Children’s doctor Anna Maskell loves Christmas. But Muswell Hill Memorial’s new locum surgeon, Jamie Thurston, hates it! So Anna makes him a deal—if she teaches him to embrace Christmas again, he’ll play Santa to their little patients! But as Anna tempts him with the joys of the season, they also discover a connection neither expected. Can Jamie find the courage to give Anna what she truly needs this Christmas—his love?

To Gerard, Chris and Chloe,

who always make Christmas special to me.

CHAPTER ONE

‘HOW ARE THE ward Christmas things coming on, Anna?’ Robert Jones asked.

‘Brilliant, thanks.’ Anna smiled at the head of the Children’s Department. ‘The Secret Santa is pretty much sorted, we’ve got Christmas dinner booked and most people have given me their deposits and menu choices, and the only thing I’m short of now is someone to be Father Christmas on Christmas Day.’ Her smile broadened. ‘Seeing as our usual Santa has let us down horribly.’

Robert held up both hands in a ‘stop’ gesture and laughed. ‘Anna, you know why I can’t do it this year. I’d have to fly back from New York. And that’s more than my life is worth, on my silver wedding anniversary.’

‘Even for the ward? Even for me?’ she teased.

‘Even for the ward and even for you,’ Robert said. ‘Actually, Anna, I did want to ask you a bit of a favour. Jamie Thurston—the new paediatric orthopod who’s covering Nalini’s maternity leave for the first three months—is joining us today.’

‘And you want me to show him around and help him settle in?’ Anna guessed.

‘Would you?’ Robert asked.

‘Of course.’ She smiled at him again. ‘I’m in the PAU this morning. I’ll leave a message with whoever is on the desk to ask him to meet me at one and I’ll take him to lunch.’

‘Great.’ Robert patted her shoulder. ‘Thank you.’

‘Pleasure,’ Anna said, and had a quick word with Lacey on the reception desk before she headed for the Paediatric Assessment Unit.

Her third patient of the day was a four-month-old baby who had been referred to her clinic by the health visitor, on the grounds of possible DDH—developmental dysplasia of the hip. A quick read through the notes ticked all the boxes of a higher risk: Poppy Byford was a first baby, a girl, born at thirty-six weeks and had been in the breech position. So Anna was pretty sure that the health visitor had picked up the problem.

‘Good morning, Ms Byford. Do come in and let’s have a look at Poppy,’ Anna said. ‘Hello, you gorgeous girl.’ She cooed at the baby, who giggled and waved her hands. ‘She’s beautiful,’ Anna said, and stuffed the little twinge of longing right back down out of the way. She could enjoy being an aunt and enjoy working with her young patients, and that was enough. Wanting more was greedy and pointless—and the quickest way to get her heart broken.

‘Thank you.’ Poppy’s mum looked nervous.

‘Your health visitor asked you to bring Poppy to see me because she thinks Poppy might have something called developmental dysplasia of the hip—you might hear it called DDH for short, or “clicky hip”,’ Anna explained. ‘Usually it shows up in a newborn examination, and I can see in Poppy’s notes that the doctor did a hip test at her six-week check and it seemed normal. But the health visitor’s concerned and wants me to do another check.’

‘Is Poppy going to be all right?’ Ms Byford asked. ‘I did start looking it up on the Internet, but…’

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