Paramedic Partners Read online

  In the light of a lamp on the banks of the marina and the beams of a full moon he could dimly see small figures curled up on the bunks. Three of them. And he recognised one of them as the only other person who knew where he kept the key. Josh!

  At that moment it all became clear. The police presence. The fellow from the garage hurrying out of Selina’s house where all the lights were blazing out into the autumn night.

  He banged on the door and bellowed the boy’s name, and Josh stirred sleepily. Kane called again and this time he sat up on the bunk and looked fearfully upwards.

  When he saw Kane peering down at him he came slowly up the steps.

  ‘Josh! Where’s the key?’ he cried.

  Josh opened a grubby fist and it was there in the middle of his palm.

  ‘Open the door!’ Kane ordered.

  The boy rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘I can’t. It’s stuck.’

  ‘No, it’s not,’ Kane said, calmer now that he had the situation in hand. ‘It’s a special lock and it can be tricky. Open one of the windows and pass the key to me, and I’ll have you out in no time.’

  At that moment Katy and Kristy appeared behind him and when they saw Kane’s shadow at the door their mouths opened wide and screams issued forth.

  ‘Hurry,’ he told Josh. ‘The girls are frightened.’

  With the key once more in his possession, it was an easy matter to release the three small fugitives. The moment they were up on deck the wailing stopped.

  ‘Right, Josh,’ he said quietly as the children eyed him apprehensively. ‘Now, tell me what this is all about.’

  Selina’s son took a deep breath.

  ‘I brought the girls to play on our boat and when we got here they wanted to see inside, but it was locked.’

  ‘And you just happened to know where the key was?’

  ‘Yes,’ he admitted, looking down at the deck.

  ‘And?’

  ‘When we got into the cabin I shut the door behind us and it locked and we couldn’t get out.’

  ‘I see. So even though you had the key in your hand, you couldn’t open the door?’

  ‘Yes,’ he muttered. ‘It was all right at first, hiding down there, but when it began to go dark we didn’t know what to do.’

  Kane reached for his mobile.

  ‘Yes?’ Selina’s voice croaked hopefully when he got through.

  ‘It’s Kane here,’ he said, and got no further.

  ‘I can’t talk now,’ she babbled. ‘Something terrible has happened. Josh and the twins are missing.’

  ‘Not any more,’ he said gently. ‘I’ve just found them in the cabin on my boat. Three little castaways, desperate to see their mums.’

  ‘Oh! Thank goodness!’ she choked. ‘We’ll be right there. I’ve been living in a nightmare for the last few hours.’

  ‘I take it that’s why the police are in the village.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said hurriedly. ‘I’m off to find Jill and Gavin, Kane. Don’t let those little scallywags out of your sight.’

  He sighed.

  ‘As if I would.’

  He felt guilty about the whole thing. If he hadn’t taken Josh to his heart, like he had, the child wouldn’t be so interested in the boat…and if he’d come straight home from work Selina would have been saved hours of anguish.

  Whatever he did, wherever he turned, he was involved in her life in one way or another, and it hurt a lot because he was reluctantly trying to achieve the opposite.

  * * *

  He stood to one side as the children were reunited with their ecstatic parents, and hid a smile at the way the three of them had bounced back as if it had been a great adventure instead of a frightening experience.

  Selina met his glance above her son’s tousled head and the promise of what they could all be to each other was in her eyes. He felt himself weaken. She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen and he’d dithered long enough.

  It was at that moment that the police arrived, straight-faced, officious. Incredibly, they questioned him as if he was up to no good.

  Had the children been on the boat when he’d left? Was he responsible for them being locked up? What had been his intentions when he’d got back?

  ‘I’d intended going to bed,’ he told them stonily, ‘after doing a twelve-hour shift with the ambulance service.’

  ‘And can anyone vouch for you being on the job all the time?’

  ‘Yes. The lad who was with me.’

  Selina was listening, aghast.

  ‘Kane is a close family friend,’ she told the officer who was asking the questions, ‘and in any case the children were with my sister-in-law until late afternoon.’

  The officer had put away his notebook.

  ‘That will be all, then, sir,’ he said imperturbably. ‘We’ve heard what the boy has to say, but as you will know we have to be very careful where the disappearance of children is concerned.’

  ‘Of course,’ Kane replied with cold politeness, and wondered when the demon that seemed to be forever on his shoulder was going to go away.

  When parents, children and the constabulary had gone, quietness settled over the boat once more and, with sleep forgotten, Kane stood on deck, gazing sombrely over the marina.

  Why was it that he who led a blameless life should always be on the fringe of something nasty? he asked himself grimly. He felt like packing his bags and going as far away as he could get. But if he did that he would never see Selina again and he wasn’t into self-punishment to that extent.

  His phone rang at that moment. It was Selina.

  ‘Are you all right, Kane?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘Yes,’ he said abruptly, then added in a softer tone, ‘Are you? You’ve had a dreadful experience.’

  ‘Yes, it was. One always thinks the worst, we kept wondering if the children had been abducted.’

  ‘By someone like me, you mean?’

  ‘No. I don’t mean that at all. You are a rock in my life.’

  ‘Really? Rocks aren’t always the safest things to cling to, you know. Goodnight, Selina. Sleep well. You’ve got your boy back.’ And before she could try to comfort him further he rang off.

  * * *

  Selina was drained as she finally climbed the stairs to bed. It had been a day she wouldn’t forget in a hurry. One nightmare after another. The anguish of the children being lost and then the policeman’s questioning of Kane.

  It was no wonder he wasn’t feeling too happy, and she didn’t blame him. It couldn’t have happened to anyone less deserving, even though the policeman had only been doing his job.

  Kane carried his pride like a huge chip on his shoulder. The life he’d lived had made him that way. But was he going to let it spoil things for them? It looked very much like it.

  Each day when she awoke she dreaded that they would find The Joshua gone the next time they went along the towpath. And who could blame Kane if he did pull up sticks?

  There’d been the night when she’d insisted that he tell her about himself, and what had happened afterwards, and though she’d done her best to show him that she was prepared to take him as she found him, it hadn’t seemed to make any difference.

  Then, to cap it all, and insensitive beyond belief, the interrogation on the boat tonight.

  For goodness’ sake! He’d been the one who’d found the children…and it was Josh’s yearning to be near Kane and the boat that had pointed his feet in that direction.

  Selina passed a weary hand over her brow. She could go over it all until she was blue in the face, but it wasn’t going to change anything.

  After Dave had died there had been no intent in her to find someone to take his place. Yet it had happened. She’d fallen in love totally and completely, and had hoped that Kane might feel the same, but his pride was wrapped around him like armour and so far she hadn’t been able to pierce it.

  Take one day at a time, she told herself as she slumped onto the bed. And maybe…She was
slipping over the edge into an exhausted sleep and ‘maybe’ was shelved until another day.

  * * *

  ‘Is Kane angry with me?’ Josh asked as the days went by with no sign of him.

  ‘No, of course not,’ Selina told him.

  ‘Is he angry with you, then?’

  ‘No,’ she said again. ‘He isn’t. I think he’s more angry with himself than anyone.’

  Perplexed blue eyes met hers.

  ‘But he hasn’t done anything wrong.’

  ‘No, he hasn’t. It might be better if he had,’ she said abstractedly, which left Josh even more confused.

  The paramedic course was progressing and when Selina came home each day she felt that if the exams were as difficult as the course, she wouldn’t be in charge of her own vehicle for some time to come.

  Peter was still hovering, and though she’d been glad of his support on the night the children had gone missing her feelings towards him hadn’t changed.

  ‘It would have to be lover boy who found the kids,’ he’d snapped when he’d heard about Kane finding them on the boat. ‘If you hadn’t let Josh go round there so much it wouldn’t have happened.’

  Selina hadn’t taken him up on it. She knew what ailed him and didn’t want to know about it. When he’d gone stomping off she’d thought that little did he know that Kane wasn’t her lover. She wished he was. And he was certainly no boy. He was a man. Every inch of him.

  For someone who’d been accused of sexual harassment Kane wasn’t exactly falling over himself to make love to her, which made her all the more convinced that he was a man who didn’t spread his favours around…or force himself on others. Far from it!

  If their relationship went on like it was doing, she might find herself seducing him. There were times when she let her imagination run riot, when she dreamt of standing before him in pliant nakedness and Kane forgetting all his hang-ups as he gave in to their need for each other.

  But that was all they were, dreams. Life in its present form was made up of work, worry and wistful longing.

  * * *

  The results of the exams were out and Selina had passed. She’d actually passed! She was now a fully fledged paramedic. Not all that much better off financially, but when it came to status, a big step up the ladder.

  The first thing she wanted to do when the glad tidings had been absorbed was to tell her colleagues at the ambulance station, Kane especially. This was something separate from their private lives. It was about the job…healthcare…and what it meant to them.

  As she left the training centre, Philip Bassett, one of the instructors who’d been on the course, came up to her. He was from down south and seemed a bit like a fish out of water in his new surroundings.

  ‘Well done, Selina,’ he said with a congratulatory handshake. ‘I hope that if ever I need an ambulance, you’ll be on board.’

  She smiled. ‘Let’s hope that won’t be for a long time.’

  He shrugged. ‘If loneliness were an illness, I’d be needing healthcare already. I moved up here to be near my sister, and I’d no sooner got settled in than she died. I don’t know a soul and I’m due to retire soon.’

  ‘Oh, dear. That is sad,’ she said. ‘Why don’t you come round to my place some time? I’m a widow with a nine-year-old son and my social life isn’t exactly flourishing.’

  Philip’s face lit up. ‘That’s very kind. I’d love to.’

  ‘Give me a ring some time and we’ll fix up a date. I’m back on shifts next week, of course, but we can sort something out.’ With a smile she added, ‘We northern folk can’t have you thinking we’re low on hospitality.’

  ‘Whatever you say,’ he agreed, and after exchanging phone numbers they parted.

  It was midday and as Selina drove to the ambulance centre she was willing Kane to be there, though there was nothing to guarantee that he would be. Even if he was on days he might be stationed somewhere in the city or have gone out on a call straight from base.

  When she arrived, with eyes sparkling and a smile lighting up her face, one of the men called across, ‘What are you doing here, Selina? I thought you were on a course.’

  ‘I am…I mean, I was,’ she told him. ‘I’ve passed. I’m a paramedic!’

  The shout went up.

  ‘Congratulations!’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said absently.

  She was looking around for Kane but it seemed as if she was to be disappointed.

  ‘So, are we going for a drink to celebrate?’ someone suggested, and before she could say yes or no it had been arranged that they would meet at the nearest wine bar at the end of the day shift.

  She wasn’t all that keen on the idea as it would mean going back home to change and asking Jill to have Josh for a while longer, but there had been so much genuine pleasure on her behalf amongst those she worked with that it would have been hard to refuse.

  Mark Guthrie had already been informed that she’d passed and he called her into his office for a chat.

  ‘This is good news, Selina,’ he told her. ‘You deserve the upgrade. When you come back to us next week you’ll have one of the trainees with you and we’ll take it from there.’

  ‘So I won’t be with Kane any more?’

  ‘Well, no. We like to spread the paramedics out, one of them to each trainee.’

  As she came out of the office she was telling herself that she’d known that was how it would be, yet she’d still asked the question.

  When she went back to the rest room Kane was there. It seemed that he was a member of one of two crews who’d just got back from emergencies. As the new arrivals crowded round her to hear her news he stood to one side, watching her with a grave intensity that made her want to go across and shake him.

  Didn’t he see that he was the only one she wanted to hear from? she thought wretchedly. Everyone was being so kind and he was standing there as if he’d been struck dumb.

  She wasn’t to know it, but that was the case. Kane was speechless. He hadn’t seen her in days, weeks even, and his need of her was so rampant he couldn’t think straight.

  He’d expected her to qualify. Selina was good, one of the best he’d ever worked with, and he was extremely pleased at her success. But it was as if he’d lost the power of speech.

  The group around her was breaking up and with one long level look in his direction she was ready to go.

  ‘I’ll see you all tonight,’ she called from the doorway, and as he wondered what that was about, she went.

  As Selina drove home there was a bleak sort of resignation inside her. Kane was not only stingy with his affections, he was also not forthcoming with congratulations either. Surely he didn’t begrudge her the success she’d worked for. If he did it was mean-minded, and she had been way out in her judgement.

  His behaviour had taken the edge off her excitement and Josh’s words came to mind. He’d wanted to know if Kane was angry with them and she’d told him stoutly that he wasn’t. Maybe she’d been mistaken. He was always getting caught up in their lives and perhaps he’d had enough.

  The outskirts of the village were in sight, and as she pulled up in front of her brother’s house domestic matters had to take over from affairs of the heart.

  Josh and the twins were watching TV when she went inside, and she was able to take Jill to one side to tell her the good news.

  ‘That’s wonderful!’ Jill cried. ‘What did Kane have to say?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘What do you mean—nothing?’

  ‘Even Denise Hapgood congratulated me, but he just stood and stared.’

  ‘How long is it since you’ve seen each other?’

  ‘Ages.’

  ‘Well, there you are,’ Jill pronounced triumphantly. ‘He’s afraid of saying the wrong thing.’

  ‘I doubt it. He’s got that off to a fine art.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Saying the wrong thing.’

  ‘So there’s no progress.’

 
‘No. None.’

  ‘Then the guy has to be blind,’ Jill teased.

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE phone rang as Selina was getting changed for the evening ahead, and her throat went dry when Kane’s voice came over the line.

  ‘Selina?’

  After the episode earlier in the afternoon there was no way she was going to let him know that just the sound of his voice was bliss. It was the lack of that very thing that had put her in the doldrums ever since.

  So she said drily, ‘Oh, you can speak, then. Or perhaps your silence, when everyone was falling over themselves to congratulate me, was because every time you open your mouth you put your foot in it?’

  ‘Maybe it was,’ he said, ‘and as I take size nines, you have to agree it’s quite a ‘‘feet’’.’

  ‘Very funny. I’m glad you can find something to joke about. But what can I do for you? I’m sure you haven’t just rung to tell me the size of your feet.’

  He was serious now. He knew she had every right to be annoyed after his ridiculous behaviour that afternoon and flippancy wasn’t going to mend matters.

  ‘No. I haven’t. I’ll take you to the wine bar if you like. As we live so close it seems silly for us both to drive into the city. What have you done about Josh?’

  ‘He’s staying with Gavin and Jill for the night.’

  ‘So you don’t have to hurry back.’

  ‘No, not if I don’t want to,’ she said stiffly, wondering where all this was leading. ‘But I’m not intending to stay too late.’

  ‘Of course. That’s up to you. So, am I picking you up?’

  ‘No, you’re not!’ she told him. ‘You don’t have to patronise me because you can’t find it in you to be glad that I’ve passed my exams.’

  ‘All right, Selina, if that’s how you feel,’ he said levelly. ‘We seem to be running true to form. You in the right all the time and I in the wrong. I’ll see you there.’

  Her defiance lasted until she found that her car wouldn’t start. As she stood beside it, fuming, the darkened garage down the road showed that it was no use going for Peter, and she was certainly not going to eat humble pie where Kane was concerned.

  It wasn’t in her nature to feel like this, she thought miserably. If only he would give in and tell her he loved her. But maybe he didn’t. Perhaps she was taking too much for granted.