Adelaide closed her eyes, mesmerised by his touch. Her body ached for more, like a starving man being shown a banquet. She breathed in the scent of Caleb, the faint sandalwood overlaid with carbolic and the exertion of the day. Something forgotten stirred within her and she recognised it as desire. That long suppressed hunger for the touch of a man.

It had never been like this with Richard.

Caleb’s breath brushed her hair and he lowered his head. ‘My Adelaide,’ he whispered.

At the first touch of his lips on hers, she sagged in his grip. He pulled away but she straightened and this time their lips touched with resolve.

His fingers tangled in her hair as he drew her closer. She pressed against him, every nerve in her body tingling. In the back of her mind, a small voice shrieked a warning. But she pushed her conscience away.

She wanted this man, wanted to take him to her bed—

‘Mama!’

A shriek from the house cut through the fog of her desire like a lightning bolt. She stumbled away from Caleb, grasping for the wall of the shed to steady herself.

‘Danny—nightmare. He gets nightmares,’ she said, hardly able to get the words out.

Caleb stood quite still, a shadow in the faint light. ‘You’d better go then, Adelaide,’ he said, his voice husky. He coughed. ‘Probably for the best.’

She took a steadying breath and strode towards the back door, letting it open and shut behind her with a soft thump. She stumbled to the table, leaning heavily on the reassuring solidity of the well-scrubbed wood.

‘For the best,’ she repeated to herself. ‘What were you thinking?’

But she recognised the thoughts that had passed through her mind as Caleb had held her, the wanton desire to be held and to be loved in every possible way. Whatever happened tomorrow, her life had just turned onto an uncertain path. One she had avoided for ten years.

Caleb sank down on the bench outside the shed and buried his head in his hands.

What have I done?

What had Bowen said? ‘An instinct for doctoring, Hunt. You can deny it all you like but that’s a calling that will keep nagging at your heels.’

In one day, he had undone the carefully constructed facade he had built around himself. All the hard work he had put into sending his training and his experience into a dark corner, to deny his calling, and it had taken one injured man to bring it all back.

And then there was Adelaide.

Was he going mad? A woman he had known a few weeks had turned his world upside down.