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‘Here you go.’ Ruby slid the filled mugs across the table towards the men.
Jack’s eyebrows were on the move again. ‘Ruby? Organised?’ His eyes widened and he turned to her. ‘Have you had a total mind make-over since I saw you last?’ He certainly didn’t have any hang-ups about everyone knowing they used to know each other.
‘Sort of.’ She shrugged off his criticism. ‘I definitely don’t rush things like a sprinter out of the starter’s block any more.’
Jack told Chris, ‘Three years ago, if she’d wanted a wall taken out, she’d have taken it out, regardless of load bearing or any other constraints.’
Chris laughed. ‘Sometimes it’s hard to slow Ruby down once she gets going with that mallet, but she’s very conscious of making the best out of this house. It’s going to be well worth all her efforts.’
Jack pressed his lips together. Holding back a retort? Then he headed to the sink, poured the coffee away and began making another one. Without milk.
‘Oh, sorry.’ She’d made it the way he used to drink it. Silly girl. She should’ve asked, not presumed, she knew.
‘Not a problem.’
Leaning back against the small bench, Ruby folded her arms over her abdomen, holding her mug in one hand. Her pie was heating in the microwave. She put distance between her and Jack, all too aware of the sparks that would fly if they touched. Trying not to watch as he stirred the bottom out of his coffee mug was hard after all those years of wondering about him; yearning for his touch, his kisses, even his understanding. She remembered how those long fingers now holding the teaspoon used to trip lightly over her feverish skin, sensitising her from head to toe.
He glanced over. ‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ Thoughtlessly she laid a hand on his upper arm then snatched it back as his eyebrows rose. Dropping onto a chair, she surreptitiously continued to study him over the rim of her mug. There were a few more crinkles at the corners of his eyes, an occasional grey strand on his head. His tall frame still didn’t carry any excess weight, but when he’d held her he’d felt more muscular than before. Had he started working out? In a gym? Not likely. But, then, how was she to know?
On her belt the pager squawked out a message, as it did on Dave’s. He said, ‘I’ll get the details.’
‘Damn it, when do I get to eat?’ She spun around to empty her coffee into the sink and bumped into Jack. As she snatched the microwave open, she clamped down on the sweet shivers dancing over her skin. ‘Lukewarm’s better than no pie at all,’ she muttered, before sinking her teeth into the gluggy pastry and racing for the helicopter behind Chris and Slats. Would lukewarm Jack be better than no Jack at all? At least she was getting away from him, and he’d have gone by the time they got back.
As Ruby clambered up into the ‘copter Dave called out, ‘You’re picking up a cardiac arrest patient from the interisland ferry.’ He came closer, Jack on his heels. ‘Ruby, I’m sending Jack in my place. Show him the ropes, will you?’
‘Sure,’ she spluttered. Didn’t anyone around here listen to her? Couldn’t they hear her silent pleas? She did not want to be confined inside the ‘copter with Jack until she’d had a few days to get her mixed-up emotions under control. Her heart thudded against her ribs. Would that even be possible?
Toughen up and deal with it. Deal with Jack. He was here. That was all there was to it. Her chin jutted out and her spine clicked as she straightened unnaturally tight and upright. She’d do the job, show him the ropes, and then she was due two days’ leave.
Out over Cook Strait, Chris hovered the helicopter above the rolling deck of the inter-islander. The sky was clear and cold, the sea running fast with a big swell. Not ideal but it could’ve been a whole lot worse.
‘Send the stretcher after me,’ Ruby instructed Jack as she prepared to be lowered to the deck with a pack and the oxygen bottle on her back.
‘Right,’ Jack snapped.
So he thought he should go first. Tough. It was her job today. At least he hadn’t argued and wasted valuable time. That was the Jack she remembered.
The ship lurched upwards as her feet reached for the deck, jarring her whole body and giving her knee some grief. Mindful of the ship’s crew, she swore silently and tried hard not to limp as she crossed to her patient, checking the area for any obstacles that might get in the way of the stretcher being lowered. She waved the crowd of onlookers further back.
A woman looked up as Ruby crouched uncomfortably beside her. ‘I’m a GP. This is Ron Jefferies, fifty years old. Lucky for him I was close by when he fell. I started CPR within sixty seconds. The ferry crew supplied a defibrillator, which I used at maximum joules. We now have a thready heart rhythm.’
Ruby introduced herself as she unzipped the pack and removed an LMA kit. ‘Ron, I’m going to insert a tube in your throat and place a mask over your face to give you oxygen.’
‘I’ll put an IV in.’ Jack was down already and knelt opposite.
‘Please.’ Ruby was already pushing up Ron’s sleeve and passing the bag of saline to the GP now standing behind her. Holding the bag aloft helped the fluid flow more easily until they were ready to winch their patient on board the helicopter. She and Jack worked quickly and efficiently together, unfolding the stretcher and snapping the locks into place at the hinges.
She directed Jack and the GP to grip Ron’s legs and upper arm, while opposite them she clutched handfuls of his trousers and shirt, ready to pull. ‘On the count of three. One. Two. Three.’ And their patient was on the stretcher, being belted securely.
‘We’re ready to transfer.’ Ruby spoke to Slats through her mouthpiece as she checked Jack had attached the winch to the stretcher. Within minutes they were all aboard and Chris had headed the machine for Wellington and the hospital.
Jack checked their patient’s vitals while Ruby wrote up the patient report form.
‘He’s one lucky man,’ she murmured. ‘How often does a GP witness an arrest? Getting the compressions that quickly definitely saved him.’
‘He owes her his life for sure.’ Jack glanced up at her. ‘Did you get her name?’
‘No time for that.’
‘We didn’t learn anything about our man here either, apart from who he is. I wonder if he was travelling with family? Friends?’
She shook her head. ‘According to the steward I spoke to while you were being winched up, he’d put it over the loudspeaker for anyone travelling with Ron Jefferies to come forward, but no one appeared. It will be up to the hospital to track down relatives.’
‘They’ll be able to talk to him when they remove the LMA.’
‘Maybe.’ The man didn’t look very alert. Ruby watched as Jack rechecked all his vitals.
In her headphone Slats said, ‘We’re here, folks. The team’s waiting for your patient.’
Jack glanced up. ‘Thank goodness. Ron needs a cardiologist urgently.’
It didn’t take long to hand Ron over to the hospital emergency staff, and then the pilots were skimming across the harbour to the airport and back to base.
Usually Ruby would gaze out the window during this short flight, looking at all the city landmarks, enjoying the moods of the harbour, unwinding after an operation. But now her eyes were drawn to Jack as he sat, hunched in the bucket seat, reading the clinical-procedures notebook they all carried.
Had he missed her as much as she had him?
Jack glanced across to her, a wry expression in those eyes. ‘Did I pass my first test?’
She held her hand out flat and wiggled it side to side. ‘Maybe.’
Annoyance flickered across his face. ‘I’m being serious, Ruby. You made it abundantly clear you’d be checking me out, so I’ve the right to know what you’re going to tell Dave when we’re back on the ground.’
Whoa. Who was this angry guy? No one she knew. For someone who wanted to be mates he didn’t seem to understand when she was teasing him. ‘I couldn’t fault you. Okay?’ It had been a straightforward job but she refrained from pointing that out.
‘Thank you.’ He studied her for a long moment before returning to reading the notebook in his hand.
Prickly so-and-so. Jack would have to learn everyone on the base teased each other every opportunity they got. It helped ease the stress levels. Pulling the boss card wouldn’t keep Jack safe at all, but he could learn that from the others. Right now she wanted out of this confined space so she could breath some Jack-less air, could look in any direction and not have her sight filled with a hunky, mouth-watering vision, could move without fear of bumping into him.
As the helicopter settled gently on the ground and the rotors slowed she stood and ran her hands down her thighs, ready for a quick escape.
‘Do we need to take that bag inside to top up or is it all right for me to bring out replacement equipment?’ Jack asked.
Peering down at him, Ruby was disconcerted to find him watching her rubbing her thighs. Tucking her hands behind her back, she answered quickly, ‘It’s fine to bring what’s needed out here as long as it’s done immediately.’ Did he remember smoothing her thighs, running exquisite circles on her skin with his forefinger? Why would he, when she’d only just remembered?
‘Then that’s what I’ll do,’ he snapped back. Unlocking the door, he dropped to the ground and strode towards the hangar.
Ruby lowered herself down, mindful of her now throbbing knee. Sucking in her stomach, she concentrated on walking without limping and trying to force Jack out of her mind.
Except he wouldn’t go away. She’d angered him again. Since when had he had such a short fuse? He’d been the one to tell jokes and tease people, and had happily accepted the same in return. Had something happened to him during the time she’d been away? Had someone hurt him? Apart from her? Another woman? Ruby stumbled. He could be married by now—to Blondie. No wedding ring meant nothing. Not all men wore them. He was very desirable and she hadn’t been the only nurse to set her sights on him in the A and E department. A smug smile tugged at her mouth. She’d been the one to win him, though. Her smile flicked off. That was then. Now was different. He wouldn’t let her close a second time.
The sound of her pager snapped through her thoughts. ‘Here we go again.’ Reading the details coming through, she turned back to the helicopter and clambered inside.
Jack was right behind her, breathing heavily. He slammed the door shut and dropped onto the seat he’d only moments before vacated. ‘What have we got?’
Ruby pushed to the front and read back the details coming through on the electronic screen. ‘“MTV on the Rumataka Road. Female, thirty years, minor injuries but trapped. Stat two. Female, six years, serious facial injuries, possible brain injury. Stat four.”‘
‘Do we pick them both up? Or just the child?’ Jack asked.
‘Just the child at this stage. Being a status four, we can’t afford to wait until the mother is freed. The mother will be transferred to Hutt Hospital by road.’
‘Will we take the child to Hutt Hospital or back to Wellington?’
‘It’s not our call, but most likely Wellington, where they’ve got an excellent neurological department. It’s only a few minutes’ extra flying time.’
‘Every minute can count.’ Jack’s eyes darkened. ‘More than anything else, that mother’s going to want to be with her daughter.’ He twisted around to stare out the window, his hands clenching and unclenching on his thighs, his mouth a white line in his pale face.
‘Jack?’ Ruby leaned closer, put a hand over his. What was wrong? It couldn’t be the flying, he’d been okay on the last trip, and anyway he was training to be a private pilot.
‘I’m fine.’ He slid his hand out from under hers, and continued staring outside.
If she hadn’t been looking so hard she wouldn’t have seen the way his bottom lip quivered ever so slightly. ‘Sure.’ She had no idea how to get him to open up. Once she’d stupidly thought that if Jack had something to say he’d say it, but now she realised he’d never told her anything that involved his feelings.
Minutes ticked by. Then he coughed. ‘I always struggle with seeing kids injured.’ His fingers flexed, fisted, flexed.
‘I think we all do.’ Ruby thought back to when she’d worked alongside Jack in A and E. Had they ever worked together with a seriously sick child? Her mind threw up a memory from her first week in A and E with Dr Forbes.
‘Ruby, for God’s sake, hurry up with that suction. This kid’s going to choke to death.’ Jack whipped the tube out of her hand. ‘Turn it on. Now.’ He whisked the end of the hard plastic around the little boy’s mouth, gentle but firm, sucking up the blood and mucus that filled the cavity. ‘Damn it, kid, don’t you die on me now.’
Nurses worked around them, stemming blood loss from the child’s legs and head, cutting away clothes and ordering X-rays. Ruby smarted as she tossed the boy’s now useless trousers into the rubbish bin. She’d reacted instantly to Jack’s command to suction the boy’s mouth. What was his problem? ‘I was doing just fine,’ she snapped at him. ‘I can take over now.’
‘Press on that leg wound. It’s bleeding again.’ Jack continued suctioning, his fingers unsteady and his mouth a white line in his pale face. He issued orders to the senior nurse about getting the oxygen mask ready, ignoring Ruby.
Later that night, when they knocked off work, Jack said, ‘You’ve got to learn not to answer back in those situations. Whatever I say goes. Understand?’
She’d nodded. ‘Sure.’ But she’d been shocked at the way he’d snatched that tube out of her hand.
‘Ruby, we can always discuss a case afterwards.’ He turned for the door, spun back. ‘You did well in there. If I seemed a little abrupt I have my reasons.’
He’d never told her what those reasons were. That had been before they’d got together so she’d put his reticence down to not knowing her very well. Wrong. It was just how he was. Had something dreadful happened to Jack as a trainee? Had he lost a patient in circumstances he blamed himself for?
In her ear Chris’s voice was an abrupt interruption. ‘ETA one minute. I’ll land on the road above the crash site.’
‘Right.’ Ruby prepared to leave the helicopter the instant it was possible.
As they raced towards the squashed car, their packs banging heavily on their backs, oxygen tank and defib in Jack’s hands, Ruby checked him out. She sighed with relief. Whatever had been disturbing him had gone, replaced with a professional, caring expression and the urgent need to help the little girl they were there for.
A policeman lifted the tape protecting the scene from the crowd of onlookers for Ruby and Jack to duck under. ‘I think you’re wanted at the ambulance.’
Changing direction, they crossed to the paramedics, who were working with a small patient on a stretcher. Ruby’s heart ached when she saw the small, blood-soaked child. A quick look at Jack but, apart from a whitening of his face, he was in full control of himself.
They listened carefully to an ambulance officer’s report. ‘I’ve given her a second bolus of saline as her BP keeps dropping. GCS is nine. She’s got a poor airway and I couldn’t intubate.’
A Glasgow coma score of nine. They didn’t come worse than that and the patient still be alive.
‘Upgrade to stat five.’ Jack immediately opened his pack and reached for a small-sized LMA kit. Ruby took the child’s head and tipped it back slightly to allow Jack easier access to her throat. Together they quickly had the airway open and oxygen flowing. Jack’s expertise was impressive, and Ruby enjoyed working with him. The girl was in excellent hands.
But as Ruby began to relax, the child went into spasms. A seizure was common with her injuries but distressing for everyone observing it. Other than making sure the girl didn’t choke, there was nothing Ruby could do but hold the child’s bloodied hand in her gloved one until she fell still again.
After a fast but thorough examination they transferred the girl to the helicopter. As Jack began taking her vitals again, she had another seizure. Followed minutes later by another. And another.
‘We’ll give her a sedative intra-nasally,’ he instructed Ruby as the rotors began speeding up.
Ruby held the nasal cannula in place and talked quietly. ‘Come on, sweetheart. This will stop those nasty fits.’
‘Blood pressure’s dropping.’ Jack’s voice was calm, steady.
‘Stay with us, sweetheart.’ Chris, spin those rotors faster, we need a hospital right now. ‘I wonder what your name is. No one back at the accident scene knew. I bet it’s something pretty.’
Jack checked the oxygen saturation level, adjusted the flow from the tank. Took blood-pressure readings again, counted the little girl’s respiratory rate.
Ruby, uncharacteristically feeling totally helpless, called up Wellington Hospital Emergency Department and gave them the child’s medical details and their ETA. They were doing all they could but it was nowhere near enough.
Slats’s calm voice sounded in her headset. ‘One minute to touchdown.’
A team of paediatric doctors and nurses awaited them, moving towards the helicopter the moment Ruby shoved the door open. The transfer was made with such care that Ruby felt an urge to cry and had to squash it down hard. Everyone knew that this little girl was fighting for her life.
Ruby and Jack stood on the rooftop, watching as the team took charge, their own part in saving the child over. A sense of inadequacy touched Ruby even though she knew she’d done all she could and their patient was better off with the hospital team now. Glancing at Jack, she saw him swallow hard.
‘You were awesome with her,’ she said.
‘Thanks, Red. It’s never enough, though, is it?’
‘Sometimes it has to be.’ Unfortunately. The downside of the job.
Jack looked down into her eyes and for a moment they connected. Really hooked up. Ruby forgot to breathe. Forgot where she was. Forgot about the waiting ‘copter. Only Jack mattered. And how good it felt to be with him again. With Jack at her side she could accomplish anything. Even staying in Wellington for ever.
Behind her Chris called out to them, ‘Time to hit the sky, you two.’
And Ruby leapt away. Jack wasn’t by her side, figuratively or otherwise. And never would be. Racing for the ‘copter, she chastised herself for her odd moment of wishful thinking. She wasn’t the same person any more, and from what little she’d seen so far, neither was Jack. Getting together again would never work out. They hadn’t managed to stay together when they’d been happy and in love. How could they possibly have a workable relationship with all that hurt they’d inflicted on each other?
CHAPTER THREE
AS THE helicopter settled on the hard back at base, Ruby glanced at her watch. Six forty-five. Yee-ha. She could sign off and go home. Grab some take-aways for her dinner on the way. Feed Zane. Put distance between her and Jack. Take time to absorb her initial impressions, think about the differences she’d already noted in him.
Up front Chris clicked off numerous switches as the whine of the rotors slowed. Then he poked his head around the bulkhead. ‘Dave’s just come through, says to meet him at the Aero House for beers. Something to do with you, Jack. An unofficial welcome aboard sort of thing.’
The Aero House was the local watering hole, frequented mostly by pilots and the girls hoping to nab them. The rescue staff used it regularly for winding down from bad days, for having a quiet drink with people who understood they didn’t always want to talk about work, and occasionally for partying.
Jack said, ‘Sounds good to me. Ruby?’
Going home where Jack wasn’t in her face all the time, where she could breathe without effort, was her preferred option. But this was the team, her family of sorts and, whatever her feelings, Jack was being made a part of it. ‘Sure, a cold one is just what I need.’
One beer and then she could leave guilt-free. Hopefully no one had a mind to start a party. Not on a Sunday night.
‘Let’s top up the packs and get out of here.’ Jack dropped to the ground and reached up for the bags Ruby handed down.
She finished cleaning up inside the ‘copter and dropped the dirty laundry bag outside for pick-up in the morning.
‘Have a busy night.’ Ruby waved goodbye to the night crews a little while later and headed out to the well-lit parking lot. As she tossed her bag into the cab of her truck she heard Jack say, ‘What are you driving now?’
She grinned. ‘Nothing like my old car, is it?’ And her grin widened at the stunned look on his face.
‘You haven’t borrowed it?’ He stared at her shining black pride and joy. ‘This truck’s yours?’
‘Right down to the last wheel nut. Isn’t it fabulous?’ She ran a hand over the bonnet. It still thrilled her to drive this beast. And she so loved the stares she got whenever she pulled into the yard at the building centre and clambered out.
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