Free Dating the Millionaire Doctor by Marion Lennox

too much trouble.’ She hesitated then, looking puzzled. ‘You’re not… He and Hazel didn’t…’ And then her face cleared. ‘I know. You’re Diane’s son.’
    â€˜That’s right.’ Jake’s voice said, Don’t go there , but Doreen had had a wonderful dinner and wonderful wine and she was past picking up subtleties.
    â€˜Oh, my dear, of course you are,’ Doreen said. ‘Thelma said you were at the funeral but no one believed her. But you’re the little boy Doc lost. He broke his heart over you.’
    â€˜Not so much as you’d notice,’ Jake snapped, clearly wanting to move on. ‘I had no contact with my father from the time I was three. I heard from him only once after my mother took me back to the States, but I was a man by then and…well…even then he didn’t seem keen to get to know me.’
    â€˜Well, that’s nonsense,’ Glenda snapped back, as if rising to bait. She clutched her hand and winced again, but a little pain wouldn’t stop her defending a man she clearly idolised. ‘I was postmistress in Combadeen for forty years and I can tell you that your father wrote to you every single week, from the day your mother took you away with that awful American.Big fat letters, they were, crammed with everything he could think of. He posted them every Friday. And you know what? Nearly every one of them came back, marked returned to sender. But he still kept sending them. Then about twenty years ago, he went over to the States. “I’m going to find him, Glenda,” he told me, but three months later he came back. He looked dreadful—and he hadn’t seen you. Your mother wouldn’t let him near. Oh, that woman…’
    Glenda’s cheeks were pink with indignation, anger building and building. ‘Not that it’s any of my business,’ she said, ‘but to hear you say there was no contact… It makes my blood boil that your mother wouldn’t let him keep in touch. But then he met Hazel. Even then, he and Hazel couldn’t have children and I know he missed you every day of his life.’
    There was a deathly silence round the table. Jake looked as if he’d gone into shock, Tori thought. His face was a mixture of conflicting emotions. Maybe she should reach out and touch him. Maybe she could reassure him.
    Maybe she should just keep out of what was clearly not her business.
    â€˜You said he met Hazel twenty years ago,’ Jake said, tightly now, angry and disbelieving. ‘Surely you meant thirty. Or more.’
    â€˜Oh, no, dear,’ Glenda said. ‘That was why they couldn’t have children. Hazel was in her early forties when they met. Of course they hoped, but it didn’t happen.’
    â€˜But my mother left because of my father’s affair with this…Hazel.’
    â€˜No, dear, she left because of the American. His name was Chuck or something appalling, and his automobile broke down here and he had to stay until it was mended and then…well, off he went, with your mother. And you. Your father couldn’t believe it. He loved her so much. Oh, but it was never going to work. Your mother hated the life as a wifeof a country doctor. She hated the calls, the feeling of everyone knowing everyone, the community. She just hated…here.’
    â€˜Are you a doctor as well?’ Finally Doreen spoke. Her eyes were alight with pleasure—and with something else.
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Oh, my dear,’ Doreen breathed. ‘To think, Glenda, Doc’s son coming home, and a doctor as well.’ And then she looked uncertainly at her sister and then directly at Jake. ‘If you really are his son, I don’t suppose… You know, Glenda won’t go and see a doctor. She broke her wrist dragging me out of the fire. Since she left hospital she won’t go back, and I know it hurts her terribly. Do you think we could