Paramedic Partners Page 8

  ‘Or somebody’s taken him. Suppose somebody’s taken him, Kane!’

  He had produced a mobile phone out of the pocket of his shorts.

  ‘I’m going to ring the police,’ he said grimly. ‘We’re not taking any chances. When something like this happens time is of the essence.’

  At that moment a line of donkeys appeared on the horizon, with two teenage boys in charge, and he said thankfully, ‘Look, Selina! On the first donkey. He’s been for a ride.’

  ‘Oh! Thank goodness!’ she breathed and promptly burst into tears.

  ‘Come here,’ he said softly. Holding her close, he gently stroked her hair.

  ‘I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to Josh,’ she sobbed. ‘He’s all I’ve got. Love brings pain with it, Kane. Too much pain. I can’t believe that he just took it into his head to wander off like that.’

  ‘Here he comes,’ he told her. ‘Let’s see what he has to say.’

  An excited Josh was running towards them, full of the thrill of the donkey ride, and Selina said weakly, ‘Josh, you had no right to go off without asking permission. Don’t ever do that again! Where did you get the money from?’

  His face crumpled.

  ‘I used the money that Uncle Gavin gave me yesterday…and I did ask you. You had your eyes closed but I thought you’d heard me. You sort of nodded your head.’

  ‘I don’t remember any of that,’ she said flatly, but she thought guiltily that she’d been miles away, daydreaming about Kane.

  At that moment the twins woke up and wanted their turn on the donkeys, but this time Selina, Kane and a subdued Josh were alongside them.

  A last paddle and then it was time for home. Selina wasn’t sorry. Those terrifying moments when she’d thought she’d lost Josh had left her with a headache and nausea…and regret as well, because she’d been too het up to appreciate being held in Kane’s arms.

  On the way back the children had chattered all the time, but Kane and Selina were silent, each of them deep in thought.

  She couldn’t be angry at Josh for long, but his wandering off had spoiled the day and she was wondering what Kane’s thoughts were on the matter. Was he thinking that there were better ways to spend his time than with a panicking mother and a disobedient child?

  When they’d dropped the twins off she said hesitantly, ‘Would you like to come in and have something to eat with us, Kane? It won’t be anything special but you’re very welcome.’

  She found that she was holding her breath, yet it wouldn’t be the end of the world if he said no, would it? He might have something planned for later.

  He smiled for the first time since they’d left the coast. She looked tired and windblown and was recovering from a nasty shock. He couldn’t let her cook for him.

  ‘Yes, I’d like to eat with you both, but only as long as you agree to me going to get us a take-away.’

  ‘Mmm, that would be great,’ she said, her spirits rising now that he didn’t want to rush off home. ‘And while you’re gone I’m going to wash the salt out of my hair, and this young man can have a bath and then get into his pyjamas.’

  Was Selina telling him something? Kane wondered as he drove off. That shortly after they’d eaten they would be alone? Somehow he didn’t think it was likely.

  In her frantic concern over Josh she’d told him that love hurt. As if its pain outweighed its joy. He supposed she had cause to feel like that. She’d suffered a great loss and now, because of it, had a horror of anything happening to her son.

  Yet the fact remained that she’d cast a spell over him. It was as if he’d been waiting for her all his life, and now that she was there, what was he going to do about it?

  Tell her, of course. The moment they were alone he would tell Selina how he felt and take his chances.

  There was the garage looming up in front of him again and ‘Uncle Peter’ on the forecourt. The fellow was haunting him, and if the baleful glare that was coming his way was anything to go by, it would seem that the feeling was mutual.

  Too bad, buddy, he thought as he drove past. We might both be playing a losing game, but I’m all set for a try.

  When he got back they were waiting for him, Josh scrubbed and clean in his pyjamas and Selina with the fair swathe of her hair lying damply against her head.

  They were smiling their welcome and Kane felt his chest tighten. His recollections of family life were so far back they were almost non-existent.

  There had been a house full of them, noisy, rumbustious, but a family nevertheless. Until his father had walked out and left them penniless. His mother hadn’t been able to cope and had put half of them into care. He’d been one of them.

  Surprisingly, they’d lived under better conditions than before, but the closeness hadn’t been there and once he’d reached manhood he’d gone his own way.

  ‘So,’ he said lightly as Selina fetched the plates that had been warming, ‘let’s eat.’

  By the time Josh was in bed a summer dusk was throwing shadows across the room and Selina got up to switch on the lamps. She’d been longing to be alone with Kane, but now the moment had arrived she was nervous. Was she imagining that there was chemistry between them?

  He’d told her when they’d first met that he preferred to be the hunter rather than the hunted. Was he thinking that she’d got him labelled as husband material?

  Instead of going back to sit beside him on the couch, she sat down in the chair facing him and turned her head away from his dark intent gaze.

  ‘What’s wrong, Selina?’ he asked. ‘Do you want me to go?’

  ‘No! I mean, yes! They don’t like staff to cohabit in the ambulance service,’ she gabbled in inane desperation.

  That brought him to his feet and he stood looking down on her in amused amazement.

  ‘Cohabit? With you at one side of the room and me on the other? We’d earn a place in the Guinness Book of Records.’

  Tears were sparkling on her lashes.

  ‘Don’t laugh at me, Kane. No man has touched me since Dave died. I feel like a nervous virgin.’

  He reached out and drew her slowly out of her chair.

  ‘There’s no need to be nervous, Selina, and I’m not laughing at you. You’re young and beautiful and I’ve wanted to make love to you ever since we met, but—’

  She put a finger to his lips.

  ‘No buts. Just hold me, Kane.’ As he enfolded her in his arms and kissed her with a passion that she’d never expected to experience again, it was there once more, the feeling of coming out of darkness.

  How long they were locked in each other’s arms she didn’t know. It was enough to know that Kane found her desirable.

  Easing herself gently out of his arms, she took his hand and led him towards the stairs. Smiling up at him, she said, ‘I can’t believe that we’ve come so far so soon. Yet it feels so right, even though I know nothing about you. My past and present are an open book to you, but yours aren’t to me. Tell me about yourself, Kane. Where you come from. About your family and friends. What makes you tick. I want to know everything about you.

  ‘Charlie came round the other night and I had the feeling that he was warning me off you. That he knew something about you but was reluctant to tell me. I fobbed him off by telling him that to me you are merely someone I work with…which was untrue.’

  Kane’s face had whitened. They were standing with their arms around each other at the bottom of the stairs and he stifled a groan. Of all times, Selina had chosen this moment to ask questions.

  There was no way he was going to lie to her. It wasn’t his style. Letting his arms fall away from her, he said tonelessly, ‘So you want to know all about me. Then I’d better tell you. I’m one of a family of eight. My father left us when I was quite small, and as my mother was almost penniless she put some of us into care. I was one of them.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ she breathed.

  ‘Oh, yes, I’m afraid. When I was old enough to fend for myself I did just that and
nothing has changed. Since those early days I’ve never been really close to anyone…until now. I’ve had relationships but none of them mattered. Maybe that’s what got to Eve Richards so much.’

  ‘And who might she be?’ Selina asked slowly.

  ‘She was my partner on the ambulance before I moved up here. Eve developed a grand passion for me and it got out of hand. When I decided to change jobs to get away from her, she accused me of sexual harassment.’

  Selina felt her jaw go slack.

  ‘So you were having an affair with her…and then decided you’d had enough?’ she questioned dismally.

  The enchantment of those moments in his arms was slipping away. She’d asked for it, but did she want to hear this?

  ‘It wasn’t like that. I wasn’t having an affair with her. She didn’t appeal to me one bit,’ he said in grim denial.

  For the first time ever he was ready to tell someone of the misery and embarrassment he’d suffered, and who better than Selina with her uncomplicated generosity of spirit? But as he braced himself to speak she forestalled him.

  ‘It all sounds very unpleasant. You wouldn’t have told me if I hadn’t insisted, would you?’ she said flatly. ‘You would have let us go on from where we were a few moments ago and I would have been none the wiser.’

  Frustration was rising in him.

  ‘Correct, and from where I’m standing it seems that would have been the best thing to do. Look at you! You’re acting as if I’m guilty of what I was accused of. For your information I was completely exonerated. It was discovered that she had mental problems.

  ‘But why am I telling you this? What happened is my affair and no one else’s, and if you’re peeved because I was intending to make love to you without having ‘‘confessed’’, it’s because I have nothing to hide.’

  ‘I see. So there was no truth in the allegation.’

  He raked his dark locks with a restless hand.

  ‘I can’t believe you asked me that. But I suppose it’s only reasonable. As you said before, you hardly know me and you wouldn’t want Josh—or yourself for that matter—associating with an unsavoury character.’

  He was lifting his jacket off the hallstand.

  ‘I’m going, Selina. I think we’ve both said enough for one night.’

  ‘No!’ she protested. ‘Don’t let us part like this, Kane.’

  ‘Look, Selina, you have only my word for it that I was innocent. You’ll have to decide whether you believe me or not. All I know is that I’m still paying for something I didn’t do. What has just happened between us is proof of that.’ And without giving her the chance to persuade him further, he opened the door and went.

  As Selina went slowly upstairs she felt numb. The last thing she’d expected when she’d asked Kane to tell her about himself had been that it would cause a rift between them. And now he had gone, hurt and angry.

  But what about her? What had he expected her to say when she discovered that it was only her persistence that had made him tell her about Eve Richards?

  He’d left thinking that she’d judged him unfairly when all she’d wanted had been for them to talk it through. That it was a sore topic had been very plain to see. So where did they go from here? Not very far, she thought dismally.

  She had to talk to him again, she thought wretchedly as she eyed the bedside phone, but how? She had neither a phone number nor an address.

  The only thing she knew was that he lived in an apartment in a high-rise block not far from where they worked. Which showed how little she knew about him. She had been right to insist he tell her something about himself, she thought bleakly. Did Kane think she was in the habit of making love with strangers?

  But her expression softened as she remembered that there were things that she did know about him. She knew that he was the best paramedic she’d ever seen in action and that, though he could be reticent at times, he was thoughtful and quick to understand. He didn’t push himself where Josh was concerned, and until last night had never laid a finger on her, except for that fleeting moment one afternoon when he’d held her hand in the ambulance.

  There’s no smoke without fire, the voice of reason said. If you want to know more there is someone you can ring—Charlie Vaughan. He should have told you what was in his mind the other night, instead of chickening out.

  But even as she was picking up the phone she knew that she couldn’t do it. Kane was hurting enough without her making things worse by turning to tittle-tattle.

  The next day Selina wandered around the cottage, restless and on edge, praying that the phone might ring and it would be Kane telling her that he understood the way she’d reacted and could they start afresh? But it remained frustratingly silent.

  * * *

  At last she was back on the job and she’d never been more eager to be there.

  The moment they were alone in the ambulance she was going to talk to Kane. Tell him that what he’d told her had been a shock, but now that she’d adjusted, couldn’t they at least be friends?

  Once that was done she would take it one step at a time and hope that she could take away his hurt and anger. She wasn’t such a poor judge of character that she would fall in love with a man of questionable morals.

  Their first call of the day was to a suspected heart attack, and as the ambulance swung beneath the huge metal doors and out onto the nearby motorway, Selina was ready to say her piece.

  In her eagerness to see him again she’d been the first of the day shift to arrive, but unfortunately Kane had been the last and until the call had come through he hadn’t even looked in her direction.

  But now there was no getting away from each other. They were a team. Whatever was going on in the background of their lives, this was what they were employed to do and, as if to remind her of that fact, he forestalled anything she might have been about to say by telling her abruptly, ‘I’m only prepared to talk about the job, Selina, and if you want to ask permission to change partners, it’s all right with me.’

  She knew that she had to stay calm.

  ‘I see you’re determined to get the first word in. Is it all right if I say something now?’ she asked as they turned onto the road where the call had come from.

  ‘Yes. As long as you do as you’re told,’ he replied, the chill persisting.

  ‘Right. First of all I don’t want to work with anyone else but you. So I’m not going to ask for the arrangement to be changed. Yes?’

  He still had the shuttered look about him. ‘So, you’re prepared to take the risk.’

  ‘If there is one…yes.’

  She was denied the chance to say anything else because Kane was stopping the ambulance in front of a neat detached house. As they pushed open the front door a voice called from above. ‘We’re up here!’

  He went up the narrow staircase two steps at a time and Selina was close behind. They both knew that if it was a heart attack these first minutes were vital.

  In a bedroom at the front of the house an elderly man in dressing-gown and pyjamas was lying on the floor with an anxious woman of a similar age bending over him. He was fighting for breath and clutching at his chest. His eyes were closed, his skin was clammy, and as Kane delved into the advance response bag Selina quickly unfastened his clothing to bare his chest.

  ‘Is it his heart?’ the woman asked shakily. ‘He’d just brought me a cup of tea up and down he went. He’s been in too much pain for me to move him so I just put a pillow under his head.’

  She was ashen with shock and Selina gave her a reassuring smile.

  ‘We need to get your husband to hospital as quickly as possible so how about packing a bag while we’re treating him?’

  ‘Er…yes. I’ll do that,’ she faltered, eager to be of use.

  ‘We’ll do an ECG first,’ Kane said quickly. ‘If the heart muscles are in the state I think they are, we’d better be ready to defibrillate.’

  The ECG showed that there was ventricular fibrillation present, and as
they worked on the patient together Selina thought that, whatever was going on in the background of their lives, this was where they were in tune.

  They had a very sick patient who might die before they got him to hospital, but not if they could help it. They would fight to save him every inch of the way, and once they’d done their part the coronary unit would take over.

  The heart rhythm improved with the electric shock treatment and the pain killers they gave him were reducing the agony inside his chest so there would be some slight improvement when they handed him over to the trauma team. But during the next few hours the man’s life would be in grave danger, in spite of the prompt attention he’d received.

  * * *

  ‘They want us to station ourselves near the entrance to the university for the rest of the day,’ Kane said after they’d delivered the man to A and E. ‘It seems that it’s another accident black spot.’

  Selina’s thoughts were on the tearful woman they’d just left. She had a long vigil ahead of her. Selina had got her a cup of tea and phoned the woman’s daughter to ask her to join her mother. It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing.

  ‘We’re not supposed to get personal on this job, Selina,’ Kane reminded her in a milder tone than the one he’d used before.

  She took her gaze off the road in front and observed him with troubled eyes. ‘Are you talking about my concern for the people we meet or you and I, Kane?’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘I see. Well, with regard to us, you’re going to have to hear me out whether you like it or not. First of all I want to apologise for the way I behaved the other night. For one thing you were a guest in my house and I should have kept my opinions to myself.’

  She sighed. ‘It all started because I wanted to know more about you and I got more than I bargained for, but it occurred to me after you’d gone that I still don’t know your address or phone number.’

  He shrugged and she knew by the way of it that there wasn’t going to be a quick resolution of their misunderstanding.

  ‘Does it matter?’ he said stiffly.

  ‘Yes, it does to me. I’ve spent the last thirty-six hours desperate to talk to you, but didn’t know how to get in touch.’