Knight on the Children's Ward Read Online Free PDF Page A

off her apron and spraying perfume. The thought made him smile—at the wrong moment, though, because Annika saw him and, although Ross snapped his face to bland, she must have thought he was enjoying her discomfort.
    Oh, but he wanted to correct her.
    He wanted to follow her and tell her that wasn’t what he’d meant as she duly turned around and headed for the washroom.
    He wanted to apologise when she came back unscented and sat at her stool while Caroline nit-picked her way through the nursing notes.
    Instead he returned to his own notes.
    DIAOR… He scrawled a line through it again.
    Still her fragrance lingered.
    He got up without a word and, unusually for Ross, closed his office door. Then he picked up his pen and forced himself to concentrate.
    DIARREA.
    He hurled his pen down. Who cared anyway? They knew what he meant!
    He was not going to fancy her, nor, if he could help it, even talk much to her.
    He was off women.
    He had sworn off women.
    And a student nurse on his ward—well, it couldn’t be without complications.
    She was his friend’s little sister too.
    No way!
    Absolutely not.
    He picked up his pen and resumed his notes.
    â€˜ The baby has ,’ he wrote instead, ‘ severe gastroenteritis .’

CHAPTER TWO
    H E DID a very good job of ignoring her.
    He did an excellent job at pulling rank and completely speaking over her head, or looking at a child or a chart or the wall when he had no choice but to address her. And at his student lecture on Monday he paid her no more attention than any of the others. He delivered a talk on gastroenteritis, and, though he hesitated as he went to spell diarrhoea , he wrote it up correctly on the whiteboard.
    She, Ross noted, was ignoring him too. She asked no questions at the end of the lecture, but an annoying student called Cassie made up for that.
    Once their eyes met, but she quickly flicked hers away, and he, though he tried to discount it, saw the flush of red on her neck and wished that he hadn’t.
    Yes, he did a very good job at ignoring her and not talking to her till, chatting to the pathologist in the bowels of the hospital a few days later, he glanced up at the big mirror that gave a view around the corridor and there was Annika. She was yawning, holding some blood samples, completely unaware she was being watched.
    â€˜I’ve been waiting for these…’ Ross said when sheturned the corner, and she jumped slightly at the sight of him. He took the bloodwork and stared at the forms rather than at her.
    â€˜The chute isn’t working,’ Annika explained. ‘I said I’d drop them in on my way home.’
    â€˜I forgot to sign the form.’
    â€˜Oh.’
    He would rather have taken ages to sign the form, but the pathologist decided they had been talking for too long and hurried him along. Annika had stopped for a moment to put on her jacket, and as his legs were much longer than hers somehow, despite trying not to, he had almost caught her up as they approached the flapping black plastic doors. It would have been really rude had she not held it open—and just plain wrong for him not to thank her and fall into step beside her.
    â€˜You look tired,’ Ross commented.
    â€˜It’s been a long shift.’
    This had got them halfway along the corridor, and now they should just walk along in silence, Ross reasoned. He was a consultant, and he could be as rude and as aloof as he liked—except he could hear his boots, her shoes, and an endless, awful silence. It was Ross who filled it.
    â€˜I’ve actually been meaning to talk to you…’ He had—long before he had liked her.
    â€˜Oh?’ She felt the adrenaline kick in, the effect of him close up far more devastating than his smile, and yet she liked it. She liked it so much that she slowed down her pace and looked over to him. ‘About what?’
    She could almost smell the bonfire—all those smiles, all