New Surgeon at Ashvale A&E (16 page)

Ruby gasped. ‘That can’t be true, can it?’ she asked, sending Sam a shocked glance.

‘That’s what the chief said,’ he acknowledged. ‘But the hospital trust board is having a further meeting this afternoon at the Heritage, so I still have a chance to sway them.’ He looked at Ruby. ‘I need you to come with me to that meeting, Ruby. I know it’s short notice, but you’re off duty this afternoon, aren’t you? Between us, I think we can persuade the executives that they will be making a mistake in closing us down. Will you do it? I’m relying on you. I need you to be there.’

‘Yes, of course I’ll do it, but how will I be able to help?’ Ruby looked at him in consternation. Michelle had moved to the bedside to record observations on their patient and was noting down temperature, respiration and heart rate on the chart.

‘You’ve kept a record of all the patients we’ve treated in the past three months, haven’t you…especially those who wouldn’t have made it if they’d had to be diverted to the Heritage.’ Sam pulled in a deep breath. ‘You’ll be able to tell them about the ones you treated personally…like young Jason, for instance. He’s still around because of you, and because he was brought here in good time.’

‘That sounds like a great idea. I keep the file in the office. I thought it might come in handy one day.’

‘Good. I’ll come and find you at three o’clock, and we’ll drive over there. Do you need to make arrangements for Becky?’

She nodded. ‘Mary’s looking after her today. I don’t think she’ll mind having her for a bit longer, but I’ll ring up later and find out.’

They left Michelle to observe young Nathan and walked together towards the central area of A&E. ‘It’s no wonder that you were feeling so bad about everything,’ Ruby commented. ‘Having to deal with a meningitis case immediately after that meeting must have been the final straw.’

‘It was just a temporary setback,’ he murmured. ‘I won’t let these things defeat me.’

She sent him an oblique glance. ‘No, that’s not your way, is it? In fact, I think I’ve finally found the key to what makes you tick. I’ve been searching all this time and wondering why it is that you avoid deep, long-lasting relationships…because it isn’t by chance that you’ve never settled down, is it? It’s a choice, albeit maybe a subconscious one, that you made a long time ago. You don’t let anything get to you. It’s the reason you don’t fall in with the social scene at work…because if you avoid people and don’t get involved in meaningful relationships, nothing and no one can hurt you.’

‘Pure guesswork,’ he said. ‘It’s all nonsense.’

She shook her head. ‘No, it isn’t. All those years ago, when you were a child, you learned how to protect yourself from being hurt. If boys were cruel and made taunts, you showed them you didn’t care. If your family was scattered over different parts of the globe, you told yourself it didn’t matter. And if any woman should be foolish enough to make any impact on your emotions, you put up the barriers and send her on her way. Why would you allow anyone to get close to you, when they might wrench your heart from you and then abandon you to oblivion once more?’

He gave a short laugh. ‘You have it all worked out, don’t
you? That clever, inquisitive mind of yours has been busy, and you’ve come to all the wrong conclusions.’

She smiled, turning to face him and trailing a hand lightly over his arm. ‘No, I haven’t. They’re all the right conclusions, and you’re trying to push me away again. You want me to think you don’t care, but I have the measure of you now, and I’m not going to be fobbed off that easily. I know you care about me, maybe even love me, but you’ll do your level best to stop me from getting too close.’ Her gaze meshed with his. Tt’s too late for those sorts of tactics, though. I’m forewarned and forearmed, and I’ll muscle my way in no matter what defences you try to put up.’

‘You’re living in a fantasy world,’ he said. ‘I told you a long while ago that I don’t do commitment. Why do things have to get serious when we can simply enjoy what we have for the moment? I tried to warn you, but it seems you didn’t listen. Don’t fall for me, Ruby. I’ll end up wrecking your life because I can never be what you want me to be. This job is what matters to me. It’s what I’ve fought for, worked for all these years. And now, when I have to concentrate fully on saving this unit, you’re distracting me with talk of loving and caring. It’s the puppy all over again…soft, romantic, mushy. That isn’t my world.’

Ruby’s eyes widened. He didn’t really mean what he said, did he? She had stung him with her insight into what made him what he was, and he couldn’t handle it. That was it, wasn’t it? Why else would he say such hurtful, cruel things?

He walked away, heading for the ambulance bay in search of his next patient, leaving her to stand forlornly in the middle of A&E, wondering why she couldn’t pull herself together. She was the laid-back one, the one who didn’t let life get her down, and here she was, feeling the sting of tears behind her eyelids. Soft, romantic, mushy…was that how he saw her? What was wrong with any of that?

‘Shouldn’t you be going off duty?’ Olivia interrupted her wayward thoughts, and Ruby glanced at her watch.

‘Oh, yes, you’re right. Only, I need to make a phone call first.’

Olivia gave her a puzzled glance, but Ruby didn’t stop to explain. She went over to the booth where the phone for private calls was situated and dialled Mary’s number.

‘How are things going?’ she asked her neighbour. ‘Is Becky all right…only, I wondered if you might be able to look after her for a couple of hours longer this afternoon? I have to go to a meeting.’

‘Oh, Ruby…I’m so glad you called. I’ve been trying to get in touch with you, but the hospital switchboard has been so busy.’ A note in Mary’s voice alerted her to the fact that something was definitely wrong. There was a hint of panic, a nervous agitation that threatened to spill over and stop her from speaking.

‘What is it, Mary? Is it Becky? Is she ill? Has she had an accident?’

‘No, no…it isn’t that. It’s Sophie. She came back. She…she seemed fine, but then…It was…I don’t know what to do…’

‘Mary, please, slow down. Start at the beginning.’ Ruby’s heart began to hammer a tattoo. Sophie was back? But something was obviously not right. Had something happened to her? Had she taken Becky? She forced herself to stay calm. She said carefully, ‘You said Sophie has come back. Is she ill, or hurt in some way?’

She heard Mary pull in a shuddery breath. ‘She said she had been ill. She went to see a doctor in the place where she’s been staying, and he did some tests and gave her some tablets to take…a thyroid problem, she said.’

‘Thyroid?’ That sounded like one of the possibilities that had been running through Ruby’s mind in these last few weeks. It would account for the tiredness and confusion, even for the lapses in memory, but she still couldn’t see why that would cause Sophie to go away and leave her baby.

‘All right, so she’s back home now, and she’s feeling better, is she? So what’s upsetting you? Has she taken Becky somewhere?’

‘No, no…it’s nothing like that.’ The frantic note was back in Mary’s voice. ‘I was so pleased to see her, but there’s this man…he followed her, you see…she said he’d been following her for a long time…and now he has Sophie and Becky trapped in the house, and I called the police, but no one came, and I don’t know what to do. I told them…this man, he grabbed her, and he locked all the doors and bolted them…and I can’t get in to help her, and I don’t know what to do.’

Ruby felt a shockwave reverberate through her whole body. ‘Mary, call the police again and find out what’s happening. How long ago did you phone them?’

‘About an hour ago. They said, did he have a weapon, and I said, no, I didn’t see one. I think they had the idea it was just a domestic incident. They say they’re really busy right now…I just don’t know what’s happening.’

‘Never mind. Phone them again. I’m coming home, Mary. I’ll be with you in a few minutes.’

She cut the call and went to grab her jacket and bag from the locker room. Then, just as she was about to leave, she caught sight of Olivia on her way to a treatment room.

‘Olivia…will you send a message to Sam for me? Tell him I can’t manage this afternoon’s meeting. Something’s come up.’

‘I’ll do that. Is it a problem at home? You look as white as a sheet.’

Ruby nodded. ‘It’s something quite serious. I have to go. Tell him I’m really sorry to let him down, but something bad has happened, and I need to go home straight away.’

She hurried away, rushing out to the car park and setting her car in motion. Her mind was racing in tune with the engine. Who was this man who was holding her sister captive? Why would he be doing that?

And how would Sam react when he discovered that she would not be going to the meeting? She didn’t want to let him down, but her sister’s and Becky’s safety meant more to her than any work-based problem. They were her family, and they needed her.

If Sam couldn’t see that, then he was a lost cause.

‘M
ARY
, are you there?’ Ruby stopped pounding on her neighbour’s door and shouted through the letterbox. ‘Mary, I need you to tell me what’s happening.’

She heard bolts being drawn back, and finally Mary opened the door. Her neighbour was distraught, running shaking fingers through her soft brown hair. ‘I’m so glad you’re here,’ Mary said. ‘I called the police again, and they said they would send someone, but they only have a couple of policewomen available. I don’t see how they’re going to be able to deal with a crazy man, do you? I tried to call the farmer up at the lodge to see if he could help, but his wife said he was out on the field with the tractor. She said she’d go and find him and tell him what was going on.’

‘That’s something, anyway. We need all the backup we can get.’ Ruby wished Sam were here. He would know how to handle the situation, wouldn’t he? He wasn’t one to let things faze him. But he wasn’t here, he was at his meeting…that was what mattered to him most of all, he’d said so. He’d told her in no uncertain terms that she would never fit into his life on any permanent basis, and that hurt. It hurt badly.

She pulled in a deep breath. ‘Did he say anything, this man who has Sophie? Did Sophie say she knew who he was?’

‘She didn’t say anything much at all. She’d only been here
a short time, and I could see she was desperate to see Becky. We’d been talking in the kitchen, and then she went to fetch Becky from the back garden, where she’d been snoozing in her pushchair. She’d just lifted her up when this man came and grabbed her, and she held on to Becky and tried to twist away from him, but it was impossible. He dragged them both away. I ran out to try and stop him, but he had her in the farmhouse before I could get to her. I think she must have gone there first, looking for you, or Becky, and she left the door unlocked.’

She started to shake all over, and Ruby went and put her arms around her. ‘We’ll get her back, Mary,’ she said, with more confidence than she felt. ‘He can’t mean to hurt her, surely? Why would he want to do that?’

Ruby was beginning to wonder whether this was the man who had been disturbed in the orchard by the farm hand just a few days ago. Had he followed Ruby home from work before that? Was that why she’d felt there was someone moving through the shrubbery that day? Perhaps he had been watching the house, waiting for Sophie.

‘I need to find a way to get into the house,’ she said, thinking aloud.

‘But the doors are locked and bolted,’ Mary said. ‘I heard him doing it. I heard him shouting, telling her to be quiet or he’d hurt her, and then little Becky started to cry. She must have been so frightened, poor thing.’

‘I could get in through the skylight,’ Ruby said. ‘If I can get up onto the side roof extension, there’s a skylight that I can prise open. I just had the roof fixed, but the skylight still needs repairing. The catch is faulty, and I didn’t get round to having it mended. What we need is a ladder.’

‘I have a ladder,’ Mary said. ‘It’s in the garage…but isn’t it too dangerous for you to be up on the roof…and what if he sees you?’

‘I’ll just have to take my chances. The skylight is positioned
quite low down near to the eaves, so I should be able to reach it fairly easily from the top of the ladder. As to him seeing me, perhaps we can distract him some way if it looks as though he might do that. If I can get into the house through the skylight, I should be able to unbolt the doors and give Sophie a means of escape. I need to take him by surprise.’

Mary was shaking her head and pressing her hands together in an agitated fashion. ‘It’s too risky. You don’t know who you’re dealing with.’

Ruby pressed her lips together. ‘Correction. He doesn’t know who he’s dealing with.’

She went with Mary to find the ladder, but as they were carrying it from the garage, she heard a car draw up by the house. Was it the police at last?

‘What on earth are you two doing?’ Sam said, getting out of the car and coming towards them.

‘Shouldn’t you be at the meeting?’ Ruby queried in surprise. She carefully manoeuvred the ladder onto the driveway and set it down.

‘Forget the meeting.’ He was grim-faced again, looking from her to Mary and back to the ladder. ‘Tell me what’s going on here. Has Becky found herself locked in the house, somehow? Why do you need a ladder?’

Ruby quickly told him what had happened. ‘He has my sister, and he threatened to harm her. The police are supposed to be on their way, but it’s been almost two hours now, and there’s still no sign of them. I have to get in there and help Sophie.’

‘And what are you planning on doing when you come face to face with him?’

‘I haven’t really thought that far.’ She made a face. ‘Threaten him with a broom handle?’

‘No.’ Sam looked across to the farmhouse, assessing the scale of the problem. ‘You don’t have to do anything of the sort. I’ll tackle him.’

Ruby bit back a retort. She was ready to do whatever was necessary, but when it came down to it, Sam was bigger, stronger and altogether more of a threat to any man than she was, and she wasn’t fool enough to argue with him over that. ‘I’ll come with you,’ she said.

‘I’d rather you didn’t.’ He turned to Mary. ‘Do you have a toolbox handy? I need something I can use to lever the window up.’

Mary seemed to be less nervous now that a man had arrived. ‘Would a chisel do? My husband has all kinds of tools in the garage.’

He nodded, and she went back into the garage and rummaged around on one of the shelves.

‘Here you are,’ she said, coming back to him.

Ruby sent him an anxious look. ‘You will be careful, won’t you? We don’t know if he has a weapon of any kind. If you manage to unbolt the front door once you’re inside the house, we can come in and help.’

He laid a hand lightly on her arm. ‘I want you to stay here, out of the way, where I know you’ll be safe,’ he said. ‘I haven’t turned my back on everything that’s important to me to come and make sure you’re all right and then have you mess it up.’

She gazed at him. It wasn’t exactly the best way of saying that he cared about her, but it was a start, and if it hadn’t been for her worries about Becky and her sister, the mere fact he’d said it would have made her heart jump in exhilaration.

‘Should we cause a distraction?’ Mary asked, but he shook his head.

‘No.’ He gave them an exasperated look. ‘Do nothing. Both of you stay here.’

They didn’t of course. There was no way Ruby was going to stand back and let him walk into danger and not be there to help him out if need be. Nor was she about to leave her
sister’s welfare to other people, even if it was Sam who was taking control of the situation.

As soon as Sam disappeared with the ladder around the side of the farmhouse, they crept towards the front of the building. Once there, Ruby whispered to Mary to stay under cover, while she headed after Sam.

Without making a sound, he had the ladder against the wall, and then he climbed up, pausing at the top to reach up and lever the window open. Ruby found herself praying that the man inside the house wouldn’t hear him.

When Sam disappeared into the house through the skylight, Ruby followed. She climbed up the ladder, taking care not to look down, and then eased herself into the attic room through the window.

Sam was already on his way down the stairs, and she crept silently after him, making her way into the hallway. Sam was listening for sounds of voices, and once he had located them in the living room, he set off in that direction. He hadn’t unbolted the front door, so Ruby made that her first objective. She carefully slid back the bolts and quietly opened the door.

Outside, she saw that the farmer had arrived. Craig was with him, and when he saw Ruby, he started towards her. Ruby stopped him, shaking her head and putting her finger to her lips to show him that he needed to be quiet. Perhaps it wasn’t a good idea to have everyone barge in just then.

Mary was speaking in a low voice to the farmer, and after a while he frowned and reached into his Land Rover for a metal bar. Craig went to speak quietly to him, and Ruby guessed they were discussing strategies.

Ruby left the door ajar and went back inside the house. She armed herself with an umbrella from the stand by the door and headed towards the dining room. She stood, half hidden by the recess of the glazed archway that led into the living room, and listened to what was going on inside the room.

‘No one’s going to take Sophie away from me,’ the man was saying. ‘She belongs with me.’

Ruby recognised Nick Dryden, her patient who she’d operated on recently.

‘Put the baby down, Nick,’ Sam said in a calm, authoritative voice. ‘She’s not a problem to anyone. You don’t need to involve the baby in any of this.’

‘It should have been my baby,’ Nick answered, a bitter note in his voice. ‘Sophie’s mine. She didn’t want to have this baby. She wanted to be with me. That’s why she went away. She doesn’t want this baby.’

Through the small opening between the door and the frame, Ruby could see Sophie’s horrified expression. She was shaking her head, her hands reaching out for Becky, who was screaming relentlessly, her small face reddened and streaked with tears. Nick was holding her with one arm, his stance threatening, his features etched with rage.

‘You’re delusional,’ Sam said in a quiet tone. ‘It’s what comes from taking drugs like ecstasy, benzodiazepines and amphetamines, among other things, over the last few years. You’ve tried all of those at one time and another, haven’t you, Nick? It’s written in your notes at the hospital, and that’s why you’re always turning up at A&E, complaining of pain and anxiety and wanting drugs to calm things down. That’s why you’re shaking and restless right now, and why your breathing is rapid.’

‘Sophie’s my woman. She loves me. I love her. I’ve always loved her, ever since I first saw her.’

‘Perhaps she’ll go on loving you if you treat the baby with love and compassion,’ Sam suggested. ‘Why would she love a man who would threaten her child?’

Nick appeared to think about that. Uncertainty showed in his eyes, and he looked at Sophie, who followed Sam’s lead and began to nod.

‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘Won’t you put Becky in her playpen so that you and I can talk? That’s what you want, isn’t it? We can’t talk while you’re holding her like that.’

Nick hesitated, and then he carefully relinquished his hold on Becky, placing her down in the playpen across the room. Sophie moved towards him, putting herself between Becky and Nick, and at the same time Sam took a slow step closer to both of them.

‘This is the police.’ A woman’s voice cracked out along the hallway, making Ruby jump. ‘Miss Martyn…Miss Sophie Martyn…are you in there? Are you all right?’

Nick Dryden, startled by the sudden intrusion, ran towards the glazed archway, looking for a means of escape. He flung open the door, and Ruby intercepted him, lifting the umbrella and pointing the sharp, elongated tip towards his midsection like a gun.

‘I’d stay there if I were you,’ she said succinctly, ‘unless you’d like another incision near where your spleen used to be.’

Startled by her sudden appearance, and uncertain about the threat, he hesitated, and that was his undoing because Sam launched himself at him and grappled his arms behind his back. ‘You’re not going anywhere,’ Sam said in a terse voice, ‘except to the police station.’

Two policewomen came into the room and, within minutes, Nick had been handcuffed and cautioned. They led him away to the waiting police car.

Ruby, in the meantime, went over to Sophie and wrapped her arms around her. ‘I’m so glad you’re safe,’ she said raggedly. ‘I’ve been so worried about you.’

Mary looked around at the gathering of people. ‘Perhaps I should go and make a pot of tea,’ she said. ‘We’re all a bit shaken up, aren’t we?’

The farmer nodded. He relinquished his iron bar now that all was well. ‘I guess I won’t be needing this now,’ he said to
Craig. ‘It’s a good thing you were at the farm with me. Between us, we’d have made a good team.’

Craig smiled. ‘You’re right.’

Becky, sitting surveying all that was going on, and still uncertain about the ordeal she’d been through, decided that she wanted out of the playpen. Tearfully, she stretched out her arms so that someone, anyone, would lift her out of there, and Sam went to the rescue.

‘You want your mother, don’t you, young lady?’ he said, picking her up and comforting her.

Ruby was still hugging Sophie, not wanting to let her go. ‘Was that man the reason you went away?’ she asked.

Sophie nodded. ‘I was confused and afraid,’ she told Ruby. ‘He had been bothering me for months, ever since I ran into him at the health centre one day. He seemed to take to me for some reason, and he had the idea that I returned his feelings. I didn’t even know him.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me what was going on?’

Sophie sat down on the sofa and held out her arms for Becky. ‘I didn’t really understand any of it. I was feeling so awful. I was tired all the time, a bit panicky and depressed. I thought it was post-natal depression and that I would get over it eventually.’

Sam settled Becky in the crook of Sophie’s arm, and she kissed her cheek and hugged the infant close. Becky snuggled into her, little fingers clasping her mother’s cotton top as though she would never let go.

Ruby sat beside her on the sofa and waited for her to go on. ‘But the depression didn’t go away, did it?’

‘No. Things just seemed to be getting worse, and I was forgetting things all the time. I tried to go to the health centre, but he was there a lot of the time. Then, one day, he threatened me. He said if I didn’t go with him, he would hurt Becky.’ She swallowed, remembering the incident and struggling
to keep her composure. ‘I managed to get away from him, and I thought, when we go to the farmhouse, we’ll be safe. He won’t know where to find us. Only, he turned up again, and I knew I had to go. If I wasn’t around, he wouldn’t be able to get to Becky, would he? He wouldn’t know where she was. It was me he wanted, and he wouldn’t go after Becky if I wasn’t there.’

She stroked Becky’s arm and back, keeping her close. ‘I couldn’t stay away, though. The doctor gave me some tablets to take, and after a few weeks, I started to think clearly again. The doctor said sometimes in pregnancy the thyroid can be affected, like an autoimmune problem, where the body turns on itself, and mine wasn’t producing enough of the hormones I needed. He said it could be treated, and it turned out that he was right.’