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CHAPTER ONE

THE party on the beach would be in full swing by now.

If anyone had noticed that Emily Morgan, Crocodile Creek Base Hospital’s anaesthetist and ICU/Emergency consultant, was late arriving, they might well have guessed that she’d gone back for another peep at a special patient in the hospital nursery.

Her colleagues would also not have been surprised to learn that she had sent the attending nurse off to make herself a cup of hot chocolate and a slice of toast while she herself watched over the baby for a few minutes.

Dr Morgan had, after all, been a key player in the drama that had gripped this hospital over the last three days. A drama that was attracting the attention of the whole community of the large coastal town in north Queensland, no less. A newborn baby had been left for dead in the Outback and, despite the best efforts of police and bush rangers, they were no closer to finding the mother of this infant boy.

Emily reached into the crib and straightened the soft woollen hat that covered the tiny head. She couldn’t resist continuing the contact by tracing a very gentle fingertip across a silky cheek.

‘They’ll be talking about you, Lucky,’ she murmured. ‘Down there on the beach. They’ll be stoking the fire with driftwood, which will smell lovely, and they’ll be barbecuing sausages and prawns, which will smell even better. Everyone who isn’t on duty will be having a drink and I should be there, too.’ Emily swallowed the lump in her throat. ‘Celebrating…’

A celebration was definitely called for, and not just because the tiny baby that hospital staff had named Lucky looked set to survive such a rocky start to life. The last few days had been tough on everybody. The poignant mix of tragedy and triumph that was a part of every medical community seemed somehow heightened here in Crocodile Creek.

And no wonder, with cases like Lucky’s. The baby stirred a little and a hand came free of its wrapping. Emily watched the tiny boy’s face twitch in exaggerated movements. Eyebrows rose over still closed eyes in comical surprise and then dropped into a fierce frown. Lips that were now a wonderfully healthy shade of pink puckered, and almost thoughtful sucking sounds could be heard amidst the soft beeps of the various monitors surrounding the incubator. Emily smiled. Competition amongst staff members to help with feeding this baby until they found his mother could well make life more interesting in the next few days.

Her hand was still inside the crib. It was too easy to move her forefinger within reach of that tiny hand but it was so good to feel the surprising strength with which Lucky gripped her fingertip. For just an instant Emily could recapture the joy she had felt only hours ago, when her finger had last been held just like this.

Joy that Lucky had been found at all after being abandoned on the outskirts of the Gunyamurra rodeo—an event that attracted hundreds of people to an area some three hundred miles west of Crocodile Creek every year. Joy that he’d come through an emergency procedure to correct his congenital heart defect and that they’d found and could treat the inherited blood disorder that could have proved fatal.

Emily had had every intention of burying any personal misery and joining the celebration on the beach when the plan had been mooted that afternoon, but time on her own had made it seem too daunting. She was tired. Physically and emotionally exhausted, in fact. It would hardly add to the spirit of the occasion if she couldn’t control these stupid tears and ended up crying on a friend’s shoulder again or something. She couldn’t face a party. Emily had never felt more miserable in her entire life.

So she had slipped back to the nursery in the hope of recapturing and gaining strength from the joy they all felt concerning Lucky. And she had…for a moment. But suddenly that tiny hand wasn’t just touching her finger. It was touching something so deep inside her the ache was simply unbearable.

And the tears were flowing again.

Not for the baby. History might be repeating itself for Emily Morgan and, yes, she did have to accept the fact that she’d been dumped by her fiancé and partner of nearly two years for another woman, but the infant ghost that had haunted her since she had first set eyes on Lucky was back where it belonged.

Way back—in a past that had no bearing on the present.

This current pain was more selfish. It was about rejection. Grief. The loss of something she had worked hard to try and get right. There was anger in the miserable mix as well. Emily Morgan had failed…again. And to top it off, there was a good dollop of plain, simple loneliness.

Except she wasn’t alone, was she? Not on the surface, anyway. Emily had a lot of friends. Good friends. And one of them was approaching right now in the form of Lucky’s nurse for the evening, Grace.

Emily managed to ease her finger free from the tiny fist without disturbing the baby, who had drifted back to sleep, and she hastily scrubbed the tears from her cheeks with an embarrassed chuckle.

‘Look at me, crying over Lucky. Professional, aren’t I?’

‘There’s been more than one tear shed over this mite.’ Grace smiled. ‘I even caught our medical director blinking pretty hard not very long ago.’ She leaned over the incubator. ‘He’s gorgeous, isn’t he? They’re not going to have any trouble finding him a foster-home, that’s for sure.’

‘We’re going to find his real family,’ Emily said firmly.

‘You reckon? They haven’t found any clues yet, have they?’

‘No.’

‘And there were hundreds of people at the rodeo. Bit hard to try and search the whole of north Queensland.’

‘Somebody knows.’ Emily stood up slowly. ‘Maybe they haven’t seen a newspaper yet or heard the news on the radio, and they don’t know he’s alive. When they do, they’ll come and get him.’ She took a last glance at the still sleeping baby. ‘How could they not?’

Grace smiled again, nodding agreement. ‘You going to the party on the beach now?’

‘On my way.’ Emily tried to sound convincing.

Lucky was going to survive. So was she. There was no good reason to avoid the celebration. None at all.

She hadn’t sounded convincing enough, apparently. Grace’s glance was sympathetic. ‘I haven’t had a chance to say anything, Em, but I’m sorry, you know? About Simon going off like that.’

‘I’m practically over it,’ Emily lied. ‘As more than one person has said, Simon Kent was a rat.’

‘He sure was. Charles is furious at the way he just walked out. It’s hardly professional to leave a hospital this size with no cardiology cover. He’s still muttering about suing for breach of contract. Personal concerns, my foot!’

‘It was obviously fate.’ Emily was keen to change the subject. ‘We’ve got a new cardiologist now, by the look of things.’

‘Mmm.’ Grace nudged Emily. ‘Go on, then. One of us should be down there, drinking a toast to the happy couple.’

Emily’s feet dragged.

She was happy for Cal. Of course she was. The group of medics that lived in the rambling old house that had been the original hospital were a family, and Cal Jamieson the best of brothers.

So was Mike, a paramedic and rescue helicopter pilot—another of her male housemates. Charles was more of a father figure but that was probably due to his position as medical director rather than his age. And the fact that he’d been there longer than anyone else. There was also that uncanny ability he had to know just a little too much about whatever was going on in his hospital—thanks largely, Emily suspected, to his skill in travelling silently on those well-oiled wheels. The quick glance she threw over her shoulder was almost automatic. You just never knew whether Charles might be following or what he might see or hear.

There was no sign of their medical director, or the wheelchair he had been confined to since a shooting accident in his teens. Emily hoped that someone had managed to persuade Charles to go down to the beach despite the difficulties presented by sand. He took a keen interest in the lives—and loves—of the people living in the doctors’ house. Not that he’d said anything to Emily about Simon yet, but when he did she knew it would be both comforting and wise.

Maybe Emily had been avoiding talking to Charles because she wouldn’t receive the level of comfort she craved. They had both known that the relationship hadn’t been strong enough to convince Emily to leave Crocodile Creek. And they had both known that Simon wasn’t a ‘stayer’.

Emily had been there for nearly six years now and was almost as good as Charles at picking the ‘stayers’. Cal and Mike were. Simon had never come close but he wasn’t alone in his reaction. The isolation was too much for some to handle. The closeness with which they all lived and worked together stifled others. As an air, sea and outback rescue base for all of far north Queensland, Crocodile Creek was a magnet to young doctors and other medical staff who wanted the drama of the Outback Flying Doctor Service or an escape from an ordinary career or life—for whatever reason.

Escape had brought Emily here but it had been the best move she had ever made. She loved her life. She loved her job and the community. She loved her friends. She just wasn’t quite up to celebrating with them right now. Seeing Cal and Gina together, the way they would be looking and smiling at each other, witnessing that kind of love—it would rub salt into a wound that was surprisingly raw, given the edge of another emotion that Emily had not really admitted to feeling yet.

Relief.

But wasn’t that simply due to the successful battle to save baby Lucky? The strength of that relief, coupled with her weariness, would inevitably lead to a bit of overlap when she thought of Simon, wouldn’t it? So why did she have the nagging suspicion that it was more the shock of how Simon had dumped her than the ending of their relationship that was so upsetting? And, if she felt like that, did that mean she had been expecting it all along and had, therefore, not tried hard enough to make it work?

It was no wonder Emily felt so confused. No wonder that her feet dragged and her head turned, seeking distraction from the endless treadmill of thoughts about Simon Kent. The door to the radio room was enticingly ajar but when Emily stepped inside, there was no one to say hello to. Whoever was on duty for emergency calls had taken the hand-held receiver from its clip on the wall. They had probably gone down to the beach to join the party for a while.

As Emily should be doing.

With a heartfelt sigh, Emily sank onto a small couch that was positioned under a window on the other side of the room from the desk and bank of telecommunication equipment. Just a few minutes, she promised herself. Time to get her head together. A private moment to get rid of a few more of those stupid tears.

The sound of footsteps in the corridor forced the stopper back into that particular bottle, however. Emily blinked hard and warned her lip muscles that they would need to try and produce a cheerful smile for whoever was returning to the radio room. But they did not co-operate. They even went slack with surprise when a familiar, large figure appeared in the doorway.

‘Why aren’t you at the party?’

‘I came to find out why you weren’t at the party.’

Emily found a smile, albeit a rather wan attempt. She could feel her exhaustion ebbing away as it always did when she was in Mike’s company. Mike could stand beside any patient with a slow heartbeat, she thought with amusement, as a cure—providing the patient was female, of course. Especially when he smiled like that.

Emily dropped her gaze. ‘I’m just not in a very party mood, I guess.’

‘Neither am I.’

Emily’s smile gathered a few more watts. ‘Oh, right. Michael Poulos not in the mood for a party.’ She glanced towards the glowing lights on the radio equipment. ‘Funny, I haven’t heard any reports about them.’

Mike stepped into the room properly. ‘Reports about what?’

‘Those flying pigs.’

‘Ah.’ Mike grinned as he took another couple of steps. ‘OK, I did go to the party. I thought it might be a good way to drown my sorrows.’

‘Mmm.’ The sound was sympathetic. It was, after all, entirely possible that Mike was feeling just as bad as she was. Unlikely, but possible. He had exactly the same reason to feel bad, didn’t he?

‘But I left as soon as I saw you weren’t there,’ Mike continued. ‘We took a vote and decided you’d be in the nursery, cooing over Lucky.’

‘I never coo. It would be unprofessional.’

Mike ignored the protest. ‘Grace told me you’d just gone. She also told me she didn’t think you were feeling up to partying. So I came looking for you.’

‘Oh.’ Emily fought to hold that bottle stopper in place.

Mike was so nice. The best kind of friend anyone could hope to have. She’d known he was an amazing person the first day she’d ever seen him—when he’d arrived back in his home town two years ago, with his gorgeous fiancée on his arm and a job waiting on Crocodile Creek’s rescue helicopter.

When Marcella had abandoned both Crocodile Creek and Mike, Emily had been secretly delighted when he had decided to move into the doctors’ house, and she cherished their friendship even though it still made her feel a little shy.

Friendship was as close as someone like Emily was ever going to get to a man in Mike’s league but here he was, having left a whole group of people he was just as close to in order to look for her. The attention was unnerving enough to make her mouth feel suddenly dry.

‘You didn’t need to do that, Mike. I’d hate to think I was spoiling an opportunity to drown your sorrows.’

She expected a flippant response concerning the number of such opportunities that would be forthcoming, but any trace of amusement faded from Mike’s features, leaving him looking uncharacteristically solemn. Not that it changed his unruly mop of black curls or the wide mouth that turned up at the corners even in repose, but a pair of eyes dark enough to appear black, and which normally danced with mischief, were suddenly serious and the flash of warmth and understanding Emily received was enough to make the stopper explode from the bottled-up tears.

The weight of Mike’s arm settled around Emily’s shoulders as he sat down on the couch beside her. Even in the midst of a wash of misery she was also aware that the size of the couch precluded any distance between them. The hard length of Mike’s thigh was pressed firmly against Emily’s leg. He was a rock. A warm, human rock, and Emily could think of nothing she wanted to do more than cling to it.

‘Sucks, doesn’t it?’

Emily could only nod. And sniff. Embarrassingly loudly.

‘It’s even worse when you have to front up to a party and see happy couples like Cal and Gina and you’re supposed to be celebrating.’ Mike’s hand tightened on Emily’s shoulder with an empathetic squeeze. ‘It’s just as well Simon bloody Kent’s gone. I could quite happily deck him for doing this to you. He’s worse than a rat. He’s an idiot. And a bastard.’

Emily shook her head. ‘If he’d been a real bastard I wouldn’t have been with him for so long. He…he said he was very sorry.’

‘Big of him,’ Mike said scathingly. ‘He was a charming bastard, I’ll grant you that.’ He snorted. ‘Cardiologist, my eye. They’re supposed to fix hearts, aren’t they? Not go around breaking them.’

A sound somewhere between a laugh and sob escaped Emily. It was so comforting to have someone on her side like this. Someone who would defend her worth and assume anyone that left her would be the one missing out.

Maybe karma did exist after all, and this was payback time. Helping Mike pick up the pieces after failed relationships had been what had cemented their friendship over the last eighteen months. Emily decided she’d better make the most of this. It wouldn’t be long before she would feel compelled to return the favour…again.

‘I can’t believe I got it so wrong,’ she sighed. ‘I’m angry as much as anything right now. I should have seen it coming and I didn’t. OK, things haven’t been that great for a while, but whenever I tried to talk about it Simon said he was just a bit stressed by work. And I believed him.’

‘You loved him. Why wouldn’t you believe him?’

‘When I look back at the last few weeks, I just cringe. I made it so easy. I helped him.’

‘You’re a nice person, Em. The nicest person I know.’ The words were like balm to the raw patch on Emily’s heart and she was happy to let Mike’s squeeze pull her a little closer. Close enough to rest her head comfortably on his shoulder. ‘You can’t help helping people. I heard about all the hours you spent with young Lucky when you were officially off duty. You can’t tell me it was just because you didn’t want to be around to see Simon bloody Kent pack his bags and move out. You were determined that baby was going to survive, weren’t you?’

‘It was helping me survive as well,’ Emily admitted. ‘I think any patients of mine would have got a fair bit of extra attention in the last few days.’

Like they had all those years ago, when throwing herself into her career had seemed the only way forward.

‘It’s not just patients that you help, though, is it?’ The deep notes in Mike’s voice rumbled against Emily’s cheek. ‘Look at all the times you’ve let me cry on your shoulder and tried to help.’ He was silent for a few seconds and then sounded thoughtful. ‘Wasn’t it you that set me up with Kirsty? To take my mind off Trudi leaving?’

‘Sorry.’ Emily’s tone was rueful. ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time.’

Actually, it hadn’t seemed like that great an idea. It had just seemed…inevitable. As ordained by fate as the fact that her relationship with Simon had just morphed into an unexciting engagement. The wild desire Emily had had of suggesting herself as a replacement for Trudi was still ridiculous enough to make her blush. And still just as easy to dismiss.

Mike grunted as though in agreement. ‘Getting dumped doesn’t do wonders for your ego, does it?’

‘Trudi didn’t dump you. She cried buckets when her visa ran out.’

‘She didn’t try applying for a new one.’

‘She was going to.’

‘Yeah. Until she met that guy in Switzerland and got married a few days later.’

‘Maybe marriage was what she was looking for.’

‘Obviously.’

‘You were a bit slow off the mark, then.’

‘What?’ Emily could feel Mike stiffen. ‘I didn’t want to marry Trudi.’

‘What about Kirsty?’ Emily sat up and eyed Mike cautiously. ‘Did you want to marry her?’

‘Of course not.’ Mike grinned disarmingly. ‘She did have great legs, though.’

Emily rolled her eyes. Of course she did. So had Trudi. And Marcella. Great legs were just another item on a list that put her on a different planet from the women Mike Poulos chose.

‘So you’re not exactly devastated, then.’

‘I guess not.’ But Mike’s grin had gone. For just a fraction of a second Emily had another glimpse into eyes that weren’t shuttered by humour and realised she was seeing a part of Mike she had never been privy to before.

Maybe something good was going to come out of this whole mess. A bond of comfort in their friendship that was going both ways for the first time.

‘I am upset,’ Mike said slowly. ‘And I’m starting to wonder what the hell’s so wrong with me.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with you,’ Emily assured him. ‘You’re a great guy, Mike. Kirsty’s an idiot.’

‘Yeah.’ A familiar glint reappeared in those dark eyes. ‘She is, isn’t she? She and Simon bloody Kent should be a perfect match.’

‘How did we not see it happening right under our noses?’

‘Because it didn’t. They took off to Brisbane when they found they couldn’t keep their hands off each other.’

‘Did you know what was going on?’

‘I had my suspicions.’

‘When?’

‘The weekend before last. When you told me you were covering a night shift for Simon because he had to rush off to Brisbane.’

‘When his mother mixed up her insulin dose and put herself into a coma. What was so suspicious about that?’

‘Just that Kirsty had rung me ten minutes earlier to say she couldn’t make it back to Crocodile Creek for a day or two because her father was having some sort of crisis with his insulin dosage.’

Emily huffed at the absurdity of it. ‘Why on earth didn’t they have the imagination to come up with different stories?’

‘Because they’re both idiots,’ Mike reminded her promptly.

Her smile came much more easily this time. It wasn’t even forced. Mike smiled back at her delightedly, clearly taking the credit for having cheered her up, at least a little, but Emily looked away quickly. She couldn’t reveal just how much she was enjoying his company.

Neither could she put any real significance on some new connection she and Mike could be forging here. They were in the same boat right now, having had their respective partners run off with each other no less, but it was a very temporary thing. Michael Poulos never stayed lonely for long. It would be foolish to imagine that this almost intimate companionship would become a regular occurrence.

And right on cue, the radio on the desk opposite the couch crackled into life.

‘Cooper’s Crossing to Crocodile Creek Air Medical Service. Come in, please.’

Mike’s attention was caught instantly and completely. He jumped to his feet. ‘Where the hell is our radio operator?’

‘Someone’s got the hand-held,’ Emily pointed out, following Mike’s example and standing up.

‘Yes. I have.’

‘Oh!’ Emily whirled so fast she almost fell over. ‘Charles! I wish you wouldn’t sneak up on people like that!’

‘It’s an advantage I have no intention of losing.’ Charles Wetherby, medical director of Crocodile Creek Base Hospital, rolled his wheelchair towards the desk. ‘The battery’s low on the hand-held,’ he said. ‘That’s why I was on my way back.’

‘Cooper’s Crossing station to AMS. Are you receiving me, over?’

Charles reached for the microphone on the desk. ‘Crocodile Creek Base Hospital, receiving you loud and clear. Is that you, Jim?’

‘Yes.’ The voice sounded hesitant. ‘Charles?’

‘Speaking,’ Charles confirmed. ‘What’s the problem, Jim?’

‘It’s my daughter, Megan. She’s…she’s not well.’

Emily knew that other people listening in could make it uncomfortable to give personal details, but Jim Cooper sounded more than hesitant now. He sounded desperate.

‘What’s happened, Jim?’

‘She hasn’t been well for a few days. She got out of bed and she’s collapsed…I can’t get any sense out of her.’ A few words were broken by static. ‘Fence down…Her mother’s trying to round up the cattle…No way I can get her back into bed.’

‘How old is Megan, Jim?’

‘Nineteen.’

‘And she’s been sick for a few days?’

‘I dunno what’s going on. Flu, maybe. Stomach pains. She’s just lying on the floor now…Her breathing sounds funny…I dunno what to do…’

Emily exchanged a horrified glance with Mike. This man was panicking. He sounded close to tears.

‘Don’t worry, Jim. We’ll get some help out to you. Don’t go too far from the radio. As soon as I’ve got things moving I’ll talk to you again.’

Charles turned to Mike. ‘Do you know if they’ve fixed that problem with the sticky needle on the fixed wing’s altimeter?’

‘They’re working on it now.’

‘It’ll have to be the chopper, then.’

‘How far is it?’

‘Cooper’s Crossing station is Wetherby Downs’ closest neighbour.’ Charles tipped his chair back and then swivelled to face the series of maps covering the wall. They were marked with a series of black, expanding circles that represented units of ten nautical miles. ‘West. Here.’

Mike whistled silently. ‘That’s a long haul for the chopper, boss. We’d have to refuel.’

‘Not a problem. We have a long-standing arrangement with Wetherby Downs to provide fuel for any AMS emergency if it’s needed. I’ll arrange it with the station manager. They’ll be waiting for you.’

‘What’s the latest info from the weather bureau?’

Emily peered at the map as the two men engaged in a rapid-fire discussion about weather forecasts, GPS co-ordinates for navigation and flight times. Wetherby Downs station was where Charles had grown up. His brother Philip ran the vast station now. Why would Charles make it sound like ringing the station manager and not his brother to arrange a fuelling stop for the helicopter was the only option?

She cast a rather speculative glance at their medical director. How fair was it that he knew so much about all of them but managed to keep so much of his own life so private? Disconcertingly, Emily found herself receiving a stare from both men that spoke of an even more avid curiosity.

‘So, how ’bout it, Em?’

‘Sorry, I wasn’t listening.’

‘Christina’s on emergency flight call but she’s having a good time at the party.’ Mike grinned at Emily. ‘Charles and I thought you might like to cover for her.’

‘Oh, no!’ Emily took a step backwards. ‘Sorry, but I don’t do helicopters.’

‘Why not?’ Charles raised an eyebrow. ‘You’ve been in the fixed-wing aircraft often enough.’

‘That’s different.’

‘Why?’ Mike sounded genuinely puzzled.

‘A plane’s safer.’

‘Why?’ Mike was sounding amused now.

‘Because it’s got wings,’ Emily muttered. She could feel her cheeks heating but continued doggedly when confronted by silence. ‘If its engine conks out it can at least glide down. It’s not going to drop like a stone.’

Mike and Charles exchanged a glance. They both grinned at Emily. She pressed her lips together stubbornly and glared back. She didn’t like being laughed at.

Then, for the second time that evening, Emily felt the comforting weight of Mike’s arm around her shoulders.

‘I wouldn’t let you drop like a stone, Em. Honest.’

The promise was as comforting as the physical touch. It offered protection. Never mind that Mike wouldn’t want to plummet to the ground himself, he made it sound as though it would be Emily he’d be taking care of.

Right now she felt too bruised to remind herself that she was quite capable of looking after herself. Having someone else doing that, even temporarily, was attractive. It made her feel special. Safe.

Safe enough to actually consider confronting her fear of flying in something that didn’t have wings?

‘But it’s dark.’

‘Not a problem.’ Mike squeezed her shoulder. ‘There’s a lovely bright moon out there and I’ll turn the lights on when we need to land. I’ll keep an eye out for the mountains, I promise.’ The pressure he exerted on Emily’s shoulder was enough to force her to turn and look at him. ‘Hey,’ he said softly. ‘Neither of us really wants to go to that party right now. An escape is just what we need. Both of us.’