Читать книгу The Playboy Doctor's Proposal - Алисон Робертс - Страница 10

‘I WAS about to ask you the same thing.’

‘I got upgraded.’ Hannah hadn’t intended to sound defensive. Why did this man always bring out the worst in her? ‘Things were a bit crowded down the back.’

‘Here you go, Dr Jackson.’ A pretty, redheaded hostess held out a tray with a fluted glass on it. ‘And here’s the menu. I’ll come back in a minute to see what you’d like for breakfast.’

‘Thank you.’ Hannah took a sip of her juice and pretended to study the menu, which gave a surprisingly wide choice for the first meal of the day. There were hours of this flight left. Was she going to have to make conversation with Ryan the whole way?

It was some sort of divine retribution. Hannah had been feeling guilty ever since Monday night when she’d let fly and been so rude to a colleague. She couldn’t blame him for either the retaliation or the way he’d been avoiding her for the last few days. The personal attack had been unprofessional and probably undeserved. He couldn’t know where the motivation had come from and Hannah certainly couldn’t tell him but…maybe she ought to apologise?

She flicked a quick glance from the menu towards Ryan. He was still glaring. He wasn’t about to use their first meeting away from work to try building any bridges, was he?

Hannah wished she hadn’t looked. Hadn’t caught those dark eyes. She couldn’t open her mouth to say anything because goodness only knew what might shoot out, given the peculiar situation of being in this man’s company away from a professional setting. Imagine if she started and then couldn’t stop?

If she told him her whole life history? About the man her mother had really fallen in love with—finally happy after years of getting over her husband’s tragic death. Of the way she’d been used and then abandoned. Hannah had known not to trust the next one that had come along. Why hadn’t her mother been able to see through him that easily? Perhaps the attraction to men like that was genetic and too powerful to resist. It might explain why Susie had made the same mistake. Fortunately, Hannah was stronger. She might want Ryan Fisher but there was no way she would allow herself to have him.

Oddly, the satisfying effect of pushing him firmly out of her emotional orbit the other night was wearing off. Here she was contemplating an apology. An attempt at establishing some kind of friendship even.

Ryan hadn’t blinked.

Hannah realised this in the same instant she realised she could only have noticed because she hadn’t looked away. The eye contact had continued for too long and…Oh, God! What if Ryan had seen even a fraction of what she’d been thinking?

Attack was the best form of defence, wasn’t it?

‘Why are you staring at me?’

‘I’m still waiting for you to answer my question.’

‘What question?’

‘What you’re doing here.’

‘I told you, I got upgraded.’

‘You know perfectly well that wasn’t what I meant. What the hell are you doing on this flight?’

‘Going to Cairns.’ Hannah didn’t need the change in Ryan’s expression to remind her how immature it was to be so deliberately obtuse. She gave in. ‘I’ve got a connecting flight at Cairns to go to a small town further north in Queensland. Crocodile Creek.’

Lips that were usually in some kind of motion, either talking or smiling, went curiously slack. The tone of Ryan’s voice was also stunned.

‘You’re going to Crocodile Creek?’

‘Yes.’

‘So am I.’

‘Did you decide what you’d like for breakfast, Dr Jackson?’

‘What?’ Hannah hadn’t even noticed the approach of the redheaded stewardess. ‘Oh, sorry. Um…Anything’s fine. I’m starving!’

The stewardess smiled. ‘I’ll see what I can surprise you with.’ She turned to the other side of the aisle. ‘And you, Dr Fisher? Have you decided?’

‘I’ll have the fresh fruit salad and a mushroom omelette, thanks.’

Ryan didn’t want to be surprised by his breakfast. Maybe he’d just had enough of a surprise. As had Hannah. She waited only a heartbeat after the stewardess had moved away.

‘Is there a particular reason why you’re going to Crocodile Creek at this particular time?”

‘Sure is. I’m best man at my best mate’s wedding.’

‘Oh…’ Hannah swallowed carefully. ‘That would be…Mike?’

Ryan actually closed his eyes. ‘And you know that because you’re also invited to the wedding?’

‘Yes.’

Ryan made a sound like a chuckle but it was so unlike the laughter Hannah would have recognised she wasn’t sure it had anything to do with amusement. ‘Don’t tell me you’re lined up to be the bridesmaid.’

‘No, of course I’m not. I don’t know Emily that well.’

‘Thank God for that.’

‘My sister’s the bridesmaid.’

Ryan’s eyes opened smartly. Hannah could have sworn she saw something like a flash of fear. Far more likely to be horror, she decided. He disliked her so much that the prospect of being a partner to her sister was appalling? That hurt. Hannah couldn’t resist retaliating.

‘My twin sister,’ she said. She smiled at Ryan. ‘We’re identical.’

Ryan shook his head. ‘I don’t believe this.’

‘It is a bit of a coincidence,’ Hannah agreed, more cheerfully. Ryan was so disconcerted that she actually felt like she had control of this situation—an emotional upper hand—and that had to be a first for any time she had spent in Ryan’s company, with the exception of Monday night. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all. ‘So, how come you know Mike so well?’

But Ryan didn’t appear to be listening. ‘There are two of you,’ he muttered. ‘Unbelievable!’

Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of their food. Hannah was hungry enough to get stuck into the delicious hot croissants and jam she was served. Ryan was only halfway through his fruit salad by the time she had cleaned her plate and he didn’t look as though he was particularly enjoying the start of his meal.

Hannah had to feel sorry for him but she couldn’t resist teasing just a little. She adopted the same, slightly aggrieved tone he had been using only a short time ago.

‘You didn’t answer my question.’

‘What question?’ Ryan wasn’t being deliberately obtuse. He looked genuinely bewildered.

‘How do you know Mike? The groom at this wedding we’re both going to.’

‘Oh…I was involved in training paramedics in the armed forces for a while, years ago. Mike was keen to add medical training to his qualifications as a helicopter pilot, having been in a few dodgy situations. We hit it off and have stayed in touch ever since.’ Ryan stirred the contents of his bowl with the spoon. ‘I was really looking forward to seeing him again,’ he added sadly. ‘The last real time we had together was a surfing holiday in Bali nearly three years ago. After he got out of the army but before he took himself off to the back of beyond.’

‘Crocodile Creek does seem a bit out of the way,’ Hannah had to agree. Besides, thinking about geography was a good way to distract herself from feeling offended that Ryan seemed to think all the pleasure might have been sucked from the upcoming weekend. ‘It was easy enough to hop on a plane to Brisbane to spend a day or two with Susie.’

‘I got the impression you never took time off.’

‘I don’t take rostered time off.’

‘Unlike me.’ Ryan said it for her. ‘’Cos you’re not lazy.’

Hannah wasn’t going to let this conversation degenerate into a personality clash. Here was the opportunity she had needed. ‘I never said you were lazy, Ryan. You work as hard as I do. You’re just more inclined to take time off.’

‘For the purposes of having fun.’

‘Well…yes…’ Hannah shrugged. ‘And why not?’ Would this count as an apology, perhaps? ‘All work and no play, etcetera.’

‘Makes Jack a dull boy,’ Ryan finished. ‘And Jill a very dull girl.’

Was he telling Hannah she was dull? Just a more pointed comment than Jennifer telling her she was an ED geek? If he saw her as being more fun—say at a wedding reception—would he find her more attractive?

Hannah stomped on the wayward thought. She didn’t want Ryan to find her attractive. She didn’t want to find him attractive, for heaven’s sake! It was something that had just happened. Like a lightning bolt. A bit of freak weather—like the cyclone currently brewing in the Coral Sea, which was again causing a bit of turbulence for the jet heading for Cairns.

The two cabin-crew members pushing a meal trolley through to economy class exchanged a doubtful glance.

‘Should we wait a bit before serving the back section?’

‘No.’ The steward who had been responsible for Hannah’s upgrade shook his head. ‘Let’s get it done, then we can clear up. If we’re going to hit any really rough stuff, it’ll be when we’re north of Brisbane.’

Hannah tightened her seat belt a little.

‘Nervous?’ Ryan must have been watching her quite closely to observe the action.

‘I’m not that keen on turbulence.’

‘Doesn’t bother me.’ Ryan smiled at Hannah. Or had that smile been intended for the approaching stewardess? ‘I quite like a bumpy ride.’

Hannah and Ryan both chose coffee rather than tea. Of course the smile had been for the pretty redhead. Likewise the comment that could easily have been taken as blatant flirting.

‘I don’t know Emily,’ Ryan said. ‘Maybe you can fill me in. She’s a doctor, yes?’

‘Yes. She’s Susie’s best friend.’

‘Susie?’

‘My sister.’

‘The clone. Right. So how long has she been in Crocodile Creek?’

‘About three years. She went to Brisbane to get some post-grad training after she finished her physiotherapy degree and she liked it so much she decided to stay.’

‘I thought she was a doctor.’

‘No. She started medical school with me but it wasn’t what she wanted.’

‘How come she lives in that doctors’ house that used to be the old hospital, then?’

‘She doesn’t.’

‘That’s not what Mike told me.’

‘Why would Mike be telling you about my sister?’

‘He wasn’t. He was telling me about his fiancée. Emily.’ Ryan groaned. ‘We’re not on the same page here, are we?’

‘No.’ And they never would be. ‘Sorry. I don’t know much about Emily either, except that she’s a really nice person and totally in love with Mike and his parents are thrilled and hoping for lots of grandchildren.’

Ryan was still frowning. ‘If you don’t know Emily and you don’t know Mike, why have you been invited to their wedding?’

‘As Susie’s partner, kind of. We haven’t seen each other since Christmas.’

‘That’s not so long ago.’

Hannah shrugged. ‘It seems a long time. We’re close, I guess.’

‘Hmm.’

Ryan’s thoughts may as well have been in a bubble over his head. As best man, he would have to partner Hannah’s clone. Another woman who wouldn’t be on the same page. Someone else who would think he was shallow and lazy and a liability.

Hannah opened her mouth to offer some reassurance. To finally apologise for losing it on Monday night in such an unprofessional manner. To suggest that they would both be able to have a good time at the wedding despite having each other’s company enforced.

She didn’t get the chance.

Her mouth opened far more widely than needed for speech as the plane hit an air pocket and seemed to drop like a rock. The fall continued long enough for someone further down the plane in economy to scream, and then they got to the bottom with a crunch and all hell broke loose.

The big jet slewed sideways into severe turbulence. The pitch of its engine roar increased. The water glass and cutlery on Hannah’s tray slithered sideways to clatter to the floor. The seat-belt sign on the overhead panel flashed on and off repeatedly with a loud dinging noise. Oxygen masks were deployed and swung like bizarre, short pendulums. Children were shrieking and someone was calling for help. The stewardess who had been pushing the meal trolley staggered through the curtain dividing business class from the rest of the cabin, her face covered in blood. She fell into the seat beside Hannah.