‘THIS is so cool!’ Connor exclaimed. He was peering through the deck rail out over Loch Lomond, while Rebecca pointed out the mountains in the distance. He smiled happily. ‘I love being out here.’
‘That’s the general idea,’ Craig told him, his tone cheerful. ‘We thought you might appreciate a boat trip across the loch. It’s calm and clear today, so you can look out at all the scenery.’
‘I like the islands,’ Connor remarked, his eyes shining. ‘They’re beautiful, and you can see for miles around.’ He shifted in his wheelchair, tilting his head to look up at Craig. ‘Do we have to go straight back to the hospital when we come off the boat? I don’t want to go back yet.’
Craig shook his head. ‘We can look around the village for a while, if you like. I don’t want to keep you out too long in case it’s tiring for you, but there are some quaint little gift shops and pretty stone-built houses, and an ice-cream parlour—I know you like ice cream.’
‘I do. Especially toffee ice cream.’ Connor was thoughtful for a moment. ‘I could get my mum a present,’ he said. ‘I brought some money with me. She likes crystals…do you think I’d be able to find one for her?’
‘We’ll have a look,’ Rebecca told him. ‘I’m sure we’ll be able to find something that she’ll like.’
‘Good.’ Connor sat back in his chair, satisfied for the moment.
Rebecca laid a hand on the deck rail, loving the way the light breeze gently lifted her hair as she looked out towards the approaching shoreline. Best of all, she loved the way Craig had moved to stand by her side, so that they were close to one another, their bodies touching. He was in a relaxed mood today, happy to be taking time out, and it felt good to be with him.
When the boat docked, Craig carefully wheeled Connor along the ramp to the quayside, and they started off for the village. ‘There’s a beach,’ Connor pointed out a few minutes later. ‘Do you think we could go there?’
Rebecca glanced at Craig. ‘I don’t see why not, do you? The sand’s firm enough around here, and we could lift the wheelchair down there between us, couldn’t we?’
He nodded. ‘OK. Just for half an hour or so, because we need to keep an eye on the time.’ He looked at Connor after they had manoeuvred the wheelchair down onto the beach. ‘I’ve a feeling this young man would stay out all day…anything to avoid going back to hospital.’ He was smiling as he said it, and the boy wrinkled his nose.
‘I’m fed up with being in the ward. My mum and dad will be going home soon, and I want to go with them. We’re all better now, so I don’t see why we can’t.’
‘That’s true, you are very much better,’ Rebecca said, sitting down on the sand beside him. ‘I expect it won’t be too long now before you’re free of us. About a week, I should think.’
‘Really?’ Connor’s eyes lit up. ‘Do you think so?’
She nodded. ‘I had a word with Sister, and she said the doctor was very pleased with how you well you were all doing. You’re able to be up and about more, and you soon won’t need to be in the wheelchair so much. He’s not making any promises, but a week should just about do it.’
‘Oh, wow, that’s brilliant.’ He beamed with pleasure and then looked around him with interest. ‘Can we collect some pebbles? My dad likes the coloured ones. He saves them and tumbles them in a machine to make jewellery.’
‘If you like.’ She glanced at Craig. ‘For someone in a wheelchair, he has a lot of energy, doesn’t he?’
‘You said it…’ His mouth made a wry shape. ‘We’ll collect the pebbles and he can save them in his pockets.’
It was at least an hour later when they finally set off for the hospital once more. The drive went smoothly, and Connor was content because he was full of ice cream and he had gifts for both his parents. ‘They’ll love these,’ he said, inspecting the beach treasures and the amethyst crystals he had bought from the shop. Craig drove into the hospital car park.
‘Yes, I’m sure they will.’ Rebecca gave him an encouraging smile.
A few minutes later they went through the main doors into the hospital and took the lift up to the ward.
A nurse greeted them at the entrance door. ‘His parents are waiting for him,’ she said. ‘As soon as they received your phone message to say that you were on your way back, they got us to bring them over.’
She ruffled Connor’s hair. ‘Come on, sonny, let’s get you reunited with them.’ She relieved Rebecca of the wheelchair and led the way along the corridor. ‘They’re longing to hear about how you got on.’
‘I had a great time,’ he said, his voice brimming over with enthusiasm, and then he became thoughtful. ‘And I’m hungry, as well. Is it teatime yet?’
Craig laughed. ‘I can see where his priorities lie.’ He glanced at Rebecca. ‘Perhaps we should say hello to his mum and dad, and then be on our way. I thought we might buy a take-away supper and enjoy a few hours of solitude back at the house. It was good to have some time to ourselves today…it seems to have been a long time since we’ve been able to simply relax.’
‘You’re right, it has. That sounds good to me.’
Before they had a chance to leave the building, though, one of the nurses from A and E came in search of Craig. She was in a hurry, a little flustered, and she seemed to be out of breath from her exertions.
‘I’m glad I’ve managed to catch up with you,’ she said. ‘The receptionist told me you were up on the paediatric ward, but I was afraid you might have gone home already.’
Craig studied her. ‘It’s OK, calm down. What’s the problem?’ He frowned. ‘Is it the baby from the neonatal unit? Has something happened to her?’
The nurse shook her head. ‘No, it’s nothing like that. As far as I know, the little girl is still in Intensive Care.’ She pulled in a quick breath. ‘It’s just that Cheryl is down in A and E. She came in a few minutes ago and she brought her toddler with her. He’s not well, and it looks as though he has an infection of some sort. She said she tried to ring you, but you must have switched your phone off.’
Craig frowned. ‘I was driving,’ he said. ‘I thought it best not to be distracted.’
‘Ah, that explains it.’
‘What’s wrong with Declan? Do you think that it’s anything serious?’
‘We don’t know yet. The poor little chap is very flushed and irritable and his skin looks a bit mottled. Until we’ve done tests, we won’t know. Of course, she’s worried about meningitis, and the first thing she thought of was to get in touch with you.’
‘I’ll come and see her right away. Thanks for telling me.’ He started off in the direction of A and E and then suddenly stopped and turned to look at Rebecca. ‘I’m sorry about this. Obviously I need to find out what’s wrong, and I don’t know how long I’ll be. Perhaps you should take the car keys and drive yourself home. I’ll get a lift back, or a taxi maybe.’ He dug into his pocket and handed her the keys.
‘Don’t you want me to wait with you?’ she said. ‘I don’t mind at all.’
He shook his head. ‘No, there’s no need for you to do that. I’ll deal with this.’ He was moving along the corridor as he spoke, and she realised that he wanted to be left alone to deal with this new situation.
Even so, she followed Craig and the nurse, her stomach clenched in a knot of uncertainty. She had to go in the direction of A and E in order to leave the hospital, and she couldn’t help but be curious about this woman and her child. He appeared to be very concerned, as anyone would be where a small child was involved. But was there more to it than that? What was this woman to him?
Clearly she must be someone very special in his life, and of course he would drop everything to go and help her child.
Cheryl was waiting for him in the main area of A and E. She was a slender young woman, very pretty, with soft fair hair and troubled blue eyes, and as soon as she saw Craig approach, she ran over and flung her arms about him.
‘Oh, I’m so glad that you’re here,’ she said in a choked voice. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I knew you would make everything all right. Will you take a look at him for me—or at least, talk to the doctors and make sure that they don’t miss anything? He looks so poorly. I can’t lose him, I can’t.’
Craig drew her to him and stroked her hair. He spoke very gently to her, words that Rebecca couldn’t hear. Then he put an arm around her and led her away. ‘Tell me what happened,’ he said softly. ‘Whatever is wrong, we’ll do everything that we can for him. Trust me.’
‘I do. You were the only one I thought of.’
They were walking towards a side bay, and Rebecca found herself following them. She stopped at the doorway, and through the glass partition she saw a small child lying on a bed. He was about three years old, she guessed. His hair was black, but even at that age his features were clearly defined, with an angular bone structure and a perfectly shaped nose and beautifully shaped lips.
‘He’s a gorgeous little boy, isn’t he?’ Helen said, coming to stand beside her. ‘Craig loves him to bits, and he always spoils him whenever Cheryl brings him here to see us.’
‘He’s beautiful,’ Rebecca agreed. Her heart felt as though it was breaking. If ever Craig were to have a child, he would surely look like this.
‘They’re going to do some tests to see what the infection might be, but Dr Bradshaw ordered antibiotic treatment in the meantime. Let’s hope it’s nothing too bad.’
Rebecca nodded. ‘I’d better go. I don’t want to intrude in any way, and I need to go and look in on my aunt before I go home.’ She glanced at Helen. ‘Will you let me know if there’s any news? You have my number, don’t you?’
‘Yes, of course.’
Rebecca turned away, a feeling of nausea swamping her. Was Declan Craig’s son? It was no wonder that he had such affection for this woman and her child. Had they been a couple at one time, and had something gone wrong between them?
Obviously, he still cared for her. He spoke to her in such a gentle manner, he had helped her to move into her new place, and now he was tending to her child. What was she to make of it?
She would have liked to say something to him, to have him hold her and tell her that her fears were unfounded, but why would he do that? He hadn’t made any declaration of love towards her or promised her that she would be the one woman he would forever want in his life. She had no place here with him, and if he was hoping that he could make something of his relationship with this other woman, who was she to get in the way of that? There was a child involved, and that changed everything.
She walked out to the car park, and did as he had suggested, taking the car and driving it back to his house. Once there, she wandered about the rooms, trying to make up her mind what she ought to do. Then she pulled out a holdall and started to bundle her few belongings into it. She had the key to Heather’s cottage in her bag, and it seemed to her that she would be better off staying there.
If Craig brought Cheryl back here to comfort her, it would be better if they were alone.
She left him a brief note, and laid the car keys on top of the scrap of paper. ‘I hope Cheryl and the little boy are all right,’ she wrote. ‘I can see that you have a lot to deal with just now, and I think it’s probably best if I give you some space. Thanks for helping me out and for giving me this lovely day out. It’s given me a chance to think things through, and I’ve come to realise that it’s best for me to stand on my own feet. My aunt has given me the key to my grandparents’ old cottage, and I’m going to be staying there for a while. It isn’t too far from the hospital. Bye, Craig. I’ll probably see you back at work next week.’
She had a qualm of indecision that made her hesitate as she left his house half an hour later, but she squashed it quickly. No matter what he said to the contrary, his priority had to be Cheryl and the little boy, and she would only be in the way if he found that she was still here when he came back home.
The cottage, she discovered, was in a completely rundown state. It smelt of damp and disuse, and that first night that Rebecca stayed there she wondered if she had perhaps made a mistake. Maybe she would have been better to book a room in a hotel.
In the morning, though, things looked a little brighter. Outside, the sun was shining, and she thought perhaps the warmth would help to dry out the house. She opened up the windows to let in the fresh air, and she called out an emergency electrician to come and switch on the service.
‘I wonder if you need a plumber in here,’ the electrician said, sucking in his breath as he walked through the living room and glanced at the peeling wallpaper. ‘Do you think you might have sprung a leak, or is it rising damp?’
‘I’m not sure. I’ve only just moved in.’
He connected the electricity supply and then went out, shaking his head. Rebecca decided not to look on the dark side. One thing at a time, that was the way to do it. Wasn’t that what Craig had once said?
She tried not to think about him. Every time his image passed through her mind she saw him with his arm about that vulnerable, fair-haired girl and it was too painful for words. She had to try to move on, to fill her life with activity…anything so that she didn’t have to dwell on what might have been.
She took down the curtains and removed the covers from the settee and chairs and put them all in the washing-machine.
Then she gazed about her at the walls, where the paper was coming away, and there and then she set about scraping it off. Maybe the cottage would dry out in a day or so and then she could splash a lick of paint about to brighten the place up. Heather wouldn’t mind—she guessed her aunt would be happy to have the house renovated.
And she also needed to find herself some transport, so a visit to a garage wouldn’t go amiss.
Back at work in A and E on Monday, she was glad of the hectic pace. ‘We’ve heard from the Royal,’ Dr Bradshaw told her. ‘They say the little girl, Chloe, has made some good headway, and she is ready to be transferred back to us. Would you like to go and pick her up?’
‘I’d love to do that,’ Rebecca said. She glanced about her, wondering whether Craig was going to turn up and accompany her. She hadn’t seen him all morning. ‘Will I be doing this on my own? I’m perfectly happy to do that.’
‘Yes, that will be fine,’ Dr Bradshaw said. ‘Craig’s on call with the helicopter this week, but I’m sure you’ll do very well on your own.’
‘Is he all right?’ she asked. ‘I wondered about the little boy, Declan, who was brought in over the weekend. Craig was very concerned about him but I haven’t had any news, so I don’t know if the child recovered or needed treatment.’
‘They admitted him to the medical ward,’ Dr Bradshaw told her. ‘It was a nasty chest infection, but he’s doing OK. He’s beginning to respond to treatment. Craig’s been up to see him a few times, but the danger period is over.’
Rebecca breathed a sigh of relief. ‘That’s good news.’
She went with the ambulance crew to bring back the baby from the Royal. Chloe was beginning to thrive now, and even after this short time Rebecca could see a difference in her. She was moving her little arms and legs and reaching out for her teddy bear, cuddling it as though even at that young age she recognised a friend.
Helen came and cooed over the cot when Rebecca trundled the baby into the ward. ‘Isn’t she an angel?’ she murmured. ‘She looks so much better than she did when I saw her last.’
‘She does. I’m hoping she’ll grow up to be a strong, healthy girl now that her heart defect has been repaired. Her mother is over the moon with her progress already.’
‘I can imagine.’ Helen smiled. ‘Cheryl was the same when she realised that Declan didn’t have meningitis. She was still worried, of course, but it wasn’t as bad as she thought it might be.’
Rebecca checked the baby’s chart and wrote down the medication schedule. ‘That must have been a relief for Craig, too.’ She handed the chart to the nurse. ‘We need to make sure that her blood pressure remains stable. If there’s any change, I’ll adjust the dosage.’
‘I’ll do half-hourly observations,’ Helen said. She glanced towards the door of the ward. ‘Here comes Craig now. He must have made his trip in double-quick time. I thought he was going over to Yorkshire again, but perhaps there was a change of plan.’
Craig was frowning as he approached them. He glanced at Rebecca and nodded briefly in her direction, before turning to Helen. ‘Hi, Helen,’ he said. ‘Do you think I could use the computer at the nurses’ station for a minute? I need to check up on something before I leave for the mountains.’
‘The mountains?’ Helen echoed. ‘Are you on mountain rescue duty today? I thought you were headed off further south.’
‘No, there was a change of plan.’ He looked at Rebecca once more, and Helen must have sensed something in the atmosphere between them because she started to move away.
‘I need to go and check up on a patient,’ she said. ‘I’ll be back in a while. Help yourself to the computer,’ she told Craig.
Rebecca sent him an oblique glance. ‘It didn’t take long for you to end up back in the air,’ she murmured. ‘I’d have thought you would have left it for a while…at least until the end of the month. That’s how your rotation works, isn’t it?’
‘Usually, it is, but something cropped up—a colleague was sick, and I volunteered to go in his place. It was easy enough for Dr Bradshaw to alter the schedules here. Besides, I felt that I had to get back up there and face the dragon, so to speak.’
Her eyes widened a fraction. So he wasn’t immune from the worries that everyone else might have after all. It had seemed as though he didn’t have a care in the world, that challenges were simply there to be taken up without any hesitation, and the helicopter crash was just another event to be confronted. Yet he had just admitted to having doubts, hadn’t he?
‘You don’t have to do it,’ she said. ‘You could work in A and E all the time and no one would think any the worse of you.’
‘Except for me.’ His gaze meshed with hers. ‘I would think less of myself if I didn’t face up to my inner demons.’
She studied him for a moment or two, her grey gaze drinking in his strong features. He was everything she wanted in a man. His inner strength was awesome, and yet even he struggled with the trials life threw at him. She felt humbled to be given this glimpse at his true feelings. Had the death of his friend being the starting point for his devil-may-care attitude? If the worst had happened, why would any thing else matter? Was that the way he saw it?
She said quietly, ‘Some demons might just fade away if you ignore them.’
‘Is that what you were doing when you left my house the other night? Did you figure that if you weren’t going to be staying there with me any more, then you didn’t need to talk to me about what was going on in your mind? You could push everything away, as though it had never happened?’
‘Nothing happened. You helped me when I was down, and it was time for me to move on. You were busy with Cheryl and I thought you probably had other more important things on your mind. It seemed like a good time to make the move.’
His mouth made a straight line. ‘So you’ve gone to live at your aunt’s place? From what she told me, it will need quite a bit of work. It hasn’t been lived in for years.’
‘Yes, that’s right. It has been neglected for some time.’
‘Then I wish you well. You obviously value your independence if you’re prepared to put up with hardship for a while. I just hadn’t realised quite how deep that feeling went. I suppose I should have taken heed as well when you said that you wanted to go back to the island. That’s the only place where you will be happy again, isn’t it? I suppose, once you get back to Islay, you’ll have everything just as you want it. You’ll be able to be near to your aunt, and you’ll have the job that you were dreaming of.’
She nodded. ‘It shouldn’t be too long now before I have some news about the post. This job was only meant to last for a few weeks while Dr Bradshaw advertised for someone who would take up a permanent staff position here, so I’ve had to keep that in mind all along.’
‘And I dare say they’ll do their best to find your aunt a rehabilitation centre somewhere on Islay. That will make things easier all round, won’t it?’
‘Yes.’ The word came out as a husky whisper.
He started to turn away from her. ‘I have to go. The pilot’s preparing for take-off, but I just wanted to get an idea of the lie of the land before we head out to the mountains. A group of climbers have landed themselves in trouble and need to be brought down. One of them probably has a broken ankle, and it sounds as though another has fractured his arm.’
‘That sounds bad.’ She hesitated. ‘Good luck.’
He nodded, but after that he didn’t look back. Rebecca felt numb inside, because he had studied her with such a cool, distant expression, as though he was no longer part of her life, and all the warmth and affection that had once been an integral part of their relationship had been doused with ice water, so that it dissolved and would never again return.
She went back to work and tried not to think about how things would be in the future. When this job finished, she would go to her island home, as he had pointed out, and she would probably never see him again. It hurt to think that they would be so near and yet so far apart.
In her lunch-break, she went to see how Heather was getting on. Her aunt was standing by a tubular frame, letting it support her weight while a nurse waited by her side in case of trouble.
‘My word, you’re doing well,’ Rebecca said. ‘You’re managing to stand on both feet…that’s wonderful.’
‘She’s coming along really nicely,’ the nurse agreed. ‘But then, she’s a determined woman is Heather. A little thing like a stroke isn’t going to keep her down for very long.’
‘That’s my aunt,’ Rebecca said with a smile. ‘She was always a go-getter.’
The nurse helped Heather back into her chair. ‘That does it for this morning, I think. The physio will probably be in to see you later on this afternoon.’
‘Aye, she said she would.’
The nurse left the room and Rebecca went to sit next to her aunt. ‘Have they said how long you might be staying here?’ she asked. ‘It’s just that Craig brought the subject up and I wondered if they had any thoughts about moving you to a rehabilitation centre for a few weeks. I suppose that would be better for you, because you would be in a place that is specially designed to help you recover your movement.’
‘The doctor did say something about it, and I mentioned it to Craig when he came to see me.’ Heather frowned, trying to make her words understood. ‘Actually, he seemed to be more bothered about what you were doing. Didn’t you tell him you were going to move into the cottage?’
Rebecca shook her head. ‘He was preoccupied with something else, and I thought it would be easier to just go.’
‘He seemed put out.’
‘He’ll get over it.’ Rebecca didn’t want to talk about Craig. It brought the knot back into her stomach and made her feel queasy all over again. ‘I thought I would do up the place for you. I could decorate and put in a new boiler, and fix up the garden, if you like. It will give me something to do over the next week or so.’
Heather gave her a shrewd look. ‘You want to keep busy,’ she said. ‘Do what you like with it, Becky. I haven’t seen the cottage in years.’
Rebecca stayed with her aunt for a while longer, telling her about her plans to renovate the cottage and planning what she would do with the garden. For all Heather said that she wasn’t bothered, it was her property, and Rebecca didn’t want to step out of line.
When she went back to work in A and E, time passed quickly. She treated a child who had a broken collar-bone, and then helped to resuscitate a baby who had been suffering from convulsions.
‘She’ll be all right now, I believe,’ she told the mother. ‘We’ve managed to bring her temperature down, and we’ll give her medicine to clear up the infection. If she does have any more convulsions, you need to see your GP right away, but I doubt this is something that will be ongoing.’
The mother was relieved. ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘You’ve been so good with her. You made me feel confident that she was in the right hands.’
Rebecca went to find Helen, so that she could explain anything that the mother needed to know before her child was discharged. ‘I’ve made out the prescription for the girl’s medication,’ she told her. ‘She’ll just need advice on how to handle any other convulsions if they occur.’
‘I’ll go and talk to her now,’ Helen said.
She was frowning, looking a little distracted, and Rebecca said, ‘Is something wrong? Do you want me to explain about the medication? I know the dosages can be a bit tricky sometimes.’
‘No, it isn’t that.’ Helen looked at her, her mouth trembling slightly. ‘It’s Craig—we received a message from the mountain rescue service just a few minutes ago. He was winched down a gorge so that he could treat a man who was stranded on a ledge. Craig had sent one injured man up to the helicopter and he was talking to the pilot by radio, telling him something about a rockfall, and then suddenly the contact was broken.’
She dragged in a shaky breath. ‘They haven’t been able to re-establish communications yet, and we don’t know whether Craig has been hurt. The copilot said he saw the beginnings of a landslide from the overhanging crag. They tried another rescue attempt, but the wind was getting up, and the pilot had to make the decision to pull back. He’s going back to Base to wait out the storm.’
Rebecca felt the blood wash out of her face. She couldn’t bear the thought that anything had happened to Craig. She had to be with him.
‘Where is the rescue base? Is it far from here?’ A feeling of dread had invaded her, sweeping through her body from head to toe.
‘It’s about five miles away, I think. The address is on the notice-board in the doctors’ lounge, along with the phone number. They came out here to pick Craig up from the helipad, but they won’t be coming back here unless they have patients on board. Why? What are you thinking?’
‘I need to be there to make sure that he’s all right. He was the only doctor on board, wasn’t he, so if I offer my services, they’re not likely to refuse, are they? They take volunteers and they’re always looking for medically trained people. If Craig has been injured, they’ll need someone to tend to him. I can do that, and I can deal with any other casualties, as well. I’m going to go over there.’
‘But, Rebecca, you’ve already been through one bad experience…how can you put yourself through this?’
‘I’m going. I have to go.’ Rebecca looked at the watch on her wrist. ‘My shift is due to end in just a few minutes. I’ve written up all my notes—everything is in order, so I can hand over without any problem.’
‘Rebecca, you can’t do this. They won’t let you. You’ve never…’
Rebecca wasn’t listening. She was already hurrying towards the doctors’ lounge. After that, she stopped to have a few hurried words with the doctor who was coming on duty to take her place, and then she went out to the car park, thankful that she’d made the decision to buy herself the smart little runabout.
If she put her foot down, she could make the journey to the rescue base in no time at all.