Table of Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

       CHAPTER SEVEN

       CHAPTER EIGHT

       CHAPTER NINE

       CHAPTER TEN

       Copyright

       CHAPTER ONE

      ‘READY, Olivia?’

      Olivia sighed, moving to open the door to admit Natalie Irving, a young and pretty girl of seventeen, with long golden hair. ‘Are you sure you and Rick wouldn’t rather go on your own?’ she frowned. ‘I can easily go shopping for the afternoon. There are lots of things I—–’

      ‘Now don’t be silly,’ Natalie dismissed, coming further into the bedroom. ‘Is this your costume?’ She held up the emerald-coloured bikini, leaving the black one-piece suit on the bed where they had both been laid out for Olivia’s examination.

      ‘The black—–’

      ‘Too old-fashioned,’ the young girl dismissed with a wrinkle of her nose, and rolled the bikini in the towel, tucking them both under her arm, sighing as she saw Olivia still hesitated. ‘You know Rick feels easier when you’re around,’ she encouraged softly.

      Olivia sobered as she thought of her patient, her green eyes thoughtful, a frown marring her usually smooth brow. She was seven years the other girl’s senior, although she didn’t feel it when Natalie bossed her about in this way! She didn’t look it either, in the clinging black vest-top and wrap-around green and black skirt, her legs long and bare, her feet thrust into loose sandals, her hair a mass of red-gold curls, her face youthfully beautiful, even if the chin was a little too determined.

      ‘I’m not sure that’s good for him,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ll be gone in a couple of days now that Rick is well again. I don’t think he would still depend on me.’

      ‘He doesn’t,’ Natalie dismissed with a confident laugh. ‘He likes you, and he’s grateful. Most nurses would jump at the chance of an afternoon lazing by the pool—wouldn’t they?’ she prompted teasingly.

      Yes, they would. And after weeks of caring for Rick Hayes, of making him believe he could walk again, of convincing him that he wasn’t going to be a cripple all his life, an afternoon doing nothing but sunbathe and swim was exactly what she needed.

      ‘But wouldn’t you and Rick rather be alone?’ Still she hesitated about accepting the invitation. The Hayes family, mother and father, Rick, and his young sister Dawn, had all been very kind to her during the three months she had been Rick’s private nurse after he was discharged from hospital following a serious car crash. But there had to be a limit to that kindness, and surely intruding on Rick’s date with his long-time girl-friend Natalie was that limit.

      Natalie didn’t seem to think so. ‘We can hardly be alone with thirty other people,’ she said dryly.

      Olivia’s eyes widened. ‘Is that how many will be there?’

      ‘About that,’ the young girl nodded.

      ‘Then perhaps I ought to go, on a professional level,’ she murmured thoughtfully. ‘It will be Rick’s first time among so many people, I don’t know how he’ll react to people seeing his limp.’

      ‘He’ll be fine,’ Natalie assured her. ‘Okay, so he’ll never play football for England—he never could play the game anyway,’ she dismissed lightly. ‘A little old limp isn’t going to effect his becoming an architect, and that’s all he’s interested in.’

      ‘Besides you,’ Olivia teased, knowing the young couple intended getting engaged on Natalie’s eighteenth birthday.

      The younger girl grinned. ‘That goes without saying.’

      ‘Modest with it!’ Olivia laughingly followed Natalie down to the car where Rick sat impatiently waiting for them.

      ‘I was going to send out a search party,’ he moaned as he drove out on to the country road. ‘I’ll never know what you women find to talk about all the time!’

      ‘Men, sweetheart,’ Natalie taunted.

      ‘I hope you meant that in the singular?’ he returned with mock jealousy.

      ‘I wouldn’t want to make you conceited,’ his girl-friend returned haughtily.

      Olivia sat in the car listening to their lighthearted bantering, smiling to herself. She was going to miss this family, every mad, lovable member of it, from the absentminded Clara, practical joker Eric, handsome Rick, self-assured Natalie, to shy Dawn, the latter slightly overshadowed by the other extroverts in her family. Three months of sharing their big rambling home was a long time to spend in close living with anyone, and the lack of a close relationship with her own parents had made her appreciate this loving and loved family all the more.

      But soon it would be over, only another five days and she would be leaving to take care of her next patient, an elderly woman who had fallen and broken her leg, needing nursing care for her first few weeks at home. She would be sorry to leave the Hayes family; she had become very fond of them all. Becoming emotionally involved was a hazard of nursing she had never quite managed to overcome, and she doubted she ever would.

      But she hadn’t left this family yet, the sun was shining, Rick and Natalie were very much in love, a wonderful glow emanating from them that made her feel included in their happiness at being alive.

      Several boisterous teenagers were already in the pool when they arrived at the Grayston home, and Olivia was at once included in their laughing group, despite her age difference from most of them.

      Happily Rick showed no selfconsciousness about wearing bathing trunks, though his legs were still badly scarred from the accident, the limp quite noticeable on one of them. But he was mentally a well-adjusted young man, and had handled the inactivity during the first months after the accident with calm acceptance, only occasional