The Rebel and the Baby Doctor by Joanna Neil Page A

the long fingers lightly tanned to a golden brown, and the sense of well-being they induced travelled along her arm and invaded the whole of her body. It was because he was holding her…that was the reason she was feeling so mixed up, wasn’t it? Her mind simply refused to function properly while he was doing that.
    ‘I don’t know about any of that,’ she murmured. ‘But I’m rapidly coming to the conclusion that I should steer clear of paediatrics throughout the rest of my training. Treating adults is one thing, but I’m beginning to realise that working with infants and children is altogether too stressful for me. I’ve had to watch Emily these last few years, growing up with a heart condition, needing constant care and attention, and I saw how worrying it wasfor my sister, bracing herself to prepare her child for different procedures.’
    ‘But Emily is doing fine now, isn’t she?’ Connor lightly stroked her arm. ‘All that care and attention has paid off in the end.’
    ‘Yes, you’re right, but it was hard watching her go through it.’ She glanced to one side at the perspex board where patients’ names were listed. ‘My little charge is in bay four. I’ll go and see how he’s doing.’
    Connor nodded. ‘Drop by when you’ve had time to assess him and let me know what’s what. I’ll be in the paediatric observation ward. I have to go and look at a couple of patients who were admitted overnight. One of them had a heart operation recently, but he collapsed last night and I have to explain to the parents about changes to his medication.’
    ‘Okay.’
    He let go of her and Phoebe hurried away before he could lure her back to his side.
    Connor appeared to have no problem at all in dealing with his small patients or their parents. She’d seen evidence of it on a number of occasions when she had passed through children’s A and E, and everybody said how good he was at working with them. It would be great if some of his confidence would rub off on her.
    Some half an hour later, when she had finished checking over the baby and had gathered together all the paperwork that needed to go along with him to the neonatal unit, she went in search of Connor once more.
    ‘Are you busy?’ she asked him, wheeling the baby into the treatment room where he was working. ‘OnlyI need you to sign off on these papers before I can take the baby up to the unit.’
    She smiled at the child Connor was tending, a young boy of around nine years old, who was lying in the bed, propped up by pillows. Then she nodded a greeting to the parents who were by his side.
    Connor came over to her. ‘Yes, of course. I’m glad that you’re here.’ His grey eyes took on a warm, inviting glimmer. ‘You can perhaps help to explain to Mr and Mrs Brannigan about the holiday centre on Exmoor. I think you’re familiar with it because that’s where your little niece went to take a break a few months ago.’
    Phoebe glanced at the parents. ‘Are you talking about the activity centre?’
    Mrs Brannigan nodded. ‘That’s right. I was thinking of taking Jamie there for a few days while my husband is away on business. Jamie’s recovering from a heart operation, and he’s been feeling quite miserable lately, so I was looking for somewhere that would be fun for him, but not too strenuous. Can you recommend it at all?’
    Phoebe nodded, and looked across the room at Jamie once more. ‘I think you would like it there, Jamie,’ she said. ‘My niece was a little younger than you when she first went to the centre. She was six years old and, like you, she had just had an operation, and she tired easily, but there were all sorts of exciting things for her to do at the activity centre. She went again last year, because she enjoyed it so much.’
    She gave the boy an encouraging smile. ‘There’s wheelchair access, and you can do things like canoeing and fishing, or if you don’t like watersports there arealways things like the farm animals