by Amy Andrews
Charlie looked up quickly. ‘You OK?’ The look on her face was worrying. He could hear her fear in her tortured breathing as she struggled to get herself back under control. ‘In and out, Carrie. This is nearly over.’
Carrie nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
Charlie felt his conscience prick at what this experience was doing to her. First she’d nearly lost her life and second he was forcing her to do something she was clearly unsuited to. She was obviously one of those squeamish people who didn’t like the sight of blood, who flicked the channel over when a medical show came on television. It had to be hard for her. This sort of scene could be difficult for even hardened professionals.
She nodded, still not trusting herself to speak. ‘Do…do you think he’s going to d-die?’
Charlie was surprised to hear her talk. She looked mute with fear and her teeth were chattering loudly. Maybe she needed conversation to distract her from the grim reality of the situation? He had two choices. Truth or gloss.
‘Probably.’ He’d never much been one for gloss.
Carrie shut her eyes again.
‘He’s got a significant head injury and multiple fractures, including probable facial, which is compromising his airway. His pupils are fixed and dilated. He has a major arterial haemorrhage.’
Carrie nodded. Through the fog of her seized thought processes she knew these were significant, life-threatening injuries.
‘But it’s OK, I’m a doctor.’ He grinned despite the circumstances, knowing she needed assurance. ‘I’m not giving up yet.’
Carrie felt relief wash through her system. Maybe his confidence was wrong in the face of the severity of the situation but it helped calm her a little.
The wail of a distant siren interrupted their conversation. They both cocked their heads.
‘See? Not much longer.’ Charlie smiled.
A fire engine arrived a minute later. It wasn’t quite what Charlie was after but it meant more hands. ‘What happened?’ asked a thin young man, jumping out of the truck.
Charlie filled them in. Within a minute the car was being dealt with, a road block was being set up to manage any traffic and Charlie’s request for light had been efficiently dealt with. He even commandeered someone to assist.
Second rule of triage—the most experienced person on scene managed the airway. But Charlie needed to get a line in and he couldn’t do that from the head of the patient. He let one of the crew take his place, stressing the importance of neck stability while he quickly placed an IV in the crook of the patient’s elbow. He hooked some fluid up to it and ran it wide open as another fireman held the bag aloft.
‘She OK, Doc?’ The human IV pole nudged Charlie.
Charlie looked down at Carrie, who had her eyes closed and was rocking her body slightly. Not really.
‘She’s fine,’ he assured the fireman. The ambulance would be here soon and she could be relieved, but in the meantime she was doing a great job with the arterial bleed.
‘OK?’ he asked as he crouched down beside Carrie, squeezing her shoulder. She looked very pale. ‘You’re doing really well. I couldn’t have done this without your help. I’m proud of you.’
Carrie looked at him, stunned by his praise. Amazed even more that it seemed to matter so much. She was a mess and she shouldn’t have been. She should have been a professional. She could have been really useful. Formed a vibrant partnership to save the man’s life. Been an asset instead of a liability. But he was complimenting her nonetheless and in this nightmare it really meant something.
Charlie contemplated splinting the man’s fractured legs but discarded the idea instantly. He knew they’d probably want to put some special haemorrhage control trousers on the patient for his trip to hospital and splints would only hamper that process. He went back to managing the airway and keeping an eye on his unwilling assistant.
The road ambulances arrived five minutes later, one carrying an intensive-care paramedic, and the chopper thundered overhead minutes after that, landing on the road nearby. Carrie was relieved of her duty, her fingers numb from applying constant pressure. Someone took over and she felt several arms lifting her up and out of the way.
A paramedic shepherded her away but she refused to be looked at until she’d checked on Dana. Surely she wasn’t still asleep? But she was. Soundly. Her cherubic pout slack, her blonde locks in disarray.
Carrie allowed the paramedic to give her a once-over by her car. Someone thrust a warm drink at her and someone else draped a blanket around her shoulders. She was grateful to be away from it all, her heart rate settling but the feeling of unreality persisting. Her neck ached and she rubbed each side absently. Her knees ached also. She looked down at her ruined trousers, torn and frayed at the knees.
She watched Charlie work in tandem with the paramedics to help stabilise the patient. She admired his confidence. His self-assuredness. She had practically fallen apart, almost vomited all over the patient. But not him. He had saved the man’s life. His insistence that she help, while difficult beyond words for her, had been the right call. Not that she’d been capable of much.
Thirty minutes later the patient was gone. Dana finally woke up as the chopper lifted noisily. Carrie got her out of her car seat and snuggled her against her chest, wrapping the blanket around both of them.
‘What happened, Mummy?’
‘There was a car accident, sweetie.’
Dana yawned. ‘It looks like a disco, Mummy. Can I dance?’
Carrie smiled. Dana was right. The scene did look like a roadside discotheque. Flashing lights from the multiple emergency vehicles strobed across the scene, reflecting the pieces of broken glass scattered like diamonds across the road surface. ‘No, sweetie, no dancing tonight.’
Dana gave her a cute sleepy smile and snuggled her face into Carrie’s neck. Carrie hugged her closer, inhaling the sweet smell of her.
Charlie approached, surprised to see a mop of blonde hair peeking out of the top of the blanket. She had a kid? No wonder she’d been reluctant to get out the car.
‘Is this your daughter?’
Carrie nodded.
‘I’m sorry, I had no idea…’ Maybe that’s why she’d been so shaky? She’d probably still been reacting to the potential consequences had the red car hit hers head on.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘Dana slept through it all.’
‘Who are you?’ Dana’s high voice broke into their conversation.
Charlie was captivated by a pair of big blue eyes fluttering behind heavy lids. ‘I’m Charlie.’ He grinned.
‘Were you in the accident?’ Dana asked sleepily.
‘No, Sleeping Beauty, I just helped out.’
Dana giggled. ‘Mummy, Charlie thinks I’m Sleeping Beauty.’
Carrie smiled down at her daughter. ‘Go to sleep, then, Sleeping Beauty.’ She dropped a kiss on Dana’s forehead.
They both watched Dana drift off.
‘How are you doing?’ Charlie asked.
‘I’m fine,’ she assured him, despite the persisting tremble of her hands.
‘I’m sorry, I was probably a bit forceful back there.’
‘You were just trying to help him,’ she said dismissively.
‘You did well.’ Charlie leant his hip against her vehicle.
Carrie laughed. ‘Sure.’
‘It’s not everyone’s cup of tea.’ He shrugged.
Carrie decided it was best he didn’t know about her qualifications. The chances that they’d ever meet in a professional capacity were fairly negligible. He was obviously an emergency medicine specialist and she was firmly ensconced in management.
‘Are you going to be right to travel home?’ he asked. ‘Your car still goes?’
Carrie looked at the dented rear side panel. It did, but she doubted whether she could drive again tonight, she felt too shaken up. ‘I’ll get one of the tow-truck drivers to take it away and arrange to have it fixed first thing tomorrow. It’s a bit of
a pain but, considering I thought we were going to die tonight, it’s an inconvenience I can live with.’
Charlie chuckled. ‘You heading back to Brisbane? Can I give you a lift home?’
Carrie watched the traffic accident investigation squad put yellow markings on the road. They’d promised her a lift back into the city but they didn’t look like they’d be finished any time soon.
She looked up into his face, taking notice of his looks for the first time. He was tall, a good head taller than her. He had nice eyes, grey eyes. A nice face, actually. Calm. Serene. Confident. Even when he’d been snapping orders he’d been completely self-assured. There was something innately tranquil about his features.
He had shaggy brown hair shot with blond, as if naturally streaked by the sun. It hung down, brushing his collar, and seemed to part naturally in the middle, falling in haphazard layers over his ears, just stopping short of impeding his vision. It was hardly inner-city chic, more 1970s rock star, but it suited his laid-back look.
Combined with his three-day growth, he looked a little hippy-ish and as far from Rupert’s cleanly shaven short back and sides as was physically possible. His arms were tanned a deep brown, as if he’d spent a lot of time in the sun. His clothes were casual—threadbare jeans and one of those trendy T-shirts that looked like it had been painted by a preschooler. His chest was broad, his biceps firm in her peripheral vision.
‘You can just drop us at the first taxi rank,’ she suggested.
‘Nonsense.’ He rejected her suggestion. ‘It’s the least I can do for your help tonight. Where do you live?’
‘Windsor.’
‘Perfect. I live in the Valley. You’re on my way.’
Charlie pushed away from the car. He cleared their departure with the scene controller while Carrie arranged for her car to be towed away.
Two minutes later he opened the passenger door to his sedan. Carrie eyed it disparagingly. The thought of leaving the scene with her precious cargo intact was amazingly lightening and for the first time since she’d met him, she could feel her old self returning.
‘You sure this thing goes?’
Charlie feigned an insulted look. ‘I’ll have you know this is a classic car.’
‘It’s ancient.’
He chuckled. It was. It had been secondhand when he’d inherited it as his uni run-around. ‘It’s…retro.’ He was fond of the old banger, preferring it to the ostentatious BMW his parents had bought him for his thirtieth birthday. It had lot of happy memories. He’d kissed his first girl in this car. Had driven to Ayers Rock in it. Slept in it the night of his bucks’ party when he’d been too drunk to drive it home. The Beamer just didn’t have the same amount of soul.
‘Hmm,’ she said, waiting for Charlie to position Dana’s seat. ‘We’ll see how far it gets us.’
Dana stirred as Carrie buckled her into the seat. ‘Where are we, Mummy?’
‘In Charlie’s car,’ Carrie said quietly. ‘He’s taking us home.’
Dana looked around with heavy eyelids. ‘I like it,’ she murmured as her eyes drifted shut.
Carrie stood up and met Charlie’s amused gaze. It was warm and sexy and she blinked, surprised by the parts of her body that were responding to it.
‘Your daughter obviously has an eye for a classic.’
‘She’s four.’
His laughter followed her into the car and Carrie felt a warm sensation down low and deep spread out sensual tentacles until her whole body was humming. It was strange and unnerving and she put the brakes on immediately. So, he had a nice face and a great smile and had talked her down from the ledge tonight. She was a single mother with her eye on a prestigious job. She didn’t have time for this.
Charlie started the car and they drove away slowly. It was a good minute before he lost sight of the multicoloured glow of the accident scene in his rear-view mirror. The adrenaline he had felt at the scene had dissipated, leaving him feeling edgy, and he drummed his fingers against the steering-wheel.
He took a sideways glance at his passenger. At least she was looking better than she had at the accident scene. There was colour in her cheeks now. She had auburn hair, he noticed for the first time. It was wavy rather than curly, tumbling to her shoulders and framing her oval face perfectly.
She had a creamy complexion with a smattering of freckles across her nose and big light brown eyes the exact shade of whiskey. She was wearing a purple tie-dyed shirt with a heavily beaded modest neckline and matching trousers. It was loose and flowing, hinting at her figure beneath rather than revealing it. She had exotic large silver hoop earrings and a thin silver choker with lines of purple beads hanging off it like icicles. The total effect was quite exotic. Very gypsy.
He adjusted the rear-view mirror so he could see Dana’s face. She was staring sleepily out the window, her blonde hair and blue eyes nothing like her mother’s.
‘So, what do you do?’ Charlie asked, making small talk as the silence stretched between them.
Carrie felt her heartbeat pick up tempo. ‘I’m…in management,’ she said.
He laughed. She looked like she read palms for a living. ‘Very vague.’
She shrugged. ‘It’s nothing very exciting. It pays the mortgage and the hours are good.’
He flicked a glance at Dana again. Her eyes had drifted shut. ‘How old did you say Dana was?’
‘She’s four.’
‘Cute age.’
Carrie smiled. ‘Yes, it is. You got kids?’
Charlie snorted. ‘No.’
OK, not into kids. ‘Not your thing?’
Quite the opposite. Charlie had wanted a family of his own for a long time. A chance to do it better than his parents had. If that was possible. If he hadn’t been genetically wired to screw it up as badly as they had.
He shrugged. ‘Veronica, my ex-wife, didn’t want them. It was probably just as well, given the divorce and everything.’
Carrie detected a bitterness scarring his deep voice. ‘Was it bad?’
Charlie’s knuckles grew white on the steering-wheel and Carrie wished she could have bitten her tongue off. She had no idea what had come over her. Maybe it was the moments they had shared at the accident scene that made her feel like she knew this man. That she could ask him such a personal question on such short acquaintance.
‘Oh, God, sorry, that’s none of my business. Forget I asked.’
He could hear the mortification in her voice and relaxed a little. ‘It’s OK. It was…kind of messy.’
They drove in silence for a little while longer.
‘So, does Dana have a dad?’
Carrie shook her head, trying to keep her voice neutral. Unemotional. Even after five years Rupert’s desertion still stung. ‘Not one that’s interested in her, no.’ She looked out the window.
‘Sorry.’
She shrugged. ‘His loss.’ Rupert had no idea what he was missing out on.
Charlie flicked another glance at the little blonde angel sleeping soundly in her seat. ‘Absolutely,’ he replied, his voice quiet.
She looked at him, hit by the sincerity of his tone. It was ridiculous to feel so connected to a person so quickly. She looked away and stared straight ahead. But his thigh was bulky and solid in her peripheral vision. His biceps flexed distractingly with every slight movement of the steering-wheel. He leaned forward and switched the radio on, his hair brushing against the neckline of his shirt and falling forward, momentarily obscuring the sexy stubble covering his jaw.
‘Do you mind? Will it wake Dana?’
Carrie dragged her gaze away from his jaw. She laughed. ‘She slept through a car smashing into us, four sirens and a helicopter.’
He chuckled. ‘Good point.’
Charlie was grateful for the music to distract them from conversation. At the accident scene Carrie had been easy to dismiss as a blood-phobic, hyperventilating tie-dye flake. But seeing her now, free of the stress of the accident, she was a different woman altogether. One that
appealed to him immensely. She had teased him about his car, sympathised over his divorce and told him about her little girl. Suddenly she was three-dimensional. Complex.
Desirable even. The thought slid insidiously into his head. No. No way. She was a single mother. You didn’t mess with them. Honourable men knew that. Especially not when his life was such a mess. A separation, a divorce and an almost year-long health crisis. In two weeks he’d have some closure, but until then his life was on hold.
And after that? There were things to do. Big things. A major project that had been shelved for too long was a priority. He wouldn’t have time for an exotic single mother and her cute child. Relationships were going to be light from now on. Nothing heavy. His life had weighed a tonne for years. And women with children deserved more than that.
They passed the rest of the trip listening to the music and indulging in occasional light conversation. Charlie was grateful when he pulled up outside her apartment block. Her laughter and her scent had filled the car. He couldn’t hear the squeak of the back tyre any more or smell the slight aroma of rust. And he liked those things about his car. OK, it was probably a guy thing—heaven knew, Veronica had hated every inch of it—but he liked them a lot. And it was disturbing to think this woman could completely obliterate them.
‘Thanks for the lift, Charlie. And for…you know…snapping me out of it back there.’ Now she was home she didn’t want to get out. Strangely she felt like staying in the car, chatting with him. They’d shared an experience tonight that few strangers shared. They’d saved a man’s life. She felt a weird kind of connection.
‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I know that wasn’t easy for you. You did good. Really.’ Charlie wanted her to go as desperately as he wanted her to stay. It was an unsettling feeling. It was as if they’d developed a strange kind of bond. ‘I’ll help you with Dana.’
They got out of the car and Carrie ducked her head to unbuckle Dana. She managed to pick her up without disturbing her.