‘What’s going on?’ asked Sam.
‘She’s going to have to go in,’ Katie told him, eyeing the mountains around her. ‘I don’t know how they’ll get the stretcher through though. She could be stuck here for hours whilst they work it out. Another whimper travelled down the corridor, and Katie moved to go back to her without noting that Sam was digging out his own phone.
*****
‘Um …’ Katie’s wide eyes took in the activity around her. There must have been at least ten guys clearing Mrs Howell’s corridor. Everything was being efficiently stacked in the dining room, which was already half full. They’d only been there twenty minutes and the corridor was almost clear enough for the stretcher. After she’d called the ambulance, Sam had pushed her aside to get to Mrs Howell and crouched down beside her.
‘Oh my,’ Mrs Howell had breathed, ‘the Lord has sent an angel from heaven. I must be slipping away.’ Her words were a little slurred and her eyes glazed; she was obviously feeling the effects of the slug of morphine. Sam had smiled at her and her glazed eyes had widened even more whilst she crossed herself, muttering, ‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph.’
Before Katie knew it, he had achieved the impossible and managed to obtain Mrs Howell’s consent to shift some of her stuff. The combination of Sam’s extreme bossiness, Mrs Howell’s morphine-addled mind, and the fact she believed he was a messenger from God contributed significantly to her acquiescence.
That was when things started getting more and more bizarre. A couple of big cars arrived and the house was filled with Sam-sized men. Mrs Howell was in seventh heaven, her morphine high mingling with the fantasy that God had seen fit to send not one but ten angels from heaven to see her over to the other side. A fair bit of interest was stirred on the road as well, with a couple of the more nosy residents (all senior citizens, as the road was full of bungalows) coming out to watch. By the time the ambulance arrived, a path had been cleared through the house to Mrs Howell and there was no difficulty extracting her. But she refused to be lifted into the ambulance until she had thanked each and every one of her ‘angels’, even grabbing Sam by the back of his neck and pulling him down for a kiss on his stubbled cheek, much to his surprise and reluctant amusement.
Katie had noticed that all the men seemed to be watching her and Sam with unconcealed curiosity. Most of them were part of Rob’s security crew on the set. Katie recognised a few, including Geoff. She’d been so worried about Mrs Howell, and so thankful to them, that she’d ended up hugging them all herself in her enthusiasm and gratitude (something she noticed Sam was not so keen on, his reaction a source of amusement to the guys). The last one she’d hugged had practically lifted her off her feet, and Sam, clearly having lost patience with the situation, grabbed her hand once she’d been lowered to the ground, pulling her slightly behind him. By that stage all the men had stopped simply watching and had started staring at them, openly grinning. Sam scowled at them all, not even thanking them for trekking out to the middle of nowhere for him, and stalked to his car with Katie being pulled along behind him.
‘Hey … um, thanks,’ she said hesitantly once they were back in his car. He was still scowling, but as he flicked her a brief glance his expression seemed to soften. After he put the key in the ignition he turned to face her, hooked her around the back of her neck and pulled her in for a brief kiss.
Once done with this, he kept his hand at the back of her neck and her forehead pressed to his for a moment. ‘Do you think you could try not to hug other men?’ he whisper-growled into her mouth. ‘In fact, to clarify, could you endeavour not to touch other men, at all.’
‘Uh … Sam, I don’t know if it’s skipped your notice but I’m sort of a touchy-feely person.’
‘Not any more,’ he said firmly in his Voice of Authority, setting her back in her seat and starting up the truck.
‘Bossy,’ she muttered under her breath, feeling a little dazed and noticing that the rest of the men had not missed their exchange in the car; judging by their smirks and the fact that none of them had made any move towards their own cars, they were enjoying the show.
Katie was phoned with two more visits whilst they were on the road, and by the time she was sitting with Mrs Llwellyn she was beginning to smell a rat. Not only had Mrs Llwellyn insisted that she bring ‘her gentleman’ inside, but there did not seem to be anything the least bit wrong with the robust eighty-nine-year-old.
‘I understand you’re a military man,’ Mrs Llwellyn questioned, her eyes flaring with curiosity and excitement.
‘Yes, Mrs Llwellyn,’ Sam answered.
‘Oh, do call me Betty,’ she told him. Katie, who had been Mrs Llwellyn’s GP for the last three years and was still yet to be invited to call her by her Christian name, rolled her eyes and sank back into the sofa with a resigned huff.
‘Mrs Llwellyn,’ Katie put in through clenched teeth. ‘How on earth do you know so much about Sam?’
‘Oh, it’s all over the village, Dr Katie. I heard from Mrs Duncan, who heard from Mrs Riley, who lives opposite Mrs Howell.’ Mrs Llwellyn turned her attention back to Sam as Katie looked up at the ceiling, seeking patience. ‘So kind of you young men sorting out Gaynor like that. Now, where were we? Ah yes, your military career. Army or Navy?’
Sam smiled at her. ‘I was in the Special Forces.’
‘Special Forces,’ Mrs Jones breathed. ‘How fascinating. And now you’re in security. Tell me – do you “pack heat”?’
Katie snorted; she’d noticed before Mrs Llwellyn’s extensive collection ofLaw and OrderDVDs. Sam pressed his lips together, his eyes dancing. ‘Pack heat?’ he asked.
‘Carry a gun,’ she whispered, leaning forward as if they were in danger of alerting the authorities to Sam’s illegal weapons stash should their voices carry beyond her small cottage.
‘Not when I’m in the UK,’ he told her, and she nodded sagely.
‘Okay,’ she said, drawing out the word before giving him a very obvious wink that made Katie very nearly choke on her tea. ‘What I would like to know is whether you would consider taking me on a ride-along in your vehicle? We could go looking for gentlemen of disrepute and threaten them with physical violence. I wouldn’t be any trouble.’
‘Mrs Llwellyn, is there actually anythingIcan help you with today?’ Katie interrupted.
‘You know it’s funny, dear, but I’m feeling so much better now,’ she chirped, then turned back to Sam. ‘Let me know when it’s convenient, dear. I’d have to get my carers to bring some extra pads, see.’
By the time Katie managed to get back to the surgery she was late for her afternoon clinic. She sighed as she looked at her screen. Already two waiting, at least twenty patients to see, leave alone the phone calls to make. To get through the sheer volume of work in general practice you have to be hardened. You have to stick to the ten-minute consultation time with ruthless efficiency and be tough with the patients. Unfortunately for Katie, ruthless efficiency and toughness were not her forte, so it was no surprise that she was still consulting at seven in the evening. When she’d finally gone through all her paperwork it was gone nine and she was dead on her feet. She shut everything down, grabbed her stuff and pushed open her consulting room door on automatic pilot, gripped by total and absolute mental exhaustion.
‘Argh!’ she cried, dropping her bag in fright.
*****
