MIRACLE ON KAIMOTU ISLAND/ALWAYS THE HERO (7 page)

‘Why did you give up medicine?’ he asked into the stillness, and the night grew even more still.

‘You know,’ she said at last, ‘that when the world gets crazy, when there are things around that are battering down in every direction, a tortoise retreats into his shell and stays there. I guess...that’s what I’ve done.’

‘Your shell being this island.’

‘That’s the one.’

‘But medicine?’

‘While James was dying... We tried everything and I mean everything. Every specialist, every treatment, every last scientific breakthrough. None of it helped.’

‘You blame medicine?’

‘No,’ she said wearily. ‘But I thought... My dad pushed and pushed me to do medicine and James pushed me to specialise, and when both of them were in trouble...Dad and then James...they both turned. They were so angry and there was nothing I could do. I used to go to bed at night and lie there and dream of being... I don’t know...a filler-up of potholes. A gardener. A wine-maker. Something that made it not my fault.’

‘It wasn’t your fault your dad and James died.’

‘No,’ she said bleakly. ‘But you try telling them that.’

‘They’re dead, Ginny.’

‘Yes, but they’re still on my shoulder. A daughter and a wife who didn’t come up to standard.’

‘That’s nuts,’ he said, and put a hand on her shoulder. He felt her stiffen.

‘No,’ she said.

‘So you’ve rejected medicine because of them. You’re rejecting friendship, too?’

There was a long silence while they both sat and stared out over the moonlit sea. He kept his hand where it was, gently on her shoulder, and he felt her make a huge—vast—effort to relax.

What had those guys done to her—her father and her husband? He thought back to the laughing, carefree girl who’d been his friend and he felt...

Yeah, well, there was no use going down that road. He couldn’t slug dead people.

He wanted to pull her closer. It took an almost superhuman effort to keep it light, hold the illusion that this was friendship, nothing more.

‘I’ll come out eventually,’ Ginny said at last. ‘I can’t stay in my shell for ever and Button will haul me out faster.’

‘You’ll go back to the mainland?’

‘No!’ It was a fierce exclamation.

‘This island’s not for hiding, Ginny,’ he said softly. ‘Life happens here as well.’

‘Yes, but I can take Button tadpoling here.’

‘She’ll love it.’ He hesitated but the urge was too great. ‘Let me in a little,’ he said. ‘We used to be friends. I’m the second-best tadpoler on the island. We could...share.’

She stiffened again. ‘Ben, I don’t... I can’t...’

‘Share?’

‘That’s the one.’ She rose, brushing away his touch. Her face was pale in the moonlight and he wondered again what those guys had done to her. Unbidden he felt his hands clench into fists. His beautiful Ginny...

‘It’s okay,’ he made himself say, forcing the anger from his voice. ‘Treat the island as a shell, then. You have Button in there with you, though, and I have a feeling she’ll tug you out. And you came out tonight. Henry’s alive because you came out, and you can’t imagine how grateful I am.’

‘It’s me who should be grateful,’ she said. ‘Henry was my friend.’

‘Henry
is
your friend.’ And then, as she didn’t reply, he pushed a little bit further.

‘Ginny, no one on this island judged you because of who your parents were. You stayed here for ten summers and there are lots of islanders who’d call you their friend. My family almost considered you one of us. We’re all still here, Ginny, waiting for you to emerge and be our friend again.’

‘I can’t.’

‘No,’ he said, and because he couldn’t stop himself he touched her cheek, a feather touch, because the need to touch her was irresistible and she was so beautiful and fearful and needful.

So Ginny.

‘You can’t,’ he said. ‘But tonight you did.’ And then, before he knew what he was going to do, before she could possibly know for he hadn’t even realised he was about to do it himself, he stooped and kissed her, lightly, on the lips.

It had been a feather touch. He’d backed away before she’d even realised he’d done it, appalled with himself, putting space between them, moving away before she could react with the fear he knew was in her.

But he had to say it.

‘We’re all here, waiting,’ he said into the darkness. ‘We’ll wait for as long as it takes. This island is as old as time itself and it has all the patience in the world.’

And as if on cue the world trembled.

It was the faintest of earth tremors, exactly the same as the tremors that had shaken this island since time immemorial.

A tiny grumble of discord from within.

Nothing to worry about? Surely not.

‘Or maybe it’s saying hurry up,’ Ben said, and grinned, and Ginny managed a shaky smile.

‘It’ll have to wait.’

‘Maybe the island’s giving you a nudge. Like we gave you a nudge. You saved Henry tonight, Ginny, so there’s a start. No pressure, love, but when you come out of your shell, we’re all waiting.’

No pressure.

He watched as she put her fingers to the lips he’d just kissed. He watched as she watched him, as something fought within her.

What had her father and husband done to her?

‘I...I need to go,’ she faltered, and he didn’t move towards her and God only knew the effort it cost him not to.

‘Yes, you do.’

‘Ben...’

‘Don’t say anything more,’ he said softly. ‘You’ve done brilliantly tonight. I love what you’re doing with Button—we all do. One step at a time, our Ginny, that’s all we ask.’

He tugged open the door of her car and watched as she climbed in.

He didn’t touch her and it almost killed him.

‘Goodnight, Ginny,’ he said softly, and she didn’t say a thing in reply.

He stood back as she did up her seat belt, as she started the engine, as she drove away, and he thought...

She looks haunted.

Not by him, he thought. She needed time.

He would give her time. Except for emergencies. Even knowing she was on the island, another doctor...

Who was he kidding? Even knowing she was on the island...his Ginny.

He would give her time. He had to.

* * *

She reached the vineyard. The lights were on inside the house. Ailsa and Hannah would be there, keeping watch over Button, waiting for her, anxious about Henry.

This island was like a cocoon, she thought, a warm, safe blanket that enveloped her and kept her safe from the real world.

Did she ever need to go back to the real world?

Kaimotu was time out, a holiday isle, a place of escape.

She could make it real.

But if she did, would the world move in?

She thought back to her marriage. The fairy-tale. A big, gorgeous, clever man her parents had approved of, dating her, making love to her, making her feel like the princess in a fairy-tale. She could have her parents’ life. She could have a happy-ever-after.

Yes, she’d had a childhood romance with Ben but that had been years before. She’d felt that what she’d found with James had been real, wonderful, a grown-up happy-ever-after.

And she’d stepped into James’s world and realised that grown up wasn’t fantasy. Not one little bit. Grown up was trying to meet expectations, climbing the career ladder, accepting scorn when you failed.

Grown up was realising that medicine couldn’t save lives—that you could do nothing to help your father or your husband.

Grown up was learning to hate yourself as well as copping hate from those around you.

‘I need a shrink,’ she said out loud, and then closed her eyes, took a deep breath, stared up at the starlit sky and figured she didn’t need a psychiatrist. She needed to move on. Move forward.

But not very much, and certainly not in the direction of Ben.

Ben had kissed her.

Ben was real.

No. He’d be just the same as all the other fantasies, she told herself. She no longer trusted her judgement. She no longer trusted men who told her she was capable, beautiful, wonderful.

She no longer trusted.

‘My job is to take care of Button and to make wine,’ she told herself, and thought that actually she hadn’t managed very well in the picking and processing department and there wouldn’t be all that much Chardonnay coming out of the vineyard this season.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said stubbornly. ‘Button’s the important thing.’ Like Henry was important. She’d helped save Henry.

Yes, but for how long? He’d have another coronary, he’d arrest, he’d die and she’d feel...she’d feel...

‘I’m not going to feel,’ she said savagely into the dark. ‘If Ben’s desperate I’ll help but nothing else. I will not be responsible for anything else but Button. It won’t be my fault.’

‘That’s a cop-out and you know it,’ she told herself, and she bit her lip and turned resolutely towards the house.

‘I know it is,’ she told herself. ‘But it’s all I’m capable of. And if Ben McMahon thinks he can change my mind just by kissing me... Pigs might fly, Ben McMahon, but you are not stuffing with my life.’

* * *

Sleep was nowhere. Ben lay in the dark and stared at the ceiling and all he could think about was that kiss.

He’d wanted her when he’d been seventeen, and he wanted her still. Crazy or not, his body was reacting to her as it had at seventeen.

He wanted her.

But while he wanted her as a woman, as the desire he’d felt all those years ago surged back to the surface, he needed her as a doctor. The skill she’d shown had knocked him sideways. He had to persuade her to join him; with her skills the island could have the medical service it deserved.

All sorts of possibilities had opened up as he’d watched her work. Islanders with cancer pain often needed to be transported to the mainland, at a time when they most wanted to stay here. He didn’t have the skills to help them.

As an anaesthetist, Ginny had those skills.

So...was he messing with that need by making it personal? By letting his desire hold sway? He’d kissed her and she’d shied away like a frightened colt.

‘So don’t kiss her,’ he said out loud, knowing that was easier said than done.

She’d been injured by the men in her life, he thought. She’d been injured by the arrogant bully he remembered her father being, and a husband who sounded like a bottom feeder. Ben wasn’t seeing her as a victim, though. With her determination to keep Button, with the skill and humour she’d shown in Theatre tonight, he knew that underneath the battered armour there was still the lovely, feisty, carrot-haired girl he’d fallen in love with all those years ago.

‘It was an adolescent crush,’ he growled to the night. ‘Get over it.’

But an adolescent crush wasn’t what he was feeling. When his mouth had touched hers, a fire had reignited.

For her, too?

If it had, she wasn’t letting on. Her armour might be battered but it was still intact, and if he wanted any chance at all of persuading her to work with him, he needed to respect it.

‘So leave her be.’

‘Except to ask her to work?’ He was arguing out loud with himself.

‘Yes,’ he told himself. ‘She worked that first afternoon because she saw desperate need. She worked tonight for the same reason. At the moment she’s giving you back-up when you most need it. Respect that, give her space, give her time.’

‘But the way you feel?’

‘Get over it,’ he said harshly. ‘You’re not seventeen any more. Go find yourself a lady who wants you.’

‘And isn’t that the whole trouble?’ he groaned, and punched a pillow. This island was small, and any affair he had, even asking someone on a date, led to expectations and complications.

Like tonight. One kiss...

Expectations and complications?

‘Leave it alone,’ he growled, and punched the pillow once more then gave up and got up and went across to the hospital to check on Henry—who was sleeping soundly and didn’t need his attention at all.

He went back to bed and finally he slept, but when he slept he dreamed of Ginny.

She was an adolescent crush who’d turned into the woman of his dreams. The idea was romantic nonsense, he told himself, even in his sleep.

* * *

And down on the harbour... It was five in the morning and almost every islander was asleep, but Squid Davies was wide awake and pacing.

‘It’s coming,’ he muttered. ‘The big one’s coming. I feel it in my bones.’ He grabbed a piece of paper and started to write.

‘Just in case,’ he muttered. ‘I’ll be prepared even if they’re not.’

CHAPTER FIVE

B
EN
 
DIDN
’
T
 
SEE
 
Ginny for days.

Henry spent four days in hospital in Auckland and then was transferred back to the island. Ben heard from his mum that Ginny had tried to persuade the old man to come back to the vineyard and stay with her, but Henry wanted to go back to his ancient cottage on the headland. It was too far from anywhere, he thought. He wouldn’t mind talking to Ginny about it.

‘But Ginny’s doing all she can,’ Ailsa told him. ‘She’s visiting him twice a day. There’s nothing more she can do. There’s nothing more anyone can do.’

So he didn’t have an exc—a reason to talk to her. But finally Button’s cardiac results came through.

There’d been a query on Button’s medical records, tests taken but not recorded. Her family doctor had noted that slight heart murmur, he’d sent her to a specialist but then she’d been brought to the island and the notes she’d brought hadn’t contained results.

It had taken a week’s perseverance on Ben’s part to get them. Laws protecting a patient’s privacy were a concern, especially when the patient was four years old, one parent had disappeared to Europe and the other wanted nothing to do with her. Ben had run out of professional ways of getting the results and had finally reverted to the personal. He’d rung Veronica’s husband, a man who blustered about not wanting anything to do with a child who wasn’t his but at least didn’t hang up on him.

‘For now you’re still legally Barbara’s parent,’ Ben had snapped at him. ‘I’m now her doctor, Ginny’s her acting guardian until the legalities are completed and we need full access to her medical records. Do you want her to die of heart failure because of your pride?’

The man had finally complied, and when Ben eventually received the results he swore.

There were problems. They’d have to be sorted. He and Ginny had to talk.

It was Monday, a gorgeous autumn day. Ben did a long morning’s clinic then he needed to make some house calls, and Ginny’s house was first.

He’d just reached the vineyard gate when the earth moved.

* * *

One moment Ginny was supervising Button eating her boiled egg and toast. The next moment she was on the floor and the world was crazy.

It was as if the whole house had been picked up and was being violently shaken. Walls became floor, floor became walls. Furniture was crashing everywhere.

She grabbed a chair but the chair slid sideways, crashed, rolled, tumbled.

Button!

She was screaming. Was Button screaming? The noise was unbelievable.

Somehow she grabbed the little girl as the chair she’d been sitting on crashed almost on top of her. She scooped her into her arms, and then the floor seemed to roll again.

The table. The table!

Drop and hold. Where had she heard that? In some long-ago safety lecture, maybe here in New Zealand when she’d been a child? New Zealand was known as the shaky isles for good reason.

There was another mantra. Get out of the house. Into the open.

But it was no use thinking that now, or trying to attempt it. This was like a wild, bucking, funfair ride, only there was nothing fun about this. Everything that wasn’t nailed down was crashing around them.

She had Button cradled hard against her but she was struggling to hold her. She was fighting to stay on her knees.

The table... If she could get past these crazy chairs...

The table was big, solid, farmhouse wood. If she could get under...

Getting anywhere was impossible. Something sharp hit her head, and she thought, Drop further.

She dropped onto her side, ignoring the crunch of things breaking under her. Button was clinging to her, limpet-like, whimpering in terror, and Ginny could move where she wanted and she knew Button wouldn’t let go.

Move where she wanted? That was a joke.

The table. She was three feet away. Roll. Roll!

The floor lurched again, tipping the other way, and under she went. She crashed into chair legs as she rolled but Button was with her, clinging so hard that Ginny had a hand free.

Grab.

She grabbed a table leg and clung.

She was under the table. The world was still rolling in great, fearsome waves, but the table and the floor beneath it were rolling with it and Ginny could hold and ride.

Thank God the house was single-storey, Ginny thought as she clung. And had an iron roof. No vast bank of heavy tiles.

Visions of knife-sharp iron flooded her mind but she shoved them away. Just hold on. Use her body to protect Button and hold on.

Wait until the earth found a new level.

* * *

Ben was just about to turn into the gate when the road buckled.

As buckles went it was truly impressive. The coast road was long and flat, and he saw the buckle start half a mile ahead of him, rising with a massive, unbelievable heave of solid earth. It hurled towards him, a great, burrowing mound, trees swaying, bitumen cracking and falling away, coming, coming...

It must have been seconds only before the great buckling mound hit him but he had enough time to think about getting out of the car and then to change his mind and decide to stay in the car but veer away fast from trees, head for the grassy verge away from the sea, pull to a halt. Or almost pull to a halt for then it hit and the car rose in the air as if it had been thrown.

It wasn’t just the one wave. It was a series of massive jolting, shaking heaves, as if the world was shifting and not knowing where to settle.

He gripped the steering-wheel and hung on. It was all he had to hold onto—the car was like a bucking bronco.

Oh, God, his island.

And stunningly, even while he was holding on for dear life, he felt himself switch into doctor mode. Earthquake. Casualties. This was major.

Squid had been right. Never doubt the sages, he thought, and then he stopped thinking because he had to hold tight and nothing else could matter.

The car rolled—it almost rolled right over—and then, unbelievably, it rolled back again, righting itself with a massive thump.

What sort of power...? What sort of damage...?

Tsunami.

The vision crashed into his mind with sickening dread. Earthquake, tsunami. Get to high land.

Not yet. He could do nothing yet but hold on.

His seat belt was holding him safe—sort of. He was fine, short of the cliff caving in and his car sliding into the sea...

Not a lot of use thinking that.

Hold on. There was nothing he could do until the rolling stopped.

But he was still thinking medicine.

Casualties. He hardly dared think but already he knew the islanders were in real trouble.

One doctor.

No, two. First things first. He’d grab Ginny.

Please, God, she was okay.

Don’t go there. He glanced towards the house and saw it heave and shift on its foundations. Please, hold.

He’d get Ginny, take her back to the hospital, leave Button with his mother...

His parents. The kids.

Do not go there.

Plan instead. The earth was settling. Panic was turning to focus.

He’d call the mainland, get help organised. Maybe he could do it now.

He flicked his phone. He had a signal.

And then he didn’t.

The telecommunications tower at the airport must have toppled.

No phone.

The authorities on the mainland would figure it out anyway, he thought grimly. A quake this size would show on every seismograph in the world.

He had two nurses on duty at the hospital, with six more on call. How many could get there?

Roads would be cut.

Roads... How...?

The car jerked and bucked and his grip on the wheel tightened.

Ginny, he thought. Please.

He stopped planning. He held on like grim death and he said the word over and over and over.

Please.

* * *

It went on and on and on. Just when she thought it had ended it started up again. She couldn’t move—she daren’t. Yes, the safest place was outside but to get there she’d have to negotiate her way through the house. There were massive exposed beams in the historic homestead. She was terrified of those beams and the table was midway between two of them so she was staying right where she was.

Button was amazingly calm. She clung and clung, and didn’t say a word as they lay huddled under the massive table.

Weirdly, Ginny found herself singing, odd little nursery rhymes she’d heard from nannies as a child, and sometimes she heard Button add a word or two as well.

There was nothing and no one but the two of them and this table. The vineyard was miles from the nearest neighbour. The shaking went on.

She held Button, she clung to her table leg and she’d never felt so alone in her life.

* * *

One part of Ben was totally focussed on what was happening, seeing the cracks open in the road, watching parts of the cliff fall into the sea, watching Ginny’s house buckle and sway.

One part of him was moving on, thinking tsunami warnings, casualty centres, evacuation plans, emergency resources.

The hospital was on high ground. It was weatherboard, and watching Ginny’s house he thought weatherboard was the way to go.

But one of Ginny’s chimneys had crashed.

Please...

Don’t go there.

The ground was settling now, the massive undulations passing. Any minute now he’d dare to get out of the car.

And go see if Ginny was safe.

The thought of her inside, near that crashed chimney, made him feel ill.

But... It wasn’t that he was especially worried about Ginny, he told himself. It was just because she was here, now. He’d watched her house heave—of course he was worried.

Plus she’d been part of his childhood. A friend.

But he knew there was more.

What were the levels of love?

It was hardly the time to think about that now. Finally the world was ceasing to shake.

Maybe it was worst on this side of the island, he prayed. Here the roads were buckled beyond using. Here huge trees had crashed. Here Ginny’s house...

Was still standing. He could see broken windows and tumbled masonry. He thought suddenly of those massive beams above the kitchen and the thought had him out of the car and running before the earth had completely settled.

Ginny.

* * *

She should take Button out from under the table.

She was afraid to move.

The quake seemed to have passed. There were still tremors, but minor ones. She could venture out from under her table and make a run for outside.

She didn’t want to. Here seemed the only safe place.

She stayed under her table and she held the silent Button and she hugged and hugged.

‘It’s okay, it’s over,’ she whispered, but she barely believed it.

‘Ginny?’

The voice came from nowhere. No, it didn’t, it came from the back veranda.

‘Ben?’ She could scarcely believe it. Ben! Here!

‘Where are you?’ he yelled.

‘I-in the kitchen. Under the table. But the beams...’

She didn’t finish. There was a series of crashes, like a bull moving through her living room, but maybe it was one desperate doctor hauling away the litter of damaged furniture blocking his path.

And then, unbelievably, he was under the table with her. He was gathering her—and Button—into his arms and he was holding them.

He held and held and her world changed yet again.

* * *

She’d thought it was over, but just as she pulled away a little, just as she relaxed and thought the world was settling, that Ben was here, that they were safe, another tremor hit.

It wasn’t nearly as big as that first, vast wave, but it was big enough for Button to cling, for Ben to haul them both close again, for her to cling back.

And think again.

What she’d just thought.

Which was nonsense. Which was everything she’d vowed never to think again.

Safe in the arms of someone who loved her?

Life was a travesty, she thought as she clung, because she still needed to cling, for Button’s sake as well as her own. Button was cocooned between them, safe, protected by their bodies, a Button sandwich between her two protective adults.

Button needed Ben.

For now Ginny needed Ben—but just for now. Only for now, she told herself fiercely.

This was crazy. This was an earthquake, for heaven’s sake, so why was she suddenly thinking of James, of a marriage that had made her glow, had made her think this was happy-ever-after, had made her believe in the fairy-tale?

Why was she thinking of the travesty that marriage had turned out to be? Of infidelity, of shattered trust. Of anger, more, of hatred, that she was the one to live. Of the knowledge that her judgement was appalling, that trust was stupid, that love was for the pages of fairy-tales.

‘Ginny...’

‘Mmm.’ It seemed almost wrong to speak, as if somehow voices might stir the demons to shake some more.

‘We need to get outside.’

‘I think I like my table.’

‘I like your table, too,’ he said. ‘But there’s the little matter of beams above us. We can’t depend on them falling straight if this gets any worse. We need to risk it. Button, we’re going to run. We’re going to wriggle out from under here, I’m going to carry you, because I’m stronger and faster than Ginny...’

‘Ginny,’ Button said, and clung tighter.

‘I can see Shuffles,’ Ben said, lightly now, making it seem almost conversational. ‘He’s right by the door on the floor. If you let me carry you, we’ll rescue Shuffles and take him outside.

Button considered. There was silence while they let her make up her mind and then she gave a decisive nod.

She turned within their sandwich squeeze and transferred her hold to Ben.

‘Get Shuffles,’ she ordered. ‘Go.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ Ben said, and touched Ginny’s face—just fleetingly, but she felt herself flinch.

He gave her a sharp, questioning glance but the time for questions wasn’t now.

‘Let’s go,’ he said, and hauled himself backwards from under the table, holding Button and Button holding him, and there was nothing left for Ginny to do but follow.