Free Spring Proposal in Swallowbrook by Abigail Gordon

indication that he was in no mood to dawdle.
    She was getting the message from two directions—her own common sense, which had been in short supply ever since their moment of meeting, and his reluctance to get too close to her. From now on she was not going to let the attractions of her landlord get to her in any shape or form.
    Tomorrow was Friday, the last day they would be doing the home visits together, and maybe if she told them at the practice that she felt confident enough now to cope on her own they would agree to her going solo on the last day of the week.
    With that thought in mind she went to bed filled with determination and purpose and surprisingly slept the moment she laid her head on the pillow.
    Not so for Hugo. With the medical journals untouched he sat late into the night, gazing across to where Ruby was deep in dreamless sleep.
    They’d met too soon, he thought. No sooner had he got his life back after Patrice and the children had gone than Ruby had arrived on the scene, tired and bedraggled after a stressful day, and she had never been out of his thoughts since.
    But of late they were not the same kind of thoughts that he’d had then, when he’d had to involve himself in looking after her wellbeing whether he’d wanted to or not. As he’d watched her dancing around the apartment on the night she’d become his tenant, as well as amusement there had been an unexpected feeling of tenderness inside him, and whenever he had cause to congratulate her on her knowledge and expertise in the surgery it was there again, a warm tide of feelings washing over him.
    He was trying to stay aloof from the physical appeal she had for him, but the memory of moments like tonight when she’d ended up in his arms for a few mind-blowing seconds and had let him see how much she liked it were not going to go away.
    In spite of having made a big thing about tonight’s dining out together being just a form of apology for being so boorish when they’d first met if he was honest with himself it had been more than that.
    He’d wanted her to himself for a few hours, away from the surgery and Lakes Rise, in neutral surroundings where he could get to know her better, and it had taken some degree of will power to wish Ruby a brief goodnight and point himself towards the house, when only a short time ago he would have been fretting to get back home to his freedom from care.
    Maybe he was beginning to feel like this about her because with Ruby he had a choice—she asked nothing of him. With Patrice and her children there had been no choice and he had let it cloud his judgement in those first days of Ruby’s arrival in the village.
    He went up to bed at last with no answers for his thoughts and wondered what tomorrow would have in store for the two of them.
    The main topic of conversation at the surgery the next morning was that Gordon, the elderly practice manager, had decided to retire, and the news was generating pleasure because they were all invited to a meal at the end of the month on his last day, and side by side with the pleasure was curiosity as to who would be taking his place.
    For Ruby, who had just expressed to the other doctors her confidence regarding going it alone on the home visits and got their approval, the retirement of the practice manager wasn’t of that much interest because she hardly knew him, and did she want to socialise in Hugo’s company once more and start the heart-searching all over again?
    The days were flying by and their relationship in the surgery was good, but almost non-existent away from it.
    She had discussed how she was attracted to him at length with her mother and Jess Hollister’s heart had twisted to hear that her beloved daughter might have met the man of her dreams and was having to do all she could to put him out of her thoughts, which wasn’t going to be easy, working in the same environment.
    ‘Shouldn’t you explain the circumstances to him?’ she’d suggested gently.