Maggie Kingsley – The Consultant's Italian Knight (страница 9)

‘Kate—’

‘And what are you doing here, anyway?’ she continued, her eyes suddenly narrowing. ‘Are you following me?’

‘Of course I’m not following you!’ he exclaimed. ‘I just happened to be conducting an enquiry across the street, and came out of the house as the baluster began to fall. Come on, my car’s over there. I’ll drive you home.’

He had already caught hold of her arm, clearly taking her agreement for granted, and she shook herself free with annoyance.

‘I don’t need—or want—you to drive me home,’ she replied. ‘My flat’s just three blocks away, and I’m perfectly capable of walking there.’

‘I’m sure you are but Union Grove is not three blocks away, and I’m driving you home.’

‘Don’t you ever take no for an answer?’ she protested, irritated beyond measure by his implacable expression. ‘I am fine—OK?—and I want to walk home, so why don’t you just go away and get on with your police work?’

‘Because I’m fresh out of little old ladies to harass and now I’m targeting a younger age group. Kate, are you going to come quietly,’ he continued, as she glared up at him, ‘or am I going to have to cuff you?’

Would he? She couldn’t be one hundred per cent certain that he wouldn’t, and with ill-disguised bad grace, she hitched her shoulder bag back up onto her shoulder and strode across the road to the dusty, nondescript Volkswagen that was sitting there.

‘This is ridiculous,’ she said, yanking open the passenger door and clambering in. ‘Haven’t you got a wife, or significant other, to go home to?’

‘My wife divorced me four years ago, and there is no significant other in my life.’

‘I…I’m sorry,’ she said awkwardly, ‘about your wife, I mean.’

‘I loved my work, my wife didn’t,’ he replied as he slid into the driver’s seat beside her. ‘End of story. Want to talk about why your marriage failed?’

‘No. ’

‘Fair enough,’ he replied. ‘He’s a doctor at the General, isn’t he, but his speciality is Orthopaedics rather than A and E.’

‘How did you…? Oh, of course,’ she continued tightly. ‘You have all my information on file, don’t you, right down to the size of shoes I take, and the make of my underwear.’

‘We only carry detailed dossiers of known and suspected drug dealers,’ he observed, then his eyes glinted. ‘But if you’d like to tell me the make of your underwear—purely for our file, of course…’

‘No, I wouldn’t,’ she said stonily, ‘and John doesn’t work at the General any more. He got another job six months ago, and can we drop this subject, please?’

‘It must be tough when two consultants get married,’ he observed as though she hadn’t spoken. ‘Two huge workloads, two equally large amounts of responsibility.’

‘John isn’t a consultant. He’s a specialist registrar.’

‘Ah. ’

‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ she demanded.

‘Some men have problems with a woman—even if that woman is their wife—making it to the top if they haven’t.’

‘John isn’t—wasn’t—that petty,’ she protested, and saw one of Mario’s eyebrows rise.

‘If you say so,’ he murmured.

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