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‘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 said. Alex shot Marie a thankful look and she received it with the quiet graciousness of a queen.
Sonya nodded. ‘Yes, that makes sense. Why didn’t you say that before, Alex?’
