New Surgeon at Ashvale A&E (12 page)

‘No, that ain’t good enough.’ His friend became belligerent and lunged towards her, pushing her with enough force so that she spun round and fell back against a wall, hitting her arm on the corner of a desk. ‘You see to him now.’

‘That’s enough.’ Sam’s voice cut through the air like a whip. ‘We don’t have to put up with disrespect. You’re out of here.’ Sam strode purposefully from the resuscitation room and grabbed the youth by the collar. With one hand at the nape of the young man’s neck and another tugging his flailing arm behind his back, he marched him out of the unit and into the hands of the security team who were at that moment heading along the corridor towards A&E.

Sam returned a minute or so later and propelled the injured drunk back into the waiting room and sat him down on a chair. A security officer came to stand guard by the door, preventing any more unauthorised access into the main treatment area.

Sam came to find Ruby, who was rubbing her arm and heading towards resus. ‘Come into the treatment room,’ he said, his voice brisk. ‘You’re white as a sheet.’

‘I’m all right. It’s a headache, that’s all…too much noise, too little sleep. I’ll be fine, and we have patients to see.’

‘They’re being looked after,’ he told her. ‘You don’t need to worry about them right now. Besides, you should have gone off duty half an hour ago.’

‘Should I?’ She allowed him to usher her into an empty treatment room and submitted to being gently pushed down onto a chair.

‘Let me take a look at your arm,’ he said.

She shook her head. ‘I told you, it’s fine. I’m fine. It’s just my head that hurts.’

He nodded. ‘Okay, we can fix that. I’ll get you some paracetamol tablets. Sit there and don’t move while I go and fetch them.’

Now that she was sitting, she found she had no inclination to go anywhere, so she did as she was told and stayed where she was. When he came back a few minutes later and handed her a glass of water, along with the tablets, she meekly accepted them and swallowed them down.

‘You were terrific back there,’ she told him, giving him back the glass and rubbing her hands over her aching temples. ‘Where did you learn to handle people like that? Do you have a secret life as a security guard?’

He gave a wry smile. ‘I learned how to handle bullies at boarding school,’ he said. ‘The older ones would pick on the new recruits. It was bad enough when they tried their tactics on me, but when they started on my younger brother, I had to let them know once and for all who they were dealing with. They didn’t try it again after that.’

She looked at him curiously. ‘I guess you must have been very fond of your brother. You were both a long way from home and family, so I expect you turned to one another for comfort and companionship.’

‘Yes, we did.’ He made a bleak kind of smile. ‘I’d always looked out for him from when we were very young, and it was a natural thing for me to do the same at school. Of course that was a long time ago. We’ve both moved on since then.’

‘But you’re still fond of one another?’

He nodded. ‘It goes without saying. Why do you ask?’

‘I was just wondering how much contact you have with him, now that he’s up in Scotland and you’re down here.’

He gave a light shrug, leaning back against the wall and watching her from a short distance. ‘Like I said, we’ve both
moved on. It’s unfortunate that we’re at other ends of the country, but it can’t be helped, I suppose. We talk to each other on the phone now and again, and of course there’s always email…but we’re both busy people working in professions that are deeply involving and time-consuming.’

‘So you don’t get to see much of your nephews?’

He shook his head. ‘Birthdays, maybe, and Christmas. I doubt they even think of me very much. They have their own lives to lead.’

‘I think it’s very sad,’ she said, getting to her feet and studying him as he began to move towards her.

‘Are you sure you’re feeling up to walking about?’ He studied her, his brows drawing together. ‘Shouldn’t you sit for a little longer? You’re still very pale.’

‘I need to curl up in bed and have a long, uninterrupted sleep,’ she said. ‘Perhaps Mum will keep Becky overnight, and I’ll be able to do that.’ She gave him a faint smile. ‘Thank you for taking care of me. I wish I could do the same for you.’

He looked at her in astonishment, giving a small chuckle. ‘Take care of me? What can you possibly mean by that?’

She gave him a sad smile. ‘Perhaps tiredness is giving me a different perspective on life.’ Even through her weariness, she had picked up on the faintly wistful note in his voice when he spoke about his brother and his family. He might declare that he was content with his life the way it was, but deep inside him wasn’t there a yearning to be part of an open-hearted, bustling family unit? So far it had eluded him, and maybe that was why he kept his emotions in check. Perhaps it was the reason why he wouldn’t allow himself to love and be loved, for fear of losing control, or even of being hurt.

She studied him thoughtfully. ‘It seems to me that you’re a wonderful, caring, intelligent individual, with everything going for you, but I can’t help feeling that you’re missing out on something very precious. I wish I could help you to find it.’

His expression was totally bewildered. ‘I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. What do you mean, Ruby? What are you trying to say?’

‘I mean that there’s more to life than work, and that doesn’t seem to have occurred to either you or your brother. Don’t you think you ought to try to get together with him and his family more often…perhaps even invite them over for the fund-raiser? Scotland isn’t all that far away, is it? Family is important, and I don’t think you should let these ties wither if it’s at all possible to save them.’ She pressed her lips together in a faintly downward curve. ‘I know it’s not my place to interfere, but who knows…your brother may be wishing you’d get in touch.’

He frowned. ‘Men don’t look at life that way. They don’t go in for all this sensitivity and sentiment type of nonsense.’

She laughed. ‘No, you’re probably right. That’s why there are women in the world—women who know how to steer men in the right direction and smooth off all the rough edges…let their softness act as a foil for men of steel.’

He began to smile and moved towards her. ‘I can go along with that.’ He reached for her, letting his palms flatten on her waist as he gently tugged her towards him. ‘I’d appreciate the feel of your soft, feminine curves against my body any day.’

His head lowered, and he kissed her tenderly, his lips brushing hers and slowly exploring the ripe fullness of her mouth as though he would savour its sweetness for as long as it was possible.

Ruby’s lips clung to his, ripples of excitement flowing through her, filling her body with exquisite longing. Her fingers tangled with the fine linen of his shirt, and she felt the heat coming from him as though she was firing up a furnace.

After a moment or two, though, he carefully started to ease her away from him. She looked up into his eyes and tried to fathom what was going on in those blue-grey depths.

‘People,’ he said, as though reading her thoughts. ‘Nurses, doctors, patients. They’re all out there, coming and going, waiting for instructions, waiting to be seen. I should go and attend to them.’ He ran his fingers through the silky fall of her hair, easing it back from her face. ‘You, on the other hand, should go home. Get some rest, and then maybe you’ll begin to see the world in a different light.’

She frowned. Of course he was right. She wasn’t thinking straight. This whole day had been odd, from start to finish, and that could only be because she’d had a bad night and was suffering the consequences.

‘I’ll go,’ she said, ‘or I’ll be fit for nothing. I have a full day ahead of me tomorrow on the farm, tending to the animals, and looking after Becky. I do wish my sister would come home. That, at least, would be one less worry. I just can’t concentrate properly for wondering where she is, or whether her health is deteriorating. I keep imagining her lying ill somewhere, dazed and confused.’

‘Maybe you should send her a text message to say that Becky is missing her. Tell her how her baby cries for her and won’t be consoled without her mother. She might gain enough strength to be able to overcome her difficulties if she believes her child needs her.’

She was surprised that he’d made the suggestion, but at least it was a step in the right direction. He was acknowledging that Becky needed her mother and taking into account the fact that Sophie would want to come home.

She thought about it as she drove along the country lanes some half an hour later, heading back to the smallholding. What would Sophie’s reaction be? Would she contemplate coming back and suffer the questions that would undoubtedly follow, or would she shrink back even further into her shell, weighed down by doubt and sickness?

She parked the car on the drive and spent a minute or two
gathering up her belongings. Then she stepped out onto the smooth tarmac, pausing to lock up. Behind her, she thought she saw a flicker of movement, but when she turned to check it out, there was only a bird flying to roost in a nearby tree.

Deep in thought, she walked towards the front porch, glancing at the honeysuckle that trailed in profusion around the door. The pale cream flowers gave off a sweet, light fragrance that filled the air, and she breathed it in, enjoying that moment of sensory bliss.

Then she heard the sound of twigs cracking underfoot, and she looked around to see who was there. ‘Sophie, is that you?’ Hope burned briefly inside her, but there was nothing, no sign of anyone on the drive, or even around the sides of the house. She went to look. All she could see was a grey shadow flitting against the background of the shrubbery, and she felt a shiver of alarm pass through her as another, more worrying thought occurred to her. Was she being followed? But then she guessed it must have been a rabbit scurrying to its burrow, or even a squirrel heading for one of the tall trees.

Perhaps she was even more tired than she thought and her mind was playing tricks on her. Going inside the house, she dropped her bags onto the table in the kitchen and went to phone her mother.

‘Go and get some rest,’ her mother said. ‘Becky’s fine. She’s playing happily, and in a little while she’ll be ready to sleep. We’ll bring her over to you tomorrow around mid-morning.’

‘Thanks, Mum.’

They chatted for a little while longer, and then Ruby went to soak in the bath, easing away the cares of the day. She fell into bed an hour later and slept deeply, waking in the morning as the sun filtered through the bedroom curtains.

Her parents dropped Becky off as promised, and they all had a late breakfast together before her mother and father set off on a journey to the coast and a visit to her grandparents.

‘Why don’t you come with us?’ her father suggested, but she shook her head.

‘I’ll stay here in case Sophie comes back. Besides, I have work in the morning, and Craig’s coming over today to see the new chicks that have hatched.’

‘Oh, they’re so gorgeous,’ her mother said, her face breaking into a smile. Her hair was a chestnut colour, similar to Ruby’s, though it was cut in a short, wavy style, and it was threaded through with streaks of grey. ‘They’re such beautiful little bundles of brown fluff…it was so good of Craig to bring the incubator over and help you to hatch them.’

‘And good of him to show me how to care for them now that they’re free of their shells.’

Ruby went to see them off, showing Becky how to wave goodbye, and then they went back into the house, and she set the baby down on the rug to play with a selection of toys.

Craig arrived a few minutes later, bringing with him a bag of ready-mixed chick food. ‘They call it chick-crumbs,’ he told her, ‘and they’ll feed on this for around a month. All they need apart from this is clean water.’

She lifted Becky up in her arms, and they went outside to the shed where the chicks were being cared for in a specially prepared brooder. Heat was provided by means of a lamp, and the chicks moved around within the area of the brooder, pecking at bits of food on the floor or falling over one another in a scrabble to reach the food trays.

‘Ba-ba…ba-ba…’ Becky said, her eyes widening with excitement, her body straining towards the brooder, and her hands reaching out as if she would grasp the baby birds.

‘No, poppet. You can’t hold them,’ Ruby gently told her, holding on to her tightly. ‘They’re too little. But we’ll stand here and look at them for a while.’ She glanced at Craig, who had filled up the feed trays with chick-crumb and was now
carefully removing a chick who had decided to clamber inside one of them. ‘How do you think they’re doing?’ she asked.

‘They look fine to me,’ he said. ‘Generally, if they’re content, they will sit together and make a purring sound. If they’re too hot, they’ll move away from the source of heat and begin to gasp, and if they’re cold, they’ll huddle together and make cheeping noises. These seem perfectly happy to me.’

‘Good, I’m glad.’

They moved away, going back towards the house, and Ruby said, ‘I wish Sophie could see them. She used to love coming over here to see the chicks when our grandparents told us they’d hatched.’

‘There’s still been no news?’

She shook her head. ‘I wondered if she might be hiding out around here, or at least be close by. Yesterday, when I came home, I had the strongest feeling that someone was following me, or watching me, but even though I looked around, I didn’t find anyone. I sent her a text message to say that Becky was missing her, but she didn’t answer. I know she wouldn’t stay away unless there was a problem. I just don’t know how to bring her back.’

‘Could anyone else have been following you?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t think so, but it was scary for a while. I’m not usually prone to wild imaginings, but, then again, I was tired.’

‘Well, it’s true the mind can play tricks on you when you’ve been overdoing things, and you have had a lot on your plate, lately.’

They went back inside the house, and Ruby settled Becky back down on the rug in the living room. The doorbell rang, and she left Craig to watch her while she went to answer it.