by Fiona Lowe
No! She’d fought too hard for it to end like this. She’d set up strategies so this situation would never happen to her and she wasn’t about to let years of sacrifice go to waste and have it fall apart now. Not here in London where it was too easy for people to make cheap shots at her being a colonial. Not when she was the recipient of one of the most prestigious scholarships on offer for neurosurgery. Not when she was so close to qualifying.
Think!
‘Actually,’ she said, shoving the tablet at her junior houseman with a hand that trembled. ‘Archie is Dr Bailey’s patient. He admitted him overnight.’
Andrew, who’d accepted the tablet without question, glanced at the screen. ‘Archie McGregor, age seven, admitted last night post-seizure and with suspected juvenile myoclonic epilepsy. Observations stable overnight and...’
Claire wanted to relax and blow out the breath that was stalled tightly in her chest but she didn’t have any time to spare. As Andrew was fielding a battery of questions from Alistair, she was trying to calmly and surreptitiously read the next patient’s history.
* * *
An hour later she was helping herself to a delicious currant bun from the nurses’ breakfast platter. As she bit into the sticky sweetness, she gave thanks that she’d not only narrowly avoided disaster, she’d also survived the round. Alistair had appeared happy with both her and Andrew’s treatment plans and now, emergencies excepted, her boss was gone for the day. She was thankfully home free. She had some medication charts to write up, some test results to read and then, fingers crossed, she was going to take advantage of the relative calm and spend some time in the library studying.
‘Oh, good.’ A very familiar voice rumbled around her, its timbre as rich and smooth as a Barossa Valley cabernet sauvignon. ‘There you are.’
Shock stuck the sticky bun to the roof of her mouth and she tried desperately to dislodge it with a slurp of tea. The hot liquid went down the wrong way and she coughed violently, trying to get her breath. The next minute, Alistair’s face was pushed in close to hers with his brows pulled down sharply.
‘Can you get air?’
She shook her head but he misunderstood and the next minute the side of his hand sliced down between her shoulder blades like a karate chop. The snaps on her bra bit into her skin. ‘Ouch.’
‘Good,’ he said, cheerfully reappearing back in front of her. ‘I need you alive today.’
‘Just today?’ she said waspishly as the tangy scent of his sweat hit her nostrils. She worked hard at resisting the urge to breathe in deeply. ‘I rather like being alive every day.’
‘As do I. Live every day as if it’s your last.’
She took a careful sip of tea. ‘I’ve often found people who say that use it as an excuse to be selfish.’
His smile faded and a line of tension ran along his jaw, disappearing up behind his ear. ‘That’s a very jaundiced view of humanity.’
She welcomed the familiar antagonism vibrating between them and relaxed into it, giving thanks that everything was back to normal. ‘Not at all. It’s merely an observation about how some people live their lives with little thought or regard for how their actions impact on others.’
His eyes darkened and he looked as if he was about to say something when he suddenly helped himself to a currant bun. She was oddly disappointed that he wasn’t going to take the discussion further. Sparring in a robust debate with Alistair North was far safer than confiding in him.
Or kissing him.
She suddenly felt stranded standing there in the small pantry. She was far too aware of him and how his mouth, which had savoured hers so thoroughly last night, was now relishing the currant bun. Too aware of how his tight behind was pressed hard against the bench and how his long, running-fit legs stretched out in front of him. She suddenly wanted to invoke the staff dress code she’d been lectured on during her orientation program.
He raised his hand to his mouth and one by one he meticulously licked the sugar from the bun off his fingers. She swallowed a gasp as her body clenched and then sighed in delight. The memory of how he tasted was burned on her brain—spicy with a hint of citrus zip. And hot. Oh-so-flaming hot.
I thought the kiss never happened so why are we doing this?
She cleared her throat. ‘I best go and write up the medication changes.’
‘Bailey can do that.’
‘Excuse me?’
He pushed off the bench. ‘Get Bailey to do the medication changes and chase up the test results. I’ve got some far more interesting work for you.’
A skitter of excitement whipped through her. There’d been a rumour going around that a charity in India was making overtures to the castle in regards to separating a set of conjoined twins. Being part of the multidisciplinary team from the planning stages through to the massive operation and postoperative care would be the chance of a lifetime.
‘Oh?’ she said, far more casually than she felt.
‘We’re giving a paper at the spring symposium.’
A streak of surprise was followed by a trickle of dread. ‘We?’ She hated that it came out on a squeak.
He nodded. ‘It’s the tradition across all the medical departments that the specialist registrar in his or her last year of their fellowship always gives a joint presentation with their consultant.’ He scratched his head and his brow furrowed. ‘Did I not mention this to you when you first arrived?’
No! ‘You did not,’ she said, trying to sound calm. The dread was now spinning her stomach and sending out wave upon wave of nausea. ‘This is the first I’ve heard of it.’
‘Oh, well, not to worry,’ he said with a grin that held a modicum of contrition. ‘Lucky it’s quiet so we should meet tomorrow’s deadline.’
‘Tomorrow.’ Her screech of disbelief could have given a sulphur-crested cockatoo a run for its money. ‘But the symposium’s still weeks away.’
‘The papers are due tomorrow. The admin staff need time to print and bind them and prepare the handouts for the attendees.’
‘We can’t write a paper in a day.’ She hated the squeak in her voice.
‘Of course we can,’ he said with all the easy confidence of someone who’d never had to think twice about reading or writing. ‘Some of the best papers I’ve ever written have happened at that adrenaline-fuelled last-minute deadline.’ Memories filled his handsome face. ‘It’s such a buzz to pull an all-nighter and finish as the fingers of dawn are lighting up the city.’
The very idea made her gag. ‘That’s not the way I work,’ she countered, desperately clutching at straws. ‘I mean, we don’t even have a topic.’
‘Of course we’ve got a topic,’ he said, sounding amused. ‘I wouldn’t do that to you.’
‘I guess I should be thankful for small mercies,’ she said sarcastically.
‘I’m sorry it slipped my mind, Claire. Your predecessor, Harry Banks, was supposed to write the paper, but as you know, he left us the moment things started looking rocky for the castle.’ His face filled with kindness. ‘I’m aware you like things to be ordered and just so, but believe me, stepping out of your comfort zone every now and then makes you feel alive.’
Oh. My. God. He was serious. He honestly thought he was doing her a favour. Her heart thumped so hard she was sure he must hear it. ‘What’s the topic?’ she asked weakly.
His face lit up. ‘Epilepsy surgery’s the most effective way to control seizures in patients with drug-resistant focal epilepsy. I’ve got all the data. It’s just a matter of assembling it and stringing it together with some well-chosen case studies. Don’t panic. Most people prefer to attend the summer symposium on the Continent. The spring one’s the smallest of the three. Think of it as a test run. If the paper’s well received there, we can work it up into something bigger for The Lancet. Too easy.’ He laughed. ‘Isn’t t
hat what you Aussie’s like to say?’
‘Something like that,’ she said faintly. The task he was asking her to undertake would be a significant one for most people, but for her the short time frame made it monumentally huge. Hopefully, she could find a quiet corner in the library where she could spread out the data and work her way through it slowly and methodically. ‘I guess I better make a start, then.’
‘Excellent.’ He gave her warm smile. ‘Give me fifteen minutes to grab a quick shower and then meet me in my office.’
No, no, no! Working alongside Alistair risked exposing her secret and she’d do anything to prevent that from happening. With a decisive movement that said all business, she pushed her glasses up her nose. ‘I’ll work in the library.’
He tilted his head and gave her a long and questioning look. Somehow, despite feeling like a desert plant wilting under the intense scrutiny of summer noontime heat, she managed to hold his gaze.
‘It makes far more sense to work in my office,’ he said, breaking the long silence. ‘All the data’s on my computer and there’ll be far fewer interruptions and distractions there.’
Fewer distractions? She stifled a groan. Her much-needed day of physical distance from Alistair North had just imploded and sucked her down with it. Now, she faced spending the working day with him in the close confines of his office. Every breath she took would carry his musky scent. The air around her would vibrate with his bounding energy and any inadvertent brush of shoulders or hands, which invariably happened when two people worked in close proximity, would only serve to remind her how amazing the strength of his toned muscles and the tautness of his skin had felt last night under her hands.
All of it was one enormous distraction, but in relative terms, her irrational attraction was the least of her worries. Her biggest problem was the challenge of hiding the fact she found data analysis and large writing tasks difficult. Under extreme pressure, it was almost impossible. If her boss discovered that, it could jeopardise her scholarship. She swallowed hard. There was only one solution—she had to get creative and make sure he never discovered her secret.
CHAPTER SIX
ALISTAIR STRODE ALONG Praed Street carrying a plastic bag containing take-away containers of Tandoori Chicken, Rogan Josh, curried vegetables and naan bread. The pungent aromas of the food made his stomach juices run and he picked up the pace. So much for a quiet day—he hadn’t even managed lunch and he couldn’t wait to tuck into the spicy delights.
It was eight in the evening and he’d been away from the office for hours. He hadn’t intended for that to happen. In fact, when Dominic MacBride had telephoned at ten interrupting his writing day, he’d told him that a policy and procedures meeting didn’t come under the banner of life or death. Today that was the only criteria that would get him to leave the office.
It was Claire who’d insisted he attend the meeting and raise the issue of referral waiting times. All had been dangerously pushed out since the staffing levels at the hospital had been decimated. ‘The board needs to know their current actions are risking lives. I’d go but they won’t listen to me. You’ve got FRCS after your name so surely that gives you more clout.’
‘I doubt they can see past the dollar signs,’ he’d said with a sigh, ‘but you’re right. It’s worth a shot.’
He and Dominic had spent a frustrating few hours getting nowhere with the board and he’d been on his way back to the office when Morag called. ‘Sorry, Alistair, but the Walkers are asking to see you. They’re insisting upon it.’
He’d gone direct to ICU and the afternoon had rolled away from him as he’d dealt with a variety of issues. Truth be told, he should have called Bailey in to deal with most of them as they came under the banner of house officer jobs, but he’d been feeling generous. He could still remember how fraught life was as a junior doctor so he’d reinserted a central line and performed a lumbar puncture. He’d rather enjoyed the hands-on medicine, although that hadn’t prevented a slight flicker of guilt that his largesse was a form of procrastination. As much as he disliked statistics, he knew he should be back in the office helping Claire with the difficult job instead of leaving her on her own to deal with it.
Given how horrified she’d both looked and sounded when she’d learned about the project, he’d been expecting to hear the return of her clipped and critical tones along with a lecture on time management each time he’d called her to notify her of yet another delay. However, on all three occasions all she’d said was, ‘No worries. These things happen. Things are going well at this end.’
Ten minutes ago, just as he’d been paying for what he’d planned to be their dinner, she’d sent him a text.
No need to return to the office. Job done. Enjoy your evening.
He’d read it twice, trying to absorb the surprising and oddly dismaying text. He couldn’t believe she’d finished the paper so quickly and without his help. Then again, he supposed if anyone was capable of knocking out something so complicated in a short space of time, it was probably Claire Mitchell. He’d tried to shrug off the unreasonable level of disappointment that they wouldn’t be having dinner together. He’d been looking forward to returning to the office, sharing a curry, working on the paper and proving to her they were both adults and capable of being in the same room together without kissing each other.
No need for that. You’ve already done it.
He’d spent a restless night lurching between reliving the amazing and mind-blowing kiss and the unsettling feelings that stirred inside him whenever he recalled Claire’s utterly appalled and slightly panicked post-kiss expression. As a result, he’d done his very British best at the interview with the Walkers last night and again this morning to sweep last night under the carpet and show Claire that everything was as it had been prior to the kiss. On one level he knew he should be pleased and relived that she regretted the incident. After all, they worked closely together and a fling wasn’t conducive to workplace harmony, not to mention the fact it would break a dozen hospital rules. But then again, he wasn’t used to anyone looking at him with such abhorrence. He felt a crazy need to prove to her that he was more than capable of respecting her wishes on the nothing happened front even though something incredible had taken place. He still couldn’t reconcile the fact that prickly, terse Claire Mitchell could kiss a man better than his wildest fantasy.
He gave a wave to the evening protestors who were warming themselves around a brazier and then switched the take-away food bag to his other hand. For a brief moment he toyed with the idea of texting Islay Kennedy and inviting her to share the curries, but then his stomach growled. Hell, he was famished and he didn’t want to delay. Taking the lift to level five, he punched in the security numbers and entered the consulting suite. After six each evening the lighting reverted to power-saving mode and the corridor was low-lit. He walked past a series of closed doors—the offices of his colleagues—and stopped in front of his, surprised by the spill of light coming from under the door. He turned the handle and stepped inside.
Holy—The first thing he saw was Claire Mitchell’s sweet behind. She was leaning over his desk and the soft fabric of her dress fell in such a way that it perfectly outlined the two orbs of her cheeks. The memory of those curves pressed hard into his lap last night sent a raft of delicious sensation thrumming through him, heating his blood and making his palms itch. All he wanted to do was walk up behind her, pull her back into him and feel her pressing against hard him.
Good God! What the hell was wrong with him? This wasn’t a role-play fantasy with a consenting partner. He was at work. She was his trainee and all of his thoughts were utterly inappropriate. He closed his eyes for a moment, concentrating hard on reducing his breathing from ragged to normal.
When he opened his eyes he avoided looking at the kryptonite that was her behind. Instead, he noticed her bare left foot was flat on the floor, her right
knee was pressed into the seat of a chair and she was leaning over his desk. Her sun-gold hair had fallen free of its usual black band, cascading in shimmering waves across her shoulders. She held her arms outstretched in front of her, taking her weight on the heels of both hands, and her glasses dangled from the fingers of her left hand.
As his gaze strayed from her glasses, he noticed the paper. Papers to be exact. His entire office looked like someone had placed a fan in front of a ream of white A4 and turned it on full tilt. Pages spilled from the desk to the floor, some were stuck to the wall and others had migrated to his other desk and completely covered the green-tooled leather. Each page was filled with some sort of black printing—from graphs and tables to double-spaced words.
‘Did it snow paper while I was gone?’ he quipped as he quietly closed the door.
Claire swung around, shock etched deeply on her face and her colour as white as the paper. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘It’s my office,’ he said equably as he set down the take-away bag. ‘More to the point, why are you here? You sent me a text saying you were finished.’
Her chin rose—a sure sign she was on the back foot. ‘I thought I was done but I got caught up with a bit of tweaking.’
He snorted and swept his arm out to encompass the room. ‘Tweaking? This looks like you’re stuck smack bang in the mud-sucking middle.’
Something akin to panic crossed her face. ‘And if I am?’
‘It’s exactly where I expected you to be.’
For a moment, her body went deathly still and then she abruptly shoved her glasses back on her face. ‘You know?’ she demanded in a voice that was half accusative and half defeated.
Know?
Then, as if someone had just poked her hard between her scapulas, her shoulders rolled back into a straight, sharp line and her nostrils flared. ‘So this was deliberate? Some sort of macabre joke? Or worse? Sophisticated bullying to get back at me for last night? To put me in my place?’