A Man Like Him

He hurried into the kitchen and grabbed his backpack from a storage cupboard. He filled it with water and fruit, scissors, tape and a basic first aid kit from a shelf above. Tossing the strap over his shoulder, Chris took a deep breath and reopened the door. The steps had vanished.

* * *

ANGELA STARED AT the chaos around her. Within forty-five minutes, the entire world had gone insane. The water curled around the hundreds of screaming and shouting people struggling to escape in their panic. Danger whispered at their backs, the noise like the roar of a giant as it chased them. The swish of tires and the blaring of car horns pierced the air, sending the holidaymakers into a state of near hysteria.

The frantic screeching of a woman ahead of her kick-started Angela’s stunned body into action. The holiday park was her life. Her refuge. She’d save it and these hundreds of people encased in a sealed bubble of terror. It would be all right. The rain would stop.

People yelled the water was coming down harder and faster and Angela’s rising panic hitched up a notch. Her niggling fear that the day’s rain was shrouded in threat had become a reality. She faced her assembled staff, the panic in their eyes clear as a mirror into their hearts. She took a deep breath and threw open her arms.

“Everyone, listen to me. We must remain calm. I want as many people as possible directed into the open-air dining area. The water will not rise above that level. It can’t possibly. It’s well over four feet from where the water is now.” She kept her shoulders straight, battling her fear into submission. “We must remain calm. We’re here to help the guests in every way we can. Please, do not endanger yourselves. Be careful. I want to see every one of you back here when this is over. Do you hear me?”

She met their eyes in turn. They nodded. It would be okay. She would make sure they made it home safely to their families. She had to. She gave a curt nod.

“Now go. I’ll see you back here soon.”

The minimal staff she had at three in the morning scattered left and right into the burgeoning crowds. People came toward the clubhouse like a million drowned rats. She’d been the first person Yvonne roused from bed. That was two hours ago. Angela had immediately left her house and sped back to the park. Its location was advertised as “quaint,” “secluded,” “quintessentially English”—now it offered zero escape.

Anger mixed with frustration had coursed through Angela’s veins when she’d leaped from her car and rushed to the office. The water had barely reached her ankles and the concerns about the boating lake had been just that...a concern. Now, this life-threatening situation loomed in front of her like an adversity on an impossible battlefield.

Inhaling a deep breath, she shook off her fears and hurried forward to help an elderly lady who’d slipped in the deluge of bodies rushing to get past her.

“It’s okay, madam. Everything will be all right. Here, take my arm.”

The woman shook so badly Angela brought her other arm around her waist and practically carried her to a free seat. The chatter of people sitting at the tables was relatively calm compared to the chaos a few feet below. People would be safe here.

She caught the eye of a mother cradling her two crying children on her lap on the other side of the table. “Could you keep this lady company for me? There’s so many—”

The woman’s smile wobbled. “Of course. You go.”

Nodding her thanks, Angela ran out of the dining area and down the steps toward the yellow brick road that snaked throughout the park from the reception to every single one of the six hundred trailers.

She waded into the water. It reached just above her knees. Cold, relentless and completely unforgiving. Cars that had been heading out of the park moments before now lay abandoned and gridlocked like wrecks piled up in a junkyard. She frantically looked around, not knowing which way to turn. The crying and screaming of a young girl of six or seven broke through her manic thoughts.

“Daddy! Daddy!”

“It’s all right. It’s all right.” Angela lifted the girl into her arms and pressed a kiss to her temple. “Everything will be all right.”

She turned and headed back up the stairs. People called out to their loved ones left and right. Children were hauled onto their parents’ backs and shoulders. The whole world looked soaked to the skin in despair. Angela’s leg muscles screamed in protest as she fought her way up the stairs and back into the dining area.

“Oh, thank God.” A woman rushed forward, her face etched in agony. “Melissa? Melissa, it’s Mummy.”

The little girl in Angela’s arms turned and her tiny body shook with relief as she held out her arms to her mother.

Angela’s heart swelled with gratitude as she passed her over. “She was calling for her father, but I don’t know...”

The woman shook her head, the silver tracks of her tears shining in the overhead lights. “He said he was going for help. I haven’t seen him since.” Her voice cracked.

Angela squeezed her hand. “He’ll be back.”

The woman nodded, but the anguish in her eyes was so deep, Angela closed hers against it. What right did she have to promise these people anything? Didn’t she know how your entire life could change beyond recognition in a single twenty-four hours? Robert’s face loomed in her mind. After everything she’d done to survive, there was no way in hell this flood would take her life. Nor would it take anyone else’s. People were stronger than they thought.

She smoothed her hand over the girl’s head as she dropped her cheek into the crook of her mother’s neck. They turned and walked away. Angela drew in a shaky breath and headed back to the steps. Barely a minute had passed and now the water burst over the top step and worse, over the swimming pools to the side of the dining area.

“My God.” The words whispered like a plea from between Angela’s freezing lips.

The power of the water, the noise of it, was deafening. It mixed with people’s terrified screams, their pleas to God and their shouts for missing family and friends. Angela brought her hands to her head in an effort to concentrate, to think of the next thing to do. She turned around three hundred and sixty degrees.

There was no way out. Nowhere else to go than up.

The water rushed like a gathering tsunami, splitting around her and running at such a speed, filthy gray froth crested its waves. She needed to move people onto the clubhouse roof. There was no other option.

With her heart pounding and her ears ringing, she looked to the car roofs, barely visible below, when minutes before people had been sitting inside hoping for escape. Horror ripped through her body at the sight of people swimming toward her, their eyes wide with fear. Furniture, suitcases, clothes and debris passed in an undulating torrent. How many? How many would survive? How much weight could the roof withstand?

Making a snap decision, she cupped her hands around her mouth. “Everybody. On the roof. Get your families on the clubhouse roof. Now!”

Sending up a silent prayer, she took a deep breath and dived back into the water. With a strength borne from adrenaline and her fight for survival, she cut through the water and grasped flaying hands. One after another, she brought people to the edge of what she hoped would be safety. Her shins smacked against the stone steps time and again before she turned and swam back out into the murky water.

Another life. Another human being. She brought more and more people to the clubhouse before heading back out again. Her arms were little more than lengths of rubber. Her lungs screamed for mercy. A sob escaped her and as Angela gasped for air, the water rose and took her under.

* * *

THE PARK MANAGER disappeared beneath the water and Chris’s gut leaped into his throat. One minute she was there. The next gone. The attraction—the protectiveness—he had when he first saw her wrenched through his chest. He had to get to her. A woman like her couldn’t die like this. The haunted look in her eyes lingered in his memory.

He felt the connection between them—an affinity, and he’d be damned if he wouldn’t find out why. He darted his gaze left and right. Chaos reigned supreme. He ran his hand over the little girl’s forearm nestled beneath his chin in an attempt to comfort her as his mind whirled with what to do next. He’d pulled her from the water but had no idea who she belonged to.

“Everything’s going to be all right, sweetheart.”

With her parents nowhere in sight, Chris’s words dissolved into the panicked air. He should get her to safety, but his gaze drew back to where the manager had vanished once again. She’d resurfaced and was now desperately reaching out to passing pieces of furniture and other debris to use as an anchor.

He drew in a deep breath. “Hey! Over here. I’m coming. Hold on.”

Her arms continued to flail, her mouth set in grim determination. There was no way she could hear him. The need to save her roared through his blood once more. He’d seen her drag one person after another to safety without regard for her own life.

He’d liked she was oblivious to him watching her. Now he wanted to see her look straight at him. Fear for her beat hard in his chest. Her strength was phenomenal, but the strongest woman on earth would lose the fight against a current building with this much ferocity.

He gritted his teeth and reached out, gripping a man’s wrist as he came out of the water on a forward stroke. The man’s eyes were frenzied and he looked past Chris toward the mirage of the disappearing clubhouse.

“Get off me.” The man tried to yank his wrist away. “What the hell are you doing?”

Chris tightened his grip and reached for the girl on his back. “Take her. Take her with you.”

The man looked to the girl and shook his head. He made to swim away but Chris held fast. “Take her or so help me God, I’ll drown you myself. Right here. Right now.”

The man cursed before grabbing the girl beneath the arms. He tossed her onto his back. She remained eerily quiet as her gaze locked on Chris. Clearly she knew she had no choice but to be passed from one strange man to another.

He forced a smile and winked. “I’ll see you on the roof, okay?”

She nodded, her bottom lip trembling. The man swam forward and in seconds they were spots in the distance. Chris focused his mind on the woman he needed to save. He couldn’t think about the girl, the man or anyone else for the time being.

He plunged forward. The manager was nowhere to be seen. He circled around. His muscles screamed with fatigue. His heart thundered in his ears. Where the hell was she? He inhaled a deep breath and sank into the dark, cold depths. Nothing but black space loomed in front of his open eyes. He reached blindly forward.

His fingers bumped hard surfaces of God only knew what but nothing human, nothing female. He searched for another few seconds before forcing himself upward for more air. As he broke the surface, he saw her.

Barely more than a few feet away, she fought against the rage of the swirling river water. She was static. Neither going backward nor forward. He cut one arm into the water and then the other. Each stroke brought him painstakingly closer to her. He moved his head from side to side and pictured the clear blue of a swimming pool.

The image loosened the tension in his arms and made his strokes longer and more confident. His hands splayed her waist and, in one fluid motion, he lifted her onto his back.

“Hold on,” he yelled. “Hold on.”

Her arms came around his neck and locked beneath his chin. “There are so many people. We have to help them.”

He ignored her words lest they creep inside his mind and unleash the panic and helplessness bubbling at the surface of his resolve. Inhaling another breath, Chris battled toward their last chance of anyone finding them alive. It seemed to take forever to reach the solid concrete upper floor of the clubhouse. The only building now visible from their vantage point.

He swam forward until his feet touched the steps leading to the roof where people rushed up the disappearing staircase. She slipped from his back and stared down at him.

“You’ll be all right now.” His words came out in short, sharp breaths. God, she was beautiful.

Swallowing hard, he turned and moved to dive back into the water.

“Wait!” Her yell stopped him short.

Their gazes locked. They stood paralyzed for a long moment.

“Be careful.”

Chris nodded and dived back into the water. He had to save more. He was a strong swimmer. He’d make it back. He had to.

CHAPTER THREE

FROM THE CLUBHOUSE ROOF, Angela stared out at the wreckage the flood had left behind. The rain stopped the moment the sun rose above the mountains. It lit the sky in glorious pink and peach. An ironic relief, for it also lit the devastation. Tears blurred her gaze. As far as the eye could see, the world was hidden beneath brown swirling water. The roofs of cars and the top few feet of trees punctuated the landscape like macabre reminders of what had been visible and alive with holidaymakers just a few short hours before.

“My God.” Her words caught painfully in her throat. How would the park ever recover from this? The money. The damage. Everything was beneath water and warping as five hundred or so people stood helpless watching it happen.

She turned from the horizon to stare at the anguished faces of the people who’d come to the Cove for a holiday, a break, a relaxing time away from life’s chaos. People stood so close their arms brushed hers, yet everything was eerily quiet. The odd murmur, the odd whisper to God blew along a soft breeze.

Children lay silent in their parents’ arms; grown men shook their heads, tears sliding over their cheeks unchecked.

She closed her eyes and forced her mind to focus. The red tiled roof of the stockroom was adjacent to the clubhouse. If they could somehow manage to pull off the tiles and underlay beneath, she could climb inside and pass up supplies. Bottled water, soda, ice cream and sealed packets of cookies were stored there for selling in the outdoor snack shop. It would at least sustain them and keep the panic of passing time at bay awhile longer.

Until what? She opened her eyes. How would they get out of here? Would the authorities send boats? A whirr sounded in the distance and she lifted her head, shielding her eyes against the sun. A helicopter.

Hope filled her chest as the noise grew around her. One by one the subdued crowd heard it, too. Fingers pointed to the sky, voices rose and then cheers erupted. Angela’s smile stretched to a full-blown grin. A man to the side of her pulled her into an embrace and pressed a firm kiss to her forehead.

“We’re saved.” He laughed, his eyes shining. “We’re saved.”

She laughed. “It’s going to be all right.” She said aloud the words that had revolved on an endless reel in her mind for the previous, terrifying hours.

“I can’t believe this has happened.” The man shook his head.

Angela swallowed. “What time is it? Do you have a watch? A phone?”

He released her and turned his wrist. “Half past six.”

Angela nodded as he turned away to his family. Five hours. It had taken just five hours to turn the park into a mud-red sea. Another whirr of blades filtered the air and then another. Three helicopters circled overhead as people raised their hands, cheering and shouting.

She squinted in an effort to see what kind of helicopters they were, praying they were for rescue or the police. She couldn’t make out the letters along the side. Wouldn’t the police or rescue teams have bold and distinct markings?

They hovered above them and flew back and forth for twenty minutes, before tilting and flying away.

As their tails disappeared over the horizon, panic overtook the crowd once more. The cheers became shouts of protest. The waving hands turned to people clutching their heads and throats. She needed to get them doing something. Keep them busy to lessen the panic and pass the time. Their saviors would be back.

Angela stared after the helicopters. They had to come back.

She took a deep breath and pushed her way through the throng of bodies. Setting her jaw against the rapid beat of her heart, Angela pushed onward. She would not panic. She was strong. A survivor. This was nothing more than a test.

Elbowing her way through the mass of men, women and children, she struggled toward the stockroom roof. Once there, she leaned over the railing surrounding the top of the clubhouse and looked down. The water was two-thirds the way up the wall, which meant the flooding had to be at least nine feet above ground level. She raised her arms.

“Everyone. Can I have your attention?”

The men and women closest looked at her and one by one tapped the shoulders of the people standing next to them. The noise lessened and Angela met their defeated gazes. People, both young and old, trembled. Their faces were pale, either from fear or cold. She forced a smile. She was the park manager; it was up to her to keep the guests buoyed and positive.

“Now the rescuers have seen us, they’ll be back. They know our situation...” Her voice wavered as a barrage of catcalls and heckling started. She waved her hands. “Please. Listen. We have no idea if people outside the park are in a worse situation. We have to be thankful we’re alive, and better, we have supplies.”

“What supplies?” A voice demanded from the crowd. “Everything we own is under the damn water.”

A chorus of agreement and a rumble of chatter followed.

Angela’s determination increased. The tenacity that had gotten her through the past two years since her divorce raged like a storm in her heart. She’d survived Robert’s abuse through experience and quick thinking. She’d survive again. God needed her to do a job and she’d damn well do it.

“We have supplies. Lots of supplies. Enough to get us through today.”

“What if we’re still here tomorrow?” the same “Man of Eternal Hope” yelled.

She dropped her hands and fisted them on her hips, all notions of niceness evolving into determination. Negativity bred like disease if it wasn’t nipped in the bud. She’d been forced to learn that quickly. Believing rescue was possible had undoubtedly saved her life more times than she cared to remember.

“Sir, if you don’t mind, you need to step back and keep your thoughts to yourself. They’re not helping.”

He glared. “Yeah? Well, you’re supposed to be in charge. You told my family when we got here two days ago this place was the best park in the damn Cove. Now look at us.”

Anger simmered in her stomach. What the hell was wrong with this guy? Angela glared. “Are you serious?”

He took a step toward her, and his wife clamped her hand to his forearm. “Frank, don’t.”

He shook her off and kept coming. “Yes, I’m serious. You think I’m in any mood to freaking joke?”

Angela tensed as her hackles rose. “We are in the middle of a natural disaster, sir. If you can’t understand that, then—”

“Then what?” He stood just feet away, his hands fisted on his hips and his face contorted with fury.

“Then you need to stand out of the way and let the other men and women help me do what little we can until the rescue crews come back.” She turned away from him and fixed her gaze on the men and women looking at her with encouragement and interest. They couldn’t see she trembled. She couldn’t show him a glimmer of weakness. If she ignored him, he’d disappear.

She cleared her throat. “Behind me is a stockroom full of soda, water, ice cream and other things. I need a handful of volunteers to help me tear enough of the roof back so I can climb inside. If we work as a team, everyone will at least have something to drink.”

At first no one moved. They continued to stare at her in dazed confusion and Angela wondered what she was supposed to do next. Then the crowd of people parted.

Her heart skipped as she met the same hazel eyes she’d last seen moving away from her when Chris Forrester dived back into the water. That was over two hours before.

He was alive. Her stomach knotted and her smile grew wide. “You.”

He winked and lifted his hand to his head in a salute. “At your service.”

“Again.”

He held out his hand. “Chris Forrester.”

Angela grasped his hand as guilty heat, because she already knew his name, seared her cheeks. “Angela Taylor...and thank you.”

He kept hold of her hand and continued to stare, his gaze wandering languidly over her face as though they were alone, rather than surrounded by hundreds of panicked holidaymakers. The nonsensical notion to kiss him leaped into her mind and she laughed.

“Well, we can’t stand around here all day.” She slowly pulled her trembling hand from his. “I assume you’re the man to help me rip off a roof.”

He blinked and his smile reappeared like a breaking sun. “Absolutely.”

He moved to stand beside her. His damp T-shirt clung to his biceps and stretched taut across his shoulders. Angela snatched her gaze toward the expectant crowd, unease rolling through her stomach. Unease because of her reaction to him. Unease that somehow or another this man had caught her interest...attracted her.

She clapped her hands. “Okay, anyone else?”

One by one, more men joined them until there were eight or nine of them working side by side to find a way to get the stockroom roof peeled off. Angela risked a final look in Chris’s direction. He had his back to her, gesturing toward the roof, clearly taking control of his new mission.

She turned away. Was she seriously ogling the man when he was trying to get food and drink for everyone? Embarrassment swept through her.

She’d concentrate on where she was needed...even if the temptation to stay near Chris burned hot inside her.

She weaved her way back among the crowds, offering words of encouragement and reassurance to the elderly and young alike. Parents seemed calmer, cradling their children in their laps as they sat on the flat concrete roof. The area was sometimes used for barbecues and a place to sit at small bistro tables. Not today. Today, it was the only safe haven in an island of danger.

Angela looked to the sky. It was a sheet of clear blue above them. Yesterday the temperatures rose to the low nineties. People wouldn’t be cold for long. The midday heat would be the next challenge.

* * *

WITH SEVERAL OF the roof tiles smashed and cleared, Chris gripped the edge of the underlay. “On my count. One, two, three.”

He and the four men on either side of him heaved the heavy black material toward them. Their combined strength and adrenaline made easy work of what would normally have been a tough job. Chris smiled. It was like peeling back the lid of a sardine can. They’d made a four-by-four-foot hole.

“Well, just look at that.”

The man next to him clapped Chris on the shoulder. “It’s the equivalent of a damn candy store window to a group of sugar-hungry kids.”

Chris laughed. “I’ll get the lady in charge. We’d better not just throw ourselves down there. No matter how much I’d like to.”

He levered himself up and looked around for Angela. He didn’t have to look far. Even with her hair wet and dirty from the floodwater, there was no mistaking her among the crowd. Chris guessed her to be five feet five or six and with her clothes still damp and clinging to every curve of her body, there was no mistaking the woman had the figure of a catwalk model.

Letting out a low, appreciative whistle between clenched teeth, Chris shook his head and cupped his hands around his mouth.

“Miss Taylor? I need you.” I need you? What the hell did I say that for?

She turned. The way she stared and the soft quirk of her eyebrow made Chris feel like an infatuated teenager. He laughed. “I mean...you’re needed over here.”

She grinned and echoed his salute of earlier. He looked back into the stockroom before he could say or do anything else to make him look more stupid. The men around him peered over, too. The place was filled with bottled water, sodas and snacks just as she’d promised. The food and drink would bring at least some hope and serenity to a possibly explosive situation. Chris didn’t doubt that was exactly her intention.