He stepped inside the house and looked around, taking in the low ceiling and the narrow passageway. Katie hoped he hadn’t noticed the spot in the far corner where the paint was peeling from the wall. Through a doorway to one side of the hall the living room was visible, and it was possible to glimpse from there the overgrown garden through the French doors. ‘This is cosy,’ he murmured. ‘Have you lived here for long?’
‘Um…a couple of months. I’m still decorating and trying to make the place my own, but I’ve been busy and I’ve had to make choices about where to start.’
He nodded. ‘I guess it isn’t easy when you’re working.’ He gave her a sideways glance. ‘Though by all accounts that won’t be much of a problem from now on, will it?’
Katie gave a shrug. ‘I’ve already had a quick skim through the job vacancy columns in the newspaper. Apparently they need someone in the rehab unit at the local hospital. That would be a start, I suppose.’
‘But it would also be a complete waste of your talents. You’re a doctor. You should be using the medical skills you acquired after all those years of training.’
Perhaps he had a point there, but Katie wasn’t in the mood to be judged and found wanting. She stiffened. ‘I don’t see why that should concern you.’ She pushed open the kitchen door and ushered him through.
Jessica was sitting at the table at the far end of the room, her fork poised in her hand, but she laid it down on her plate and blinked as Alex walked into the room.
‘Alex?’ Her face lit up in a shy smile. ‘You found me? I didn’t think we would see you again so soon.’
‘No, it is sooner than expected, I must agree with you there. I’m glad that you seem to have settled back in here without too much upset.’ He sent a quick glance around the room. ‘It’s homely in here, very clean and cheerful.’
Katie had placed a bowl of roses on the worktop, and she had set out groups of fine glassware and ceramics at intervals on shelves around the room. It wasn’t much, but it made the difference between what might have been purely a functional kitchen and what she considered to be the heart of the home. What had he been expecting, something austere and unwelcoming?
She sent him a dark, cynical glance. ‘See? She’s perfectly well. I haven’t locked her in a cupboard or banished her to bed without so much as a bowl of gruel, if that’s what you were thinking.’ Her mouth made a derisive slant. ‘Are you satisfied now that you’ve seen for yourself that she’s all right?’
He turned, his grey-blue gaze homing in on her. ‘Actually, that isn’t the reason I’m here.’
‘Oh.’ Katie swallowed hard. Perhaps riling him wasn’t such a good idea after all. He had done nothing but help out today, and she was beginning to sound like an ungrateful harridan. That wasn’t at all like her, and she couldn’t for an instant fathom why he should be having this effect on her. Perhaps this awful day was beginning to get to her. She said slowly, ‘It wasn’t?’
He shook his head and reached inside his jacket pocket. ‘When I cleared up the equipment after we had helped the man by the roadside, I must have accidentally scooped up your notebooks. I found this when I restocked my medical bag. There are some addresses and phone numbers in there, and I thought perhaps you might need it.’ He handed over the small leather case.
‘Oh, I…uh…Thank you.’ Katie tried to accept it with good grace. ‘It must have dropped out of my bag when I was looking for my phone. I thought I had put everything back.’ He was wrong-footing her at every turn, and she found herself wishing for all the world that she could rewind the day and start over again. Maybe she would do things differently, given the chance.
She flicked through the pages of the small notebook. ‘I’m so glad that you brought this back to me. I would have been lost without it.’
‘You’re welcome.’ He nodded to Jessica and then turned, as though he was getting ready to leave, causing Jessica to raise her brows behind his back and gesticulate wildly to Katie as though she was wrong to let him escape. When Katie didn’t react, Jessica shook her head, and obviously thought she was a hopeless case.
Katie frowned. Then, just in time, she recovered herself and said quickly, ‘Do you have to go right now? I think Jess would be glad of the chance to talk to you for a while, and there’s some tea in the pot. You could help yourself to some supper, too, if you like. There’s plenty left.’ She drifted a hand over the tabletop. ‘I made too much pizza, and there’s plenty of salad, if you would like some. Please, sit down and help yourself. I expect you’ve been too busy these last few hours to think about food.’
He seemed to hesitate, but only for a moment. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I must say it’s been a while since I’ve eaten, and this does look good.’ He pulled out a chair and sat down, then frowned at the triangular segments of the pizza. ‘Did you really make this yourself?’
Did he have to doubt everything about her? Katie bit back a withering retort and managed to send him a sweet smile instead. ‘Yes, I did. It isn’t all that difficult, you know.’
He bit off a corner section, savouring the combined flavours of melted cheese, tomato and herbs, and gave her a quizzical look in return. Perhaps he had decided to ignore the underlying thread of sarcasm in her voice, because he concentrated instead on finishing off his food while parrying questions from Jessica.
He circumvented the more personal queries, but answered others. She wanted to know what exactly he did at the hospital, and what his meeting would have been about if he had managed to get to it in time.
‘I’m in charge of the A and E department at South Lake,’ he told her. ‘I started off there as a registrar, but now I’ve moved up the ladder and I’m a consultant. I’d like to progress even further, and perhaps take charge of a bigger unit, but that all depends on how I get on in this post. I have to go to lots of meetings so that I can keep in touch with what’s going on in other hospitals in the area.’
Jessica was enthralled and, considering that she had been his reluctant detainee earlier, that said something about the man’s charisma.
Katie poured tea and handed him a cup. ‘How is the man we found at the side of the road doing? Have they managed to stabilise his condition?’ She chose her words carefully, because she didn’t want to upset Jessica in any way, and perhaps he realised that, as he answered in a fairly guarded manner.
‘When I left, they were taking him along to Intensive Care. They found the source of his internal injuries and he went to Theatre to have that put right. It’s going to be a question of time now more than anything. Time for him to heal, and for the swelling around his brain to ease.’
Katie’s gaze was troubled. It didn’t sound too good, but at least she felt that they had done all they could for the man. ‘I dread to think what would have happened if we had just driven past him. It’s all because of Jessica that we stopped to investigate in the first place.’
He nodded. ‘You did really well,’ he said, giving the young girl an encouraging smile. It was a smile that lit up his face and gave Katie a glimpse of features that she had not noticed before now. His mouth was perfectly formed, she saw, his teeth were straight and gleaming like pearls, and his eyes were pure heaven, filled with dancing lights that would have sparked any woman’s dreams to flame.
She brought herself back to reality with a jerk. What was
