Hot-Shot Doc, Christmas Bride
Joanna Neil
Table of Contents
When Joanna Neil discovered Mills & Boon®, her lifelong addiction to reading crystallised into an exciting new career writing Medical™ Romance. Her characters are probably the outcome of her varied lifestyle, which includes working as a clerk, typist, nurse and infant teacher. She enjoys dressmaking and cooking at her Leicestershire home. Her family includes a husband, son and daughter, an exuberant yellow Labrador and two slightly crazed cockatiels. She currently works with a team of tutors at her local education centre, to provide creative writing workshops for people interested in exploring their own writing ambitions.
Chapter One
‘THANKS for the lift, Tom. You’re an absolute lifesaver.’ Alison gave her neighbour a friendly wave and watched him drive away before hotfooting it into the hospital’s A&E department.
What a way to start the day. She’d had nothing but trouble with the car for the last week, and then today, when she’d tried to start the engine, it had simply spluttered and died. It had been plain from that point that she was going to be late for her shift. Only by a few minutes, but of all the days to break her perfect record it had to be this one—when the new boss was due to put in an appearance.
No one seemed to know very much about him—except that he’d been brought in at the last minute after one of the consultants had been taken ill—and from what she had heard he was only going to be here for two days a week. What kind of job was that? And what did he do for the rest of the time? The only other thing she knew about him was that he was a friend of one of the managers.
The doors of the unit swished open and she hurried along the corridor, bypassing Reception and heading towards the doctors’ restroom. If she could just slip off her jacket and sling her stethoscope around her neck before she made an appearance in the unit, perhaps he would be none the wiser.
‘Whoa…steady on there. Where’s the fire?’
She skidded to a halt and narrowly missed running headlong into the man who suddenly appeared in her path. As it was, her palms grappled with his chest as she sought to stop the collision, and at the same time a pair of large male hands reached out as though to steady her, circling her upper arms in a light but firm grip. The holdall that she carried over her shoulder swung forward with the momentum, and the man let out a soft ‘oomph’ as the weight of it slammed into his midriff.
‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ she managed, sucking air into her lungs. Her fingers scrambled against fine-quality worsted material, and she realised that he was wearing a suit—dark grey and beautifully tailored. That was not a good sign, given that most of the male doctors of her acquaintance went around in rolled up shirtsleeves and trousers.
‘I didn’t see you,’ she said, lifting her gaze. ‘You seemed to come out of nowhere.’ The faint note of accusation hung on the air as she tried to work out whether he had emerged from the side corridor or the supplies cupboard. What on earth would this man be doing in either place? Only staff had access to these areas.
Then she looked at him properly for the first time, and his features came into sharp focus—all clean, angular lines, and crisp black hair, with grey eyes that appeared to look deep down into her soul. The breath seemed to leave her all over again. He was altogether striking. The kind of man who, once seen, was never forgotten.
‘Ah…’ he murmured. ‘That would be me in my ghostly guise—stalking the corridors of the hospital in wait for the unwary. It seems I struck lucky this time.’
She laughed. ‘Maybe. Though from the looks of you, you’re anything but ethereal. Anyway, coming into contact with all that hard muscle and bone was a dead giveaway.’ She studied him once again, her long, honey-blonde hair swirling about her shoulders with the upward tilt of her head. ‘It’s all right for you to let go of me now,’ she hastily reassured him. ‘I’m not running from a fire, but I am anxious to go on duty before anyone realises that I should have been here five minutes ago.’ She frowned. ‘I do hope you’re not my new boss in A&E. I really wanted to show him my best side.’
He gave a wry smile, looking her over, his gaze taking in her softly curving figure outlined by the cashmere top and gently flowing skirt that she was wearing. ‘I think you may have already done that,’ he murmured, a soft gleam in his eyes causing warm colour to rush into her cheeks.
Her mouth dropped open a fraction. Had she heard that right? She decided to ignore the remark. Thinking about it would have made her far too hot and bothered.
‘Oh, dear. That has to mean that you’re the new man,’ she ventured after a moment or two, her brow knotting. ‘What are you doing out here in the corridor? Shouldn’t you be in A&E, tending to the sick and injured?’
Slowly he released her, letting his hands fall to his sides. ‘I dare say I could ask the same of you,’ he countered. ‘But in the interests of good working relationships I think we’ll let that go for the moment. I’m sure you must have good reason for flying in here like a bullet from a gun.’
He looked her over, as though he was making sure she was still all in one piece.
‘As for myself,’ he added, ‘yes, I’m the new locum. And as to what I’m doing here in the corridor…I thought it would be a good idea to acquaint myself with the lie of the land and get to know the people that I’ll be working with. I must say I wasn’t expecting it to happen quite this way, but here in A&E we have to be ready for any eventuality, don’t we?’
‘I suppose we do.’ A wave of heat flowed along her cheeks. Had she really just asked her new boss what he was doing outside A&E? ‘So, you’ll be working here with us while Dr Meadows recovers from his heart attack?’
‘That’s