LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER ONE

      ‘JENNY, have you seen my medical bag? I can’t find it anywhere, but I was sure I put it down somewhere in here.’ Megan looked around the room distractedly, harassed and in a hurry. ‘I’m running late, but I know I’m going to need it, and the last thing I want to do is to start off badly today of all days.’

      On her first morning in a new job she couldn’t afford to have anything go wrong, could she? Things were going to be difficult enough for her as it was, starting work in a hospital that was strange to her, and with a boss she had never met before, without her turning up late as well on her first day.

      Jenny had been buttering toast, but now she frowned and wiped her hands on a teatowel, looking around the breakfast chaos of the small, usually neat kitchen. ‘I thought I saw it on the Welsh dresser just a moment ago.’ Her brows met in a tiny furrowed line, and she turned to look at her small son, Ben. ‘Have you seen Megan’s medical bag, Ben?’

      Three-year-old Ben didn’t answer. He was sitting at the table, preoccupied with his breakfast, taking no notice of anything that was going on around him. His set of toy dinosaurs was lined up on the breakfast table, nose to tail, but he wasn’t playing with them. He was engrossed with eating toast fingers and he didn’t even look up when his mother spoke to him. That was a little bit odd, Megan thought, but that was the way Ben was, and perhaps he was simply absorbed in what he was doing.

      ‘Gone.’ Josh, just two years old, eighteen months younger than his brother, his mouth smeared with strawberry jam, looked up and pointed a sticky, chubby finger towards the dresser. ‘Ben hided it.’

      ‘Oh, dear.’ Jenny shook her head and sighed. ‘I might have guessed. I can see that it’s going to be one of those days.’ She grimaced. ‘I’ll go and look in the cupboard—that’s where I usually find things that have strangely disappeared.’

      Megan went and sat down at the table opposite Ben. She smiled at him, watching the way he lined up the toast soldiers across his plate. He was totally absorbed in what he was doing, the tip of his tongue protruding slightly from his pink lips as he concentrated.

      ‘Are you making a pattern?’ Megan asked. ‘Perhaps we could make something together when I get home from work. I’ll show you how to cut bits of coloured paper and how to make patterns with them if you like.’

      She wasn’t sure that Ben had heard her. He didn’t look up at her and he didn’t answer, and just then Jenny came back, holding the briefcase.

      ‘Here you are. I found it in the cupboard, just as we thought. I’m sorry about that, Megan. I don’t know what gets into his head sometimes, but he’s always hiding things away. I’ve no idea why he does it.’

      ‘Don’t worry about it,’ Megan said, relieved that it had been found. ‘I’m sure he was just playing.’

      She gave her sister a quick, concerned look. Jenny was thinner than she ought to be, the strain of the last few weeks showing on her delicate features. Her chestnut-coloured hair tumbled in dark, wispy strands around her face, making her look more than usually pale this morning. Her blue eyes were troubled, giving her a haunted look, and that worried Megan.

      Mindful of her need to get to work on time, she still hesitated, wondering if there was anything she could do to make Jenny feel better.

      ‘Will you be all right today?’ she asked. ‘You look weary this morning. Have you still not had a good night’s sleep?’

      ‘Not really.’ Jenny didn’t say any more, and Megan searched her face for clues as to what she was thinking.

      ‘I wish I could stay and keep you company, or do something to help. We could meet up at lunchtime, if you like, and spend some time together.’ She felt sure that it would help if Jenny was able to talk her problems through, but instead she mostly kept things bottled

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