A Consultant Beyond Compare. Joanna Neil

see why she had to lay her life bare for this man. He had dropped into her life from out of nowhere, and he could just as easily disappear into nothingness once more. Out of sight, out of mind—wasn’t that what people said? And that being the case, the spectre of working in A and E once more would disappear along with him, wouldn’t it?

      ‘I can’t stay and debate the matter with you,’ he said on a brisk note, ‘but I think you’re making a mistake.’ He pressed his lips together in a straight line. ‘I have to go.’

      He glanced at Jessica, who had gone to stand a short distance away from the ambulance, watching the paramedics make their preparations to leave. Then he turned his attention back to Katie.

      ‘How are you going to manage? Don’t you owe it to that young girl to keep a roof over her head?’ His grey eyes darkened. ‘Or maybe she comes a long way down on your list of priorities? I suppose that could explain a lot.’

      Katie straightened her back. ‘You don’t know anything about me, or my sister,’ she said. ‘How can you presume to judge me when we’ve only just met?’

      He inclined his head a fraction. ‘That’s true,’ he murmured, and his mouth indented in a vestige of a smile. ‘You’re definitely something of an enigma, Katie Sorenson…but I dare say I’ll fathom the puzzle somehow.’

      He moved swiftly away from her and headed towards his car, stopping only to say a quick goodbye to Jessica. Then he slid behind the wheel and sped away in the wake of the ambulance.

      Jessica came over to where Katie was standing. ‘Did I hear him offer you a job?’

      Katie nodded. ‘Yes. He seems to think I could find a place in his A and E department, but I told him I wanted to look around for something else. That’s why I moved here, so that I could put all that behind me and make a fresh start.’

      Jessica nodded. ‘Yes, I know, but you’ll be going to work in another A and E department at some point, won’t you? You have to, surely? You’re a good doctor, and you’re needed out there. Anyway, you weren’t ever going to stay at the rehab centre for very long, were you?’

      Katie started to walk towards her car. ‘Actually I found that it was far more rewarding than I expected. It was certainly less frantic than what I was doing at the hospital, and I wasn’t planning on making a change yet.’

      ‘But you told Alex that you were out of work now.’ Jessica shook her head, so that her glossy brown curls danced in the afternoon sunlight. ‘You can’t give up on being a doctor. It isn’t right. Just because things went wrong for you back home. I don’t care what anybody says, I know you, and I know you couldn’t have done anything wrong. You’re always so careful, so good in everything that you do. Everyone knows that…Mum says that’s why they haven’t put anything bad in your work record.’ She looked at Katie. ‘They haven’t, have they?’

      Katie bent her head a fraction, so that her chestnut curls momentarily fell across her cheek, covering her features. ‘That may be so, but I still don’t feel that I can work in A and E.’ She frowned, her blue eyes clouding. ‘I was getting on all right at the rehab centre. I liked working with the staff there, and it was good to know that I was helping people to get back on their feet after they were incapacitated.’

      Jessica put her arms around her in a fleeting hug. ‘I’m sorry it came to an end. You’ll have to tell me what happened. But even so, it seems all wrong to me that you were working there in the first place. You used to love being in Emergency. You went through all that training, and it was all you ever wanted to do, remember? Now that I’m here, you can go back to it, can’t you? And things will be easier for you because I’ll be here to tidy up and make the meals, and just as soon as I find a job I’ll be able to help out with the finances.’

      Katie smiled. Oh, for youthful innocence. Her sister made it all sound so simple. All she had to do was go after what she wanted and things would turn out fine. It was a lovely thought, and if only that was the way things worked she would be more than happy…but there was more to it than that, wasn’t there?

      Her confidence had been badly shaken, and all her hopes and dreams had crumbled about her. Life would never be quite the same ever again.

      ‘We should head back to my cottage,’ Katie said, pulling open her car door. ‘You can tell me what went wrong at home and why you decided to come all the way out here.’

      Jessica pulled a face as she settled herself in the passenger seat. ‘Do I have to? I’d much rather talk about you and Alex and the job at his hospital.’ She rolled her eyes in a dramatic gesture. ‘When he’s not trying to take charge of me he’s really something, isn’t he? I bet the girls back home would think he was gorgeous.’

      Katie threw her a look from under her lashes. ‘That may be so, but we aren’t going to see him again, so perhaps we should try to forget about him. We’ll concentrate on you from now on.’

      It was a brave attempt at self-protection on Katie’s part—easier to forget about it and move on. Those all-seeing, grey-blue eyes were imprinted on her mind, though, and the promise that glimmered within them would haunt her for some time to come.

      ‘Oh, phooey.’ Jessica rolled her eyes. ‘He’s a dream-boat, and you’re such a spoilsport. How can you not want to talk about him?’