Unknown (14 page)

Sarah was in awe of everything. She was still staring about her when Mark turned away from the bureau and placed a box of chocolates on a nearby table.

'I don't know how I'm going to explain to your parents,' she told him. 'They must think I'm a dreadful person. I can't even control my dog. I should never have—'

'It's all right,' Mark said, coming towards her. She shook her head. 'No, it isn't.' She waved her arms, gesturing around the room. 'Look at all this... They're used to having everything in its place, in perfect order. And then I come along...'

'I told you, you don't have to worry,' Mark said. By now he was standing in front of her. He slid his arms around her waist.

'That's all right for you to say, you—' She didn't get to say any more, though, because all at once he was kissing her, effectively cutting off her words. He edged her backwards, pressuring her against the wood panelling, and then he deepened the kiss, crushing the softness of her lips beneath his as though he would possess all of her. He drew the breath from her body and left her gasping, yearning for more.

He kissed her until she was senseless, until every thought had left her head and all that remained was a longing to have him run his hands all over her. Perhaps he read her mind because he did just that, gliding his hands over her curves, stroking her and drawing her up against him so that every part of her was in searing contact with his long body. She melted against him, the strength of his muscled thigh bringing flame to course through her blood. She couldn't get enough of him. What was wrong with her?

'Mark,' she managed, but he was busy trailing kisses over her face, along the curve of her throat, sliding ever downwards until he reached the curve of her breast. She pulled in a ragged breath, and he sighed against the smooth slope of her creamy flesh.

'Sarah,' he muttered huskily, 'do you know that you make me crazy, that you make me lose my mind? I want you... I need you... I can't think straight when you're around. Do you know what you do to me?'

Her lips parted, as though she would answer him, but her head was whirling, and she was finding it hard to take in what he was saying. 'Mark, I ...'

She stopped speaking then, and whatever either of them would have said faded into oblivion when they suddenly heard voices coming from nearby.

'What was that?' Sarah whispered. She stiffened, and tried to look around.

Mark reluctantly dragged himself away from her and he, too, gazed around the room. 'It must be the caterers going into the kitchen next door,' he muttered. 'I'd forgotten about them.'

He looked down at her and frowned, as though his head was clearing at last. 'I suppose they could come in here at any moment.' He winced. 'Perhaps we had better go and join the others outside.'

It was just as well that they pulled themselves together, Sarah thought a moment later. Mark's mother met them as they walked out through the dining-room doors and onto the paved terrace outside.

'I've been looking for you,' she said. She nodded towards Sarah and glanced at Mark. 'Your father's getting ready to draw the raffle.'

Mark showed her the chocolates. 'I went to fetch these,' he said.

Sarah put in quickly, 'It was all my fault. I should never have left Kingston tied up. I might have known something would go wrong. I'll pay for the chocolates, and of course I'll pay for any damage to the garden. Will you let me know how much it will be?'

'I won't hear of it,' his mother said. 'The gardener will soon put things right, and as to the chocolates, you should forget about it.' She turned and walked with them to the dais where the raffle was being held.

Sarah didn't make any more attempts to put things right. She didn't know how to begin, because she realised that Mark's family were above any of that. They lived in a different world to hers.

Mark was roped in to help out with the organisation of events for the rest of the afternoon, and Sarah stayed with Jamie and her father, and tried to ensure that there were no more mishaps. She wondered if Mark was avoiding her.

When they decided it was time to leave an hour or so later, she sought him out to say goodbye to him. He was clearing away some of the litter from around the raffle stall.

'You had a good crowd here today,' her father said.

'We did.' Mark smiled briefly. 'It's been a really successful day, one way or another. We're well on the way to getting the dialysis machine, and the grand opening of the new renal unit's only a couple of weeks away. I'm really pleased with the way things are going.'

He looked at Sarah, but their leave-taking was calm and unemotional. He made no mention of what had happened between them earlier, and Sarah wondered if he was regretting it. She realised that it had been a spur-of-the-moment thing, something that had simply happened and would probably be forgotten.

Not by her, because she had been affected deeply, more so than had ever happened in her life before, and she had come to realise that she was very much aware of Mark, of wanting him, and needing him.

It was an odd, unaccustomed sensation. Was this love, this strange butterfly feeling in her stomach? Falling for Mark could never come to anything, though, could it? Wanting him to love her in return was just a dream, a whimsical fancy. He had kissed her to shut her up, that was all. With him, it was a purely physical thing. He had never said that he loved her.

* * *

It was just a week later, when Sarah was back at work, that preparations for the opening of the new renal unit began to show signs of real progress.

Mark was standing with his father by a table, looking over an architect's model of the hospital. 'I'm really glad that you've managed to find the time to show me around the unit,' his father said. 'Things have gone well and it's all been finished ahead of schedule, hasn't it?'

'It has.' Mark smiled at his father. 'We're going to have the grand opening next week, but I thought you would appreciate a quick preview.' He turned and acknowledged a low-voiced comment from someone who stood next to him.

Sarah watched the group of men from a short distance away. There were about a couple of dozen people all told, and they had all gathered together in a room just along the corridor from A and E. It was a meeting point, and she was there in a public-relations capacity, to serve coffee and to help people feel at ease.

She helped herself to coffee from the filter machine, and Megan came to stand alongside her. 'I always feel uncomfortable at these get-togethers,' Megan said. 'I never feel as though I really fit in. They all seem to be on a different plane to us, don't they?'

'I know what you mean,' Sarah murmured. 'It's probably because they are. I suppose that's why they're called "suits". They look impressive and high profile, as though they spend their lives moving among influential circles. We're more hands-on—workers at the coalface, so to speak.'

Megan chuckled. 'At least you changed out of your scrubs for the occasion.'

Sarah smiled and sipped at her coffee. She saw someone turn to Stuart Ballard, Mark's father, and heard him say, 'We're all very grateful to you for your help with this project. Not just for your generous donation, but also for the tireless work you've done to raise funds in other areas. Without your assistance we wouldn't have been able to get this project off the ground.'

Sarah recognised the man as management. He was one of the smartly dressed executives who had been showing various people around the hospital over the last week. There had been a flurry of activity, and everyone was getting ready for the big event. She hadn't even seen much of Mark. When he wasn't working, he was talking to management.

Today, four of the management team had descended briefly on A and E and were intent on revealing the new unit to Mark's father and to medical personnel from hospitals round about, those that were within the catchment area that would be served by the unit.

Owen was among the group of visitors, and now he murmured something to his companion and slipped away from the crowd.

He came over to Sarah. 'I was hoping I'd get a chance to talk to you before we move on,' he said. He gave her a hug, his arms going around her and holding her close, and when Sarah recovered from the intimacy of the gesture, she looked around and saw that Megan had moved away.

Perhaps she felt that she was intruding. Sarah pressed her lips together and hoped that no one else had seen his exuberant greeting. She sent a surreptitious glance around the room and then wished that she hadn't done that. Mark was watching her, his eyes narrowing on Owen and his gaze fixed on Owen's arm, which was still draped around her. Self-conscious now, she tried to ease herself away from him.

Owen didn't seem to notice her discomfiture. 'You can see why they think so highly of your boss,' he said in a low aside. 'They don't get many people who bring their families along with bulging cheque-books. It must have seemed like a heaven-sent opportunity when Mark introduced his father to them.'

'Don't you think that you might be misjudging him?' Sarah murmured. 'He's wealthy, I grant you, but I've never known Mark to make a big thing of his background. I think he's genuinely pleased that we're getting the renal unit, A lot of people are going to benefit from it.'

Owen's expression was sardonic. 'I can see that you've fallen in with the crowd of worshippers at his feet.'

Sarah wasn't going to rise to his sarcasm. 'It isn't like that. We've needed something like this for a long time, and the whole community has backed the project. The hospital chiefs are bound to be appreciative of any efforts to help.'

'It's a pity they don't concentrate their attention on those things more often,' he said. 'Then we wouldn't have to go along with all the hoohah about targets and waiting times. We all have enough to do, caring for our patients, without worrying about reaching some artificial quota.'

'You could be right,' she said, 'but they're not actually to blame for any of it, are they? They just have to go along with pronouncements from above and then try to compete with hospitals in other regions.' Owen was bound to be feeling cynical. Management had turned him down for the job that Mark had been given.

She was suddenly aware of Mark coming towards them.

'Hello, Owen,' he said. 'I'm glad that you were able to come along to visit our new unit. How's the job going at your hospital? Is it what you expected it to be?'

'It's excellent,' Owen said. 'Things are running very smoothly, though we could always do with more staff, of course.'

Mark nodded. 'I'd heard something of the sort. I hope you're not thinking of trying to take Sarah away from us. She still has a contract here, you know.'

Owen glanced at Sarah, and then turned back once more to Mark. 'I know that. If I hoped to persuade her, it wasn't A and E that I had in mind. She's always been very good in paediatric medicine. I think if she was to specialise in that area, she could go far.'

'That's probably true, but I hope that she'll stay here. We're crying out for A and E staff.'

Sarah glowered at both of them and put in tersely, 'I hope you two haven't forgotten that I'm standing here. You're talking about me as though I have no say in the matter.'

Mark made a wry smile. 'You're right, of course. I'm sorry about that.' He gave Owen a long look. 'I'm sure you know that we would have valued your services here, if you had stayed.'

Owen sent him a disparaging stare. 'You must know that I would never have done that.'

Mark shrugged. 'It was your choice.' He glanced towards the management team. 'I think they're getting ready to move on,' he murmured. 'I have to go and join them.'

Sarah followed the direction of his gaze and watched him as he moved away. 'I must go back to work,' she told Owen. 'We're going to be shorthanded while Mark is away for the next hour.'

Owen lifted a brow. 'Isn't this his day off? Is he taking time off in the middle of a shift?'

She shook her head. 'An occasional bit of PR is part of his job. Anyway, his bleeper's on. He'll stay in touch in case he's needed.'

Owen straightened and looked at her searchingly. 'I'll probably be able to come back and see you before I go,' he said. 'Would you like to have dinner with me this evening?'

'I can't. I have to stay with Jamie. My father looks after him whenever he can, when he's not on call or taking surgery, but I need to be there this evening.'

'Some other time, perhaps?'

'Maybe.' She was noncommittal and he moved away, frowning, and went to join the rest of the visitors who were trooping out into the corridor.

Sarah went back to work, and almost straight away she was plunged into dealing with one crisis after another. She'd hardly had time to pause for breath when the triage nurse hurried over to her.

'Would you come and take a look at this patient for me?' Megan asked. 'She's complaining of abdominal pain, along with diarrhoea and vomiting. It could be just a simple abdominal complaint, but she looks very ill and I'm concerned about her condition. Do you mind? I know that you're busy.'

'No, I don't mind at all.' Sarah went along with Megan to the treatment room.

The woman did look in a bad way, and when Sarah checked her over she was disturbed to find that her patient's heart was racing at around three times what was normal and that she was feverish. She was near to collapse and showed signs of tremor and extreme agitation.

'I think we'd better cool her down,' Sarah said. 'We'll try sponging her with tepid water and set up some fans in here.' She frowned. 'I haven't quite come across anything like this before.' She wished that Mark was here to advise her, but she didn't want to disturb him while he was with the visitors, and her immediate superior had his hands full right then, dealing with someone who had been brought in from a road traffic accident.

Sarah stopped to think for a moment. 'I'm going to order some blood tests,' she said finally. 'I'll write out the forms for you. We'll need urea and electrolytes, blood glucose and a full blood count, among others. We'd better screen for infection, too.'

'I'll set that up now,' Megan said. Seeing Sarah hesitate, she added, 'Was there anything else?'