When she was working on the station she generally became ‘one of the boys’ and fitted in that way. She could shoot a mean game of pool, muster on horseback for a full day without getting saddle-sore and was known for her skill in coaxing difficult engines into life. Her father, brothers and the employees at Woollara had long forgotten she was a woman.
If she was everyone’s mate at Woollara, she was all nurse at work. ‘Professional, organised and reliable’ were the words that always turned up on her performance reviews. At work she had a different ‘uniform’ from the cowboy boots and jeans she wore at the station. But it was a uniform, and it made her blend in with the other medical professionals and told the community she was a nurse. The role absorbed her and she gave herself to it, enjoying every moment.
The only part of her that really said ‘Emily’ was her perfume, although most people missed that. They thought the thing that defined her was her dyed hair. But her hair was just a ruse. Bright hair hid her pain. Bright caused people to look up rather than down and distracted them so she could avoid their scrutiny of her lack of attributes.
She ran some hair gel through her hair. She’d worn it spiky short for so long that its current length surprised her. It was still above her shoulders but long enough for the curls to come back and taunt her. She tried to tame them into place with the waxy product.
In celebration or commiseration of the new job—at this point she wasn’t exactly certain which one it was—she’d dyed her hair purple. The mirror reflected purple hair and green scrubs. Hmm, the women’s movement would be proud of her. Then again, others might think she was going to take up tennis at Wimbledon.
She nervously fingered the hem of her top and then tugged down hard before breathing in deeply. She spoke to the mirror. ‘Right, Emily. You’re the unit manager and working for Linton for better or worse. Linton only sees you as a nurse so you’re safe and your heart is safe. You’re a professional and all personal feelings get left on this side of the door.
‘This is work. Work is your shield against his charm. Focus on the job. You can do this.’ She pulled her name tag and security tag over her neck and spun round to face the door.
CHAPTER THREE
PUSHING open the door, Emily walked into her new department. Unlike the last time she’d been in A and E—when it had held an air of panic and unravelling control—today it seemed almost serene.
‘Emily!’ Karen waved at her, pausing with one hand on the curtains of cubicle two, the other hand holding a dish containing a syringe. ‘It’s so great to have you here. I’ll see you at the desk in a few minutes.’
She waved and smiled at the warmth in the other nurse’s greeting. She hoped Karen represented the rest of the nursing staff with her friendliness.
‘Emily, you’re finally here.’ Linton spun round, his freshly starched white coat sitting square across his broad shoulders and his stethoscope draped casually around his neck. Unlike his informal clothes on Saturday, today he wore a blue and white pinstriped business shirt with a silk tie. Everything about him said, ‘A doctor in charge of his department’.
Puffs of heat spiralled through her. How could one man look so devastatingly handsome perched casually on the edge of a desk?
‘I am, I’m here.’ Duh! Of course she was here. What happened to ‘lovely to be here’ or ‘looking forward to working with the team’? So much for wowing him and everyone else with scintillating conversation.
He glanced at her name tag, which snuggled into the indentation under her breasts. ‘Survived the admin orientation, I see?’
She laughed, remembering her long and excruciatingly dull morning. ‘As long as I remember to fill out every form in triplicate, I should be fine. I sometimes think Admin believes patients should be in triplicate as well.’ She glanced up at the patient board. It was pretty empty, only listing two patients in cubicles and no one in the resus room.
‘It looks like I’ve got a nice quiet afternoon to settle in on my first day.’
‘Of course. I especially arranged it to welcome you.’ His tanned face creased into a sparkling smile, which travelled rapidly up his cheekbones and into his eyes. Twinkling eyes, the same aqua green as the water around the coral cays of the Pacific Ocean.
She wanted to stretch out and float lazily in his gaze, revelling in the emphasis he put on the word ‘you’. But that was far too dangerous. Keep it all business. She flicked a recalcitrant curl out of her eye. ‘Especially for me? Yeah, right, I’ll remind you of that when it’s frantic and I still don’t know where everything is.’
He gave her a long, pensive look, which finished with one brow rising. ‘Ah, Emily, for a moment I forgot you don’t let me get away with anything.’
A trail of pain pricked her. Surely she hadn’t offended him? But there was no way she could flirt with him. He saw flirting as a game. As it was, she was gripping the last vestiges of her self-esteem when it came to Linton, and that was one game she couldn’t play.
Before she could speak he slid off the desk, rising to his feet, his height dwarfing her. ‘Now, I think you’ve met almost everyone except for the night staff. You know Karen and you’ve met Jason and Patti. Our students are with us for three months, and as you worked out the other Saturday, they’re in their first weeks. As well as you starting today, we have a new resident, Daniel, and an agency nurse, Jodie. She’s on a six-week contract but if she’s any good we’re hoping she can stay longer.’
‘That’s a lot of new staff.’ A flutter of panic vibrated in her stomach. ‘When do Michael and Cathy get back from their honeymoon?’
He drew in a long breath and sighed. ‘Another six weeks.’
She did the mental maths of the number of hours in the day over available staff. ‘So the roster’s still short?’
He grinned. ‘Not as short as it was a week ago.’
‘And that’s supposed to reassure me?’ She heard the rising inflection of her voice.
He gave her a playful thump on the shoulder, similar to the ones she received from her brothers on a regular basis. ‘I told you I needed you here.’ He turned away and started walking as if he knew she would follow.
Irritation at his highhandedness quelled her mounting panic. She cut off a quip and took three quick steps to catch up as he was already talking as if she was standing next to him.
‘If I’m out of the department when a patient comes in, I want to be notified. If it’s a straightforward case then you and Daniel can deal with it, but page me if you need me or if you believe Daniel needs me.’ He gave her a knowing look.
‘New resident-itis?’
His shoulders rose and fell. ‘It’s early days but I don’t want him taking on something he can’t handle.’ He stopped walking as he reached his office door, his face suddenly clearing of the usual fun and flirty expressions that defined him. ‘Emily, we’re a team. Don’t ever feel you have to cope on your own. I’m only ever a page or a phone call away.’
His sincerity washed through her, trickling under her defences like floodwaters squeezing through cracks in a levee. Her mind threatened to leap from work to studying how his eyelashes almost brushed his cheek when he blinked. Stop reading more into this than exists. He’s your boss and he’d be telling all new staff this.
She forced her attention back to the job. ‘What meetings are expected?’
He ushered her into his office and picked up a stack of folders from his desk. ‘We have a weekly meeting to discuss medical and nursing issues but I have an open-door policy so, please, don’t wait until Tuesdays at two to discuss something important. Honest and open communication is vital in a department like this.’
Honest and open. As long as it only pertained to work, she was off the hook. She couldn’t work at Warragurra Base if he knew how she really felt about him. She was embarrassed enough by it. She didn’t want to feel this way. She hated it that after everything she’d been through with Nathan, even though she knew she wasn’t ready for another relationship, she couldn’t control her body’s reaction to Linton.
