He looked at her curiously, this competent, brisk young woman. With the dawn had come natural light, filtering down and angled so he could see her. The night before she’d been a shadow behind the lantern, or maybe he’d been too hazy, drug affected to see her clearly. Now he had a proper look.
She looked competent. Determined. Her jeans and windcheater were filthy, her hair dust-caked, but he could see more than just a general impression. She was only little, a package of efficiency about five feet two or three. Slight. Wiry? He’d have to say that—there was no trace of an idle life or an indulged lifestyle about her. Her hair seemed almost flame-red beneath the dust. It looked as if it could be amazing but right now her curls were tied back in a practical, businesslike ponytail.
Watching her as she adjusted his straps, he had a sudden irrational urge to reach out and release the ponytail. He wanted to see what those curls looked like floating free.
Yeah, like that was a good idea. Patient hitting on doctor? She was leaving the lower part of his good arm free—so he could scratch his nose if he wanted—but looking at that determined chin, feeling the brisk competence she was exuding, he thought she’d have his arms tied down in an instant if he tried it on.
He had the very strong impression that Dr Elsa McCrae was not a woman to mess with.
And she had principles. She’d just knocked back what to her, he suspected, might be the holiday of a lifetime, in order to barter for two chairs for her oldies. He’d seen the flash of amazement in her eyes as he’d made his offer. He’d also seen regret slam home. Common sense had taken over. With this woman, it probably always would.
‘You like family medicine?’ he asked curiously, watching her face as she worked.
‘I like making people feel better.’
‘Then you’ve made me feel better,’ he said—and to his astonishment he saw a hint of a blush.
But she brushed it away, got efficient again fast. ‘Then I’ve done my job,’ she said lightly. ‘Now...you want to say goodbye to your nice cosy bedroom before we hoist you up?’
‘I thought I was going to die in this nice cosy bedroom. I hate this nice cosy bedroom.’
‘Then let’s get you out of here,’ she said and glanced up. ‘Righto, people, haul him up.’
* * *
She’d say this for him, the guy was stoic.
The trip down the mountain was tough on the carriers, but it’d be a whole lot tougher for the man on the stretcher. The path was rough, criss-crossed by tree roots. They were forced to detour round boulders the path makers had been unable to shift. With the dawn, five more of the islanders had come up to help, so there were two shifts of four to carry him down, but Marc had to endure the journey as best he could.
Elsa followed behind. She wasn’t permitted to be a stretcher bearer.
‘You slip and who do you think’ll patch you up?’ Macka had growled.
‘Grandpa?’
‘Yeah, and then he’d have this fella in one bed and you in another, and all the Christmas tourist influx to cope with on his own. You were a damned fool to go down that hole by yourself, Doc. We won’t have you taking any more risks now.’
So she walked behind, watching her step, chatting to the guys on the alternate bearer shift, watching the man on the stretcher.
He was hurting—she could see that, but there was little she could do about it. She had his leg and arm firmly fixed but there was no way to stop the stretcher being jolted.
He’d said he wouldn’t complain, and he didn’t, but she could see the tension on his face.
And the mortification.
He was a cardiologist, a city surgeon. These guys were top of the tree in the medical profession. He’d offered her a holiday in St Moritz without blinking, and she’d heard in his voice that he was serious. He’d be earning big money. Huge.
He looked—what? Mid-thirties? He was lean, dark-haired, tanned beneath the dust. Even now, strapped to the stretcher and in pain, she could see an air of authority about him.
He was a guy who was used to being in charge of his world.
He wasn’t in charge now. He was totally at the mercy of the people carrying his stretcher. Macka, a burly sixty-something policeman. Denise, the island mechanic, also in her sixties. Little, round, always grease-stained, she was the best square dancer on the island, tough as old boots. Graham, the local accountant, fiftyish, who wore prim three-piece suits for five days a week but as soon as he was out of the office he donned tartan lumberjack gear. Mike, a still pimply kid who’d just finished his schooling and would be off to university in the autumn, but who spent all his spare time climbing and abseiling.
The alternate shift consisted of just as motley a collection of characters, but every one of them was competent. They knew this island. They knew what they were doing.
Marc was forced to lie on his stretcher and trust them.
Elsa had once asked if she could have a go at being carried on the stretcher, just to see what it felt like. They’d strapped her down and taken her over a rough path and she’d felt almost claustrophobic, totally at the mercy of a team who could drop her at any minute. They wouldn’t. She knew them and trusted them inherently, but Marc would have no such trust.
She watched his face and saw the strain and knew instinctively that this guy’s life was all about control.
‘Pain level?’ she asked, coming alongside the stretcher. ‘You want a top-up?’
‘I’m fuzzy as it is,’ he told her. ‘I want my wits about me.’
‘So if we drop you, you might be able to save yourself? It won’t happen,’ she told him. ‘This team has never dropped a punter yet.’
He grunted and went back to staring straight upward. She fell back again and continued to watch him closely.
His control looked as if it was stretched to the limit. He didn’t complain though. Not a whinge.
‘He’s a doctor, you say,’ Macka said to her at the next change of shift.
‘Yep.’
‘You reckon we could organise a plane strike or something so we can set his leg and put him behind your grandpa’s clinic desk for a week or six? Give your grandpa—and you—a bit of a break?’
‘As if,’ she said and then looked curiously up at Macka. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘It’s only...well, I dropped in to pick up supplies before we came up to find you,’ he told her. ‘And I thought old Doc was looking a bit grey around the edges.’
‘He’s probably just worried about me.’
‘Aye, that’d be it,’ Macka said, but he sounded doubtful and Elsa winced and thought, No, please, Grandpa, don’t get sick.
He had renal problems. He had heart problems.
He’d promised her he’d live for ever, and as a kid she’d depended on that promise. Now...not so much and the thought made her feel ill.
Her attention distracted, she stumbled on a tree root and Macka caught her arm and steadied her.
‘Thanks,’ she muttered to Macka, and then to herself she said, Cut it out, focus on now.
Finally they were down. Macka’s police-van-cum-ambulance was parked near the start of the walking track. Elsa left them loading their patient on board and took her own car—and Sherlock—back to the hospital. Grandpa came out to greet her, and she had the opportunity to check him out as he bent to pat the exuberant Sherlock.
He did look tired, she conceded. Grey? Maybe. Robert McCrae had been the island’s doctor for fifty years and he hated slowing down, but she was going to have to insist.
Though where did that leave her? When Robert had started here, the population of the island had been three hundred with practically no outsiders. Now it was a tourist mecca, its population of seven hundred exploding over the mainland holiday breaks. The outer islands had tourists flooding them too, and she and Robert were still the only doctors.
It wouldn’t matter so much if tourists didn’t insist on doing such risky things. Like Marcus Pierce, trekking up an unknown mountain trail by himself and letting no one know where he was going. If Sherlock hadn’t found him... She closed her eyes, unable to bear thinking of the consequences.
But he’d be thinking of the consequences, she thought. He’d have spent over twenty-four hours thinking the absolute worst. He’d probably need trauma counselling if he wasn’t to cop PTSD. She needed a trauma counsellor on staff.
The trauma counsellor would have to be her.
But for now she was late for morning clinic and Grandpa looked as if he needed a good lie-down—he’d also have spent a wakeful night worrying about her. And then there was Christmas! Without turkeys? Even as she got out of the car she saw the hospital cook flapping in the background, waiting to talk to her. Waiting for Elsa to solve the turkey problem.
First things first. A shower. She felt disgusting and she guessed she smelled disgusting too. She had to move on, and she needed help. ‘Grandpa, you know the situation?’ she asked him. ‘This guy needs fluids, intravenous antibiotics—he has a couple of decent lacerations—a bed bath to get most of the grime off before we can touch him. What’s the situation with evacuation to the mainland?’
‘Not possible,’ Robert told her. ‘There’s still smoke haze drifting our way. Unless it’s life or death we’re on our own.’
‘Then we ultrasound his shoulder and X-ray his leg and hope it’s fixable here.’ She grimaced. ‘You know he’s a doctor?’
‘The worst kind of patient.’
‘You’d know,’ she said and managed a smile. ‘Like me giving you orders to get eight hours’ sleep no matter what? I’m betting you didn’t sleep much last night.’
‘I can sleep when I’m dead,’ Robert said simply. ‘Not when there’s work to do. Go on and get yourself clean, girl, and worry about them who need it.’
* * *
The woman who appeared at his bedside an hour later stunned him.
In the gloom of the cave, layered in dust, wearing hiking gear, he’d thought she was good-looking.
Now though...she pushed back the curtain of the examination cubicle and he had to blink.
She was dressed in sky-blue trousers and a soft white shirt, both almost concealed by a white coat. Her shoes were sensible flats, but they were bright pink and she’d tied her hair back in a matching pink ribbon. The pink should clash with her hair, but it certainly didn’t. She wore little if any make-up, but she didn’t need it. She didn’t need anything. With her flaming curls, her sparkling green eyes, the flash of colour in her clothing...she was enough to make a man feel better all on her own.
And he’d been feeling better anyway, soaking in the luxury of a decent mattress, pillows, warmth, no more bumping stretcher and enough painkiller to make him dozy.
‘I think I’ve died and gone to heaven,’ he managed. She smiled—and that made things even more confusing. It was a killer of a smile. A smile that made a man...
Get a grip. He needed to. It must be the drugs that were making him feel...woozy?
‘Feeling better, then?’ she asked.
‘You’d better believe it. Did you ask for only two lift chairs? Try asking for a hundred. Half my kingdom if you like.’
‘I’ll believe it when I see it,’ she said with a smile that robbed her words of offence. ‘You have no idea of how many rescued tourists who’ve left the island promising largesse, never to be heard of again.’
‘I keep my promises,’ he told her, and her smile slipped. She looked at him for a long moment and then gave a determined little nod.
‘I believe you will,’ she said. ‘Thank you. But mind, we won’t hold you to it. Do nothing until you’re well, and then think about it. I had no business to ask.’
‘As I had no business to expect you to save my life.’
‘It’s what we do,’ she told him. ‘Our whole team, including Sherlock. Do you need to let your people know what’s happening?’
‘One of the nurses lent me a phone.’
‘And you got through? Great. I guess no one will be able to rush to your side before the mainland smoke clears, but I hope you stopped them being anxious. Tell them they can ring me if they want reassurance.’
He thought of Kayla’s reaction to his call. Admittedly, he hadn’t told her about being trapped—he’d just said he’d fallen while scattering his mother’s ashes—but even so she’d been less than sympathetic. She’d asked incisive questions about his injuries but once she was reassured about their severity she’d moved on.
She’d go to St Moritz anyway, she’d decided. She’d let their friends know their party would be one person short, but she was busy. She had to pack. There’d been brief words of commiseration before she disconnected, and that was that.
‘No one wants reassurance,’ he said brusquely, and Elsa gave him a searching look and then flicked the overhead screen to blank, so it showed only white light.
‘Okay, then. You want to see your X-rays? They’re reassuring at least.’
‘They’re only reassuring if they show no break at all.’
‘You still dreaming of St Moritz? Move on,’ she told him and put up the X-ray.
It showed a clean break of both tibia and fibula. Slight dislocation but no splintering. It could have been much, much worse.
‘I can set this,’ she told him. ‘Grandpa and I concur. We’d rather send you to the mainland to a decent orthopod, but you know the restrictions on flights at the moment. I did specific training for remote medicine, including orthopaedics, before I came here, and so did Grandpa. We’ve both set breaks like this, and so far we haven’t managed to put a single foot on backwards. Grandpa’s competent with anaesthetics and I’ll do the setting. The alternative is to leave it as it is until evacuation, but even with strong splinting we both know movement’s possible. Which means circulation could be blocked. So I’m asking you to trust us.’
‘I trust you.’
She gave another of her brisk nods, a gesture he was starting to know. And like.
‘The good news is that your ultrasound shows little damage to your shoulder. No tears. It’ll be sore for a while and you’ll have to protect it, but you seem to have done no long-term damage.’
‘Your grandfather told me that.’
‘Right, then,’ she said. ‘You’ve had nothing to eat since your muesli bars before we started the trek. We’ll wait another couple of hours to make sure they’re well down, and then we’ll set your leg. Meanwhile, I have a clinic queue a mile long so you won’t see me until Theatre. The nurses will look after you.’
‘They already have.’ He looked into her face and behind the smile, behind the briskness, he saw strain. She would have slept badly last night, if at all. He knew enough of this woman to accept that her first responsibility would have been to check on him, probably hourly, so she wouldn’t have let herself fall into a deep sleep.
‘You’ve had quite a night yourself. Your grandpa can’t run clinic while you have a rest?’
‘I wish,’ she said wryly. She was up-to-date with the clinic news now. ‘Grandpa was up during the night himself, with a fisherman who decided at midnight that his finger was infected. He hurt it last week. It was only when his wife thought sweating in bed was a problem that they decided to call for help. So it’s Grandpa who needs the rest, not that he’ll take it.’
‘I wish I could help.’
‘You can, by being sensible and compliant and not throwing out a single complication,’ she told him. ‘Focus, Dr Pierce. I want an exemplary patient.’
‘I’ll do my best.’
‘And I’ll do mine,’ she told him. ‘Now, you rest for all of us. See you in Theatre.’
And she was gone, her white coat a blur as she closed the door behind her.
He was left with the im
pression of capability and practicality. And more. An indefinable something.
He’d made a lot more work for this woman. She should be angry with him. She was just resigned, he thought. And capable and practical.
And that indefinable...something.
CHAPTER SIX
IN THE END Marc’s surgery was straightforward. Her grandfather gave the general anaesthetic—this was the way they normally worked, and it worked well now. The leg was relatively easy to stabilise. She cleaned and debrided lacerations, put in stitches to the deepest and put a back slab on his leg. It’d eventually be a full cast, but not until the stitches were out and the swelling had gone down.
Despite the reassurance of the ultrasound, she still wanted to test shoulder rotation without the pain caused by the bruising. She found nothing to disturb her.
He’d got off lightly, Elsa thought as she left him in the care of the theatre staff.
Next.
Somehow she convinced Robert to take a nap—which was a worry all on its own. Yes, he’d had to work during the night but both of them were accustomed to doing that. Her grandfather hated conceding weakness, and his agreement to have an afternoon sleep surprised her. Now, not only did she have a queue a mile long at her clinic, she had the niggling fear that he wasn’t telling all.
‘Maybe I’m coming down with a cold,’ he muttered when she pressed him. ‘Or maybe it’s just worrying about you, girl. Tell you what, you stop worrying about me and I’ll stop worrying about you. Which means quitting with the diving down unknown caves.’
She grinned and asked no more questions, but as she sat in clinic and saw patient after patient, her sense of unease deepened.
And clinic was made worse by the fact that every patient wanted to discuss her night’s adventures.
‘They say he’s a doctor. Louise Pierce’s boy.’ Marc’s mother had been a member of the local climbing group, sometimes spending so much time here the islanders considered her almost one of them. ‘Why didn’t he take one of us up to the peak with him? Damned idiot, he could have killed you too.’
Mistletoe Kiss with the Heart Doctor Page 6