by Joanna Neil
That was definitely one warning she would take to heart from this point on. Her judgement was obviously flawed, and she had to learn to keep her instincts in check.
‘Things will go on as they did before,’ Ben was saying. ‘Choose the wallpaper you want for the living room and bedroom and I’ll see to it that the job’s done for you.’
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I’ll bear it in mind.’
He looked at her oddly, and perhaps it was the clipped tone she had used that made him pause for thought. He didn’t comment, though, except to say, ‘You’re tired, aren’t you? It must have been a long day for you, with one thing and another. I’ll leave you to get yourself to bed.’ He hesitated, and then added with a wry tilt to his mouth, ‘Unless you need a hand to do that?’
She stood up, throwing him an inhibiting stare. ‘I expect I’ll see you in the morning,’ she said, going over to the kitchen door and opening it. ‘Goodnight, Ben.’
‘’Night, Sarah.’
CHAPTER SIX
‘ARE you ready to go?’ There was a tinge of doubt in Ben’s tone as his glance flickered over Sarah from head to toe.
Bleary eyed, she gazed at him over the rim of her coffee-cup. Why was he looking at her like that? Did he think she looked a mess? She was wearing khaki-coloured cargo trousers, her favourites because they had a multitude of pockets that she found useful when she was out and about, and a cotton T-shirt that was comfortable and fitted really well.
‘I think so.’ She frowned. ‘You’re early this morning, aren’t you?’ She looked down at her watch, but the attempt to focus was too much for her and she gave up on the attempt. ‘I’ve only just come back from dropping Emily off at nursery.’
‘No. I’m bang on time.’ He frowned. ‘Perhaps you’re not firing on all cylinders today?’
A line indented her brow as she mulled that over. He probably had a point there. She felt decidedly under par, whereas he was his usual energetic, lively self, ready to deal with whatever the day threw at him. He even looked good. Even in her befuddled state, she was able to take in the fact that he was a sight for sore eyes. That dark hair, and those sculpted, angular features were enough to make any woman go weak at the knees.
She tried to shake off the hazy yearnings and the aching despair of unfulfilled need that suddenly welled up inside her. Whatever it was that she wanted, she knew better than to look in his direction. He was off limits and, no matter what she felt for him, she had to remember that she might be spoken for.
‘I’ll be all right just as soon as I’ve finished my coffee. Do you want to sit down for a minute?’ She waved a hand towards a chair by the kitchen table.
‘No, thanks. We have a callout—someone who has fallen from a roof he was working on, and his workmate is suffering from shock and bruising because he was on a ladder beneath him and was knocked to the ground. The ambulance is already on its way.’
‘Oh… I see…’ She put down her coffee-cup. ‘In that case…’ She searched around for her bag, and gazed blankly at the empty space where it should have been.
‘Is this what you’re looking for?’ Ben asked, lifting her bag from the Welsh dresser and handing it to her.
‘Um…yes. Thanks.’ She made a brief check inside the bag to make sure that she had her notebook and a pen. ‘OK, I’m ready.’
She went out with him to the rapid-response car, and once they were settled inside, Ben started off in the direction of the callout. He wound down the windows, letting a blast of fresh air fill the vehicle, and she guessed that he was doing what he could to ensure that she was fully awake.
‘So what happened?’ he asked. ‘Did you have a late night?’
‘It wasn’t so much late as disturbed,’ she told him. ‘Emily has been having bad dreams recently, and last night was particularly bad. I had to go in and reassure her on several occasions. It won’t matter for her, because she can have a nap at nursery if she wants, but I’m having trouble keeping my eyes open this morning.’
‘So that’s why you needed the coffee.’ He gave a faint smile. ‘Perhaps the fresh air will perk you up a bit.’
‘Let’s hope so.’ She gazed out of the window, not really taking in the undulating landscape but trying to focus her mind on what lay ahead.
‘What’s causing Emily to have these bad dreams? Do you know?’
‘I’m not altogether sure.’ Sarah frowned, trying to piece together what had been going on. ‘I think it’s something to do with the children that Carol is fostering. I suppose it could be that she’s feeling a little jealous of the attention they’re getting. I can’t quite work it out, and she isn’t very clear as to what she’s dreaming about. When I go to her when she wakes up in the night, she’s very confused. She sometimes shouts things out, but none of it makes any sense.’
‘Do you think it could be that she’s remembering the day that you were attacked? It must have been very frightening for her to see her mother in such a helpless situation.’
Sarah’s mouth flattened. ‘I don’t know. Apparently she said very little about it when it first happened. Then, when I came out of hospital, we encouraged her to tell us what she was thinking, to no avail, but she seemed to be doing better, and we thought that she had brushed it off, in the way that children do forget these things.’
‘Hmm. I suppose moving house might have been enough to stir things up again.’
Sarah nodded, sending him a bleak look. ‘I feel guilty about that, but it was something I felt I had to do, and sooner or later we would have had to leave Carol’s house anyway. We couldn’t be a burden on them for much longer. But initially it seemed that Emily took the move in her stride.’
He shot her a quick glance. ‘You shouldn’t blame yourself. Children are very resilient, and I dare say she’ll come through this well enough.’
By the time they arrived at their destination, Sarah was feeling much more like her normal self. The paramedics were already attending to the man who had fallen from the roof, although he was still lying on the ground, while his colleague was sitting on the steps at the back of the ambulance. Sarah guessed that he was being treated for shock.
Already, a small crowd of onlookers had gathered across the road. It looked to Sarah as though they were mostly people who had come out of the shop opposite to see what was going on, and some had come out of their houses, probably to see if there was anything they could do to help.
She turned her attention back to the injured men. ‘He’s not able to move his arm because of extreme pain,’ the paramedic was saying to Ben. ‘Otherwise he has swelling around his shoulder and skin abrasions. He’s fully conscious.’
Ben knelt down to examine the patient. ‘Do you have pain anywhere else, John?’ he asked. ‘Try to keep your head and spine as still as possible, until we can get you on to the stretcher.’
‘It’s hard to say,’ John mumbled. ‘The shoulder’s the worst. That took the brunt of the fall.’
‘Yes, I think you’ve probably broken your shoulder blade—I’ll immobilise it by putting a sling in place, and I’ll give you something for the pain.’ Before he did that, though, Ben assessed the man’s response to stimulation by pressing on various parts of his legs.
Then he spoke to the paramedic, and they had a brief conversation about how they were going to move the patient. ‘We’ll need everyone to work together to lift him as carefully as possible.’
Turning back to the man, he said, ‘I’m going to put a collar round your neck to make sure that we keep everything perfectly still, and after that we’re going to put you onto a spinal board, just to make sure that you don’t suffer any more damage. You’ll be checked over more thoroughly for other injuries at the hospital.’
Sarah helped to lift the man onto the spinal board, and then stood back as Ben and the paramedics prepared to strap him in place.
A few minutes later he was safely in the ambulance, and the vehicle moved away, taking him to the hospital. Sarah watched until it was out of
sight, and wondered how he would fare.
Several more calls followed during the course of the morning, and she busied herself noting down all the aspects of care that would go into her report.
‘Are you managing to get all the information you need?’ Ben asked. ‘I know it can be difficult when you’re not familiar with the equipment and you may not be sure how it’s used.’
‘I haven’t had any trouble so far,’ Sarah told him. ‘The paramedics have helped me out with one or two things that I wasn’t sure of, but for the most part I seem to be managing.’ She moved her shoulders, easing a knot of tension that had formed there.
Ben observed the action. ‘I think it’s time we stopped for lunch,’ he murmured. ‘We could buy something from the local bakery, if you like?’
‘That sounds like a good idea.’ She glanced around. ‘Aren’t we fairly close to where your mother lives? You could perhaps go and look in on her if you wanted, and then come back to pick me up later.’
‘Or you could come with me.’ He raised a questioning brow. ‘I’m sure she would like to see you again.’
‘OK, if you think she won’t mind.’
They bought crispy bread rolls with cheese and salad fillings, along with iced buns and chocolate eclairs for dessert, and Sarah felt her mouth already watering with anticipation.
‘I didn’t realise that I was so hungry,’ she murmured.
‘You’re lucky that you can eat chocolate eclairs and buns without having to worry about putting on weight,’ Ben commented, his glance skimming over her slight figure.
Sarah fidgeted under that assessing gaze. ‘That’s not exactly true,’ she said. ‘My appetite appears to have improved lately, and I’ve actually put on a few pounds.’
His grey eyes took on a smoky glimmer. ‘It suits you. You look lovely, very appealing, with curves in all the right places.’
Sarah felt her face run with heat, but he just laughed softly and held open the door of the car so that she could slide in.
When they arrived at his mother’s house just a short time later, it was clear that Jennifer was more than happy to see them.
‘I was wondering how you were getting on with your new job,’ she told Sarah, as she showed them into the kitchen. ‘Ben told me that you had been out with the cave rescue team. That must have been quite an experience for you.’ She busied herself filling the kettle with water and setting out plates on the dining table.
‘It was, but, then, I seem to have been doing all sorts of things that I’ve never done before. Just being on call with the paramedics takes me out and about all over the place, sometimes further afield than you might imagine, especially if we’re transporting a patient between hospitals.’
‘I expect it does.’ Jennifer studied Sarah for a moment. ‘Has it stirred any memories for you? Have there been any places that you recognised?’
Sarah nodded cautiously. ‘I wasn’t sure, but there was a stretch of land that looked vaguely familiar. There was a farmhouse, set in a deep valley, with a few isolated cottages here and there. It was just a fleeting thing, though, and I couldn’t have said that I specifically remember it as something from my past. As far as I know, I was expecting to travel further north before I was attacked. I suppose it could have been that I visited the area as a child.’
Ben sent her a quick glance. ‘This whole region is a magnet for tourists, and if you lived further away it’s possible that you came here once in a while. I’m sure it will come to you, given time. Sometimes these things are more likely to happen when you’re feeling relaxed, and you haven’t had a chance to simply sit back and absorb things, have you?’ He waved her to a chair, and began to set the food out on plates.
‘I bought cheese and salad rolls for you,’ he told his mother, ‘and there are iced buns and chocolate eclairs for afterwards. I know how much you like them.’
Jennifer gave a pleased smile. ‘I do. It was so thoughtful of you to do that.’ She stopped to pull in a breath or two, and then sat down, needing to rest for a moment.
Ben finished making a pot of tea and then came to join them at the table. ‘I’ve been trying to persuade Sarah that she should come along to the rescue team’s fundraising dance tomorrow. I think it would do her some good. Like I said, she needs to relax a bit.’
Jennifer paused in the act of biting into her cheese roll. ‘You will go to it, won’t you?’ she said looking at Sarah. ‘I know that people have a lot of fun there.’
‘I am not sure about that,’ Sarah murmured. ‘I’ll take Emily along to the fete, but the evening’s a bit more tricky. There’s always a problem of finding a babysitter.’ It was an excuse, but it was also true.
‘I could do it for you,’ Jennifer said. ‘I would love to take care of Emily for you.’
Sarah opened her mouth to say something, but Ben interrupted before she could answer. ‘I don’t think that would be wise,’ he said. ‘You may be feeling better in yourself, but you’re still not as strong as you were, and two-year-olds can be challenging at the best of times. Even Sarah gets exhausted looking after her.’
‘I think you’re worrying too much,’ Jennifer told him, but Ben was adamant.
‘Anyway,’ he said, ‘I’m sure Emily’s foster-mother would be only too happy to have Emily for a few hours. She said as much to me when I spoke to her about it the other day.’
Sarah’s eyes widened. ‘You spoke to her about it? When was this?’
‘A few days ago, when the subject of the dance first came up. I think you were talking to Emily and the new foster-children, at the time. Carol thought going to the dance would do you a world of good.’
Sarah’s expression fluctuated between exasperation and amusement.
‘It’s very thoughtful of you and Carol to consider my wellbeing that way,’ she said in a mock annoyed tone, ‘but you have to remember that I was in hospital because I had an injury to my brain… I didn’t have my brain removed while I was there, and I am capable of making decisions for myself, you know.’
Jennifer began to laugh. ‘She has a point there, Ben.’
He acknowledged that with a faint tilt to his mouth. ‘I appreciate that,’ he said, looking at Sarah, ‘but you haven’t taken any time for yourself, and I think you should.’
Sarah sent him a stare. At least his mother understood how she felt.
Some time later, Jennifer saw them out of the front door as they readied themselves to return to work. She came outside with them to the front of the house, stopping to say a few words to her neighbour, who was busy deadheading flowers in her garden.
Ben introduced Sarah to the neighbour and pointed out her small child, Ryan, a boy of about three, who was kneeling down and running a toy car along the path.
‘Jane’s been keeping an eye on my mother while she’s been ill. She’s been a terrific help to us, and she’s managed to take a lot of the worry from me.’
‘I can imagine.’
The neighbour chatted to Ben and his mother for a short time, and Sarah contented herself with listening and glancing over to the little boy from time to time. He stood up and disappeared round a corner of the house, but after a while he reappeared, surreptitiously holding something in one hand, while trailing the car along the top of an ornamental birdbath with the other.
As she watched, he tripped over the raised edging of the path and fell to the ground. Sarah was ready to go over to him to make sure that he was all right, but after a moment he stood up and stayed very still. His back was to her, and it occurred to Sarah that there was something strange about the way he was simply standing there, but it might have been that he was taking time to plan what he was going to do next.
His mother was still talking to Ben and Jennifer, and Sarah guessed that she had not seen him fall. Perhaps she ought to mention it to her in case he had grazed his knee?
Then, all at once, as she watched, the child’s legs seemed to buckle under him and he collapsed to the ground. Sarah gave a small cry of disma
y and ran towards him, kneeling down and turning him over. He was limp in her arms, and there was a bluish tinge to his mouth. His eyes appeared to be rolling back in his head.
Sarah wasn’t sure what to do. Was he having a fit? Then, as she looked him over, she saw that he had the remains of a biscuit clutched in his hand. Swiftly, she opened his mouth and looked to see if there was anything in there. At the back of his throat she saw a small portion of biscuit that had remained whole, and without giving it any more thought she started to tug on it with her fingers. It came free, but he still remained limp in her arms, and in desperation she turned him over and thumped his back.
By now Ben had come to kneel beside her, and she was aware of the boy’s mother looking on in agonised dismay. She was half expecting Ben to take over from her, but he didn’t, and she wondered if he thought that she knew what she was doing. The truth was, she didn’t. She had acted without thinking at all.
After what seemed like an endless minute, Ryan spluttered, and what was left of the biscuit dropped out of his mouth onto the grass. Sarah breathed a sigh of relief. Bringing him back into a half-sitting position, she examined him to make sure he was breathing.
The little boy opened his eyes and lay there for a moment, looking up at her.
Then he frowned, and in a grumpy voice he muttered, ‘Where’s my biscuit?’ and all the while he was staring at her as though she had been responsible for stealing it from him.
Sarah didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. ‘You had me so worried just then, young man,’ she said.
‘Oh, thank heaven,’ his mother said. She reached for him and Sarah relinquished the child into his mother’s arms. Jane was hugging him at the same time as scolding him for sneaking into the house to find the biscuits. ‘Ryan, don’t you ever do that to me again,’ she told him.
She looked up at Sarah. ‘I don’t know how to thank you,’ she said. ‘You saved his life.’
‘I’m just glad that he’s all right,’ Sarah murmured. After a while, she turned to Ben and Jennifer. ‘Did I hear the bleeper a moment ago?’