Wedding at Sunday Creek. Leah Martyn

Maggie, but thanks.’ Darcie waved the other’s offer away. ‘Go home to your boys.’ Maggie was the sole parent of two adolescent sons and spent her time juggling work, home and family. In the time Darcie had been here, she and Maggie had become friends and confidantes.

      Although it was usually Maggie who confided and she who listened, Darcie had to admit. Somehow she couldn’t slip into the confidences other women seemed to share as easily as the name of their hairdresser. ‘I’ll be fine,’ she said now. ‘And it’ll be good to have a senior doctor about the place,’ she added with a bravado she was far from feeling.

      * * *

      Jack was just putting the phone down when Darcie arrived back in her office. ‘All squared away?’ she asked, flicking him a hardly-there smile.

      ‘Thanks.’ He uncurled to his feet.

      Taking a cursory look around her office, she moved to close one of the blinds.

      ‘So, what are the living arrangements here?’ Jack asked.

      ‘The house for the MD is being refurbished at present, so you’ll have to bunk in with the rest of us in the communal residence for now. At the moment, there’s just me and one of the nurses.’

      ‘That doesn’t seem like a hardship,’ he said, giving a slow smile and a nod of satisfaction.

      Darcie felt nerves criss-cross in her stomach, resolving to have a word with the decorators and ask them to get a wriggle on. The sooner Cassidy was in a place of his own where he could strut his alpha maleness to his heart’s content, the better. ‘The flying doctors stay over sometimes too,’ she added, making it sound like some kind of buffer. ‘And now and again we have students from overseas who just want to observe how we administer medicine in the outback.’

      He nodded, taking the information on board.

      Darcie’s gaze flew over him. She’d waited so long for another doctor. Now Jack Cassidy’s arrival, the unexpectedness of it, seemed almost surreal. ‘Do you have luggage?’

      ‘There didn’t seem anyone about so I stashed it in what looked like a utility room on the way through.’

      ‘We’ve a small team of permanent nurses who are the backbone of the place.’ Darcie willed a businesslike tone into her voice. ‘Ancillary staff come and go a bit.’

      He sent her a brooding look. ‘So, it’s you and the nurses most of the time, then?’

      She nodded. ‘The flying doctors are invaluable, of course.’

      ‘Whoops—sorry.’ Lauren jerked to a stop in the doorway.

      ‘Lauren.’ Darcie managed a brief smile. ‘This is Dr Cassidy, our new MD.’

      ‘Jack.’ He held out his hand.

      ‘Oh, hi.’ Lauren was all smiles. ‘You arrived on the plane and there was no one to meet you,’ she lamented.

      ‘There was a mix-up with emails,’ Darcie interrupted shortly, fed up with the whole fiasco. ‘Did you need me for something, Lauren?’

      ‘Oh, yes. I wondered if you’d mind having a word with young Mitchell Anderson.’

      A frown touched Darcie’s forehead. ‘I’ve signed his release. He’s going home tomorrow. What seems to be the problem?’

      ‘Oh, nothing about his physical care,’ Lauren hastily amended. ‘But he seems a bit...out of sorts for someone who’s going home tomorrow.’

      ‘I’ll look in on him.’ Darcie sent out a contained little smile.

      ‘Thanks.’ Lauren gave a little eye flutter aimed mostly at Jack. ‘I’m heading back to the station. Yell if you need me.’

      ‘What was your patient admitted for?’ Jack asked, standing aside for Darcie to precede him out of the office.

      ‘Snakebite.’

      ‘You know, he may just need to talk the experience through.’

      Darcie shrugged. ‘I’m aware of that. I tried to find a bit of common ground and initiate a discussion about snakes and their habits. I knew Mitch would be able to tell me more than I could possibly know but he didn’t respond. I’d actually never seen a case of snakebite,’ she admitted candidly. ‘But I know the drill now. Compression, head for the nearest hospital and hope like mad they have antivenin on hand.’

      ‘Mmm.’ A dry smile nipped Jack’s mouth. ‘Much more civilised than in the old days. They used to pack the bite puncture with gunpowder and light the fuse. You can imagine what that did to the affected part of the body,’ he elaborated ghoulishly.

      If he was hoping for her shocked reaction, he wasn’t going to get it. ‘Pretty drastic,’ she said calmly. ‘I read about it in the local history section of the library.’

      Jack flashed a white grin. Oh, she’d do, this one. Clever, cool and disarmingly sure of her ground as well.

      It was a real turn-on.

      Uh-oh. Mentally, he dived for cover. He’d just untangled his emotions from one relationship. He’d have to be insane to go looking for a replacement so quickly. But as they began to walk along the corridor towards the wards, the flower-fresh drift of her shampoo awakened his senses with a swift stab of want as incisive and sharp as the first cut of a scalpel.

       CHAPTER TWO

      JACK YANKED HIS thoughts up short with a barely discernible shake of his head. He needed to get back into professional mode and quickly. ‘Give me the background on your patient.’

      ‘Mitchell is sixteen.’ Darcie spun her head to look at him and found herself staring into his eyes. They had the luminosity of an early morning seascape, she thought fancifully. She cleared her throat. ‘He works on his parents’ property about a hundred kilometres out. He was bitten on Monday last.’

      ‘So he’s been hospitalised all this week?’

      ‘It seemed the best and safest option. I’m still getting my head around the distances folk have to travel out here. If I’d released him too early and he’d had a relapse and had to come back in—’

      ‘So you erred on the side of caution. I’d have done the same. Where was he bitten?’

      ‘On the calf muscle. Fortunately, he was near enough to the homestead to be found fairly quickly and he didn’t panic. His parents were able to bring him straight in to the hospital.’

      ‘You don’t think he could possibly be suffering from some kind of PTSD?’

      Darcie looked sceptical. ‘That’s a bit improbable, isn’t it?’

      ‘It can happen as a result of dog bites and shark attacks. How’s he been sleeping?’

      ‘Not all that well, actually. But I put it down to the strangeness of being in hospital for the first time.’

      ‘Well, that’s probably true. But there could be another reason why he’s clammed up.’ Jack’s lips tweaked to a one-cornered grin. ‘He’s sixteen, Darcie. His testosterone has to be all over the place.’

      Darcie’s chin came up defensively. Same old sexist rubbish. ‘Are you saying he’s embarrassed around a female doctor? I was totally professional.’

      ‘I’m sure you were.’

      She swept a strand of hair behind her ear in agitation. ‘Perhaps I should try talking to him again.’

      ‘Why don’t you let me?’

      ‘You?’

      ‘I’m on staff now,’ he reminded her. ‘And your Mitchell may just open up to another male. That’s if you’re agreeable?’