Read Online The Rebel Surgeon's Proposal by MARGARET MCDONAGH - Free Book Online

sofa. ‘Thanks for the company. I’ve really enjoyed this evening.’
    ‘Me, too.’
    At the front door, he hesitated. Somehow he resisted the urge to kiss her senseless, knowing he would never leave if he once tasted the sweetness of her mouth. Instead, he brushed his lips across her forehead and forced himself to move back.
    ‘I’ll see you at work tomorrow.’ He enjoyed one last lingering look at her before turning away. ‘Sweet dreams, Chessie.’
    His steps carried him swiftly back to his mother’s housewhere he collected his car and drove home—alone—hot and needy for Francesca. Tomorrow couldn’t come soon enough. He thought of her, of all she had been through in the past with her controlling mother, and vowed to ensure that she always felt safe and secure and had everything she wanted to make her own decisions for her future.
    He just hoped above all else that he could share that future with her.

CHAPTER FOUR

    F RANCESCA knew the instant that Luke stepped up behind her. Her whole body tingled, her pulse raced and heat percolated through her, pooling low in her belly. He let out a low whistle as he leaned in closer to look at the images on the screen. So close she could scent his earthy, musky fragrance and feel the heat of his body transferring to hers.
    ‘That is some break.’ His warm breath whispered across the skin of her neck as he spoke, stirring the loose strands of hair that had escaped her braid.
    ‘Nasty,’ she managed to murmur in agreement, fixing her gaze on the X-rays, struggling to maintain her professionalism. ‘What will you do?’
    The motorcyclist had been knocked from his bike by a hit-and-run driver shortly after one on Friday morning. He had been rushed the ten miles from one of the outlying villages to Strathlochan Hospital by ambulance, the paramedics rightly concerned about haemorrhaging inside the thigh. The A and E team had stabilised the patient and paged Orthopaedics and Radiology—which had brought Luke and herself to the department as they were both on call for the night shift.
    Despite the doctors immobilising the leg in a splint andadministering analgesics, the man was still in pain. Unsurprising, Francesca thought as she looked at the multiple breaks. His femur was fractured in two places high up the shaft, while the tibia was broken, with a sheared-off fragment, and the fibula had snapped, one end piercing the skin.
    Luke brushed against her as he reached to change the images to view the fractures from another angle. ‘We’ll have to put a nail and screws in the femur and plates on the tib and fib.’
    ‘Looks like you’ll be in Theatre for a while.’
    ‘Sure does. Good thing I always liked Mechano kits and fixing things.’ Luke cast her a mischievous smile before turning back to linger a moment more, his expression serious as he studied the various digital X-rays she had taken. ‘I’ll call Maurice. He’ll want to come in for this one. And with so much bleeding, as well as all the dirt in the wound and the risk of infection with an open fracture, we won’t delay operating.’
    As he moved away to talk with Robert Mowbray, the A and E consultant in charge of the patient, Francesca breathed out a sigh of relief and endeavoured to get her wayward responses back under control. This had been going on for nearly ten days now and, despite her regular assurances to herself that things would settle down, her awareness of Luke seemed to get stronger every day.
    From the first moment of the first day working together in the fracture clinic, Francesca had been impressed by and in awe of Luke’s skill. He knew what he wanted and didn’t suffer fools gladly, but even in Theatre during a tense operation—where she had seen other surgeons lose their rag and take their temper out on assorted staff—Luke never lost his cool and always treated people with respect. She had quickly realised that Luke had cultivated a work persona, just as she had, reminding her once