Читать книгу Role Play - Caroline Anderson - Страница 4

ABIGAIL PEARCE was going to marry a doctor. It wasn’t a conscious decision, rather something she had always known and accepted.

What she also knew, after a week in general practice, was that there was no way he would be a GP!

The lifestyle was horrendous. Paper mountains, patients with nothing wrong with them and patients who were clearly dying and had left it too late to do anything, all muddled up with legions of bronchitics and asthmatics —and the whole lot of them tied together with endless miles of tangled red tape!

It didn’t suit Abbie’s chaotic and ephemeral mind at all, and as she drove towards the surgery on that lovely August morning she felt the now familiar panic tightening her chest. What would she do if someone came in and she wasn’t sure about her diagnosis? For the first time in her life there wasn’t someone else to ask, a registrar to fall back on at a moment’s notice.

Not that she was really alone. There were other doctors in the practice, she was hardly single-handed, but the senior partner Dr Williams was off sick with a bad back, Dr Patel didn’t seem inclined to be over-friendly towards her, and Dr Chandler was on holiday. Only Peter Sargent had been welcoming, and Abbie was fairly sure it was because all his ‘heartsink’ patients had transferred themselves to her within the first thirty seconds, or so it seemed.

And her heart was sinking, too, at the thought of the rest of the year yawning away ahead of her like something out of a horror movie. It wasn’t going to be improved by the fact that she was late, either.

Her inventive mind busily working on excuses, she swung into the car park and skidded to an undignified halt. There was a red sports car — well, it had been once, about thirty years ago, she thought disparagingly—abandoned across the entrance, the roof down and Tina Turner blaring forth from the open cockpit. She had nearly hit it — not that she would have done it a great deal of harm, when all was said and done, but her own could have sustained considerable damage ——

A car tooted furiously behind her, and she inched forwards until she was nearly touching the muddy bumper. What a heap!

And blocking her space. She climbed out and locked her car, checking to see how far out into the road it was hanging. Not very. She might just get away with it until whoever owned it moved the horrible relic.

She squeezed past the front of the car, smearing mud on her jacket as she went, and ran up the steps into the office at the back of the surgery where the practice meeting was drawing to a close.

‘Sorry I’m late,’ she apologised, scattering her smile among the assembled company. ‘Some yob’s abandoned a heap of scrap in the car park and I couldn’t get in.’

‘Ah.’

Her eyes swivelled to the owner of the voice, and as their gazes locked a tiny quiver of something unfamiliar curled around her throat and tightened.

She watched, mesmerised, as the stranger unravelled his long legs and stood up, the soft battered leather of his jacket tugging over his broad shoulders as he pushed the chair in, sending her pulse rocketing; confused, she dropped her eyes and they lingered over lean hips and long, long legs in faded denim jeans that hugged his body intimately, finally crumpling to a halt at the ancient trainers on his feet.

She relaxed with a tiny sigh of relief. He looked for all the world like an overgrown college student — or one of her brothers, she thought absently, and then found herself trapped again by those extraordinary blue-gold eyes.

He was laughing at her, aware of her minute inspection of his person and supremely, masculinely confident that he would have passed muster. As he returned the compliment with a quick, appreciative once-over, all her muscles leapt to attention again, and she felt the heat rising from her toes upwards until she flushed almost guiltily.

‘I’ll move it.’

His voice was rich and deep and gravelly, and completed the process of cerebral disintegration that had started the second she clapped eyes on him. ‘What?’ she said absently.

‘The car.’

She gathered her scattered thought-processes rapidly. Oh. It’s yours, then,’ she managed inanely, and to her disgust and humiliation her voice sounded breathless and far-away.

His smile was brilliant, teasing, wicked. ‘ “Heap of scrap”,’ he said softly. ‘Is that any way to speak of my charger, when I’ve come dashing back from my holiday like a knight in shining armour to rescue you from the clutches of my colleagues? Not to mention calling me a yob!’

‘Oh, God,’ she mumbled under her breath, and felt the heat rising in her cheeks. Had she really said all that?

He shrugged away from the table and held out his hand. ‘You must be Abigail Pearce. Leo Chandler — yob, doctor, knight in shining armour — at your service, ma’am.’ His hand was warm and dry and firm, engulfing hers and making her feel unexpectedly feminine and fragile. She was stunned at the shock-wave that rippled up her arm from the brief contact, and as soon as she could she whipped her hand away and tucked it into her pocket.

He smiled knowingly. ‘I’ll move the “heap of scrap”.’

And with a grin he sauntered out through the door and left her standing rooted to the spot, her mouth hanging slightly open.

A slight noise behid her brought her back to reality with a bump, and, snapping her mouth shut, she turned back to the others.

‘Oh, God,’ she repeated, and slumped against the wall.

Peter Sargent chuckled. ‘That’ll get you off to a flying start — good job he doesn’t take offence easily.’

Abbie was still feeling thoroughly rattled by the encounter, and she was sure it showed. To escape from Ravi Patel’s knowing black eyes, she went back outside to move her car just as Leo Chandler loped up the steps.

‘There you are,’ he said with that spectacular grin. ‘Plenty of room now, even for you. Oh, by the way, Dr Pearce, we need to have a chat some time. Colin’s asked me to take over your training until he’s back, so we could do with sorting out a few things. Coffee suit you?’

‘That’ll be fine,’ she mumbled, stunned again by the amazing eyes. Or was it the man behind them?

She climbed into her car, over-conscious of his lazy scrutiny, and crashed the gears. What on earth had got into her? She was twenty-seven, for goodness’ sake — she’d survived all her brothers’ friends, and the endless stream of available men at medical school — why this particular man, and why now of all times? He was a shocking flirt, too, a superficial, womanising tease, not at all the sort of man she had in mind.

So why the damage to her pulse-rate?

Must be a virus, she thought with the last vestige of humour, and, crunching the gears again, she eased into the tiny space he had left her and struggled out.

‘Poor little car,’ he murmured as she reached the top of the steps.

‘You put me off,’ she said crossly, and then was angry with herself for giving it away.

His grin broadened. ‘Interesting.’

‘I’m glad you think so,’ she replied as coolly as she could manage, and, sucking in her breath, she squeezed past him through the gap.

Or she would have done if he hadn’t moved his arm up to block her path.

She came to a dead halt, her breasts pressed against his well-muscled forearm, her heart doing a tango against her ribs.

‘Don’t forget our date.’

She stepped back and looked up into his eyes, bewildered by his words and by the flood of sensation that was swamping her. ‘Date?’ she said weakly.

‘Coffee — to talk about your training programme.’

‘Oh — yes, of course.’

‘You’re blushing,’ he said with evident amusement, and she felt the colour deepen.

‘Rubbish, it’s hot. Excuse me, I have a surgery …’

‘Ah, yes.’ He moved out of her way, almost reluctantly, and she felt his eyes on her until she reached the door at the far side of the office.

And not only his eyes. Ravi, too, was watching her, her sloe eyes intent, accusing.

So that’s the way of it, Abbie thought. Well, I’m no threat to you, Ravi, dear. Have him, and welcome.

She shut her surgery door behind her with relief.

It was short-lived. The second her last patient exited the surgery, Leo Chandler was in, two cups of coffee balanced in one hand, a file in the other.

‘What kept you?’ she asked drily.

He grinned his appreciation. ‘Me?’ he murmured innocently. ‘I’ve been dangling around for ages while you built relationships with your patients. “Good morning, that looks nasty, have a bottle of pills, goodbye.” ’

She sighed and leant back in the chair, lifting the heavy mass of red-gold hair that tumbled in cheerful profusion over her shoulders. Her neck was hot — really she should have worn it up, or at least tied back, but she had been on the drag ——

‘Why were you late, by the way?’ he asked as if he read her mind. ‘I mean, pulling up behind my “heap of scrap” must have taken you — oh, thirty seconds? At the outside.’

She sighed again. Clearly that remark was going to haunt her forever more. ‘Time isn’t my absolutely best thing,’ she confessed with a rueful grin.

‘You don’t say.’ He handed her the coffee and sprawled in the chair beside her desk, long legs stuck out in front, his cup balanced precariously on his belt-buckle. He had changed into a pair of cool cotton trousers and a soft, stone washed shirt, the cuffs turned back to reveal the scatter of fine golden hair that dusted his wrists and forearms. The trousers were much less conspicuously masculine than the jeans had been, and yet —— She looked away, her cheeks heating again.

Her embarrassment wasn’t eased by his evident enjoyment of it.

‘So,’ he said suddenly. ‘Your training. Done any role-play exercises before?’

She groaned and rolled her eyes. ‘Role play?’

‘Mmm. Doctor, doctor, I think I’m a pair of curtains. Pull yourself together, man. That sort of thing.’

She giggled despite herself. ‘Not for years. Why?’

He shrugged. ‘Because it can be very useful for exploring the unsolved mysteries of doctor-patient relationships.’

He shifted in his chair, and swung his eyes away from her, suddenly awkward.

‘Before we get on to that, there’s something I wanted to ask you about — something personal.’

Her heart tightened in anticipation. Not that date he had teased her with, surely? But what else …?

‘Ask away,’ she prompted.

He was silent for a second, then he spoke in a rush, his voice strained. ‘I’m having problems — personal problems. Well, sexual problems, I suppose. I’m — I think I’m impotent.’

She laughed. She didn’t mean to, but the idea of the man in front of her having any kind of sexual problem at all was just absurd in the extreme.

He met her eyes, his own reproving. ‘Tut-tut. You aren’t supposed to laugh, you’re supposed to ask me when it started, how many times it’s happened, if it’s always the same pattern, if it’s only when I’m with a partner or ——’

‘All right, all right!’ She threw her hands up in the air in an attitude of surrender, and tried to school her expression. ‘You just caught me unprepared.’

‘And would you be prepared if someone came up to you and said something like that in a supermarket, or in a restaurant?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous! They wouldn’t ——’

‘Oh no?’ He leant back and shook his head. ‘Don’t be too sure. I was in the bar at the squash club last winter and someone came up to me — total stranger — and asked me what he should do about his genital warts. I told him to see his GP, and he said I was his GP, and what should he do?’

‘What did you tell him?’

‘Come and see me at the surgery. What else? If you give advice when you can’t make an examination, then you could be in deep legal trouble. Once you’ve started to give any advice at all, you’ve assumed responsibility for the treatment and the repercussions could be phenomenal. Now, about my sexual problems ——’

She laughed again.

He gave her a reproachful look. ‘I’m disappointed in you, Dr Pearce. I thought you might have some new perspective on it that might help me.’

‘You’re ridiculous,’ she told him bluntly, trying hard not to blush. ‘The only sexual problem you’ve got is finding time for all those opportunities in your hectic schedule, I have no doubt.’

He grinned. ‘I’m flattered.’

‘It wasn’t meant to be a compliment,’ she said severely, squashing the urge to laugh.

The grin widened. ‘Listen, little lady, with my problem I’ll take what I can get.’

‘Yes, well, just make sure it isn’t something nasty.’

‘Like Ravinda Patel?’

Her head flew up and their eyes clashed in the sudden silence. ‘I thought …’

He shook his head slowly. ‘Ravi’s interested in me, but that’s as far as it goes. I’ve never given her the slightest encouragement.’

‘That’s not how it looks.’

He shrugged. ‘Ravi’s got expressive eyes. You’ll have to trust me.’

Abbie wasn’t sure she dared. Instead, she changed tack. ‘Why are you telling me all this?’

‘Because the internal politics of any closely knit working community are very sensitive — I just wanted you to know the truth.’

‘How do I know it’s the truth? How do I know you aren’t the world’s most monumental flirt who’s seen a new toy to play with?’

‘Me?’ His expression of injured innocence had to be seen to be believed. Only the wicked twinkling of his extraordinary blue-gold eyes gave him away.

‘You, Leo Chandler,’ she said firmly, and quelled the urge to laugh. ‘Anyway, all that besides, what good is role play going to do? We just end up making fools of ourselves and learning nothing we couldn’t learn by any other more conventional means.’

‘Does that worry you? Making a fool of yourself?’

She shifted awkwardly. How did he know that? ‘I like to be in control of a situation,’ she compromised.

He laughed. ‘In general practice? No way. You want pathology if you want control. Dead people don’t do anything unexpected. Live people, now …’ He shot her a sideways look. ‘I have to go out on some calls — come with me. Part of your education.’

‘Only if we can go in my car,’ she said quickly.

He grinned. ‘Mine not good enough for you?’ he teased.

She felt herself flush, ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean that, but it is a little — well — unconventional?’ she tried.

He grinned. ‘So she is. I’m only using her while my incredibly boring and middle-of-the-road Volvo is being serviced. Topsy usually only comes out on high days and holidays.’

‘Topsy?’ she said incredulously. Not since her brothers’ youth had she heard of a car with a name. ‘Why Topsy?’

He shrugged expressively. ‘Because of the servicing and repair bills, which, like Topsy, just grow’d and grow’d.’

She laughed softly. ‘I’ll bet. Look, I’m sorry if I was rude. It’s nothing personal, I’m just not into retro-motoring.’

He gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘Most women think she’s wonderful.’

‘Yes, well, I’m not most women,’ she told him repressively.

He shot her an odd look. ‘No, you’re not, are you?’ he said, his voice quiet. ‘Pity, it could have been fun. Ah, well …’ He uncoiled his legs and stood up, suddenly almost oppressively large in the small room, and ambled towards the door, whistling softly.

She glared at his departing back, and was treated to the disturbing sight of his neat little bottom and long, lean legs striding casually down the corridor, the soft cotton of his trousers tugging and easing, outlining his firm, muscular thighs with every stride.

He turned at the end and caught her watching him, smiling knowingly at her blush.

‘Coming?’

She went — against her better judgement — in Topsy. The car was in distinctly average condition, and she handled, as he put it, ‘like a bitch’, which did nothing for Abbie’s nerves. Nor, frankly, did his proximity in the little car. It was, quite simply, nothing like big enough to keep her as far away from his long, rangy body as she would have liked to be, and every time he changed gear her leg muscles contracted to pull herself further away from him.

Predictably, he noticed. ‘Why are you trying to climb out of the door?’ he asked casually.

She forced herself to appear relaxed. ‘I wasn’t — I was just trying to keep out of your way.’

He shot her an evil grin. ‘Don’t worry on my account,’ he told her, and she gave him a dirty look and turned away to stare fixedly out of the side-window, anchoring her hair firmly with one hand to stop it from flying in her eyes.

It was a mercifully short drive, thankfully, through the leafy little Suffolk town of Brocklingford to the house of his first patient.

She was a girl of twelve who suffered from autism, a disorder of behaviour affecting the ability to communicate, where everything said was taken literally — not only words, but tone and movements. Nothing emphatic, nor over-demonstrative, and certainly no physical contact that was a demonstration of affection, Leo told her, because the other and most noticeable feature of autism was an inability to form any relationship or interact normally with another person. It also involved repetitive behaviour patterns, and frustration of those patterns almost inevitably led to major tantrums.

Maxie, she was told, was not severely autistic but had ‘autistic features’ — meaning, in her case, the lack of social communication skills, and repetitive behaviour coupled with the classic shocking temper. However, she was very gifted musically and also highly intelligent, which was quite unusual.

Abbie was interested, never having had an autistic patient, but she was quite unprepared for the level of literal thinking she was to find.

Maxie’s mother greeted them at the door and told them that she had refused to stay in bed. Leo grinned, unsurprised, and followed the woman through to the back of the house.

The girl was pretty in a plain sort of way, but very distant. She was sitting in the dining-room, playing the pino with exquisite sensitivity.

‘Hello, Maxie,’ Leo said softly.

She stopped playing abruptly and looked at him with no interest at all. ‘Dr Chandler. Why are you here?’ she asked tonelessly.

‘Your mother said you hadn’t been feeling well.’

She turned away, avoiding eye contact. ‘Yes. I’ve got a headache now. Who’s that with you?’

‘Dr Pearce. She’s going to be with the practice for a year. May I have a look at you?’

She turned back again. ‘Can’t you see me?’

At first Abbie thought she was being cheeky, but then realised she had interpreted Leo’s remark quite literally.

‘Yes, but I need to look at your eyes and ears and throat with an instrument, and measure your blood-pressure with another, and then perhaps ask you some questions about your diet.’

‘I’m not on a diet.’

‘The food you eat every day is your diet. We talk about being on a diet when we really mean a reducing diet.’

‘Oh.’ She turned away again. ‘All right.’

‘Could you come over here?’

She stood, her movements wooden, and walked over to him. He looked into her eyes with the torch, then checked her ears and took her blood-presssure and temperature.

‘You’re a bit hot.’

‘It’s sunny.’

‘No, inside. You’ve got a raised temperature — I think you might have a mild virus that’s making you feel ill. May I feel your neck and under your arms?’

She nodded, and he kept his touch to the minimum. Even so, Abbie could see her shrinking.

‘Your glands are up — I think you might have glandular fever. Have you had a sore throat recently?’

‘You did have one last week,’ her mother put in, and Maxie nodded again.

‘It was very sore — it still hurts.’

‘May I see?’

He shone his torch down her throat and nodded.

‘Yes, it looks like a mild case of glandular fever, for which the treatment is rest, rest and more rest. Early nights, not too much activity, and take things easy for a while — maybe even a month. OK?’

Her mother nodded and smiled. ‘OK. I had it when I was sixteen, so I can remember what it’s like. We’ll have to have some early nights, I think.’

Leo smiled, but Maxie turned back to the piano. ‘I don’t want to rest. Goodbye, Dr Chandler.’

She began to play again, loudly, and her mother shook her head and led them out into the hall, closing the door.

‘She really ought to rest, you know,’ Leo said seriously.

‘I know. I’ll do what I can, but she’s better off playing the piano than working herself up into a steaming tantrum over it until she collapses with exhaustion.’

‘Does she do that?’ Abbie asked, amazed that the calm, almost monochromatic child they had just witnessed could throw a tantrum.

Mrs Clarke rolled her eyes. ‘Does she ever! You’ve seen her, haven’t you, Dr Chandler?’

‘Oh, yes — it’s spectacular. She’s only calm when she’s getting her own way, but she’s as stubborn as a mule. Any attempt to coerce her and she flips. Still, you manage her very well.’

The mother shrugged. ‘I don’t really. We achieve a sort of peace by letting her do things her way. Anything else is cataclysmic! It took some time to learn how to deal with her, and years after that before I could undo the harm I’d done with hugs and cuddles and abortive attempts at discipline.’

Leo nodded. ‘The school seems to have helped.’

‘Yes — me as much as her. It gives me a break from her but the holidays are just as difficult as ever.’

Leo laid a large, comforting hand on her shoulder and squeezed gently. ‘You’re doing a grand job — don’t lose heart.’

The mother gave them a weary smile. ‘Thank you. It helps to hear it.’

As they drove away, Abbie turned to Leo and shook her head. ‘How does she cope?’

‘How does anyone cope? There but for fortune and all that.’

‘Why didn’t you take a blood sample to check for mononucleosis?’

He shot her a grin. ‘Because Maxie doesn’t like needles, and when Maxie doesn’t like something she says so — loudly! Anyway, there’s no point. Whatever she’s got, a few weeks of taking it easy will knock it on the head, and if it doesn’t we can deal with it then. Now, we’re going to see the rest of my patients, and on the way back to the surgery we’re going to pick up some lunch and eat it by the river.’

‘Um — do you need me with you?’

He glanced at her, his eyes twinkling wickedly. ‘Well, now — there’s need, and there’s need. What’s the problem?’

She gave a tiny snort of disbelief. ‘Apart from you? I have things I ought to be doing — I’ve got an antenatal clinic this afternoon and I wanted to go through the notes, and then there are prescriptions I should be signing and letters to write and ——’

‘I’ve done your prescriptions and I’m doing your antenatal clinic this afternoon, so you’ll have plenty of time to sit down with Peggy and do the letters. Anything else?’

‘Yes,’ she said, furiously embarrassed. ‘I need the loo.’

He chuckled. ‘Trust a woman. Why didn’t you go ——?’

‘Don’t! Don’t say it! Don’t say a word!’ she exploded. ‘How was I to know you planned a day-long expedition? Anyway, you didn’t give me time!’

‘It’s all that coffee you had for breakfast when you should have been on your way to work,’ he teased.

‘I didn’t have time,’ she repeated tightly.

‘You amaze me.’ He shot her a wink. ‘Can you hang on ten minutes? Our next call is in the hospice.’

She subsided huffily. ‘I should think so.’

‘I hope so — don’t want my upholstery ruined.’

She glared at him. ‘I think you’re a few years too late to worry about that!’

He tutted gently. ‘I don’t know — why are you so determined to insult my car? Anybody would think you didn’t like me.’

She glared at him again. ‘Anybody would be right,’ she muttered.

Without warning he swung the car off the road and screeched to a halt in a lay-by. Abbie was flung forward and grabbed the dashboard automatically, her heart pounding.

‘Sorry — the brakes snatch a bit.’

Slowly she released her death-grip on the dashboard and sagged back against the seat. ‘Do you always drive like that?’ she asked him weakly.

He chuckled softly under his breath. ‘Only when I’m trying to impress a woman.’

‘I’m impressed,’ she groaned. ‘Why have we stopped?’

‘Because you’re telling lies.’

She frowned at him in puzzlement. ‘Lies?’

‘You said you didn’t like me.’

She laughed shortly. ‘God, that’s some ego you’ve got.’

His smile was slow and lazy. ‘Abbie, Abbie — don’t beat around the bush. You like me — even though you might not want to. and you want me — even though you think it’s a lousy idea. I do, too, but ——’ His shrug was Gallic and very expressive.

She blushed. ‘Dream on,’ she muttered.

‘Oh, Abigail. You’re lovely — but then you know that, don’t you?’ His fingers sifted through her hair, fanning it out against her shoulders. ‘Beautiful — like sunlight trapped in autumn leaves. It feels wonderful …’ He let it fall from his fingers and sat back with a sigh. ‘What’s the matter, Abbie? Am I too direct for you? Should I pretend for the sake of convention? Perhaps for the first few days — a fortnight, maybe? Or wait even longer, until you’ll believe me if I say I love you, so your conscience is satisfied as well as your body?’

She drew herself away from him, so that the last strand of her hair fell from his fingers, as if breaking the contact would defuse the tension that zinged between them.

He was right, of course. She did like him, and want him, and she did, indeed, think it was a lousy idea. Furthermore, acting on her feelings was the very last thing she intended to do, and she told him so.

‘Why?’ he asked softly, and his fingers invaded her hair again, sifting the strands with sensuous slowness.

Her heartbeat grew heavier, so that she could feel the blood pulsing through her body, bringing it alive. She pulled away again.

‘Are you always so damned unsubtle?’

‘Unsubtle?’ He smiled. ‘I’m wounded. I thought I was being very understanding.’

She glowered at him. ‘I don’t know you!’

‘There’s time.’

‘A year. That’s all. I’m here for a year.’

He shrugged. ‘That’s OK. I can handle a long-term relationship.’

‘Long-term?’ she exclaimed. ‘I meant only a year!’

He gave a short laugh. ‘Damn it, Abbie, I’m not proposing. All I’m suggesting is that we spend some time together — a mutual scratching of itches.’

‘I don’t do that sort of thing,’ she replied tightly, ‘and certainly not with egotistical doctors!’

‘No? You should. You might enjoy it.’

‘I doubt it.’

He shook his head slowly. ‘What a waste. Oh, well, if you change your mind, I’m here. We’d better get to the hospice.’

For the rest of the short drive Abbie sat scrunched up at her side of the car, hardly daring to breathe in case he made some suggestive remark, and wondering all the time how he could possibly have qualified as a doctor when his morals were so clearly askew.

Then she saw him in action at the hospice, and all her preconceptions about him were eroded at a stroke.

They arrived at the modern, purpose-built hospice just as the sun broke through the clouds, and Abbie felt peace steal over her immediately. The buildings were low, constructed in mellow golden brick, and the whole atmosphere was one of tranquillity.

‘Lovely, isn’t it?’ he said softly. ‘There are other kinds of healing apart from the physical. It’s so easy to forget that, and most hospitals are soulless places, but I love coming here. Every visit refreshes me, even when, as so often, it signals the end. Even so, there’s a lightness about it.’

Abbie could feel the lightness seeping into her as they stepped into the airy, quiet reception area.

‘Ladies’ loo,’ he said with a nudge of his head towards a door. ‘I’ll have a chat to the staff for a minute.’

She escaped gratefully, and hurried back to find him deep in conversation with a diminutive little nurse in sister’s uniform.

‘You must be Dr Pearce,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Welcome to St Saviour. We’ll look forward to seeing you when Leo comes on his clinic days, shall we?’

She mumbled something non-committal, unaware that Leo even did clinic days at the hospice, and then they left the sister and went towards the little four-bedded ward.

‘We’re going to see Mary Tanner,’ Leo told her. ‘She’s forty-two, had a mastectomy three years ago and she’s got skeletal metastases. Recently she’s had some back pain so she’s had a course of radiotherapy to try and halt the pressure on the nerves, and she’s in for convalescence and drug review before going home again. Lots of emotional problems, obviously. They’ve got two girls just coming up for their teens.’

They went into the ward, and he was greeted with gentle warmth by the staff, and genuine respect and affection by the patient, Mary Tanner, and her husband Gerry.

He introduced Abbie to them, then perched on the bed and asked Mary how she was feeling now.

‘Oh, heaps better. My back feels nearly OK now already and the pain’s much better controlled. I feel almost human again,’ she said with a low laugh, and Leo smiled.

‘Good. Home soon, then?’

‘Oh, yes, I think so — if Gerry can cope.’

‘Of course I can cope,’ he told his wife, but his eyes were sad. Abbie looked away, feeling like an intruder, and Leo stood up to leave, dropping a kiss on Mary’s cheek.

‘I’ll pop in and see you again once you’re home. Come with us, Gerry, and we’ll have a chat to the staff about when she can leave.’

As they approached the reception area, Leo turned to Gerry. ‘How are you really coping?’

He shrugged. ‘I just feel so guilty. I’ve really enjoyed being able to slouch around and take the kids out for long walks without worrying about her, and I feel a real louse because she’s the one with the problems, really, and I feel I ought to be offering her more support, but I don’t know, I just can’t — not all the time. I feel better now, but — oh, I don’t know; it’s just such hard work trying to be cheerful …’

Leo squeezed his shoulder gently. ‘Don’t feel guilty, Gerry. I’m sure Mary understands, you know — and I think in a way it’s a relief for her to have some time away from you all when she doesn’t have to be brave and cheerful all the time, too.’

‘Really?’ He looked doubtful, but was clearly desperate for reassurance, and Leo gave it to him.

‘Yes, really. This situation’s very emotionally demanding on all of you and you need to recharge your batteries. Once you’ve done that, you’ll be more use to her, and her to you. Don’t feel guilty. She’ll be home to you soon, and you’ll be glad you’ve had a rest.’

Gerry smiled, more relaxed. ‘You’re right — as always.’

Leo tapped on the sister’s door, and they all trooped in and discussed Mary’s progress and decided she should go home at the end of the week unless she had any further set-backs.

As they parted at the door, Gerry turned to Leo and smiled wearily. ‘Thanks for dropping by.’

Leo shook his hand warmly. ‘My pleasure. See you soon. And don’t feel guilty. If you need to talk, you know where to find me.’

Gerry nodded and turned away, walking back to his wife and the crisis in their lives.

‘Do you know them well?’ Abbie asked, remembering the kiss he had given Mary as they left her bedside.

‘No — well, only since Mary’s mastectomy. I’ve spent a lot of time with both of them since. Why?’

She shrugged. ‘Just wondered. You kissed her.’

His mouth quirked. ‘Jealous, Abbie? The offer’s still open.’

So they were back to that, were they? ‘Of course I’m not jealous. It just seemed — odd, that’s all.’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t find it odd to greet people with physical contact. I’m a toucher, Abbie …’

His hand was resting lightly on the small of her back as he spoke. She stepped away.

‘I’d noticed,’ she said shortly.

‘Whereas you — you’re a buttoned-up little virgin.’

‘I am not!’ she denied hotly, acutely uncomfortable with the sudden shift in the direction of the conversation, and he laughed, a low, smoky laugh that did incredible things to her system.

‘Well, then, all I can say is that whoever you’ve had affairs with didn’t even get close to the real you.’

Abbie made no attempt to correct him. What was the point? He was so absolutely right.