The Baby of Their Dreams (Contemporary Medical Romance) by Carol Marinelli Read Free Book Online Page A

had the absolute fortune of collapsing with a heart attack and going into full cardiac arrest.’
    ‘Fortune?’
    ‘We always joke now that he had a personality transplant because, while his illness made me switch from physics to biology and suddenly become very interested in medicine and saving the world, my father completely changed. He was very depressed at first and he had to see a psychologist and things but then he completely turned his life around. He sold up, got out of the money game, and he and my mother fell in love all over again, and now...’
    He hesitated. He didn’t want to give too many specifics. He didn’t want to say that he was looking forward to Monday and heading over to see his slightly eccentric parents or rather, disconcertingly, he did want to tell her just that.
    There was a part of Dominic that wanted to extend this conversation, which meant extending them, and that wasn’t what this weekend was about so he kept things light.
    ‘They started an internet dating service. Or rather it wasn’t by internet initially, it was more a word-of-mouth thing. They used to set up their friends and anyone coming over to Spain...’
    ‘Stop!’ Cat laughed.
    ‘It’s true, though. Now they run this very exclusive dating site for the over fifties...’
    To hear this rather detached man talking about his crazy parents made Cat start to
really
laugh.
    Oh, she laughed at times, of course she did.
    Just not like this.
    They lay then in silence and Dominic thought about the six months after Heather had died.
    After the funeral, instead of throwing himself into work, as had been his initial plan, he had accepted his parents’ suggestion to come and stay in Spain with them.
    At first they had infuriated him with their calm acceptance of the terrible facts. Of course they had been upset but not once had they matched his anger.
    As he had raged and paced around the villa, or slept in well past midday, they had simply accepted him and whatever place he was in—providing conversation when needed and meals that appeared whether he felt he needed them or not.
    And finally, when the anger had gone, Dominic had been very grateful for their presence and calm, which had allowed him to heal in his own time.
    He had spent days walking and watching the ocean as he slowly come back to join a world that had altered for ever. Yet move on he had, catching himself the first time he’d found himself laughing along at a joke or smiling at a thought that had popped into his head.
    And a smile stretched his lips as he thought of them now.
    ‘They’re amazing people,’ he admitted. ‘So, yes, what seemed like the most terrible disaster at the time turned out to be a blessing.’
    They stared at each other, they found each other, right there in that moment.
    ‘Don’t leave tonight...’ he said, but even before the words were out he was changing his mind and even as she heard them there was confusion in her eyes because it was supposed to be a one-night stand.
    ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s go in the water.’
    There they could be apart and think.
    There she could work out how to articulate the million reasons that she had to go back. How did she tell him that the woman he had met this weekend didn’t actually exist, that she wasn’t floaty and feminine and spontaneous?
    She was rigid and brittle and meticulous.
    And Dominic too, as they ran to the water, was wondering what had possessed him to ask her to stay.
    But not even the sea could keep them apart because ten strides in they were waist deep in water, limbs around each other, kissing in the sun, out on display, and there was no reason in the world why she should leave.
    The water was idyllic, just a shade cooler than the temperature of skin, and she could feel the sun beating on her shoulders.
    She’d heard about the magical seven. Seven waves in, seven out, seven years since love had died and today it felt as if it was being born again.
    They said nothing but