The Temptation Test Read online

  ‘Ms Carpenter is my liaison person!’ Noah said grimly, then he seized Jena’s elbow and steered her out of his office, across the reception area and into the main hospital foyer.

  ‘My liaison person?’ Jena echoed, hoping her voice didn’t reveal the sudden attack of breathlessness the rushed exit must have caused.

  ‘You know what I mean!’ He was growling again. ‘You’re here to see to the welfare of the patients in this circus, not pander to that shiny-tailed pen-pusher or the celebrity-chasers on the board.’

  His tone of voice, as well as his choice of words, left her in no doubt about what he thought of the pair they’d left in his office. The breathlessness she’d felt earlier was nothing compared to the total panic now reverberating through her chest. What had seemed like a relatively easy job was turning into a nightmare—before it had even begun.

  ‘You know,’ she said, wiggling her arm to remind him he was still gripping her elbow, ‘when I came up here, spending the three weeks in Matt’s old shack loomed as the major challenge of the location. I had no idea I was going to be caught up in a civil war.’

  She turned towards him as she spoke and Noah saw the apprehension in her eyes.

  ‘It’s hardly that!’ he said gruffly, then remembered it was pretty close.

  ‘Well, not as far as the film project is concerned,’ he amended. ‘I might have been against it in the beginning but, you’re right, I needed money for something else and agreed because of the financial inducement.’

  He studied her again but, as far as he could see, the denim eyes were no less wary.

  The woman was genuinely worried.

  ‘I won’t cause you any problems,’ he promised.

  Her smile broke through like sun through clouds, and she shook her head, making the strands of flaxen hair which had escaped the knot glimmer in the dim light of the foyer.

  ‘No?’ The teasing smile accompanying the word pressed the slit of a dimple into her right cheek.

  He reined back a brief diversionary thought about the possibility of other dimples on Ms Carpenter’s delectable body, and put some distance between them once again.

  ‘Not if you don’t cause me any,’ he said, grumbling the words so she realised his moment of weakness had passed. ‘Now, come along, I haven’t got all day. I’ll introduce you to whoever’s on duty and find someone to take you around so you can see the layout of the place.’

  He stalked off through a door on the right of the foyer, and Jena, puzzled by his mood swings, followed.

  ‘Rhoda Dent, Sister-in-Charge,’ Noah said, stopping by the nurses’ station and waving his hand towards the woman sitting at the computer.

  ‘I’m Jena Carpenter,’ Jena offered when she realised the doctor had no intention of making a proper introduction.

  She glanced towards him, and guessed it wasn’t rudeness this time. His attention had been diverted by something on a piece of paper he’d picked up off the desk.

  ‘Tom Jackson admitted Carla Trantino last night?’ he said, looking past Jena to the nursing sister.

  ‘He didn’t leave you a message?’ Rhoda murmured, scanning her desk as if a message might have been overlooked.

  ‘Could have done,’ Noah muttered. ‘I tipped over a lot of papers—might have missed something that had been on top.’ His eyes were again studying the paper as if some hidden meaning might be gleaned form whatever was written there. ‘What happened?’

  ‘No drugs,’ Rhoda said swiftly. ‘Well, not as far as anyone could tell. Tom felt a blood test would have been invasive—would have sent the wrong message to Carla.’

  ‘That we didn’t trust her?’ Noah nodded, while Jena tried to guess what was happening. Tom Jackson was obviously another of the town’s doctors but, from Rhoda’s reassuring response about drugs, could Carla be a drug addict?

  In a country town?

  ‘Good for Tom!’ Noah continued, leaving Jena no wiser. ‘I knew he’d backed me in the project but hadn’t realised he was wholeheartedly behind it.’

  ‘His favourite cousin died of an overdose,’ Rhoda said quietly. ‘But Carla’s problem was more a physical thing. Apparently a couple of local idiots decided the girls at your place were fair game and walked in expecting a party. The intruders had had too much to drink and had brought more alcohol with them. According to Tom, who had it from the lad called Davo, one of them grabbed Suzy by the arm and when Suzy screamed, all Carla’s street-survival skills came into action.’

  ‘It’s a wonder it’s not the local lads in hospital,’ Noah said, but he shook his head as if the offhand remark did nothing to ease whatever pain this conversation was causing.

  He cut across the room to a bed at the far end, and Jena, sensing her presence would be even less welcome than the film crew’s, waited by the desk. Perhaps Rhoda would explain what was going on—or would she? Wasn’t there such a thing as patient confidentiality?

  ‘This is the women’s ward and behind us are the men,’ Rhoda said, not explaining but motioning with her head to another long, airy room, visible through a wide arch. ‘Both have doors off the main hall, but because the stairs go up this side of the men’s ward door, you don’t notice it.’

  Jena pictured the entry and wide hall in her mind.

  ‘On the other side, behind the reception and office area, there’s an operating theatre and Casualty, which has its own entrance out the back.’

  A younger nurse came in at that moment, and Rhoda signalled to her to join them.

  ‘Jill, this is Jena Carpenter from the film company. Will you take her on a guided tour of the place and introduce her to all the staff while I walk round with Noah?’

  Jill, a plump pretty young woman with reddish hair and the freckled skin it usually accompanied, looked delighted.

  ‘We’ve all been dying for the filming to start. I know Noah says the whole idea is to act as normally as possible but, honestly, in a place this size, the Christmas street parade’s exciting—so you can imagine what it’s like having a television crew putting our hospital on Real Life!’

  Her bubbly enthusiasm restored some of Jena’s equilibrium. Or perhaps getting out of sight of Noah Blacklock had done it?

  Jill led her across the ward and out through wide French doors onto an enclosed verandah.

  ‘We call these the verandah beds for obvious reasons,’ Jill said, smiling and waving her fingers at an elderly woman who was sitting up in the first bed. ‘Hi, Mrs Nevins.’

  The woman smiled but didn’t reply, her attention focussed on the pattern of the brightly coloured wool she was knitting into an intricate pattern.

  Drawn by the colours, Jena would have liked to have stopped, but Jill swept her onward, mentioning the names of other elderly patients as they passed.

  ‘It’s a kind of a stabilising and non-urgent care area,’ Jill explained. ‘People in for tests and trials of treatment. We’ve three GPs in town, and most of the people on the verandah are their patients rather than public patients. We’ve five private rooms, but the locals seem to prefer being on the verandah with other people, rather than shut away in rooms on their own. We use three of the private rooms for maternity suites now, though we don’t have many babies delivered here. The town has an excellent midwife, so many women are opting for home births.’

  Jena tried to absorb this flood of information, while mentally drawing her own rough floor plan of the hospital. When Jill led her off the verandah through a different set of French doors, she expected to come into the men’s ward but instead found herself in a brightly decorated space more in keeping with a child-care centre than a hospital.

  ‘This is our outpatient department. When Noah came it had the same pale green paint and tan linoleum as the rest of the hospital, but he checked through the stats and decided more kids came here than adults, so why not make it kid-friendly?’

  ‘It’s certainly worked,’ Jena remarked, looking around in wonder at the vivid transfers on the walls and the bright mobiles hanging f
rom the ceiling.

  ‘Mr Finch didn’t want to spend money on what he thought was a foolish idea so there was a bit of an argument about it. In the end, Noah did the work himself—with a bit of help from the yardman and the nurses. Now the grown-ups like it, too,’ Jill assured her. She waved her hand towards treatment tables set against the wall. ‘We have physios and occupational therapists who visit fortnightly and a speech pathologist who comes once a month. They use the room as a treatment room, which explains why it sees more kids than adults.’

  Jena nodded to show she’d understood, but the image of the Noah Blacklock slapping on paint and sticking bright decals on the wall was a bit hard to accept—and she was still puzzled over the layout of the place.

  ‘But where’s the men’s ward?’ she asked, and Jill chuckled.

  ‘Back this way,’ she said, leading Jena through an internal door which took them into the corridor and eventually into the wide hall behind the stairs. ‘On this lower floor, the building bumps out into a T-shape, so you go off the verandah straight into Outpatients. We walked past the door into Men’s. The private rooms are on the verandah section on the other side.’

  She then walked Jena at a bewildering pace through the series of small rooms filling the crosspiece of the T—equipment rooms, pharmacy, linen store, a huge kitchen where the smell of sweet buns baking made Jena’s mouth water, then to the other side where X-Ray, scrub rooms, a well-equipped theatre and recovery room were all nestled side by side. Across from them was another ward where post-surgical patients, either minor cases treated at the hospital or those recuperating from operations in the city, were nursed.

  In the same section as that occupied by the colourful Outpatients, on the other side was Casualty, empty now but looking ready for any emergency.

  ‘Ha! I’ve found you. Jill show you everything? Was there anything else you needed to know?’

  Did her reaction to Noah Blacklock’s presence count as an emergency?

  And why was he suddenly so cheerful, even helpful, when he’d made it plain earlier he was against all she stood for?

  ‘Jill’s been very kind, and I’ve met the cook who must surely be the most important member of the staff,’ she said, hoping this amiable version of the doctor might be persuaded to remain.

  ‘It’s fairly rare to find a fully operational hospital kitchen so close to the city,’ he agreed—agreeably! ‘Most places get catered food delivered on a contract basis. Fortunately, Kareela had a heritage of good hospital food and a legacy of reliable kitchen staff. Mrs Meldrum’s been here for thirty years.’

  Jill murmured something about getting back to work and slipped away, leaving Jena uncertain what to do next.

  ‘I’m sure you’ve also got work to do,’ she said to Noah, who glanced at his watch and shrugged.

  ‘Not for twenty minutes when an outpatient session begins. Would you like a cup of coffee?’

  While she might, at first, have been surprised by his change in demeanour, Jena now found herself suspicious of it.

  Highly suspicious.

  She peered at him but could read nothing in a face which might have been hewn from fine-grained granite, so little did it reveal.

  ‘OK!’

  He didn’t react to the half-heartedness of her agreement, merely nodding his head in the direction of the kitchen then leading the way.

  He must want something. That was the only possible explanation for such a change—unless, of course, he was a practising schizophrenic!

  Noah led the way towards the kitchen, his mind working furiously as he debated how he could draw Miss Liaison Person into helping Carla plan the group’s contribution to the Christmas street parade.

  ‘So, taking it easy, are you?’ Mrs Meldrum asked, as he led Jena into the kitchen. ‘And about time. How are things out at the lake? Sure you don’t want to reconsider and shift into my spare room?’

  ‘Quite sure, Mrs M.,’ he replied. ‘The shack’s comfortable enough for a short-term stay.’

  He was surprised to find he actually meant it. Though he’d been furious when Linda’s machinations had necessitated his move out of town, the few days he’d already had out by the lake had been surprisingly restful. Until last night when a phone call from his sister, demanding to know his Christmas plans and telling him exactly what his nieces and nephews required in the way of gifts, had disturbed his sleep. Then he’d overslept so this morning he’d been running late…

  Setting the memory of that folly firmly aside, he picked up the conversation before the women could wonder if he’d fallen asleep.

  ‘Anyway, there’s far too much excitement in town for the likes of me.’

  ‘I heard what those hooligans did,’ the cook replied. ‘Young Brett Ward was one of them. I’ll have something to say to his mother, you see if I don’t.’

  She turned to Jena and added, ‘Sorry. You haven’t a clue what we’re talking about, have you? Country town stuff, that’s all it is.’

  Jena looked from the motherly woman to the man whose mood had switched so swiftly and waited for more of an explanation, but the cook was offering a choice of the fresh buns, hot from the oven, or biscuits she’d baked yesterday.

  ‘You have to have something with your tea or coffee,’ she told Jena, waving her to a chair at a large, well-scrubbed table. ‘Bad to be drinking caffeine on an empty stomach.’

  ‘Is that a medical fact?’ Jena asked Noah, who grinned at her as he replied.

  ‘I think caffeine habits are probably bad whether you eat with it or not, but that doesn’t stop me downing plenty of Mrs Meldrum’s brew. It’s good,’ he added, as if he felt it necessary to assure her of the quality.

  She tried to concentrate on the words, but the smile had caused a shift in her internal dynamics so she was busy reappraising her initial perceptions of the man.

  Which was better than considering her physical reactions to him.

  Caffeine—that’s what they were discussing.

  ‘I’m sure your coffee’s excellent, and I’d love one of those fresh buns,’ Jena said, concentrating hard on the woman who ran the kitchen. ‘The smell of them cooking has been tantalising me.’

  Mrs Meldrum pushed two mugs, a coffeepot and a plate of buns, halved and buttered so the butter was melting into the fresh dough and glazing the currants, across the table towards where Jena sat.

  She reached for the coffeepot and poured herself a cup, then stretched across the table for milk and sugar. Giving Noah Blacklock, who’d settled into the chair next to her, long enough to take up the conversation.

  He failed to take advantage of the opportunity, but Jena wasn’t going to help out again. She took a bun and bit into it, the pleasure of the simple tastes so strong she wanted to moan with sheer delight.

  She tried the coffee—it lived up to Noah’s praise—and finished the piece of bun.

  ‘The set designer and carpenters will be here at eleven,’ she said when it became apparent Noah had forgotten why he’d invited her for coffee. ‘I’ll speak to them about moving quietly.’

  He frowned at her, as if trying to remember who she was, then asked, ‘What exactly will you be doing?’ He hesitated, then added, ‘I mean, I know you’re to liaise between the television crew and me, but when there’s no liaising to be done—like now—what’s your job?’

  ‘This week, I’ll be following you and other staff around, getting a feel for the routines. When it goes to air, the programme will appear to have been shot in a week, but the actual filming is scheduled to take a fortnight then bits will be cut—’

  ‘Real-life TV?’ he murmured again, but less aggressively this time.

  She grinned at him.

  ‘I doubt there’s any such thing, but it will be more real than Country Hospital, the show they’ll use for comparisons!’

  Then, because grinning at him didn’t seem like such a good idea, she turned her attention back to his question.

  ‘Once I’ve got some idea of what your usual d
ay entails, and have a feel for the hospital routine, I’ll do a suggested filming schedule.’

  ‘Doctor arrives at work, doctor saves life, doctor delivers baby—’

  ‘Doctor gets a sock on the jaw!’ Jena warned. ‘And the show isn’t about you, it’s about the hospital, the staff and the patients.’

  ‘You can do that—work out filming schedules?’ he asked, sounding genuinely puzzled.

  Jena hoped her reaction hadn’t shown on her face. After all, Noah Blacklock wasn’t the first person to doubt she had a brain.

  Though this time it irritated her far more than usual…

  Not wanting to go there, she took a deep breath and explained.

  ‘I’ve been involved in television production for eighteen months so I have some idea of what works and what doesn’t,’ she said. ‘I began as a general dogsbody, helping out wherever I was needed, then moved on to production assistant. This will be much the same, only my primary concern will be keeping an eye on the crew once filming starts so the hospital staff and patients aren’t inconvenienced.’

  ‘Which shouldn’t be too difficult once you’ve explained what you want them to do?’

  The question hung in the air between them, loaded with undercurrents Jena couldn’t understand.

  Unless…

  Memories of losing the job she’d really wanted flashed through her head—the producer’s voice saying, ‘I know you’re more than a pretty face, Jena, but other people’s perception of you will be different. The general public would see you as a beautiful blonde but not credit you with brains, and the show would lose veracity.’

  Sitting in the hospital kitchen, anger now fizzed where attraction had briefly flickered.

  ‘You’re saying even a blonde should be able to manage it?’ she fumed, standing up and pushing back her chair with her calves. ‘Talk about stereotypical thinking!’

  ‘No, not at all!’

  Noah was also on his feet, and almost stuttering in his haste to deny her assumption.