Authors: Unknown
The door opened and she snatched her hand free just in time before Pip bustled in, carrying mugs of coffee. 'I thought we could all use some before heading back to the fray,' the motherly nurse announced with a warm smile.
'Thanks, Pip.'
Taking a coffee, she sat back and sipped it, conscious of Cameron drawing up a chair beside her. Her whole body felt sensitised all the time, remembering his touch. Surely this terrible need, longing, lust—whatever it was—had to ease? But each time they were together, instead of dissipating, the urgency and specialness increased. It frightened her.
'Ginger?'
'Sorry.' She shook her head to clear her thoughts. She had tuned out and hadn't heard a word of the conversation, nor realised that Andrew, the dietician on their team, had joined them. 'What did you say?'
Andrew opened a tin and handed it round. 'One of the parents just gave it to me as a thank-you. Why do they all bring food to a dietician at an eating disorders clinic?'
Chuckling, Ginger smiled at him. In his early forties, he was quiet and calm, excellent at his job, swiftly building a rapport with their patients.
'I usually get chocolates,' Pip confessed. 'What are those, Andrew?'
'Home-made ginger biscuits, apparently.'
Ginger screwed up her nose. 'Not for me, thanks.'
'How can you have your name and yet hate the taste of ginger?' Andrew teased.
'I don't know.'
'What about you, Cameron?' Pip asked, drawing him into the conversation and passing him the tin.
'Thanks. I've become something of a connoisseur. The taste of Ginger is one I've come to cherish and savour.'
Ginger flushed at his outrageousness, sucking in a breath at the wicked mischief in his eyes as his gaze met hers. Fortunately his real meaning seemed to have gone over Andrew's head, if not Pip's. The nurse's eyebrows shot upwards and a shocked, delighted giggle escaped. Embarrassed, Ginger vowed retribution. She tried to appear unmoved but her heart betrayed her by hammering in her chest, and she couldn't stop thinking about the feel of Cameron's skilful mouth all over her body.
She was relieved when Cameron's pager sounded and he glanced down at it with a frown. 'Excuse me a moment,' he murmured, crossing to the door and stepping out into the corridor where an internal hospital phone was located on the wall nearby.
'I have to get on, too.' Andrew snapped the lid back on the tin of home-made biscuits and tucked it under his arm with a grin. 'See you later.'
Rising to her feet, Ginger gathered up her files. 'Danielle Watson is being discharged today and I promised I'd look in on her and her parents before she goes. I need to set up some times to see her back in clinic.'
'How's she doing?' Pip queried with evident concern.
'She's made good progress. I wish I could do more for her, but she seems to have learned a valuable lesson from this latest scare and spell in hospital.'
'Let's hope so.' Pip paused a moment, her gaze speculative. 'Things seem to be going really well with you and Cameron. I'm so glad, lovey.'
Anxiety flared inside her. 'It doesn't mean anything. It's just a temporary thing, Pip. Neither Cameron nor I are in the market for a relationship.' She thought back to what he had said the night he had told her about Molly and his failed marriage to Lisa, the woman who had betrayed and hurt him. His certainty that he was never looking to get involved again had come through loud and clear. Fighting back her confused emotions, she tried to smile. 'If I win the Ackerman money, all my time and energy will be going into the new clinic and caring for my patients. The same for Cameron if he wins. And if he does, my time in Strathlochan will be over when the unit closes in the spring, I will be moving on.'
The words made her feel ill and she knew her performance for Pip was all bravado. Before her friend could reply, Ginger turned to go out of the door, dismayed to find Cameron leaning against the wall beside the phone. He'd been waiting for her. And he had clearly heard every word she had said to Pip. Heard, and, from the bleak expression in cold grey eyes, had been hurt. They stared at one another in silence, then Cameron stepped back.
'I have to go.'
Her throat felt tight and tears welled in her eyes as she watched him walk away from her. 'Damn, damn, damn.'
* * *
Cameron felt numb, dead inside. Ginger's words had cut him to the core. She felt nothing. To her what they had was nothing more than a temporary fling, a sexy interlude. It hurt more than he could have believed possible.
Somehow he managed to keep his mind on his work for the rest of the day, including a tricky consultation with a middle-aged woman who had been cutting herself for over twenty years. It was sad, the habit ingrained, and he knew it would be tough and take time to make a difference to her behaviour and coping methods. Thankful not to run into Ginger around the hospital, he drove home, alone, to a cold, dark cottage. Already the place felt different to him after the few nights Ginger had spent here, sharing his life, sharing his bed. But apparently sharing nothing of herself. Just sex. Tonight he couldn't be with her. He needed time away from her to think.
After a microwave meal he failed to taste, he sat staring unseeingly into the flickering flames of the fire. He wasn't sure when his feelings had changed and become so complicated. When they had first started out, he'd been so bowled over by Ginger and the chemistry they had shared that he hadn't given much thought to his emotions, to how involved he was becoming. The revelation that he loved her had shocked and scared him rigid. He'd told himself he would never trust a woman again, would never consider marriage a second time, but along had come Ginger, who was more important to him than any woman had ever been.
With Ginger he had started to think of strings and promises, of happy-ever-afters, despite the obstacles. He couldn't now imagine his life without Ginger in it. It scared the hell out of him. Because clearly her feelings were very different from his own. When the decision came through about the Ackerman funding, he and Ginger would be over. If it wasn't for his patients, his other backers, he would walk away now if it meant keeping Ginger, but he wasn't sure even that would be enough. She had made her feelings clear. Work was her life. As his had been before he had met her. She had no place in hers for anything more than a brief but pleasurable diversion. That wasn't enough for him, not any more.
With Ginger he wanted all or nothing—and he was very much afraid that for the woman he had come to love more than he had ever imagined possible, it would be nothing.
After a sleepless, lonely night, he prepared to go to the hospital, never having felt less like facing a busy day at work. A quick cup of coffee and a banana were all he could force down for breakfast, then, after checking he had everything he needed, he headed for the front door, bending down to pick up the half-dozen envelopes the postman had pushed through the letter box. He was going to set them aside to deal with when he came home, when the logo on one envelope caught his eye.
The Ackerman Corporation. Cameron felt every cell in his body freeze. Was this it? Was this the answer that would determine the course of his and Ginger's futures? He had no idea how long he stood there, just staring at it, but he finally galvanised himself into action and slit open the envelope. Drawing out the letter, he felt his pulse racing and he drew in a ragged, unsteady breath as he unfolded the page and forced himself to look at it.
It took several read-throughs before the words, and all they implied, filtered through the fog in his brain. Dread weighed heavily upon him. The decision had been made. Life would never be the same again. His insides churning, he leaned against the wall for support, absorbing the shock. The first thing he had to do was to find Ginger.
'Sarah
, please hold all my calls. And
I
don't want to be disturbed.'
A moment of silence greeted Ginger's request and then Sarah responded, surprise and concern evident in her voice. 'Are you all right?'
'I'm fine.' Her hand tightened its death-like grip on the receiver. 'I have some things I need to do.'
'But your appointments—'
'I've not forgotten, Sarah. I'll let you know when I'm free.'
Ginger put the phone down before her assistant could comment further. She knew she was behaving strangely but she couldn't help it. Feeling chilled to the bone, she stared at the sheet of paper that lay on her desk. Her shaking fingers cautiously moved towards it as if it were some toxic, dangerous substance she was afraid to touch. It was dangerous and she was afraid. The last thing she had expected when she had arrived at work that morning was to find the envelope embossed with the name of the Ackerman Corporation awaiting her. Decision day. She had closed herself into her office, needing to be alone to absorb the most important news of her life. Her heart had stopped as she had read the letter and she wasn't at all sure if and when it might ever begin to beat again.
She had always known that the allocation of the funding offered by the benevolent former resident of Strathlochan would mean the end of someone's dreams, an end to hope and tireless hard work undertaken to deliver the best patient care possible. Over the weeks she had tried not to think how she would feel. Nothing could have prepared her for the sense of failure and utter desolation that now held her paralysed as the news sank in that her bid had not been successful. There would be no specialist eating disorders unit in Strathlochan. She had let her patients and her staff down.
Inconsequential thoughts darted at random through her brain. How would shy, unconfident Sarah, who had blossomed this past year, cope with finding a new job? What would her other staff do? What did the rental agreement for her house lay down about notice to quit? Come the spring, her job here would vanish and she would have to find another position elsewhere, leaving behind friends, colleagues and, most upsettingly, the patients who depended on her. She couldn't—
wouldn't
—think about Cameron. It hurt too much. She felt so numb inside that Cameron was the final straw, the death blow that finished her completely.
Voices in the outer office barely impinged on her consciousness, but she frowned when someone knocked on her door. Surely she had told Sarah she didn't want to see anyone? Against her wishes, the door opened and she glanced up, unshed tears tightening her throat and stinging her eyes as her defeated gaze clashed with Cameron's. He closed the door and leaned back against it, watching her in silence. She dimly registered that he had the twin to her own letter clutched in one hand, and that he didn't look as euphoric as she would have expected.
She felt guilty and selfish but she couldn't feel good for Cameron, not when her patients had lost the service they so desperately needed and when all her goals were destroyed.
'Have you come here to gloat?' The words came out colder and sharper than she had intended, driven by the gut-wrenching pain and helplessness eating her away inside.
'Don't, Ginger. You know it's not like that.' She tried to close her ears to the upset in his voice, her eyes to the pain bruising his own. 'This was never a battle between us. I didn't want this to happen. It's desperately unfortunate and I'm sorry.'
'Why be sorry? You won.'
He closed the gap between them, hesitating beside her desk as she inched away from him. 'It doesn't feel that way. Ginger—'
'It's OK.'
'Damn it, no, it isn't!' His voice rose, filled with frustration and desperation. 'I never, ever wanted you to be hurt.'
'Well, you got everything else you wanted. I hope it works out for you. Now, please go.'
'Ginger—'
Her hands clenched to fists, her nails digging painfully into her palms as she battled to hold on to a fragment of her remaining composure. 'Go away, Cameron. I don't want to see or talk to you. It's finished.'
He hesitated, it seemed for an eternity. Ginger stared resolutely at her desk, willing him to leave her alone. She held her breath, the air in her office seeming thick with oppressive tension, every second ticking on the clock on her wall sounding like a gunshot. Finally, when she didn't think she could stand it another moment, Cameron made a heart-rending sound of distress and turned away, leaving her to her own misery. The closed door was symbolic of all that now placed an impenetrable barrier between them.
Ginger tried to close her mind to the memory of the terrible look on his face. He had been gutted...but no way could he feel as bad as she did. His dreams were coming true, his plans materialising, while her own had been shattered. He was moving on without her, leaving her behind, while everything she had worked so hard for was crumbling around her. The tears fell then, scorching, aching tears that ripped the heart right out of her chest. She cried as she had not done for a long, long time. Cried for her patients, her staff, her failure...cried for the loss of Cameron, the man she loved and who she would never be with again.
Cameron had never been so busy and yet the days passed with interminable slowness. The nights were even worse. Aside from his consultations and his self-help groups, he now found his time taken up with meetings and discussions with Iain, other backers and Ackerman's aides, as the push to make the new self-harm facility a reality gathered pace. But his heart wasn't in it. His chest felt tight and he was hollow inside. This was no victory. He couldn't enjoy a single second of achieving his goal, not when he knew what the decision on the funding had cost Ginger.
She had been devastated. He had seen that in her tortured expression, heard it in the strained, flat voice, and all he wanted to do was comfort her. But she wouldn't let him. That she felt she had nothing left in Strathlochan and would be moving away in a few months' time was too appalling to contemplate.
For so many years he had thought he could never feel again, yet from the moment he had met her, Ginger had turned his head, touched his heart, found his soul, helped him to heal. And yet he had never felt she was his, not completely. He hadn't wanted to believe they were on borrowed time, that she was serious when she claimed they would be over when the news of the Ackerman money came through. Now he would give anything to change reality so they could be together. But Ginger didn't want him. Whatever she had given him in bed, she had always kept something of herself apart, so sure what they had couldn't work. If only she had believed.