Viv might be Scottish, but was there any reason she couldn’t make a home in Hanoi?
The seed started to sprout in his brain. He gave her hand a squeeze. ‘Wine it is. Let’s go.’
CHAPTER TEN
THE TENSION IN the house had lifted and Vivienne finally felt as if she could concentrate on her job and enjoy it. She was learning as much as she could about the health of the people in Hanoi and getting more in tune with the specific conditions here that could affect pregnant women.
Duc had started humming again. That meant he was more relaxed.
She should be happy. She should be delighted. She should be able to write off what had happened between them as just a blip.
But somewhere deep inside it felt like so much more.
One kiss had stoked a whole lot of illicit thoughts about her best friend that she was trying really hard to lock away in a box somewhere.
Every now and then they would brush against each other or she would find herself looking at him in a different way. And either of those things would send a whole host of tingles down her spine. It was as if someone had just flicked a switch in her body.
Before, Duc had stayed safely in the ‘friend’ category.
Could she really ever feel that way about him again?
Part of her was hurt that he clearly hadn’t wanted things to proceed between them. No. Strike that. Part of her was devastated.
It hurt to know that he’d been the one to stop. He’d been the one to reject her.
She couldn’t even explain it to herself. But the fact that it had been Duc who had pushed away. It hurt more than ever.
With the rest of the guys she’d been involved with, there had been no real expectations. Sure, she’d thought she’d had her heart broken a few times, but the truth was there had been no promises. No happy-ever-afters. All the break-ups had been inevitable. She’d gone into the relationships knowing none of these were the guy to capture her heart.
But Duc? That was different. That was a whole host of emotions and hormones for a guy she already loved and respected. A guy she laughed with. A guy she didn’t hesitate to throw her arms around. This wasn’t some random pick up in a club. This was Duc. The one solid relationship she actually had with a man.
And he’d kissed her then backed away.
She was trying so hard to put on a brave front and pretend that her heart didn’t feel as if it had been ripped clean out of her chest.
But in order to keep things in check, she pushed all those thoughts away and jammed them in a box in her head, somewhere out of reach. She’d learned to live like this a long time ago. When her adoptive parents had gently tried to push her in certain directions. When they’d both died in quick succession and the rest of her adoptive family had kind of faded into the background. When she’d tracked down her birth parents and realised there were no happy endings. Not for her anyway.
For the most part, she tilted her chin up and smiled.
She had to. She had a job to do. The staff here were some of the nicest she’d ever worked with. She was slowly but surely tackling the language barrier. Some nights she asked Duc to speak to her purely in Vietnamese so she could practise.
She’d become familiar with the surrounding area, the restaurants, the shops, the shopkeepers, the local transport.
The city was bright, colourful and vibrant and she felt surprisingly safe for a foreign girl in a strange place.
Some things didn’t change, of course. She still burned everything she attempted to cook.
Duc still laughed at her regularly as she set off the smoke alarm in the house and had to open the doors and windows to let the smoke out.
Three months, that was how long she’d been here now.
Ron had served his notice at the obstetric hospital and had started with a bang. It had taken him five minutes to get on board with some of Joe’s ideas about community clinics, and she’d found herself screening pregnant women alongside school-age children who were coming for vaccinations and older people getting treated for long-term health conditions.
He’d agreed with all the protocols she’d started within the hospital and helped oversee staff training.
She’d just gathered some notes for the clinic this afternoon when Sen appeared at the door with some letters in her hands. ‘Oh, sorry, I was looking for Duc.’
‘He’s gone to see a patient. Someone with suspected appendicitis, I think.’
Sen gave a nod. ‘I printed out the emails he asked for. I’ll just leave them on the desk.’
She disappeared and Vivienne glanced at the pile of papers. Something caught her eye and she froze.
She didn’t mean to read a private email—but it was just sitting there and Sen had already seen it.
It was formal, thanking Duc for his enquiry, with a string of dates and steps he’d have to take if he chose to go back to his surgical position.
He hadn’t mentioned a single thing. Not once.
She looked further down the page. Duc had only sent the original email a few days before.
She gulped. He was planning to go back to his job. It was hardly a surprise. He’d always said he didn’t want to stay at May M?n permanently, and this would only ever be a temporary solution.
Her mouth was dry. But he hadn’t mentioned it to her. He hadn’t said anything at all.
She took a deep breath. She had a job to do. She had to get on.
She’d only taken a few steps when she heard a screech and a loud bang outside. She didn’t hesitate but turned and dropped the notes back onto the main desk and ran down the corridor. Two of the nurses were already at the main entrance.
Viv ran up behind them and stared at the disaster outside.
A lorry was on its side. The front of the lorry looked as if it had hit the side of a crumpled car. The traffic outside the hospital had come to a com
plete halt with only a few mopeds snaking past.
She ran outside with Lien and the two nurses hot on her heels. She dropped to her knees on the road, bending down to look through the broken glass at the driver. His leg was twisted at an ugly angle and he was unconscious. She put her hand under her scrub top and punched out some of the shards of glass, so she could reach inside and feel for a pulse and check for breathing. He had one, and his breathing seemed steady.
Lien shouted over to her, ‘I’ve got a heavily pregnant woman here. Do you want to swap?’
Viv nodded but as she turned to move away a flash of red caught her eye. Her heart rate stuttered. She knew what she was seeing. A small leg under the wheel of the truck.
‘Lien!’ she screamed. ‘I think there’s a kid under here.’
Duc appeared at her back, closely followed by Joe. They exchanged glances and Duc dropped to his knees and partially disappeared beneath the twisted metal. He looked up and spoke a few whispered words to Joe.
The nurses had run back inside to grab some supplies, and they reappeared, one with a mobile trolley and one with a wheelchair.
Joe’s face was serious. ‘Viv, you swap with Lien. Shout for me if you need a hand. Duc and I will take care of this.’
Her heart twisted in her chest. She knew they were trying to protect her, and a grateful part of her brain kicked in. She was primarily a midwife. She wasn’t a children’s nurse. Could she even be useful to them anyway?
Lien was still at the other car. She gave Vivienne a nod and they both ran, swapping places.
The little red trouser leg had imprinted itself on her brain and it took all her strength to focus on the woman in the car in front of her. She wasn’t just pregnant. She was very pregnant.
Viv spoke in her best broken Vietnamese. ‘I’m Viv. I’m a midwife at the May M?n Hospital. How many weeks are you?’
The woman had both hands on her stomach and tears running down her face. ‘Thirty-nine,’ she breathed. ‘But my waters have broken.’
Viv looked further into the car. There was a damp patch on the front seat between the woman’s legs. Viv turned to one of the nurses. ‘Can I have a BP monitor and a stethoscope? And a portable Doppler.’ The woman had the window down in her car, and Viv reached her hand in to release the door. The worst impact had been on the other side, so thankfully the door opened with a couple of tugs.