Midwives On-Call. Alison Roberts

The man she’d loved with all her heart. The man who’d walked away five years ago to give her the chance of a new life.

      So many emotions were slamming through her head … anger, bewilderment, grief … She’d had five years to move on but, crazy or not, this man still felt a part of her.

      She’d crashed his car. He was right here.

      There was no help for it. She took a deep, deep breath. She braced herself.

      She raised her head, and she turned to face her husband.

      Emily.

      He was seeing her but his mind wasn’t taking her in. Emily!

      For one wild moment he thought he must be mistaken. This was a different woman, older, a bit … worn round the edges. Weary? Faded jeans and stained windcheater. Unkempt curls.

      But still Emily.

      His wife? She still was, he thought stupidly. His Em.

      But she wasn’t his Em. He’d walked away five years ago. He’d left her to her new life, and she had nothing to do with him.

      Except she was here. She was staring up at him, her eyes reflecting his disbelief. Horror?

      Shock held him rigid.

      She’d wrecked his car. He loved this car. He should be feeling …

      No. There was no should, or if there was he hadn’t read that particular handbook.

      Should he feel grief? Should he feel guilt?

      He felt neither. All he felt was numb.

      She’d had a minute’s warning. He’d had none.

      ‘Em?’ He looked … incredulous. He looked more shocked than she was—bewildered beyond words.

      What were you supposed to say to a husband you hadn’t seen or spoken to for five years? There was no handbook for this.

      ‘H-hi?’ she managed.

      ‘You’ve just crashed my car,’ he said, stupidly.

      ‘You were supposed to be a bike.’ Okay, maybe that was just as stupid. This conversation was going exactly nowhere. They’d established, what, that he wasn’t a bike?

      He was her husband—and he was right beside her. Looking completely dumbfounded.

      ‘You have a milk stain on your shoulder.’

      That would be the first thing he’d notice, she thought. Her uniform was in her bag. She never put it on at home—her chances of getting out of the house clean were about zero—so she was still wearing jeans and the baggy windcheater she’d worn at breakfast.

      Gretta had had a milky drink before being ill. Em had picked her up and cuddled her before she’d left.

      Strangely, the stain left her feeling exposed. She didn’t want this man to see … her.

      ‘There are child seats in your wagon.’

      He still sounded incredulous. Milk stains? Family wagon? He’d be seeing a very different woman from the one he’d seen five years ago.

      But he looked … just the same. Same tall, lean, gorgeous. Same deep brown eyes that crinkled at the edges when he smiled, and Oliver smiled a lot. Same wide mouth and strong bone structure. Same dark, wavy hair, close cropped to try and get rid of the curl, only that never worked. It was so thick. She remembered running her fingers through that hair …

      Um, no. Not appropriate. Regardless of formalities, this was her husband. Or ex-husband? They hadn’t bothered with divorce yet but she’d moved on.

      She’d just crashed his car.

      ‘You’re using Harry’s car park,’ she said, pointing accusingly at … um … one slightly bent sports car. It was beautiful—at least some of it still was. An open sports car. Vintage. It wasn’t the sort of car that you might be able to pop down to the car parts place in your lunch hour and buy a new panel.

      He’d always loved cars. She remembered the day they’d sold his last sports car.

      His last? No. Who knew how many cars he’d been through since? Anyway, she remembered the day they’d sold the sleek little roadster both of them had loved, trading it in for a family wagon. Smaller than this but just as sensible. They’d gone straight from the car showroom to the nursery suppliers, and had had the baby seat fitted there and then.

      She’d been six months pregnant. They’d driven home with identical smug looks on their faces.

      He’d wanted a family as much as she had. Or she’d thought he did. What had happened then had proved she hadn’t known him at all.

      ‘I’ve been allocated this car park,’ he was saying, and she had to force herself back to here, to now. ‘Level Five, Bay Eleven. That’s mine.’

      ‘You’re visiting?’

      ‘I’m employed here, as of today.’

      ‘You can’t be.’

      He didn’t reply. He climbed out of the wagon, dug his hands deep in his pockets, glanced back at his wreck of a car and looked at her again.

      ‘Why can’t I, Em?’ The wreck of the car faded to secondary importance. This was suddenly all about them.

      ‘Because I work here.’

      ‘It’s the most specialised neonatal service in Melbourne. You know that’s what I do.’

      ‘You went to the States.’ She felt numb. Stupid. Out of control. She’d been sure her ex-husband had been on the other side of world. She didn’t want him to be here.

      ‘I did specialist training in in-utero surgery in the States.’ This was a dumb conversation. He was out of the car, leaning back on one of the concrete columns, watching her as she clung to the steering wheel like she was drowning. ‘I’ve accepted a job back here. And before you say anything, no, I didn’t know you were working here. I thought you were still at Hemmingway Private. I knew when I came back that there was a chance we might meet, but Melbourne’s a big place. I’m not stalking you.’

      ‘I never meant …’

      ‘No?’

      ‘No,’ she managed. ‘And I’m sorry I crashed into your car.’

      Finally things were starting to return to normal. Like her heart rate. Her pulse had gone through the roof when the cars had hit. She’d been subconsciously trying to get it down, practising the deep-breathing techniques she used when she was pacing the floor with Gretta, frightened for herself, frightened for the future. The techniques came to her aid instinctively now when she was frightened. Or discombobulated.

      Discombobulated was how she felt, she conceded. Stalking? That sounded as if he thought she might be frightened of him, and she’d never been frightened of Oliver.

      ‘Can we exchange details?’ she managed, trying desperately to sound normal. Like this was a chance meeting of old acquaintances, but they needed to talk about car insurance. ‘Oliver, it’s really nice to see you again …’ Was it? Um, no, but it sounded the right thing to say. ‘But I’m late as it is.’

      ‘Which was why you crashed.’

      ‘Okay, it was my fault,’ she snapped. ‘But, believe it or not, there are extenuating circumstances. That’s not your business.’ She clambered out of the car and dug for her licence in her shabby holdall. She pulled out two disposable diapers and a packet of baby wipes before she found her purse, and she was so flustered she dropped them. Oliver gathered them without a word, and handed them back. She flushed and handed him her licence instead.

      He took it wordlessly, and studied it.

      ‘You still call yourself Emily Evans?’

      ‘You