‘AH, NO!’
Will rammed his hands through his hair and stared disbelievingly at the wide, wet stain on the mattress. Cocking his head a little, he looked up at the ceiling, and winced. Yup, there was a corresponding stain, right over the middle of the bed. The new bed.
Great. There must be a missing tile on the roof, just over the bedroom, and, of course, as luck would have it, it had been the wettest March on record.
He sniffed experimentally, and sighed. Mildew. Lovely. Probably soaked right through the bed and rotted the carpet underneath. He said something his grandmother wouldn’t have understood, and stomped out, slamming the door behind him.
Before anyone could use the little cottage, it would need a new bed—another one—and a new carpet—and Lucie Compton, their new GP registrar, was due in two hours. He crossed the yard, turned and squinted up into the sun. Yes, there it was—or wasn’t. A neat hole in the middle of the roof slope. Still, it could have been worse. The tile was sitting in the gutter and hadn’t smashed on the ground—although if it had smashed at least he would have stood a chance of noticing it sooner.
He gave a hefty sigh and fetched the ladder and some tools from the barn. Within moments he’d put the tile back and secured it, and checked the others around it. All looked fine.
Good. He put the tools away and came back for the ladder, and as he carried it round the end of the little converted barn he noticed Minnie, the tiny little Siamese kitten, running across the roof and crying.
‘Oh, Minnie, how did you get up there?’ he asked, exasperated.
‘Mreouw—rrr,’ she replied.
‘Did you? Well, that’ll teach me to leave the ladder there for you, won’t it?’
‘Mreow.’
‘OK, I’m coming,’ he said. He glanced at his watch. One hour seventeen minutes and counting. Hell.
He stuck the ladder up against the side of the barn, checked that it was steady and gave the sloping ground a dubious look. Oh, dammit. He didn’t have time to tie it. He rattled it again, just to make sure it was secure, and climbed carefully to the top.
‘Come on, Minnie. Come here.’
The kitten came almost within reach, sat down and cried piteously.
‘Well, come here, then!’ he coaxed with the last shred of his patience. He held out his fingers and she brushed against them. If he could just reach out…
The ladder jolted, lurching slightly to the side, and he grabbed the rungs and hung on, freezing for a moment.
Hmm. Now what? Minnie came to the top, within reach, and rubbed herself against the top rung. ‘Damn cat,’ he said with affection, and reached for her cautiously.
There was another lurch, and he felt the ladder sliding out from under him. He grabbed the top rung and prayed, but God was either elsewhere or had decided it was time Will was taught a lesson.
It was, he thought with strange detachment, almost like watching something in slow motion. The ladder skidded, dropped below the guttering and then slid down the side of the barn, gathering speed as it neared the ground.
Oh, hell, he thought. I really don’t need this.
Then he hit the deck.
Everything hurt. His head hurt, his legs hurt, his ribs felt crushed, but it was his arms that were really, really giving him stick.
He rested his forehead on the rung in front of him and instantly regretted it. He shifted, finding a bit that wasn’t bruised, and lay still for a moment, waiting for his chest to reinflate and his heart to slow down.
He was also waiting for the pain to recede, but he was a realist. Five minutes later his breathing and heart rate were back to normal, and he decided that two out of three weren’t bad. Given a choice, he would have gone for a different two, of course.
The kitten rubbed herself against his head, and he cracked open an eye and glared at her balefully.
‘I am going to kill you,’ he said slowly and clearly. ‘Just as soon as I work out how to get out of here.’
Unabashed, she sat down just inches away and washed herself.
Will ignored her. He had other problems more immediate than a bit of cathartic blood-letting. He shifted experimentally, and gasped. OK. Not a good idea to press down on his right arm. What about the left?
Nope.
Knees? Better. And shoulders were OK. Now, if he could just roll over…
He bit back a string of choice epithets, and rolled onto his back, falling with a sickening jolt to the ground beside the ladder.
Phase one completed. Now all he had to do was get to his feet, go inside and call for help.
Hah!
He lifted his head a fraction, and stifled a groan. Damn. Headache. He persisted, peering at his arms which lay awkwardly across his chest.
No doubt about the right one, he thought in disgust. He’d be lucky to get away without pinning and plating. And the left?
His wrist was swelling before his eyes, and if it got much bigger his watch was going to cut off the circulation to his hand. Wonderful. He closed his eyes with a sigh and laid his head back down carefully on the ground. He’d just have to wait for Lucie Compton to arrive and rescue him.
There was a lump of something hard sticking into his spine, but it was beyond him to shift himself away from it. It was just one more small pain amongst many. If he were a philosopher, he’d welcome the pain as proof that he was alive. However, he wasn’t, and at that particular moment he wouldn’t have minded being dead.
And then, just as if survival itself wasn’t a big enough bundle of laughs, he felt the first heavy splash of rain hit his face….
Lucie was late. Lucie was usually late, but she really, really hadn’t needed Fergus giving her the third degree on the way out.
He knew she had to do this, knew that spending time in a general practice was part of her GP training, knew that it was only temporary.
Well, not any more. Not the separation, at any rate, although her sojourn into the countryside would be as brief as she could get away with. Six months tops. That, on top of the six months she’d already spent in her inner-city practice, would see her qualified to practise as a GP, and then she’d be back in the city like a rat out of a trap.
Of course, she didn’t have to spend the time in the country. She could quite easily have found another London practice but, to be honest, Fergus was one of the reasons she’d wanted to get away, at least just for a while, to put some distance between them and see if what they had was a forever thing or just a temporary habit that needed breaking.
Well, she’d broken it, in words of one syllable.
YOU DO NOT OWN ME. GO AWAY. LEAVE ME ALONE.
OK, mostly one syllable. He’d understood, anyway. He’d flounced off, slamming the door of his car and roaring off into the sunset—except it had been some time after sunrise and he hadn’t roared anywhere very much in the traffic off the Fulham Road.
She pulled over to the side of the road and checked her map. It was raining, of course, blurring everything and making it harder to read the signs.
“‘Pass the turning to High Corner and take the next track on the right. Follow to the end. It’s a bit rough in places.” Hmm.’ She peered at the sandy track ahead. Could that be it? It didn’t seem to have a sign, and looked like nothing more than a farm track, but the address was Ferryview Farm, so it was possible.
With a resigned shrug, she turned onto the track and followed it. Some of it was sandy, some stony, some just downright boggy. It was a bit rough in places, she thought, and then lurched into a pothole.
Make that very rough, she corrected herself, and picked her way carefully through the next few puddles. Of course, without the rain—
There was a lurch, a nasty crunching grinding noise and her car came to rest on the centre of the track, its wheels dangling in matched potholes.
She put it in reverse and tried to drive out, but it was stuck fast, teetering on a high point. Damn.
Damn, damn, damn.
She got out, straight into a puddle that went over her ankle, and slammed her car door with a wail of frustration. Just let Dr Ryan wait until she caught up with him!
Pulling her coat close around her shoulders and hitching the collar up against the driving rain, she headed up the track. It couldn’t be far, surely?
Not that it mattered if it was miles. She had no choice, not until she could get a breakdown truck to come and drag her car off the track.
Always assuming, of course, that she hadn’t shattered the sump!
‘Look on the bright side, Lucie,’ she told herself, scraping a muddy hand through her rapidly frizzling hair. ‘It could be snowing.’
Ten seconds later a little flurry of sleet plastered itself against her face. ‘I didn’t say that!’ she wailed, and hitched the collar higher. The moment she caught up with Dr William ‘it’s a bit rough in places’ Ryan, she was going to kill him!
She was late. Typical bloody woman, she was late, just when he needed her. He thought again of struggling to his feet and trying to get inside, but after the effort of sitting up and shuffling back into the lee of the barn, he thought it would probably kill him. Besides, the house keys were in his pocket, and he knew getting them out was beyond him.
So he sat, and he waited, and he fumed.
Still, he had Minnie for company—Minnie, the cause of all his grief. He might have known the damn cat was perfectly capable of getting herself down off the roof. If he’d thought about it at all, which, of course, he hadn’t, he would have realised she could jump down on the top of the oil storage tank at the back and thence down to the ground. It was probably the way she’d got up in the first place.
He dropped his head back against the side of the barn and closed his eyes. The sun was out now—typical of April, sleet and driving rain one minute, glorious sunshine the next—and where he was sitting in the shelter of the barn, he was facing directly into it.
Good. It might warm him up, stop him shivering uncontrollably. He was in shock, of course, because of the fracture. Fractures? His right arm was certainly distorted, and his left was still swelling around the wrist. His watch was painfully tight, the flesh bulging each side of the broad metal strap. He tried to undo it with his teeth, but it was too firm and, besides, it hurt too much to prod about with it unnecessarily.
Please, God, don’t let me have two broken arms, he thought in despair. His mind ran through a list of things he couldn’t do with two broken arms—and there were a lot in there that were very personal!
God again, teaching him compassion for his patients? Giving him a closer understanding of their needs and suffering?
Or just fate playing a nasty practical joke?
Where was Lucie Compton? Richard had waxed so lyrical about her after he’d interviewed her that Will had had great hopes—but if her medical skills were as good as her timekeeping, it didn’t bode well for her patients. And he, he realised, was going to be her first one.
Hell.
Bruno was barking in the house, shut inside because Will had just been on his way out when he’d checked the cottage and found the leak. However, the dog had been quiet until now apart from the odd bark, and now he was letting loose with a volley. Someone coming?
Odd. Surely not Lucie? Will couldn’t hear a car, but there was something. Footsteps. Fast, cross little footsteps.
A woman came into view, small, bedraggled and evidently as mad as a wet hen. She marched up to him, fixed him with a glare and said crisply, ‘A bit rough in places?’
What? He opened his mouth to speak, but she rattled on, clearly divesting herself of some pent-up rage.
‘I could have you up under the Trades Descriptions Act!’ she stormed. ‘A bit rough! Do you know I’ve grounded my car and probably trashed it on your damn drive?’
Oh, hell. It was Lucie Compton, finally. And now he’d get to test her medical skills, if he could just get a word in—
‘I expect the sump’s broken, knowing my luck,’ she ranted on, ‘and I’ll have to get the engine replaced! And I’m wringing wet and frozen, and my mobile phone doesn’t work out here in this God-forsaken bit of wilderness, and all you can do is sit there and smirk!’
She lifted her foot, and for a sickening moment he thought she was going to kick him, but she stamped it crossly and spun on her heel, walking away and then wheeling round and striding back.
‘Well, for goodness’ sake, aren’t you going to say anything? Apologise or something? I mean, the very least you could do is get off your idle backside and let me in! I’m soaked to the skin, I’m freezing to death and you don’t give a damn.’
God, she was beautiful, with her hair a wild tangle of damp curls and steam coming out of her ears! Her eyes were spitting green sparks, and her mouth when she finally paused for breath was soft and lush and too wide for conventional beauty, but he could imagine it trailing over his poor wounded body and kissing it better. He stifled a groan and met her furious eyes.
‘You’re late. Help me up,’ he said gruffly, and she stopped in her tracks and her wide, soft, pretty mouth fell open in surprise.
‘Excuse me?’
‘The ladder slipped. I think my arms are broken. Could you, please, help me up?’
Her jaw flapped for a moment, and her eyes widened, tracking over him and filling with horror. ‘Well, why on earth didn’t you say so, instead of just sitting there?’
‘I would have done, but you made it well nigh impossible to get a word in edgeways,’ he said drily. To his satisfaction she coloured, the anger going out of her like air out of a punctured balloon.
‘Sorry,’ she conceded gruffly. ‘Um…how do you suggest we do this? What have you broken?’
‘Right radius and ulna, and maybe something in my left wrist. Oh, and I’m a bit concussed and my legs hurt like hell, but they move, at least. Otherwise I’m just peachy.’
‘Right. Um.’
She crouched down and bent over him, the damp tendrils of her wildly curling hair teasing his face. ‘May I see?’
He lowered his legs, wincing as he did so, and revealed his forearms. ‘Don’t touch anything,’ he warned through gritted teeth, and she nodded. Thank God she only looked, and didn’t feel the need to prod him.
‘OK. You need a couple of slings before I try and move you. Have you got any in the house?’
‘Yes, but until I get up you can’t get in. The keys are in my pocket.’
‘Oh.’ She glanced down at his jeans, snug around his hips, and she coloured slightly. ‘Um—are you sure? Which pocket?’
‘The right.’
‘You could shift onto your left hip and I could see if I could wriggle my hand in…’
He shifted, swallowing hard and hoping for a good hefty jolt of pain to take his mind off those slender little fingers. They wormed and wriggled their way in, while she blushed and apologised. She gave a little grunt of effort and her breath puffed soft and minty-fresh over his face. He closed his eyes and groaned, and wondered how long it would be before he embarrassed himself with her prodding and probing about so damn close—
‘Got them!’ she said victoriously, brandishing them in front of his nose.
He sighed with relief. ‘Mind the dog. He’s all right, but he’ll come and jump all over me, and I don’t need it just now.’
‘I’ll keep him in,’ she promised. ‘Where are the slings?’
‘Kitchen. Cupboard on the left of the sink. The dog’s called Bruno.’ He watched her go, and wondered how, in the midst of so much pain, he could be so aware of her cute little bottom in those tight, unbelievably sexy jeans…
Lucie let herself in and greeted the dog, a huge hairy black thing with doleful eyes and jaws that could have sheared a man’s thigh, and hoped the eyes would win.
‘Good doggie, nice Bruno. Sit.’
To her amazement he sat, his tail wiggling furiously, and she reached out a tentative hand and patted him. ‘Good boy,’ she said, a little more confidently, and he barked again, standing up and going to the door to scratch hopefully at it.
‘Sorry, babes, you’ve got to stay inside,’ she told him, and looked around. Sink. Good. Cupboard on left—and slings. Excellent. She squirmed past the dog, shut the door and ran back down the steps and over to the barn.
His eyes were shut, and she could see, now she was less angry, that his face was grey and drawn. She wondered how long he’d been there, and how on earth she’d get him out.
‘Dr Ryan?’
‘Will,’ he mumbled, opening his eyes. ‘Lucie, take my watch off, can you? It hurts like hell.’
She carefully unclipped the metal strap, but she couldn’t slide it over his hand. The face was cracked, and it had stopped about three hours ago. Had he been there that long? Probably.
‘Let’s get a support on that right arm first,’ she said, and carefully lifted his hand as he shifted his elbow away from his body.
She was as gentle as possible, but he still bit back a groan and braced himself against the barn. She fixed the sling, then put the left arm, which seemed less painful, in a lower sling so it wouldn’t interfere with the right.
‘OK. Now I need to get you up and out to hospital. Any ideas?’
His eyes flickered open. ‘Teleporting?’
Humour, even in all that pain. She felt a flicker of admiration. ‘Sorry, not an option. Do you have a car?’
‘Yes. It’s round the corner in the barn. The keys are with the door keys. Lock the back door again and get the car out and bring it round.’
‘What about insurance?’ she asked, being practical for once in her life.
‘You’re covered if you’re over twenty-five.’ He gave her a sceptical look.
‘Well, of course I am!’ she said in disgust, and stomped off. ‘Idiot. He knows quite well how old I am!’ She locked the back door, ignoring Bruno’s pleas, and went round the corner.
Oh, lord, it was a massive great Volvo estate! Miles long, and hugely wide. Terrific. She’d never driven anything this big before, and she was going to have to do it smoothly and carefully. With an audience.
Marvellous. She could hardly wait.
She got in, stared at the gear lever and got out again, stomping back round the corner to Will.
‘It’s automatic,’ she said accusingly.
‘Yes—that makes it easier.’
‘Fiddlesticks.’
‘Trust me, I’m a doctor. D is drive, P is park, R is reverse, N is neutral. Leave it in Park, start the engine, put your foot on the brake and put it into Drive. You have to hold down the button on top while you move the lever.’
‘Hmm.’
She went back, started it, put it in drive and took her foot cautiously off the brake and screamed when it moved. She hit the brakes, her left foot flailing uselessly, looking for a task. Idiot, she told herself, and eased her foot off the brake again. It rolled gently forwards, and she tried the accelerator, cautiously. OK.
She nosed out of the barn, totally unsure how far she was from anything, and cursed herself for never having driven anything bigger than a supermini. She crept round the end of the barn, stopped as close to Will as she could get and looked at the gear lever in puzzlement.
‘Put it in Park,’ he told her. ‘And put the hand-brake on,’ he added as an afterthought, as if he didn’t quite trust her.
She was about to make a smart-alec retort when she took her foot off the footbrake and the car rolled forwards a fraction.
She gave another little yelp and slammed her foot back down, and he shot her a pitying look.
‘It moved!’ she said defensively.
‘It’s fine. It’s just taking up the slack. You could have reversed it in so the door was closer.’
‘No, I couldn’t,’ Lucie said tightly, realising with dismay that she was going to have to reverse around the barn to get back to the track. Oh, blast. She got out of the car and slammed the door, and he winced.
‘Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea,’ he muttered.
‘You don’t have a choice,’ she reminded him.
‘We could have called an ambulance.’
‘We might have to yet. My car’s in the way.’
‘I’ve got a tow-rope. We can pull it out.’
‘We?’ She eyed him up and down, and snorted. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘We’ll worry about it later. Just get me in the damn car,’ Will said through gritted teeth, and she stood in front of him and grasped him by the shoulders, pulling him forwards and upwards as he got his legs under him and straightened with a groan.
‘OK?’
He gave her a dirty look. ‘Wonderful. Open the car door.’
She cocked an eyebrow at him. ‘Please?’
‘Please.’
‘Better.’
‘Don’t push it,’ he growled, and she gave up. She stomped round the bonnet, yanked open the front passenger door and came back for him, but he was already on his way, stubborn and self-reliant. Fine. Let him struggle.
Then Will wavered, and she had a sudden vision of him toppling over on those broken arms. Not a good idea, and she needed this post if she was going to finish her training. Stifling her urge to leave him to it, she put her arm around his waist to steady him and helped him round the car, then opened the door and watched as he eased himself in. His jaw was working furiously, his eyes were screwed shut and once he was in he dropped his head back against the headrest and let out a shaky sigh.
‘I think we’ll pass on the seat belt,’ he said through gritted teeth, and she shut the door firmly on him.
Lucie crossed round to the driver’s side, wondering how, under these circumstances, she could have been so conscious of the hard, lean feel of his body. Even through the thickness of the soft sweater he was wearing she’d been aware of every rib, every muscle, every breath.
She had a feeling he was, too, and her compassion returned, forcing out her bizarre and untimely thoughts and replacing them with a more appropriate concern for his health. She slid behind the wheel, looked over her shoulder and wondered how on earth she was going to reverse this thing the size of an oil tanker back around the barn…
How could she be so stupid? Will asked himself. How could a woman with apparently enough brain to train and qualify as a doctor be so stupid that she couldn’t manage to drive a perfectly normal car?
She panicked, she overreacted, she allowed sometimes too much room, sometimes nothing like enough, and her judgement on the bumpy drive left a great deal to be desired.
No wonder she’d got her car stuck.
‘Are you trying to do it again, you idiot woman?’ he snapped as she jolted down yet another pothole.
‘Don’t call me names just because your drive’s so awful! There should be a law against it.’
There should be a law against her smart mouth, but he didn’t suppose he’d get it past all the women MPs. ‘Drive on the centre and the side,’ he told her through gritted teeth, but there were places where you had to pick your way and, sure as eggs, she’d pick the wrong one.
And every jolt was agonising. He would have driven himself, except, of course, he couldn’t even hold the steering-wheel, never mind turn it. Damn.
They lurched through another pothole and he felt cold sweat spring out on his brow. He needed to lie down. He needed pain relief. He needed oblivion.
He didn’t need to be giving some delinquent female driving lessons!
‘There’s my car,’ she announced defiantly, and he cracked his eyes open and sighed with relief.
‘You can drive round it. Head for the left—the ground’s firm there.’
Well, more or less. They got through it with a bit of lurching and wheel-spinning, and then the track improved. Just another few minutes, he told himself. Just a little longer…
‘Yes, it’s a lovely clean fracture through the radius and ulna. Classic Colles’. We’ll reduce it here, if you like. As for the other one, it’s just a nasty sprain, you’ll be glad to know.’
He was. He was hugely glad to know that he wasn’t going to be dependent on anyone for help with his basic functions. It would probably hurt like hell to use it, but at least if it wasn’t plastered, he’d have some rotation in the hand, and that would make all the difference.
Will didn’t enjoy having the fracture reduced. They bandaged his hand to compress it and drive the blood out of it, which hurt, then stopped the blood supply to his arm and filled the vessels with local anaesthetic.
That bit was fine. Then the doctor grasped his hand and pulled, and the bones slid back into place with an audible crunch.
To his utter disgust, he threw up, and all he could think was thank God Lucie wasn’t there watching him with her wide green eyes and sassy mouth. Just for good measure, he retched again, then sagged back against the bed.
‘Finished?’ the nurse asked him in a kind voice, and he nodded weakly.
The doctor shot him a thoughtful look. ‘I think you’ve got a touch of concussion. Perhaps we need to keep you in overnight.’
‘No,’ he said firmly, ignoring the pounding in his head and the tingling sensation in his cheek. What concussion? ‘I’m fine. I want to go home.’
‘Stubborn sod, aren’t you?’ the doctor said cheerfully, and stood back to survey his handiwork. ‘That looks fine. We’ll let the anaesthetic out now and see how it feels when it comes round. Oh, and you’ll need another X-ray after we put a back-slab on—an open cast, just in case it swells overnight. You’ll need to come back tomorrow for a check-up and have a proper cast on if all’s well. OK?’
Will nodded.
‘I still think you should stay overnight, but so long as you’ll have someone with you, that’ll have to do. You know what to look out for.’
He did. He’d dished out advice on head injuries for years, but he’d never had to take it. He wasn’t thinking too clearly now, and his hand was beginning to tingle as they let the blood back through it.
At least the other one felt safer now, strapped up and supported from his fingers to his elbow in tight Tubigrip with a hole cut for the thumb.
MICE, he was reminded. Mobilisation, ice, compression, elevation. It used to be RICE, but they’d changed the rules and got rid of the resting in favour of mobilisation. That was good, because without his right arm, the left was going to be mobilised a heck of a lot in the next few weeks!
‘I’ll write you up for some painkillers,’ the doctor said. ‘You can take up to eight a day, no more than two at a time and no closer together than four hours.’
He had no intention of taking them, except as a last resort, but he accepted them anyway—not that it was exactly difficult to get a prescription. He’d pick one up on Monday morning when he went to work, he thought, and then it hit him.
How on earth was he going to work with one arm in a cast and the other—the wrong one—in a support? Brilliant. And Lucie was just starting a six-month stint as a trainee, and he was the only member of the practice qualified to train her.
He sighed. Well, she’d just have to cover his patients, and he’d supervise her and tell her what to do and she could drive him around—always assuming he could stand it! She’d be staying at the cottage anyway, he thought, and then remembered the cottage bedroom—the one without a bed, with a stinking, soaked carpet that needed replacing.
He let his breath out on an irritated sigh. She’d have to stay in the house—which might be as well for a day or two, but in the long term would drive him utterly frantic. Still, it wouldn’t need to be long term. He could order a bed and a carpet over the phone, and have them installed and move her in there within a couple of days.
He would need to. He guarded his privacy jealously, and he wasn’t sharing his house with anyone any longer than was absolutely necessary.
Most particularly not a pretty, sassy little thing with attitude. He’d lose his mind!
Lucie was bored. She’d read all the leaflets, studied all the posters, walked up and down all the corridors, tried out the drinks machine and read half the magazines.
How long could it take, she thought, to do a couple of X-rays and slap on a cast?
A nurse appeared. ‘Dr Compton?’
Finally! She bounced to her feet and crossed the room. ‘How is he?’
The nurse smiled understandingly. ‘Bit grouchy. Men don’t like losing their independence. He’s ready to go home now.’
Lucie followed her to one of the treatment rooms, and there was Will sitting in the wheelchair, looking like something the cat had dragged in. He shot her a conciliatory look. ‘Sorry you’ve had such a long wait.’
‘That’s OK. I know more than I ever wanted to know about how to sail the Atlantic, adjust grandfather clocks and make mango chutney. Do you want a wheelchair ride to the car, or shall I bring it to the door?’
‘Both,’ the nurse said.
‘I’ll walk,’ said Will.
Lucie looked from one to the other, nodded and went out, jingling the car keys in her hand and humming softly, a smile playing around her lips. Stubborn, difficult man. It was going to be an interesting six months.