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‘And being a blonde makes me dizzy?’ Her whole body was tingling with outrage and something else she chose not to identify. ‘You are the most chauvinistic, misogynistic, prejudiced male—’
‘And I like you, too.’ He smiled complacently and then turned to look at the ravine, totally dismissive of her words, his mind obviously working on the problem ahead. How to evacuate the boys.
‘Look.’ She took a deep breath and deliberately made her tone conciliatory. ‘I may be a woman but I do know these mountains and I can help—believe me.’
Judging from the look he gave her, he didn’t. ‘At a guess you’re five feet nothing and eight stone. The chances of you being able to deploy any muscle to save those guys down there is remote.’
‘Mountain rescue isn’t about muscle.’ Her fists clenched by her sides.
‘No?’ He tilted his head, his eyes hard. ‘Didn’t you say the water level is high at the moment? What if one of them has fallen into a dangerous position and needs to be moved to save his life? Good at lifting bulky teenagers, are you?’
Ally counted to ten. It wasn’t enough so she tried twenty. ‘Well, as you rightly said, someone needs to go for help, so once you give me a brief on their condition I’ll alert mountain rescue.’
With a short laugh he turned his attention back to the rope. ‘You’re not going anywhere. The wind is getting worse, the path is barely visible and you’re going down this mountain on your own over my dead body.’
Ally ground her teeth. The thought was actually quite attractive! ‘I came up it on my own.’
‘Ever heard the saying, Two wrongs don’t make a right?’ He tugged off a glove to get a better grip on what he was doing.
Ally ignored his tone and scanned the items he’d laid on the ground. ‘If you’re really planning to abseil down to them this isn’t the best place.’
He muttered something rude under his breath. ‘You’re trying to give me an abseiling lesson?’
‘Yes.’ She forced herself to hold his stare, refusing to be intimidated by his dry, forbidding tone. Obviously he thought she couldn’t teach him anything, and his arrogance made her grind her teeth in frustration. Except that something told her that, however difficult the abseil, this man would manage it. He was supremely confident, very fit and, judging from the equipment he was pulling out of his rucksack, he obviously knew exactly what he was doing. But he didn’t know the area like she did and it would be stupid to make the abseil more dangerous than it had to be.
‘Do it from further up the gully. There’s a six-metre waterfall directly beneath us and another one directly below that. It’s a double cascade and totally unclimbable unless it’s dry.’
He studied her in silence for a long moment, dark eyes narrowed. ‘You’re telling me you’ve abseiled into this ghyll?’
‘Amazing, isn’t it?’ Her voice was honey-sweet. ‘Even my blonde hair and blue eyes didn’t hold me back.’
He stared at her. ‘You’re saying you can abseil?’
She batted her eyelashes in a parody of a dumb blonde. ‘If I really concentrate hard I can even read and write.’
He grinned. ‘OK, OK. So maybe I jumped to conclusions—’
‘No, you?’ Ally gave him a pert look, picked up the rope and slammed it against his chest. ‘I know these mountains inside out and that ghyll is a death trap in weather like this. You need to be higher up. There are some flat rocks to the right of the falls. It’s safer there and your rope is less likely to get snagged. And for your information, I’m five feet five, not five feet—above average for a woman, actually. I just seem smaller because you’re tall. I weigh nine stone, and I may not have your volume of muscle but I’m extremely fit and more than capable of getting down this mountain in one piece and contacting the rescue services.’
Without waiting for his reply, she picked up his rucksack and trudged up the path, aware that he was close behind her.
‘Do it from here.’ She dumped his rucksack as far away from the edge as possible. ‘There’s a good place to anchor up there.’
He followed her gaze to a spiky rock above the path. ‘Are you an only child?’
Ally blinked, totally thrown by his question. ‘Sorry?’
‘You must be,’ he muttered under his breath, shaking his head and pulling a tape sling out of his rucksack.
‘Why?’ What was he talking about?
‘Because, having had you, no mother would have the nerve to put herself through the worry again,’ he said dryly. ‘Your exploits must have given her heart failure. So you must be an only child. Or the youngest.’
Ally grinned in spite of herself. ‘The youngest, actually. Shall I follow you down?’
‘Have you got a helmet?’
‘No.’
‘Then you’re staying here.’ His eyes gleamed. ‘Although, if you’ve spent your life being reckless, I don’t suppose this is exactly the time to reform you. But as you rightly said, one of us needs to go for help. If you’re sure you can do it without getting lost then that’s the best solution.’
‘Lost? Why should I get lost?’ Ally held onto her temper. Just. ‘Your opinion of women is appalling. Who on earth have you spent your life mixing with?’
‘You want a list?’ He gave her a wolfish grin and she could have bitten her tongue off. What a stupid thing to say. A man like him would have had women clawing each other to get at him since he could walk.
She changed the subject quickly, her voice crisp and businesslike. ‘You do know not to move a casualty unless it’s absolutely necessary?’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘You’d like to add a first-aid lesson to your abseiling lesson?’
She flushed. ‘I wasn’t being rude. It’s just that I’m a doctor and I thought that—’
‘A doctor?’ His eyes narrowed and she rolled her eyes.
‘Don’t tell me—you don’t think women should be doctors.’
‘Did I say that?’
He hadn’t, of course, and, judging from the strange light in his eyes, she had a nasty feeling that he was overplaying the chauvinism just to wind her up. And she was falling for it every time…
‘Just go and fetch the mountain rescue team and stop worrying.’ This time his tone was gentle. ‘I’m a doctor, too, so you can relax.’
Relax? He had to be kidding! She’d never be able to relax in his company in a million years! And he didn’t look like any doctor she’d ever met. He looked more like someone from the SAS.
She watched while he checked the anchor point once more and adjusted his helmet, before looping a rope around his body in classic abseiling style.
‘Ouch.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘Not the most comfortable way of doing it.’
‘You can say that again.’ He gave her a rueful smile. ‘Unfortunately, I didn’t come out fully equipped for abseiling.’
‘Will you be OK?’
‘Oh, yes.’ He gave a short laugh. ‘My youth was as misspent as yours.’
‘Well, be careful,’ she mumbled. ‘It’s a difficult abseil.’
‘I’ll manage.’ His eyes locked with hers. ‘Are you sure you can get down the mountain safely? It goes against my better judgement to let you go alone…’
She smiled sweetly. ‘Do us both a favour and leave your better judgement down there in the gully, will you?’
Why on earth did she find him so attractive? All he needed was a loincloth and he’d be the original Stone-Age man!
‘Are you this prejudiced against all women or is it just blondes?’
He gave her a slow, sexy grin that melted her irritation faster than ice cream in a microwave. ‘Don’t misunderstand me, I’ve always been a sucker for blondes. In the right place.’
‘And no doubt that’s chained to the kitchen sink at home.’
‘Barefoot and pregnant, you mean?’ His eyes gleamed wickedly. ‘Oh, no, sweetheart. If you were mine I wouldn’t waste you in the kitchen.’
If she were his—
For a moment Ally stared into those dark eyes, seduced by the blatant interest she saw there, and then she shook herself. She wasn’t his. She wasn’t interested. She had Charlie now and they got on fine together. Life might not be exciting, but it was stable and predictable and that was what she wanted.
‘Well, remind me to leave the bedroom window open so that you don’t get stuck delivering the box of Milk Tray,’ she snapped, determined not to show him how much he flustered her. His slow smile told her that her efforts were in vain. He knew all right.
‘Humour me. Sending a woman down a mountain alone in this weather offends my notions of chivalry.’ His eyes gleamed with appreciation. ‘Even if she has got guts.’
‘Well, chivalry isn’t going to save those boys,’ Ally pointed out briskly, pulling herself together rapidly and clicking her fingers at Hero, her dog, who bounded up eagerly. ‘I’ll wait while you abseil down.’
He gave a short nod and Ally tried not to look impressed as he went over the edge like a pro. There was no doubt that he knew what he was doing. He probably would have had heart failure if he’d seen the way she used to fling herself over the edge as a child. For several long minutes she hovered anxiously and then heard his voice, faint and muffled from deep down in the ghyll.
‘I’ve got them. One of them has fractured his clavicle but he seems fine otherwise. The other is unconscious with a nasty head injury, fractured tibia and maybe a few broken ribs, judging from the way he’s lying. Go as fast as you can but be careful!’
‘Will do,’ Ally yelled, whistling to the dog as she paced down the path as quickly as she felt was safe. Would she bring the team back in time?
* * *
It took two hours for her to return with the mountain rescue team and another hour for them to stretcher the two boys out of the ravine.
Ally’s eyes widened as she recognised the first of the casualties, his arm secured in a broad sling.
‘Andy? What on earth have you been doing?’
Despite his pallor, the boy coloured and looked thoroughly embarrassed.
‘Look, we’re really, really sorry, Dr McGuire…’
Ally made a soothing noise. Now wasn’t the time to tell him off. ‘Why weren’t you roped up?’
Andy closed his eyes and shook his head, wincing with the pain. ‘We didn’t think we needed to. We judged it all wrong.’
‘Well, you can say that again,’ muttered Jack Morgan, leader of the mountain rescue team, who was co-ordinating the rescue. He threw an exasperated look in the direction of the injured youngster. ‘Who’s the other boy?’
Andy shifted on the stretcher. ‘Pete. Pete Williams.’
‘Oh, no! Not Pete!’ Ally sprinted towards the edge of the ghyll to watch the second stretcher being lifted. She’d heard via the radio communications that the team had had trouble stabilising his injuries.
She’d known Pete for years. Ever since he’d first developed diabetes. Since then he’d devoted his short life to ignoring his diabetes and trying to prove he was no different from any other young teenager by getting into one scrape after another. And now he was seriously hurt. Her heart lurched and she mentally crossed her fingers as they lifted him up. Please, let him be OK. Please.
‘He’s in a bad way—we need the air support unit, really, but the weather’s too foul. We’ll have to carry him off.’ Jack helped steady the second stretcher as they lowered it onto the hard ground. He glanced at the man who had masterminded the rescue from the bottom of the ghyll and did a double take.
‘Nicholson?’ Wide-mouthed with shock, he pushed his helmet back, a look of delight spreading across his craggy features. ‘Damn, it is you! Sean, my boy, it’s good to see you!’
Ally frowned and braced herself against a sudden gust of wind. The mist was clearing but the wind was rising steadily. ‘You know him?’
Jack grinned. ‘I do indeed. Not that I was expecting to see him. When you told me that some macho idiot had abseiled into the ghyll, I was expecting to find another crazy tourist.’
‘Oh, thanks, Jack.’ Ally closed her eyes briefly, flushing as she heard her less than complimentary description fed back to her and caught Sean’s amused glance. Oh, well, at least he wasn’t offended.
‘So how are you, Sean?’ Jack was oblivious to her embar-rassment. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Being in the wrong place at the wrong time as usual,’ Sean muttered, wrenching off one of his gloves and checking the boy over again. ‘I didn’t know you were in charge of this lot now, Jack. This lad’s in a bad way. Nasty head injury—in and out of consciousness—fractured ribs and a compound fracture of his tibia—we splinted that down below.’
‘Right.’ Jack frowned as he looked at the boy lying on the stretcher. ‘Anything else?’
‘He’s wet through from the waterfall and heading for hypothermia. His right ankle’s gone—but he was climbing in trainers so that’s hardly surprising. At a guess that’s probably why he slipped. We’ve put him in a polythene survival bag but we need to get a line in and get him off this mountain fast.’
‘Trainers? In this weather?’ Jack shook his head and exchanged a look with Sean. ‘Nothing changes, does it? The mountains are still full of blithering idiots keeping us busy. Why on earth didn’t he stay at home and watch television?’
‘It’s Wednesday. Nothing on.’ Ted Wilson, the equipment officer, grinned wryly at his team-mates, his humour ever present even in an emergency.
Ally was on her knees beside the stretcher. ‘Pete? Pete, can you hear me?’
The boy lay still, his pallor frightening.
‘You know him?’ Sean was frowning down at her and stupidly she felt tears prick her eyes. Poor, poor Pete.
‘Yes.’ She cleared her throat. ‘He’s one of my patients.’
‘Local boys?’ Jack rolled his eyes and shook his head, his look of exasperation tempered by the worry in his eyes. ‘They should know better. It’s bad enough rescuing tourists without having to start on the locals as well.’
Ally wanted to tell them that Pete was just trying to prove himself but she couldn’t break a confidence so instead she mentioned the diabetes and then invested all her energy into doing what she could to save the boy. He groaned and opened his eyes, focusing with difficulty on the people around him.
‘It’s OK, Pete.’ Ally ripped off one glove and stroked his face gently with her slim, warm fingers, before checking his pulse. At least he was conscious. ‘You’ve hurt yourself, sweetheart, but we’ll soon sort you out.’
‘Big softy is our Ally. She ought to be reading him the riot act, not holding his hand,’ Jack murmured to Sean, before picking up the radio and issuing more orders.
‘S-sorry…’ Pete winced and coughed slightly, his face contorting with pain.
Ally frowned. She didn’t like the look of him one little bit. His lips were blue and his breathing was laboured and irregular. She glanced urgently up at Sean who was discussing the best way to carry the boys off the mountain.
‘Problems?’ In an instant he was crouched down next to her, the light-hearted banter of their previous encounter gone. The self-assurance was still there, but for some reason she found that oddly reassuring. She had a very bad feeling about young Pete.
‘I can’t—’ Pete took a jerky breath and then another, and his eyes bulged with panic.
‘It’s OK, Pete. Just try and relax,’ Ally soothed, jerking her head towards two of the team members who were hovering. ‘Let’s sit him up.’
Together they carefully lifted him into a sitting position so that he could breathe more easily and Ally looked at Sean. ‘Pneumothorax?’
