him was about seventy or maybe older-even the policeman was over sixty-so he was the youngest man there by almost thirty years.
And he knew damned well that if he didn’t go then it’d be Amy who roped herself to the dinghy. She was accustomed to taking the weight of the world on her shoulders.
This time it would be him. If this was all he could do for her-then so be it.
He had no choice.
He bent and he kissed her, a swift demanding kiss that was more about grounding himself, somehow, making sense of what he was about to do.
A month ago, maybe he would have thought what he intended was madness-risking himself for someone who might even now be dead. But Amy was watching him with eyes that shone. Amy was holding him. Amy’s mouth was pliant and soft under his and she knew what he was doing. She might hate it but she expected it because he knew without doubt that if he didn’t go then she would.
Amy, who gave her all.
He…loved her?
Now was not the time for such crazy thinking. Now was the time to put her away from him and loop the rope at his waist around the massive rope that now swung across the river.
They were waiting for him.
‘Let’s go,’ he said. He gently put his hands on Amy’s shoulders and put her away from him. It was like a physical wrench.
As it was for Amy. She lifted her hand and touched his cheek-one fleeting touch-and then stood back.
Her life had been about hard choices and she knew more than most that Joss didn’t have a choice at all.
He had to go.
There was nothing for her to do but watch.
The dinghy was fastened to the stronger cable so it couldn’t be pulled off course, and they’d attached the dinghy to the looping lighter line so those on either side could pull. Joss, therefore, had only to keep his little craft stable.
It was easier said than done. The water was a maelstrom of surging surf. He lay back in the boat to give him maximum stability, his hands holding the thicker cable as he was pulled carefully, inch by inch, across the river. Each time a breaker surged he stopped and concentrated on keeping the boat upright. It was a mammoth task.
A couple of times the breakers almost submerged the boat but Joss emerged every time. He’d done his preparation well. The two teams had control of the boat as much as they could, and Joss was attached to the boat and to the cable. He had the best chance…
He just had to keep upright.
Amy’s heart was in her mouth. There wasn’t a word from the team on her side. Joss’s father was here-he was head of the team feeding out rope after the dinghy, helping to guide it. Daisy was in the team holding the main cable. Margy and Harry Crammond were here, and with a shock Amy recognised at least eight inmates from her nursing home.
They might be old but when there was work to be done they weren’t backward in coming forward.
They were her people.
She loved them so much. She looked out to where Joss was fighting the waves and the impossibility of what she was thinking broke over her yet again. She was falling in love-no, she’d fallen in love-but her choice was bleak indeed.
No. She had no choice. Her place was here, with her people. Joss belonged to another place. Not Iluka.
He was not her man.
But…dear God, she loved him.
All Joss could think of was staying afloat. Of staying alive. But he wasn’t alone.
The teams on either side were manoeuvring his boat, trying as best they could to keep it steady as they inched it toward the island. He was alone, but not alone.
They had another dinghy and he didn’t need to be told that if he fell someone else would try.
Maybe Amy…
No! He had to reach the island.
Somehow he did. The dinghy reached the island just as the waves had backed off. Those holding the ropes had timed it brilliantly. He unfastened himself-even that was hard-and stepped out onto solid rock. The boat was immediately dragged away. For a moment he panicked-but only for a moment. Of course. They’d drag it away from the rocks to keep it from being punctured. Another wave broke and he had to kneel and cling to keep a foothold.
As the wave receded, he looked up. The figure was still sprawled face down on the rocks. As Joss scrambled to reach him, he stirred and moaned.
He was alive!
Just. He’d come close to drowning, Joss guessed. His eyes were glazed and not focussing. He was barely conscious.
Joss worked fast. The guy was trying to breathe but it was shallow and laboured. Was the airway clear? Carefully he manoeuvred the injured man onto his side, conscious all the time of the damage he could do himself. It was no use making the man’s breathing easier if he destabilised a fractured neck in the process.
Another wave surged but the man’s head was just above the water line. Joss moved his own body to take the brunt of the wave’s force. The guy muttered and groaned again.
‘You’re OK, mate,’ he told him. ‘Just relax.’
There was no response.
The man was about Joss’s age, he guessed-in his early thirties, maybe? He was dressed in waterproofs but his clothes underneath were neat and almost prim. He wore a white shirt and smart casual trousers-or they had been smart. They were smart no longer.
This was no fisherman.
Of course it wasn’t a fisherman. A fisherman would have known it was crazy to take a boat out on a day like today.
With Joss’s body deflecting the water from his face, the man’s breathing was deeper, his colour returning. Joss took a quick blood pressure and pulse reading-blood pressure ninety, heart rate a hundred and twenty.
Why the low blood pressure? Was he bleeding?
He’d groaned. He must be close to surfacing. What else?
Swiftly Joss ran his hands over his patient’s body, doing a fast physical examination. There seemed little to find on his upper body. He’d copped a blow to his head-there was a haematoma already turning an angry red-purple on his forehead but it didn’t look too bad. The bone structure seemed intact. If there were fractures, they were minor.
His hands moved lower. The guy’s waterproof pants had been ripped and his knee was bleeding sluggishly. He lifted the leg and a gush of blood met his hand from below.
Hell.
With the man’s breathing stable, this was a priority.
Joss grabbed a pressure bandage, pushed it down hard until the bleeding eased and then taped it into position, but the pool under the man’s leg was bright with blood. He must have lost litres.
There was nothing he could do about it here. The waves were still surging over him. He had to get the man back into the dinghy but he was trying to assess if anything else needed urgent attention before he did.
One leg seemed shorter than the other.
Joss frowned and did a visual measurement, but it wasn’t his imagination. He was sure.
The hip was either fractured or dislocated-or both. The blow to the leg must have shoved the femur out of position. Joss flinched again as he saw it.
He had to move fast. Dislocated hips were a time bomb. The muscular capsule, the lining inside the cup holding the major bone to the leg, should provide blood to the ball of the thigh joint. Disrupt that for too long and the head
