Читать книгу Doctor And Son - Maggie Kingsley - Страница 8

‘DON’T want to go to the day centre. Want to stay home with Mummy.’

Annie glanced at the kitchen clock then back to her son’s truculent face with a groan. She didn’t need this, not today. Not when Gideon had asked her to sit in on his morning clinic for the very first time.

‘I thought you liked the centre. You said the toys were terrific—’

‘Don’t want to go. Don’t like it there any more.’

Annie put his cereal bowl in the sink, her brain working overtime.

‘I could collect you early today,’ she suggested. ‘I should be finished at the hospital around two o’clock, and after I’ve done some quick shopping—’ frantic, more like ‘—I could collect you at three.’

Jamie didn’t look impressed. In fact, he looked even more truculent. ‘I’ve got a sore tummy.’

‘I’m not surprised considering how fast you ate your breakfast.’

‘I mean a really sore tummy. And a sore head.’

She stared at him uncertainly. He’d been perfectly fine when he’d got up this morning, and he looked perfectly fine now, but…

‘Wait here while Mummy gets her thermometer,’ she ordered.

‘Don’t want the termoneter,’ Jamie yelled after her. ‘Want to stay home.’

And I’m the worst mother in the world, Annie thought when she’d taken his temperature and found it to be normal. It was obvious what was happening. The novelty of going to the centre had worn off and this was Jamie’s way of telling her he felt abandoned, but what could she do? She had to work to keep a roof over their heads. She couldn’t keep on relying on David for the rest of her life.

‘Sweetheart, Mummy has to work—you know she does.’

‘You never did when we stayed with Uncle David,’ Jamie argued, his face beginning to crumple.

‘Look, if you’re a good boy and go to the centre, I’ll buy you that pudding you like for tea,’ she said swiftly. ‘The one with the chocolate bits in it?’

And now I’m bribing him, she thought, seeing Jamie’s face miraculously clear. Bribing my own son. But I don’t have time for this. Dr Dunwoody is only just speaking to me after the tea trolley disaster on Monday, and if I’m late…

‘Can I have chips for my tea, too?’ Jamie asked as she helped him on with his coat. ‘And beans—can I have beans with my chips?’

Beans and chips, and chocolate pudding. The hospital nutritionist would faint clean away at the sound of that diet, but if she said no she’d never get Jamie to the centre.

‘OK, but only for today as a special treat,’ she replied, salving her conscience. ‘Now, remember—’

‘Not to sing or shout going down the stairs, ’cos Mrs Patterson will come out wearing her grumpy face.’

Annie’s heart constricted as she stared down at her son. He was only four. He should be able to run and play whenever he wanted, but their landlady had made her feelings only too plain when they’d moved into the flat above hers.

‘It was bad enough when I rented the place to those university students,’ she’d sniffed. ‘Playing their stereos at all hours of the day and night, never shutting a door when they could bang it, but I refuse to have my eardrums blasted by a screaming child. No offence meant, Ms Hart, but I’ve always been a firm believer in speaking my mind.’

And speak it she had. Constantly.

But at least not today. For once Annie managed to tiptoe down the stairs and past Mrs Patterson’s door without having to endure her usual catalogue of complaints. She’d undoubtedly have to hear them when she arrived home this afternoon, but at least she’d missed them this morning. Now all she had to do was to get Jamie to the centre, and herself to the hospital on time.

A task she had about as much hope of achieving as flying, she realised, glancing down at her watch with a groan.

‘Where have you been?’ Liz exclaimed when Annie flew into the staffroom at ten past eight. ‘I’ve been stalling for you as long as I could but—’

‘Is Woody blowing a fuse?’ Annie interrupted, throwing her coat over one of the staffroom chairs.

‘Luckily for you she’s been on the telephone for the past fifteen minutes, trying to discover what’s happened to the X-rays she ordered for Mrs Douglas. It’s Gideon I’ve been stalling, and by now he must think you’ve got severe bladder problems.’

‘Bladder problems?’ Annie repeated, pausing in the middle of dragging on her white coat.

‘I had to come up with something to explain your absence so I said you were in the loo. Now, for heaven’s sake, get yourself along to his consulting room fast.’

Annie needed no second bidding. She was out the door, running. Head down, heart racing, along the corridor, round the corner, and to her utter horror slap bang into Gideon yet again.

‘I’m sorry—so sorry,’ she gasped, disentangling herself from his arms as fast as she could, red-cheeked with embarrassment.

‘I’m not.’ He grinned. ‘In fact, I think I could get to quite like this. Not every day, of course—you can have too much of a good thing—but once in a while? Yup, I reckon I could live with that.’

He was joking—she knew he was—trying to make her feel better—but it didn’t help.

Why did this have to keep on happening to her? She never used to be so inefficient. She never used to be so clumsy, and yet in less than a week at the Belfield she’d been late twice, trashed the contents of a tea trolley and now cannoned into her boss for the second time.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said unhappily. ‘I know I’m late again.’

‘I wondered about that. Liz kept telling me you were in the toilet, and I was beginning to think you might need to see me in a professional capacity.’

He was smiling but, try as she may she couldn’t smile back. ‘Please, don’t blame Sister Baker—she was only trying to help. I had…There were problems at home.’

All amusement instantly disappeared from his face. ‘Nothing serious, I hope?’

Just my son realising that when I leave him I’m going to be gone for hours. Just the question of what am I going to do tomorrow, or the day after, if the same thing happens again.

Tell him, her mind whispered, he’ll understand.

But what if he didn’t? The male doctors at the Manchester Infirmary had been anything but sympathetic when a female doctor was late, or distracted, because of family problems.

‘Unreliable’ had been one of their favourite comments. ‘Not sufficiently committed’ had been another. And always the implication had been the same. That it was a mistake to employ a female doctor with a young child.

‘No, it was nothing serious,’ she said. ‘Everything’s fine.’

‘But—’

‘Do I have time to look at the files of some of the patients you’ll be seeing this morning?’

He knew she was changing the subject. He also looked as though he’d very much like to press her on why she’d been late, but abruptly he turned on his heel and led the way into his consulting room.

‘Take your pick.’

She stared at his desk. Her pick? Good grief, there had to be at least fifty—if not more—files sitting there.

‘How long did you say this clinic was supposed to last?’ she asked involuntarily, only to colour when she suddenly realised how that might sound. ‘Not that it matters, of course. I mean, that’s what I’m here for—to learn, to assist. And I know we don’t work nine to five, and—’

‘Annie, I wasn’t about to whip out a placard with the words “Poor attitude—lack of commitment” written on it,’ he snapped. ‘So relax, OK?’

The colour on her cheeks darkened. ‘Yes. Sorry.’

‘Half of those files belong to patients we’ll be seeing today. The other half belong to patients I’ll be seeing on Monday, and I’m taking them home with me for a quick read-through at the weekend.’

‘Oh, right.’ She nodded. ‘Sorry.’

And I wish to heaven you’d stop apologising to me, Gideon thought, selecting the top file from the pile on his desk and handing it to her. The woman he’d met on the stairs might have got his intentions all wrong but at least she’d had some spunk about her. Lord, but she’d been angry that day, her blue eyes flashing, contempt plain on her face, but he’d liked her. He still did, but not when she behaved like some stressed-out, scared rabbit.

She’d said there’d been trouble at home. Could she be looking after an infirm or elderly relative—was that why she’d been late this morning? Her file might tell him but to get it he’d have to ask Admin, and he knew only too well what the gossiping girls who worked there would make of such a request.

‘Mr Caldwell’s interested in Annie Hart,’ they’d snigger, and they’d be right.

But not in the silly, lovesick way they would mean. His interest was purely professional. Based solely on safeguarding the best interests of the department. And yet as he saw a small frown suddenly crease her forehead he couldn’t help but wonder what it would take to make her smile—really smile. Dammit, she couldn’t be any more than twenty-seven or twenty-eight, and yet she looked as though she carried all the cares of the world on her shoulders.

‘Annie—’

‘Miss Bannerman has fibroids?’

Well, it wasn’t quite what he’d had in mind as a topic of conversation, but if talking about their first patient would make her relax he was more than willing to go with it.

‘Carol was referred to me six months ago because of excessive menstrual pain and bleeding, and bladder problems.’

‘The bladder problems would be due to the pressure of her fibroids?’ she suggested, and he nodded.

‘Fibroids—or benign tumours of the uterine muscle to give them their correct name—are very common amongst women over thirty-five. It’s only when they start to interfere with a woman’s life—as they have done in Carol’s—that we need to do something about them.’

She handed him back the file. ‘I notice you’ve been treating her with drugs.’

‘Fibroids are caused by too much oestrogen in the body. If we can decrease the level, the fibroids usually shrink, and the pain and excessive bleeding lessens, but—’

‘The drugs can’t cure the fibroids, and as they tend to have side-effects if taken for too long, it’s not a long-term solution,’ she finished for him.

He stared at her thoughtfully. Woody had said she was bright, and she obviously was, but bright doctors didn’t necessarily make good ones. Annie could have all the book learning in the world, but if her communication skills with patients were as poor as they were with him…

He cleared his throat. ‘On Carol’s last visit I told her she really only had two options. A hysterectomy, or a laparoscopic myomectomy. She’s coming in today to discuss those options, and I’d like you to advise her.’

‘Me?’ she faltered. ‘But—’

‘As you said yourself, you’re here to learn.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘I’m not going to abandon you, Annie,’ he said gently. ‘I’ll sit in—put in my pennyworth if you need it—but I think it would be a useful exercise, don’t you?’

She obviously didn’t, and he could see her point. Throwing her in at the deep end on her very first clinic was deeply unfair. It was also, as it turned out, a revelation.

The minute Carol Bannerman walked in, Annie became a different woman. Gone was the nervous, apologetic person he kept meeting, and in her place sat a calm, understanding professional. A professional who gently and simply outlined the two procedures, showing not a trace of impatience or irritation whenever Carol asked for clarification.

Which made her decision not to immediately apply for a junior doctor’s position after she’d finished med school all the more puzzling. She was bright, confident—just so long as he wasn’t around—so why had she put her career on hold for four years?

It was a mystery, and one he intended solving, but not right now. Not when it seemed that Carol had finally come to a decision.

‘I want to have the laparoscopic myomectomy,’ she declared. ‘I know Mr Caldwell said my fibroids might come back if I had that, but to have a hysterectomy…’ Tears filled Carol’s eyes and she blinked them away quickly. ‘I’m only thirty-six, Dr Hart, and my partner and I really want a baby.’

Annie glanced across at Gideon, but his face gave her no clue as to what he was thinking. Her brother always said that consultants who performed hysterectomies for fibroids were lazy surgeons, but if it was Gideon’s preferred choice…

Go for it, Annie, she told herself. He asked you to advise Carol Bannerman, and if he doesn’t like what you say, so be it.

‘I see no reason why anyone should have a perfectly healthy uterus removed just to get rid of some benign tumours,’ she said firmly.

‘Then you agree with me?’ Carol said uncertainly. ‘You think I should have a myomectomy?’

Deliberately Annie avoided Gideon’s gaze. ‘Yes, I do. There’s only one thing I should warn you about,’ she continued when Carol let out a sigh of relief. ‘If you do become pregnant after the myomectomy, you’ll almost certainly need a Caesarean section to deliver. The procedure tends to weaken the uterine wall, you see.’

‘A Caesarean sounds good to me,’ Carol observed with a shaky laugh. ‘Eliminate all that painful huff, puff and pant stuff, and just get the baby out.’

‘If it was as simple as that, every mum-to-be would opt for one.’ Annie smiled. ‘But a Caesarean’s not something to be undertaken lightly. It’s an operation—a big one—and most women take six to eight weeks to recover from it. Not a very attractive proposition if you’ve a young baby to look after.’

‘I’ll cross that bridge when—if—I ever get to it,’ Carol declared. ‘How long will I have to stay in hospital?’

‘I…um…’ Annie glanced across at Gideon in mute appeal and he leant forward in his seat.

‘A couple of days at most, and if everything goes to plan you should be back at work within a fortnight. It’s not a difficult procedure,’ he continued when Carol looked surprised.

But was it what he would have recommended? Annie wondered as he made a note in his appointment book. Surely it must be, or wouldn’t he have contradicted her advice?

But he didn’t say anything—not even after Carol had gone. To be fair, there wasn’t really the time—not with a waiting room full of anxious, nervous women—but she thought he might have said something. Even if it had only been, ‘Annie Hart, you’re an idiot.’

‘So what did you think of your first clinic?’ was all he said when the last of their patients had finally gone.

‘I enjoyed it,’ she replied. ‘Especially meeting your IVF patient—Mrs Norton. She was so thrilled to be pregnant.’

‘I’m surprised she wasn’t a little smug.’

‘Smug?’ she repeated in confusion.

‘I wanted her to stop when her third IVF treatment failed. It’s so emotionally devastating, you see, when the procedure doesn’t work, but Jennifer was determined to give it one last try, and as it turns out she was right and I was wrong.’

He’d given her the opening she needed, and she took it. ‘Carol Bannerman—the lady with fibroids. I was right, wasn’t I, to suggest she opt for a myomectomy?’

His eyebrows rose. ‘I think the more important question here is, do you think you were right?’

‘But—’

‘But me no buts, Annie. Do you think you advised the best possible course of treatment for her?’

Quickly she mentally reviewed Carol Bannerman’s case notes, then took a deep breath. ‘Yes. Yes, I do.’

For what seemed like an eternity he said nothing, then his lips curved. ‘So do I.’

‘Then why didn’t you say so?’ she protested, letting out the breath she hadn’t even known she’d been holding. ‘I’ve been sweating buckets all morning—’

‘I noticed.’

‘Why, you…you rat!’ The words were out before she could stop them, and she flushed scarlet. ‘I’m so sorry—’

‘Please—oh, please, don’t apologise,’ he exclaimed, his face creasing into a broad smile. ‘You’re absolutely right. It was a rotten thing to do, but I was curious to see how long it would take you to crack and say something to me other than “Sorry”.’

‘Your entire clinic apparently,’ she said ruefully, and his smile widened.

‘That’s better. That’s what I’ve been wanting to see—some lightness about you, some humour.’

She bit her lip. ‘I didn’t realise I was so grim.’

His brown eyes caught and held hers. ‘Not grim. Just tense, and nervous, and there’s no need for you to be. I’m not an ogre, you know.’

No, he wasn’t, she thought as she gazed up at him and felt her own lips curving in response to the smile on his. He was nice, and understanding, and…

This is a mistake, her mind warned. A big, big mistake. You’re starting to like him. Not as your boss, but as a man, and remember what happened the last time you liked your boss—the heartache it caused, the devastation when he walked away. Do you want that again?

‘Annie—’

‘Good grief, is it a quarter to two already?’ she exclaimed, catching sight of the clock on the wall behind him. ‘I have to go.’

‘But I was hoping we might have lunch together in the canteen,’ he protested. ‘I know you’re supposed to go off duty today at one o’clock, but you can’t call me a rat and then not give me the opportunity to prove to you that I’m actually a big soft teddy bear.’

Lunch with him in the canteen sounded appealing—far too appealing. Thank goodness she couldn’t. Thank goodness she really did have to go.

‘I’m sorry but I can’t,’ she said, quickly picking up her bag and heading for the door. ‘I have to go shopping.’

‘But, Annie—’

She’d gone, and he threw down his pen with frustration. What the hell had he said wrong now? For crying out loud, all he’d suggested was lunch in the canteen, and yet she’d shot out of his room as though he’d lit a fire under her. To go shopping.

He snorted derisively. He supposed it was marginally better than the old ‘I’m washing my hair’ routine, but why she’d needed to make up an excuse was beyond him. It wasn’t as though he’d asked her for a date, just to join him for lunch in the canteen so they could get to know one another better. And he’d thought they were beginning to do just that when—

‘Gideon, have you got any more of those cervical smear leaflets we give out to patients?’ Helen asked, popping her head round his consulting-room door. ‘There’s none left in the waiting room.’

‘If there’s none left in the waiting room, get onto Admin,’ he snapped. ‘I’m not the local stationery office.’

‘Right.’ She nodded. ‘Sorry.’

‘Hell’s bells, not you, too,’ he groaned, then shook his head when his SHO’s eyebrows rose. ‘Sorry, Helen, but right now I’ve had my fill of people apologising to me.’

‘Rough clinic?’ she said sympathetically.

‘Not the clinic. It’s…’ He struggled to find the right words, and gave up. ‘Helen, do I seem like an ogre to you?’

‘An ogre?’ She stared at him in surprise. ‘Of course you’re not an ogre. Who said—?’

‘Nobody,’ he interrupted hurriedly. Lord, but he wished he’d never started this conversation. Especially not with Helen. ‘It isn’t important. Forget it.’

‘Not on your life!’ she exclaimed, her brown eyes sparkling. ‘Come on—give. Who is she?’

‘She?’ he repeated faintly.

‘Gideon, I’ve known you for almost seven years, and you’ve never terrified a patient in your life, so it’s got to be a girl. Someone you desperately want to make a good impression on, or you wouldn’t care two hoots whether she was terrified of you or not.’

He stared at her, open-mouthed, then shook his head. ‘The processes of the female mind are wondrous to behold.’

‘I’m right, though, aren’t I?’ Helen declared. ‘Who is it? I hope it’s not that busty new nurse in Paediatrics. She’s not your type at all, and that frosty-faced receptionist in radiology would be a disaster.’

‘Helen—’

‘Which only leaves either the new nurse in A and E, or Annie Hart.’

To his dismay, hot colour began to creep across his cheeks. ‘Helen—’

‘It’s Annie, isn’t it?’ she whooped with delight. ‘Oh, Gideon, I’m so pleased. I know how much you loved Susan, but Annie’s a sweet girl, and—’

‘Helen, read my lips,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘I am not—repeat not—interested in Dr Hart other than in a purely professional capacity.’

‘You’ve had a row, right?’ she commiserated. ‘Look, it’ll blow over. All you have to do is be your own sweet self, and she’ll come round.’

And I’m surrounded by lunatics, Gideon thought dazedly as Helen’s bleeper sounded and she hurried off to answer it. All I asked was whether I was an ogre and immediately my SHO’s hearing wedding bells. With Annie Hart, of all people. OK, so she’s a very pretty girl, and she clearly needs somebody to take care of her, but it isn’t going to be me. No way. Not ever.

But it felt good when you were holding her, didn’t it? his mind whispered. Every time she’s tumbled into your arms it’s felt right, almost as though she somehow—oddly—belonged there. And what about the feel of her slender waist beneath your fingers, the soft curve of her breasts—so high and surprisingly full—and—

He swore under his breath as his body suddenly reacted with unbridled enthusiasm to the picture his mind had just created. How long had it been since he’d been out with a woman—two, maybe three years? It had obviously been far too long, but he’d been so busy since Susan had died with all the interminable meetings that were part and parcel of his job. The clinics, the operations, the ward rounds…

Excuses, Gideon, his mind whispered as he strode out of his room, and not very good ones at that. You haven’t dated anyone since Susan died because you’re scared to get close to anyone again in case you lose them, too. It’s fear that’s kept you celibate, not work.

‘Oh, shut up,’ he muttered just as Tom Brooke came out of his room. ‘No, not you, Tom,’ he continued when the specialist registrar looked startled. ‘I’m just having a bad day, that’s all.’

‘Join the club,’ Tom sighed. ‘Are you coming down to the canteen for lunch?’

Gideon shook his head. ‘I think I might just do a quick ward round, then get off home.’

‘Good idea.’ Tom nodded. ‘You look as though you could do with some rest.’

He sure as heck needed something, Gideon decided after he’d toured the ward then made his way down to the car park. And it wasn’t Helen sticking her oar in. OK, so his long-dormant hormones seemed to have unexpectedly kicked into life, but that didn’t mean he had to act on them. It didn’t mean he was interested—in the sense of being interested—in Annie Hart.

He had a lot more important things to think about anyway, he told himself as he drove down Rottenrow, then along Richmond Road and into Duke Street. Like getting home, for a start. He should have left the hospital earlier, of course. The traffic was always murder on a Friday afternoon, and today it was even slower because of the icy roads and driving sleet.

At least he was warm and cosy in his car, he thought as he drummed his fingers absently on the steering-wheel, waiting for the van ahead of him to move. Not like the poor people out on the street. People like…

Annie. He’d have recognised her anywhere, and she hadn’t been lying about the shopping. She was lugging four obviously very heavy carrier bags up the road, and she looked wet, and cold, and miserable.

Without a second’s thought he cut in towards the pavement, ignoring the cacophony of car horns that greeted his manoeuvre, and parked beside her.

‘M-Mr Caldwell,’ she stammered as he got out of his car. ‘Is there something wrong—at the hospital—?’

‘The name’s Gideon, and nothing’s wrong at the hospital, but you look in serious need of a lift home.’

She shook her head. ‘It’s kind of you to offer, but I just live round the corner in Thornton Street.’

Which was a good half a mile away if he remembered rightly, and all of it uphill. He opened his passenger door. ‘Get in, Annie.’

‘No, honestly, there’s no need—’

‘Annie, I’m illegally parked on double yellow lines, so unless you want me to get a ticket from that traffic warden who’s bearing down on us, please, get in the car.’

She did so with obvious reluctance, and when they arrived in Thornton Street she even more reluctantly allowed him to carry her groceries up to her top-floor flat.

He wasn’t surprised. Given how edgy she always was in his company, he’d have been amazed if she’d welcomed his offer of help, but what did surprise him—horrified him, if he was honest—was her flat.

‘It has a lovely view of the cathedral,’ she said defensively, clearly sensing his dismay as he carried her groceries through to the tiny kitchen. ‘And it’s near to the hospital.’

Yes, but it’s the most depressing place I’ve ever seen, he wanted to reply. OK, so it was clean and tidy, and the few pieces of furniture gleamed with much polishing, but its dark green wallpaper would have given him nightmares, and as for the chipped and peeling paintwork…

‘How long have you lived here?’ he asked.

‘Two months.’

Two minutes would have been more than enough for him. ‘Annie—’

‘Would you like a cup of coffee before you go?’

Subtle she wasn’t, but he had no intention of leaving. Not yet, at any rate. Junior doctor’s salaries weren’t exactly lavish, but surely a single woman could have afforded something better than this?

‘I’ll help you unpack first,’ he said firmly. ‘And, yes, I know you don’t need any help,’ he continued when she opened her mouth, patently intending to protest, ‘but just humour me, please, hmm?’

Gideon didn’t wait for her reply. Instead, he determinedly began emptying her grocery bags, but the more packets and tins he placed on the kitchen table, the more confused he became. Spaghetti hoops, Twinkie bars, lollipops. What kind of weird diet was she on?

‘Far be it for me to criticise,’ he observed, reaching down into one of the bags to retrieve what looked like Beanie biscuits, ‘but if this is a sample of your eating habits, I think you badly need some nutritional advice.’

She opened her mouth, closed it again, then seemed to come to a decision. ‘They’re not for me. They’re…they’re for my son.’

His hand stilled. ‘I didn’t realise you were married.’

‘I’m not. And I’m not divorced either,’ she continued as his eyebrows rose. ‘I’m a single parent.’

He stared at her silently. It explained so much. Answered so many questions, and yet raised a whole lot more.

‘Your son—he’s four, isn’t he?’

‘Yes, but how—?’

‘It didn’t require much genius to figure it out,’ he declared as she stared at him in astonishment. ‘You took four years out between finishing med school and applying for the post at the Belfield, so…’ He shrugged. ‘Was that why you were late this morning—because of your son?’

‘It won’t happen again,’ she said quickly. ‘He didn’t want to go to the day-care centre, you see, but I promise it won’t happen again.’

‘Hell’s bells, Annie, your son is your first priority, not the bloody hospital,’ he snapped, then bit his lip when she flinched. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to yell, but I do understand. I know the kind of pressure Helen faces with her two kids—’

‘I don’t want—or need—any allowances made for me.’

But she did, he thought. Every working mother needed help sometimes. ‘Annie—’

He came to a halt as her front doorbell rang, and when she went to answer it he stayed in the kitchen. He would have remained there, too, if the increasingly strident sound of a female voice hadn’t aroused his curiosity.

‘Is there something wrong?’ he asked, emerging from the kitchen in time to see a dumpy, middle-aged woman brandishing a toy truck under Annie’s nose.

‘It’s nothing,’ Annie said quickly. ‘Please, go back in the kitchen.’

Not on your life, he thought, seeing the woman glance from him to Annie with a look he didn’t care for.

‘I’m Gideon Caldwell—a friend of Annie’s,’ he said, holding out his hand. ‘And you are…?’

The woman didn’t unbend an inch. In fact, she bristled even more.

‘Mrs Patterson, the landlady, and as I’ve just been telling Ms Hart, this is the fourth time I’ve found this toy lying outside my door.’

‘And you brought it back for her—how very kind of you,’ he said smoothly.

‘Kindness had nothing to do it,’ she snapped. ‘It shouldn’t have been there in the first place.’

‘I’ll speak to Jamie,’ Annie said hurriedly. ‘Make sure it doesn’t happen again.’

‘You keep saying that, and it’s not good enough,’ Mrs Patterson retorted. ‘He’s always leaving his toys lying about, and he was running up and down again this morning. Thump, thump, thump, from seven o’clock onwards. I could rent this flat to anyone, Ms Hart—’

‘Did you advertise this flat as being unsuitable for children?’ Gideon interrupted.

Mrs Patterson stared at him. ‘I beg your pardon?’

‘When you advertised this flat, did you specifically stipulate it was unsuitable for young children?’ he asked, his voice hard, cold.

‘No, but—’

‘Then so long as Dr Hart pays her rent, I think you should take yourself, and your veiled threats, elsewhere, don’t you?’

Mrs Patterson’s mouth fell open. She turned a quite amazing shade of red, then with a fulminating look at Annie she banged out the door, leaving Annie gazing after her.

‘Well, I think I sorted that out, don’t you?’ Gideon smiled, but to his surprise Annie didn’t look pleased. She looked furious.

‘Sorted it out?’ she repeated. ‘All you’ve done is made things ten times worse!’

‘But—’

‘She’s already on my back twice a day.’

‘Then move out—get somewhere else.’

Her colour changed from fiery red to white, then back to red again. ‘Do you have any idea how difficult it is for a woman with a young child to get affordable rented accommodation in Glasgow?’

‘No, but—’

‘It took me almost six months to find this place—’

‘You should have kept looking.’

She clenched her hands together until her knuckles showed white. ‘OK, that does it. You waltz in here uninvited, sneer at my home—oh, yes, you did,’ she continued as he tried to protest, ‘and then you antagonise my landlady. I think you’ve more than outstayed your welcome, don’t you?’

‘Annie—’

‘Goodbye, Mr Caldwell.’

‘The name’s Gideon,’ he said in exasperation. ‘G-I-D-E-O-N. Good grief, it’s not that hard to pronounce.’

‘And the door is right behind you,’ she said pointedly.

He wondered if he should remind her that he hadn’t had his coffee yet, but one look at her furious face told him it would be a mistake. She’d undoubtedly give it to him all right. Right over his head.

Well, fine, he thought as he strode out the door. If she didn’t want his help, then fine. If she wanted to be intimidated by a harridan landlady, and live with her son in a depressing flat, then that was fine, too. He washed his hands of her.

He had better things to do than worry about a girl with corn-coloured curls and large blue eyes who probably had to lug heavy shopping bags up that steep hill every week. Much better things. And if he couldn’t think of a single thing at the moment, he sure as heck soon would.