you at the hospital,’ he called to her retreating back.
* * *
Jack drove home via the supermarket and picked up the strawberry yoghurt. When he arrived at his house he was told that Saskia was already in bed and asleep. He’d been hoping that Christine might have kept her up after her bath, as she often did, so that he could see his daughter and put her to bed himself. He liked reading bedtime stories to her and asking what she’d done during the day. It was for him one of the highlights of the day.
‘I thought you’d probably be home late,’ said Christine, ‘with you going out with a colleague.’ He noted the hint of criticism in her voice.
He couldn’t remember whether he’d mentioned that it was a female work colleague—but from the disapproving way she was reacting he guessed that he must have let slip that it had been a woman he was meeting. Christine, wonderful nanny and housekeeper that she was, was also overly protective of her employer. She was always warning him about ‘unscrupulous women’—according to her, there were hordes of them who were just waiting to grab someone like him and trick him into marriage. If there were women throwing themselves at him, Jack had been too grief-stricken or too busy to notice. In fact, Anna Craven was the first woman he’d asked out since his wife died.
He went upstairs and crept into his daughter’s room. He could see in the soft glow from her nightlight that she was asleep. He knelt by the side of her small bed and moved the teddy bear that was pressed up against her chubby cheek. She stirred slightly before resuming her blissful slumber. Her rounded features were still those of a baby even though she proudly told everyone that she was a ‘big girl’ now that she was three.
He touched her golden hair, stroking it gently with his fingers. Her mother’s golden hair…the mother she’d never known.
‘Saskia,’ he whispered softly, ‘Sweet dreams, my darling.’
He gazed at her silently for several minutes, conscious of the almost imperceptible rise and fall of her breathing, watching over her like a guardian angel.
What a strange couple of days it had been! Days of such contrasting emotions. Yesterday, when he’d first seen Anna, the shock had almost felled him. He truly had thought he’d been starting to hallucinate…the pain he’d experienced had almost been physical in its intensity. Three years had been swept away in the blink of an eye when he’d come face to face with Anneka’s double. Anneka, his adored wife, taken from him so suddenly and so cruelly.
Jack sighed deeply. Thank goodness for work, he mused. It had given him something other than his bereavement to focus on. And, later that day, when he’d found himself working with Anna, he’d been able to put the whole episode in perspective. He now realised that, apart from the close physical resemblance, Dr Anna Craven was very different from his late wife. He was so glad she’d agreed to go out with him for a drink—especially as she was the only woman he’d found remotely attractive in the last three years. Asking her out tonight had helped him to get over yet another obstacle as he clawed his way back to emotional normality. It hadn’t been easy…to other men it would have been just a quick drink after work, but for Jack it had constantly brought back memories of happier times. There had been a time when he hadn’t been able to imagine ever wanting to go out with another woman—but today he’d desperately wanted Anna to come out with him. Furthermore, he’d found her attractive. Extremely attractive.
‘Welcome back to the land of the living,’ he murmured to himself, still gazing fondly at his daughter.
Then he kissed her softly on the forehead, placed the teddy bear at the end of the bed and let himself out of the room, closing the door silently behind him.
CHAPTER TWO
THE following week, Anna changed from the day shift to the night shift. Although it played havoc with her sleep pattern, in some ways she preferred the night shift. The atmosphere in the hospital was completely different—a strange mixture of cosiness and danger.
During the long hours of the night shift, Anna was frequently reminded of why she’d chosen to specialise in A and E. It made her feel as if she was right in the centre of everything, with her finger on the pulse of life.
As she strode through the swing doors that led into the accident and emergency department, a small knot of tension formed in her stomach. It happened every time, particularly when she was on the night shift. She knew it would only be temporary and would disappear within a couple of minutes. It told her that the adrenalin rush had begun and that she was ready to swing into action without a moment’s delay.
She hadn’t taken more than a dozen steps when one of the nurses grabbed her.
‘Dr Craven, you’re needed in Resus One,’ she said. ‘Patient just admitted…young child…rescued from a house fire…extensive burns to his legs. Mr Harvey is in charge.’
She put on a sterile gown and walked briskly towards the resuscitation room. A light over the entrance was signalling a code blue. She quickened her pace. A code blue meant that a life-threatening crisis was on hand.
Resus One was a hive of activity. Several people in theatre blues and surgical gowns were circling the trolley and on it was the small, motionless figure of a child. The bottom half of his body was covered with the special wet dressings used for burns. Through the antiseptic-smelling air drifted another smell, the nauseating, never-to-be-forgotten smell of burnt flesh.
Jack looked up. Once again he experienced a chilling moment as the woman who so resembled his late wife walked into the resus room.
‘Glad to have your assistance, Dr Craven,’ he said, keeping his voice on an even keel, though his heartbeat had gone into overdrive. He’d get used to it, he told himself, working with her on a daily basis—and the shock waves would become less each time they met. Or maybe not…because these particular shock waves were becoming very pleasurable, he had to admit.
‘We’re prepping this young patent for a transfusion,’ he told her. ‘The burns are so bad that he needs blood as soon as possible or there’s a good chance he’ll die of shock.’
‘What’s his blood pressure?’ she asked.
‘Eighty over sixty,’ a nurse replied. ‘He’s showing signs of shock.’
‘How old is he?’
‘About six, we think,’ replied Jack. ‘We don’t know for sure because he was alone in the house when the fire started. His parents haven’t been contacted yet.’ He gave this information factually but Anna could see the rage in his eyes.
At that moment, the monitors surrounding the boy began to bleep erratically as the lines on the screens became jagged and irregular.
‘Get the defibrillator over here,’ Jack shouted. ‘He’s arrested!’
Anna and the rest of the team went to work. The boy’s oxygen level was increased and Anna moved forward, holding the defibrillator paddles.
‘One, two, three—clear!’ she called. Down went the paddles onto the boy’s chest. There was a loud buzzing and the boy’s small body was practically lifted off the operating trolley.
Everyone turned their attention to the monitor. The boy’s heart was beating regularly again but the rate was weak, the green lines barely moving up and down.
