Under His Influence
Page 60
His lips covered hers and she was lost.
It wasn’t a long kiss, just a few seconds was enough to do it. Stone let her go and said, “You’ll tell that other doctor to let me go, won’t you?”
She nodded.
“You’ll tell him you have no concerns about me.”
“No concerns,” she echoed. “He might not…agree with me.”
“Then you’ll have to persuade him, won’t you, Jennifer?”
She reached a hand out, wanting to touch his stubbled cheek. He indulged her desire for a moment or so, then took her hand and replaced it firmly in her lap.
“Go on then,” he prompted. “Put it in your notes.”
She scribbled a few disconnected phrases and then sat there, watching him in a daze.
“Will that be all?” he asked, perfectly polite.
“Oh!” She recollected the purpose of her visit, her profession, the fact that she lived a life outside the orbit of this man, though it didn’t quite strike home. It didn’t seem true somehow. “Do I have to go…I could take a few more minutes…”
“You’re on duty, Jennifer.”
There was a rough knock at the door, then the nurse entered without waiting for any permission.
“The camera’s been turned off somehow. Just had to check you were okay.”
He stood on the end of the bed, fiddling with the CCTV eye in the corner of the ceiling while Dr. Wolseley gasped, brought back to reality by the sudden realisation of what she had put at stake by succumbing to Stone’s mysterious allure. She shook her head violently and backed over to the door. Perhaps she needed to check herself in here.
But when she looked at Stone, slumped back on the bed now, a bored sneer accompanying his observation of the nurse’s actions, all thoughts were dislodged by one imperative. Do what he told me to do. Get him out of here.
She turned to leave, bumping into a young woman on the other side of the doorway.
“J
ohn Stone?” the woman asked, uncertain.
Dr. Wolseley felt herself consumed by jealousy. This woman was attractive and sexy. Was she his wife? His girlfriend?
“Who are you?”
“Mimi. He asked me to visit. Is it okay to go in?”
Dr. Wolseley simply sniffed and stalked off down the corridor, nose in the air, looking for her senior colleague.
Mimi stuck her head cautiously around the side of the door.
John, apparently sensing her, instantly turned and focused all his attention on her, ignoring the fiddling of the nurse in the corner.
“Miranda,” he exclaimed. “You came.”
“I wasn’t going to. This is against my better judgement.”
“You’re doing the right thing.” John stood, holding out his hands.
“No. I’m not going to touch you. You stay there on that bed and I’ll sit on the chair. Over here. I’d like that nurse to stay too.”
The nurse turned around and stepped off the bed, smiling.