Twins for Christmas. Alison Roberts

an echo of Kate’s reaction to the news.

      ‘Oh, my God! On Christmas Eve? That’s awful!’

      ‘Put Mrs McCulloch in one of the cubicles,’ Dr Foster ordered. ‘Let’s get her bloods off and a urine specimen before we get too busy. Put out a call for everyone in the trauma team, would you, please, Kate?’

      Kate nodded and turned—but not before she glanced at Rory. She was too aware that he was still staring at her. He seemed to sense her gaze and lifted his own. He might not have been shocked at seeing her on his arrival, but he certainly was now.

      Kate held his gaze for just a heartbeat as she watched his mental calculations. Remembering dates. Counting weeks.

      Yes, she told him silently. I’m just over six months pregnant.

      And you’re the father.

      CHAPTER TWO

      SHE was pregnant.

      No wonder she had looked different when he’d seen her sitting at the desk. Rounder. Softer. The soft waves of her hair that almost touched her shoulders had been catching the light and shining like a golden halo. If it was true that pregnancy gave all women a special glow, then Kate had turned it up a notch. She shone as brightly as the light at the end of a very long tunnel.

      The way he had remembered her being anyway—but she was pregnant.

      Enormously pregnant. Way more than six months along, so she must have already been pregnant that night.

      And that hurt, dammit, because the memory of that night had been the single bright note in those first dark weeks.

      Rory had to help hold his mother’s arm still while blood was drawn for the necessary tests. And the insertion of a catheter was the only way they’d be able to obtain a urine specimen from a patient who couldn’t co-operate because she had no understanding of where she was. Or why. It was a miserable but mercifully short period of time.

      ‘It’s all right, Mamma. It’ll be over soon. You’re being brave.’

      He managed to keep up a stream of soothing words, in both English and his mother’s native Italian, even as he reeled from the shock of seeing Kate’s condition—as unexpected as it had been to be bringing his only living relative here tonight.

      He hadn’t questioned the destination. He’d already made the demand for extra medical attention for his mother and, given that he no longer carried any authority within this medical hierarchy, it had seemed prudent to put up with what might be a difficult time revisiting St Bethel’s. If he was honest, part of him really wanted the opportunity to see Kate Simpson again, but he’d been wary. He knew quite well he might have made her into something she wasn’t.

      A life-saver.

      Some kind of saint. An angel, even.

      He’d known he’d have to face the probability that she wasn’t all that he had built her up to be in his head—and his heart. But not like this. Not this slap in the face that told him she’d been already pregnant by another man that night. That her words and her touch and the … love he’d felt had not been genuine.

      As if it wasn’t bad enough to have his mother’s illness tipping her to a place where she was convinced that her prayers had been answered and she had her precious Jamie with her again. Now Rory also had to deal with the most precious thing he’d had in his life for the last six months being exposed as a fraud. As a dream that had no basis in reality.

      The tiny Christmas tree on the central desk, beside a donation box for some worthy cause, caught Rory’s eye as he slumped farther into the chair beside his mother’s bed when the blood test had been completed. He closed his eyes for a moment as he put a hand to his forehead and pressed on both temples—his thumb on one side of his head, his middle finger on the other side.

      Merry Christmas, he told himself bitterly.

      Merry bloody Christmas!

      He looked as though he was wishing himself a million miles away from this place.

      Why? Because he had to face the prospect of fatherhood? Of her being the mother of his children?

      Well, tough! Kate’s face tightened as she moved swiftly past the cubicle the McCullochs were in, making her way to join Judy as she spotted the arrival of the first ambulance from the scene of the accident involving the mini-bus full of children. Two stretchers and some ambulatory patients were being ushered into the department by paramedics and police officers.

      It was probably all for the best that she had no choice but to ignore Rory and his distress right now. He needed time. She’d had more than enough to get her head around the new direction her life was going in, and she’d come to terms with it. More than accepted it. She already loved these babies. Passionately.

      That love was comforting to remember. Empowering. And for the first time Kate realised she actually had the advantage. In a neat twist of fate, she wasn’t going to be in the background, watching other women claim Rory’s attention. Eventually he was going to have to seek her out so that they could talk about this. Or she would find him. It didn’t matter, because she was in control.

      It was something that might have thrown her completely six months ago, but Lord knows she’d had more than enough practice in discriminating between fantasy and reality. She was an expert. There was no danger of having that control undermined by any hope that her situation would magically change.

      Hope got crushed.

      It was only when you removed the fuel from unrequited love that it had any chance of burning out.

      And the easiest way to remove it was to focus on something else entirely.

      Like the teenaged girl on one of the stretchers. Her lower leg was splinted and propped up on a pillow. One arm was also splinted and in a sling. She was sobbing hysterically.

      ‘This is Helen,’ a paramedic informed them. ‘She’s sixteen years old and has a fractured right tib and fib and a Colles’ fracture of her right wrist.’

      ‘Vital signs?’

      ‘All within normal limits.’

      ‘Resus 3,’ Judy directed.

      ‘Noooo,’ the girl sobbed. ‘Don’t take me away from Danni.’

      Judy was already moving to the second stretcher as she did her job of triage.

      ‘Who’s Danni?’ Kate queried.

      ‘This is. Danielle.’ An older woman was standing beside a policewoman. She had a pale face and a bloodstained bandage on her head. She was holding a wailing toddler. ‘She’s Helen’s baby.’

      ‘Is she injured?’

      ‘They didn’t think so at the scene,’ the policewoman responded. ‘And Florence insisted she was OK to come with her.’

      Kate eyed the older woman. ‘You know these children?’

      ‘Yes. I’m the housekeeper up at the Castle.’

      ‘Great. You’ll be able to help me with the information I’ll need.’ Kate was all too aware of the need to start gathering that information and filling in paperwork before it got out of hand with this influx of new arrivals.

      Another paramedic was handing a new case to Judy, just behind her.

      ‘Wally’s twelve and he was KO’ed. Unconscious for possibly ten minutes. Responsive, but his GCS is down to thirteen. Repetitive speech pattern and some nausea.’

      ‘Wally?’ Judy crouched beside the boy, who lay flat on his back with a hard collar protecting his neck. ‘Do you know where you are, love?’

      ‘We’ve been at a party.’ A white grin appeared in a very dark small face. ‘Christmas. Da-da-da … Da-da-da …’

      It