‘Come on, Little Louse, you’re going to have to walk up the stairs. The lift’s broken and Mummy’s too tired to carry you up four floors.’ Jamie jumped out of the car and slammed it shut. Libby had extracted Rosie from her car seat and deposited her on the pavement and Rosie’s bottom lip had started trembling yet again.
*****
Libby turned to face Dr Grantham and let out what might have been her hundredth sigh of the day. There he stood on the pavement in front of her crappy block of flats, next to his stupid fancy penis-extension car, looking way more attractive than was fair given her own bedraggled state, his pristine tailored suit making him seem even more intimidating than his scrubs and his white open shirt-collar a sharp contrast to his tanned throat. The hospital infection control banned ties, otherwise Libby knew he would be sporting one of those as well. There was nothing casual or relaxed about this man.
After picking Rosie up from the nursery, she and Brian had engaged in an epic hour-long battle of wills, which of course he won. He would only splutter briefly when she turned the key in the ignition, and even when she’d managed to find someone to give him a jump start he’d roared to life for about ten seconds before letting out a sort of death rattle and wheezing his last. Then, stubborn, stubborn arse that she was, instead of phoning Kira for help, and after realizing she had no data left on her iphone, she’d gone back up to the deserted anaesthetic offices to go online and plan which bus routes they should take home.
It wasn’t as if Kira wouldn’t have come to fetch them, but Libby was careful about how many favours she asked of people. She knew she had nothing to give in return and she didn’t want to use them up. She’d been struggling for so long it was almost ingrained in her to fight her own battles, sort out her and Rosie’s problems by herself. When she’d seen how complicated the route home was though, it had been too much. That’s when she’d retreated into the small toilet to have a quick self-indulgent cry where Rosie couldn’t see her.
So now, not only did Mr Perfect know that she was a single mother, but he had been kicked in the shin by her offspring, seen Brian – the crappiest car in the history of crappy cars – and was currently eyeing her block of flats like it was the black hole of Calcutta. Rosie gave her a mutinous look and Libby gritted her teeth in preparation for the tantrum of the century; her daughter was a force to be reckoned with on a good day, but a tired and hungry Rosie, faced with climbing four flights of stairs, would not be pretty.
‘Thanks,’ she told the big guy in front of her, who was – yet again – blocking her way. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
He just stood there, his eyes bouncing from mother to daughter. Then, to Libby’s complete and total shock, he reached down and swept Rosie up in his arms as if she were as light as a feather. The tears that had formed in Rosie’s eyes suddenly dried up and her small mouth fell open.
‘I’ll carry you up, okay, kiddo?’ he said to her through a wide smile. She blinked, then nodded; Libby doubted that any female, be they four or forty, would say no to Dr Grantham when he smiled like that.
‘Your face is furry,’ Rosie told him, squeezing his cheeks together as Libby fumbled with the front door. Jamie’s deep chuckle echoed through the urine-smelling corridor.
‘I can take her from here,’ Libby lied, shifting the car seat in her arms and wanting to get rid of him as quickly as possible. Dr Grantham just looked at her, raised one eyebrow, and then stepped through the door she had opened, with Rosie still wrapped around him like a little octopus. He looked briefly at the defunct lift and shook his head before taking the steps two at a time up to the fourth floor. Libby shuffled after him as fast as she could. On the first floor he took the car seat off her, leaving her with just her backpack. By the time she caught him up on her landing she was wheezing for breath and cursing the fact that she hadn’t bothered to get a new inhaler. He still had Rosie secure on his hip, totally and annoyingly unaffected by the climb. It wasn’t the physical exertion that triggered her asthma so much as the stress.
‘Okay,’ she managed to get out in between breaths, ‘thanks … again. We’ll just …’ She trailed off as she held her arms out for her daughter, but Rosie’s attention was still fixed on Dr Grantham.
‘You pwomised about the boat,’ Rosie told him, continuing to drop her Rs now that she was tired. ‘It’s vewy naughty to lie. I told Mrs Wilkinson that I had put a big beetle in her bag when I hadn’t and I lost Golden TimeandI went on the Thunder Cloud.’
To be fair to him Dr Grantham managed to keep a straight face throughout Rosie’s dire warning.
‘Well, we’ll have to see what your mummy thinks about – ’
‘Wemember:Golden Time…’ Rosie told him, her voice rising in indignation and her little hands squeezing his cheeks together again.
‘Okay,’ Dr Grantham said, his voice distorted as Rosie forced his lips into a pout. ‘We’ll go out on my boat.’ Rosie released his cheeks and then gave one of them a pat as if rewarding a wayward toddler after a tantrum.
‘You can put me down now,’ she told him imperiously, wriggling around to hold out her arms for Libby. ‘I’m ready for my supper, Mummy.’
Libby rolled her eyes as she swung Rosie away from Dr Grantham and onto her own hip. ‘Do you think Your Highness would consider walking to the kitchen?’ Rosie snuggled into her mother’s neck and shook her head. The flat door was wide open now and Libby was aware that she hadn’t had time to transform her bed in the living room back into a sofa. They only had one small bedroom, which Rosie used when she wasn’t sneaking in to sleep with Mummy. Dr Grantham’s gaze had moved past Libby’s shoulder and she knew he was taking in the disarray of the cramped space. She turned as she set Rosie down on her feet, making big eyes at her when the pout threatened, and pointing sharply towards the tiny table and chairs squished next to the kitchen counter. Rosie huffed but moved away, allowing Libby to turn back to Dr Grantham.
‘Thanks for lugging her up,’ she said as she started shutting the door. ‘See you tomorrow. I’ll be – ’
The door was inches from closing when his foot shot out and blocked it. Libby looked down at his large shoe, then up to his frowning face, in confusion.
‘I’ll pick you guys up tomorrow,’ he told her, and her mouth fell open in shock.
‘Uh … no really, you don’t – ’
‘You two are not getting the bloody bus at God knows what time in the morning after hardly any sleep.’
She growled. Libby actually growled in frustration. She was so shocked by the sound that her hand went up to cover her mouth and her wide eyes flew to his. The bastard was smiling (but who wouldn’t when confronted by an adult human female that growled). Maybe she and Rosie weren’t so different after all.
‘See you tomorrow,’ he said through his smile. ‘Phone?’ He held out his hand and Libby automatically handed her unlocked iphone over. After tapping away on the screen for a few seconds he handed it back.
‘Right, my number’s in there. I’ll see you both in the morning,’ he said. She started to reply, but he moved forward, crowding Libby back, away from the door, and pushing his head round, shocking her out of what she was about to say. ‘Bye, Pirate Rosie,’ he called, giving the little girl a wave and another smile; then he quickly withdrew, and turned on his heel for the stairs.
Gah! He was so bloody bossy.
Libby shut the door and flicked the latch closed, then banged her head against the solid wood once. She hadn’t missed the way his eyes had flashed around her living space a moment ago, or the tightness in his jaw once he’d taken in the chaos. She straightened her shoulders and lifted her head: maybe her carwasbollocks and her flatwastiny, but, against the odds, they were hers. She’d done what she had to do to hold onto what little she had. Pride was not something you could afford when you were desperate.
Chapter 7
