‘So do I,’ Logan said dryly, snapping the top off a bottle of beer. ‘Would someone mind telling our patients? I need a regular bedtime and regular meals. I can’t function like this. It gives me indigestion.’
‘I’m serious, Logan,’ Evanna said. ‘She’s really hard to settle in the evenings because she doesn’t know whether she’s supposed to be awake or asleep.’
Logan sighed and reached out his arms for his daughter. ‘Routine is overrated,’ he said roughly, as he buried his face in the little girl’s blonde curls. ‘If she goes to bed early then there are some nights when I don’t see her, and I don’t want that. I need cuddles.’
Kyla’s heart shifted as she saw the two of them together and suddenly she found she had a lump in her throat. He’s a good father, she thought to herself, and she knew from the soft expression in her friend’s eyes that Evanna was thinking the same thing.
Then she looked at Ethan and something in his eyes caught her attention.
She saw shock, pain and desolation so huge that it almost hurt to watch.
And he was staring at the baby.
‘I offered her some of my home-made soup,’ Evanna was saying as she pulled faces at the little girl, drawing smiles of delight, ‘but she wasn’t interested.’
Had no one else noticed? Kyla wondered as she moved instinctively towards Ethan. Had no one else noticed the grim set of his mouth or the fact that his entire body was unnaturally still? It was as if he were afraid to move.
Did he hate babies? Had he lost a baby? What could possibly have happened in his life to trigger that sort of reaction?
Her mind sifted through options and came up with nothing concrete.
Perhaps she
was just being dramatic. He was single after all. It was perfectly possible that he just didn’t like babies.
‘She doesn’t need soup, she needs attention. Give your daddy a cuddle,’ Logan drawled in a soft voice, and the little girl gurgled with delight and lifted her hand to pull his hair.
‘Ow—you have got to stop doing that, sweet pea, or Daddy is going to be bald and that is not a “good look”, as your Aunty Kyla would say.’ Logan wrapped his daughter’s tiny fist in his hand and planted a noisy kiss on her cheek. ‘Pull someone else’s hair. Kyla has plenty.’
‘Ethan?’ Kyla moved over to Ethan’s side and touched his arm. ‘Are you all right?’
It was a moment before he even noticed she was there. ‘Of course.’ His voice was flat. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’
‘I don’t know. You just seem—’
‘Tired,’ he supplied, his gaze cool as he turned to look at her. ‘It’s been a long day and it was a long night before that. I probably should have made my excuses and had an early night instead of accepting the invitation.’
Was that what was wrong? He was tired?
Kyla glanced towards her niece and then back at him, searching for clues. She wanted to ask a question but she had no idea which words would lead her to the right answer. Why would the sight of a strange baby affect him so badly? It didn’t make sense. ‘She’s sweet, isn’t she?’
There was a long silence and Ethan’s knuckles were white as he gripped the bottle of beer. ‘I don’t know much about babies,’ he said hoarsely, lifting the bottle to his lips and drinking deeply, ‘but I’m sure she’s very sweet.’
He was a loner, Kyla reminded herself. A man who clearly had no experience of family. It was perfectly natural that he wouldn’t be comfortable with babies. But somehow none of her reasoning made her feel better and Evanna’s words of warning rang in her head.
‘I had a call from the Infirmary on the mainland,’ Logan said, strolling across to them. ‘Doug’s doing well. They’re going to keep him in for a few more days, review his drugs and then send him back.’
‘We’re going to have to add him to our cardiac rehab list,’ Kyla said, her eyes still on Ethan. ‘We need to try and get him to take some exercise. Evanna runs a class at the community centre once a week. When he’s recovered, I’ll talk to him about it.’
‘It’s Leslie who is going to need the support.’ Logan winced as Kirsty grabbed another hunk of hair. ‘She rang me from the hospital with loads of questions.’
‘Don’t they answer questions in hospital?’
Logan gave a laugh. ‘She doesn’t trust them. She wanted to hear it from me.’
Kyla rolled her eyes. ‘What’s it like to enjoy such godlike status?’
‘Exhausting. Leslie is coming back over tomorrow to check on Andrea. She’s staying with a schoolfriend but obviously she was pretty upset about the whole thing and worried about her dad. Those prawns are done, Ethan. There’s a plate there and some of Evanna’s lemon mayonnaise on the side. Help yourself.’