The Surgeon She's Been Waiting For

‘So there wouldn’t be much point in my showing you around the department, then, would there?’

He shook his head. ‘Not really.’

She sent him a thoughtful glance. ‘So why did you stay here and let him talk your ears off? You were all for leaving over an hour ago, weren’t you?’

‘That’s true, but you asked me not to go away, and even though I realise that might have been a ruse to delay me so that your boss could make his pitch, I thought perhaps if I stayed I might at least be able to persuade you to have dinner with me this evening.’

She took a sharp intake of breath. Had he really stayed simply because she’d asked him to? For a dizzying moment her head reeled with the full import of that. Perhaps in some way he was as taken with her as she was intrigued by him. Why else would he be asking her out to dinner?

But then reality descended on her like a dark cloud. The man wasn’t free to ask her out, was he? Did he have no shame?

‘Mr Benyon,’ she said in a tight voice, ‘I don’t quite know how to put this politely, but I have to say that I think it’s in very poor taste for you to be asking me out when your wife is desperately ill in hospital.’

He stared at her for a moment without saying anything at all. His blue gaze skimmed over her, taking in the smoke grey of her eyes and coming to linger on the firm tilt of her chin. Then, very quietly, he said, ‘I take it that’s a no, then?’

‘It certainly is. That’s a…read my lips…definite no.’

‘Hmm.’ He studied her thoughtfully. ‘You know, you’re really very uptight and overwrought for someone so young. It shows in the stiff line of your shoulders and in the way you move, as though you have to make every second count. I can’t help thinking that it might do you a world of good if you could manage to loosen up just a little.’

She blinked, taken aback by his blunt assessment. ‘You’re entitled to your opinion,’ she told him, ‘but the plain fact is I have a job to do, and it’s work that I enjoy, and feel privileged to take on, even if you seem to take the opposite view.’ She frowned. ‘Of course, I understand that your wife’s condition must be playing on your mind to some extent right now, and you have Harry to look after. Perhaps that’s why you don’t feel like considering John’s offer.’

‘I appreciate your concern,’ he murmured, ‘however misplaced it might be. Of course I’m worried about Francie’s condition. What happened to her doesn’t bear thinking about, and it was extremely difficult for me to come to terms with the events that followed. The truth is, though, Francie is my sister, not my wife, and if you weren’t quite so wound up with the job and everything that goes along with it, you might have taken time out to think things through, and then you probably wouldn’t have jumped to conclusions quite so readily.’