Risk of a Lifetime (Mills & Boon Medical) Read Free Page B

sighed and straightened up, the tenuous link broken. ‘Goodnight, Grumps. Sleep well. I’ll see you in the morning.’
    There was a grunt, but the old man was already drifting off, and he went out and closed the door softly behind him.
    His grandmother was waiting in the kitchen, a cup by the kettle. ‘Tea or coffee?’
    ‘Oh, tea, weak. I’ve had too much coffee today.’
    ‘So how was he with you?’
    ‘OK. Bit argumentative.’ He gave a wry grin, and his grandmother smiled sadly.
    ‘I don’t know what we’d do without you.’ Her face crumpled briefly. ‘Hideous bloody disease,’ she muttered, a little quiver in her voice. ‘It’s so cruel, so wicked. He used to be such a nice man, so kind and affectionate, just like you. I can’t bear the thought of having to watch you disintegrate like him—’
    ‘You won’t have to,’ he said firmly. ‘I’ve told you that.’
    ‘So you have,’ she said quietly, and then she straightened up and looked him in the eye with that way of hers that told him she knew he was lying.
    He felt a flicker of guilt and dismissed it. It wasn’t really a lie. She wouldn’t see him deteriorate like his grandfather—but possibly only because she was unlikely to live long enough for the disease to manifest itself. If he’d even got the gene...
    He drank his tea, chatted about his day to give his grandmother something to distract her from the topic he was so keen to avoid, and then left her, driving the short distance to his rented house.
    He hadn’t needed to rent it. He could have stayed with his grandparents or his parents. Both of them lived within minutes of the hospital, but this had been closer, and he’d used that as an excuse because he’d needed it. It was his sanctuary, his private space, his bolthole from the awful reality that was his potential destiny.
    He parked in the carport at the back of the garden and let himself in through the conservatory. It was a lovely evening, a little chilly but he didn’t mind that. He needed the fresh air. He poured himself a glass of wine, took it back out to the garden and dropped into the swing seat, shifting it idly to and fro with one foot and letting his mind drift over the day.
    And centre stage was Annie Brooks.
    She was older than him. Mid-thirties? Maybe late? He didn’t know exactly, but she was consultant grade and even with his rigid focus on his career he hadn’t got there yet. Just this last rung on the ladder to go and he’d be able to look for a consultant’s post.
    Where would he be then?
    London? Back to Great Ormond Street, maybe.
    Not here, that was for sure. Once his grandfather had gone, there would be nothing to keep him here in this quiet coastal backwater where nothing much ever happened.
    At least, it hadn’t in the last thirty-two years, and he had no reason to believe it would happen now just because he’d come home to watch his grandfather die a slow and lingering death.
    He sighed, the image of his grandmother’s face as she’d looked at him in the kitchen triggering another twinge of guilt.
    Did she really know he was lying?
    He hadn’t lied, though. Not exactly, and she wouldn’t have to watch him disintegrate, not unless he got really unlucky. He’d told her he hadn’t had a positive result from the predictive screening test, which was true, because he hadn’t had the result at all.
    He’d had the genetic counselling, the blood test, gone through the whole process right up to the bitter end. But he hadn’t taken that last step of hearing his fate, and he didn’t want to. It was his life. He could make his own decisions about it, and choosing whether or not to know the truth about his own destiny was one of them. Not telling his family about that decision was another, but it would stop with him, that wasn’t a lie, because he wasn’t having children.
    Ever.
    And nor was he taking some poor unsuspecting woman with him on the journey to hell, if that should turn out to be his