Kiss Me Under the Mistletoe. Fiona Harper

a dietician or, even worse, a chiropodist.

      ‘What’s your specialisation?’ he demanded.

      ‘I majored in surgery, but surgery isn’t my specialisation now. Look, I think I can set your mind—’

      ‘Paediatrics, or adult?’

      ‘Adult, and if you’d just let me finish—’

      ‘Seth, my head and chest injuries need Neurology,’ Jerry called. ‘I’m stabilising him as best I can, but he’s definitely got an intracranial haematoma.’

      ‘OK, I’ll—’

      ‘Seth, could you please come and take a look at Mrs Lennox?’ Babs exclaimed. ‘Her BP’s all over the place.’

      ‘I’ll be there in a—’

      ‘This child’s urine is very dark,’ Dr Sweatshirt observed. ‘Looks like possible myoglobinuria to me—iron and protein being released from a damaged muscle into his blood and urine. You really should be taking blood samples.’

      ‘And do I look as though I’ve got six pairs of hands?’ Seth exclaimed with frustration, then swore under his breath when a tide of hot colour washed across Dr Sweatshirt’s cheeks.

      He shouldn’t be taking out his frustration on her. It wasn’t right, and it wasn’t fair. She hadn’t needed to offer to help, especially as she didn’t officially start work at the Belfield until tomorrow. ‘Look, I’m sor—’

      ‘Seth, I really do need you,’ Babs protested. ‘Fiona and I have got an IV line into Mrs Lennox, and we’ve checked her ABCs, but we’re not doctors.’

      Ms Sweatshirt was. She’d been right about the possibility of myoglobinuria, and with a specialisation in surgery she probably knew as much—if not more—about burns patients as he did.

      ‘OK, Dr whatever-your-name-is,’ he said brusquely. ‘Can you take care of the child while I check out Mrs Lennox?’

      Dr Sweatshirt nodded. She didn’t meet his gaze but she nodded, and he hurried across the examination room.

      ‘I’ve paged Orthopaedics,’ Babs declared. ‘Do you want Fiona to get the technicians down for a scan?’

      ‘Yes, please, and, Babs…’ He lowered his voice. ‘Would you assist Dr Sweatshirt? Watch what she does, and if you’re worried—’

      ‘Seth, I’ll assist her with pleasure, but you heard what Madge said. She’s a bona fide doctor, and she starts work in the hospital tomorrow, so stop stressing. Ye gods, if ever a woman looked as though she knew what she was doing, she does.’

      She did, Seth thought as he glanced across at Dr Sweatshirt. She looked calm, in control and completely professional. She was also quite attractive if a man’s taste ran to women with soft brown eyes and riotously curly brown hair pulled back into a lopsided ponytail. His didn’t. He preferred big-busted blondes with pizzazz, not skinny, wholesome-looking women who looked as though they could have got a part in a remake of Anne of Green Gables, but that didn’t excuse the fact that he’d been quite unforgivably rude to her.

      He sighed as he inserted a catheter into Mrs Lennox’s bladder, then checked her femoral pulses. Time for an apology. Time for a quick blast of the old Hardcastle charm.

      He cleared his throat pointedly, and saw Dr Sweatshirt’s head come up.

      ‘I owe you an apology, don’t I?’ he said. ‘I’ve been quite appallingly rude to you when you didn’t need to volunteer to help, so if you want to lob an IV bag in my direction I promise I won’t duck.’

      She looked momentarily startled, but when he threw her one of his guaranteed gotta-love-me Hardcastle grins he was the one who blinked when an answering smile slowly curved her lips. Hey, but that smile was quite something. It lit up her face, completely transforming her. Maybe she could be his type after all. Not permanently, of course, because he didn’t do permanence, but maybe for dinner tonight, a few dates…

      ‘I’ve just realised I don’t even know your name,’ he said, upping his smile a notch. ‘I’m Seth Hardcastle, A and E consultant, and you are—’

      ‘OK, which of you jokers called for a brain expert?’

      Seth turned to see the consultant from Neurology standing in the doorway, and laughed. ‘Jerry did, but I wouldn’t say no to a quick brain transplant.’

      ‘I don’t do freebies, Seth.’ The consultant grinned, but as he walked towards Jerry it wasn’t Seth who sighed but Olivia.

      She needed a quick brain transplant too or, perhaps more accurately, a quick course in self-assertiveness. She should have told Seth Hardcastle who she was. She should have said, Look, sunshine, I’m your boss, but the trouble was she’d never been the ‘Look, sunshine’ type. She’d always favoured the softly-softly approach both in her personal and her professional life, coaxing by persuasion rather than by confrontation, and it had worked. Well, it had worked in her professional life at any rate.

      ‘Liv, Phil was a jerk, and you divorced him,’ Deborah had said. ‘Get over it, move on.’ And she would. Eventually. But six months wasn’t nearly long enough to forget that the man who had promised to love and cherish her had been bedding his secretary on a depressingly regular basis throughout their short married life.

      ‘Are you all right?’

      Babs was gazing at her curiously, and Olivia forced a smile.

      ‘I’m fine. It’s just…Is the department always this chaotic?’

      The sister chuckled. ‘You should see us on a Saturday night. I don’t know how we’d manage without Seth and Jerry.’

      Jerry Swanson. The department’s specialist registrar. Thirty-two and married to one of the nurses in Women’s Surgical, according to his file. She could handle him, but Seth Hardcastle…

      The trouble was he looked even more impressive up close than he’d done in the waiting room. He shouldn’t have done. His blue eyes were bloodshot, his chin was dark with stubble and his black hair was falling carelessly over his forehead. He looked as though he hadn’t slept for days. He also looked as sexy as hell, and it wasn’t a reassuring combination.

      ‘I know Seth can be a bit abrasive,’ the sister continued, clearly misinterpreting her silence, ‘but he’s one of the best consultants I’ve ever worked with.’

      And if I don’t toughen up, he’s going to walk right over me, Olivia thought as she heard Seth snap at something Tony Melville had said.

      ‘Oh, hallelujah,’ Babs exclaimed with relief. ‘Here come the crispy squad.’

      The crispy squad. The irreverent name most A and E units gave to the burns unit. The crispy squad would take care of the little boy, Neurology was attending to the chest and head case, and Seth and Jerry could look after Mrs Lennox and the man with the open leg wound. She wasn’t needed any more. She could simply slip away, and she fully intended doing just that when she suddenly heard Seth say her name.

      ‘I’m afraid Seth’s on his high horse about our new clinical director,’ Babs said ruefully as a slight crease furrowed Olivia’s forehead. ‘He’s not very happy at her appointment.’

      Not very happy was the understatement of the year, Olivia thought as she heard Jerry declare, ‘Look, all I said was I can’t see Admin appointing somebody with no A and E experience,’ and Seth flashing back, ‘Well, if she’s not a pen-pusher, I bet her so-called experience consists of performing unnecessary cosmetic operations on women with more money than sense.’

      A spurt of anger flared inside Olivia as she stared at the consultant’s irate face, a spurt she hadn’t felt since she’d found out about Phil’s extra-marital affair. Just who the hell did Seth Hardcastle think he was? Well, she might not be able to tell him who he was, but she sure as shooting could tell him what he was.

      She