Emergency: A Marriage Worth Keeping

“Isla.”

When she didn’t answer, Salvador moved into the en suite bathroom. She lay there staring at his reflection in the dressing-room-table mirror, watching as he quietly undressed and then leaned over the sink to brush his teeth. The vivid, raised scar on his back, so red and angry, was easy to make out even from this distance.

How she longed to touch it, longed to run gentle fingers over it, to ask him how much it hurt. She winced as she imagined the gnarled metal from the car wreckage stabbing into his beautiful back and then the torturous operation to remove it.

But their wounds didn’t only lie skin-deep. Now they had to fight for the survival of their marriage!

A and E Drama

Blood pressure is high and pulses are racing

in these fast-paced, dramatic stories from

Harlequin® Medical Romance™.

They’ll move a mountain to save a life

in an emergency, be they the crash team,

emergency doctors or paramedics. There are

lots of critical situations amongst the

high tension and emotional passion in these

exciting stories of lives and loves at risk!

Carol Marinelli now also writes for Harlequin Presents™!

Emergency: A Marriage Worth Keeping

Carol Marinelli

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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CONTENTS

Cover

Introduction

Title Page

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

EPILOGUE

Copyright

PROLOGUE

‘DOES your husband have a temper?’

‘He’s Spanish,’ Isla answered, thinking of that gorgeous, volatile Latin temperament, of Sav’s arms waving in exasperation as he tried to ram home a point, tripping over the words as his mother tongue took over. ‘So of course he’s got a temper.’ Isla gave a nervous smile but it faded as she saw the solicitor’s eyebrow lift a good inch. ‘But he’s never hit me,’ she broke in immediately, annoyed at the connotation. ‘Sav would never hit me—never,’ she said again for effect, but the solicitor remained unmoved.

‘He doesn’t have to hit you,’ Karin said knowingly. ‘Abuse isn’t always physical.’

‘I’m not abused,’ Isla said firmly.

‘But your husband does have a temper?’

‘Actually, having said that, he doesn’t have a temper any more.’ Isla let out a low, mirthless laugh. ‘We’ve moved well past the stand-up row stage.’

‘And where are you now, Isla?’ Karin asked, waiting patiently as Isla took her time to respond, wondering how she could sum up in a short sentence the abyss their marriage had fallen into, the long lonely days rattling around a house that was too big, too quiet, followed by even longer, lonely nights as they lay in bed, firmly entrenched on their own sides and pretending to be asleep.

‘Where are you now, Isla?’ Karin asked again, only more gently this time, watching as her client’s tired, reddened eyes slowly lifted.

‘Sitting in a solicitor’s office, working out my options.’

The silence dragged on, Isla immersed in her own thoughts and Karin waiting for her client to elaborate further. Usually an expert at summing up people, to Karin there was something about Isla Ramirez that didn’t add up. When she’d walked nervously into her office two weeks ago Karin had been positive that after the initial brief consultation she’d never see her again. Sure almost that the rather fragile-looking blonde with the perfectly manicured nails and Pilate-toned thighs had arrived at the solicitor’s office on the back of a marital row. The affection in her voice when she’d spoken about her husband hadn’t fitted the usual mould of a woman about to leave her husband, and when Karin had actually gone through the procedures for a divorce, she had been sure that Isla Ramirez would be out of her office never to be seen again, yet here she was two weeks later, a touch thinner, a touch more exhausted perhaps, but with a steely determination Karin had missed at their last meeting.

It was Karin who eventually broke the silence, picking up her pen and shuffling the pile of notices in front of her. ‘OK, so we’ll lodge your application citing irretrievable breakdown?’

The solicitor’s pen was poised over her notes and Isla knew she was waiting for her to respond. Clearing her throat, Isla attempted to say yes but had to settle instead for a hesitant nod, which Karin Jensen failed to notice.

‘That is what we agreed on?’ Karin checked, looking up when Isla still failed to answer.

She hadn’t exactly agreed on anything, Isla wanted to point out. She’d merely come in to discuss her options.

Again.

Admittedly, the first visit had been a rather pale affair, with herself mumbling questions, feeling as guilty as hell for even being there, and the solicitor determinedly not giving too much away during the utterly no-obligation, free consultation.

Karin had been much more animated on this visit. Now there was actually money on the table, now she’d seemingly passed from curious to determined, Karin was only too happy to discuss Isla’s options.

Only too happy to sum up nine years of marriage in two little words.

Two very apt little words, Isla reluctantly admitted, fiddling with her handbag and hoping Karin would offer her another glass of water.

Her marriage had definitely broken down.

And if Sav even had a hint she’d visited a solicitor, irretrievable was certainly a word that sprang to mind.

‘I don’t want to do anything just yet.’ Her voice was back and Isla deliberately ignored the frown flickering across the young woman’s face. ‘I’m going back to work tomorrow and once I’ve got a wage coming in and have found somewhere for the children and me to live—’

‘Hold it right there.’ Karin put up a very steady hand, a sharp contrast to Isla’s trembling ones fiddling nervously in her lap. ‘The last thing you do is go back to work. Salvador, I mean Sav, has an obligation to you and the children to keep you in the style to which you’re accustomed, and as for moving out…’ She shook her head very slowly, very deliberately and fixed her client with a steely glare. ‘It’s your husband that will be moving out of the family home.’

‘I don’t want it to be like that,’ Isla insisted. ‘I have no intention of kicking him out of his home. Sav has enough on his plate already, without looking for somewhere else to live. He’s an emergency consultant. He hasn’t got time to be—’

‘And you’re a mother to his twin sons,’ Karin broke in. ‘It makes more sense for Salv—Sav to move out than to traumatize the boys with a house move as well as a divorce.’

‘Perhaps,’ Isla sighed.

‘And the very last thing you should even be thinking about is returning to work. It’s up to Sav to support you, to keep you in a manner—’

‘And he will,’ Isla broke in. ‘I don’t doubt that for a moment. But I’m more than capable of working, I certainly don’t need to bleed him dry. I know that when he calms down he’ll do the right thing and provide for me and the children.’

‘Maybe he will.’ Karin shrugged but her voice hardened. ‘For a while perhaps, at least until the next Mrs Ramirez comes along.’

‘Sav’s not like that,’ Isla said—immediately and with conviction. ‘There’s no one else involved in this, and I really can’t see anyone else “coming along”—for either of us,’ she added, but even though Karin never turned as much as a hair, never said a single word, Isla could almost hear the Just you wait that hung in the air, and it infuriated her.

What would Karin Jensen know about them?

What would Karin Jensen know about the love that had been between them, the sheer magic they had shared, and if, even with all that love, this marriage couldn’t work, then there was no way on this earth she’d do it again and she knew, just knew, that Sav would feel the same.

‘I want this divorce to be as amicable as possible…’

‘There’s no such thing.’ Karin shook her head. ‘Not when there are children involved. How do you know that Sav isn’t going to apply for custody of the boys? How do you know that Sav isn’t going to want to be the primary carer?’

Isla felt the colour drain out of her cheeks.

‘As soon as these papers are served the first thing Sav’s going to do is get himself a solicitor and, believe me, Isla, once that happens you can leave the word amicable out of your vocabulary for a while. You need to come out of your corner fighting.’

‘But Sav hasn’t done anything wrong,’ Isla protested.

‘Then why are you here?’

She had a point, Isla reluctantly acknowledged. At every turn she’d defended Sav, at every opportunity she’d insisted how nice he was, what a wonderful father he was, what a great provider he’d been. But as much as it galled her to admit it, Karin had a point: if her marriage was so wonderful, why at two o’clock on a Wednesday afternoon was she sitting in a solicitor’s office in the city, trying to find out how a seemingly happily married woman went about getting a divorce?

‘Because I can’t live with him any more.’ Tears she’d been determined not to shed in this meeting were threatening now, and Isla blinked them back, expecting an irritated sigh from the well-groomed businesswoman that sat on the other side of the table. But instead Karin pushed over a box of tissues and poured another cup of water from the cooler as Isla did her best to regain her composure. ‘Because nothing I do or say seems to make a difference. We just don’t talk…’

‘Since Casey died?’

This time Isla didn’t even try to blink back her tears, they were coming thick and fast just at the mention of her son’s name—a name she ached to hear, a name that was curiously absent in her household, a name that brought a warning look from Sav every time she ventured it.

‘I know he misses him. I know that he’s devastated at what happened, but he won’t talk to me about it. He won’t talk to me about anything any more. It’s like living with a stranger.’

‘Look, I’m not one to knock back business.’ Karin gave a dry smile but her eyes were kind. ‘But it sounds to me as if there’s still a lot of love there. Have you thought about counselling?’ She watched Isla screw up her nose.

‘Sav doesn’t believe in it.’

‘But he’s a doctor,’ Karin responded. ‘Surely—’

‘It’s a case of do as I say, not as I do with Sav. Sure, he recommends it for his patients, and no doubt he believes in its merits, but he’s too damn proud and stubborn to even contemplate that counselling might help him.’

‘Have you been to see anyone?’

Isla nodded. ‘I don’t think I’d be here otherwise,’ she said with simple honesty. ‘It definitely helped at first.’

‘But not now?’

Isla shook her head as Karin let out a tiny sigh. ‘I’ve gone as far as I can on my own with this. Things really have to change at home. Have to change,’ she reiterated. ‘And I just can’t see any other way.’

‘Talk to him again, Isla. Tell him how close he is to losing—’

‘I’ve been trying to for over a year now,’ Isla gulped, ‘and I get nowhere. If it was just about me, then perhaps I could take it. But it’s affecting the twins, I know it is. As much as we try to act normal in front of them, they can feel the tension between us. They’ve been through so much already.’

‘A divorce isn’t an easy option,’ Karin pointed out. ‘No matter how gently you tread, this will affect them.’

‘I know.’ Isla nodded, closing her eyes in dread, appalled that it had come to this, appalled at what she was instigating. ‘But I’ve given it a lot of thought.’ She gave a painful laugh, utterly void of humour. ‘In fact, it’s all I’ve thought about. I honestly believe that in the long term this will be for the best. A new start, a clean break for all of us. Not the torture of the boys watching their parents’ marriage slowly fall apart, the unspoken rule that they can never say their brother’s name in front of their father. They miss him as much as we do, and Sav’s silence on the subject isn’t helping. It’s making it worse, so much worse than it has to be. It’s like a cancer invading every cell of our lives.’ She blew her nose loudly into the tissues, her head spinning as she tried to process all Karin had said about the mechanics of a divorce. Trying and failing to contemplate a future, however bleak the present might be, without Sav.

‘Have you given any thought to a trial separation?’ Karin suggested. ‘Say, three months apart…’

‘Sav wouldn’t hear of it.’ Instantly Isla shook her head. ‘If he even knew that I was here, it would be all over bar the shouting. It’s all or nothing with Sav, and frankly I don’t think it would be fair on the children, leaving them in limbo for three months. If I go ahead with this, it has to be a clean break.’

‘OK,’ Karin said slowly. ‘Then why don’t we schedule another appointment?’ The solicitor’s voice was calm and even, such a contrast to the swirling, confusing mass of emotions Isla seemed to be constantly engulfed in these days. ‘Say, for a month’s time?’

‘Why?’ Isla blinked back at the other woman. ‘What’s that going to solve? I didn’t come here on a whim, Karin.’

‘I’m sure you didn’t,’ Karin said sympathetically. ‘But we have gone over a lot of ground today, there’s a lot of information there for you to process. Think about it,’ she said firmly. ‘Think long and hard about it, and while you’re at it try talking to Sav again, tell him how close he is to the marriage ending.’

‘I thought you were a divorce lawyer…’ Isla managed a wobbly smile ‘…not a marriage counsellor.’

‘I’m a great divorce lawyer,’ Karin fixed her with a steely glare. ‘I fight for my clients to the last breath, but at the end of the day, I need them on my side.’ She gave a small shrug. ‘I’m just not quite sure that you’re there yet.’

‘I’m not,’ Isla admitted, raking a hand through her newly cut blonde hair and feeling foolish all of a sudden. ‘I’ve wasted your time—’ Isla started, but Karin waved her apology away.

‘Not at all, Isla. You’re the one paying for my advice, so take it. Go home, think about what I’ve said and try again to talk to Sav. If you still want to go ahead with a divorce, I’ll be here for you and more than ready to roll.’

‘Thank you.’

Karin stood up and shook her client’s hand. ‘But you will listen to what I’ve said and not go and do anything stupid, though?’

‘Like what?’ Isla frowned.

‘Like moving out and starting a job.’ She gave a low laugh. ‘Hair and nails and a figure like that don’t come cheap, Isla.’

Isla shook her head. ‘I do my own nails, Karin, and as for the figure, you’re right—it didn’t come cheap.’ She watched as the solicitor frowned. ‘Losing a child is the highest price anyone can pay.’ Opening the door to the office, she paused a moment. ‘This is my divorce, Karin. I’ll do it my way.’

Her bravado evaporated as soon as Isla stepped into the waiting room. Waiting in line at Reception behind an irate fair-headed gentleman who was insisting that he be seen next, furiously demanding an explanation for a summons he had received that morning, Isla felt as if she were drowning in her own misery, being pulled ever deeper into a circle of hate where she and Sav surely didn’t belong.

One month.

Amazingly it calmed her.

One month to get her life in order, one month to give her marriage yet another shot, one month to come to her decision.

CHAPTER ONE

‘WHAT did you do today?’

Cheeks flaming, Isla took another slug of water, every drop sticking in her throat as she attempted to eat the dinner she had hastily prepared for Sav and herself. Late picking the boys up from school, the whole evening had been a downward spiral of chaos, but thankfully Sav had been caught up at work, finally coming home late to a reasonable tidy house and a seemingly normal wife. The twins, delighted after their rare treat of take-away burgers and chips, were supposed to be in bed, but she could hear them bumping around upstairs and for once was grateful for it, grateful that Sav left the table to sort them out and didn’t seem to notice her discomfort.

‘I said they could read for ten more minutes.’ He didn’t come back to the table. Instead, he headed for the fridge and pulled out a bottle of wine, pouring her a glass before sitting down.

‘Have one,’ she suggested, but Sav shook his head.

‘The hospital might call.’

‘You’re not on call tonight Sav,’ Isla pointed out, ‘and even if they do, surely you can have one glass with dinner.’

‘So, what did you do today?’ Sav asked again, ignoring what she had just said, and getting back to a subject she’d rather ignore.

‘Not much.’ Isla gave a vague shrug. ‘I had my hair done this morning.’

‘It looks nice,’ Sav responded, barely even looking up, and Isla managed a wry smile at the solicitor’s comments—this morning had been her first trip to the hairdresser’s in over a year, her long dark blonde hair finally meeting scissors for the first time since Casey’s death. The trim she’d intended before she started back to work had inadvertently turned into her own extreme make-over—her hair now hung in a sleek shoulder-length curtain and she’d taken the hairdresser’s advice and had a few foils put in. The hairdresser had raved at the result, and even the mums at the school had jumped up and down as Isla had stood blushing at the scrutiny but quietly pleased. But the one opinion that mattered, the one person she’d been hoping to impress, had scarcely even noticed.

‘What else?’

‘Not much.’ Isla blushed. A useless liar at the best of times, she wondered how some people managed to have affairs, managed to spend an afternoon making steamy, breathless love and somehow managing to arrive at the dinner table apparently normal. Her two trips to see Karin Jensen had been fraught with guilt—paying in cash, ringing them up to ensure they’d understood that no correspondence should be sent to the house. Even her parking ticket for the Art Centre in Melbourne had been carefully shredded.

Oh, God!

Another lurch of panic as she remembered her E-Tag, the tiny white box that Melburnians displayed on the dashboards of their cars, the tiny white box that bleeped as you went through the road tolls on the way to the city. If Sav looked at the bill he’d know she’d been there, would…

Taking another slug of wine, she ignored Sav’s slightly questioning glance as he topped up her glass, knowing he was undoubtedly confused. It normally took her the best part of an evening to work her way down a single glass, but here she was two minutes in and practically on her second!

He wouldn’t even look at the E-Tag account when it arrived, Isla consoled herself, and even if he did, as if he’d remember what had happened the previous month, as if he’d demand to know what the hell she’d been doing in the city that day. Sav wasn’t like that.

They trusted each other.

Tears pierced her eyes as she realized the incongruity of her thoughts.

Never in a million years would it enter his head that she’d been to see a solicitor today. That their marriage was nearly at the end of the line.

‘It suits you.’

‘Sorry?’ Blinking back at him, she tried to drag her mind back to the conversation but lost her way.

‘Your hair.’ He gave her a rare smile. ‘You’re upset that I didn’t notice you’d had it cut.’

‘I’m not!’

‘But I did notice,’ he carried on, ignoring her denial. ‘As soon as I came in I thought how nice it looked. I just forgot to say it.’

Which just about summed them up really, Isla thought sadly. ‘I picked up my uniforms from the hospital as well. I called in to see you but you were tied up with a patient. I told them not to disturb you.’

‘It’s been like that all day—all week, actually.’ Looking up, Isla could see the lines of tension grooved around his dark eyes as he spoke. His black hair, which to most people probably looked immaculate, by Sav’s high standards was probably overdue for a trim, and she realized how tired he looked—not the usual, it’s-been-a-long-day tired, but totally, completely exhausted. ‘I’d better get used to it, I guess. I’ve got Heath questioning my every move, taking great pains to point out every T I don’t cross or I that I don’t dot in an attempt to show how much better he’d have been for the consultant’s role, and with Martin not due back for another three weeks it’s going to be hell.’

The problems with Heath had been an ongoing saga since Sav had been made consultant. Sav and Heath had both applied for the consultant’s position eighteen months ago, and both of them had agreed at the time, ‘May the best man win.’ But when the position had gone to Sav, mainly due to the unspoken fact that Heath had been going through a messy divorce and custody issues, Heath had taken it in bad part, taking an almost morbid delight in pointing out how much better a choice he’d have been for the job when Sav had taken a month off after Casey’s death.

‘Hell!’ Sav added just for effect, and Isla knew that little tag had been aimed at her. It wasn’t just Heath that was getting to Sav. Isla had lived with him long enough to read between the lines. Taking a breath, she decided to voice what was clearly on his mind.

‘And me going back to work isn’t exactly going to help matters.’

‘I didn’t say that,’ Sav snapped.

‘No, but you thought it,’ Isla retorted, taking an angry sip of her wine. ‘You don’t start till nine, Sav. The boys’ uniforms will be out, I’ll give them their breakfast before I go. All you have to do is drop them off at school—it’s hardly a big deal.’

‘It is a big deal if you’re having a heart attack,’ Sav retorted, his Spanish accent deepening the angrier he got. ‘It’s one hell of a big deal if you’re lying there bleeding to death in Resuscitation and the only consultant covering the department is at home, babysitting his children.’

‘If that happens,’ Isla responded, trying desperately to keep her voice even, ‘then you’ll ring Louise. She’s only around the corner, she’s said that she’ll come straightaway. We’ve already worked this out!’

‘No, you worked it out, Isla. You’re the one who worked this whole harebrained scheme out, you’re the one who decided to make your grand return to nursing the one month in the year when you know Martin Elmes is on holiday.’

‘There was never going to be a good time for you, Sav,’ Isla retorted. ‘The simple fact of the matter is that you don’t want me to go back to work, least of all as a nurse in your department. You have this archaic belief that any wife of yours should be firmly entrenched at home.’

‘That’s not true.’ Sav shook his head, pushed away his half-eaten dinner then shook his head again. ‘The plan was that you were going to go back to work next year—’

‘No,’ Isla broke in, ‘the plan was, once the children were at school I’d start back at work.’ It was Isla pushing her plate away now, Isla who couldn’t face another morsel, Isla trying to raise another subject that was out of bounds. ‘And the children are at school now. It would have been next year if…’

He was standing up now, ready to stalk off to the study or the living room, to pick up the phone and ring the hospital and hopefully find out that he had to go in. And on any other night, Isla would have followed him in, finished what she was saying, tried to force the conversation, but tonight she let him go, tonight she just let him walk off, because quite simply she didn’t have the energy to scrape at the stony walls of silence he so forcibly erected.

Just couldn’t do this any more.

‘I’m going for a run after I’ve tidied the kitchen,’ she was shouting into the hallway as he stalked off, and Isla saw his shoulders stiffen, an almost questioning look on that inscrutable face as he turned around, her lack of response clearly not what he’d expected. ‘I’ll take my mobile. You can call me if the hospital rings and I’ll come straight back.’

Sav didn’t call. In fact, he didn’t even come out of the study when she arrived home a good hour later, and barely looked up when, drooping with exhaustion, she popped her head around the study door and said goodnight.

She should have fallen asleep. Only half an hour ago she’d barely been able to keep her eyes open, but the shower had woken her, her mind spinning with guilt as she lay in bed, scarcely able to fathom where she had been today, reeling in horror as she pictured Sav’s face if he ever found out, tears slipping into her hair as she imagined the devastation on Luke’s and Harry’s faces if they ever had to break it to them that Mummy and Daddy wouldn’t be living together any more.

‘Isla?’ Sav whispered it gently as he tiptoed into the bedroom and Isla recognized the low throaty, unvoiced question.

At first, when Casey had died, their love life had been put on hold. They had clung to each other through the long dark nights more out of fear than intimacy, guilt impinging on guilt whenever passion had taken over, as if somehow it had been wrong to feel pleasure, to indulge each other. But as their marriage had dissolved around them as the communication gates had slammed firmly closed, still, surprisingly perhaps, the passion had remained, the huge sexual attraction that had sparked on contact all those years ago still burning brightly, the one shining light in their marriage apart from the twins. It was the only time Sav let his guard down, the sweet, sweet release of their lovemaking almost addictive in its nature, everything else temporarily cast aside as passion took over.

But not tonight.

Yes, she was going to give her marriage all she had, but the physical side of it wasn’t the issue. The physical side of it was the only bit that didn’t need rescuing.

‘Isla.’ He said it again, and when she didn’t answer, Sav moved into the en suite and she lay there staring at his reflection in the dressing-table mirror, watching as Sav quietly undressed then leant over the sink to brush his teeth, the vivid raised scar on his back so red and angry it was easy to make out even from this distance.

How she longed to touch it, longed to run gentle fingers over it, to ask him how much it hurt, wincing as she imagined the gnarled metal from the car wreckage stabbing into his beautiful back, the intricate operation to remove it.

Closing her eyes as the light flicked off, she concentrated on keeping her breathing even, willed her hammering heart to slow down as he came across the room and pulled the sheet back, felt the indentation of the mattress as he climbed in. She waited for him to roll over, to turn his back to her, only he didn’t. This time a strong arm reached out in the darkness, his body spooning in beside her, his face burying itself in her hair and inhaling the unfamiliar citrus scent of the hairdresser’s shampoo. She could feel his arousal nudging into the backs of her thighs, his hand dusting over the curve of her bottom. She could feel the stirring of her own arousal somewhere deep inside, her body responding just as it always did, her nipples jutting to attention at the mere suggestion of his touch. And it hurt, physically hurt, not to respond, to lie there feigning sleep when every nerve, every pore screamed for his touch, when her mind begged for the balmy oblivion only Sav could bring. But she couldn’t do it, couldn’t make love to him given where she’d been today.

Couldn’t pretend any more, even for a little while, that everything was OK.