Hampstead Fever

Carol Cooper

Description

A HEATWAVE BRINGS EMOTIONS TO BOILING POINT...It is high summer in London and trouble is brewing.Chef Dan should be blissfully happy. He has the woman of his dreams and a job in a trendy Hampstead bistro. But his over-anxious partner, engrossed in their baby, has no time for him.Stressed doctor Geoff finds solace in the arms of a mercurial actress. Journalist Harriet's long-term relationship with Sanjay hits the buffers, leaving each of them with serious questions to answer. Meanwhile single mother of four Karen lacks the appetite for a suitable relationship.Passion and panic rise in the heatwave. Who can spot the danger signs?"Combines the observational wit of Nick Hornby, the emotional depths of Anna Maxted, and the complex cast of Armistead Maupin"- JJ Marsh, author."Cooper has an impressive way of evolving her characters and their perspectives until you feel you're reading about your own friends"- Sue Moorcroft, author"Fun and frolics, racy and pacy. The good doctor has done it again!"- Matt Bendoris, The Sun."A steamy wit-sprinkled story, and a fabulous read from start to finish" - Glynis Smy, author."The true-to-life characters, the intricacies and the underlying emotions make this one fever everyone needs a dose of!" Pixie McKenna, media doctor.

Informations

• Publié par: Hardwick Press
• Date de parution: 30 juin 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781783019502
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

HAMPSTEAD FEVER
Carol Cooper
HAMPSTEAD FEVER
Copyright 2016 Carol Cooper
Cover design by Jessica Bell
Published by Hardwick Press 2016
London, UK
The right of Carol Cooper to be identified as the author of this Work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Under no circumstances may any part of this book be photocopied for resale.
This is a work of fiction. All characters and events in this work, other than those clearly in the public domain, are entirely fictitious. Any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
THANK YOU FOR READING
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Also by Carol Cooper
From ONE NIGHT AT THE JACARANDA
HAMPSTEAD FEVER - QUESTIONS FOR BOOK CLUBS
CHAPTER ONE
DAN
Dan nibbled Laure s earlobe as his fingers wandered over the contours of her breast.
In the cot one foot away, the baby gave a cry. The cot death guidelines said it was OK for babies of eleven months to sleep in their own rooms, but no point trying to tell Laure that again.
It s only a testing cry, said Dan.
She said nothing. He could already feel her thighs and stomach clench. And not in a good way.
The moment was gone. He d have to sort himself out. Again.
Stop it. She reached across to the baby. Not in front of Jack.
Why? It s not like he knows what I m doing.
Babies are very intuitive. She must have read that somewhere. The flat had more baby books than Waterstone s. Anyway, you re making the whole bed jiggle.
He s a bloke. Never too soon to learn essential skills. Still. Dan covered himself with the sheet. It reeked of milk and sweat and stuff, all getting high in this ridiculous heat. Eleven at night and not a breath of air in the flat.
Dan closed his eyes. He usually did. Tonight it would also help avoid her steely gaze. The warders used to have that look. Loosely translated it meant, I know your game, sunshine.
He could hear their son, sucking. Now she was cooing at Jack, like she used to coo at him. His hand speeded up to a frenetic pace.
Actually, she d never cooed at him, but never mind. He thought of her magnificent breasts. Way better than Page Three or a lads mag. Or the National Gallery. He d spent a lot of time there after doing bird. Education they were, galleries and museums. Free, gratis, and for nothing as well.
Now Dan was wilting a tad. He opened his eyes. She returned the gaze over Jack s head. You could hardly see where the boob stopped and their baby s blond head began. His little hand stretched out over Laure s ribcage under her breast.
Before the baby, Laure had loved Dan. Never mind that he wasn t as posh as her. She d loved him unconditionally. Or so he d thought. Then little Jack came along. The much-wanted baby who mewled and puked.
Shakespeare, that was. Class.
Their baby also pooped and needed feeding, changing, cuddling, and a zillion other things that added up to twenty-four hours a day. And that wasn t counting visits to the doctor, because Laure wasn t going to take any chances when Jack sneezed or brought up a bit more milk than usual. That little scrap of baby had totally rearranged their lives.
He d gone soft now. Which never happened to him.
GEOFF
Fuck progress, thought Geoff.
He jabbed F5 then F1 to save the consultation. Now he wondered if he should have pressed F8 instead. Or as well. As it was, it only made the previous consultation re-appear. He was running late. No surprise there. With the new patient database, it took twenty minutes to do a simple little thing like print a chest X-ray form. Back in the day, all he d had to do was yank open a drawer, grab a form, scribble CXR , and sign it. Job done.
Bloody hell, life was easy when he first qualified, fifteen years ago, burning with zeal to make a difference. Turned out he d been trained for a lifetime of sorting out computer problems and hordes of patients with minor symptoms.
Fuck the new database.
Fuck the commissioning group that brought it in only months after the previous change in software. And, today, fuck the entire NHS management.
He gazed at the screen. It was filled not with the patient s medical details, but with irrelevant guff like Pt consent given , Pt address changed (which it actually hadn t, unless you counted a new comma), and perhaps the most common entry of all, DNA for Did Not Attend . Stuff that mattered like coughing up blood lay hidden below reams of pointless entries.
A young man sat there in front of him. Unemployed, with a squat nose and tats up one arm. A sleeve, they called it. There hadn t been a single patient without tats all morning. One very attractive patient, job in some investment firm, had a tattooed swallow below her knee. What was that going to look like when she got saggy skin and osteoarthritis? But then these days even the prime minister s wife had a tattoo. Jesus!
Geoff asked, What can I do for you? You never asked patients what brought them to the health centre today, unless you wanted to hear all about the 232 bus.
Meanwhile the computer was firing a range of tasks at Geoff: check the patient s blood pressure, calculate his risk of a heart attack in the next ten years, and get his consent to share info. It was also reminding him that, come the year 2060, said ugly git would be due his elderly health check.
The patient (whose name Geoff had instantly forgotten) had pain in the left testicle.
Might be a torsion. Uncommon in adults, but, unless treated promptly, it could lead to gangrene of the testicle.
Right. I need to take a look, Geoff said, pulling the paper curtains across.
As he waited for the fellow to undress, he wiped the photo on his desk with a tissue. It was Davey, aged five, at the beach. Brancaster Staithe, Norfolk. Happy days before the divorce. Before Australia.
Ready yet? Geoff called out, aware of how late his clinic was running.
Yeah. Course.
Turned out the man was sitting fully clothed the other side of the drapes.
As patiently as possible, Geoff explained again what he needed to examine. Another three minutes passed while the man undressed. Back in Camp Bastion, every second counted. Military medicine had pushed forwards the frontiers of many specialities, like resuscitation, trauma surgery, anaesthesia, and plastic surgery. No visible impact on general practice, though.
On examination there was nothing abnormal about this patient s tackle, apart from the pong. The heatwave did little to improve patients personal hygiene. Geoff peeled off his gloves and dumped them in the bin. Hmm. All s well there. When did you first get the pain?
The man shrugged. Maybe a week ago. But I ain t got it no more, like. Not since I pulled that bird the other day.
Fair enough, said Geoff, even though there was nothing fair about it. The ugly, unemployed fucker got laid just like that, while he, Geoff, had been celibate for ten months and counting.
KAREN
The bench was hard. So was he.
Twenty-five minutes, thought Karen as she flung her knickers into the corner of the changing room. No point wearing your best underwear when it ended up with the abandoned socks and shin pads.
Footie Dad, still in his Charlton Athletic shirt, dragged her on top of him on the bench they d hauled into the middle of the changing room. Karen was getting the hang of keeping one leg either side of the narrow bench.
The place whiffed of Dettol and trainers. On the plus side, the windows were too high for anyone to see in. The door was locked and they d jammed a chair against it too, just in case.
Twenty-one minutes left, according to the clock. They gathered pace.
Squeak scrape, squeak scrape went the bench on the floor tiles.
She hoped the rickety old thing would last their weekly encounters, because she planned on many more.
In a perfect world, Karen wouldn t have been banging the children s football coach. But she d become resourceful since her marriage broke down. While her four children were parked with friends, she got nearly thirty minutes on a Sunday at about 5 p.m. It was simpler than having real boyfriends who met the kids, came into everyone s lives, and eventually turned out a disappointment all round. She and Footie Dad rarely bothered to speak, so, in the six weeks they d been at it, he d not once told her that his wife didn t understand him, or that they d slept apart for years.
That was fine by her. Time was short and Karen had no interest at all in the state of his marriage, or much else about him.
After all, she was just using him for sex.
HARRIET
Even now, a good five minutes after rushing