THE DRIVE TO Coventry took a little more than an hour, the destruction far too close to home for comfort.
Thick black smoke crowded out the morning sun, turning the start of a new day into the continuation of a nightmare. Coventry was not entirely razed, but the bombing had been considerable. Blocks and blocks of buildings were reduced to flat scars upon the earth. The dazed, blank stares of the people walking aimlessly about reminded Emma of the men who came through Victoria Station after Dunkirk. Eyes hollowed out by horrors no human should have to witness.
Margaret gave directions to the WVS station they’d been instructed to drive to, her voice small and fragile.
Makeshift medical aid stations were set up along sidewalks, where nurses bandaged who they could while the other victims waited their turn with dirty cloths held to their wounds. Those first aid efforts made Emma wish she had taken classes at the Red Cross, that she had more to offer than the provisions they carried.
Emma pulled the van to a stop in front of a building that appeared to still be intact despite missing all its windows, likely blown out by the blasts. A woman ran out to greet them, her WVS coat buttoned up despite the sweat glistening on her brow. “Park and set up here. I hope you brought a lot of food and anything else you could spare.”
“Five hundred pounds of food,” Margaret replied. “Several bags of clothes, all mended, clean, and ready to be worn immediately.”
Disappointment flitted across the woman’s lined features. “It’s a start. Come on then, let’s have those clothes.”
Emma carried the heavy sacks of recycled clothes into the building. Men, women, and children shuffled about inside, guided by the soothing tones of the WVS volunteers.
“His name was Harold Baker,” a woman with a bandage on her head said in a loud voice. “Harold Baker,” she repeated, her voice breaking. “I haven’t seen him since last night.” Her words faded into weary sobs.
The woman leading Emma cast her a mournful look. “This might be difficult,” she cautioned.
“I can take it,” Emma replied, quoting Churchill’s words.
If Britain could take it, so could she.
When she returned to the mobile canteen, Margaret already had production underway, passing out mugs and jam jars as quickly as she could. There was a softness to her words as Emma approached, reverent and sympathetic to the countless people who lined up for their small meal of tea, a margarine sandwich and some vegetable soup.
They’d been given extra stores of sugar, knowing more than a stiff bit of tea would be needed to counter the shock of what the inhabitants of Coventry had endured. Seeing the trembling hands reaching for cups had Emma and Margaret dumping the sugar in by heavy spoonfuls.
As people received their drinks and food, they shared their stories. The neighbor’s house that had caved in. The mum who ran for her daughter and never came back. The boys who stayed out to see the bombs and collect the fallen shrapnel, and who no one had heard from since.
Every person had known loss. No one was unaffected.
And neither were Emma and Margaret.
Whatever power held their composure together did so with a careful thread, one Emma knew would break as soon as she was alone. But for now, it was enough. She and Margaret could press on. They could absorb those stories that people needed unburdened, they could heal hearts as medics worked to heal bodies.
They could take it.
But as the queue of people did not diminish, the five hundred pounds of food that had seemed so abundant that morning was suddenly and completely insufficient. In only an hour, they were halfway through their stores with sugar running dangerously low.
“Can I get a tub of hot water?” a nurse asked.
“We can brew the tea for you if you like,” Emma offered.
The nurse shook her head. “It’s for the doctors. They need clean water and the mains are out.”
“Of course.” Emma took the empty tub from the woman. “We can boil as much as you need.”
A look of relief washed over the nurse’s face.
She returned several more times throughout the day, long after the food was gone.
“Go on,” Emma said as she waited on the infernal pot to boil. “I’ll bring it to you when it’s ready.”
The nurse immediately ran toward the makeshift hospital, holding her white cap in place with her hand. Emma filled the tub when the water was sufficiently boiled and carried the sloshing basin to the hospital.
Inside, the medicinal scent of carbolic mingled with other smells she didn’t want to name. All around her were cries of pain. And of loss.
She handed the nurse the tub of water and quickly tried to exit the building.
In the middle of all the chaos was a little girl wearing the dress that Olivia had donated, the one made of ice-blue satin and tulle that was far too fancy for any real use. There were no shoes on the girl’s dirty feet, but that wasn’t what caught Emma’s attention—it was how the girl twirled so the skirt belled out around her shins, a child reveling in the simple joy of a pretty frock amid the horrors of war.
Someday Emma would share with Olivia what her dress had meant to that girl.
“My son,” a woman cried. “Help him, please.”
The frantic mother rushed to Emma, her son in her arms, too large to be carried, and yet limp where he hung from her grip, spilling out of her embrace. Emma froze, uncertain of what she could do, shocked to her core at the stillness of the child.
A nurse brushed past Emma before she could call for one, taking the boy from his mother and carrying him toward the hall.
Once outside, Emma staggered toward the mobile canteen, the strength that had propelled her through the day drained away to the point that her legs didn’t feel capable of holding her upright for a second longer. The food was gone, the tea empty, the sugar little more than a sweet dream, and barely enough petrol in the tank to get them back to Nottingham.
There was nothing more they could offer.
Neither she nor Margaret spoke on the ride home, both processing the horrors of Coventry, fully absorbed in the stories they’d heard, the heartbreak they’d witnessed. The blackout was in effect when they arrived in Nottingham, but Emma no longer cared about her stipulations of not driving in the dark. In truth, she was grateful for something else to focus on. She dropped Margaret off at her home first, then drove to Victoria Station to park the mobile canteen.
She climbed out of the van, her legs weak, her thoughts spinning.
“Miss Taylor?”
She turned at the familiar masculine voice to find Charles Fisk in his fire brigade coat and boots, streaked black with soot. A fire truck was several meters behind him, parked at the train station as part of the citywide disbursement of emergency vehicles, to prevent them all from being taken out at once by a well-placed bomb.
“Charles.” She stumbled toward him, not even feeling her feet as they moved.
He caught her when she came close, pulling her into the solidness of his body, his arms curling around her. Making her feel safe. “Emma.” He breathed her name into her ear.
She clung to him, reveling in his quiet strength, not realizing how desperately she’d needed it until that moment.
“Were you at Coventry too?” His voice rumbled against her cheek where she’d laid her head against his chest.
She nodded and looked up at him. “It’s so awful. This war. What’s happened to those people.”
His jaw flexed and his expression hardened.
“It could happen to Nottingham,” Emma said, putting voice to her worst fears. “There was a woman with a son who... That could have been my daughter—”
“No.” He held her gaze, his expression determined. “That will not be Nottingham. That will not be Olivia.”
Emma swallowed. “How do you know?”
Charles’ eyes searched hers and she tried to find the flecks of amber and green in the darkness.
“Because I will always make sure you’re both safe.” His brows pulled down with sincerity.
Before Emma could think about what she was doing, she pushed up onto her toes and pressed her lips to his. His arms tightened around her, equal parts gentle and firm, as his warm mouth moved against hers, capturing the kiss.
A thrill shot through her, fiery with the reminder that she was alive. That Olivia was alive. That there had been a dormant part of Emma desperately longing for this.
Charles ended the kiss with a slow, easy smile and released his hold on her. She settled back on her heels even as she felt as if she was floating away. That half grin teased up higher at the corner of his lips and made her heart flutter. “Will you now join me for dinner one night next week?”
Every reason she had to say no tumbled backward in her mind, pushed away by the lingering heat of his mouth on her lips, the slight burn from the rasp of his stubbled jaw at her chin. “I’m not working at the canteen after work on Wednesday.”
His grin widened, showing off that dimple on his right cheek. “What a coincidence. I’m not working Wednesday afternoon either.”