Ethan said darkly. ‘Mark my words.’
LIZZIE DID HER best to get on with her day, but she was very worried. Not about the publicity, given Leo hadn’t been the surgeon who’d operated, but about Francesca. Late in the evening, long after the patients had gone, she was still reluctant to go home till she knew what was happing.
‘Why don’t you call Leo?’ Gwen suggested, as she headed out the door.
‘I might,’ Lizzie said, but when she tried she just got his voicemail.
It felt strange to be alone in the clinic. Lizzie tried to find something to do but there wasn’t much. She took the files of the patients Leo would be seeing tomorrow into his office and placed them on the table. She couldn’t help but walk over to the shelf and take down the ballet programme. She started to flick through it then became so engrossed she hardly heard Leo coming through the door.
‘She’s stable.’
Lizzie turned around at the sound of Leo’s voice.
‘Several clots, but small ones, thank God.’ He closed his eyes briefly. Both had worked in medicine long enough to know that had it been a large clot, nothing anyone could have done would have changed the outcome. ‘I’m just so glad she came to the clinic. Had that happened at home …’ He walked over and looked at the programme Lizzie was holding. ‘It’s not often that I question my work but on days like today …’
‘Leo, you didn’t even do the surgery.’
‘I know that, but I could easily have. There is a risk. I say it every day but on days like today you just question things.’
‘Lexi seems to think it might look bad for the clinic if it gets out.’
‘It’s already out,’ Leo said. ‘Lexi just rang and told me. She’s had two journalists call in the last hour.’
‘She’s telling them that Francesca didn’t have the surgery here?’
‘No,’ Leo said. ‘I never comment on any patients.’
‘But—’
‘No buts,’ Leo said. ‘You can’t play that card only when it suits and I’m certainly not going to put the blame on Geoff. It’s a post-operative complication—it could be any one of us.’
‘Even so,’ Lizzie said. ‘It’s your reputation …’
‘My reputation can take it,’ Leo said. ‘It’s par for the course, Lizzie. If I couldn’t handle this sort of thing I’d have given up on surgery ages ago.’ He sounded so assured and confident but she could tell he was deeply concerned.
It was all just so unfair.
‘Do you want a drink?’ Lizzie offered.
‘I’d kill for a coffee.’ Leo yawned. ‘I’ll give Francesca’s niece another call and see how she is and then I’m going to ring Geoff and speak with him.’
‘I meant …’ She looked at the decanter.
‘That’s for the patients, oh, and Ethan,’ Leo said, then nodded. ‘Go on, then, if you’ll join me.’
She shouldn’t be joining him, both knew that. They were heading into dangerous territory and it had been a long and emotional day, but she wanted to talk to him more than she wanted to go home.
Lizzie poured them both a drink while Leo scrolled through his tablet.
‘Have you seen this?’
As she walked over Lizzie wondered which of their famous clients she was about to see, or whether it was something about Francesca, but instead it was an article she had read several months ago.
‘That’s how I found out about Ethan,’ Leo said. ‘From a news article. That’s why I was so insistent that Francesca ring Amelia—I know how it feels not to be told. How could the hospital not tell me?’
Lizzie said nothing, though she knew much more. Not that Ethan had ever been particularly effusive, but he had opened up a little to her and of course she’d read his notes.
What had happened to Ethan was so much worse than the little Leo knew.
‘I don’t know how we grew so far apart,’ Leo mused. ‘Actually, I do. I never wanted him to go into the military,’ he admitted. ‘I wanted him here, working in the family business …’
‘It means a lot to you, doesn’t it?’ Lizzie offered. ‘The family name.’
‘Didn’t you look me up before you came to work here?’ He loved it that she blushed as she admitted that she had. ‘You should have read back further. The Hunter name was mud for years. I wanted Ethan to help rebuild it.’
‘Mud?’ Lizzie frowned. ‘Your father was an esteemed surgeon and your mother …’ She blushed again, remembering her own father’s less than complimentary description of Leo’s mother, though she could hardly say that now, but Leo got in first.
‘My parents’ marriage was a disaster. Not to the outside world at first, but they soon got to see it, warts and all. You really don’t know about them?’ Leo asked, and Lizzie admitted to having done a little research before plucking up the courage to ring him. ‘I read his obituary.’
‘Obituaries tend to gloss over certain things. Yes, the Hunter name was prestigious, yes, we catered to the rich and wealthy and had a stunning reputation, till my father forgot to leave the less pleasant side of his personality at home.’
He didn’t mean to elaborate further, he had already said far more than he usually did, but, yes, Leo told himself, it had been a long day and so he continued.
‘You know how people say they build a place from nothing?’ He looked directly at her and normally she averted her eyes but tonight she felt as if she was looking at the real Leo Hunter and instead of looking away she nodded.
‘I built this from less than nothing. Not that your lover seems very impressed …’
Had she agreed to lunch he’d have asked the question far more nicely. Instead, his eyes were just a touch accusing as he awaited her response.
‘He’s not my lover.’
‘Has he ever been?’
‘No! Anyway, what is it to you?’ Her voice trailed off because it was a stupid question, a very stupid question given the attraction crackling between herself and Leo, and this time Lizzie did pull her eyes away. ‘What is it with you and Ethan?’ In a desperate attempt to distract Leo from her previous question, she asked what few would dare. Something needed to be said—even Ethan had joked that he had thought his days of unexploded land mines were over. ‘Why don’t the two of you get on?’
‘Is that the head nurse asking?’
‘No,’
