you check the couple in the car again?’ He glanced up at the young man, who was still hovering. ‘Can you take over here and press on the wound? That would leave us free to check on the others.’
Lucy opened her mouth to point out that the man had turned pale green at the sight of all the blood, but the doctor was already halfway through demonstrating the first aid for an arterial bleed, his tone brisk and matter-of-fact as he talked. His cool confidence seemed to have a positive effect on the driver and he was soon nodding agreement and preparing to take over from Lucy.
Relieved that someone who clearly knew what he was doing was now in charge, she swapped places with the other man and looked ruefully down at her hands.
‘There’s a water bottle on my bike.’ The blue eyed doctor had noticed her predicament and she smiled at him gratefully.
Seconds later she had cleaned up as best she could and was dealing with the people in the car.
The woman passenger had already dragged herself out through the sun roof and was sitting on the grass verge, blood trickling from a wound in her scalp. Judging that she was obviously not in immediate danger, Lucy turned her attentions to the driver.
After tugging at the door without success, she climbed onto the bonnet and talked to him through the sun roof.
‘Can you tell me where it hurts?’
The man groaned, his face chalk-white. ‘My legs.’
Lucy squinted down into the footwell, but the twisted metal stopped her seeing anything. ‘Can you wiggle your toes? Yes or no?’
‘Yes.’
Well, that was something, but there was still always the risk that he’d damaged his spine.
‘How are we doing here?’ The doctor was suddenly by her side, his gaze calm and appraising as he looked at her. How could he be so cool about the whole situation? Her insides were totally knotted.
‘His legs are trapped, but he’s got feeling,’ she told him, sliding off the bonnet and straightening her clothes quickly. ‘But I’m worried about his neck and I can’t get the door open. The passenger climbed out through the sun roof.’
‘We’ll deal with him first, then,’ the doctor murmured, taking a firm grip of the doorhandle and bracing his broad shoulders. ‘Let’s see what we can do about the door, shall we?’
Planting his foot on the car to give him extra leverage, he gave the door a powerful yank and it groaned open reluctantly. Noting the swell of muscle under his leathers, Lucy wondered how on earth she would have managed if he hadn’t come along. There was no way she could have opened that door.
Having sorted out the door, he squatted down beside the injured man, asked a few questions and then straightened up again.
Lucy looked at him anxiously. ‘Wh—what do you want me to do? Should we get him out?’
‘No way.’ The doctor shook his head decisively. ‘We need to immobilise his spine. We’ll leave him there until the ambulance arrives and we can get our hands on a spinal board.’
Lucy’s gaze skidded towards the car and she lowered her voice. ‘What if the car catches fire?’
His blue eyes gleamed slightly. ‘You’ve been watching too many movies. It does happen, of course, but very rarely, and the car seems OK in this case. We’ll keep an eye on it but I don’t want to move him until we can get some support on that neck. It’s the only part of him that’s really worrying me.’
Lucy wondered what it must be like to have so much self-confidence. He didn’t seem at all daunted by the emergency situation they were facing. He just assessed each problem as it came along and dealt with it.
He pulled back the sleeve of his jacket and glanced at his watch. ‘OK—well, we’ve done just about everything we can with limited equipment. What we need now is an ambulance.’
Looking at the grim set of his mouth, Lucy gave a little shiver and decided that she wouldn’t want to be on the wrong side of him. There was no denying that he was staggeringly handsome, but there was something intimidating about the breadth of his muscular shoulders and the ruthless set of his dark jaw.
And then they both heard the clack, clack, clack of an approaching helicopter and he glanced towards her and gave her a wink and a smile that made her insides turn over. He had the sexiest smile she’d ever seen and suddenly the rhythm of her breathing was totally disrupted. When he smiled like that it softened his appearance and he no longer looked rough and aggressively male. Just plain handsome.
Lucy looked away from him, confused by her reaction to him. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d noticed that a man was handsome.
Maybe it was a good sign.
Maybe she was slowly starting to recover from everything that had happened.
Strong fingers gripped her arm and held her firmly. ‘Stay well back while they land.’
She did as she was told, responding automatically to the cool authority in his tone. She had no intention of arguing with him. As far as she was concerned there’d been no question as to who’d been in charge from the moment he’d stepped off his motorbike.
Lucy watched in fascination as the helicopter hovered and the pilot landed with breathtaking skill. She’d heard about the air ambulance of course, but this was the first time she’d actually seen it in action.
Two paramedics ran from the helicopter and one of them grinned in surprise when he saw the doctor.
‘Joel? I thought we’d got rid of you, mate!’
‘So did I,’ the doctor replied, his tone dry, ‘but someone up there obviously thought differently. The motorcyclist needs a line in fast, Greg. Let’s get some Hartmann’s into him, and for goodness’ sake make it warm or we’ll kill him off. And grab a Hudson mask because he needs ninety percent oxygen. You’d better warn them to have three units of O-neg ready in A and E because he’s going to need blood. He’s our priority. We need to evacuate him before the occupants of the car.’
The paramedic called Greg nodded. ‘There’s an ambulance on its way—ETA three minutes. They can take the people from the car.’
‘Great. Let’s get to work, then.’
Lucy stood to one side, assuming that if he wanted her help he’d ask for it. He reeled off several other instructions and then strode off to deal with the motorcyclist while the second paramedic hurried up to her.
‘What’s the story with the guy in the car?’
‘It’s his neck, or at least that’s what he—Joel.’ She stumbled over the name. ‘Joel is worried about. He thinks it should be immobilised before he’s moved.’
The paramedic nodded. ‘Let’s do it then. I’ve never known Joel be wrong.’
So the self-confidence was justified.
Lucy glanced in the direction of the doctor, who was now on his knees beside the motorcyclist, squeezing fluid into him from an IV bag. ‘I can’t understand how he
