She’d asked Jen to call in this guy so she needed to be the one to deal with him. ‘Back in a minute, Sam.’ Poppy grabbed the cubicle curtains and deliberately pulled them open with a jerk, making the hangers swish against the metal with a rushing ping to remind Jen and the unknown doctor that there was a patient in the department. She marched briskly to the desk.
‘Oh, Ms Stanfield.’ Jen glanced around the man standing with his back to Poppy. Her organised demeanour had slipped slightly but instead of looking angry or crushed at being spoken to as if she was a child, her expression was one of resignation tinged with sadness and regret. ‘Poppy Stanfield, meet Dr. Matt Albright, Head of ED.’
The tall, broad-shouldered man turned slowly, his sun-streaked chestnut hair moving with him. It was longer than the average male doctor’s and the style was either deliberately messy-chic or overdue for a cut. A few strands fell forward, masking his left cheek, but his right side was fully exposed, and olive skin hollowed slightly under a fine but high cheekbone before stretching over a perfectly chiselled nose. A dark five-o’clock shadow circled tightly compressed lips, leaving Poppy in no doubt of his masculinity.
With a jolting shock she realised he wasn’t handsome—he was disconcertingly beautiful in a way that put everyone else into shadow. In ancient times he would have been sculpted in marble and raised onto a pedestal as the epitome of beauty. Poppy found herself staring as if she was in a gallery admiring a painting where the artist had created impossibly stunning good looks that didn’t belong on battle-scarred earth.
He was heart-stoppingly gorgeous and she’d bet anything women fell at his feet. Once she would have too but thankfully, due to years of practice, she was now immune and not even a quiver of attraction moved inside her.
Nothing ever does any more.
Shut up. Work excites me. She extended her hand towards him. ‘Matt.’
His hand gripped hers with a firm, brisk shake, and a faint tingling rush started, intensifying as it shot along her arm. Immune, are you?
Compressed nerve from a too-firm grip, that’s all.
‘Poppy.’ He raised his espresso-brown eyes to meet her gaze. She expected to see at least a flicker of interest in a new colleague, almost certainly a calculating professional sizing-up, and, at worst, a derisive flare at the fact she was a surgeon and a woman. None of it worried her because she knew exactly how to handle the men she worked with—she’d had years of experience.
But what she saw was so unexpected that it sucked the air from her lungs, almost pulling her with it. A short, sharp flame flickered in his eyes for a split second, illuminating hunger, but as it faded almost as fast as it had flared, she caught deep and dark swirling shadows before clouds rolled in briskly, masking all emotion.
She swayed on her heels as his hunger called up a blast of her own heat but as she glimpsed the misery in his eyes, she shivered and a jet of arctic cold scudded through her. Fire and ice collided; lust and pain coiling together before spiralling down to touch a place that had been firmly closed off and abandoned since—
She abruptly pulled her hand out of his, breaking his touch and moving her gaze to his left shoulder. There you go, simple solution: no eye contact. She didn’t want to care about what hid behind that flawless face and now that his heat wasn’t flowing through her, she marshalled her wayward thoughts and valiantly recomposed herself. This was no time to be discomfited. She needed to be in control and in charge, her future depended on it.
‘As Jen will have explained, I need you to anaesthetise Sam Dennison.’
Long, lean fingers on his right hand crossed his wide and casually clad chest, flicking at the sleeve band of his white T-shirt. ‘This is my department and I need to examine my patient before any decisions are made.’ He turned and walked towards the cubicle.
Poppy matched his stride. ‘And as Bundallagong’s resident surgeon for the next ninety days or less, it’s my considered opinion that—’
‘You’ve had time to examine Sam and now you need to extend that courtesy to me.’
He didn’t alter his pace and before she could reply, Matt Albright stepped through the curtains and closed them in her face.
CHAPTER TWO
MATT could hear the new surgeon pacing, her black heels clicking an impatient rhythm against the linoleum floor. Well, she could just wait. He wasn’t a stickler for protocol but Jen had overstepped the mark by not calling him in to examine Sam first. God, he was sick of the town walking on eggshells around him and trying to protect him when all he wanted was normality. Yeah, and what exactly is that these days?
‘You OK, Doc?’ The young miner lay propped up against a bank of pillows, his eyes slightly glazed from the opiate pain relief.
Hell, if a spaced-out patient noticed he was shaking with frustration then things were really spinning out.
Matt, how can you always be so calm? Lisa’s slightly accusing voice sounded faintly in his head. But that conversation had taken place in another lifetime, before everything he’d held dear had been brutally stolen from him. He hadn’t known calm in over a year.
‘I’m fine.’ Pull the other one. ‘But you’re not. That appendix rumbling again?’
‘Yeah, although whatever that other doctor gave me is good stuff.’ Sam grinned happily.
Matt smiled as he examined him. ‘Have you got any family up here?’
Sam shook his head. ‘Nah, came for the job and the money.’
‘I’ll arrange for a phone so you can talk to your mum because there’s a very high chance you’ll be parting with your appendix. We’ll fast you from midnight and observe you overnight.’
‘OK.’
‘Any questions?’
‘Nah, you explained it all last time and then it got better.’ Sam’s eyes fluttered closed as the drugs really kicked in, tempering any concern over the surgery that he might have.
Matt decided he’d explain it all again to him later. He pulled the curtains open and the new surgeon immediately ceased pacing, but she held her wide shoulders square and tight. It struck him that there was nothing soft about this woman except for her name.
And her mouth.
Guilt kicked him hard. His initial top-to-toe glance of her had stalled unexpectedly on her mouth and a flash of lust-filled heat had sparked momentarily, shocking him deeply. There’d only ever been one woman for him, and until ten minutes ago no one else had ever registered on his radar, let alone elicited such a response. But there’d been something about Poppy Stanfield’s plump mouth that had held him mesmerised. Lips that peaked in an inviting bow were the colour of crushed strawberries and hinted at tasting like an explosion of seductive sweetness. He’d almost licked his own in response.
It was a totally ridiculous and over-the-top reaction given the contrast between the softness of the lips and the precise and no-nonsense words they formed. Everything else about Poppy Stanfield was sharp angles and harsh lines. Her long black hair was pulled straight back exposing a high and intelligent forehead. Black
