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Her mood was pensive, though. Was she simply imagining things? No matter how Abby tried to brush it off, the thought niggled that the caller might have been Richard. Given that she had told him she didn’t want anything more to do with him, he might well have been messing about, playing silly games with her.
It was a sad state of affairs, because their relationship had been good to begin with, she recalled. Richard had been sexy, appealing, persuasive, and she had found herself falling for him over the weeks that had passed.
It had only been later that she had realised there was another side to him, a part of his nature that needed to be in control, to take over, to have everything his way. That was when she had tried to break off the relationship, but her retreat had only made him more possessive, more argumentative, and when the split had finally come it had been fraught with tension. It had been worrying when he had accused her of seeing other men, falsely as it happened, and he had become steadily more resentful and threatening.
‘We belong together,’ he’d said, in a way that chilled her to the bone. ‘If you ever try to leave me, you’ll regret it. I won’t let you go, and I’ll not let any other man come near you.’
And now here she was, several months later, wondering whether even now it was still not finished with.
‘Do you think you could go and dream about your love life in your own time?’ Jordan’s voice cut tersely across her thoughts. ‘We’re running an emergency department here, not a sweethearts’ convention.’
‘I wasn’t…I mean…I was just called to the phone, that’s all. I wasn’t letting it interfere with my work.’
‘Weren’t you? While you were lost in fantasyland, patients have been lining up to be seen. If you can’t keep your mind on the job, you shouldn’t be here at all.’
‘I’m allowed to take a break,’ she said, her green eyes flashing him a cool challenge. ‘Just because I choose to take it in a phone booth instead of the doctors’ lounge doesn’t make it any less valid, and I’m still around and ready if a major emergency comes in.’
‘If you say so,’ he threw back drily. ‘Looking at you, some might have doubted that.’ He thrust a chart into her hand. ‘The woman in cubicle two has a possible migraine. She, at least, has a reasonable excuse for having a muzzy head.’
Abby took the chart without another word and went to examine the woman. Insufferable man. What was his problem? Did he think it was his life’s work to provoke his colleagues, or was it just her that he had it in for? She had only met him the previous day and already she was having to bite her tongue for fear of landing herself out of a job.
Whatever had made her think being part of his team was a rung up the professional ladder? She might as well have tried cosying up to a snarling tiger.
CHAPTER THREE
JESSICA was still not feeling too well when Abby returned home that evening.
‘Did you go and see the doctor?’ Abby asked, going into the kitchen of the house next door. Jessica nodded. She still had very little colour and looked as though she was on the verge of collapse.
‘He said it was probably a virus of some sort, but he gave me something to settle my stomach and told me to rest.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘That’ll be the day—who can rest with a four-year-old running around? Actually, though, I don’t feel as sick as I did this morning. Just this awful tiredness.’
‘I can watch Chloe for you for an hour or two if you want to go and lie down,’ Abby offered. ‘You look as though you could do with a break.’ She filled a kettle with water and set about making her neighbour a hot drink. ‘If you’ve not eaten much today, perhaps you could try a little soup. I’ll make some for you, shall I?’
‘You’re an angel. Thanks, though I’m not really hungry.’ Jessica ran a hand wearily through her dark hair. ‘You and Mrs Matthews have been so good to me today. Corinne took Chloe to nursery school and brought her home for me. I feel really bad about putting on you both like this.’
‘Nonsense. I’m sure we both want to do what we can for you. It’s not easy when you’re feeling ill and you’ve a child to care for. As soon as you’ve eaten something, you should go and rest for a while. Doctor’s orders!’
‘Bless you,’ Jessica said, closing her eyes for a moment as though her eyelids were weighted down. ‘If you’re adamant about it, I think I will. Chloe certainly seems to have taken to you.’
‘She’ll be fine with me. Don’t you worry. I’ll bring her back later and help get her ready for bed, if you like.’
‘Thanks.’
Abby waited while Jessica managed some of the soup, and then settled her into bed.
Chloe was perfectly happy to come and make pink play dough in Abby’s kitchen, and she used biscuit cutters to make shapes out of it while Abby got on with tackling a few chores.
‘Dan’el writed a letter to my mummy,’ Chloe volunteered, holding up a squidgy heart shape for Abby to admire. ‘There was kisses on it.’
‘That must have been nice for her,’ Abby commented with a smile. There had been a letter from him among her own post when she had arrived home.
‘Mmm. I think she liked it,’ the child agreed. ‘But Mummy’s eyes was wet. She said she had a cold.’
Poor Jessica. Abby could imagine how wretched she must be feeling right now, both physically and mentally, with her family keeping their distance and the man she had come to rely on half the world away. And that was without trouble from her ex-husband to give her grief.
* * *
Over the next few weeks, Abby had problems of her own to contend with at the hospital, and she was on edge a lot of the time, trying to steer a steady course through the minefield of working with Jordan.
If he thought she was the slightest bit hesitant, he would query her decisions and make her account for every test that she ordered. So far, she had managed to keep on top of things, but it hadn’t been easy.
Late one afternoon, she stopped by the desk to sign some forms for the laboratory and found herself stifling a yawn. She had been run off her feet for most of the day, and the thought of going home and soaking in a relaxing bath was uppermost in her mind.
Unhappily for her, Jordan chose that moment to sweep by, and pounced with deadly accuracy. ‘Are we keeping you up, Abby?’ he enquired in a low drawl.
She gazed up at him blankly for a moment.
His blue-grey eyes slanted down over her slender figure, noting the slight tilt of her shoulders and the negligent way she stood, one leg pressed up against the wooden front of the desk, the other foot eased out of her shoe while she rubbed her aching ankle against the calf of her other leg. She was suddenly aware of the narrow fit of her skirt, and the way her cotton top drifted upwards over her rib cage as she raised a hand to cover her mouth.
Too late, she tried to change the yawn into a cough, and his mouth twisted sardonically.
‘Nice try,’ he muttered drily, ‘but totally unconvincing. Maybe you should tell your boyfriend to go home earlier so that you can get some sleep.’
The unfairness of it made her open her mouth in protest, but he had already moved on, striding towards the light box where he stopped to view a set of X-rays and offered an opinion to the registrar who was frowning at them in worried indecision.
It wasn’t as though there was a scrap of truth in his accusation, Abby thought resentfully. She had stayed on last night after her shift should have ended to follow up on a patient that she had been admitting, and as a consequence she had only managed a couple of hours’ sleep before coming into work this morning.
Why was it that she always seemed to get the sharp end of his tongue, while the rest of her colleagues escaped with samples of his dry wit?
It was so unfair, but she wasn’t going to demean herself by explaining what had really happened, especially when he was deep in conversation with his registrar.
He crossed her path again when she was about to get in her car to drive home a couple of hours later.
‘Finished for the day?’ he enquired softly.
‘I have,’ she said, flicking a frosty glance in his direction. ‘Any objections?’
She regretted the words as soon as she had said them. Junior doctors simply didn’t talk to consultants like that—not if they wanted to get on. But it was out now, and he was giving her a brooding stare through thick, dark lashes, his eyes half-closed.
‘None at all. Enjoy your evening,’ he said.
It wasn’t what she had expected and it threw her off balance. She sent him a wary glance. ‘I will.’
She drove home and tried to shake the image of his sculpted features from her mind. He was there to vex and challenge her throughout her working day and she refused to let him disturb her off-duty time as well.
It wasn’t so easy to dismiss him from her thoughts, though, and she tried to forget about him by spending the evening with Jessica and Corinne Matthews in Jessica’s garden. They sat out on the patio and talked quietly, sipping at glasses of chilled wine until it began to get dark. Then they decided to turn in for the night and each went back to her own home.
Abby was tired, and when she finally lay down in bed, she fell asleep straight away.
She didn’t know what it was that woke her. One minute she was deep in slumber, the next she was sitting up in bed and staring around at the night shadows in confusion. The clock on her bedside table read a quarter to four, and she thought she caught a faint beam of light arcing through her bedroom curtains.
It was probably just moonlight, but for some reason her heart was pounding heavily. Then she heard a sound, like the click of a gate, and she suddenly felt fearful for Jessica and Chloe next door. Was Jessica’s ex-husband on the prowl?
She slid her feet into soft mules and pulled her fleecy wrap around herself, while she tried to decide what she should do. Jessica might need some help, and Abby was determined to protect her and Chloe from any untoward happenings.
She crept down the stairs, thankful that the dim glow from the lamp she had left on in the hall lit her way. Going out through the back door of the house, she headed for Jessica’s kitchen door. It was locked, but as she looked up, Abbey could see that the bathroom window was open.
Just then, the kitchen light came on, and Abby heard Chloe’s small voice. ‘Daddy here, Mummy?’ she was asking.
Jessica’s answer was muted, and Abby tapped on the kitchen door and said in an urgent low voice, ‘Jess—it’s Abby. Can I come in?’
Abby heard the slide of a bolt and then Jessica opened the door. She was white-faced and her hands shook a little, but Abby could see that she was trying to appear calm for Chloe’s sake.
‘Me have lem’nade, Mummy?’
‘No, Chloe. Not now.’
Abby went into the kitchen and shut the door behind her. ‘I thought I heard something and I came to see if you were all right.’
Jessica nodded, and said in an undertone, ‘I thought I heard someone prowling around outside, and got up to take a look. Then Chloe said she saw someone in her room, but she might have been dreaming.’
Abby looked at her in alarm. ‘Have you checked the house?’
‘Yes. There’s no one here now, but the bathroom window has been forced open.’ She frowned. ‘I’ll have to get that fixed as soon as I can. Perhaps I can block it up some way, just for tonight.’
‘Why I not have lem’nade?’ Chloe asked, rubbing her eyes.
‘It’s not good for you at this time of night. I’ll make you a milk drink instead. You go and curl up on the settee and I’ll bring it to you.’
Jessica settled her daughter, then fetched a saucepan from the cupboard and set about making hot chocolate.
She was trembling still, and Abby said quietly, ‘I’ll do that. You sit down. You look a bit wobbly on your feet.’ She went to the hob and watched the milk heat in the pan, then poured it into mugs and stirred the chocolate thoughtfully. ‘Do you think it was Colin?’
‘I don’t know. It might have been, but with him, trouble usually starts when he’s had too much drink. He’s not usually one to creep about.’ She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. ‘Unless he’s trying out some new way to upset me…I suppose you must think I’m feeble to let him get to me this way?’
Abby shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think that at all. I know what it’s like to deal with someone who’s unstable. I knew a man in London who could be menacing if he didn’t get his own way. He was possessive and determined to have me as his girl friend. I even had to change my phone number because of him. I tried talking to him, reasoning with him, but nothing worked, and in the end I left. It was too wearing on my nerves to have to keep on dealing with him.’
‘I think it’s a bit like that with Colin. He can’t bear to think that I don’t want him any more. That’s why he keeps coming back.’
‘Have you called the police about tonight’s break-in?’
Jessica shook her head. ‘There doesn’t seem to be much point. Whoever it was has gone now, and it would only upset Chloe to have police all over the place. Perhaps I’ll tell them in the morning, when she’s at nursery.’
‘I suppose you’re right.’ Abby looked at Jessica’s pale face and said, ‘Shall I stay here with you for the rest of the night?’
‘Would you? I must admit I’m feeling really wound up about all this. It’s frightening to think that someone’s been creeping about my house.’
‘I would feel exactly the same.’ Abby gave her a hug. ‘We’ll all feel safer if we stay together.’
She doubted that either of them would get much sleep after that, but at least Chloe didn’t appear to be too upset by the incident. They took the little girl up to bed a few minutes later, and she looked out of her bedroom window to satisfy herself that all was well before she climbed into bed. Then she got up again and said sleepily, ‘Me go in Mummy’s bed?’
‘All right.’ Jessica hugged her daughter close, and Abby settled down for what was left of the night in Chloe’s room. When Jessica woke her in the morning, in time to get ready for work, she felt as though she had only just fallen asleep.
In the A and E department, Jordan was his usual energetic, breezy self, and Abby looked at him sourly through bleary eyes as the morning progressed. How did he manage to be so full of life, with such endless vitality? If he said as much as one small thing to her about looking tired she would not be responsible for her actions. As it was, she was still feeling anxious about the events of the night before, and her mood was fractious.
Chloe had bounced downstairs to breakfast as happily as ever, and had seemed not to be affected by what had gone on, except that when she had been biting on a slice of buttery toast she had said curiously, ‘Dat man still in your house, Abby?’
Abby had blinked. ‘What man, sweetheart?’
Chloe had shrugged awkwardly and had then looked at her with a touch of uncertainty as though she had felt she might have said something wrong. ‘I sawed him.’
‘When did you see him, Chloe?’
‘In the dark. I looked out my window.’ Then Chloe had stopped speaking, and had resolutely refused to answer any more questions, no matter how tentatively they had been put to her.
Abby had been worried. She had made a quick check of the house, realising too late that she had left the back door unlocked in her haste last night, but there had been no sign of anything untoward, nothing appeared to be missing, and she had begun to wonder whether Chloe had imagined it.
Then, as she had been preparing to set off for work, she had discovered the imprint of a man’s shoe in the shrubbery outside her patio doors. The sight of it had sent a chill through her whole body.
Perhaps Jordan recognised that she was out of sorts and not to be messed with, because he gave her a sideways glance as she snatched up a patient’s case file from the desk and briskly scanned it, but he said nothing.
‘I’ve had Mr Stevens’ test results back from the lab,’ Sarah said, coming up behind her, and Abby jumped as though she had been scalded.
Recovering, she said quietly, ‘Thanks, Sarah. I’ll let him know.’
They were busy in the department, and she didn’t have time to stop and dwell on things, but in the late afternoon, when they had finished dealing with a nasty road traffic accident, she was having a quick cup of coffee when Sarah called her to her next patient.
‘She’s been brought in by a neighbour,’ Sarah said. ‘The neighbour thinks she’s been knocked about by her boyfriend—there’s a history of injuries over the past three years, but the woman isn’t admitting to anything. She has a fever and she looks very poorly. She’s complaining of severe headache and pain in and above the eye. I’ve put her in cubicle five.’
‘OK, I’ll take a look at her right away.’
Abby was shocked by the woman’s facial injuries, but she didn’t let her see that she was affected. Instead, she murmured sympathetically, ‘That looks as though it must be really hurting, Rhea. How did it happen?’
‘I tripped and banged my face on a door,’ the woman answered. She was aged around thirty, and her cheekbone and eye socket were swollen. There was also a split in the skin, which looked as though it had started healing but infection had set in. She looked ill.
‘This must have happened a few days ago,’ Abby murmured, inspecting the wound. ‘It looks as though the cheek has become infected…it must be very tender. Didn’t you go and see your doctor for treatment?’
‘No, I…I didn’t want to bother him. I thought it would clear up on its own.’
‘Are you having any problems with your vision?’
‘Yes, things are a bit blurred.’
‘All right, Rhea. You rest there, while I go and consult with a colleague. We’re going to have to admit you, so that we can clear up the infection as quickly as possible. It’s possible that there’s a small clot forming at the back of the eye, which is building up the pressure there and causing your visual disturbance, so we need to deal with that as well. I’ll leave you with the nurse, so that she can take a swab. That will help us to identify the bacterium causing the infection.’
She left the cubicle and went to find Jordan. He was with a patient, but he came to talk to her as soon as she asked, and she quickly told him about Rhea.
‘I think I need to start her on antibiotics straight away, and I’m organising a scan. Should I give her anticoagulants? I’m pretty sure that she has a thrombosis as a result of the infection, and her sight is already being affected.’
‘Yes, that’s the best course of action. If we don’t act quickly she could lose her sight altogether. It’s not something that we come across often these days—mostly infections are cleared up by antibiotics before they can get this far, but she probably left it because she didn’t want to let anyone see what had happened.’
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