Wishes of the Heart

By Stefania Gil

How far would you be able to go for a love that does not correspond to you?

Life gives Ellie Griffin a second chance; a dreamy girl, who decided to believe the love promises of the wrong man. And this second chance forces her to have a close relationship with Dr. Sean Norton; a man who is not at all attractive to her and who has tried to conquer her without success.

Ellie knows how to admit that Sean is persevering, but she is not interested.

She has a big wound to heal and doesn't feel like messing things up anymore. However, Sean, who will never give up, devises a master plan to stay with Ellie and teach her what real love is like and how she deserves to be loved.

Will Ellie manage to open her eyes and realize that Sean is that "perfect" man she always dreamed of?

Will he be able to decipher what are the true desires that her heart harbors?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stefania Gil
• Release date: Apr 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9781071540503

Book preview

" If the present tries to judge the past, it will lose the future"

— Winston Churchill —

Prologue

Sean was walking like a caged lion outside the hospital in the emergency room.

He felt a heavy pressure on his chest as he watched the ambulance line up on the way to where he was waiting with a team of nurses.

He also felt nauseous. He wanted to vomit but it was not the time.

Ellie needed him calm and with his senses at ease.

When the ambulance doors opened and his eyes met Leah's, what little calm he had left went to hell.

Leah's eyes were red and her gaze didn't bode well.

The paramedics did their job and got Ellie off the unit as she lay unconscious on the stretcher on which she was being transferred.

She was pale and dark furrows framed her sweet eyes.

One of the paramedics quickly commented as he lifted the stretcher and rolled it into the hospital entrance. This was found by her friend, not hers the paramedic handed Sean an empty orange plastic cylinder. She has a weak pulse, we don't know how many pills she took and it probably happened about four hours ago the man continued to give Sean directions as he and his partner proceeded to Ellie's house.

Sean forced himself to pay attention even though his concentration was poor and he faded even more when he saw Ellie's bad face.

Ellie was taken to an emergency cubicle where the nurses prepared to attend to her according to the orders given by Dr. Norton.

And Sean could hardly think.

Because of the number of hours that were presumed to have passed between taking the pills and being taken to the hospital, a gastric lavage would not help. The pills had already been absorbed and Ellie's unconscious state could complicate the expulsion of fluids from her stomach.

They had to apply the antidote.

Dr Norton, are you OK? I'm fine. Nurse Sabine Smith looked at him with concern and he nodded, trying to demonstrate a confidence he didn't have.

His hands and legs were shaking. But he couldn't prove that he was out of his mind; Ellie's life came first, and he was the one who had to save it.

He couldn't lose her.

I'm not gonna let you go, Ellie.

Ellie's vital signs slowed down, she seemed to want to give up and that infuriated Sean who, for a moment, wanted to reclaim the stupidity he had just committed.

He felt anger and pain at the same time.

What had led her to do something like this?

Sean the emergency room doctor who was on call with him that day brought him back down to earth. He was still standing in front of Ellie, his cheeks felt wet, and his hand was holding the girl. His partner put a hand on his shoulder. I'll do it. You can't waste any more time.

Sean understood that his feelings were playing tricks on him. He wanted to heal the life of the woman he loved most in the world, and those same feelings were clouding his judgment, overriding his ability to heal her.

He nodded, defeated, looking his partner in the eye.

I'm going to ask you to leave.

Dr. Norton watched the hospital guards approach the cubicle. He couldn't blame his colleague for exaggerating, he had witnessed such a scene himself in the past and knew that the way they proceeded was the right one. He would put up no resistance.

He understood that well.

He nodded again, and several tears rolled down his cheeks.

He gave Ellie a sweet kiss on the forehead.

Get well, honey. Please. I need you healthy.

Several nurses saw him with absolute compassion. Others saw tenderness towards the man who made his female colleagues sigh like teenagers. They didn't know that this was the woman he loved in silence.

He stepped aside and was escorted by the guards to the waiting room, where Leah lay in his arms to share the anguish that overwhelmed them both at that moment.

When the code blue alarm went off, it made him feel a terror he had never felt before. And suddenly, everything stopped in the most hellish seconds of her life.

Sean, Leah's voice was shaking and thin. What's code blue? Why is everyone running? Leah's scream was filled with panic.

Please, God. Don't take her away from me was all Sean could think of as he prevented Leah from leaving the waiting room.

Don't take her away yet, I'm begging you.

Chapter 1

Ellie Griffin, since childhood, was a romantic child. From the time she learned to speak and play on her own, she assumed the role of the bride who came to church dressed in white with a colorful bouquet of flowers and dragging a twenty-meter tail.

Her imaginary boyfriends were always perfect. Both, physically and emotionally, and she knew that she would become the woman in the life of one of them and would be the most important thing for him.

She would be independent and at the same time, she would take care of the house with love and care and she would activate the children's factory as much as she could because she wanted many children.

A huge family. A big house with a beautiful garden to take care of and a large kitchen where he could pamper his loved ones through the palate.

She always wanted to be the perfect housewife.

And as it often happens, the hard experiences of life are moving further and further away from what we once dreamed of, making us think that what we have to live is all we will ever achieve.

Ellie was not very lucky in love.

Since she was a teenager she was unable to get the boy she liked to notice her. Maybe that's because she set her sights on the wrong guys; that's how whimsical Cupid's crush was, right? And then, while she was waiting for a proper courtship, what she got was indifference or, in other cases, pity because most of the boys she looked at were too old for her.

That's how her need to be reciprocated led her to become the matchmaker for her friends, her brother and even her pets. It was not fair that life was played out in such a way, at least she was satisfied with being able to see the love reflected in others.

Yes, she was a hopeless dreamer and romantic.

It worked well for her to connect with other people.

Except for Leah and Ryan, best friend and brother respectively. Those two became a personal love project for years for Ellie who was determined to bring together the two people she loved most in the world.

It never worked and now, her brother was in another city, happy; and her best friend was in the best stage of her life. After all that the girl suffered, it was the least she deserved.

Ellie never liked to feel controlled and her mother was an expert in controls. Her father, he didn't know if he was playing along with Mrs. Laureen Griffin so he wouldn't end up arguing with her or maybe he was just as controlling as she was.

Ellie still couldn't figure it out.

Nor was it a matter that kept her awake, if they were happy like that, good for them.

For her it was more than enough to go and see them once a week, as her mother ordered; because it was unthinkable that the Griffin family would not meet on Sundays for lunch as the most correct social customs established.

Ellie hated feeling forced to go every Sunday of her life to her old house to listen to her mother tell her everything she was doing wrong and how she should do it in the right way. Ryan also took a good share of that control, however, he was a little smarter and went along with Mr. and Mrs. Griffin and did whatever he wanted to do.

Ellie, on the other hand, used to go against them just because she didn't give them the satisfaction of feeling they were controlling their lives in some way.

And so she ended up in a thousand problems and disappointments. It was a dynamic that didn't change over the years and seemed to only get worse.

When Ellie first saw Danny Harris she couldn't hide her immediate attraction to the man who, at that moment, was coming over to greet her mother with all the kindness and chivalry that characterized him.

Ellie would never forget that first encounter. Neither would her mother, because she too realized the look on their faces and how uncomfortable the situation had become. So Laureen politely and dryly cut the encounter short and told her daughter not to set her eyes on that man because he was married to the daughter of a neighbor of Mrs. Griffin's that Ellie hardly knew because the woman had only lived there a short time.

That comments on her mother's side upset and even hurt her because she didn't understand how her mother could believe that she would get into the middle of a marriage. She would not. Or at least, she thought she would, because when she met Danny a second time, his whole world turned upside down and he started to put aside his values and principles to succumb to the temptation of this man.

It was wrong and she knew it, however, she accepted the first coffee; then, the first lunch; the first dinner; and so they continued until they consummated the passion that was installed between them.

He always talked to her about how unhappy he was in his marriage and she believed him to be a fool from the first confession dominated by something more than just a passion. She didn't want to admit it, but she knew that Danny was her ideal Prince Charming and she couldn't stop her feelings for him from blossoming so quickly and without being able to do anything about it.

When she wanted to take action because she knew very well that she was not doing things the right way, Danny wrapped her in his words and kisses making her lose her mind and from then on, her feelings towards him became more and more intense, especially when the promises of the soon divorce with his wife appeared.

Love for him was born and Ellie did not feel able to nip everything in the bud because she felt she would lose her life just by trying. Imagining life without Danny was like plunging into a darkness that consumed her completely. He was her whole life. At times, for days, shared. She didn't care, at least she had him and she knew that sooner than she thought she would have him with her forever.

Wasn't that what he was always telling her? That they were getting closer to getting it?

Soon, Ellie. Soon we'll be happy. I'm going to buy you the house you love so much and we're going to fill it with children and pets.

And silly Ellie believed his every word. Until, in reality, it crashed into her in the worst way which led her to be consumed by the darkness she was so afraid of.

***

It was an ordinary Sunday; she was leaving her parents' house accompanied by Ryan when she saw, at the end of the street, a figure she would recognize from thousands of miles away.

He saw her and looked down in shame. Ellie knew that the mere fact that he was leaving his mother-in-law's house on a Sunday was not a good sign. Especially when he claimed that things with his wife were getting worse and worse.

Would anything have happened? After all, no one could be denied help, even if things were very bad.

And as she tried to pretend in front of her brother, she noticed that Mrs. Harris, the wife of the man she loved with devotion, had a prominent belly.

At the time, she didn't know how to feel.

It was as if all the time she spent with Danny was passing in quick motion in front of her eyes.

A film that allowed her to see, in seconds, how stupid and innocent she had been for the last two years.

She got strength from nowhere, nobody could know about it and least of all Ryan, who would tear Danny's head off and then her as an idiot and for letting herself be convinced in such a ridiculous way by a man who was more than obvious that he was happily married.

Her stomach turned.

She got into her car and started the engine, while her brother watched