Nine Months to Change His Life

‘I don’t need a walking-stick.’

‘Yeah, you can get up and hike right up the beach without even a wince,’ she said. ‘I don’t think so. Lie still and think of nothing at all while I go and find what I need. Do what the lady tells you. Stay.’

* * *

Stay. He had no choice.

‘Smash ’em Mary.’ The name echoed in his head, weirdly reassuring.

The last few hours had been a nightmare. In the end he’d decided it was a dream. He’d been drifting in and out of consciousness or that was how it’d seemed. The past was mixing with the future. He and Jake as kids in that great, ostentatious mansion their parents called home. Their father yelling at them. ‘You moronic imbeciles, you’re your mother’s spawn. You’ve inherited nothing from me. Stupid, stupid, stupid.’

That’s how he felt now. Stupid.

Jake, flying through the air with the blast from the roadside bomb. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Jake on a rope, smashing through the waves.

‘Ben, look after your brother.’ That was their mother. Rita Marlene. Beautiful, fragile, fatally flawed. ‘Promise me.’

She was here now. Promise me.

Where was Jake?

This was all a dream.

His mother?

Smash ’em Mary.

There was no way a dream could conjure a Smash ’em Mary. The name hauled him out of his stupor as nothing else could.

Stay.

He had no choice but to obey. The nightmare was still there. If he moved, it might slam back.

He’d lie still and submit. To Smash ’em Mary?

She’d been so close he’d seen her face. She had an elfin haircut, with wet, short-cropped curls plastering her forehead. She had a finely boned face, brown eyes and freckles.

She had shadows under her eyes. Exhaustion?

Because of him? Had she been searching for him—or someone else?

How many yachts had gone down?

Memory was surging back, and he groaned and tried to rise. But then she was back, pushing him down onto the sand.

‘Disobedience means no elephant stamp,’ she told him. ‘I said lie still and I meant lie still.’ Then she faltered a little, and the assurance faded. ‘Ben, I can’t sugar-coat this. Your leg might be broken and there’s no way I can assess it here.

‘In normal circumstances I’d call an ambulance, we’d fill you full of nice woozy drugs, put you on a stretcher and cart you off to a hospital, but right now all you have is me. So I’ve found a couple of decent sticks. I’ll tie one to your leg to keep it still. The other’s a walking-stick. You’re going to hold onto me and we’ll get you off this beach.’

He tried to think about it. It was hard to think about anything but closing his eyes and going to sleep.

‘Ben,’ Mary snapped. ‘Don’t even think about closing your eyes. You’re cold to the marrow. The tide’s coming in. You go to sleep and you won’t wake up.’

‘What’s wrong with that?’ It was a slur. It was so hard to make his voice work.

‘Because Jake needs you,’ Mary snapped again. ‘You pull yourself together and help me, and then we’ll both help Jake. Just do it.’

And put like that, of course he’d do it. He had no choice.

* * *

Afterwards she could never figure out how they managed. She’d read somewhere of mothers lifting cars off children, superhuman feats made possible by the adrenalin of terror. There was something about a cyclone bearing down that provided the same sort of impetus.

She was facing sleet and sand and the blasting of leaves and branches from the storm-swept trees of Hideaway Island and beyond. She had to get this man two hundred yards up a rocky cliff to the safety of the cave. The sheer effort of hauling him was making her feel faint, but there was no way she was letting him go.

‘If I had to find a drowned rat of a sailor, why couldn’t I have found a little one?’ she gasped. They were halfway up the path, seemingly a million miles from the top. Ben was grim-faced with pain. He was leaning on his stick but his left leg was useless and he was forced to lean on her heavily. His weight was almost unbearable.

‘Leave me and come back when the storm’s done,’ he gasped.

‘No way,’ she said, and then, as he propped himself up on the walking-stick, turning stubborn, she hauled out the big guns. ‘Keep going. Jake needs you even if I don’t.’ She didn’t have a clue who Jake was but it shut him up. He went back to concentrating on one ghastly step at a time, and so did she.

His leg seemed useless. He was totally dependent on one leg, his stick and her support. Compound fracture? Blocked blood supply? There hadn’t been the time or visibility on the beach to see. She’d simply ripped her coat into strips and tied the stick on his leg to keep it as steady as she could.

But it was bad. He was dragging it behind him and she could feel that every step took him to the edge.

She felt close to the edge herself. How much worse must it be for him?

‘If I were you, I’d be screaming in agony,’ she managed, and she felt him stiffen. She could feel his tension, his fear—and now his shock.

‘Smash...Smash ’em Mary screams in agony?’

‘I’m good at it,’ she confessed. ‘It’s great for getting free points from the referee.’

‘You’re...kidding me.’

‘Nope.’ She was trying desperately to sound normal, to keep the exhaustion from her voice as they hauled themselves one appalling step after another. Dizziness was washing over her in waves, but she wouldn’t succumb. ‘I’ve watched wrestlers on the telly. I swear their agony is pretend but they make millions. Some day I might.’

‘As a wrestler, or with roller derby?’

‘I might need to work on my muscles a bit for wrestling. I should have done it earlier. Muscles’d be helping now.’

They surely would. He was doing his best but she was practically dragging him.

Left to his own devices, he’d have lain where he was until the storm passed. Or not. This diminutive woman was giving him no choice.

‘Mary—’

‘Shut up and keep going.’

‘You don’t have to—’

‘Lie down and we lie down together,’ she muttered, grim with determination. ‘I don’t give up. I might get it horribly wrong, but I don’t give up. Ever.’

He had no clue what that meant. All he knew was that she was iron. She wasn’t faltering. No matter how steep the ground grew, she wasn’t slowing.

But she stopped talking. She must be as close to the edge as he was, he thought. If he could only help...

And then suddenly, blessedly, the ground flattened. His leg jolted with the shock of a change of levels but she didn’t pause.

‘Heinz... Heinz’s waiting just round this corner.’ She was gasping for breath, not bothering to disguise her distress now they were on level ground.

‘Heinz?’

‘My...my guard dog.’

Somehow she hauled him another few steps, around a bluff that instantly, magically chopped off the screaming wind. Ten more steps took them towards darkness...the mouth of a cave? Five more steps and they were inside. The rain ceased. The light dimmed.

‘Welcome to my lair,’ Mary managed, and that was all she could get out.

‘I can’t...’ she muttered—and she folded into a crumpled heap.

What the...?

Somehow he dropped beside her, fumbling to lift her head, to clear her face from the sandy ground. Was this a faint? Please, God, let this just be exhaustion. To have hauled him so far...

This woman had put her own life on the line to save his. She’d given her all and more. Her faint had to be from sheer exhaustion, he told himself fiercely. It had to be. If it was worse, he’d carry the guilt for the rest of his life.

Her eyes were open, dazed, confused.

‘Hey,’ he managed. ‘It’s okay. We’re safe now. You’ve saved me, now it’s your turn to relax.’

He was so close to the edge himself. He could do so little but he did his best. Somehow he got his arm under her shoulders. He lifted her head so her face was resting on his chest instead of the rock and sand. He felt her heartbeat against his.

Somehow he hauled her deeper into the cave, tugging her along with him. His leg jabbed like a red-hot poker smashing down.

They were out of the wind. They were out of danger.

He held her but he could do no more. The darkness was closing in. The pain in his leg... He couldn’t think past it.

Exhaustion held sway. He closed his eyes and the dim light became dark.

CHAPTER TWO

SOMETHING WARM AND rough was washing his face.

Someone was hauling away his clothes.

How long had he let darkness enfold him? Too long, it seemed. Things were happening that were out of his control.

Who was he kidding? He’d been out of control ever since the yacht’s mast had snapped. Or ever since the cyclone had turned and headed straight for them.

His sodden jacket and sweater were off. There was a towel around his chest.

His pants were coming off. He grabbed at them but too late—they were down past his knees and further.

The face washer was working faster.

‘Heinz, leave the man alone. He’s all sandy,’ a voice said. ‘He’ll taste disgusting.’

His rescuing angel was alive and bossy again, and for a moment relief threatened to overwhelm him. She’d survived. They both had.

He opened his eyes. There was a light to his left, a flame, a crackling of wood catching fire.

A dog was between him and the flame. A scruffy-looking terrier-type dog, knee-high, tongue dangling for future use and his tail waving hopefully, like adventure was just around the corner.

His pants disappeared. He had what seemed like a towel around his torso. Nothing else?

A blanket was lowered over his chest on top of the towel. Fuzzy. Dry. Bliss!

Not over his legs.

‘Now let’s see the damage.’ The bossy, prosaic voice was becoming almost a part of him. He wanted to hold on to that voice. It seemed all that stood between him and the abyss. ‘But first let me wriggle a blanket under you. I need to get you warm.’

Two hands held him, hip and chest. They rolled, slowly but firmly, just enough to haul him on his side. His leg responded with even more pain, but her body held him close enough to her to stop his leg flopping. The rolled blanket slipped under, unrolling so he had a base that wasn’t sand. Her hands rolled him the other way and he was on a makeshift bed.

It had been a professional move.

She was a roller-derbying medic?

‘Who...who are you?’

‘I told you. Mary to my friends. Smash ’em Mary to those who get in my way.’ She hauled something else over the top of him, some kind of quilt. Soft and deep.

He was naked? How had that happened?

He wasn’t asking questions. The blanket was under him. The quilt was on top. The beginnings of warmth...

If it wasn’t for his leg he could give in to it but his leg was reminding him of damage with one vicious jolt after another. The fearsome throbbing left room for little else, pushing him back to the abyss.

She had a torch and was playing its beam down on the source of pain. He felt light fingers touching, not adding to the pain, just feather-light exploring.

‘I want an X-ray,’ she said fretfully.

‘I’d assumed you’d have the equipment,’ he managed, trying desperately to get his words to sound normal. ‘X-ray equipment in the next room.’ What else did she have in this cave? That he was lying on a blanket under a quilt with a fire beside him was amazing all by itself. The pain eased off for a moment but then...

Jake.

Jake was suddenly front and centre, his body dangling precariously from the chopper.

‘Who’s Jake?’ she asked. Had he said his name aloud? Who knew? His head was doing strange things. His body was no longer under his control.

‘My...my brother,’ he managed. Hell, Jake... ‘My twin.’

‘I’m guessing he was on the boat with you.’

‘Yes.’

‘Idiots,’ she said, bitterly. ‘Off you go, great macho men, pitting yourselves against the elements, leaving your womenfolk lighting candles against your return.’ She was still examining his leg. ‘I remember my dad singing that song, “Men must work and women must weep...and the harbour bar be moaning...”’ I bet you didn’t even have to work. I bet you did it just to prove you’re he-men.’

It was so close to the truth he couldn’t answer. He and Jake, pushing the boundaries for as long as he could remember.

‘No...no womenfolk,’ he managed.

‘Except me,’ she said bitterly. ‘Lucky me. Was Jake with you? Could he be down on the beach as well?’

And he knew, he just knew that, no matter how warm and safe this refuge was, if he said yes she’d be out there again, scouring the beach for drowned sailors. She’d passed out from exhaustion and yet she was ready to go again. This wasn’t a woman for weeping. This was a woman for doing.

‘No,’ he managed.

‘You got separated?’

‘We were well clear of the rest of the fleet, making a run for the Bay of Islands.’

‘Which is where you are.’

‘Great,’ he managed. ‘But I hadn’t planned on floating the last few miles.’

‘And Jake?’

‘They tried to take him off.’ He was having real trouble getting his voice to work. ‘The last run of the rescue chopper.’

‘Tried?’

‘They lowered a woman with a harness. The last I saw he was hanging on to the rescue rope off the chopper.’

‘Was he in the harness?’

‘Y-yes.’ Hell, it was hard to think. ‘They both were.’

‘Well, there you go, then,’ she said, in such a prosaic way that it broke through his terror. ‘So the last time you saw him he was being raised into a rescue chopper. I know those teams. They never lose their man. They’ll bring him all the way to Auckland dangling from his harness if they have to, and he’ll get the best view of the storm of anyone in the country. So now I can stop fretting about idiot Jake and focus on idiot Ben. Ben, I reckon your kneecap is dislocated, not broken.’

‘Dislocated?’ What did it matter? Broken, dislocated, if he had his druthers he’d have it removed. But there was an overriding shift in the lead around his heart. Jake was safe? What was it about her words that had him believing her?

But she was now focused on his leg. ‘You’ve figured I’m a nurse?’ she demanded. ‘I spent two years in an orthopaedic ward and I think I recognise this injury. Given normal circumstances, I wouldn’t touch this with a barge pole. If it’s broken then I stand to do more damage. But we’re on the edge of a cyclone. The island you’ve been washed up on is the smallest and farthest out of the group and I have no radio reception. There’s no way we can get help, maybe for a couple of days. If I leave this much longer you might be facing permanent disability. So how do you feel about me trying to put it back?’

He didn’t feel anything but his leg.

‘Ben, I’m asking for a bit more of that he-man courage,’ she said, her voice gentling. ‘Will you trust me to do this?’

Did he trust her?

His world was fuzzy with pain. He’d spent hours with the sea tossing him where it willed. He’d convinced himself Jake was dead.

Right now this sprite had hauled him from the sea, almost killing herself in the process. She’d put him on something soft. She’d given him Jake back. Now she was offering to fix...

‘It’ll hurt more while I’m doing it,’ she said, and he thought, Okay, possibly not fix.

‘And if it’s broken I might do more damage—but, honestly, Ben, it does look dislocated.’

And he heard her worry. For the first time he heard her fear.

She was making a call, he thought, but she wasn’t sure. If his leg was broken, she could hurt him more.

But her instincts said fix, and right now all he had in the world were her instincts.

‘Go for it.’

‘You won’t sue if you end up walking backwards?’

‘I’ll think of you every time I do.’

She choked on laughter that sounded almost hysterical. Then she took a deep breath and he felt her settle.

‘Okay. I’m going to wedge pillows behind you so you’re half sitting and your hip is bent. That should loosen the quadriceps holding everything tight. Then I’m going to slowly straighten your knee, applying gentle pressure to the side of the kneecap until I can tease it back into place. I can’t do it fast, because force could make any broken bone worse, so you’ll just have to grit anything you have to grit while I work. Can you do that, Ben?’

‘If you can, I can,’ he said simply. ‘Do it.’

* * *

To say it was an uncomfortable few minutes was putting it mildly. There was nothing mild about what happened next. When finally Mary grunted in satisfaction he felt sick.

‘Don’t you dare vomit in my nice clean cave,’ she said, and her tremor revealed the strain he’d put her through. She was tucking the great soft quilt around him again. ‘Not now it’s over. I’ve done it, Ben. You can relax. If you promise not to vomit, I’ll give you some water.’

‘Whisky?’

‘And don’t we both need that? Sorry, my cellar doesn’t run to fancy. Water it is.’

She held a bottle to his lips, and he hadn’t realised how thirsty he was. How much salt water had he swallowed?

He tried a grunt of thanks that didn’t quite come off.

‘Stop now,’ he managed. ‘Rest...rest yourself.’

He couldn’t say anything else. The blackness was waiting to receive him.

* * *

Rest? She’d love to but she daren’t. She was back in control.

What had she been about, fainting? She’d never done such a thing. Probably if she had no one would have noticed, she conceded, but now, regaining consciousness sprawled on this man’s chest had scared her almost into fainting again.

She had no intention of doing so. She was in control now, as she always was. To lose control was terrifying.

So she hauled herself back into efficiency. She cleaned his face, noting the blood had come from a jagged scratch from his hairline to behind his ear. Not too deep. She washed it and applied antiseptic and he didn’t stir.

He looked tough, she thought. Weathered. A true sailor? There were lines around his eyes that looked wrong. What was he, thirty-five or so? Those lines said he was older. Those lines said life had been tough.

Who was he?

What was she supposed to do with him?

Nothing. Outside the wind was doing crazy things. The way the cave was facing, the sleet with the wind behind it seemed almost a veranda by itself. The ground swept down and away, which meant they were never going to be wet.

So now it was like being in front of a television, with the entrance to the cave showing terror. Trees had been slashed over, bent almost double. The sea through the rain was a churning maelstrom.

They’d only just made it in time, she thought. If this guy was still on the beach now...

She shuddered and she couldn’t stop. She was so very cold. Her raincoat was in tatters and she was soaked.

Heinz whined and crept close. She hugged him.

Control, she told herself. Keep a hold of yourself.

The wind outside was screaming.

She stoked up the fire with as much wood as she dared. There was driftwood at the cave entrance—she should drag more inside, but she didn’t want to go near that wind.

She couldn’t stop the tremors.

‘Rest yourself,’ he’d said, and the urge to do so was suddenly urgent.

Ben was lying on her blanket. He was covered by her friend’s gorgeous quilt. Queen-sized.

He looked deeply asleep. Exhausted.

She might just accept that she was exhausted as well.

She should stay alert and keep watch.

For what? What more could she do? If the wind swung round they were in trouble, but there was nothing she could do to prevent it.

If her sailor stirred she needed to know.

She was so cold.

She touched his skin under the quilt and he was cold, too. Colder than she was, despite the quilt.

What would a sensible woman do?

What a sensible woman had to do. She hauled off her outer clothes. She left her bra and knickers on—a woman had to preserve some decency.

She arranged her wet clothes and Ben’s on the trolley, using it as a clothes horse by the fire.

She hugged Heinz close and gently wriggled them both onto the blanket.

Under the quilt.

She’d hauled off Ben’s soggy clothes but she winced as she felt his skin. He was so cold. How long had he been in the water?

There should be procedures for this sort of situation. Some way she could use her body to warm him without...without what? Catching something?

Catching cold. This was crazy.

‘Men must work and women must weep...’

Not this woman. This woman put her arms around her frigid sailor, curled her body so as much skin as possible was touching, tried not to think she was taking as much comfort as she was giving...

And tried to sleep.

CHAPTER THREE

HE WOKE AND he was warm.

How cold had he been and for how long? There was a nightmare somewhere in the dark, the pain in his leg, his terror for Jake. They were waiting to enclose him again, but the nightmare was all about cold and noise and motion, and right now he was enclosed in a cloud of warmth and softness, and he was holding a woman.

Or she was holding him. He was on his back, his head on cushions. She was curved by his side, lying on her front, her head in the crook of his shoulder, her arm over his chest, as if she would cover as much of his body as she could.

Which was fine by him. The warmth and the comfort of skin against skin was unbelievable.

There was a bit of fur there as well. A dog? On the other side of him.

Well, why wouldn’t there be, for on that side was a fire.

He was enfolded by dog and woman and hearth.

Words came back to him...

‘Men must work and women must weep’?

Had she said that to him, this woman? Some time in the past?

This woman wasn’t weeping. This woman was all about giving herself to him, feeding him warmth, feeding him safety.

He didn’t move. Why move? He remembered a wall of pain and he wasn’t going there. If he shifted an inch, it might return.

Who was she, this woman? She was soundly asleep, her body folded against his. Some time during the darkness he must have moved to hold her. One of his arms held her loosely against him.

Mine.

It was a thought as primeval as time itself. Claiming a woman.

Claiming a need.

His body was responding.

Um...not. Not even in your dreams, he told himself, but the instinctive stirring brought reality back. Or as much reality as he could remember.

The yacht, the Rita Marlene.

The storm.

Jake, hanging from that rope.

‘Want to tell me about it?’

Her voice was slurred with sleep. She didn’t move. She didn’t pull away. This position, it seemed, was working for them both.

It was the deepest of intimacies and he knew nothing about her. Nothing except she’d saved his life.

She must have felt him stiffen. Something had woken her but she wasn’t pulling away. She seemed totally relaxed, part of the dark.

Outside he could still hear the screaming of the storm. Here there was only them.

‘You already told me I’m a dumb male. What else is there to tell?’

He felt her smile. How could he do that? How did he feel like he knew this woman?

Something about skin against skin?

Something about her raw courage?

‘There’s variations of dumb,’ she said. ‘So you were in the yacht race.’

‘We were.’

‘You and Jake-on-the-Rope.’

‘Yep.’ There was even reassurance there, too. She’d said Jake-on-the-Rope like it was completely normal that his brother should be swinging on a rope from a chopper somewhere out over the Southern Ocean.

‘You’re from the States.’

‘A woman of intuition.’

‘Not dumb at all. How many on the boat?’