A Special Kind of Family (14 page)

‘Selfish…’

‘Yes, selfish. This is a fantastic set-up. You’re telling me I can’t stay?’

‘You’ll be gone in a week.’

‘I believe the contract Graham is drawing up is for six months. Am I so appalling?’

‘No, but—’

‘But what?’ she demanded, exasperated. ‘What’s the worst that can happen? Graham tells me you have an outreach patient population of over eight thousand. Surely you can spare the odd patient or two. And if you’re worried I might hit on you, surely you’re old enough to fend me off. In fact, consider me fended.’

‘I don’t know whether I can work with you,’ he said, goaded. ‘Can’t you understand that? The way I feel…How can I risk it? I need to stay as I am. My work’s important to me. My kids are important to me. You mess with my head.’

‘And you mess with mine. So maybe we need to sort it. Tell
me you’re not the least bit interested in me, or you’re in love with Tansy, or you swore celibacy until Armageddon. Just say it and then forget it. And I will, too. End of story. Professional colleagues and nothing more.’

He stared at her, seemingly baffled. She gazed calmly back.

The phone rang.

He didn’t want her.

She watched him speak into the phone, as she saw his body tense and stay rigidly turned away from her…

I’ve lost, she thought bleakly. Where do I go from here?

‘Where’s the crash?’

Despite her confusion, despite feeling humiliated to her socks, she picked up on what he was saying.

‘How many? Hell, okay, I’m on my way. Stay calm, mate, you’re the first on scene and you have to cope. Make sure everyone’s breathing—concentrate on getting muck away from their mouths and noses, and make sure no one’s slumped so they’re restricting their air flow. I’ll be with you in minutes. Go.’

His phone was back in his pocket and he hauled the door open.

She knew what she’d heard. A car crash. Multiple casualties.

‘Do you need help?’ she demanded.

‘No,’ he snapped.

He strode two steps out the door, and then stopped. Took a grip. Saw sense.

‘Yes,’ he said, without looking back. ‘There’s been a head-on collision two miles on the other side of town, just past my place. That was a local farmer. Four injuries, and from the sound of it they’re bad. The ambulance is fifty miles away. Yes, I might need help. I’d appreciate it if you came.’

H
E SHOULDN’T
focus on anything but the task ahead. But after a fast call to the police and to the ambulance service, with two miles between them and the crash site there was room for more.

Erin was staring straight ahead. He’d hurt her, he thought. He’d watched as her features had flattened, from eager, laughing, even maybe seductive, to humiliation and anger.

Her impulse to stay here, made in hours, was nuts.

She was just like his mother.

The thought slammed home and it hurt. He only vaguely remembered his mother, but what he remembered was flatness and apathy. Except for the times she’d arrived home ‘in love’.

‘Oh, Dom, this is wonderful, this is different, this will totally transform our lives.’

And it always did. The fragile security they achieved in between his mother’s romantic attachments—a place to call home, school routine, belongings—was cast to the wind as they followed one loser after another.

Even at seven he’d remembered saying desperately to his mother, ‘How can you be in love after only one night? How can you decide to move without even thinking about it?’

He glanced across at Erin and saw that was exactly where she was. She was all for throwing the old life away and starting the new, just because it was exciting, different and wonderful.

It wasn’t wonderful, he told himself grimly. She’d wake up and realise what was important—Charles, her parents, her career. And he’d be responsible.

‘You always mess things up for me.’
Hell, where had that come from? His mother’s voice, sobbing from the past.
‘He’d want me if I didn’t have you. Don’t whine, Dominic, we’ll find somewhere else to live and next time be smarter. Just stay in the background. I don’t know…disappear.’

He had. He’d ended up in foster-care—thank God, with Ruby—and his mother had never come back for him.

Impulsive decisions were for fools. Relationships sucked. Love at first sight was for idiots.

He glanced across at Erin and he felt his gut clench. He had no intention of making her miserable. But the way he felt about her…

He might even imagine himself in love with her. But if he did…if he stayed round her for much longer…it’d just make everything worse.

The accident was about half a mile past Dom’s home. They passed his house, going at speed. Erin glanced fleetingly at the driveway and Charles’s car was still parked in front.

‘Call him,’ Dom said before she could say anything. ‘Frank said we have multiple casualties. If Charles is another doctor and he’s prepared to help…’

‘You must really be desperate,’ Erin muttered, but she used her cellphone and waited for Charles to answer.

Charles’s phone rang through to the message bank. Odd. And what was he doing, still there?

It couldn’t matter. Dom had rounded the last bend and the crash was in view.

It looked shocking. Horrific.

A purple kombi van was on the wrong side of the road. It looked as if it had hit a sedan, then spun, so the sedan had smashed full on into the kombi’s side.

The sedan was a crumpled mess. The trunk had torn open. Baggage had been thrown out onto the road. A child’s doll was lying on the verge, looking like a small, dreadful corpse.

A guy in khaki overalls and boots bigger than Erin’s was holding a little girl in his arms. The child was sobbing uncontrollably, screaming for her mother.

‘That’s Frank, the farmer who called us,’ Dom said. ‘Hell, we’ll need some local help as well. Ring Graham.’

He hit the brakes and was out of the car, clicking onto a number and tossing her his phone before Erin could respond.

Okay. First things first, follow orders, but there was no way she was calmly sitting in the car making phone calls. She was out of the car as well, running toward the wreck as Dom hauled gear out of the trunk.

‘Car smash, two miles out of town past Dom’s place,’ she snapped as Graham answered. ‘Dom and I are here. We’ve called the ambulance but we need more help.’

‘I’ll have the boys there in minutes,’ Graham said, and Erin thought fleetingly, The man’s been up all night and here he was, helping out again. Local communities at their best. But then she stopped thinking. She was at the wreck now, and what she saw…

It was a family sedan. The van was higher than the sedan and the front of the sedan was wedged right under the van’s chassis.

Dom was already working. They only had access on the left side. The door of the car had been hauled open. Dom was half in, working on whoever was closest.

‘I got the little girl out ’cos she was screaming,’ Frank called hopelessly from behind them. ‘I don’t know what—’

‘Just take care of her,’ Dom called. ‘It’s okay. We’ll deal with this.’

It wasn’t okay.

The woman closest to them was in her thirties or early forties. She was staring straight ahead, whimpering in shock and fear.

‘Sharon, hey, it’s okay, let’s get you out,’ Dom said and she turned her face a little.

‘D-Dom.’

So Dom knew them. That made it…worse.

A vicious gash ran down the side of Sharon’s head from just above her ear. She had the look of someone just returning from unconsciousness, Erin thought. Dom was mopping blood from around her mouth. Erin reached through from the front and took her wrist. Her pulse was thready and her complexion was sickly blue.

‘Does it hurt to breathe?’ Dom asked.

‘N-No.’

They had to get her out to reach her partner. There was another child in the back seat.

So much blood. Far too much blood.

Erin wriggled in underneath Dom and slid her hands across the seat, feeling for any obstructions.

‘My hands are under her knees,’ Erin said curtly. ‘Seat belt undone?’

‘Yes.’

‘On count of three, lift.’

They lifted. Blessedly she came free.

They worked as if they’d been trained together. Dom must have done the same emergency training she’d done, Erin thought appreciatively. They had Sharon away from the wreck in seconds, carrying her over to the verge to where Frank still stood helplessly holding the child.

They laid her on the grass. Erin had been doing a lightning assessment as they’d moved her. The moment they had her down Dom was moving back to the wreck. Erin gave Sharon a moment more, checking vital signs.

Her airway was clear. The gash on her head was bleeding but not gushing. They had her on her side so the blood was no longer running down her face.

There were fractures, she thought, glancing at the woman’s leg, but she was breathing steadily and was conscious.

There was no time to check for more.

‘Stay with her,’ she said to Frank. ‘Sit down beside her with the little girl.’ She took Sharon’s hand. ‘Sharon, Dom and I need to get everyone else out of the car. Frank will look after you and your daughter.’

It was all she had time for. She was away, back to Dom.

Dom had the little boy out of the car before she reached him. One look at him and she knew there was urgent need, but Dom was tugging the little boy past her.

‘See to his dad,’ he snapped to her. ‘I have Max. His dad’s name is Ivan and he’s in trouble.’

So was the little boy. The child’s face was a mass of blood but Dom’s command had been urgent and unequivocal.

Ivan, the boy’s father, was crumpled against the far side of the car. The steering-wheel was crushed against his chest. Even from here she could see the effort it was for him to breathe. His breathing came as short sharp gasps. His hand was on his chest, and he looked frantic.

Triage.

‘No,’ she said, pulling back in fast decision. Ivan had to be pulled from the car before she could help him and it couldn’t be a lift. Because of the urgency it would have to be a messy pull, and she couldn’t do it. She lifted Max from Dom’s arms without waiting for him to respond. ‘Ivan can’t breathe and he needs your strength. Get him out of there. I’ll take over with Max. Breathing tubes?’

‘In the case.’

‘Thank God for that.’

The little boy’s breath was bubbling as if he was breathing underwater. Something had smashed into his face. With the amount of blood in his mouth and nose, he was likely to drown.

Moving fast, she laid him on the verge, close to his mother. His nose was broken, there were smashed teeth—the little boy
would need reconstructive surgery. But that was for the future. For now all she could do was clear his mouth and throat, set him on his side, fit an oral airway and administer oxygen. Thank God for Dom’s equipment.

Thank God for Dom.

The little boy had gone past terror. He hadn’t enough strength left to fight her; he simply submitted.

‘You’ll be safe, Max,’ she told him. ‘You can breathe now, and I’m giving you something to stop it hurting. I’m popping a mask over your face to make it easier to breathe.’ She manoeuvred him so he was lying propped against his mother. Frank was still holding the little girl, looking more and more terrified by the minute.

Where on earth was help?

‘Can you set the little girl down on the grass?’ she said to Frank, and then to Sharon, ‘Can you please hold your daughter’s hand? I need Frank to hold Max’s mask in place.’ Then, as no one moved, she lifted the little girl bodily from Frank’s grasp and set her down by her mother. Then she grabbed Frank’s big, weather-beaten hands, tugged him down so he was forced to crouch, and forcibly put his hand over Max’s mask.

‘Hold that,’ she ordered. ‘Don’t any of you move. Frank, if that mask moves…if Max looks like he’s not getting enough air, if there’s anything that scares you, then you yell loud enough to wake the dead and I’ll be back. But Dom needs me.’

Dom did need her.

He had Ivan out of the car but Ivan’s breathing was so shallow it was barely there.

Erin took a moment to watch as Dom worked. Ivan’s chest was hardly moving—one side seemed totally still. Dom’s fingers were on his throat and he sent her a silent message with his eyes. She knew what it had to be. He’d have felt Ivan’s trachea, and found it pushed to one side.

This had to be a tension pneumothorax. The symptoms fitted. He’d have broken ribs and a puncture to his lung, so air was
escaping from his lung into his chest every time he breathed. The air couldn’t be exhaled. The pressure would be enough to collapse both lungs.

Dominic had obviously already made the diagnosis. He was grabbing what he needed from his bag. He had a cannula between his teeth, still in its protective sterile casing, holding it while he ripped the side of Ivan’s shirt from neck to waist.

She grabbed a sterile swab from the bag. Dom looked like he’d been going in without—there was no time for niceties here when the only imperative was to save the man’s life. But she moved like lightning, hauling the swab open, swabbing Ivan’s chest, noting the enlarged veins in his neck, how the left side of his chest wasn’t responding even when he managed to take a breath.

Air would be being sucked out into the chest wall, building, building, so the lungs could no longer expand, so no more air could get in. He was hardly breathing at all, just sharp, tiny gasps that did nothing to alleviate the blue of his lips and the terror in his eyes.

They had to get the pressure off.

She pulled her hand away, leaving the path clear for Dom—but suddenly the cannula was in her hand.

‘You’re the emergency specialist,’ Dom snapped. ‘You go in.’

She didn’t argue. At one level she appreciated Dom’s hardheadedness. That morning he’d objected when she’d taken over his patient—and so he should. But now he was deferring to her specialist training, ego aside.

He was already moving on, fitting an oxygen mask, leaving her to what she had to do.

She positioned the needle with care but with speed, then pushed in with force. Deep within the chest.

Over the top of the sixth rib, in line with the axilla, into the thoracic cavity.

The air hissed out like a burst of steam under pressure.

She’d done this once before and then it had been too late. Please…

It wasn’t too late now. Ivan’s next breaths, miraculously, were slower, and his chest rose and fell. Rose and fell.

They’d done it.

Dom had fitted an oxygen mask over Ivan’s face. The man’s colour was improving already.

Blessed be Dom’s medical kit, Erin thought again, thankfully. He had four oxygen cylinders. Four!

‘You’ll have to restock oxygen before your football team goes diving again,’ she whispered, allowing herself a tiny release from tension as Ivan took another breath that actually worked, letting air into his chest and making his chest wall rise and fall almost normally.

They needed to get him to hospital, fast. He needed a chest tube and an underwater seal fitted until his lung had a chance to heal, but with the pressure off, the other lung could work and he should survive.

And they were no longer alone. There were suddenly vehicles everywhere. The cavalry had arrived—in force.

‘Hey,’ Dom said in a voice that was suddenly a bit unsteady. His hand was on Ivan’s shoulder. His words might be for him but he was looking at Erin. ‘We’ve done it. Well done. Ivan, you’re going to be okay, mate. We’ve sucked a ruddy great air pocket out of your chest. Or rather Doc Erin has. We’re bloody lucky to have her.’

And then, as Erin’s eyes filled unaccountably with tears, he went on to answer the unspoken questions in Ivan’s eyes. ‘Sharon and the kids are going to be okay. You’re going to be okay.’

Erin left him to it. She stumbled—her legs unaccountably weren’t working properly—over to the verge to do the same thing for Sharon.

‘Your husband and your kids will live.’

It could have been so much worse.

‘Where’s the driver of the kombi?’ someone demanded.

It was Graham—of course. He was wearing—of all things—a kilt. Later she’d discover that the local Highland
band had been practicing. Everyone round them was wearing kilts. Her sense of unreality deepened. A nightmare, with kilts.

‘I couldn’t find him,’ Frank said. The farmer was still seated on the verge, one arm full of the little girl, the other holding the little boy’s mask in place. Erin put a hand on the little girl’s neck and felt her pulse. It was strong and steady.