From Single Mum to Lady
Judy Campbell

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Table of Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

Dedication

Dear Reader

About the Author

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Copyright

To ‘Granny Annie’ with much love.

Dear Reader

Writing about Jandy and Patrick was kick-started by a conversation with a friend of mine. She’d been a single hard-working mum, with no time in her life for romance, and after years of putting her child first had lost confidence in going out on a date with anyone. She did meet her dream man in the end, quite unexpectedly, and this inspired me to write about Jandy, who has given up all hope of meeting a soul-mate but, despite her busy multi-tasking life, finds him eventually.

It was great fun to write, and I was quite sorry to say goodbye to Jandy, Patrick and their little girls at the end of the book! I do hope you enjoy reading it.

Best wishes

Judy

Judy Campbell is from Cheshire. As a teenager she spent a great year at high school in Oregon, USA, as an exchange student. She has worked in a variety of jobs, including teaching young children, being a secretary and running a small family business. Her husband comes from a medical family and one of their three grown-up children is a GP. Any spare time—when she’s not writing romantic fiction—is spent playing golf, especially in the Highlands of Scotland.

CHAPTER ONE

‘OH, NO! What the…?’ yelped Jandy Marshall, as a freezing cascade of water poured down on her, soaking her hair and nurse’s uniform in a few traumatic seconds. She stared up at the kitchen ceiling and the ever-widening circle of damp in disbelief and groaned. ‘Not that damn pipe…it’s burst again!’

Just what she needed on a Monday morning, she thought bitterly, scrabbling under the sink for the stop tap and shoving a bucket under the steady stream of water. She grabbed a tea towel from a drawer and towelled her hair before stepping out of her clothes and throwing them into the sink. She was getting quite adept at coping with disasters like this—if it wasn’t the pipe bursting, it was the washing machine having a nervous breakdown…

She picked up the phone and dialled the plumber’s number from memory, watching as the pouring water became a trickle and then an intermittent drip.

‘This is an out-of-hours service. Your call is important to us, and we will be with you as soon as possible…’

Jandy slammed down the phone and glared at it aggressively. It seemed the rest of the world needed a plumber as well…she’d have to leave it for the time being.

As Monday mornings went, it hadn’t been a good start. Apart from the burst pipe, there was a load of white washing which had been transformed to a uniform bright pink. Jandy loved Lydia dearly, they were as close as twin sisters could be, but sometimes she could strangle her when she was being extra-scatty instead of just ordinarily inefficient: colouring all the washing indeed! And trust her to still be nicely tucked up in bed after a late night while everything was going haywire downstairs!

‘What’s the matter, Mummy? Are you cross? You’re very wet!’ Four-year-old Abigail looked with interest at her mother’s expression and then at the soaking floor.

Jandy sighed—cross was an understatement! What she really felt was very tired. She hadn’t had a holiday in ages and life seemed to be all work and no play. She loved her work in the A and E department of Delford General but it would have been nice to go out socially occasionally.

She smiled ruefully down at her daughter. ‘The pipe’s burst again, and your red dress was washed with all the white things and now it’s coloured everything else pink.’

‘I like pink,’ said Abigail placidly.

Jandy laughed. ‘Well, that’s all right, then!’

And of course what did a few discoloured garments matter when she might be losing the little house she rented? The final straw that morning had been the letter from the estate agent saying that the owner wanted to sell the property, but she could have first refusal if she was interested in buying.

No chance of that at the moment, thought Jandy, grimacing as she slung the sheets over the line in the kitchen. Paying for child care, a car, and just general living seemed to soak up most of what she earned. They’d just have to look around for another rented property—but she’d never find anything as good as the house they were in, or as reasonably priced.

Surely the day couldn’t get any worse. She flicked a look at her watch and sucked in her breath—she had a quarter of an hour to put on a fresh uniform and get to the hospital after dropping Abigail off at the childminder’s—she might just do it.

Jandy felt the familiar flash of guilt as she rushed back down the path after a hurried hug of farewell when she’d taken her little daughter to Pippa’s. She always seemed to be at the last minute, playing catchup and, she reflected wryly, clearing up after her sister. She turned as she closed the gate and looked back to see Abigail waving at her from the window, looking perfectly happy. She was adorable and Jandy was so lucky to have her…she just wished there was a father on hand to complete the picture…

The clock was nudging 8.05 a.m. as she parked her car in the last space of the hospital staff car park, ran up the steps and clattered through Reception on her way to the locker room.

Danny Smith, the receptionist, looked up from his lads’ mag and shook an admonitory finger at her. ‘You’d better hurry up…his lordship’s showing the new registrar round the department now.’

Damn—she’d forgotten there’d be a new person on the staff today, someone else to get used to and have to guide for a while. She’d been wrong about the day not getting any worse, she thought irritably as she pulled on her hospital greens. No doubt about it, she could feel a bad mood coming on. Of course she couldn’t begrudge Sue taking six months’ maternity leave, although she was going to miss her terribly and the fun they had. When she was feeling down, Sue would cheer her up with a joke or a teasing comment: she was a kindred spirit, and life at Delford General was going to be that much duller now without her. What she needed, thought Jandy, pulling her blonde hair back into the ponytail she wore for work, was a bit of excitement—something new to revitalise her and brighten up the everyday humdrum. And the chances of that happening at the moment were more remote than winning the lottery.

The man stood for a moment before the entrance to the A and E department looking up at the square new wing that had been attached to the old Victorian hospital. He was a tall figure, the collar of his jacket turned up against the cold, and head and shoulders above the people swirling around him. So here he was—back where he’d been born, starting over again and picking up the pieces of his life. Soon London would become a distant memory, and Delford was going to be his home once more…his and Livy’s, and he’d just have to make the best of it.

Straightening his shoulders as if bracing himself for his new life, he picked up the briefcase by his feet and started to make his way purposefully through the automatic doors into the A and E waiting room. He glanced briefly at some parents and two small children in one corner, and a man in a wheelchair gazing at a television on the wall showing a quiz show. Evidently the rush hadn’t yet started.

‘Patrick Sinclair—locum registrar for A and E checking in,’ he said to the man behind the glass window in Reception.

The staff for the daytime shift were in the kitchen, all grabbing a drink before the day started in earnest and some crisis erupted. Tim Vernon, the dapper little A and E consultant, was walking briskly out of the room as Jandy came in. Two junior nurses were gossiping and Bob Thoms, one of the registrars, was peering at the duty roster, an anxious frown creasing his brow—he was a great worrier. He turned round as Jandy came in.

‘Oh, great—what a relief, you’re here! I thought you might be ill or something and we’d be short-staffed!’ he exclaimed. ‘You OK?’

‘A burst pipe, no plumber and water all over the place,’ she said gloomily. ‘Worst of all I’ve had notice that the landlord wants to sell the house. Marvellous start to a Monday.’

Sister Karen Borley, large and kindly, handed her a cup and smiled at her sympathetically—she knew Jandy’s mornings were a little chaotic and that she was only ever late if there’d been an emergency of some kind.

‘Here you are, my girl—this’ll perk you up.’ She looked sympathetically at Jandy. ‘You’ll be looking for somewhere else to live, then—I’ll keep my eyes open.’

Jandy took a gulp of scalding coffee and closed her eyes gratefully. ‘Ah, thanks, Karen, you’re a pal. Umm, that coffee’s good…I’m coming round a bit now.’ She turned to the others. ‘Tell me, what’s this new reg like?’

‘He looks capable, although I think Tilly might find another adjective.’ Karen laughed. ‘He’s from one of the big London teaching hospitals and has a wonderful CV, so he should be sound enough.’

‘I hope he’s easy to work with,’ Jandy said mournfully. ‘It won’t be the same without Sue.’

‘If I know anything about these hot-shot doctors from down South, he’ll have an ego as big as an elephant and an inflated idea of his ability,’ commented Bob Thoms tetchily.

A picture of Terry, Abigail’s father, floated into Jandy’s mind—he had been a high-flying business man from London who had felt demeaned coming up further north than Watford Junction! Jandy had mistaken his arrogance for a kind of sophisticated confidence and had been immensely flattered by his attention—she’d been easily taken in. She wouldn’t be fooled a second time, but the thought of working with another person like that was not a comforting one.

‘So coming up to Delford will be small time to him, I suppose,’ she sighed. ‘I wonder why he’s come?’

‘We’ll get used to him,’ said Karen, picking up some files and walking towards the door. ‘I’ll see you in a few minutes for the handover from the night shift—I’m just off to check that the porter’s put the waste bins round the back. You come with me, Valerie,’ she added to one of the student nurses. ‘I’ll show you where I like my supplies kept—I can’t bear mess.’

Tilly Rodman, the other student nurse, rolled her eyes as Karen and Valerie went out. ‘I can’t believe that sister said the new reg is only “Capable”! He’s gorgeous! My blood pressure went up like a rocket when I saw him…’

Bob Thoms drained his coffee and sighed. ‘I’d like to know what this man has that I haven’t…’

He left the room, but not before his eyes met Jandy’s in amused exasperation. Tilly fell in love regularly with the senior registrars even if they looked only half-human. She would be in ecstasies about him for weeks, convinced that this was The One, as she put it on the many occasions she fell for someone.

Tilly had yet to learn, thought Jandy wryly, that looks weren’t everything. In her experience handsome didn’t always mean kind or thoughtful—sometimes it disguised selfish and cruel.

She rinsed her mug under the tap and dried it vigorously with a tea towel. What on earth did she know about men anyhow? It had been so long since she’d been out on a date—everyday life had taken over and any offers were quickly rebuffed. After Terry all her confidence had gone where relationships were concerned—she didn’t want to be hurt again and her priority now was little Abigail. Anyway, her sister had enough assurance when it came to men for both of them!

‘Frankly, Tilly,’ she said briskly, as she folded the towel neatly and hung it on a rail, ‘as far as I’m concerned, the new registrar can look like Godzilla as long as he can do the job. Unless he can patch someone up who’s been in an RTA and send them home better than they came in, I can assure you that a whole team of rugby-playing registrars dressed only in their birthday suits wouldn’t interest me…’

Tilly’s eyes swivelled to look at the door behind Jandy, and widened slightly, then she gave a little giggle. ‘Oops!’ she muttered.

Jandy whirled round and reddened. ‘Oh…er, hello,’ she said lamely to the tall, broad man who stood in the doorway. She was conscious of a strong patrician face and dark blue eyes looking into hers, one eyebrow raised quizzically.

Trust her to make a fool of herself, she thought ruefully. A flustered glance at the man confirmed that with his formidable physique he was definitely the sort who would like roaring around a rugby pitch on a wet Saturday afternoon or pounding the streets in an invigorating daily run. He was almost certainly the new registrar, and he looked every inch the super-confident hot-shot doctor from London, as Bob Thoms had put it!

His gaze flickered over her in a mildly interested manner, taking in her slightly flushed cheeks and wide dark brown eyes.

‘I don’t normally turn up for work in a birthday suit,’ he remarked blandly. ‘But I do play rugby and I hope I can send the patients home in fairly good shape!’

He had a deep attractive voice—‘well bred’ was the expression that sprang to mind.

Jandy allowed herself a prim smile, and said in a dignified tone, ‘I’m just trying to explain to Tilly here that expertise is more important than anything…’

‘Of course, I couldn’t agree more,’ the man said, nodding gravely. ‘I’m Patrick Sinclair, by the way—taking over from Sue Gordon. I was told that there might be some coffee going if I was lucky.’

His sudden smile took her by surprise, rather like the sun coming out from a cloud, and it lit up his whole face. He looked almost boyish and, Jandy supposed grudgingly, was reasonably good looking. She noticed a faded white scar that ran down the side of one cheek—the result of a rugby tackle, she imagined, and when he turned on the smile Jandy could easily understand why Tilly had fallen for him. But how would she feel if she discovered he had a wife and three children?

Jandy held her hand out to him and said rather stiffly, ‘Welcome to Delford General, then. I’m Staff Nurse Jandy Marshall, and this is Tilly Rodman, one of our student nurses.’

He turned to Tilly dipping his head slightly. ‘Ah, yes—we met before, I think. I’m looking forward to working with you.’

Tilly gulped and stared at him admiringly. ‘Yeah…great…’

‘Perhaps a cup of coffee for Dr Sinclair,’ prompted Jandy with a touch of impatience.

Tilly looked as if she was rooted to the spot by the sight of this man—surely all the women in Casualty weren’t going to buckle at the knees as soon as they saw him, Jandy thought irritably. She flicked another look at Patrick Sinclair—he was just another locum registrar passing through the department for a few months, a stopgap until Sue returned. OK, so he looked rather like a marketer’s dream for advertising some quasi-medical cure for flu—she supposed deep blue eyes in a strong good-looking face could easily persuade gullible people to buy a product…

She frowned: Patrick Sinclair had the confident air of someone who knew how attractive he was—but he was here to do a job, not act as the department’s pin-up! As a single mum juggling motherhood and a demanding job, she certainly wasn’t going to pander to his self-importance.

Karen Borley put her head round the door. ‘Tilly—can you come to the plaster room, please, and do a bit of clearing up—the place is a tip.’

‘Yes, Sister.’ Tilly thrust a cup of coffee into the man’s hand and bolted out of the room, with a final blushing look at Patrick, and Jandy was left alone with him.

In the short silence between them Jandy caught a depressing sight of herself in the mirror over the sink. She didn’t look her best—as usual her hair was scraped back into a ponytail to keep it off her face, and she hadn’t a scrap of make-up on. If only she’d put on a touch of lipstick it might have made her look less severe, less pallid, instead of which she looked what she was: an overworked single mum who’d been multi-tasking since she’d got up that morning! Not that it mattered what Patrick Sinclair thought of her looks, she told herself sharply. Nevertheless, she drew herself up to her full five feet six inches, and sucked in her stomach.

‘Have you had a tour of the department yet?’ she asked Patrick.

‘Not yet. Dr Vernon was called away and didn’t have time to show me much.’

He took a sip of coffee and for the first time she noticed the broad band of gold on his left ring finger. So he was married—a crushing blow to Tilly and probably every woman in Casualty, thought Jandy wryly. Well, she certainly wasn’t going to start moping because he was a married man, even though she had to admit that he was the first blazingly attractive male to have worked in A and E for ages—which didn’t mean she had to start thinking of love, romance or any sort of attachment. The last sort of man she needed was another hot-shot guy from the cosmopolitan life in London who found himself in the northern sticks of England and was married—she’d been there, done that.

He smiled at her. ‘So you and I are going to be colleagues—have you been at Delford General long?’

‘About three years now—I enjoy it really, most of the time. Where have you been working?’

‘In London, at S. Cuthbert’s. It’s a good hospital—I’ve been there since I qualified, but the last six months I’ve been with the London Air Ambulance for a stint.’

Jandy was impressed despite herself—this guy had some pretty comprehensive experience in trauma, and you had to have nerves of steel to cope with the serious accidents you dealt with on a daily basis.

‘Won’t you miss that? It could seem quite dull here!’

He laughed. ‘I don’t think so—I might miss the good things about London, like the river, the Houses of Parliament, all the theatres…’

Suddenly a picture flashed into her mind of him in a theatre foyer, dressed immaculately in a dinner jacket, with a gorgeous woman on his arm, an easy, sophisticated confidence about him—leading the kind of life that she could only dream of.

‘I expect,’ she said challengingly, ‘you’ll find us old-fashioned after a place like St Cuthbert’s.’

He looked at her quizzically, detecting her defensive tone, and remarked lightly, ‘I’m sure I won’t—most hospitals have similar procedures, don’t they?’

‘But what on earth made you come up to Delford?’ Jandy asked rather bluntly. ‘It sounds as if you had a wonderful life in London.’

‘My father isn’t too well and I need to be nearer him,’ he explained. ‘There’s a lot of sorting out to be done which I can’t do from London.’

Although he probably wishes he wasn’t here in boring Delford, which could boast a cinema and not much else, surmised Jandy, but she felt a little ashamed of her unwelcoming thoughts and said more gently, ‘I’m sorry about your father—that’s a worry for you, and of course it must have been a wrench to leave your exciting life in London.’

Was it her imagination, or did a fleeting glance of sadness cross his face, something indefinable that hinted that life hadn’t been that wonderful in London after all? However, when he spoke his voice was light.

‘Yes—I was very happy there…but life here will have its own advantages, I’m sure. I came from this area originally, and there’s some beautiful countryside around that I’m looking forward to exploring again and showing to my daughter. I’m coming back to my roots, you might say.’

‘That’ll be fun,’ said Jandy politely.

‘And you?’ he enquired. ‘Have you always lived and worked in Delford?’

Jandy nodded. ‘Most of the time. I did leave for a short while and went to Manchester.’ She paused for a second, then started wiping the draining board fiercely. Funny how even after all this time just the thought of the place sent a shock wave of horror through her mind. Then she turned back to him with a tight smile and said briefly, ‘It didn’t work out how I thought it would, so I came back.’

She tried to hide her feelings, but those warm brown eyes of hers couldn’t disguise the fact that something pretty awful had happened to her there, reflected Patrick. Funny—she looked like a golden girl that had everything going for her—soft fair natural looks and a healthy, curvaceous figure—who would have thought that there were any ghosts in her past? But he’d obviously touched a raw nerve there, he guessed, something that she wanted to forget…just like him, just like millions of people.

‘And you live in Delford now?’

‘Probably not for long,’ sighed Jandy. ‘I’ve just been told we’ve got to get out of the house we’re in—a pity, because it’s so near the childminder and shops. I doubt if we’ll find anywhere else so convenient—or so reasonably priced. There’s a small college in the town and all the good places get snapped up pretty quickly.’

‘I hope something turns up,’ Patrick said politely.

‘Oh, I’ll get something,’ said Jandy brightly, pushing away the horrible worry that she might not have a roof over her head in a month’s time. ‘And now perhaps I can give you a quick tour of the delights of Delford General A and E before we get cracking.’

Patrick looked at Jandy with interest as he followed her out of the room—so she had a child as well. For some reason he’d imagined her to be a free agent, but just because she had no wedding ring it didn’t mean she was unattached. He felt a momentary stab of disappointment, the reflex emotion of a hot-blooded male to a stunning woman who was already in a relationship, then shrugged inwardly. Speculating on a social life was the last thing he needed at the moment—looking after his father and little daughter would absorb all his time, and of course getting heavily involved with someone could be very dangerous, as he’d learned to his cost. At least, he reflected, there was help on hand now to look after Livy when she wasn’t at school, and she would have a lovely home and gardens to play in.

Jandy having shown him the layout of the theatres and X-ray department, they went back to the central station where computers monitoring the stage of every emergency patient’s treatment flickered and changed as the results of tests came through. On the wall behind the large curving desk were the whiteboards that listed which cubicle each patient was in, with a short résumé of their condition. A gradual building up of activity in the department had started, and a steady flow of patients was waiting to be seen by the triage nurse. In the background a child wailed from one of the cubicles in the paediatric section and a man was arguing loudly with the receptionist in the waiting room.

‘I thought this would happen,’ said Bob Thoms mournfully as he went off to one of the cubicles to examine an abscess on someone’s back. ‘I was hoping to get some new tyres from that garage opposite if we got ten minutes off for lunch, but it looks as if it’s going to be solid patients wall to wall.’

Tim Vernon, immaculate in his white coat and neatly knotted tie, came up to Patrick. ‘Sorry to leave you just then, Patrick, but you’ll soon get the hang of things, I’m sure, after all your experience in London. Anyway, it’s good to have you in the department—and I bet your father is delighted you’ve come back here to live with him. That place of his is far too big for one person. Tell him I miss our games of golf.’

So he’d moved his family in with his father, thought Jandy, standing near them as she flicked through the admissions chart. She wondered idly whereabouts in Delford Patrick’s father lived and smiled wryly. There was no chance of Abigail, her sister and herself moving in with her widowed mother while she was looking for a new place—her mother lived in a tiny house in Scotland and was busy running a truck stop café, with her boyfriend. Chloe Marshall loved her daughters and grandchild dearly, but she didn’t encourage long visits from her family—a few days were all she could tolerate!

Dr Vernon looked down at his clipboard and cleared his throat. ‘Right—let’s get started shall we? Staff Nurse—would you go with Dr Sinclair and look at the little boy in the paediatric department, number one cubicle? He’s got a gash on his leg, and a worrying bump on the head—I don’t know how he acquired it. You’d better book an X-ray.’

Tilly Rodman, passed by, pushing a dripstand, and whispered to Jandy, ‘Lucky you…send Dr Sinclair along to the plaster room when you’ve finished with him!’

For heaven’s sake, Jandy thought impatiently, the man was going to be intolerable if he felt that all the women in the unit were falling for him. She just hoped that he was good at his job.

They both walked quickly to the small wing off the main A and E department that had been designated for children. It was a small area that had been used in the past for high-dependency patients and although the walls had been decorated with nursery-rhyme characters to try and make it more child-friendly, it badly needed a make-over—and much more space.

Patrick Sinclair looked round it assessingly. ‘This is the paediatric section?’ he remarked with slight incredulity. ‘Is there a play area here for children that are waiting to be seen?’

‘We’re in line to have a larger wing very soon,’ said Jandy defensively. ‘It’s better than it used to be in the main department—of course, I’m sure you’re used to state-of-the-art facilities, but we’re short of cash here.’

He looked at her shrewdly as if he realised she was annoyed. ‘I’m not making comparisons—Cuthbert’s was a newly built hospital, so it wouldn’t be fair to do so. I was merely making an observation,’ he said smoothly. ‘Right—shall we get started?’

Annoyed by what she took to be rather high-handed criticism of her beloved Delford Infirmary, Jandy followed him into the cubicle.

Her heart went out to the little boy—large frightened eyes looked at them owlishly through wirerimmed glasses on a pale little face, and there were tear stains on his round cheeks. When they came in he knuckled his hand into his eyes to try and stop crying. She knew it wasn’t only the pain that upset him—it was the alien surroundings and not knowing what was going to happen to him next. Despite the efforts to make the room more child-friendly to a five-year-old, the place was deeply intimidating.

A purpling bump like a dark egg was on one of the child’s temples and one small leg had a long deep gash down the calf. There was something pathetic about that little limb laid across the bed.

A woman sat in a corner, looking at a magazine and chewing gum but not doing much to comfort the little boy—in fact, not taking any notice of him at all. She looked up at Patrick and Jandy with little interest, giving them a nod, and went back to her magazine.

Patrick said, ‘Good morning,’ to her courteously, then sat down on a chair by the bed and leaned forward to the child, trying to get his attention and distract him from his present terror. He smiled cheerfully and patted one plump little hand comfortingly.

‘Hello—you’re Jimmy Tate, aren’t you?’ he asked gently, having a swift look at the file he’d been given. ‘I’m Dr Sinclair and this is Nurse Marshall, and we’re going to be looking after you. Don’t you worry, we’ll have you feeling better in no time, Jimmy.’

Patrick’s voice was soothing and the familiar clichés reassuring. Gradually Jimmy’s sobs became intermittent, just the odd one shaking his little body, and although his lip still trembled, now he was looking at Patrick, gradually relaxing a little.

Jandy swivelled the overhead light above the child so that his wounds could be seen more clearly, and reflected almost with surprise that the new registrar seemed to have a good manner with his small patient—getting Jimmy to relax and trust him went a long way towards recovery. If Dr Sinclair was arrogant, he was hiding it at the moment and she relented.

‘You’re a brave boy,’ Patrick said, looking closely at the bruise on the child’s temple and then the cut on his leg. He looked up at Jandy. ‘I think we can use steristrips for this, don’t you?’

Jandy nodded and smiled reassuringly at the little boy. ‘It really will feel better when I’ve put the magic strips on,’ she said. She went to a cupboard which, when opened, revealed a stock of toys from which she pulled out a kaleidoscope. ‘Have you seen one of these, Jimmy? While I’m bandaging your poorly leg, I want you to shake that and look down it—you’ll see some lovely patterns there.’

Slowly Jimmy reached for the toy and put his eye to it. Jandy watched as the little boy became absorbed in what he was seeing then she started to swab the wound gently with saline solution.

Patrick turned to the woman, who’d barely looked up as they’d come in, continuing to be engrossed in her magazine. She seemed totally uninterested in what was happening to Jimmy.

‘Excuse me.’ His voice was courteous but firm—meant to be heeded. ‘Can you tell me what happened?’

The woman stopped chewing her gum for a second and brushed a lock of greasy hair from her eyes. She had the unkempt look of someone who had lost interest in life and herself, reflected Jandy. There were a lot like her who came to Casualty.

‘He fell off his bicycle and hit his head on the steps,’ she said tersely. ‘I told him not to ride it in the back garden with the dogs around.’

‘I take it you’re Mrs Tate—his mother?’ asked Patrick, making a few notes.

‘I’m not his mother—I’m his stepmother.’

Her voice was almost aggressive and Jandy saw Patrick look up quickly, something unfathomable in his expression, then he said smoothly, ‘Has he been sick?’

‘Yes—all over the floor of course.’

‘I see. And did the dogs snap at him while he was riding his bike?’

Mrs Tate shrugged and said in a defensive tone, ‘No, they just jumped up at him, having a bit of a lark. It was Jimmy’s fault—he was teasing them. They wouldn’t hurt a fly if they hadn’t been provoked…he’s been told often enough.’ She shifted restlessly in her chair. ‘Will this take long? I’ve got a baby at home and I had to ask my neighbour to look after her while I brought this one in.’

Patrick’s eyes met Jandy’s for a brief second—they were flinty hard. They were all taught to be impartial but she didn’t blame him for showing a hint of the fury he must be feeling on the child’s behalf. How could anyone be so unsympathetic to an injured five-year-old? A muscle tightened slightly by Patrick’s mouth and his voice was clipped.

‘It will take as long as it takes to see to this wound and make sure Jimmy’s not injured his skull—he’ll be taken to X-Ray in a minute. Now, can you tell me what time he had this accident?’

‘About an hour ago,’ Mrs Tate replied sulkily.

‘Did you see it happen?’

Her eyes shifted momentarily and she muttered, ‘No—but I sent for the ambulance as soon as I saw it was serious,’ she added self-righteously.

‘Were you out when it happened?’

Again her eyes looked away from his. ‘Just at a neighbour’s—not far away.’

‘So you don’t know if the dogs attacked him?’

Jandy could almost feel Patrick Sinclair restraining himself—it wasn’t their role to be judgemental, but it could be difficult at times. He made some notes on the file and the woman scowled.

‘I told you—they wouldn’t do that. Can I go now? You can ring me when you’ve seen to him. Stop whinging, Jimmy—you’re a big boy now.’

Big tears had started to roll down Jimmy’s cheeks again and Jandy compressed her lips—it wasn’t fair that the little boy should be chastised.

‘Perhaps you could wait and see the result of the X-ray?’ she suggested. ‘It won’t take me long to dress his wound. I take it he’s had his tetanus jab?’

Mrs Tate sighed heavily. ‘He’s had all them jabs. I’ll have to go and ring my neighbour, then…I’ll be outside the entrance if you need me.’

She disappeared down towards the waiting room and Patrick turned to Jandy. ‘We’ll need to run blood tests, Hb, CRP and respiration checks before we take him down to X-Ray and ring up Paediatrics and get someone to look at the plates.’

Jimmy looked at them both, eyes round and anxious behind his glasses. Patrick smiled kindly at him.

‘Hang on there, Jimmy, and we’ll take you down to have a photograph taken of your head—it won’t hurt a bit. I tell you what, Nurse Marshall, I think this little boy’s been one of the bravest we’ve had here today—I think he deserves something special!’

His blue eyes looked at her questioningly—not having worked at this hospital before, he wouldn’t know what rewards they offered their little patients.

Jandy grinned. ‘Quite right, Doctor—I’ve got a special medal for someone like Jimmy!’

She opened a drawer and handed Patrick a plastic medal with ‘Very Brave Patient’ printed on it, which Patrick pinned on Jimmy’s jumper. The little boy stared down at it then looked up at the adults with a shy smile.

‘Is it mine?’ he asked. It was the first time he’d spoken.

‘It certainly is—you deserve it, sweetheart,’ said Jandy. ‘And now we’ll take you to have that photograph taken.’

‘I’m not happy with that head wound and the fact he’s been sick,’ said Patrick as he and Jandy walked back from the paediatric section, leaving Tilly Rodman to stay with Jimmy and read him a story. ‘Have you rung Paediatrics yet? He’ll be kept in anyway for observation, whatever the results are.’

Jandy nodded. ‘They’ve got a bed—and at least it gives him a night away from that ghastly woman. She’d obviously left him alone while she gossiped with her friend.’

Patrick’s expression darkened, and Jandy noticed the small scar at the side of his face seemed more pronounced and livid.

‘I can’t tell you how angry that woman makes me,’ he said in a controlled, terse tone that only emphasised his disgust. ‘I’ve no doubt that that little boy’s not having a very happy life. I’ll talk to the child liaison officer about my concerns regarding the stepmother—no child should be at the mercy of someone like that. I didn’t see a shred of affection or compassion for Jimmy.’

There was such suppressed venom in his voice that Jandy looked at him with surprise. She would have thought he’d have taken a more measured approach—still taking it just as seriously but not quite so personally. After all, in an A and E department it wasn’t unusual to come across a case like Jimmy’s.

‘It’s really got to you, hasn’t it?’ she said.

He looked down at her and shrugged. ‘I guess I went over the top a bit there—took it to heart. I should be more objective, I know.’ He bunched his hands in his pockets. ‘Sorry—it’s a bit of a hobby horse of mine.’

Jandy nodded, slightly bemused by this worldlywise doctor’s soft centre—somehow she felt there was a hidden agenda behind his words.

‘I feel that way too,’ she said. ‘I don’t know how anyone could be as callous as she was…but it happens, doesn’t it? We see all sorts of cases here and often it’s quite heart-rending. And, of course, if we have any doubts about Jimmy’s treatment, we should have it investigated.’

Patrick looked down at her upturned concerned face with her wide brown eyes illuminated by a beam of sunshine through the window, honey-blonde hair shining in its light—some had escaped from the band that held it back, and suddenly he pictured how it would spill out like a sheet of soft gold over her shoulders if the band was pulled away completely…

He smiled wryly to himself. How long ago had it been since he’d touched a woman or had any kind of intimacy with one? Oh, sure, he’d thought about it when he’d been the odd one out at a party when everyone else had a partner, or lying awake in the early hours and feeling sorry for himself. But that one memorable disaster three years ago had ensured that he’d kept well away from anything but mild flirtations since then.

Of course, he thought sadly, once he’d had everything—a wonderful woman, a perfect life, and then like a bolt from the blue it had come to an end, and he couldn’t imagine ever having it again. He clenched his fists together to control his emotions. Stop it, he told himself fiercely—don’t go there! He had his darling Livy to think of now.

Then he sighed as he refocused on the real world. ‘I’d better go and write up this case report,’ he said abruptly, shifting his gaze from her face. ‘See you soon.’

Jandy stared rather bemusedly after his tall retreating figure as he strode back to the desk. When Patrick had looked at her with those intense blue eyes of his, she had felt the oddest little tug on her heart, a flicker of attraction. How peculiar was that, when only a few minutes before she’d been annoyed by his criticism of the paediatric department—another bighead from London who probably thought he knew everything!

She went to clear up the cubicle that Jimmy had occupied and reflected crossly that she hadn’t thought for a long time about men, except for the need to steer clear of them as much as possible. Then a man walked into the department with an attractive smile and amazing blue eyes and suddenly she was imagining all kinds of things! She shook her head irritably. Being too aware of married men and their thoughts was a dangerous pastime—they were strictly off-limits to her. What she had to concentrate on was finding a new place for her, Abigail and Lydia to live—and soon!

CHAPTER TWO

AFTER the initial flurry of cases there was a lull. Typical of A and E—one couldn’t predict what was going to come in, although generally Friday and Saturday nights were mayhem. Jandy finished checking the cubicles for supplies of bandages, paper towels and latex gloves, and during the ten minutes allotted for her lunch decided to ring her sister and ask her to get in touch with the agent about the lease of the house. There was no possibility of buying it, but perhaps the owner could be persuaded to give them a little more time to find something else.

Jandy walked quickly down the corridor to the payphone in Reception as Delford A and E was firmly against the use of mobile phones in the department. It was typical that someone was already using the phone, she thought with irritation. She leant against the wall near the kiosk, hoping the man would see she was waiting, then she realised that it was Patrick Sinclair.

Watching him now, she wondered what had made her think there had been anything remotely intimate in the way he had looked at her earlier. He was just an ordinary guy who happened to have the kind of sexy looks that would draw some women’s eyes—over six feet of impressive body, in fact, and thick dark hair, endearingly rumpled—but he wasn’t all that special, was he?

He finished his conversation, came out of the kiosk and gave her a smile and a half-wave as he passed her—she was surprised at the little frisson of excitement she felt when he did that. She found herself smiling as she dialled her sister’s mobile number and started to speak to her.

‘Hi, Lydia—did you get onto the agent about the house? I left the letter on the kitchen table…’

Karen Borley was writing up the whiteboard when Jandy returned. She looked at Jandy’s exasperated face.

‘Has something happened?’ she enquired.

Jandy groaned. ‘I’ve just been speaking to my sister. She’s been in touch with the agent and we definitely have to be out in four weeks—sooner if possible! Can you believe Lydia has told the agent we’d be interested in a massive house at an enormous monthly rent? She seems to think we’re rolling in money.’

‘Oh, dear—Lydia is rather impetuous, isn’t she?’ said Karen vaguely as she shuffled through some case sheets.

‘Of course she’s away the next week,’ added Jandy, ‘Leaving me to organise everything! Typical!’

Patrick Sinclair looked up from the computer and said noncommittally, ‘If you really are stuck for somewhere to live, I do happen to know a place that’s empty and needs a tenant—it’s a bit neglected and it’s in the country, so it may not suit you. But if you get desperate…’

Jandy was surprised that a man like him should bother himself with her problems. ‘Really? It’s very kind of you to suggest it…I might be very interested…do you know the owner?’

He nodded. ‘Yes—I know him well.’

‘Perhaps if you could find out the rent he’s asking…’

‘No problem,’ Patrick started to say, when Karen put down the phone and interrupted them, her cheeks slightly pink as if she’d heard something of interest. She looked around, making sure no one was listening.

‘Mr Vernon’s just been on to me about a patient he’s been looking at in the small theatre,’ she said in a hushed voice. ‘He was picked up by the police outside a pub earlier this morning and taken back to the station on a drunk and disorderly charge. Evidently he’d had a bit of a fracas with some young lads…but it’s rather a delicate situation.’

‘So far normal,’ murmured Jandy. ‘So why is it a delicate situation?’

Sister flicked a look at her and said impressively, ‘I think you’ll know what I mean when you see him—it’s Leo Parker, the agony uncle who does that chat show on television.’

Jandy raised her eyebrows. ‘Wow! Leo Parker, the Voice of Reason? The press will be interested, won’t they?’

‘Exactly!’ Karen pursed her lips. ‘I don’t want a word of who this patient is to get out—I can’t bear those journalists running all over the place, disrupting the department, questioning everybody. If they get a whiff of this, it’ll be bedlam.’

‘Better prepare for bedlam, then,’ Jandy said under her breath. ‘This place is like a sieve when it comes to gossip!’

She heard Patrick chuckle as they filed into the cubicle. ‘Sounds familiar…’ he murmured.

‘Mr Parker was just about conscious when he was brought in,’ explained Karen. ‘The police were concerned that it might not be just drink that’s affecting him and that he could have had a crack on the head.’

‘Are his X-rays clear?’ asked Patrick.

‘Not a sign of anything. Mr Vernon has already had a look at his skull plates—quite normal. But he’s in and out of consciousness, so something’s wrong. We’re waiting for his bloods to come back, but I’d like him closely monitored. Give me a shout if you find anything.’

Leo Parker lay on the bed, the impressive head of thick grey hair, which was his trademark, matted with blood from a gash on his forehead. He shifted restlessly from side to side, moving his limbs and muttering incoherently. Jandy was struck by how ordinary he looked, just as vulnerable as every other patient who came in to A and E reduced to helplessness by their condition.

‘Poor man—not quite the towering TV personality at the moment,’ murmured Jandy, looking at the trace on the graph over the bed giving his oxygen levels and pulse rate. ‘Heart rate’s accelerated and his BP’s quite low.’

‘He’s right out of it at the moment,’ commented Patrick, bending over the man and shining a small torch into the pupil of each eye. Then he bent the patient’s legs, striking below the knees sharply. ‘His reflexes seem OK. What about his plantar reflex?’

Jandy took a pencil out of her pocket and drew it across the base of the man’s foot, which curled in response.

‘Nothing wrong there…’ She bent forward and sniffed the man’s breath. ‘Nice and beery—he’s obviously had a few bevies,’ she remarked. She frowned and sniffed again. ‘Wait a minute…there’s something else…Funny smell…acetone, I think.’

Patrick leaned close to the man and nodded back at her, touching the man’s face. ‘Absolutely right—he’s sweaty as well. Alcohol-induced hypoglycaemia,’ he added almost to himself. ‘I don’t suppose he checked his blood-sugar levels after having a bit to drink. That’s why his speech is so garbled—his glucose levels will be very low.’

‘If he’d been left in that police cell, it could have been curtains.’

‘Yup—he’s lucky they brought him in when they did. We’ll give him fifty grams of glucose intravenously. I take it the packs are in the cupboard up there?’

Jandy handed Patrick one of the pre-packed syringes and they both watched the patient after he’d been injected to see how long it took for him to come round.

‘If only he realised the harm he could do to himself when he drinks,’ he remarked drily. ‘Because he’s diabetic everything can shut down when the nervous system becomes sluggish…organ damage, brain damage, you name it.’

Leo gradually opened his eyes and looked around him in a confused way. ‘Hello, there,’ Patrick said. ‘Feeling a bit better, Mr Parker? I think you’re nearly with us again.’

The man gazed up at him blankly, blinking his eyes and staring around fuzzily, his system trying to restore reactions and memory.

‘Well, that took just over a minute—miraculous!’ murmured Patrick. He nodded at Jandy approvingly.

God, his eyes were amazing! Once again they seemed to hold hers for a second before she could drag her glance away. Irritably she thought that it was becoming something of a habit, imagining that the man was looking at her in some sort of special way. He wasn’t hers to fantasise about.

She reached into the cupboard without comment and slipped on latex gloves before starting to swab the cut on Leo Parker’s head. He made a feeble attempt to bat her hand away then began to stir, trying to sit up before flopping back against the pillow.

‘Where am I?’ he mumbled.

‘You’re in Delford General Casualty Department,’ said Patrick. ‘You overdid the alcohol, I’m afraid…not a good idea when you’re diabetic. We’ll get you a bed.’

There was a sudden pause, and a girl’s impatient voice floated over to them beyond the curtain. ‘I need to see Leo now. I was with him when he fell…he’ll want me with him…’

‘Are you a relative?’ Jandy recognised the voice of Danny Smith, the A and E receptionist.

‘I’m his partner—and his PA.’ The girl’s voice sounded defiant. ‘Delphine Hunt.’

‘Well, the doctor’s looking at him now—can you wait a minute?’

Patrick went over to the curtains and swished them back. ‘You can come in now if you like—Mr Parker’s coming round gradually. Perhaps you can tell us what happened.’

Delphine Hunt had bright red hair cascading past her shoulders, and a very short dress under a fake-fur evening jacket. She brushed Patrick aside without a word and flung herself onto the bed next to Leo Parker, kissing him passionately then breaking into sobs. ‘Babe—are you OK? I’ve been out of my mind with worry…’

‘Hey—wait a moment,’ said Patrick, moving forward and pulling the girl away. ‘Let the patient breathe! He’s just coming out of a diabetic coma—he’s not fit to be manhandled.’

‘Is he going to be OK? I thought those thugs were going to kill him…’ Delphine started to cry and the make-up around her eyes ran in little black rivulets down her cheeks.

Jandy pushed a chair forward. ‘Why don’t you sit down here and tell us what happened?’ she said gently.

‘And keep your voice down please,’ added Patrick drily.

‘We…we were having a quiet drink, and these yobbos started calling him names, just because he’s on TV.’ Delphine pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and blew her nose. ‘Leo’s a bit impetuous and he went over and had it out with them…and the next thing he’s on the floor and the police have been called. They said he was drunk and disorderly. He never was—he’d only had a few, and it wasn’t his fault at all!’

‘I guess you’ve been trying to get to him since he was taken to the police station, haven’t you?’ said Patrick.

‘I’d just got to the station when the ambulance drove off and I saw Leo being taken on it and driven away…they wouldn’t tell me a thing.’

From the bed, Leo Parker whispered, ‘Delphine—what are you doing here?’

The girl took his hands. ‘Oh, babe, you’re OK. Thank God!’ She turned to Patrick and Jandy. ‘Can we go now? I’ll call a taxi.’

‘Mr Parker certainly can’t go,’ interrupted Patrick sternly. ‘You need to stay in overnight—we’ve got to get you balanced,’ he said to Leo. ‘You know that, don’t you, or you might find yourself in a coma again.’

Leo struggled to sit up. ‘I can’t stay here the night,’ he said, aghast. ‘I’ve got to be at the studio by lunchtime. What time is it now?’

‘Ten-thirty—you won’t have time to recover properly by then,’ said Jandy.

‘I will,’ said Leo, his voice slurring slightly. He swung his legs over the bed and started to get down. ‘I’m going to discharge myself—I’m perfectly all right.’

Patrick put his hand on the man’s shoulder. ‘You’ve got to give yourself time to recover—drink and diabetes don’t mix. And you’ve got a nasty gash on your head.’

Leo stared at them all and then, as if the reality of the situation fully hit him, put a hand over his face and groaned.

‘Oh, my God. If the press get hold of this…’ He looked up at them pleadingly. ‘If this gets into the papers, I’m sunk. I’m recording a show about alcohol abuse today. I can’t let it get out that I’ve had a bit too much of the sauce myself.’

‘Everything here is strictly confidential,’ Patrick promised.

Leo looked at him wryly. ‘Things have a funny way of getting out into the public domain, you know.’

‘Then let’s go now, Leo, darling, before anyone knows. I’ve booked us into the hotel together,’ said Delphine eagerly, laying a possessive hand on his arm.

Leo sighed heavily. ‘Have you got two rooms?’

Delphine looked a little abashed. ‘Well—no. You said we could be together, babe…’

‘You silly mare! Do you think the press are dumb? My PA and I sharing a room doesn’t look good—have you forgotten I’m a family man to the public?’

Jandy flicked the briefest of glances towards Patrick over Delphine’s head, and his gaze held hers for a fraction of a second, before returning impassively to the scene before him.

‘I really wouldn’t advise you leaving the hospital yet,’ he said firmly.

‘Advise what you like—but don’t ruin my career. I’ll do what I damn well like. I can discharge myself if I want to.’

He was interrupted in mid-sentence by the sound of the curtains being viciously flung back, and a small plump woman stood before them, staring at Leo Parker with undisguised fury.

‘So you’ve done it again, have you?’ she said coldly. ‘Will you never learn, you old fool? And you can forget about discharging yourself as well.’

There was a short silence then Patrick said evenly, ‘Excuse me, but just who are you?’

The woman turned to him and said icily, ‘I’m Phyllis Parker, young man, Leo Parker’s wife, and I’m just about sick of him making such a Charlie of himself!’

‘Oh, God—Phyllis!’ Leo Parker flopped back on his pillows and closed his eyes. In the corner, Delphine began to cry.

Patrick and Jandy watched as Leo Parker was pushed down the corridor on the way to Medical, closely followed by his wife, still berating him. They disappeared into the lift and Patrick and Jandy went into Sister Borley’s office behind the central station.

He turned to Jandy and said sardonically, ‘I’ve never watched his programme before, but I’m going to make a point of seeing it and hearing his views on family life and the evils of drink.’

‘Same here,’ said Jandy, trying to keep a straight face.

‘I reckon Leo Parker’s going to have some explaining to do…’

His clear blue eyes laughed down at her, his grave face softened by humour, and Jandy answered his amusement with a grin, mutually diverted by the little scene that had just been played out. Patrick Sinclair could be quite engaging when he wanted to, she admitted.

Karen put down the phone she’d been speaking into. ‘That,’ she said with compressed lips, ‘was the Delford Gazette. It’s already got out that Leo Parker’s a patient here—and I’m not surprised after all the fuss!’

She went out of the room and wiped the whiteboard vigorously, venting her irritation by obliterating the annoying Mr Parker’s name now he had been taken to the medical ward. Jandy went to deal with a young girl with a staple stuck down her fingernail.

It was a fairly routine afternoon—a sprained ankle, a scalded arm and a child with a hacking cough who should have been taken to see his G.P., according to Mr Vernon, and not brought to A and E, cluttering up the department.

Karen sat down at her desk with a sigh of relief. ‘Right,’ she said comfortably. ‘At last! Time for a breather. It could be a chance for us to catch up on all the patient assessment forms and maybe—’

The sudden jarring sound of the trauma bleep split the air. ‘Trauma call, trauma call, trauma team to A and E Resus. ETA three minutes…trauma call…’

Karen swore softly to herself. ‘Wouldn’t you know it? I spoke too soon.’

The relaxed atmosphere changed and there was an air of tension as everyone available gathered round the central station, prepared to spring into action.

Tim Vernon came out of a cubicle, swinging his stethoscope impatiently as if he couldn’t wait to get going, and Max Fuller, the porter, started pushing trolleys down the passage and out of the way of the entrance. Karen’s voice was authoritative and clipped, her look of motherly cosiness changed to brisk efficiency as she spoke on the phone to the ambulancemen.

‘OK, everyone—an RTA on the main Delford road. My information is that there’s an injured female hit by a motorcycle, lacerations to her face and in great pain. A cyclist with obvious fracture of right leg, and a pillion passenger with a very low BP and head injury, possible status 3. ETA any minute now.’ She put down the phone and turned to the staff. ‘Patrick, you take the injured female with lacerations on her face in Theatre One and the status 3 patient will go into the big theatre.’

‘I’ll take the status 3 patient,’ said Dr Vernon. ‘Bob—you come with me.’

‘That’s three patients for urgent X-rays. John Cooper can take the suspect broken leg with Tilly. Max—make sure we’ve got enough oxygen cylinders and dripstands in that big theatre. Jandy, can you be on hand to help where necessary?’

Jandy felt the familiar ripple of adrenalin kicking through her body as they waited for the ambulances to arrive. It was peculiar to Casualty—that tremor of excitement mixed with apprehension in dealing with absolutely any injury or illness thrown at them, and often time was not on their side. Split-second decisions had to be made and the staff in the department were the first line of defence.

Tilly nibbled at her nails nervously. ‘It’s nerveracking, not knowing what you’ll get. I hate these horrible accidents. I’m frightened I’ll faint or something.’

Jandy placed a reassuring hand on Tilly’s arm—the young nurse had only been in the department a few weeks and it was a very fast learning curve for all the students.

‘It’s always a bit scary—knowing that how we deal with patients here can determine the outcome of their eventual recovery. And every case is different,’ she admitted. ‘But once we’re in the thick of it, there’s no time to think. You put everything else out of your head.’

Patrick stood near the door, looking down the drive where the ambulances would come from. He turned and smiled at the young nurse. ‘But this is what it’s all about, isn’t it? Being able to turn your hand to anything. In the end it becomes instinctive. It’s exciting!’

He grinned at Jandy, eyes dancing with anticipation, confidently looking forward to the challenge of the unknown. Everyone’s idea of the perfect doctor, she thought wryly, his hospital greens seeming to emphasise his athletic physique. She was uneasily aware that she was just a little too conscious of Patrick’s attraction and that devastating easy smile of his, but he was just an ordinary married guy, wasn’t he? Not her type at all. She bit her lip. This man was getting too much under her skin.

She glanced at Bob Thoms—what a contrast! His brow was furrowed with anxiety as usual. He was a good doctor, painstaking and thorough, but always racked by worries that his best might not be good enough—what a pity she couldn’t find someone like him attractive. Bob was free and single with no hint of arrogance or over-confidence about him—but incredibly dull!

She forced herself to concentrate on the moment, to push out of her mind the distracting fact that Patrick was standing close to her. Then the flashing blue lights of the ambulances appeared as they came up the drive, and gradually the whine of the sirens died down as they reached the entrance. In a few minutes the doors swished open and three trolleys were being pushed through into the wide passage. A plump woman clutching a large handbag was running beside one of the trolleys, tears streaming down her face. Jandy took her arm gently but firmly and steered her to the side of the passage.

‘Come with me for a minute,’ she said gently. ‘Just let the doctors see to the patient…Are you a relative?’

‘I’m her mother…Mrs Thorpe…’ The woman clung to Jandy hysterically, hiccuping sobs shaking her, as the shock of the incident she’d just witnessed set in. ‘She…she’s having a baby. Please help her. She mustn’t lose this one—she’s had two miscarriages already.’

‘Come with me to the desk and let’s take her details. First, what’s her name?’

‘Brenda Evans…she’s twenty-five. She’s been longing for this baby…’

Mrs Thorpe’s voice started to rise in panic again and Jandy quickly said, ‘Tell me what happened…take it slowly.’

Gradually the woman started to calm down, and in the telling of the story her mind was forced to concentrate on something other than what was now happening to her daughter.

‘This motorbike…it came towards us with no warning. It was going that fast. I saw it coming, and I screamed to Brenda, but it hit her and sent her sprawling on the ground.’ Mrs Thorpe paused for a second to control her tears. ‘Will…will she lose the baby?’

With the skill born of much practice in calming worried relatives, Jandy led her to a chair and said comfortingly, ‘She’s in very good hands, Mrs Thorpe, and I know they will be monitoring her very closely—especially now they know her medical history. I’m going to get you a cup of tea and then I’ll go and find out just what’s happening to her. You try and calm down—she’ll need you to look after her when she goes home.’

A paramedic was wheeling Mrs Thorpe’s daughter briskly into one of the small theatres. ‘This is Brenda Evans,’ he said. ‘She’s in a lot of pain, but superficially at least she only seems to have lacerations. BP 100 over 70, pulse 120. Reasonably stable. She’s also seven and a half months pregnant.’

‘What happened?’ asked Patrick, bending over the supine figure on the trolley.

‘It looks like a motorcycle tried to take a corner at speed and hit this lady a glancing blow—she fell forward onto her face.’

Jandy had come into the cubicle to see what was happening so that she could update the patient’s mother on the latest information. She was watching the girl’s face—there was a large graze on her chin, covered with grit.

‘She’s very pale…’ she murmured to Patrick. ‘Obviously she’s in shock, but she’s blinking her eyes all the time. What’s causing that?’

He frowned and looked at Brenda’s face closely. ‘Rapid blinking is often a sign of a sharp pain. I wonder…Can you speak, Brenda?’

Brenda grimaced and mumbled something through stiff lips.

‘I reckon it’s something to do with her jaw—see how stiffly she’s holding it,’ Patrick said. ‘Moving it seems to cause her extreme discomfort.’

He ran his hands lightly over her face, watching her reactions carefully. Brenda sucked in her breath and groaned.

‘I’m sorry, Brenda,’ he said gently. ‘That’s all I’m going to do at the moment. We’ll give you something for the pain, don’t worry. You’ll be all right—just try and relax and don’t do anything that might move your jaw.’

He patted her arm, trying to reassure her and with his calm voice showing her that he was very much in charge. You got to know people’s skills quite quickly when you worked with them in Casualty, reflected Jandy. Patrick had a sure touch with patients, knowing that the familiar platitudes would soothe Brenda. He knew that physical and aural contact with a frightened patient could reduce the effects of shock.

It was one of Karen’s repeated adages to her team: ‘Remember that reassurance is one of the most powerful clinical tools you’ve got.’ When it came to medicine, Dr Sinclair was ticking quite a few boxes so far, admitted Jandy.

‘Can you arrange to have Brenda X-rayed ASAP?’ Patrick asked Jandy.

‘But she’s pregnant,’ she pointed out.

Patrick shook his head. ‘She’s going to need surgery on her jaw, I’m afraid, and we’ve got to know exactly what the damage is. The X-ray won’t be over the baby—fortunately she’s late on in her pregnancy.’

‘Do you think she’s broken her jaw?’

‘The first thing to hit the floor was her chin I reckon—like that!’ Patrick demonstrated this by smacking his fist into his other hand. ‘That’s where the cut is. I’ll bet what’s happened is that the force of the impact has snapped off her left condyle—the part of the bone that forms the hinge of the jaw.’

‘She hit her chin just at the wrong point, then.’

Patrick nodded. ‘Every time she moves her jaw, bone fragments are scraping across the tissue surrounding her ear.’

Jandy grimaced. ‘Poor woman—that’s seriously painful. What about pain relief?’

‘After her X-ray give her ten milligrams of morphine and get her booked into Surgical—I’ll speak to the surgical registrar. We need someone from Maternity to look her over as well. We don’t want her having this baby yet.’

Jandy split open a pair of lanolin gloves and with exquisite gentleness swabbed the wound on Brenda’s chin. ‘Her mother’s really anxious about her,’ she said. ‘I think it would help if you explained Brenda’s injuries rather than me—you’re the expert.’

He laughed. ‘I’ll do my best.’

Patrick sat down next to Mrs Thorpe on one of the chairs in the corridor, leaning towards her as he described what he thought had happened, giving a short but lucid explanation. Gradually the tension left the woman’s face until she was actually giving a watery smile by the time he was called away to the phone.

‘Oh, he’s a lovely man that Dr Sinclair,’ said Mrs Thorpe when Jandy returned from trying to get a slot for Brenda’s X-ray. ‘I feel she’s in really good hands. Could I go and see Brenda now?’

Jandy smiled. ‘I’m sure it would do her good if you just sat by her and held her hand until they take her for X-rays. The calmer she’s kept, the better.’

‘I understand,’ said Mrs Thorpe. The tea and the chat to Patrick about her daughter had composed her and she was ready to cope again. She followed Jandy to the small theatre where her daughter was and sat by her bed, flicking a wondering eye at all the monitoring equipment around the bed.

‘Eh, it’s like a space capsule in here,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen so many tubes and dials!’

She picked up her daughter’s hand and squeezed it. ‘You’ll be alright, love,’ she said softly. ‘I’ve had a chat to that Dr Sinclair—he’s doing his best for you, I know.’

Patrick popped his head round the curtain. ‘Has the X-ray been booked yet?’ he asked.

‘There’s a bit of a delay—one of the machines is being serviced and there’s a queue for the other,’ Jandy informed him.

He frowned. ‘For God’s sake—surely it’s usual to service the machines at a quieter time? How long are they going to be?’

‘About twenty minutes, I think.’

‘That’s ridiculous! This needs to be done immediately—surely there should be a procedure for urgent cases?’

Jandy sympathised with him. It was incredibly frustrating to have treatment blocked for the patient, but she also noticed the implied criticism of the hospital. Poor old Delford General wasn’t awash with funds for any more X-ray machines.

‘I’m sorry, there’s not much I can do about it. There’s only one machine at the moment for a lot of patients.’

‘I’m not accusing you of causing the hold-up,’ he said tersely. Then his tone softened. ‘I’m sorry—I’m not knocking Delford, believe me.’

He looked at her steadily then left the room, and she blushed at his accurate reading of her thoughts. Actually, she agreed with him that somewhere along the line there had been inefficiency. Perhaps she was being a little too prickly where Patrick was concerned!

Karen bustled up to Jandy, her pale blue tunic top straining slightly over her full figure, her face pink from exertion. Jandy often wondered why Karen was so plump as she seemed to run everywhere, and had an inexhaustible supply of energy.

‘Ah, there you are,’ she puffed. ‘I think we’re under control now. Dr Vernon’s booked the head injury into the neurological ward for obs, and Brenda Evans will be prepped for Theatre later.’ She shot a look at her watch. ‘Time for the handover soon and then home, sweet home, thank goodness!’ Her voice dropped. ‘By the way, I’m rather impressed by Patrick Sinclair—aren’t you? As I said before, he seems extremely capable!’

‘Yes,’ allowed Jandy cautiously.

He seemed extremely everything—wonderful with his patients and a good clinician. But she still had reservations about this self-assured man and his drop-dead handsome looks—she would see how he performed over the next few weeks! Men like him tended to be arrogant, everything dropping into their laps very easily, and she could see how he might break some poor girl’s heart if he was free. What a good job it was that he was a family man and a no-go area—she’d learned from her own experience that loving a married man was not an option.

CHAPTER THREE

‘I DON’T believe this,’ muttered Jandy, looking at the huge tailback of vehicles round the car park. For the third time that month the car-park barrier had jammed and from her experience it could take at least three quarters of an hour to sort out. Nothing for it but to get the bus and leave the car in the car park—she hated to keep Pippa waiting when she was due to pick up Abigail. It had been a gruelling week and she was tired—although her fears about working with the new registrar had been groundless.

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