A GP Worth Staying For

By Louisa Heaton

A Second chance…
...with the new Island doc?
For widowed GP Owen Ledger, the arrival of his replacement, Dr. Lucy Childs, is step one on the road to a new life away from the island where he spent his marriage. Only as Owen hands over the practice to warmhearted Lucy, he starts to see everything through fresh eyes. Could Lucy be the final step to a second chance and show Owen that he does belong on the island—with her?
 
“…Louisa Heaton is definitely a writer after my own heart, creating heartwarming romance with ambitious conflicts, compelling medical drama and amazing locales. I look forward to escaping with Heaton’s next release!”
-Goodreads on Risking Her Heart on the Trauma Doc
 
“Ms. Heaton pens a story that is sure to keep the reader engaged and cheering her characters on in their journey to a HEA and this one is up there with the best, a fabulous story of second chances…. This really is a beautiful moving story….”
-Goodreads on Pregnant by the Single Dad Doc
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Harlequin Medical Romance
• Release date: Nov 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9780369712387

Louisa Heaton

I'm a married mother of four (including a set of twins) and I live on an island in Hampshire. When not wrangling my children, husband or countless animals, I can often be found walking along the beach muttering to myself, as I work out plot points. In my spare time, I read a lot, quilt and patchwork, usually when I ought to be doing something else.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

DR OWEN LEDGER cupped his mouth with his hands and blew a quick burst of air into them before rubbing them together. It was freezing, and standing in Sandpiper Bay Station in the middle of a blizzard, waiting for a train to arrive, was not his idea of fun. He turned up the collar of his jacket and stamped his feet as he saw the lights of the train in the distance through the thick flakes of snow, and he felt much better to know that soon the new doctor would be here and they could get back into the warmth of his car.

Dr Childs was going to be his ticket out of here and he couldn’t wait to go. Make a fresh new start in a brand-new place where absolutely no one knew him. Where absolutely no one could judge him on his past and look at him with pitying eyes.

Okay, they might not actually be pitying eyes, but they certainly felt that way to him. The people of Morrow Island knew too much about him, and it was hard to create the professional distance that he needed as a doctor. He knew these people. He knew their families and their friends and what happened to them on a daily basis. Because the island grapevine never needed much time to get going and there were only a couple of hundred people here.

When it came to serious matters—when it came to having to deliver difficult news—it was hard to maintain the distance he needed to protect himself, as well as them, when they had all come to his wedding. When most of them had danced with his bride.

When all of them had attended her funeral.

The train pulled in and the doors slid open to allow an assortment of passengers to get off. He recognised Gerry Farmer, who gave him a wave, and then Peter Atkins, who said hello, shook his freezing hand and asked him if he needed a lift.

‘I’m okay, thanks, Pete! Just waiting for the new doc,’ he said, shivering in the snow.

‘It’s today? Gosh, I guess that means we don’t have you for much longer?’

‘Four weeks and I’m gone. End of January. Just enough time to get Dr Childs settled in and introduced to everyone.’

‘I’ll remind Josie. I think she’s going to drop some scones round for you. She made a batch with ginger. Best things you’ve ever tasted!’ Josie was Pete’s daughter, who had aspirations to be on some baking show on the television.

He nodded and gave a brief wave. ‘I’ll look forward to it!’

‘G’night!’

Owen watched as Pete hurried away, then turned back to look at the platform. There was only one passenger who remained. She was very small and dainty, wrapped in a calf-length coat with a multicoloured scarf and matching hat, and she was pulling behind her a suitcase that had to weigh more than she did.

He hoped she wasn’t the doctor—because she was startlingly attractive and the two of them were going to have to live in the same house until he moved out. The property he lived in came with the job, and the surgery was connected to the main house.

She had large doe-like eyes, innocent and wide. Possibly brown, but it was hard to see in the dark and be sure. But she was pale from the cold and had a bright red nose—like Rudolph the reindeer.

Despite that, he very much liked what he saw.

‘Dr Childs?’ he said.

She smiled and nodded, snow hitting her face. ‘Dr Ledger?’

‘Owen. Can I take your case for you? I’m afraid the car is parked quite a distance away.’

‘Thank you.’ She passed him her case and he took it, surprised at its weight. What did she have in this thing? Solid oak units?

‘How was your journey?’ He turned so she could hear him over the strong wind that blew snow into their faces.

‘Not bad.’

‘That’s great.’

‘I appreciate you meeting me like this.’

He could barely hear her over the sound of the howling wind, and he kept checking to make sure she was keeping up with him as they walked against it. The tail end of this storm had brought them snow two days after Christmas, bathing the small island in white, frosting it like a cake. They didn’t normally get snow there, so it was a novelty, but he was glad the off-roader was able to make it down most of the rural roads on the island, so that he could tend to his patients.

Dr Childs would have to get used to driving it, too. The car, like the house, came with the job.

When they reached the vehicle, he opened the passenger door for her, then took her suitcase and put it in the rear. He got into the driver’s seat and closed his own door with a huge sense of relief, as if they’d just yomped miles over rough terrain.

‘I’m sorry the weather’s so bad. It’s not normally like this at this time of year.’

She turned to smile at him, blinking those big doe eyes at him. A strange sensation hit him squarely in the stomach and he had to turn away, pretending he was struggling to get the key into the ignition. Dr Childs was very beautiful, but nothing was going to happen. He was very much single now, and Dr Childs could be Miss Fricking World and he wouldn’t do anything about it.

He’d been burned once. Had his heart ripped from his chest, set fire to and stomped on. There was no way he was going to complicate matters before he left. She was here to work, and he was here to pack up and leave once she’d got orientated. That was all. That was going to be the extent of their relationship.

He started the engine. ‘Ready to go home?’

She nodded. ‘I am.’

The brightness in her dark eyes was hypnotic and he had to force himself to turn away once again, flicking on the headlights full beam. Turning on the windscreen wipers to remove a shield of snow.

What was going on here?

The sooner he could get out of here, the better.

---

Dr Lucy Childs sat in the passenger seat of the car, looking towards the old farmhouse that would be her new home. She couldn’t see too much of it, because of the darkness and the blizzard, but it looked sizeable.

From the train station, Owen had driven them across the bridge that connected the mainland to the island and then down a myriad of winding country roads, until they’d reached a lane that was pitted with potholes.

The lane was bordered by drystone walls and ditches, but the farmhouse itself, from what she could see, looked nice. A curl of smoke issued from the chimney, indicating that a real fire was burning inside, and a solitary yellow light glowed like a beacon from one of its windows.

‘I thought I’d have the place all warm for you when you arrived,’ said Owen.

She turned to smile at him, grateful for his kind consideration. ‘Thanks.’

Dr Owen Ledger was an astoundingly attractive man—which she’d not expected to find. When she’d come across the advert for a job here on Morrow Island she’d expected to find the outgoing doctor would be a silver-haired man, maybe a little portly. Someone ready for retirement, perhaps? With a penchant for reading a real newspaper and enjoying a pint down at the pub? And he’d have a nice wife—someone warm and welcoming, who wore a pinny and had her hair curled and set each weekend.

Not him. Not the thirty-something, handsome devil who sat beside her, with his raven-black hair and intense green eyes that were framed with enviable thick, dark lashes. The kind of lashes that women would pay lots of money for in extensions and expensive mascara.

And they were going to have to live in the same house for the next few weeks, before he moved on...

Hmm. I’ll take one for the team, she thought with a smile. It would be a nice bonus, that was for sure.

‘This place looks amazing,’ she said.

‘It is. It used to be a proper farm. They raised beef cattle here for many years, until the farmer sold off his land. The medical trust bought the property and moved the surgery here from its old place, which was in the middle of nowhere. At least here people can get to us quickly. We’re on the outskirts of the village and the bus stops right at the end of the lane.’

‘I understand it’s just us?’

‘Mostly. We have a nurse from the mainland who drives over once a month for our lumps and bumps clinic, and Helen is our receptionist. She works here every morning, and if she can’t make it, her daughter steps in. I can give you a tour when we get inside. Ready to brave the snow again?’

Her stomach churned as the moment to step from the car grew closer. This was it. The start of her new life. She’d left everyone behind to do this. To come to the middle of nowhere, where no one knew her. That had been the whole point. A fresh start. A clean slate. The chance to start over without everyone watching her constantly and worrying over her, waiting for her to falter.

‘Okay. I’m ready.’

They both got out of the car and Owen went to the rear of the vehicle and popped open the boot, pulling Lucy’s suitcase from it and placing it on the road, before pulling up the long handle so that he could drag the case behind him.

The wind had dropped, and it was almost silent as she stood there in the road with the deepening dark and the soft, silent snow. She turned to look at the farmhouse, situated here on this small island just off the southern coast of Cornwall. It was meant to have the GP practice attached to it. Maybe it was in another building that she couldn’t see?

That yellow light did look welcoming. And the smoke that hinted at a real fire made her want to get inside and be hypnotised by the warmth and pop and crackle of the flames, to stretch her toes out in front of it. All she had to do was take a step. And then another. And another.

She started forward, behind Owen. Her suitcase wheels were making more noise on the road than she was.

The farmhouse door was made of a modern uPVC, along with the windows, though the rest of the building looked as if it had stood for centuries. The stones were dark and covered in lichen or moss in parts, and when she reached out to touch this place that would soon be her for ever home she felt a soft furriness against the cold.

‘Hello, house, I’m Lucy,’ she whispered, staring up at the building around her and feeling incredibly stupid for having spoken to the house. But houses were easy to talk to. They didn’t talk back, they didn’t ask awkward questions she wasn’t sure she’d ever be ready to answer and they didn’t try and smother you or wrap you in cotton wool, as if you were a broken, fragile thing.

Owen looked at her with a quizzical smile. ‘You say hello to houses?’

She smiled back, feeling her cheeks flush. ‘You don’t?’

He smiled again and turned to open the door, throwing it open wide, and the warm glow from within burst out to welcome her. He stood back, so she could go in first, and she stepped inside, brushing her feet on the mat and then pulling off her boots as she looked around the place.

A fire crackled away in a large inglenook fireplace, and above her head were old, black Elizabethan beams. The room was filled with soft, squishy chairs and the walls were lined with bookcases, stuffed to overflowing with books. In a corner, a guitar was propped up on a stand, and through a doorway, off to her left, she saw a sleek white kitchen.

‘Wow.’

‘Welcome home.’

Owen closed the door on the cold behind her and they both began to peel off their heavy overcoats. Owen took hers from her and hung it up next to his, which strangely seemed unbearably intimate, and then wheeled her suitcase over to the base of the wooden stairs behind them.

She couldn’t help but notice, now that he was out of his coat, that Owen was rather delicious. He wore soft dark jeans and a black V-neck jumper with a white shirt over a nice flat stomach, and when he rolled his sleeves up she noted that he had very nice forearms and wore a chunky metal wristwatch.

Do. Not. Stare.

‘Obviously you’ll be free to decorate how you like once you’ve settled in,’ he said.

‘Are you kidding me? This place is perfect.’

She stepped forward to touch the back of one of the couches, running her fingers over the soft wool blanket that was draped over the back. Naturally, her gaze went to the books. As a bookworm herself, she could discover a lot about a person by the titles on their shelves. Owen had a mix of medical texts and science fiction stories and that made her smile. She’d always loved stories and films set in space, too.

‘Fancy a hot drink?’ he asked.

She nodded.

‘Tea? Coffee? Hot chocolate?’

‘Hot chocolate sounds perfect.’

He headed into the kitchen and after a moment or two she followed him in, watching him as he made his way around. It was quite a modern kitchen. Sleek and rounded, the cupboards had an automatic soft close that she liked, and Owen had filled the room with chrome equipment. There was a chrome toaster, a kettle and a large coffee machine in one corner. And yet on the windowsill were softer touches—hyacinth bulbs in pink and blue and a large red-leafed poinsettia.

Owen clearly knew his way around a kitchen, and she envied him that. She’d never been very good at cooking, and often became quickly acquainted with the microwave. But she was determined to learn. One day, anyway.

Coming here to Morrow was meant to give her that time. She’d not wanted a GP post that would take up her entire day, with all her evenings and most weekends on call. Morrow offered only a morning clinic, Monday to Friday, and though she would be on call after that, an island with two hundred people on it meant that her bleep would hardly ever go off, or so the trust had assured her during the interview process. Any real emergencies meant the island’s residents driving themselves to the hospital a few miles away on the mainland, or calling an ambulance.

Owen had steamed the milk in some contraption she didn’t recognise, and soon he was handing her a large mug of steaming hot chocolate. She sipped at it and it was delicious. He leaned back against one of the kitchen units and they faced one another in quiet for a moment.

‘So what made you choose a job on a tiny Cornish island?’ he asked. ‘It’s not the most obvious step in a career.’

She met his gaze, then looked away, blowing the steam from the top of her drink before taking another small sip. She didn’t know him well enough to tell him everything—and what would be the point in that, anyway? The whole reason for coming here was so that she would have a clean slate and people would judge her on her ability, not her disability.

She smiled. ‘I was just looking for a slower pace. Somewhere quieter than the inner city.’

‘Where were you based before?’

‘Wandsworth. London.’

‘How many patients on your roll?’

‘Two thousand.’

He