‘Nonsense.’ It was. It had to be because if it wasn’t, it would mean he would lose his job and that was all he had to fill his future.
And if he lost his job, he would lose Anna.
‘I didn’t like the noise,’ he admitted stiffly. ‘I told you I didn’t like parties. I left because I’d had enough. The noise of the crackers was just the last straw.’
‘Do you actually remember leaving the canteen?’
‘Of course I do.’ And he did, in a vague, dream-like way. A background that had faded rapidly as he’d got sucked into the flashback. He remembered that Anna had been following him and … ‘I … bumped someone,’ he said aloud. ‘They spilled their drink.’
That surprised her. ‘You didn’t look like you were aware of what you were doing.’
‘I was … angry.’
‘Why?’
‘The party. The noise. All that food and drink and the silly costumes. It’s all such a waste of time and money.’
She wasn’t convinced. ‘You didn’t stop, Luke. You didn’t hear me calling you. I kissed you because I couldn’t think of anything else that might shock you enough to get you off whatever planet you were on.’
‘And I hope you plan to include that little gem in whatever report you’re obviously intending to make.’
A spark flashed in Anna’s eyes. ‘For God’s sake, Luke. This isn’t about reports or jobs or whether someone gets embarrassed. This is about the fact that if there’s any chance of you “losing focus” or having a flashback or whatever the hell that was really all about that you’re obviously not prepared to talk about, then you can’t operate on people.’
Luke watched the play of expression on Anna’s face. Her distress was all too easy to see in the frown lines framing her eyes. In the way her lips trembled.
‘I’m not out to get you,’ she said fiercely. ‘I want to help you.’
It was more than that, Anna realised as the words left her mouth. Had it been growing within her all the time she’d been watching Luke so carefully? Hoping to see him smile? Thinking so often about that short space of time when they’d been alone in her house and tumbling ever further into the confusion of her response to him. She could see the shadows that clouded his life and his eyes. There were things that haunted him and closed him off but she’d had a glimpse of the man he’d once been. Or could be.
She wanted, more than anything, to dispel those shadows. To get close enough to be allowed to help him.
She cared about him, Anna realised with something like dismay. She couldn’t pinpoint when it had happened. Maybe the evidence had been there for days and days. A sum of everything she had seen or imagined. Elements that had floated in an uncoordinated fashion until the fear she had felt in seeing Luke virtually run from the canteen.
Something else had been added in when she had felt him respond to her kiss. A confused medley of caring and attraction. Not something she wanted to try and analyse and she certainly couldn’t possibly tell him about any of it. Not when it was beyond the realms of possibility that he could feel anything like the same connection. Or that someone like him would want help from someone like her. He was more qualified than she was in so many ways. He was older. More skilled. He had seen and done things she would never want to do.
No wonder he was looking at her in a stony silence that took a little too long to be broken.
‘Help me?’ The words were bitten out scathingly. ‘How do you propose doing that, exactly, Anna? By spreading a rumour that I might be unfit to do my job?’
‘No.’ Anna tried to catch his gaze but Luke was looking at the blasted potted tree they were standing beside. ‘I think if you have the time, you’ll get on top of whatever it is or find the help you need from someone a lot more qualified than I am.’
The snort of sound was incredulous. ‘A shrink, you mean? Cheers, Anna.’
She ignored the rejection. She’d be angry, too, if someone suggested she couldn’t handle her own issues. ‘What I was going to suggest is that you don’t operate unless I’m assisting you. For the protection of everybody involved.’
‘You think I need supervising? By you?’
Anna flinched, biting back the observation that he had needed her during Colin Herbert’s surgery. Something told her that Luke was trying to turn this into a confrontation he could feel justified in dismissing. She had to find a way to rescue this discussion or she would lose him. For ever.
The lift suddenly pinged into life close by. The doors slid open.
‘Oops, wrong floor,’ a masculine voice said. ‘Hey … sounds like there’s a party going on.’
‘Yeah. Staff do, mate. Doctors and nurses. Security wasn’t invited.’
‘Shame. Wanna crash it?’
‘Nah. More than our jobs are worth. Come on. Push the damn button.’
The doors slid shut again but a single word of the exchange lingered in Anna’s ears.
Crash.
The kiss seemed a very long time ago. Hard to believe it had happened, even. But it had and for a brief time Anna had felt the same kind of connection she had that day he’d told her about his friend ‘Crash’. It was possible to find a chink in the armour he wore.
‘Actually,’ she told Luke quietly, ‘I was thinking of it more in terms of it being beneficial to both of us.’
‘So I get a supervisor. What do you get?’
‘A mentor,’ Anna said. ‘The chance to learn from someone whose work I already respect.’ She managed a smile as Luke finally made eye contact again. Had she also managed to placate him? ‘Think about it. I’m going to go back to that party for a bit. I need some food.’
Going back into the canteen was the last thing Luke wanted to do but he found himself following Anna after a brief hesitation. He needed to prove he could. To Anna and to anyone else who might have raised their eyebrows at the manner in which he’d left. Most of all, he needed to prove it to himself.
He could see Anna walking well ahead of him.
He didn’t need a babysitter. Or help.
He didn’t need somebody kissing him because they thought he was on ‘another planet’ either. Because they felt sorry for him?
No. Anna had said she could learn from him. That she respected his work. That didn’t suggest she felt sorry for him. That kiss hadn’t held any hint of unwillingness. Quite the opposite.
She’d kissed him because she’d wanted to kiss him. And what’s more she’d wanted to keep on kissing him. It wouldn’t have been difficult to pull away as soon as he’d responded. What she was saying was at odds with her behaviour. As much of a contradiction as her smart suits and paint-splattered old clothes. It was a puzzle and Luke liked that. He liked having Anna to think about. To ponder over. He was like a boat being tossed on a stormy ocean and Anna was his anchor. Maybe he could get to his future without her but it would be hard.
Lonely.
Luke was walking slowly. He could see the brightly lit interior of the canteen now, beyond the doors that were propped open by chairs. Anna had vanished into the crowd.
A couple stood on the shadowy side of the doors, partly screened because one of the chairs had shifted. A man and a woman. He wouldn’t have taken any particular notice of them except that he could feel the atmosphere as he got closer.
A palpable tension. Maybe he recognised it because the air had the same charged feeling as it had had in those stunned moments after kissing Anna.