sea breeze reaching them again.
Alex stopped, turning slowly to take in the view of the sea and then to take another look at the cabin.
‘How lovely!’ he exclaimed. ‘It looks as if it’s been here for ever.’
‘That’s Beth’s cabin,’ Susie told him. ‘She’s the permanent doctor for the medical centre now and she fell in love with that cabin. It’s the only one of the original cabins that was left intact enough to use after Willie. The others are just shells and we use them for the messy activities like pottery. See?’ She pointed at another veranda which was covered with lumpy-looking, as yet unglazed bowls made from coils of clay.
‘The cabin you’ll be using is brand-new,’ she continued. ‘But they’ve been careful to use the same kind of materials.’ She smiled at Alex, a concession that their relationship might be on a better footing now, thanks to his communication. ‘The mosquito netting will probably work a lot better, as well.’
‘I hadn’t thought about mosquitoes.’ Alex sounded irritated. Did he really expect to keep on top of what was happening so far away in Sydney and still be aware of every potential issue in this environment? ‘How much of a problem are they?’
‘Generally well controlled,’ Susie responded. ‘And you’ll find eco-friendly insect repellent in the cabin.’
‘What about mosquito-borne disease? Like Dengue fever and Ross River virus?’
‘There hasn’t been a case of anything nasty for years.’
‘Complacency is never a good safety net.’ Alex increased the length of his stride. ‘Another good reason to make sure Stella keeps herself well covered.’
He was forging ahead of her now so he couldn’t see the way Susie shook her head. Or hear her resigned sigh.
Much to Alex’s relief, Stella was in the cabin Susie led him to.
He could hear the sound of her voice as they stepped up onto the veranda, part of his brain registering the fact that this was going to be a much nicer place to stay than a penthouse hotel suite. The netting overhead and around the sides of the veranda was so fine it was virtually invisible, and the surrounding trees were so close that sitting out here would be like sitting in the middle of the forest.
The larger part of his brain, however, was hearing the sound of his daughter’s laughter and feeling the tension of his arrival and everything he’d left behind in Sydney fading.
When had he last heard her laugh like that? So long ago, it had probably been before her cancer had been diagnosed, and that was just over two years now. Was this part of what had been happening on this camp? If so, the donation he’d made to kick-start the rebuilding process had just paid for itself tenfold. And the staff needed to know how appreciative he was.
Alex turned his head, intending to catch Susie’s gaze and say something to that effect, but she was moving ahead to enter the main room of the cabin through the open ranch sliders that led to the veranda. She had a huge smile on her face.
‘Mike! Em! What are you guys doing here?’
‘We were looking for you,’ a feminine voice responded.
Alex stepped into a spacious, open-plan living area to see Susie hugging another blonde woman. His gaze flicked past the man beside them, who was grinning cheerfully to where Stella was sitting on a cane couch. Her smile was fading rapidly as she watched her father’s entrance and she looked disturbingly—and inexplicably—nervous. Then her gaze shifted and Alex understood.
He glared at the boy standing at the other end of Stella’s couch. Trying to look nonchalant, with a towel slung casually over one shoulder that did nothing to cover his bare chest or disguise the way his damp board shorts clung to his hips.
‘G’day,’ the boy said. ‘You must be Star’s dad.’
‘What? Who?’
Susie broke away from the hug. ‘This is Alex,’ she said to the group in general. ‘Stella’s father. Alex, this is Mike and Emily, whom you’ve heard about already.’
‘Hiya!’ Mike extended his hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, Alex.’
Emily had a sweet smile and was nodding agreement. Susie was beaming at the boy.
‘Hey, Jamie! Did you have a good swim?’
‘It was awesome.’
Alex