Doctor Standing // The Year of Waiting — Jane Beech

Marilyn Clinton was a fortunate girl, young, pretty and engaged to handsome Adrian Desmond. Such a contrast to Clive Standing, the brusque surgeon who operated on her when she was taken ill.

...But when her illness and its serious aftermath allowed her, even compelled her, to think afresh about her future, she began to see things in a different perspective -- and then Fate intervened, suddenly, unpredictably, to alter the whole course of her life.