let out a kind of whimper. ‘Blooming Arran. I need food, a shower and a bed. Tell me you know where our hotel is.’
Gerry smiled. ‘It’s about a five-minute drive from here. And it’s not a hotel. It’s a cottage. Apparently accommodation can be tricky here. There’re only a few hotels, but some holiday lets. We’ll be lucky if we stay in the same place twice.’
Kristie put both hands on the steering wheel and started the engine. ‘Just tell me which direction.’ Her head was starting to thump. It was probably the jet-lag and a bit of dehydration. If she couldn’t get something in the can in the next three days she would be toast. Her career was already dangling by a thread. Another failure against her name and Louie would be right—no one would want to work with her.
She was going to have to try all her Kristie charm on Dr Grump. Because if she didn’t, who knew what could happen next?
* * *
They were sitting in his waiting room—again. Patients had already started asking questions. Some were even volunteering to be filmed. Three days of this every month for the next year?
He’d checked with his union. Apparently the TV contract was standard, and the appendix regarding patient consent was similar to one used by other TV series. As long as consent was granted and paperwork completed, there was no reason for him not to continue.
Truth was, he’d heard this news one day ago, but still couldn’t bring himself to tell the TV crew. The guy—Gerry—permanently looked as if he could go to sleep at the drop of the hat, whereas his counterpart—Kristie—looked more wound up than the tightest spring.
Pam, one of the secretaries, stuck her head around the door. She had a sheaf of messages in her hand. ‘Hospital called. X-ray problems again. Mrs McTaggart needs her painkillers upped. John Henderson phoned—sounded terrible—I’ve put him down for a house call, and...’ She paused for a second, giving him a wary look. ‘And I’ve got his permission to take the film crew.’
Rhuaridh’s head flicked up from the bunch of prescriptions he’d been signing. Pam sighed. She was another member of staff that he’d inherited from his father, meaning she knew him better than most. ‘You did what?’
Pam never pandered to him. ‘Magda had already gone through all the patient permissions with me. So I’ve started getting them. Now hurry up and take that woman out of my waiting room before she spontaneously combusts.’ Pam spun around and left, not giving him any chance to respond.
Rhuaridh leaned back in his chair and glanced at his watch. Nearly three p.m. He could do this. A few hours today, then all of tomorrow and he wouldn’t have to see them again for another month. He tried to rationalise it in his brain. How bad could this be?
He pasted his best kind of smile on his face and walked outside.
* * *
Finally. He’d finally graced them with his presence.
There were only so many outdoor shots they could film on Arran—and Gerry had shot them all. Filler time, to use around the actual, proper filming. The thing they didn’t have a single second of.
For a second yesterday, as they’d sat in the waiting room all day, she’d had half a mind to try and put a secret camera in this guy’s room. It wasn’t that she didn’t know all the unethical issues with this, it was just that she was feeling that desperate.
And after two days of waiting, Rhuaridh Gillespie gave them a half-nod of his head. ‘I’ve checked things out. We need to go to the local hospital. You’ll need to sort out your permissions with the patients when you get there.’
She refused to let that make her mad. She’d already spent part of the night before meeting the nurse manager in charge at the hospital and sorting out all the paperwork with the long-stay patients.
She hadn’t let Gerry see that she’d actually been sick outside before they’d entered. She’d been determined that she had to get the first visit to the place over and done with. Once they’d got inside and made the obligatory introductions she’d stuck her hands in her pockets so no one could see them shaking. If she’d had any other choice, she would have walked away from filming inside a hospital. But the fact was, there wasn’t another choice. It was this, or nothing. So she’d pushed all her memories into a box and tried to lock it up tight.
Once the horrible squirming feeling in her stomach had finally disappeared, she’d decided that distraction was the best technique so she’d spent some time talking with some of the older patients, and had already decided to go back and interview a few of them on camera.
So by the time they joined Rhuaridh in his black four-by-four and he drove down the road to the hospital she felt a bit better prepared and that horrible ominous sensation had diminished a little. The journey only took a few minutes.
It became pretty clear in the first moments after they entered the hospital that Rhuaridh wasn’t going to give them any chance to prepare, lightwise, soundwise or anything-wise. It was almost as if he was determined to ignore them.
Gerry murmured, ‘I can work around him.’
Kristie straightened her spine. If she didn’t start to get some decent filming soon she could kiss her career goodbye. But there was a little fire of anger burning down inside her. She didn’t let people ignore her. And she’d checked the contract, she knew exactly what Dr Gillespie was getting in return for doing this. He owed her three days of filming every month, and if this guy didn’t start to deliver, she wouldn’t hesitate to remind him.
But Kristie knew, at least for now, she should try and ease him into this filming. Maybe the guy was nervous. Maybe he was shy. Or maybe the guy was just a jerk. Part of her was mad. Did he have any idea how hard she was finding this? Obviously not. But whatever it was that was eating him, she had less than a day and a half to find out.
‘So, Dr Gillespie, can you tell me about the first patient we’ll be seeing?’
She could see the muscles under his white shirt tense. The ones around the base of his neck were particularly prominent. She nodded to Gerry to keep filming as Rhuaridh muttered a few unintelligible words.
‘To the camera, Dr Gillespie,’ she said smoothly.
He blinked and turned towards her just as Gerry flicked on their extra light. She almost stepped back. Resentment and annoyance seemed to ooze from every pore. For a second she was sure he was going to say no.
So she moved quickly. ‘In fact, let’s start with introductions. Face the camera, I’ll introduce you, then you can tell the viewers a little about yourself.’ She shot him a look, then added in a quiet voice, ‘And don’t mumble.’
She would never normally do things like this. Usually she would go over all the introductory questions with their subject, check their responses, and make sure everyone was comfortable before they started filming. But the fact was—on this occasion—they just didn’t have the time.
Before he had a chance to object she turned to the camera and gave her widest smile. ‘Hi, there, folks. It’s Kristie Nelson here, and I’m your host for...’ She realised her mistake almost instantly, but no one watching would notice it. Did this guy know he was going to be called a Hot Highland Doc for the next year? Maybe better to keep some things quiet, this was already an uphill struggle.
She
