Praise for

Kate Hardy:

‘BOUND BY A BABY moved me to tears many times. It is a full-on emotional drama. Author Kate Hardy brought this tale shimmering with emotions. Highly recommended for all lovers of romance.’

—Contemporary Romance Reviews

BOUND BY A BABY

won the 2014 RoNA

(Romantic Novelists’ Association) Rose award!

‘When you pick up a romance novel by Kate Hardy you know that you’re going to be reading a spellbinding novel which you will want to devour in a single sitting, and A CHRISTMAS KNIGHT is certainly no exception.’

—CataRomance

‘Bailey, I really want to kiss you,’ he whispered.

‘I want you to kiss me, too,’ she whispered back.

That was all the encouragement he needed. He dipped his head again, and took his sweet time kissing her. Every brush of his mouth against hers, every nibble, made him more and more aware of her. And she was kissing him back, her arms wrapped as tightly round him as his were round her.

He wanted this to last for ever.

But then he became aware that the music had changed and become more up-tempo, and he and Bailey were still swaying together as if the band was playing a slow dance. He broke the kiss, and he could see the exact moment that she realised what was going on, too. Those gorgeous dark eyes were absolutely huge. And she looked as shocked as he felt. Panicked, almost.

This wasn’t supposed to be happening.

‘I … um …’ she said, and tailed off.

‘Yeah.’ He didn’t know what to say either. What he really wanted to do was kiss her again …

Dear Reader

When I wrote IT STARTED WITH NO STRINGS … I was drawn to the heroine’s best friend, Bailey Randall—she’s one of these irrepressibly cheerful people (quite like me!) and, given that she loves the gym and dance-based classes (ahem … again, quite like me!), I really had to give in and write her story.

But Bailey’s irrepressible cheeriness hides a deep sadness. And when she meets seemingly dour Scot Jared Fraser she discovers that he’s hiding a few things, too. She doesn’t think she can give him what he wants out of life, he completely misreads her, and yet they discover that they can’t resist each other. When Bailey’s worst nightmare and Jared’s deepest dream come true, will they realise that they could end up healing each other’s hearts?

I hope you enjoy their story.

I’m always delighted to hear from readers, so do come and visit me at www.katehardy.com

With love

Kate Hardy

KATE HARDY lives in Norwich, in the east of England, with her husband, two young children, one bouncy spaniel and too many books to count! When she’s not busy writing romance or researching local history, she helps out at her children’s schools. She also loves cooking—spot the recipes sneaked into her books! (They’re also on her website, along with extracts and stories behind the books.)

Writing for Mills & Boon® has been a dream come true for Kate—something she wanted to do ever since she was twelve. She’s been writing Medical Romances™ for over ten years now. She says it’s the best of both worlds, because she gets to learn lots of new things when she’s researching the background to a book: add a touch of passion, drama and danger, a new gorgeous hero every time, and it’s the perfect job!

Kate’s always delighted to hear from readers, so do drop in to her website at www.katehardy.com

A Baby to Heal
Their Hearts
Kate Hardy

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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To C.C. Coburn and Cathleen Ross—hope you enjoy Herod!

Table of Contents

Cover

Praise

Excerpt

About the Author

Dear Reader

Title Page

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

EPILOGUE

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

‘SHE’S A BONNY LASS, our Bailey,’ Archie said.

Jared’s heart sank at the expression on the coach’s face. Clearly Archie had taken a fancy to the researcher. And Jared had a nasty feeling that this might be a case of the coach’s libido taking over from his common sense.

Allegedly, this ‘bonny lass’ researcher had a system that could reduce soft-tissue injuries among the players. So far, so good—but the figures being bandied about were crazy. In Jared’s experience, when something sounded too good to be true, it usually was. And he could really do without some pretty, flaky girl distracting the players and getting in the way when he needed to treat them. Especially when he’d only just started his new job as the doctor to the youth team of a premiership division football club.

He’d been here before, when a manager’s or player’s head had been turned by a pretty girl, and the outcome was always messy. Worse still, it tended to have an impact on the rest of the team. With a bunch of teenage lads, this could get very messy indeed.

But he kept his thoughts to himself and gave the coach a polite smile. ‘That’s nice.’

Hopefully this Bailey woman would get bored quickly, or her system would be debunked, and they could go back to a more sensible way of preventing soft-tissue injuries—like sport-specific training, after he’d assessed each of the players and taken a proper medical history.

In the meantime, he’d have to grit his teeth and be as polite and as neutral as possible.

‘Bailey—oh, good, you’re here. Come and meet Jared Fraser, the new team doctor,’ Archie McLennan called over from the side of the football pitch as Bailey walked through the players’ tunnel.

Bailey smiled at the youth team’s coach, but she made sure that she stood just far enough away so that Archie couldn’t put his arm round her shoulders. She liked him very much as a colleague—he was at least prepared to listen to new ideas and he’d been more than fair with her on the research project so far—but she really wasn’t in the market for a relationship.

Particularly with someone who was recently divorced and with a lifestyle that really didn’t work for her; that was just setting things up to fail. And Bailey had failed quite enough in her relationships, thank you very much. She wanted life to be simple in the future—full of her family, her friends and her work, and that was enough for her. She didn’t need anything more.

‘Jared, this is Bailey Randall—the doctor whose research project I was telling you about,’ Archie said.

For a moment, Jared looked as if he’d seen a ghost. Then he seemed to pull himself together and gave her a brief nod of acknowledgement. ‘Dr Randall.’

But he didn’t smile at her. Did he not approve of women being involved with a football team? Was he not good at social skills? Or—given that his accent was quite distinctive—was he just living up to the stereotype of the slightly dour, strong-and-silent Scotsman?

It was a shame, because he had the most gorgeous eyes. A deep, intense blue—the colour of a bluebell carpet. If he smiled, she’d just bet his eyes would have an irresistible twinkle.

Which was crazy. Since when did she think so fancifully? Bluebells, indeed.

‘Pleased to meet you,’ she said, giving him her brightest smile, and held her hand out for him to shake.

He gave another brief inclination of his head and shook her hand. His grip was firm, brief and very businesslike. He still didn’t smile, though. Or say any kind of social pleasantry.

Oh, well. It wasn’t as if she’d need to have that much to do with him, was it? Her project—to test a monitoring system to see if it could help to reduce the number of soft-tissue injuries in the team—had been agreed by the football club’s chair of directors. She’d been working with Archie, the youth team coach, at training sessions and on match days when they played at home, and so far the system’s results were proving very interesting indeed.

‘Hey, Bailey.’ John, one of the players, came over to the side and high-fived her.

‘Hey, John. How’s the ankle?’ she asked.

‘It’s holding up, thanks to you,’ he said with a smile.

‘And you’re still wearing that support?’

He nodded. ‘And I’m doing the wobble-board exercises, like you showed me last time,’ he said.

‘Good.’

‘Bailey helped out on a couple of sessions when she was here and your predecessor called in sick,’ Archie told Jared. ‘John sprained his ankle a few weeks back.’

‘Sprained ankles are the most common injury in football,’ Bailey said, just so Jared Fraser would know that she did actually understand the situation—maybe he was the dinosaur kind of man who thought that women knew next to nothing about sport. ‘He was running when he hit a bump in the field, the sole of his foot rolled under and the movement damaged the ligaments on the outside of his ankle.’ She shrugged. ‘The wobble-board training we’ve been doing reduces the risk of him damaging his ankle again.’

Jared gave her another of those brief nods, but otherwise he was completely impassive.

Oh, great. How on earth was he going to connect with the players? Or maybe he was better at communicating when he was in work mode, being a doctor. She certainly hoped so, because the boys were still young enough to need encouragement and support; they weren’t likely to respond to dourness.

‘I ought to give you each other’s mobile phone numbers and email addresses and what have you—in case you need to discuss anything,’ Archie said.

‘I doubt we will,’ Jared said, ‘but fine.’

Oh, what was the guy’s problem? She itched to shake him, but that wouldn’t be professional. Particularly in front of the youth team. Doctors, coaches and managers were supposed to present a united front. OK, so strictly speaking she didn’t work for the football club—she was here purely as a researcher—but she still needed to be professional. ‘Give me your number,’ she said, ‘and I’ll text you with my email address so you have all my details.’

Once that was sorted out, she took her laptop out of its case. ‘OK, guys, you know the drill. Let’s go.’ As the players lined up, she switched on her laptop, then called each team member by name and handed him a monitor with a chest strap, checking each one in with the laptop as she went.

‘So what exactly is this system?’ Jared asked when the players had filed onto the field to warm up. ‘Some kind of glorified pedometer, like those expensive wristband gadgets that tell people they woke up three times during the night, but don’t actually tell them why they woke up or what they can do about it?’

He sounded downright hostile. What was his problem? she thought again. But she gritted her teeth and tried her best to be polite. ‘It does measure the number of steps the players take, yes,’ she said, ‘but it also monitors their average speed, the average steps they take per game, their heart rate average and maximum, and their VO2.’ VO2 measured the amount of oxygen used by the body to convert the energy from food into adenosine triphosphate; the higher the VO2 max, the higher the athlete’s level of fitness.

He scoffed. ‘How on earth can you measure VO2 properly without hooking someone up to a system with a mask?’

‘It’s an estimate,’ she admitted, ‘but this system is a lot more than just a “glorified pedometer”.’ She put exaggerated quotes round the phrase with her fingers, just to make the point that she wasn’t impressed by his assessment. Sure, once he knew what the system did and how it worked, she’d be happy to listen to him and to any suggestions he might have for improving it. But right now he was speaking from a position of being totally uninformed, so how could his opinion be in the least bit valid?

‘The point is,’ she said, ‘to look at reducing the number of soft-tissue injuries. That means the players get more time to train and play, and they spend less time recovering from injuries. This particular system has been tested with a rugby team and it reduced their soft-tissue injury rate by seventy per cent, and my boss thinks it’s worth giving it a try on other sports.’ She gave him a grim smile. ‘Just so you know, I’m not trying to put you out of a job. If anything, I’m trying to make your life easier by taking out the small, time-consuming stuff.’

‘And you’re actually a qualified doctor?’ he asked, sounding sceptical.

Give me strength, Bailey thought, but she gave him another polite smile. ‘Remind me to bring my degree certificate in with me next time,’ she said. ‘Or you can look me up on the Internet, if you’re that fussed. I run sports medicine clinics three days a week at the London Victoria, so you’ll find me listed in the department there, and I spend the other two working days each week on a research project.’

‘So you’re using this system of yours with other teams as well?’ he asked.

‘No—this is the only team I’m working with, and I only do one research project at a time. My last one was preventative medicine,’ she explained. ‘Basically I worked with patients who had high blood pressure. The aim was to help them to lose weight and maintain lean muscle mass, and that reduced both their blood pressure and their risk of cardiovascular incidents.’ She couldn’t resist adding, ‘And by that I mean heart attacks and strokes.’

‘Right.’ Jared stared at Bailey. Archie had called her a ‘bonny lass’, but she was so much more than that. She was truly beautiful, with a heart-shaped face and huge brown eyes—emphasised by her elfin crop. She looked more like some glamorous Mediterranean princess than a doctor.

But, in Jared’s experience, beautiful women spelled trouble and heartache. His ex, Sasha, had used her stunning looks to get her own way—and Jared had fallen for it hard enough to get very badly burned. Nowadays he was pretty much impervious to huge eyes and winsome smiles. But he’d already seen how Archie was following Bailey round like a lapdog; he had a nasty feeling that Bailey Randall had used her looks to get her own way with her ridiculous bit of computerised kit, the way Sasha always used her looks.

Still, at least this system of hers wasn’t something that would actually hurt the players. It wouldn’t be of much real use—like the pricey fitness wristbands he’d referred to earlier, it wouldn’t give enough information about what was actually wrong or how to fix it—but it wouldn’t do any real harm, either.

Jared spent the session on the side of the pitch, ready in case any of the players had an injury that needed treating. But there were no strains, sprains or anything more serious; and, at the other end of the scale, there wasn’t even a bruise or a contusion.

Half a lifetime ago, he’d been one of them, he thought wryly. A young hopeful, planning a career in the sport and dreaming of playing for his country. He’d actually made it and played for the England under-nineteen squad, scoring several goals in international matches. But Bailey Randall’s bit of kit wouldn’t have done anything to save him from the knee injury in his final game—the tackle that had stopped his football career in its tracks. Jared had ended up pursuing his original plans instead, studying for his A-levels and following in the family tradition by taking a degree in medicine.

The lure of football had drawn Jared to work with a club as their team doctor, rather than working in a hospital or his parents’ general practice. And he still enjoyed the highs and lows of the game, the camaraderie among the players and hearing the supporters roar their approval when a goal was scored.

At the end of the training session, Archie turned to Bailey. ‘Over to you.’

Jared watched in sheer disbelief as Bailey proceeded to take the youth team through a series of yoga stretches and then breathing exercises.

What place did yoga have on a football pitch? In his experience, the players would do far better working on sport-specific training. As well as ball control, they needed to focus on muscular endurance and lower-body strength, and also work on explosive acceleration and short bursts of speed. If Archie wanted him to do it, Jared could design a training programme easily enough—either a warm-up routine that would work for the whole team, or some player-specific programmes to help deal with each player’s weak spots—and it would do a lot more for the players’ overall neuromuscular co-ordination than yoga would.

But having a go at Bailey Randall in front of the team wouldn’t be professional, so Jared kept his mouth shut until the lads had gone for a shower and she was doing things on her laptop. Then he walked over to her and said, ‘Can we have a quick word?’

She looked up from her laptop with an expression of surprise, but nodded. ‘Sure.’

‘What exactly does your box of tricks tell us?’ he asked.

‘It analyses each player’s performance. For each player, I can show you a graph of his average performance over the last ten matches or training sessions, and how today’s performance compares against that average.’

So far, so good. ‘Which tells us what?’

‘The system will pick up if a player is underperforming,’ she said. ‘Maybe he’s coming down with a cold but isn’t showing any symptoms yet—and if he’s sick he’s more at risk of sustaining injury and shouldn’t be playing.’

He gave her a sceptical look. ‘So you’re telling me you can predict if a player’s going to get a cough or a cold?’

‘No, but I can predict the likelihood of the player sustaining an injury in his next match, based on his performance today and measured against an average of his last ten sessions.’

‘Right.’ Jared still wasn’t totally convinced. And then he tackled the subject that bothered him most about today’s antics. ‘And the yoga?’

‘As a football team doctor—someone who’s clearly specialised in sports medicine—you’d already know that dynamic stretches are more useful than static stretches.’ She held his gaze. ‘But if you want me to spell it out to prove that I know what I’m talking about, dynamic stretches means continuous movement. That promotes blood flow, strength and stability. It also means you can work on more than one muscle group at a time—so it’s more functional, because it mimics what happens with everyday movements. And you only hold the stretch for a short period of time, so the muscle releases more effectively and you get a better range of movement with each repetition.’ She raised her eyebrows, as if challenging him to call her on it. ‘Happy?’

He nodded. She did at least know her stuff, then. Even if she was a bit misguided about the computer programme. ‘So you’re a qualified yoga teacher?’

‘No. But a qualified teacher—the one who’s taught me for the last five years—helped me put the routine together.’

‘Right. And the breathing?’

She put her hands on her hips and gave him a hard stare. ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake! Are you going to quiz me on every aspect of this? Look, the project’s already been approved by Mr Fincham.’ The chairman of the club’s board of directors. ‘If you have a problem with it, then maybe you need to speak to him about it.’

‘I just don’t see what use yoga is going to be to a bunch of lads who need sport-specific training,’ he said.

‘“Lads” being the operative word,’ she said. ‘They’re sixteen, seventeen—technically they’re not quite adults, and most of their peers are either still in education or starting some kind of apprenticeship. I won’t insult them by calling them children, because they’re not, but they still have quite a lot of growing up to do. And, in the profession they’ve chosen, they’re all very much in the public eye. The media hounds are just waiting to tear into the behaviour of overpaid footballers, whipping up a frenzy among their readers about how badly the boys behave.’

‘That’s true,’ he said, ‘but I still don’t get what it has to do with yoga.’

‘Discipline,’ she said crisply.

‘They already have the discipline of turning up for training and doing what Archie tells them to do.’

‘Holding the yoga poses also takes discipline, and so does the breathing. So it’s good practice and it helps to underline what Archie does with them. Plus it’s good for helping to deal with stress,’ she said.

That was the bit Jared really didn’t buy into.

She clearly saw the scepticism in his expression, because she sighed. ‘Look, if they get hassled by photographers or journalists or even just someone else in a club when they’re out—someone who wants to prove himself as a big hero who can challenge a footballer and beat him up—then all they have to do is remember to breathe and it’ll help them to take everything down a notch.’

‘Hmm,’ he said, still not convinced.

She threw her hands up in apparent disgust. ‘You know what? You can think what you like, Dr Fraser. It’s not going to make any difference to my research. If you’ve got some good ideas for how the data can be used, or about different measurements that would be useful in analysing the team’s performance, then I’d be very happy to listen. But if all you’re going to do is moan and bitch, then please just go and find someone else to annoy, because I’m busy. Excuse me.’

Bailey Randall clearly didn’t like it when someone actually questioned her. And she still hadn’t convinced him of the benefits of her project. ‘Of course you are,’ he said, knowing how nasty it sounded but right at that moment not caring.

As he walked away, he was sure he heard her mutter, ‘What an ass.’

She was entitled to her opinion. He wasn’t very impressed by her, either. But they’d just have to make the best of it, for as long as it took for Archie and the team director to realise that her ‘research’ was all a load of hokum.

CHAPTER TWO

‘HE’S IMPOSSIBLE. TALK about blinkered. And narrow-minded. And—and—Arrgh!’ Bailey stabbed her fork into her cake in utter frustration.

To her dismay, Joni just laughed.

‘You’re my best friend,’ Bailey reminded her. ‘You’re supposed to be supportive.’

‘I am. Of course I am,’ Joni soothed. ‘But you’re the queen of endorphins. You always see the best in people, and to see you having a hissy fit about someone—well, he’s obviously made quite an impression on you.’

‘And not a good one.’ Bailey ate a forkful of cake and then rolled her eyes at the plate. ‘Oh, come on. If I’m going to eat this stuff, it could at least reward me with a sugar rush.’

‘Maybe it just makes you grumpy.’

Bailey narrowed her eyes at her best friend. ‘Now you’re laughing at me.’

Joni reached over the table and hugged her. ‘I love you, and you’re in an almighty strop. Which doesn’t happen very often. This Jared Fraser guy has really rattled you.’

Bailey glowered. ‘Honestly. He quizzed me on every single aspect of my project.’

‘Which is better than just dismissing it.’

‘He did dismiss it, actually. He thinks the players should be doing sport-specific training.’

Joni coughed. ‘You’re the sports medicine doctor, not me. And I seem to remember you saying something about sport-specific training being the most effective.’

‘But it’s not the only kind of training they should be doing,’ Bailey said. ‘Yoga means dynamic stretches, which are more effective than static ones. And there’s the discipline of holding the pose and doing the breathing. It’s really good for the boys, and it helps them to focus.’

‘Maybe you should make Jared do the stuff with the boys,’ Joni suggested. ‘And you can make him do extra planks.’

‘Don’t tempt me.’ Bailey ate more cake. ‘Actually, Joni, that might be a good idea. He needs to chill out a bit. Downward dog and breathing—that would do the trick.’

‘I’d love to be a fly on the wall when you suggest it to him,’ Joni said.

‘No, you wouldn’t. You hate people fighting—and he really doesn’t like me.’

‘You don’t like him, either,’ Joni pointed out.

‘Well, no. Because he’s rude, arrogant and narrow-minded. With men like him around, I’m more than happy to stay single.’

They both knew that wasn’t the real reason why Bailey was resolutely single. After her life had imploded two and a half years ago, her marriage had cracked beyond repair. And Bailey still wasn’t ready to risk trying another relationship. She didn’t know if she ever would be.

‘I don’t know what to say,’ Joni said, giving her another hug, ‘except I love you and I believe in you.’

‘You, too,’ Bailey said.

‘And I worry about you. That you’re lonely.’

‘That’s because you’re all loved up. Which is just as it should be,’ Bailey said, ‘given that it’s just under two months until you get married to Aaron. And he’s a sweetie.’

‘Even so, I worry about you, Bailey.’

‘I’m fine,’ Bailey said, forcing herself to smile. ‘Just grumpy tonight. And don’t breathe a word of this to my mum, or she’ll say that I’m attracted to Jared Fraser and I’m in denial about it.’

‘Are you?’ Joni asked.

Bailey blew out a breath. ‘You’re about the only person who could get away with asking that. No. He might be nice looking if he smiled,’ she said, ‘and to be fair he does have nice eyes. The colour of bluebells. But even if he was as sweet as Aaron, I still wouldn’t be interested. I’m fine exactly as I am. I don’t need anyone to complicate my life.’

Her words were slightly hollow, and she was pretty sure that Joni would pick up on that. But to her relief Joni didn’t push it any further, or comment on that stupid remark she’d made about bluebells.

She wasn’t attracted to Jared Fraser. She wanted to give him a good shake and tell him to open his mind a bit.

And bluebells were out of the question.

Before the next match, Bailey had a meeting with Archie to discuss the latest results from her software. As she’d half expected, Jared was there. Still playing dour, strong and silent. Well, that was his problem. She had a job to do.

‘Travis is underperforming,’ she said, showing them the graph on her laptop screen. ‘It might be that he’s had too many late nights over the last week, or it might be that he’s coming down with something—but I’d recommend that he doesn’t play as part of the team today.’

‘I’ve already assessed the squad this morning, and they’re all perfectly fit,’ Jared said.

‘A player who’s underperforming is at a greater risk of soft-tissue injury,’ she reminded him.

‘According to your theory. Which has yet to be proven, because if you pull a player off every time they do a few steps less per game, then of course he won’t get a soft-tissue injury, because he won’t actually be playing. And if you follow that through every time, you’ll end up with a really tiny pool of players. And the rest of them won’t have had enough practice to help them improve their skills.’

‘If they’re off for weeks with an injury, that’s not going to help them improve their skills, either,’ she pointed out.

‘Travis is fine.’ He folded his arms. ‘You’re making a fuss over nothing.’

‘Travis isn’t fine.’ She mirrored his defensive stance. ‘But it isn’t our call. It’s Archie’s.’

‘Fine,’ Jared said.

Archie looked at them both and sighed. ‘I’ll have a word with the lad.’

Clearly Travis was desperate to play, because Archie came back to tell them that the boy was in the team.

If Jared said ‘Told you so’, she might just punch him.

He didn’t. But it was written all over his face.

Cross, Bailey sat on the bench at the side of the pitch and texted her best friend: Jared Fraser has to be the most smug, self-satisfied man in the universe.

A few seconds later, her phone beeped. She glanced at the screen, expecting Joni to have sent her a chin-up-and-rise-above-it type of message, and was surprised to see that the message was from Jared Fraser. Why would he be texting her? He was sitting less than six feet away from her. He could lean across and talk to her. He didn’t need to resort to texting.

Curious, she opened the message. Herod?

What?

Don’t understand, she texted back. Ridiculous man. What was he on about?

Her phone beeped a few seconds later. Your message: «Herod Fraser has to be the most smug, self-satisfied man in the universe.»

Then she realised exactly what had just happened.

Oh, no.

She’d been typing so fast that she obviously hadn’t noticed her phone autocorrecting ‘Jared’ to ‘Herod’. And Jared’s name was right next to Joni’s in her phone book. When Bailey had tapped on the recipient box, she’d clearly pressed the wrong name on the screen.

So now Jared Fraser knew exactly what she thought about him.

Which could make life very awkward indeed.

Sorry, she typed back. Not that she was apologising for what she’d said. She stood by every word of that—well, bar the autocorrected name. She was only apologising for her mistake.

Didn’t mean to send that to you.

I’d already worked that one out for myself.

She sneaked a glance at him to see if she could work out how much he was going to make her pay for that little error, and was shocked to realise that he was actually smiling. He wasn’t angry or even irritated; he was amused.

There was a sudden rush of feeling in her stomach, as if champagne was fizzing through her veins instead of blood. Totally ridiculous. But when the man smiled, it changed him totally. Rather than being the dour, hard-faced, slightly intimidating man she’d instinctively disliked, he was beautiful.

Oh, help. She really couldn’t afford to let her thoughts go in that direction. For all she knew, he could be married or at least involved with someone. She knew nothing about the man, other than that he was the new youth team doctor and he didn’t believe in her research at all.

‘Sir, are you the Jared Fraser?’ Billy, one of the substitutes, asked, coming over to sit in the pointedly large gap on the bench between Bailey and Jared.

The Jared Fraser? Why would there be something special about a football team’s doctor? Bailey wondered.

‘How do you mean?’ Jared asked.

‘Me and the lads—we saw it on the Internet. We weren’t sure if it was you. But if it is—you were one of the youngest players ever to score a goal in the England under-nineteen team. And on your debut match,’ Billy added breathlessly. ‘And you scored that goal in the championship, the one that won the match.’

‘It was a long time ago now. I haven’t played in years,’ Jared said.

Bailey couldn’t quite work this out. Jared had been a star football player as a teenager? Then how come he was a doctor now? He didn’t look that much older than she was—five years at the most, she reckoned—so surely he could still play football. Or, if he’d retired from football, it was more likely that he would have become a coach or a manager. Footballer to medic was quite a career change. Especially given that you needed four years at university followed by two years’ foundation training, and then you had to work your way up the ranks. To be experienced enough to have a job as a football team doctor, Jared must have been working in medicine for at least ten years. Maybe more. So why had he switched careers?

Feeling slightly guilty about being so nosy—but she could hardly ask the man himself, given how grumpy and impossible he was—she flicked onto the Internet on her phone and looked up ‘Jared Fraser footballer England team’ in a search engine.

The photograph was eighteen years old now, but the teenager was still recognisable as the man she knew. Jared Fraser had indeed been a footballer. One of the youngest players to score a goal for his country, at the age of seventeen. He’d played in several international matches and had scored the winning goal in a championship game. All the pundits had been tipping him to be one of the greatest players ever. But then, according to the online biography she was reading, he’d been involved in a bad tackle. One that had given him an anterior cruciate ligament injury that had ended his playing days.

So his dreams had been taken from him and he’d ended up in a totally different career. Poor guy. It would, perhaps, explain the dourness. She’d be pretty grumpy, too, if she was no longer able to do her dream job.

Maybe she’d give Jared Fraser just a little bit of slack in future.

Though not from pity. She remembered what it felt like, being an object of pity. It was one of the reasons why she’d moved departments. She might’ve been able to stick it out, had it not been for the guilt—the knowledge that people felt they had to be careful around her instead of beaming their heads off about a piece of personal good news, the kind of joy everyone else would celebrate with. Because how did you tell someone you were expecting a baby when you knew they’d lost theirs, and in such a difficult way?

Yeah. Bailey Randall knew all about broken dreams. And how you just had to pick yourself up, dust yourself down and pretend that everything was absolutely fine. Because, if you did that, hopefully one day it would be just fine.

Halfway through the match, she noticed Travis lying on the ground, clutching his leg. Jared was already on his feet and running towards the boy; play had stopped and Jared was examining the player as she joined them.

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked.

‘Let me finish the SALTAPS stuff,’ Jared said.

‘SALTAPS?’ It was obviously some kind of mnemonic, but not one she’d come across before.

‘Stop play, analyse, look for injury, touch the site, active movement, passive movement, stand up,’ he explained swiftly. ‘Travis, what happened?’

‘I don’t know—there’s just this pain down the back of my left leg,’ the boy said, his face pale with pain.

Gently, Jared examined him. ‘Did you hear a pop or a crack before the pain started?’

‘I’m not sure,’ Travis admitted. ‘I was focusing on the ball.’

‘OK. Does it hurt when you move?’

Travis nodded.

‘I want you to bend your knee. If it hurts, stop moving straight away and tell me.’

The young player followed Jared’s instructions and winced. ‘It really hurts.’

‘OK. I’m not even going to try the last bit—getting you up on your feet. I think you’ve got a hamstring injury, though I need to check a couple more things before I treat you. Archie’s going to need to substitute you.’

‘No, he can’t!’ Travis looked devastated. ‘I’ll be all right in a second or two. I’ll be able to keep playing.’

Jared shook his head. ‘Play on when you’re injured and you’ll do even more damage. You need treatment.’

Bailey had been pretty sure it was a hamstring injury, too, given Travis’s symptoms. Hopefully it would be a partial rupture and wouldn’t affect the whole muscle. ‘Dr Fraser, you need to be on the pitch in case there’s another injury,’ she said. ‘I’ll take Travis to the dressing room and finish off the assessments for you.’

He looked at her and, for a moment, she thought he was going to refuse. Then he gave a brief nod. ‘Thank you, Dr Randall. That would be helpful.’

‘I’ll talk to you when I’ve assessed him,’ she said. Even though she was pretty sure that they’d recommend the same course of treatment, strictly speaking, Jared was in charge and Travis was his patient, and she was only here for research purposes. She didn’t have the right to make decisions for Jared.

She supported Travis back to the dressing room. There was a wide, flat bench that would do nicely for her purposes; she gestured to it. ‘OK. I want you to lie down here on your back, Travis, so I can go through the assessments and see how much damage you’ve done.’

‘There’s no need, really. I’ll be all right in a few minutes,’ Travis said, but she could see that his mouth was tight with pain.

‘I still have to assess you, or Dr Fraser will have my guts for garters,’ she said with a smile. ‘OK. I’m going to raise your legs one at a time, keeping your knees straight. Tell me as soon as it hurts, OK? And I’ll stop immediately.’ She took him through a range of tests, noting his reactions.

‘I’ll put a compression bandage on—that’ll stop the pain and the bleeding inside your ligament, which causes the inflammation—and an ice pack,’ she said when she’d finished. ‘And now I’m going to make you a cup of tea, and I want you to sit there with your leg up and the ice pack on the back of your thigh for the next ten minutes or so, while I go and talk to Dr Fraser, OK?’

‘Yes, Doc.’ He sighed. ‘Am I going to be out of the team for long?’

‘For at least a couple of weeks,’ she said. ‘I know it’s hard and I know you want to play, but it’s better to let yourself recover fully now than to play on it too soon and do more damage.’ She finished making the tea. ‘Sugar?’

‘No. You’re all right.’ He gave her a rueful smile. ‘Thanks, Doc.’

‘That’s what I’m here for. And painkillers,’ she said. ‘Are you allergic to anything, or taking any medication for anything?’

‘No.’

‘OK. I’ll give you a couple of paracetamol for now—you can take some more in another four hours—and I’ll see what else Dr Fraser suggests.’ She patted his shoulder. ‘Chin up. It could be worse.’

‘Could it?’ Travis asked, looking miserable.

‘Oh, yes. Imagine having an itch on your leg in the middle of a really hot summer day—except your leg’s in a full cast and you can’t reach the itchy bit.’

That earned her another wry smile. ‘OK. That’s worse. Because I’d be off even longer with an actual break, wouldn’t I?’

‘Yes. But you’re young and fit, so you’ll heal just fine—as long as you do what Dr Fraser says.’

‘I guess.’

She left him miserably sipping his mug of tea while she went to find Jared.

Jared knew the very moment that Bailey stepped out of the tunnel onto the field, even though his back was to her. The fact that he was so aware of her was slightly unnerving. They didn’t even like each other—he’d known that even before she’d accidentally sent him that text saying exactly how she felt about him, in very unflattering terms. Dressed in a hooded sweatshirt, baggy tracksuit pants and flat training shoes, Bailey Randall should’ve looked slightly scruffy and absolutely unsexy—the complete opposite to his über-groomed ex-wife.

The problem was, Bailey was gorgeous. And those unflattering baggy clothes just made him want to peel them off and see exactly what was underneath them.

Not good. He didn’t want to be attracted to her. He didn’t want to be attracted to anyone.

Work, he reminded himself. This is work. You have an injured player, and she’s helped you out. Be nice. Be polite. Be professional. And stay detached.

‘How’s young Travis?’ he asked when she reached him.

‘Pretty miserable,’ she said.

Yeah. He knew how it felt, being taken off the pitch with an injury when you were desperate to keep playing. And, even though Travis’s injury was relatively minor and he’d make a full recovery, Jared knew that the inactivity would make the boy utterly despondent. He’d been there himself. ‘So what’s your verdict?’ he asked.

‘I got him to do a straight leg raise and resisted knee flexion, then did a slump test and palpation,’ she said. ‘I’d say it’s a grade two hamstring strain. I’ve put an ice pack on and a compression bandage for now and explained to him about standard RICE treatment. He’s having a cup of tea while I’m talking to you and seeing what treatment you want him to have.’

‘Thank you,’ he said. He was impressed by the quiet, no-fuss way she’d examined the boy and reported back. There was no ‘Told you so’ or point-scoring against him, even though he probably deserved it; all her focus had been on making her patient comfortable. She’d also come to talk to him about a treatment plan instead of telling him how to treat his patient, despite the fact she was obviously more than capable of doing her own treatment plan, so she’d respected his position in the club, too. Maybe he’d been unfair to her about her project, because she’d been spot on about the actual medicine she’d discussed with him. If she was that competent, she was unlikely to be working on a project that had no merit.

‘The poor lad’s going to be gutted about missing training and matches, but he needs to do it properly or he’ll end up with another tear in the muscle on top of this one, and it’ll take even longer to heal,’ she said.

Jared nodded. ‘He needs cold therapy and compression every hour for the first day, and to keep his leg elevated while he’s sitting, to reduce the swelling.’

‘I gave him some paracetamol—he said he’s not on any other medication and he’s not allergic to anything.’

‘Good. That’ll help with the pain during the acute stage, over the next couple of days,’ he said.

‘I told him that you’d come up with a rehab programme,’ she said, ‘but if he was my patient I’d suggest a sports massage at the end of the first week, and strengthening exercises in the meantime—standing knee flexion, bridge and seated hamstring curls with a resistance band. Nothing too strenuous, and he has to stop as soon as it hurts.’

‘Good plan,’ he said. Exactly what he would have suggested. They might not get on, but in medical terms they were definitely on the same page. ‘He can also do some gentle walking and swimming, then introduce running gradually. Though it’ll be several weeks before he’s ready to come back to full training.’

She nodded. ‘Look, I know you don’t believe in the stuff I’m doing, and I’m not going to rub your nose in it and say “I told you so”. But I do want some time to talk you through what I’m doing and—well, I suppose I really want to get you on board with the project,’ she admitted. ‘Can we have a meeting to talk about it—I mean really talk?’

If he’d listened to her and supported her argument that Travis was underperforming, the boy might not be sitting in the dressing room right now with a hamstring injury. Guilt made him sharp. ‘The only free time I have is before breakfast.’

He knew he was being obnoxious, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself. What was it about Bailey Randall that made him behave like this? Something about her just knocked him off balance, and he liked things to be in perfect equilibrium nowadays.

‘Before breakfast,’ she mused. ‘I normally train at the gym then—but OK. I guess I can skip my session in the gym for once.’

‘Or we could train in the gym together.’ The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. What on earth was wrong with him? Panic flooded through him. This was such a bad idea.

‘Train together, and then talk about my project over breakfast? That works for me. As long as your partner doesn’t mind,’ she added quickly.

‘No partner.’ Though he appreciated that she’d tried to be considerate. In the world of football, there was a lot of jealousy. Sasha definitely wouldn’t have been happy about him having a breakfast meeting with a female colleague. Then again, Sasha had had meetings of her own with his male colleagues. In hotel rooms. He pushed the thought away. ‘Will yours mind?’ He tried to extend the same courtesy to Bailey.

‘I’m single,’ she said, ‘and I like it that way.’

Which sounded to him as if she’d been hurt, too.

Not that it was any of his business. And he wouldn’t dream of asking for details.

‘One last thing to sort—my gym or yours?’ she asked.

‘So you don’t go to a women-only gym?’ Oh, great. And now he was insulting her.

She smiled. ‘I’m not intimidated by anyone, regardless of their gender or their age or how pretty they are. I go to a place that has equipment I like and staff who can push me harder if I want a one-to-one training session. And it happens to be reasonably close to the London Victoria, so I can train before work.’ She paused. ‘There’s a café there, too. The coffee’s not brilliant, but they do a pretty good Eggs Florentine—which they don’t serve in the hospital canteen, or I’d suggest breakfast there because their coffee’s slightly better.’

There was no way he could back out of this now. ‘OK. Your gym, tomorrow. Let me know the address and what time.’

‘Seven,’ she said. ‘And I’ll text you the address.’ And there was a tiny, tiny hint of mischief in her eyes as she added, ‘Herod.’

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