‘No Enya.’ Kirsty was clutching at straws. ‘We’d need technology to play Enya, and think of the germs we’d have to contend with. Hospitals are full of golden staph, and I bet sound systems have their share, too. You wouldn’t want your baby catching golden staph.’
‘No, indeed.’ Susie took a rasping breath and humour died. ‘Kirsty, I can’t really have my baby on this rock.’
‘I suspect you don’t have a choice,’ Kirsty said, and as the next contraction hit she thought, no, it was more than a suspicion.
They were miles from anywhere. When the tide came in they’d be in the water. Somewhere there was Kenneth, intent on murder.
And they were having a baby.
‘If I ever suggested I didn’t need a man in my life, can I change my mind now?’ she said under her breath. ‘Jake, I need you. Now!’
‘Rot-Tooth Rocks are that white line on the horizon.’
The moment Rod said it, Jake had the field glasses fixed on the horizon. ‘Can’t we go faster?’
He was ignored.
Closer.
‘I think…’ Jake was straining to see and Rod grabbed the glasses back from him. The big fisherman’s eyes were creased from staring at the sea all his life. He focused. And what he saw…
He dropped the glasses and gunned the motor so hard black smoke started coming out the rear.
‘Hey,’ the police sergeant said, startled. ‘You’ll kill us.’
‘They’re on the rock,’ Rod snapped. ‘From here…one’s crouching over but one…hell, maybe one’s dead.’
‘There’s a boat coming.’ Kirsty whispered it to Susie but Susie was no longer listening. She was in a mist of pain and terror. She should have an epidural, Kirsty thought numbly. To have this type of pressure on her already damaged back… To have this level of pain…
There was a boat coming.
Was it Kenneth? It was still too far away to make out.
They couldn’t slip back down into the water now. They couldn’t hide.
Another contraction, merging into the last.
‘No,’ Susie screamed. ‘Kirsty, no…’
‘Breathe into it,’ Kirsty said, firmly releasing the clutching fingers and moving to where she needed to be. Which gave her exactly six inches of balancing space before she toppled into the sea. ‘OK, Susie, if you must, you must. Push.’
‘Kirsty!’
They were near enough to be heard. Jake was at the side of the boat, yelling frantically to the girls on the rock.
Kirsty was kneeling over Susie and he couldn’t see…he couldn’t see…
She must be able to hear him.
‘Kirsty!’
Fifty yards. Thirty.
‘I daren’t go closer,’ Rod muttered, but before he finished saying it Jake was over the side, stroking his way desperately through the white water.
One minute Kirsty was frantic. Despairing. The next Jake was beside her, hauling himself up on the rock. Assessing fast.
‘What’s happening?’ he snapped, and Kirsty gave a choked cry of fear and shock.
Jake was grasping her shoulders, pulling her aside. She was too close to Susie for him to be able to see.
‘Back into medical mode here, Dr McMahon.’
And, snap, just like that, it returned. Somehow. Enough for her to be able to falter, ‘The cord. It’s round the neck. I can’t stop…’
She was picked up and lifted to the other end of the rock where there was a tiny amount of space by Susie’s head. Jake was crouching down, his big hands moving.
‘Susie, stop pushing,’ he snapped, so loudly that Kirsty jumped in shock.
‘Pant. Don’t push. You’re not to push, Susie. Stop!’
Kirsty knew what he was doing. It was what she’d been trying to do but her hands were so cold they were numb, the pain in her chest was too sharp, she didn’t have the strength…
He’d be pushing the baby back. Just a bit. Just a little so he could manoeuvre…
‘There.’ It was a sigh of triumph, and Susie cried out.
‘I can’t-I can’t…’
‘It’s OK,’ Jake said, still triumphant. ‘Push, Susie, love. Go for it.’
And ten seconds later Rosie Kirsteen Douglas emerged into the world. Two miles out to sea, on a flat piece of rock not much bigger than a man. Seven pounds eleven ounces, and with the healthiest set of lungs a baby could be blessed with.
Jake held her in his hands, moving swiftly, ripping up his shirt, tying the cord with a scrap of fabric, holding her up-just for a second-so the men in the boat could see, holding her for another millisecond so Kirsty could see, and then smiling down at Susie, showing her her baby and tucking the tiny newborn under Susie’s sodden windcheater, tight against her skin.
After the mammoth effort Susie had made, her breasts had to be warmest place available, Kirsty thought. It was the warmest place until they could get themselves off the rock.
Sensible.
But Kirsty was no longer sensible. Susie was smiling and smiling, cradling her body into a protective curve, no longer aware of anything but this new little life that was gloriously hers.
Kirsty was weeping. Her head was in her hands and she was out of control, and when Jake swore and managed to get himself to where he could reach her, touch her, take her into his arms and hold her, the weeping only grew worse.
She was lost.
She didn’t cry. She never cried.
She cried now as if she’d cry for ever.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
SHE woke and she was on the wrong side of a hospital bed. The inside rather than the outside. It was so extraordinary that she had to shake her head to make herself believe she wasn’t dreaming.
Shaking her head wasn’t a good idea. Shaking anything wasn’t good.
She stayed very still indeed, and when Babs tiptoed in to do her obs and Kirsty spoke, Babs gave a squeak of surprise.
‘I thought you were asleep.’
‘Just very, very still,’ Kirsty said cautiously. She reached out and grabbed Babs’s wrist, anxious that this contact with the outside world not be broken. ‘What’s happening?’
‘You’re black and blue and red all over,’ Babs said cheerfully. ‘If you want a more technical medical diagnosis, I’ll have to get your doctor. Which, since your doctor has been pacing the corridor for the past two hours waiting for you to wake up, won’t be too hard at all. Let me take your blood pressure and temp. and I’ll fetch him.’ And then, as she looked at Kirsty’s face, she grinned and relented. ‘OK, I’ll fetch him now. Something tells me your blood pressure before and after you see your treating doctor might be very different.’
Before Kirsty could reply, she’d whisked herself out of the room-and one minute later Jake was there. He stood
