An irresistible attraction...

That won’t be denied!

Paramedic Cooper Sinclair’s carefully planned first day at New Zealand’s Aratika Rescue Base goes awry when he joins forces with fiery Felicity “Fizz” Wilson to rescue a car crash victim from the sea! The stunning adrenaline junkie should be off-limits to a brooding, guarded man like him, but her skill and vitality are undeniable. Cooper’s avoided love for so long, but can he ignore his attraction to Fizz?

ALISON ROBERTS is a New Zealander, currently lucky enough to be living in the South of France. She is also lucky enough to write for the Mills & Boon Medical Romance line. A primary school teacher in a former life, she is now a qualified paramedic. She loves to travel and dance, drink champagne, and spend time with her daughter and her friends.

Also by Alison Roberts

The Surrogate’s Unexpected Miracle

Sleigh Ride with the Single Dad

The Shy Nurse’s Rebel Doc

Rescued by Her Mr Right

Their Newborn Baby Gift

Twins on Her Doorstep

Rescued Hearts miniseries

The Doctor’s Wife for Keeps

Twin Surprise for the Italian Doc

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk.

Resisting Her Rescue Doc

Alison Roberts

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-08986-9

RESISTING HER RESCUE DOC

© 2019 Alison Roberts

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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Version: 2020-03-02

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Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

HOW ANNOYING WAS THIS?

Apart from a large motorbike that forced its way down the centre of the road, traffic on this coastal route into New Zealand’s capital city, Wellington, had suddenly slowed and then come to a complete halt for no obvious reason.

Cooper Sinclair was due to meet his colleagues at the city’s rescue helicopter base in just over an hour before he started his new job there tomorrow. He had, of course, planned for any contingencies that could have delayed his arrival, but that window of time had been used up by a flat tyre way back near Lake Taupo in the middle of the north island. A few minutes later, when the traffic showed no signs of beginning to move again, he followed the example of someone he could see nearer the brow of this hill, who was getting out of his car to try and find out what was going on.

‘What’s happening?’ he called.

‘Accident,’ the stranger yelled back. ‘Someone’s driven off the road and gone down the bank just on the other side of this hill.’

The ‘bank’, from what Cooper could see, was more like a small cliff with a rocky beach at the bottom of the steep slope. From the top of this hill, or just over its brow, it could have been a drop of over fifteen metres and a vehicle landing on a hard surface like that from even a much smaller distance could be badly damaged with its occupants in real trouble. Turning swiftly, Cooper opened the back of his SUV to extract a small backpack. He tossed his keys to the stranger he’d been speaking to as he ran past.

‘Get someone to move my car off the road if it’s needed,’ he said. ‘I’m a paramedic. I’m going to see if I can help.’

‘Good on ya, mate.’ The stranger nodded. ‘I’ll keep an eye on your car.’

A small crowd was gathering on the side of the road and, as Cooper got closer, he could see why some people were looking so shocked. The car must have gone off the road with some speed to have buckled and then broken through the metal safety barrier like that. It had careened down the steep bank, carving a path through the undergrowth, and had come to rest, teetering on a low outcrop of rocks with waves breaking around it.

He might not be on duty but it was automatic for Cooper to go into scene assessment mode. To be looking for what extra help was going to be needed and what apparent dangers there were for any responding crews—and the public.

‘Stand back,’ he told people as he moved through the crowd. ‘The edge of this bank doesn’t look that stable. Has anyone called the emergency services?’

‘I think an ambulance is on its way,’ someone told him.

Cooper pulled out his own phone to punch in the three-digit emergency number. They needed more than an ambulance here. Police would be needed to control traffic and spectators. The fire service was needed urgently to stabilise this car with winch lines or something to prevent it getting dislodged by the waves and ending up completely underwater. Even if there were injured people inside the vehicle, it was too dangerous for anyone to try and approach it until it could be secured somehow. Would the hooks and lines from the fire trucks be enough? Maybe they needed to get a crane on the way...

His assessment and planning came to a crunching halt as he got through the rest of the crowd to get a completely clear view of the bottom of the bank. He didn’t even finish dialling the emergency services number.

‘Hey...’ he yelled as loudly as he could. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’

‘She just took off down there,’ someone said from behind him. ‘Seemed like she knew what she was doing...’

‘She’s mad,’ Cooper muttered, staring down at the lone figure on the rocky foreshore a good ten metres beneath him.

The tall, slim woman was standing on top of a rock, a short distance from where the car was teetering on other rocks. She was wearing rolled-up jeans and sneakers, and a white T-shirt that was knotted on one side. Right now, her arms were in the air and she was swiftly winding long dark hair into a knot that she somehow secured easily onto the top of her head. Then she leaned forward, holding her arms out to balance herself, obviously looking for a place to step that would take her closer to the car.

‘Oi...’ Cooper’s shout was even louder this time and he was moving as he made the sound. ‘Get back...’

Sure enough, the ground was crumbling on the edge of the drop and he started a slide that was barely controlled as he aimed for a shrub that had branches big enough to hold his weight. Then he climbed over some rocks and kept going, faster than he knew was safe but he had to get down the bank and into a position where he could stop this crazy bystander from creating yet another problem for the emergency services when they arrived on scene. On top of being concerned about the woman’s well-being, he was not happy that he was being forced to put himself in danger like this. As soon as he could, he yelled again.

‘Stay where you are. Wait...’

She took absolutely no notice of him. With a nimble leap, she landed on another rock and then steadied herself as a wave washed over her feet. Then she moved again to land within reaching distance of the back door of the crashed car. That was when Cooper saw what she was focused on—a small face in the window of that door—a child who looked no more than a couple of years old. He saw her grab the handle of the door and try to open it, almost losing her balance as a larger wave curled around her legs. The door didn’t open.

Nobody else was following Cooper down the bank. For a few seconds, when he reached the bottom, he lost sight of what the woman was doing as he scrambled over the rocks closest to the base of the cliff but then reached the point where she had been when he’d first seen her and he had a clear view of what she was up to. She had managed to open the driver’s door and he could see the shape of an adult slumped forward, apparently unconscious. The rescuer tilted the person’s head back to open the airway, which told Cooper that she did, at least, have some idea of what she was doing, but she didn’t pause to do anything else in the way of assessment or treatment for the driver. She slid her arm between the front seat and the back door, twisting her body to enable her to reach the lock, and both the confidence and elegance of her movements kept Cooper standing on his rock, simply watching.

She got the back door open and must have released a safety belt that allowed her to scoop up the small child who was now screaming with terror.

‘Mummy... Mummy...’

The woman was saying something that Cooper couldn’t hear as she wrapped her arms around the child and turned, looking down to choose both her stepping point and a moment when a new wave was not about to break. Cooper moved at the same time, his long stride taking him to the next outcrop of rocks. Someone needed to see what was going on with the child’s mother and to try and get her out of the car if it was possible to do so without it being too risky. It wasn’t something he would want to try on his own, so it was a relief to hear the sound of sirens getting louder on the road above them. He would make sure this woman and the kid got back safely to shore and then come back to plan the next steps that could be taken the moment the first crews got down the bank.

To his surprise, he found the child being shoved into his arms by the woman. There was nothing he could do but take hold of it.

‘Take her,’ she said. ‘I’ve got to go back.’

‘No... It’s not safe,’ Cooper told her. ‘Wait for the firies. That car’s not stable.’

‘That car has a baby in the back seat,’ she snapped. ‘Keep yourself safe. I’ve got a job to do, here.’

Cooper was left staring at her back, his jaw slack. He was the person who should be doing whatever was needed here. He had years of experience as an advanced paramedic. Qualifications in scene management and dealing with unusual and dangerous situations just like this. Who was this woman? And what was it about her that made him feel as if she really was the person in charge, here? Did it have anything to do with that hint of something like a grin she’d thrown over her shoulder as she’d turned away from him? Or that he was sure he’d heard her say ‘Trust me... I know what I’m doing...’?

The toddler in his arms wriggled and screamed so he held her tightly and carried her carefully out of the water. He could see uniformed fire officers making their way down the bank where a ladder was being positioned. He could also see that the fire truck had been parked so that the winch gear at the back could be deployed. It was going to take a lot more than wedges or chocks to stabilise a car that was rocking on its perch with every wave. There was no sign of an ambulance crew yet. One of the fire officers reached the water’s edge at the same time as Cooper. He held his arms out to take the child.

‘Is she injured?’

‘Haven’t checked. Her airway’s certainly clear.’ And children who were crying that loudly were generally not badly injured. It was more likely to be the quiet ones you had to worry about. ‘Are there any medics on scene yet?’

‘Not yet. Traffic’s snarled up badly for miles. They’ll deploy a chopper soon, if it’s needed.’ The fire officer stared past Cooper. ‘How many others are in the car, do you know?’

‘Apparently there’s a baby in the back. There’s a crazy woman who’s trying to get her out.’ Cooper turned his head but all he could see was an undeniably shapely, denim-clad bottom poking out of the back door of the car. Wriggling, as she moved backwards and then turned, a baby’s car seat in her arms.

‘Good grief...is that Fizz?’ Another fire officer had joined his senior colleague and was shading his eyes against the glint of the afternoon sun on the sea, trying to assess what they were about to deal with.

‘Trust her to be first on the scene.’ The older fireman shook his head, heading into the water to help rescue the baby. ‘Why doesn’t it even surprise me?’

‘Fizz?’ This was getting even weirder, Cooper decided. Who had a name like some sort of party drink?

‘She’s an ED doc,’ he was told. ‘But give her a chance to get out in an ambulance or helicopter and she’s in, boots ’n all. Everybody in this business knows Fizz.’ His tone was admiring. ‘Don’t worry, she knows what she’s doing.’ But he was watching the handover of the baby seat to the fire officer. ‘Uh-oh...’

‘Oh, no...’ Cooper couldn’t believe what he was seeing. There were experts on scene now. Equipment to make any further rescue attempts a lot safer. This woman with the odd name and an unbelievable attitude had already saved two children but it seemed that that wasn’t enough. She was heading back to the car yet again.

‘Fizz!’ the younger fire officer yelled. ‘Hold your horses. We need to get a cable onto that car, at least.’

Either she didn’t hear him or—and this seemed more likely to Cooper by now—she was choosing not to hear him. He wasn’t the only person to be appalled by her recklessness and, as he automatically moved to try and prevent another casualty, he found himself part of a group of rescue workers, armed with ropes and tools and protective clothing. There were police officers here now, as well as the fire crews, but he still couldn’t see any paramedics arriving.

‘Stay back, mate,’ one of them told him. ‘This isn’t a spectator sport.’

‘I’m a paramedic,’ Cooper replied. ‘With specialty training in disaster and scene management.’

And this looked like it was about to become a disaster, on a small scale, anyway. A wave large enough to reach his waist rolled in and one of the firemen lost his footing. The crashed car also lost its grip on the rocks beneath it, tipping and then sliding sideways with a chilling, metallic screech. A second wave rolled right over the top of its roof.

Where was that adrenaline junkie emergency department doctor?

Cooper couldn’t see her anywhere and, just for a heartbeat, he was aware of something that felt like...grief?

He didn’t even know this woman and she had taken stupid risks here, so if she was injured or had been killed—perhaps knocked out and then pinned underwater by the car—everybody would know it was her own fault but...

But how incredible a person was she? Cooper had met a lot of courageous people in his lifetime, both as his colleagues and amongst the patients he had treated, but this woman stood out as being something quite astonishing. Fearless. Concerned only about people other than herself.

Or maybe it was something much deeper than that. Much darker. A flashback to a moment in time he could never undo and would never forgive himself for. A moment that he could have used to try harder to stop someone doing something foolhardy. A moment that could have meant he wouldn’t have lost the person who’d been everything to him.

A chain of people was in the water now and a plastic basket stretcher was being carried towards where the car had settled, but Cooper was ahead of them and he could see that the driver’s door had stayed open as the car had been washed sideways. He could see movement as the foam of a wave cleared. The doctor was still alive...but she was inside the vehicle and it looked like she was struggling to release the catch of the safety belt.

Cooper had a cutting device on his multi-tool that was in a pocket of the first-aid kit he kept in the small backpack but he’d left that back on the beach before he’d climbed that first rock. Because he’d known he wouldn’t be able to treat anybody until they were out of the sea. Not that he spared more than a split second of thought to how useful that device would be right now. In fact, he wasn’t thinking anything particularly coherent. If he had been, he’d never have done what he did right then, which was to take a deep breath, reach down to take hold of the car door and pull himself beneath the surface of the water.

It was useful to have the outline of the door as a guide because it took more than a second to be able to see past the sting of salt water in his eyes. And it kept him from being washed away by the swirling current of the waves coming past. The car was more stable now than it had been on top of the rocks but it was still moving. How long had it been since the first wave had rolled over its roof and started to fill the interior? How long had it been since this mysterious woman had taken a breath of her own? Her hair had come undone from its knot and was now floating around her head, making her look like a mermaid and probably obscuring her vision as she wrestled with the seat-belt catch.

Cooper caught her hand and pushed it away from the catch. Then he held the bottom and felt for the release button. Pressing it down hard didn’t seem to be enough, so he held the button down with one hand and took hold of the upper part of the strap with his other hand and pulled. Hard.

He felt the driver of the car slump towards him as the belt was released and he caught her under her armpits, pulling her free of the vehicle and then pushing up through the water. He just had to hope that she didn’t have any kind of spinal injury but there was no way she could have been left in the car long enough for a more careful extrication process because she would have drowned.

He wasn’t even sure that she was breathing now as he lifted her head clear of a breaking wave but there were others taking over. Taking the woman from his arms and putting her into the rescue basket to carry her towards the shore. Beside him, his fellow rescuer had already emerged from beneath the surface and she was dragging in great gulps of air as she tried to catch her breath.

‘Thanks...’ she managed. ‘I was having a...bit of trouble...there.’

Not that she looked at all bothered by the fact that her ‘bit of trouble’ could have actually put them both in danger. She wasn’t looking directly at him, either, as she pushed her hair back from her face and swiftly braided it to get it under control but he could see that her whole face had a glow about it—as if it had been so exciting, she’d do it all over again in a heartbeat.

Wow...there was something inspirational in that kind of passion. But Cooper had always known that, hadn’t he? She reminded him of...

No. He wasn’t about to go there. Even the nudge in that direction was discomforting, which was probably why his tone was distinctly sharp when he spoke again.

‘It’s lucky I didn’t have to rescue you as well,’ he said. ‘I can’t believe you did that.’

The reprimand in his tone was wasted on her. She didn’t seem to even be listening. She was watching the progress of the fire officers who were carrying the driver back to shore.

‘I need to see if she’s okay.’ She started moving. ‘I’m just hoping...she didn’t start drowning while I was fiddling with that belt.’

‘There was still some air in there, between waves.’ Cooper automatically reached out as the woman beside him stumbled on a rock. To his surprise, she caught his hand and held it as they both made their way back to shore as quickly as they could. His brain registered how that wet T-shirt was clinging to her body and he knew that image was going to resurface at a later, and less inappropriate, moment.

They were both soaking wet and should have been freezing given the water temperature and the slight breeze adding a chill factor but, oddly, the only thing that made Cooper realise he might be cold was the extraordinary warmth of that hand he was holding. It wasn’t until she let go, as they leapt out of the last wash of the waves, that he started to shiver.

The toddler and the baby in the car seat were nowhere to be seen so they must have been taken up the bank already. Perhaps the police officers on scene were caring for them in the warmth of one of their vehicles. They needed to get the female driver into shelter as well but it looked as if she wasn’t stable enough for what would have to be a slow journey up the steep slope.

He watched Fizz crouch beside the woman. She had her cheek near the victim’s face and a hand on her abdomen. ‘She’s breathing...just.’ She looked past the group of fire officers nearby. ‘Doesn’t look like we’ve got an ambulance on scene yet, does it?’

‘No.’ Cooper could see his own backpack not that far away. ‘But I’m a paramedic. I’ve got a kit. I’ll grab a stethoscope, shall I?’

It was the first really direct look he had received from her. She had brown eyes, he noticed. Really dark orbs that were assessing him with lightning speed.

‘Get my kit, too, would you?’ she said. ‘It’s over there on top of that flat rock.’

Cooper moved instantly. It felt as if he’d passed an unspoken test of some kind, he realised as he grabbed both backpacks and turned back. Not that it should have made any difference at all to this situation but instinct told him that it would not be an easy thing to gain this woman’s approval. Absurdly, Cooper actually felt a beat of pride in himself that he was being accepted as a temporary colleague.

* * *

He was a big bear of a man, this unexpected assistant that she had. Well over six feet in height and broad-shouldered.

Felicity Wilson believed that he was what he said he was. He’d clearly known what he was doing when he’d taken over getting this woman out of her crashed car and the way he’d told her to stay back until the car could be secured safely was pretty much what most people in the emergency services would have told her.

How could anybody have stood back when you could see that tiny face in the window, though? And yeah... Fizz knew she had a bit of an issue with impulsiveness when it came to dangerous situations but how good did it feel when taking that risk actually worked?

It would feel even better if she could make sure the mother of those children made it out of this disaster alive.

He had big hands as well, this man, but they were clever and nimble. He was opening pockets within the backpacks and extracting all the kinds of things that were going to be needed. Fizz stole the occasional glance as she looked up from doing a rapid primary survey on her patient, who was groaning but not conscious enough to open her eyes or speak to them coherently. She lay in the plastic rescue basket the fire service had provided.

Currently, those officers were setting up a canvas wind shield around them and watching what was happening. Two of them had taken off their heavy jackets and had passed them to the medics. Fizz felt swamped by the size of the garment but she wasn’t about to let it hamper her movements.

‘I’d put her GCS at less than ten. She’s tachycardic at one twenty-four,’ she told the man helping to stabilise her patient. ‘Tachypnoeic with a respiration rate of thirty-two and... I’m not sure I’m getting any breath sounds on the left side. Hard to tell with the noise of the waves.’

‘Pneumothorax?’ The fire-service jacket looked like it was the perfect size for this man. And he looked as if he was well used to a uniform and the authority it conveyed. He had found the small oxygen cylinder in a side pocket of her first-aid kit and was attaching a mask. ‘Is she hypoxic?’

‘Let’s get some oxygen on.’ Fizz nodded. ‘Got some shears?’ She cut at the woman’s clothing when he placed the tool in her hands and then slipped the elastic of the oxygen mask around their patient’s head to keep it in place.

‘Look at that...’ The marks of deep bruising from the seat-belt injury were already visible in dark red patches. Fizz palpated the side of the woman’s chest. ‘Definitely some rib fractures.’

Her partner had his fingers on the woman’s neck. ‘Carotid pulse palpable but weak,’ he told her. ‘Looks like her jugular venous pressure is raised, too.’

Fizz nodded. She could see the veins on the neck were visibly distended. She needed to have another listen to the chest and to check whether the tracheal line was deviated, which could confirm that air trapped in the woman’s chest was developing into the emergency that a tension pneumothorax represented.

Her partner was setting up for an IV, she noticed. He had his own roll that contained cannulas, alcohol wipes, Luer plugs and tape. He also had a litre of saline and a giving set ready to go. And he’d got a blood-pressure cuff on their patient’s arm already.

‘Blood pressure’s eighty-five over fifty,’ he told her. ‘Can’t see any external bleeding. I’ll check that her pelvis is stable in a tick.’

Fizz nodded but didn’t say anything for a moment. She had her stethoscope on her patient’s chest. Right side then left side. Yes...she was sure there were no breath sounds on the left but was it air or blood that was stopping the lung functioning?

‘I’m missing my ED ultrasound,’ she muttered.

‘The portable ones we carry in the ambulance now are great. Love them.’

She gave him a glance that probably looked startled but she knew that it was only the most highly trained paramedics that got to use equipment like portable ultrasound machines or ventilators. This guy not only knew what he was doing but he was very likely to be very good at it as well. It only took the briefest eye contact but she knew that he could tell exactly what she was thinking. His gaze was steady.

I am good at what I do, it told her. You can trust me...

‘What’s your name?’

‘Cooper. Cooper Sinclair.’

He wasn’t local. Fizz would have noticed this man amongst all the emergency services personnel she had worked with in the last few years. Noticed and remembered him. It wasn’t just his size that made him stand out. He had a strong Scottish accent. Not that where he came from or why he was here was of any interest to her right now.

‘What do you need there, Doc?’ A senior fire officer had come close. ‘Ambulance is just arriving on scene now but it’ll take them a minute or two to get their gear down the cliff. They want me to ask you what you need.’

‘The usual,’ Fizz responded. ‘Life pack, oxygen and the kit. I’d like to get her airway secured before we move her.’

‘Her name’s Sonya Greene. We got her bag out of the car and found her driver’s licence. She’s thirty-two years old.’

The same age as she was. With two very young children. ‘Somebody tracing next of kin?’

‘Cops are onto it. I’ll go and help get that gear down to you.’

‘You going to intubate?’ Cooper asked as the fire officer stepped back, talking into his radio.

‘I’ll need to decompress the chest before intubating.’

He nodded. ‘Positive pressure ventilation could make a pneumothorax a lot worse.’

‘I think it’s getting worse, anyway. Does that look like tracheal deviation to you?’

His head came very close to her own as he leaned over to get into a position to be able to see the line of their patient’s neck and chest. Fizz could feel his body heat, which struck her as odd because she knew how cold they both had to be, despite the thick jackets over their wet clothes. She made a note in the corner of her brain that they should probably wrap some foil sheets around themselves at the first opportunity. But she wasn’t going to mention it just yet. Somehow, she knew that this Cooper was not going to be any more interested in his own protection from hypothermia at the moment than she was.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Tension pneumothorax?’

‘That’s what I’m thinking.’

The new medics on scene arrived moments later.

‘Want me to get an IV in, Fizz?’ one of the paramedics asked.

‘We’re good for the moment. You’ve got that, haven’t you, Cooper?’

‘Yep.’

It was someone else’s turn to look startled. Fizz gave him a brief nod. ‘Cooper here is an advanced paramedic, Jack,’ she told the new arrival. ‘I was lucky he was here. We nearly didn’t get to save this woman. And right now, I need to decompress her chest and I want to do a finger thoracostomy rather than a needle decompression. Can you draw up some local?’ She looked at the second crew member. ‘Could you get the monitor on, please? I’d like to know what her oxygen and CO2 levels are.’

All four of them were kept very busy for the next fifteen minutes but Fizz was satisfied that it was safe to transport their patient by that point. The chest decompression had dealt with the breathing emergency and both the pulse and breathing rate had dropped to an acceptable level. Blood pressure was coming up and the airway was controlled.

‘Good job.’ She nodded, as the paramedics secured their patient in the basket for the journey up the steep bank. ‘I’ll come with you in the ambulance and get a police officer to get my car back into town.’

There were plenty of fire officers ready to help lift the basket stretcher and pass it up the chain of people on the bank. Fizz shoved things back into her pack and zipped it shut. She could tidy and restock it at the hospital. Cooper was collecting his own kit.

‘Thanks for your help,’ she told him. ‘Couldn’t have done it without you.’

‘It was a pleasure.’ Cooper smiled at her and, to her surprise, Fizz found her breath actually catching in her throat.

Wow...that was some smile...

‘Yeah...thanks, mate.’ Jack, the paramedic, was slipping the straps of his large pack over his shoulders. ‘You here on holiday or something?’

‘No. I’m actually starting work here tomorrow. At the Aratika Rescue Base?’

‘Oh, wow...choppers?’

‘And the rest.’ Cooper’s shrug was modest. ‘Coastguard work. Police operations. Specialist Emergency Response Team stuff.’

The glance Jack threw over his shoulder, as he went to catch up with the progress of the stretcher, was impressed.

Fizz had to admit she was pretty impressed herself. The members of that team on the rescue base were an elite group of people. She’d love to be an official, full-time member of that team herself but she loved her hospital work too much to give it up. Right now, she had arranged her life to give her the best of both worlds, by devoting her spare time away from ED shifts to the base and she got to work with some amazing people in both arenas.

It looked as if a new and very interesting person had just arrived in one of her worlds.

‘Guess I’ll be seeing you around,’ she told Cooper. ‘I try to be available to help on as many shifts as I can with the base.’

‘Good to know,’ he said. ‘I’ll be able to find out the end of this story. I hope it’s a happy ending.’

‘I specialise in happy endings wherever possible.’ Fizz threw him a grin as she headed towards the bank. The stretcher was more than halfway up already. They would be on the road and heading for the biggest emergency department in the area within a few minutes.

She turned her head once more as she stepped onto the first rung of the ladder that was now secured to the bank.

Cooper wasn’t that far behind her.

‘Hey,’ he called.

‘What?’

‘Just wanted to say that your name suits you. See you around, Fizz.’

She didn’t say anything in response. She didn’t look back again as she climbed to road level and then into the back of the ambulance. It was time to put the big, Scottish paramedic right out of her mind and focus on keeping her patient stable until they reached the hospital and got her to Theatre, if necessary, as quickly as possible to sort out that chest injury.

Fizz knew she would see him around sooner or later.

Hopefully, it would be sooner...

CHAPTER TWO

‘IT’S A FANTASTIC LOCATION.’

Cooper was standing in front of the glass wall that made up this central, third-floor office area of the Aratika Rescue Base. He could see the helipad directly below them with people working around two bright yellow aircraft. It looked as if one of the helicopters was being refuelled and someone—presumably a pilot—was walking around the other one, doing a detailed external check.

‘They’re Kawasaki BK117s, yes?’

‘With every bell and whistle you could wish for.’ Aratika’s manager, Don Smith, sounded proud. ‘We’ve got a backup Squirrel in case both the BKs are out at the same time and there’s no way of getting to another job by road or sea, but that’s actually never happened during my time here.’ He rapped his knuckles on the window sill. ‘Touch wood. If I needed saving I’d want it to be a BK showing up. They’re awesome rescue aircraft.’

‘They’re exactly what we used at the base in Scotland. Love working in them.’

‘You’ll be very familiar with the layout, then, which is a bonus. How many years have you got under your belt now? Ten?’

‘Close enough. I got into helicopter work as soon as I could after I graduated as a paramedic. It was always my burning ambition. Ever since I saw a crew at work when I was a teenager, up in a mountain range in Scotland.’

But it hadn’t been the overwhelming relief of seeing the helicopter arrive at that accident scene that had instilled an unwavering determination to be like the members of that crew. It hadn’t even been the astonishingly technical level of care that had been provided for the victim of that horrendous fall that had made him feel like he was in an episode of some high drama medical television series. No...what had stayed with Cooper and made him so determined to be like those heroes had been the way he had been cared for. The absolute compassion in the way they had done their best to support him as he’d dealt with the horror of his brother’s death and the respect they had shown to both himself and to Connor—even after they knew there was nothing more they could do for him.

‘And you’ve added a string of other accomplishments as well.’ Don’s words cut into the memory that had flashed into his mind. ‘I have to say your CV was pretty impressive. Urban and Land Search and Rescue qualifications, with mountain experience. Disaster management. Coastguard training...’

Cooper shrugged modestly. ‘I like to keep busy. And I like the challenge of learning new stuff. Or being in a new environment—and from what I’ve seen of New Zealand so far, it’s got a lot to offer.’

He knew how impressive his CV was but there was a downside to the kind of ambition that had driven him to achieve so much in his career already. It came from a single-minded devotion to that career that had meant there’d been no room for anything else in his life. Here he was in his mid-thirties—all of twenty years since his determination to be the best rescue worker ever had been conceived—and there’d been nothing to hold him back from shifting his life to the other side of the world for a fresh and interesting challenge.

No long-term relationship to consider. No family ties that were binding. No desire for family ties like that, for that matter. Cooper Sinclair lived for his work and, yeah...the downside was that it could be lonely sometimes, but he wouldn’t have that impressive CV or be as good at this job as he knew his references recorded if he’d let a personal life interfere with where he was heading. Or maybe that should be where he’d already arrived. Was that why he’d come in search of new challenges in a new country? Because he’d been running out of ideas of how to take his skill set to an even higher level?

He shifted his gaze to a parking area off to one side of the helipad, where there were four-wheel drive emergency vehicles, huge command centre trucks and even rescue service motorbikes parked.

‘You’re well equipped to respond by road. And did I read that you take charge of any major incidents?’

Don nodded. ‘We get dispatched to work with police and the fire service as command for any multiple casualty incidents or disasters. We also have single-crewed vehicles available at all times for first response if the local ambulance service is overloaded or they need advanced paramedic assistance for patient care. Those staff members are in addition to the helicopter crews. That’s where we’re starting you off for orientation.’

Cooper’s eyebrows rose even though he tilted his head to acknowledge the challenge. But Don smiled.

‘Don’t worry. We’re not throwing you in the deep end by yourself just yet. You’ll be double-crewed until you are comfortable with protocols and destinations, etcetera. In fact...’ Don checked his watch. ‘Let’s head downstairs. Shift changeover will be happening and there’ll be a good crowd to introduce you to, including the guy who’s going to be crewed with you for the moment. I expect they’ll all be having breakfast right now.’

‘Sounds great.’ Cooper took one more look at the stunning view of Wellington harbour in front of him with the skyline of the city visible to one side, past the cranes and ships of a busy port and rugged, forest-covered hills in the distance to the other side. ‘I still can’t get over this view,’ he said as he followed his new manager. ‘You must have one of the best offices in the world.’

‘Can’t complain,’ Don agreed. ‘But this location was chosen for more than the view it gives us upstairs. It provides the fastest access to pretty much everywhere we need to go. We’ve got a straight run into the central city, or over to the west coast, we’ve got the coastguard base two minutes away when they need a medic, and if we’re heading to the mountains or further north, the choppers just head straight for those hills, which is well away from the flight paths for the airport. That’s where the name came from. Aratika means a direct, or straight, path in Maori.’

‘Great name.’ Cooper let the door swing shut on the view behind him.

There was an enticing smell of frying bacon coming from the kitchen area of the staffroom on the second floor of this big, modern building and, due to the change of a night shift to a day shift, there was a large enough group of people to present a challenge in remembering all the names coming at Cooper. Paramedics, pilots, ground crew, which included mechanics and people that serviced and restocked gear—even an older woman who seemed to have the role of a housekeeper—Shirley. It was Shirley who was cooking the bacon at the moment.

‘Welcome to Aratika,’ she said to Cooper, with a warm smile. ‘Can I interest you in a bacon sandwich?’

‘Thanks...maybe later.’ Cooper wasn’t ready to relax enough to eat yet but everybody here seemed just as welcoming as Shirley, so far. It was disconcerting, a moment after thinking that, to find someone staring at him, their jaw dropping.

‘No way...’ He looked back at the newspaper spread on the table in front of him, flipping back to the front page.

‘That’s Joe,’ Don told him. ‘He’s the one you’ll be double-crewing with until you’re comfortable with how things work around here. Joe? This is Cooper Sinclair.’

‘And unless he’s got an identical twin brother...’ Joe looked up again as he got to his feet. ‘I’ve been looking at a picture of what you were getting up to yesterday afternoon. You just couldn’t wait to get to work, huh?’

‘Oh?’ Cooper’s smile froze halfway. It was a just a throwaway comment on behalf of his new colleague. There was no was Joe could know that he’d touched a deep nerve.

That Cooper had had an identical twin brother...

Joe gestured at the newspaper. ‘You’re a hero already.’

Cooper hadn’t seen any newspapers yet today. Or any television last night, for that matter. By the time he’d got through the traffic jam the accident had created and located the central city hotel that would be home until he found something more permanent, he’d been too wrecked to do anything but sort out his wet clothing, find something to eat and then crash for the night. At least he’d been able to contact Don and apologise for missing his orientation meeting at the base and it had been a relief to find that his new manager hadn’t been fazed.

‘Tomorrow’s another day,’ he’d said. ‘Can’t fault you for getting involved in an accident scene. Would have been disappointed if you hadn’t.’

Joe was looking just as laid back as he held out his hand. ‘Good to meet you, Cooper. Look forward to working with you.’

Cooper shook his hand. ‘Likewise.’

Don was reaching for the paper. ‘Front page? Oh... Nice photo...’

Someone had taken it from the top of the cliff with a good zoom lens. There he was, with that crying toddler in his arms, facing back towards the shore. Just a little out of focus in the background behind him, he could see Fizz heading back to where the car was teetering on the rocks, a splash of foam catching the sunlight dramatically in mid-air like a halo around both the vehicle and the woman.

‘Looks like you were enjoying yourself, mate.’ One of the pilots had stepped closer to look over Don’s shoulder.

‘I wouldn’t say that, exactly,’ Cooper murmured, but he had to admit there was a hint of something other than professional concern in his expression and he knew why as well.

That had been the moment when he’d been processing the way Fizz had dismissed his bid of taking charge of the situation. When she’d turned back to go and get the baby. When she’d cracked a version of what had become an old joke—Trust me... I’m a doctor... He’d been gobsmacked but undeniably impressed. Maybe that was the reason for that hint of a lopsided smile on his face and yes...it did look as if it could be interpreted as him getting an enormous amount of satisfaction out of what he was doing. It was just as well, he thought, that the picture hadn’t been taken a bit later, when they’d been holding hands as they’d hopped rocks to get back to shore—their wet clothes plastered against their skin.

He’d been right about that particular image coming back to haunt him. It had happened when he’d stood for a long time under the spray of that very welcome hot shower. It had come back with even more punch when he’d slid, naked, between the crisp sheets of his bed. If she ever got tired of being some kind of action woman, Fizz could probably easily get a job as a model. Tall and slim but with curves in all the right places. That long dark hair, dark eyes and olive skin that made him think she could have Mediterranean ancestry. Greek or Italian, maybe?

‘I heard about that job. I was in the ED when it came in.’

Cooper turned towards the speaker, relieved to have his runaway thoughts reined in so abruptly. It was a petite woman with blonde hair who was about his own age. What was her name again? Oh, yeah... Maggie.

‘Do you know if the patient was still stable on arrival? I think her name was Sonya. And if the kids were okay?’

‘Yep.’ Maggie nodded. ‘I was around for a while. I’d gone in with a kid from up north who was in status asthmaticus and I wanted to hang around until he was stable. I’m pretty sure the kids were fine. They got checked out and there were relatives to take care of them, including their father from what I gathered. They put a chest drain in the mother, took off about a litre of blood and fluid, gave her a blood transfusion and then took her off to Theatre. I don’t know what they needed to do to patch her up, though. You can ask Fizz next time she’s here. She went with her to Theatre.’

‘Fizz?’ Someone else, a bacon sandwich in hand, paused to peer at the picture. ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake...that’s her in the background, isn’t it?’

‘She was the first on scene,’ Cooper said. ‘I was yelling at her to stay back until the car could be stabilised but she didn’t take a blind bit of notice.’

‘Sounds like Fizz.’ But Joe was grinning. ‘You’ll find she behaves better when she’s in uniform.’ His grin broadened. ‘Sometimes.’

The familiarity in his tone gave Cooper an odd beat of something he didn’t want to try and identify but could be related to envy, perhaps? Just how well did Joe know Fizz? And why was he even wondering about whether she was single or not? For heaven’s sake, he’d only just arrived in a new city to start a new job and a new life. Hooking up with someone hadn’t even entered his head as part of his immediate agenda. To contemplate the remote possibility of hooking up with someone he’d only spent a matter of minutes with, not to mention someone who’d pretty much ignored him to start with, who’d bossed him around like a minion after that, and had probably forgotten his existence the moment she’d walked away was...well, it was stupid enough to make it easy to dismiss in the same instant it had grazed his mind.

Don’s smile was tolerant enough to suggest that he, too, not only knew Fizz well but could excuse her lack of compliance with safety instructions. His expression reminded Cooper of a fond parent who made allowances for a wayward child. The attitude to the young doctor was intriguing. What did she have that made everybody who knew her prepared to forgive what came across as a maverick streak—something that was not usually acceptable in the emergency services community?

Don had already moved on from his amusement in relation to how well Fizz behaved herself when she was officially on duty. ‘Speaking of uniforms, we need to get Cooper here kitted out. Although...’ His gaze took in the black T-shirt, dark trousers and steel-capped boots Cooper was wearing. ‘Just a team T-shirt might be enough for the moment. And some overalls for a chopper callout, maybe. If there’s room, he could go as third crew at some point soon. He definitely needs a pager, though. Preferably before your shift is due to start.’

‘Come on...’ Joe signalled that Cooper should follow him. ‘I’ll introduce you to Danny downstairs who’s in charge of uniforms and pagers and suchlike and then we’ll find you a locker. The grand tour can wait until after breakfast if things stay quiet for that long.’

Even as he finished speaking, a loud beeping was heard and one of the pilots reached for his pager. Two of the paramedics, including Maggie, reached for theirs seconds later. All three staff members got to their feet and headed for the stairway that led to ground level.

Maggie wagged her finger at Joe as she went past. ‘That was your fault,’ she told him. ‘You said the “Q” word. Karma’s going to get you soon, as well, you know.’

‘She’s right.’ Joe sighed. ‘We’d better sort your pager out first, Cooper. We’ll be the next taxi in the rank before long. Let’s get you that pair of overalls until we sort your full uniform out properly.’

* * *

‘Phew...’ Felicity Wilson let herself sink into the armchair in the corner of the emergency department staffroom of Wellington’s Royal Hospital. ‘I thought we were never going to get a break.’

‘It’s been full on, hasn’t it? Thanks for staying on, Fizz, but you can get away anytime now. We’re fully staffed for the afternoon shift and we’ve caught up on the backlog.’

‘I’ll just have my coffee and catch my breath.’ Fizz smiled at her colleague, Tom—one of the senior consultants here. ‘I’ve already ditched my plans to attend a four-wheel drive club meeting. They’re just planning the next run, which is a sand forest gig that I’ve done before. I might wait until the CT scan results come through on that six-year-old kid that fell out of the tree. I hope he hasn’t got anything more than a mild concussion to go with his broken arm.’

‘Young Micky? He’s been a frequent flyer in here since he was a toddler when he fell off the couch and broke his collarbone. Apparently that was his first attempt at flying.’ Tom shook his head. ‘You have to feel sorry for his mother.’ His glance at Fizz was accompanied by a grin. ‘I’ll bet your mother had that worried look a lot of the time when you were growing up.’

‘I wasn’t accident prone.’

‘But you’re into dangerous pastimes. You probably jumped out of trees with a homemade parachute instead of falling out of them.’

‘Actually, no... I was quite a boring kid. Very well behaved.’

Tom shook his head. ‘So what happened? You grew up and just got a taste for things like hang gliding and off-road driving?’

Fizz shrugged. ‘Something like that.’ Yeah...she’d got a taste for an overdose of adrenaline, that was true. Who wouldn’t, when you discovered that it could blow anything else that you were feeling into oblivion?

Things like grief.

And having no faith in the future.

Mind you, it was such a long time ago that she’d discovered the potency of adrenaline as a mood-altering medication it was just a part of her history. A life-changing part, admittedly, especially when she’d eventually found a way of incorporating that kind of excitement into the job she loved so much. At least people were more likely to be impressed when you were putting yourself in danger in order to save other people and not just for personal escape masquerading as enjoyment.

‘And you always just happen to be where the action is happening. That picture of you in the paper a few days ago... Unbelievable... And you just happened to be driving right behind the woman who ran her car off the road?’

‘I saw it happening. Some idiot on a motorbike was trying to pass when he didn’t have room and she had to swerve. Her wheel caught in the gravel on the side of the road and she just lost control and went straight through the barrier.’ Fizz shrugged. ‘Hey...what can I say? Apparently I’m a trauma magnet.’

‘I guess it keeps life interesting.’

‘Yep...’ Fizz took a sip of her coffee, her mind slipping back to that incident the other day. To the adrenaline rush of getting that child and the baby out of that car. To that moment of fear when she’d been underwater and realising that she wasn’t going to get that safety belt undone and that, at any moment, the car could get displaced enough to trap her underwater.

She was no stranger to situations that were scary. She had chosen them, way back, when it hadn’t actually seemed to matter that much if she didn’t survive. By the time she’d got through to the other side of the darkest period in her life, she had every desire to survive but she still didn’t shy away from situations that she knew might be a little too risky, because she knew how good that rush of relief was when they were over. That sheer exhilaration that the odds had been beaten and you were still alive? It was definitely a kind of drug, that feeling.

Addictive...

And every time it added to her confidence in being able to rely on herself. It confirmed her belief that being totally independent was the only safe way to exist and it was okay, because life was still good. Better than good, in fact.

‘Anyway... I’d better get back.’ Tom drained his mug and then rinsed it out under the tap. ‘You in tomorrow, Fizz?’

‘No. Day off.’

‘As in a real day off, or are you doing a shift at the rescue base?’

‘Rescue base,’ Fizz admitted. ‘But you know what they say about a change being as good as a holiday, right?’

Tom was laughing as he left the staffroom. Fizz sipped her coffee again, her gaze drifting towards the big table in the centre of the room and to the pile of magazines and newspapers on one end of it.

It had only been a couple of days since she’d been in the background of that front-page picture. Was the paper still in that pile? Not that Fizz kept mementoes like that but, now that Tom had reminded her, she just wanted to have another look at that photo.

It wasn’t until she’d found the paper on the bottom of the pile that Fizz realised why she’d wanted to see it again. There was something about the man who was the hero of this image that was pulling her back.

Attracting her...

And it had been a long time since she’d been aware of that particular kind of tingle. Had her self-imposed break from men gone on long enough to have run its course? Was she missing male companionship—not to mention great sex—enough to make it worth the risk of having to deal with someone who started wanting something more than she was prepared to offer?

More than she was capable of offering?

Maybe the attraction was simply there because they’d shared a dramatic incident and he’d been the one to tip the balance and make the good result of that rescue possible. Fizz could still feel echoes from that touch of his hand when he’d pushed hers aside to deal with unclipping that seat belt. And when he’d gripped hers to help her keep her balance when they’d been scrambling over those slippery rocks on their way back to dry land. How safe had that physical attachment to that big, solid man made her feel? Not that she needed anyone to make her feel safe but it hadn’t been unpleasant, that was for sure.

She could remember how deft his hands had been when he had been working with her to save that woman’s life on the beach. And that hint of laughter curling through a rather gorgeous accent when he’d said that her name suited her. It wasn’t just Cooper Sinclair’s accent that was gorgeous, either. Fizz stared at the photo. She’d noticed how big he was that day but she hadn’t taken any particular notice of his features—those intelligent eyes, that strong nose and chin. A mouth that looked ready to curl into what would probably be a cheeky smile at any moment.

Okay. The attraction wasn’t just to do with the situation they had both found themselves in. And it wasn’t just that she was over being celibate. This Cooper was something special. He was also a foreigner who might only be in the country for a limited amount of time, which could be a real bonus. If—and, given the impression she already had of him, it might be quite a big if—he was single, it was possible he might be interested in a friendship. One of those friendships that had benefits, even, and were as close to a conventional relationship as Fizz was prepared to allow.

She cast a somewhat furtive glance over her shoulder but she was still alone in the staffroom. Carefully, she ripped off the front page of this old newspaper and then folded and tore around the edges of that photograph. Then she folded the image until it became a small square that she slipped into the pocket of her scrubs tunic.

It was an odd thing to do but...she might want to have another look at it later. When she wasn’t in danger of being interrupted.

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