it was Jennifer’s face he saw. And Jennifer he dreamed about.
RAMÓN tried. He really, really tried to be professional in his dealings with Jennifer. But then he saw her with a small child whose parents had rarely visited. She was sitting in a chair with the child on her lap, reading a story and persuading the child to point out things in the pictures. In her lunch-break, he noted, when she really should have been taking some time out for herself.
She cared about her patients. She cared about her staff. So why didn’t she let anyone care about her?
He should walk away. Not get involved. He knew that would be the sensible thing to do. But ten minutes later, after she’d settled the child back in bed, he rapped on her office door and opened it.
She looked up from her desk. ‘Yes?’
‘May I have a word, please, Jennifer?’
‘Everyone calls me JJ.’
Everyone else might, but he didn’t. He wasn’t going to reduce a beautiful name to initials. She was fiddling with her wedding ring again, he noticed. Did she do that all the time, or was it just when he was around? He closed the door behind him and leaned against it. ‘Have dinner with me tonight, Jennifer.’
Oh, Lord. She’d heard those words before. Years ago. Then she’d said yes—and it had been the start of the worst mistake of her life. She’d learned her lesson in the hardest way. ‘No.’
‘Why not?’
Tall, dark, handsome and arrogant—assuming that, of course, she’d want to go out with him. Little mousy Jennifer, swept off her feet by the first man who’d paid her some attention.
Well, not this time. She didn’t make the same mistake twice. She’d learned a lot from her counselling and she wasn’t going back to being a victim. ‘I don’t want to.’
‘What’s the problem? The time? You’re busy tonight?’
‘What don’t you understand about the word “no”?’ she asked.
‘Your mouth is saying no,’ he said simply, ‘but your eyes are saying something else.’
Damn. He’d noticed. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dr Martínez,’ she lied.
‘Ramón,’ he corrected.
‘Ramón.’ It felt as if she were talking through a mouthful of treacle.
‘Why do you have such trouble saying my name?’
Her face heated. ‘I don’t,’ she protested.
‘You do. And not because my name’s Spanish.’
‘I’m sure you already have an opinion.’
He smiled. ‘I do. I think, Jennifer, that there’s something between us. Something you don’t want to acknowledge. And that’s why you have a problem saying my name.’
‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘Then say it.’ To her horror, he actually came to sit on the edge of her desk. Put one hand on her shoulder. Used the other to tilt her chin so she was looking up at him. ‘Say it,’ he coaxed.
It was the melted chocolate thing again. She’d bet he knew he was doing it. He probably did it to a dozen women an hour. She wasn’t special to him and she wasn’t falling for it. ‘Ramón.’
‘You’re blushing.’
‘Because you’re annoying me. You’re invading my space.’
He folded his hands in his lap. Even though he was no longer touching her, she could still sense the feel of his skin against hers. Feel the heat of his body. Imagine the warmth of his mouth.
This really couldn’t be happening.
‘If you were on the other side of the ward and my back was to you, I’d still know the moment you walked into the room,’ he said softly.
He said things like that to all the women. Of course he did. He was the sexy Spanish doctor, used to women falling at his feet. And yet what he’d said touched a chord in her. She’d know he was there, too. She was aware of him whenever he set foot on the ward.
‘Have dinner with me, Jennifer. Please?’
She shook her head. ‘I can’t.’
‘Can’t or won’t?’
‘Both,’ she muttered.
He tipped his head on one side. ‘Why?’
She wasn’t going to answer that one.
He tried again. ‘What’s so bad about having dinner with me? Or are all your restaurants as terrible as the hospital cafeteria?’
‘I prefer to keep my private life separate from work,’ she said.
He nodded. ‘I understand. Enjoy your lunch-break, Jennifer.’ And then he left, as abruptly as he’d walked into the room.
So he was going to leave her alone? He really wasn’t going to bulldoze her?
Her relief was short-lived. Because when she came back from lunch, there was a memo on her desk. A typed memo from the director of Paediatrics, saying that the hospital needed Jennifer, as a senior member of the nursing team, to help look after their seconded consultant. Ramón Martínez was a guest in their city and they should treat him accordingly.
In other words, she was supposed to show him around and have dinner with him, to make sure he was happy and gave his own hospital in Seville a favourable report on Brad’s. If he didn’t, the word would spread and Brad’s was unlikely to get any more seconded specialists. With the recruitment crisis in the health service, Brad’s depended on secondees to fill specialist roles. No specialists meant longer waiting lists, which upset the financial people, who’d say the departments hadn’t met their targets and would cut the budget even more. The vicious circle would go on and on and on…
She crumpled the memo with unusual force and hurled it at her wastebasket. The snake! He’d tried one way and it hadn’t worked. And now he’d pulled a few strings and manoeuvred things so she’d be forced to go out with him. Well, it wasn’t going to work. The next time she saw him, she’d tell him straight.
Except she couldn’t. Because the next time she saw Ramón, she was in Stephen Knights’s cubicle, writing down the results of his observations, and Ramón had just walked into the room. She could hardly pick a fight with him in front of parents. Instead, she gritted her teeth and carried on with her task.
‘Jennifer, may I see you for a moment, please?’
She bit back the ‘Go to hell’ that had risen to her lips. ‘Of course, Dr Martínez.’
This
