‘Go,’ he said, and he reached out and touched her face in a fleeting gesture that could mean anything at all but it meant everything. It gave her the strength to pull herself up and stagger across the garden after Marilyn.
‘Watch your feet,’ she managed to scream, and the front firefighter stopped dead, long enough for her to reach the puppies and gather them up again into her arms. Poor Marilyn. This was not an ideal maternity hospital, she thought grimly, but at least they were alive.
And help was at hand. The lead firefighter was in front of her, his hands on her shoulders, his face grim and his voice sharply authoritative.
‘Is anyone inside?’
‘We’re all out,’ she managed. She tried to turn, and he relaxed his grasp, but only a little. And indeed if he’d released her completely she might have toppled over. ‘They’re by the veranda.’
‘Doc?’
‘And the two boys. In the garden by the steps. The fire’s upstairs.’
‘Put her behind the truck,’ the guy growled to someone behind him and she was placed firmly into the hold of someone else. Someone propelling her out of the way.
‘I need to go back to Dom.’
‘We’ll bring Dom to you,’ the man said.
And in minutes they did. She was sitting where she’d been led, on the far side of the fire truck, feeling reaction set in, feeling sick, holding an armload of puppies and with Marilyn draped over her legs.
Dom was carrying Martin, and a firefighter was carrying Nathan.
Martin was fully conscious now. His eyes were huge, full of fear. Only Nathan was no longer fearful. With terror past, this was a small boy’s dream. Firefighters and engines and fire.
For Martin it looked to be the stuff of nightmares.
‘We’ve rung an ambulance,’ the firefighter told Dom, but Dom shook his head and lowered himself to sit beside Erin, still holding Martin hard against him.
‘We won’t need an ambulance,’ he said, firm and sure. ‘Martin’s okay now. He passed out through smoke inhalation but he’s looking good. If you can grab my emergency bag from the back of my car I’ll give him some oxygen. You know I’m a doctor, Graham. I can take care of him.’
‘But…’ Erin paused. Martin had come close to dying from smoke inhalation. If she’d had him in her emergency department she’d be wanting oxygen, X-rays, intensive care type observation for the night.
Dom would know the score as well as she did. He’d know there was a possibility they’d cracked ribs. Why…?
And then she looked at Martin, who was shivering against Dom, deathly pale, terrified. Dom was weighing relative risks, she realised. Keep him here and run the risk of complications-or send him to hospital and maybe cause even more trauma. If his mother had been harming him to draw attention to herself…This child must have had enough of hospitals for life.
Okay. She’d go with Dom on this one.
‘How much oxygen do you have here?’ she asked, and he flashed her a look that said he knew what she was thinking, but he knew what he was doing.
‘Enough to send the local football team scuba diving for a week or so.’
She refused to smile. She needed to focus. ‘Can you do a chest X-ray here?’
‘Yes.’
‘Okay, then,’ she conceded. ‘I concur.’
The tension in Dom’s face eased a little. ‘Great.’
Above them, the firefighter was frowning. ‘If you’re sure…’
‘I’m sure,’ Dom said. ‘Just go save my house.’
‘I’m a doctor, too,’ Erin told him. ‘I’ll take care of them.’
The man cast her a look that said frankly he didn’t believe her. Maybe she wouldn’t either, she thought drily. She was wearing pink pyjamas-silk. She was covered in soot and she was wrapped in a huge grey army blanket. Doctor? Sure.
‘It really is okay,’ Dom said. ‘Erin helped me with Jamie Sutherland yesterday. You’ve probably heard. She’s more than competent. Amazingly I seem to have a colleague.’
‘Well, about bloody time,’ the man said, and gave Erin a grin. ‘Welcome to Bombadeen, Doc. You sure are welcome.’ He gave her a salute, part gentle mockery but there was thanks and admiration in there as well-and disappeared back to the action. Another firefighter brought Dom’s equipment, and they were left alone.
Which was…weird.
Sitting in a huddle on the far side of the biggest of the fire engines, it was as if they were in a cocoon of isolation, cut off from the drama being played out on the other side of the truck. Men were shouting, orders were being thrown, flashlights were augmenting the floodlights-it seemed the press had arrived. There was organised chaos as the firefighters went about their business. Floodlights were playing over the house, but here they were in shadow.
They were in a tight huddle. Dom had Martin hugged tight against him. Erin had checked Martin’s lungs. She’d put on an oxygen mask on him, but Martin was recovering by the minute. Thank God.
Dom was sitting with his back against the truck’s rear tyre, and involuntarily Erin shifted closer-close enough so she could feel the comfort of his big body against hers. She was holding Nathan but the feel of one little boy wasn’t enough contact. She needed as much reassurance as she could get.
She needed to feel that she wasn’t alone, that the terror of the fire was over.
Marilyn was settling down amidst her puppies, nuzzling each, doing her eternal check, and the dog’s rump was firmly settled against her leg. Marilyn, too, it seemed, needed comfort.
‘Hey, more blankets,’ someone called from the shadows, and produced a pile of thick wool to spread over all of them. Dry, soft wool. Lovely.
Amazingly Nathan was back to being himself. He wriggled out of their grasp and ventured to the end of the fire truck, taking a blanket with him. Erin watched his small face transform from fear and shock to wonder. Firefighters. Hoses, pumps, water…
He was a small boy again, and this was an adventure.
Not for her, yet. Not for Martin and not for Dom. She sniffed, feeling a bit desperate, and Dom’s arm came round her shoulders.
‘It’s okay,’ he said softly. ‘We’re safe. Thanks to you.’
‘I didn’t…’
‘You know, smoke makes you want to be sick,’ Dom said thoughtfully, his hand putting pressure on her shoulders in a silent warning that he was no longer talking to her-that he had a plan. ‘It’s horrid. Being sick is horrid. Being burned is horrid.’
She sensed, rather than saw, Martin tense in Dom’s arms. Nathan was out of earshot but there was no way Martin was ready to call this an adventure.
‘I’m guessing you made a little fire, Martin,’ Dom said softly, and in the eerie, deflected light from the floodlights she saw the little boy’s eyes flare.
‘I didn’t…’
‘I think you did,’ Dom said, and amazingly his tone was conversational. Matter-of-fact. ‘In the blanket box in Tansy’s room.’
‘It was only a little fire,’ Martin whispered. ‘I thought it would hurt me just a little bit. But then I got scared and hid in the cupboard.’
‘And that was really, really sensible,’ Dom said, still matter-of-factly. ‘Because who wants to be hurt? If you’d hurt yourself you would have had to go to hospital and Nathan and I would miss you.’
‘You’d come and sit by me. You’d give me stuff.’
‘We give you more stuff when you’re here,’ he said. ‘Lots more stuff. Hospital’s lonely.’
‘My mum was in hospital.’
There were depths here she hadn’t dreamed of. Erin found she was forgetting to breathe. Oh, Martin…
Oh, Dom.
‘I’m thinking Erin reminded you of your mum,’ Dom said softly. ‘Your mum’s very sick. That’s bad, but what’s worse is that sometimes she made you sick or hurt too, so she could go to hospital with you. That was part of her
