CHAPTER SIX

      YESTERDAY HAD BEEN a success. The flood of people who’d wanted to be first to explore the new clinic had subsided into a steady but satisfying trickle. Alex had received a couple of calls from local doctors, enquiring about referring patients to the clinic, and he’d shown a consultant from the nearby hospital around. She had a young patient whose family were currently travelling an hour each way to get to a hydrotherapy pool, and was pleased to find a closer facility that would meet the girl’s needs.

      Today there was a new challenge.

      Alex assumed his best trust-me-I’m-a-doctor smile, and when he looked down at Marie he saw a similar one plastered uneasily across her face.

      ‘Oh, really, Alex.’ Sonya Graham-Hall flapped her hand at the photographer from the local paper, indicating that he was to stand down while she gave her clients a good talking-to. ‘Can you try not to look as if you’ve eaten something that doesn’t agree with you? You’re supposed to be welcoming. And stand a little closer to Marie. You’re a team…’

      Marie was looking a little overawed by Sonya. Alex took a step towards her, feeling the inevitable thrill as her shoulder touched his arm. He bent towards her, whispering an old joke from medical school, and she suppressed a laugh. He couldn’t help smiling, and heard the camera click rapidly.

      ‘Wonderful!’

      Sonya beamed at everyone, and Alex stepped forward to shake the photographer’s hand and thank him. Then Sonya marched across the reception area to where the local reporter was standing, leading him towards the front doors.

      ‘What’s she doing?’ Marie looked up at him. ‘Can’t he find his own way?’

      ‘It’s Sonya’s modus operandi. She’s making sure he knows what he’s meant to write. Although he probably won’t realise that’s what she’s done until after he’s filed his story.’

      Alex knew Sonya’s husband from school, and knew she was the best PR representative in London. She was so much in demand that it was usual for her to interview clients, rather than the other way round. Alex had been lucky, though, and a phone call had not only managed to secure Sonya’s services, but they were on a pro bono basis, because she loved the idea of the clinic. There was something to be said for the public school network.

      ‘She’s formidable, isn’t she?’ Marie’s smile indicated that she thought formidable was a really good thing. ‘I’m a little scared of her.’

      Alex couldn’t fathom what Marie would have to be scared about. If he’d been asked to define ‘formidable’, the first person who would have come to mind was Marie. But not quite in the same way as Sonya, who relied on killer heels, designer jackets and an upper-class accent that would have sliced through concrete.

      ‘She knows so many important people…’

      ‘It’s her job to know people. Anyway, don’t we prefer to think of everyone as important?’

      Marie frowned, nudging him with her elbow. ‘Of course we do. You know what I mean.’

      Alex knew. Marie had already told him that she felt like a fish out of water with the great and the good, but they were exactly the kind of people who had the money and influence to help them make this project grow into a whole chain of clinics in different parts of the country. He wished Marie would stop thinking of them as somehow out of her league, because she was just as good as any of them.

      ‘Right, then.’ Sonya returned, beaming. ‘I think he’s on track. While I’m here, perhaps we can review where we are with everything else.’

      ‘Thanks, Sonya. My office?’

      Alex led the way, hearing Sonya chatting brightly to Marie, and Marie’s awkward, awestruck replies.

      Sonya plumped herself into one of the easy chairs, drawing a slim tablet out of her handbag. In Sonya’s eyes, paper was messy, and she didn’t do mess.

      ‘Ooh, look. I love these. Such lovely colours. Can I have one?’

      She leaned forward towards the coffee table, catching up the sheet of brightly coloured stickers that Marie had presented him with this morning. They had the name of the clinic on them, along with the main telephone number and website address, but Alex suspected that their real intent was to bring yet another much-needed shot of colour into his office.

      ‘Help yourself. Marie has had a few printed. Shall we get some more?’ Marie was already squirming in her seat, and Alex decided to embarrass her a little more.

      ‘Definitely. This is just the kind of fun thing we want. Something to get away from the boring medical image.’

      Alex felt his eyebrows shoot up.

      ‘You know what I mean, Alex. Of course the medical part is the most important, but we want people to feel that you’re approachable and not a stuffy old doctor.’

      ‘Yes, we do.’ Marie spoke up, reddening slightly at her audacity, and Sonya nodded.

      ‘Now. I have the local radio interview set up—you’re on your own with that one, Alex.’

      ‘I can handle it.’ Alex reckoned he could talk for ten minutes about the clinic easily enough.

      ‘I’m sure you can. But I’m sending you a list of keywords and I want you to memorise them.’

      Sonya swiped her finger across her tablet, and Alex heard a ding from the other side of the room as his desktop computer signalled that he had mail.

      ‘Really? Keywords?’

      ‘Yes, of course, darling. Think of it as like…’ Sonya waved her hand in the air, groping for the right words.

      ‘Like talking to a patient? Sometimes you have to emphasise what’s important without confusing them with a load of irrelevant detail,’ Marie ventured.

      ‘Yes, exactly.’

      Sonya gave Marie a conspiratorial smile, indicating she was pleased to see that at least one of them was on track, and Marie reddened again.

      ‘I’m still working on the TV appearance, and there are a couple of functions that I’d like you to go to if I can get you an invitation.’ Sonya leaned forward in her seat. ‘You still have reservations about promoting the royal aspect in the media?’

      Alex felt the side of his jaw twitch. ‘If by reservations you mean that I’m absolutely sure that I don’t want any of that in the media, then, yes, I’m still absolutely sure.’

      ‘But it’s such a good story, Alex. It would catch people’s imaginations. It doesn’t get much hotter than this—you’re a doctor, very rich, royal, and to top it off a handsome bachelor.’

      Alex shook his head, and then Marie spoke. Like an angel coming to rescue him.

      ‘We’ve agreed a policy about this.’

      ‘Ah… Yes?’

      Sonya turned to Marie, clearly wanting her to elaborate. And Alex wanted to know what policy he’d agreed, as well.

      ‘The compelling nature of Alex’s story is the problem—it could quite easily prompt a media circus. Our values are that the clinic is the one and only important thing. Once it’s a bit more established we could look at it again, but now’s not the right time.’

      Nicely