Doctor Knows Best by Ann Jennings Page B

said the words lightly, but her heart was strangely heavy. It had never bothered her before, but now suddenly she felt that her Mr. Right never would come, because he was right there beside her. The only trouble was that he already had a family—he had just said so.
    â€œPerhaps you are too choosy,” he said, taking her arm and leading her into the restaurant.
    â€œPerhaps,” answered Megan wistfully, suddenly wishing she had never agreed to go with him for a meal.
    Very carefully she kept the conversation light and informal during dinner, determined not to let it get on to a personal level. Soon she had him laughing with her anecdotes of the various characters who worked in the County General.
    â€œI can see it is not only the switchboard that is the fount of all knowledge,” he said, smiling at her, his vivid blue eyes sparkling.
    Megan steeled her heart to look at him without going weak at the knees, something she found increasingly difficult to do. Why, oh why did he have to be married, her heart cried out, because by now she was convinced that he was.
    â€œYou forget I’ve been at the County General ever since I started nursing. I did my training here and I’ve stayed here ever since.”
    â€œHave you never thought of moving on?” he asked. “Most girls seem to get itchy feet once they have qualified.”
    Megan sighed and before she knew it she was explaining to him the reasons she had decided to stay put. Her father had been a doctor in general practice in Devon, and had died very young of leukaemia, leaving her mother with an inadequate pension and two young children to bring up.
    â€œThe house, our family home, still isn’t paid for,” she told Giles, “and I feel morally bound to help my mother with the mortgage as she went without so much herself in order to give Richard and me a good education.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” he said gently, reaching across the table and enclosing her small hand warmly within his large one. “It must have been very hard for you all.”
    Megan smiled. “Yes, it was, but at least we’ve got the happy memories. My father was such a happy-go-lucky man. Even when he knew he was dying he refused to get depressed, not even at the end. The only thing that did worry him was the fact that he had not taken out a good insurance, and he knew my mother would have a financial struggle when he was gone.”
    She sighed again, thinking of those dark days. Then she brightened. “But my mother is a remarkable woman too; she always used to say to him, ‘Who needs money? We have our love, that’s enough.’”
    â€œShe was right of course,” said Giles sombrely. “No amount of money is a substitute for love. So, you see, you have been rich really, having a happy childhood, having loving memories to look back on.”
    He sounded strangely envious. Megan laughed. “You know all about me,” she said, “but I know very little about you. All I know is that you have a house in Cheyne Walk.”
    For a moment he hesitated, then he said slowly, “My childhood was not happy. My parents eventually split up after many terrible rows, and my mother left the country. My sister and I stayed behind in London with my father and had a succession of housekeepers—some good, some bad and some distinctly indifferent.” He smiled at Megan. “So you can see I envy you your background, even if it was cruelly shattered by your father’s death. As you say, you still have happy memories of your mother and father together. Mine, I’m afraid, are only bitter, and they say history always repeats itself.”
    With that cryptic remark he changed the subject, leaving Megan more than a little puzzled by his last few words. However, he adroitly steered the conversation on to lighter subjects and soon had Megan laughing with his hilarious accounts of incidents that had occurred at his