Read the book: «Saving Maddie's Baby»

To Meredith and Alison,

who make my writer’s life fun.

Table of Contents

Cover

Praise for Marion Lennox

Wildfire Island Docs

Dear Reader

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

Copyright

PROLOGUE

HEROES AND HEROINES don’t choose to be brave, Maddie decided. Mostly they have bravery thrust upon them. In her particular case, a heroine was created when vast chunks of rock trapped one doctor in an underground mine, a mine she should never have been near in the first place.

This heroine wasn’t brave. This heroine was stupid.

Everyone knew the mine was dangerous. Ian Lockhart, the owner, had left Wildfire Island weeks ago, with salaries unpaid and debts outstanding. The mine had been closed for non-compliance with safety standards not long after Ian’s disappearance.

So whose bright idea had it been to see if they could tap one of the seams close to the surface?

There were reasons this seam hadn’t been tapped before. The rock was brittle. Without salaries, though, and desperate for income, the islanders had cut through the fence and quietly burrowed. No one was supposed to know.

But now … The call had come through an hour ago. A splintered piece of shoring timber and a minor rockfall had left one of the islanders with a fractured leg.

If it hadn’t been badly fractured they might have brought Kalifa down to the hospital, keeping their mining secret. Instead, his mates had had the sense to ring Maddie, asking her to come across the mountains to the overgrown mine site.

Maddie—Madeline Haddon—was heavily pregnant but she was the only doctor available. The miners had told her there were shards of bone puncturing Kalifa’s skin, so transporting him by road before assessment meant the risk of cutting off the blood supply.

She’d had to go.

Once at the mine site, it had taken work to stabilise him. Kalifa needed specialist surgery if he wasn’t to be left with a permanent limp, and she was worried about the strain on his heart. She’d just rung Keanu, the other island doctor, who was currently on his way back from a clinic on an outer island. She’d been asking him to organise Kalifa’s evacuation to Cairns when there was an ominous rumble from underground.

The mouth of the mine had belched a vast cloud of dirt and dust.

She’d thought Kalifa and the two friends who’d called her had been working alone. She’d never imagined there were men still in there. Surely not? But out they came, staggering, blinded by dust.

She’d been helping lift Kalifa into the back of the jeep—her jeep was set up as a no-frills ambulance, used in emergencies for patient transport. She’d turned and gazed in horror as the miners stumbled out.

‘How many of you are down there?’ The guy out first had a jagged gash on his arm. She grabbed a dressing and applied pressure.

‘Tw-twelve,’ the guy told her.

‘Are you all out now?’ When they’d rung about Kalifa she’d assumed … Why hadn’t she asked?

‘Three still to come.’

‘Why? Where are they?’

‘Malu’s smashed his leg,’ the guy told her. ‘He’s bleeding like a stuck pig.’

‘Is he stuck? Has the shaft caved right in?’

‘Just … just a bit of a rockfall where Kalifa fell against the shoring timber. Malu got unlucky—we were trying to shore it up again and he was right underneath where it fell. Macca and Reuben are helping him out but they had to stop to tighten the tourniquet. But the shaft’s clear enough in front of the fall. They’ll be out soon.’ His voice faltered. ‘As long as they can stop the bleeding.’

She stared at the mine mouth in dismay.

The dust was settling. It was looking almost normal.

Bleeding out …

Oh, help.

She’d done a swift, sweeping assessment of those around her. No one seemed in immediate distress. Men were already helping each other. The nurse who’d accompanied her, Caroline Lockhart, was taking care of a miner who looked like he’d fractured his arm. He was still standing, not in obvious danger. A couple of the men were crouched on the ground, coughing. They should be checked.

Triage.

One broken arm. Bruises, lacerations, nothing else obvious. Kalifa was waiting to be transferred to hospital.

Bleeding out …

Triage told her exactly where she was needed.

But she was pregnant. Pregnant! Instinctively her hand went to her belly, cringing at what she was contemplating.

What was the risk?

This had been a minor rockfall, she’d told herself. The shaft was still clear.

Along that shaft, Malu was bleeding to death. She had no choice.

‘Help me,’ she snapped at an uninjured miner. She grabbed his hand, pressing it onto the pad she’d made on his mate’s bleeding arm. ‘Push hard and keep up the pressure until Caroline has time to help you. The bleeding’s already easing but don’t let go. Caroline, can you radio Keanu?’

‘He’s on his way in from Atangi.’

‘Tell him to land the boat on this side of the island and get here as fast as he can. Meanwhile, don’t move Kalifa. He needs a doctor with him during transfer. The blood supply to the leg’s stable, as long as he doesn’t shift. But he has enough pain relief on board to keep him comfortable. Meanwhile, give me your torch,’ she snapped at another miner. ‘And your hard hat.’

‘Y-you can’t go in there,’ the miner stammered. ‘Doc, you’re pregnant. It’s dangerous.’

‘Of course it’s dangerous. You’ve been working in a mine that’s supposed to be closed, you morons. But what choice do I have? Malu’s got two children and his wife’s my friend. Caro, you’re in charge.’

And she picked up her bag, shoved on a hard hat and headed into the shaft.

‘Doc, wait, I’ll come with you,’ one of the miners yelled after her.

‘Don’t even think about it. You have children, too,’ she snapped back. ‘We now have four idiots in the mine. Don’t anyone dare make it five.’

CHAPTER ONE

DR JOSHUA CAMPBELL was so bored with solitaire he’d resorted to cheating to finish each game faster. It defeated the purpose, but he’d read every journal he could get his hands on. He’d checked and rechecked equipment. He’d paced. He was driving the rest of the staff at Cairns Air Sea Rescue Service nuts. He was going out of his mind.

No one in Northern Queensland seemed to have done so much as stand on a spider for the whole week. He’d been rostered for patient transfers, and every one of them had been routine. Patients had either been heading home, or were being flown from the city hospital to the country hospitals where they could continue recuperation among friends. There’d not been a single emergency amongst them.

‘If this keeps up I’m joining the army,’ Josh grumbled to Beth, his paramedic colleague. ‘Maybe there’s a place for me in the bomb squad. Do you suppose there’s any call for bomb disposal any place around here?’

‘You could try cleaning our kitchen as practice,’ Beth said morosely. ‘School holidays and three teenage boys? I’d defy a hand grenade to make more mess. You need to try a touch of domesticity if you want explosions. Consider marriage.’

‘Been there, got the T-shirt,’ he muttered.

‘That’s right, with Maddie, but that’s ancient history.’ Beth and Josh had joined the service at the same time, and after years of working together there was little they didn’t know about each other. ‘You hardly stuck around long enough to feel the full force of domestic bliss.’ And then her smile faded. ‘Whoops, sorry, Josh, I know you lost the baby, but still … It was so long ago. You and Karen, you think you might …?’

‘No!’ He said it with more vehemence than he’d meant to use. In fact, he startled himself. They were in the staff office, in the corner of the great hangar that held the service planes. The door was open and Josh’s vehemence echoed out into the vaulted hangar. ‘No,’ he repeated, more mildly. ‘Domesticity doesn’t interest either of us.’

‘And you’re seeing less of each other,’ Beth said thoughtfully. ‘Moving on? Seeing we’re quiet, you want to check some dating sites? We might just find the one.’

‘Beth …’

‘You’re thirty-six years old, Josh. Okay, you still have the looks. Indeed you do. It drives me nuts, seeing the way old ladies melt when you smile. But your looks’ll fade, my lad. You’ll be on your walker before you know it, gumming your crusts, bewailing not having a grandchild to dandle …’

‘I’m definitely applying for the bomb squad,’ he retorted, and tossed a sheaf of paper at her. ‘Just to get away from you. Sort these for a change. They’re already sorted but so what? Give me some peace so I can download a bomb squad application.’

And then the radio buzzed into life. They both made a grab, but Beth got there first. She listened to the curt instructions on the other end and her face set.

The tossed papers lay ignored on the floor. Josh was already reaching for his jacket. He knew that look. ‘What?’ he demanded as she finished.

‘Trouble,’ Beth said, snagging her jacket, as well. ‘Mine collapse on Wildfire Island. One smashed leg, needs evac to the orthopods in Cairns. Plane’s leaving in ten.’

‘Mine collapse?’ He was snapping queries as he got organised. ‘Just the one injury?’

‘He was injured at the start of it. One of the supports collapsed. Fell on this guy’s leg but the rest of the idiots didn’t see it as a sign they should evacuate. But now …’ She took a deep breath. ‘The collapse looks serious. We’re working on early information but one of the local doctors is trapped, as well.’

One of the local doctors.

Wildfire.

And something inside seemed to freeze.

Beth stopped, too. ‘Josh? What is it?’

‘You said Wildfire. Part of the M’Langi group?’

‘Yeah.’

‘That’s where Maddie’s working.’

‘Maddie?’ Her eyes widened as she understood. ‘Your Maddie?’

‘We’re not married.’ It was a dumb thing to say but it was all he could think of.

‘I know that. You haven’t been married for years. So how do you know she’s there?’

‘I sort of … keep tabs. She’s working fly in, fly out, two weeks there, one week on the mainland. Her mum’s still in a nursing home in Cairns.’

‘Right.’ Beth started gathering gear again and he moved into automatic mode and did the same. There was a moment’s loaded silence, and then …

‘You mean you stalk her?’ she demanded, but he knew it was Beth’s way of making things light. Making a joke …

‘I do not stalk!’

‘But you keep tabs.’ There was little to add to their bags, only the drugs they kept locked away or refrigerated. ‘It sounds creepy.’

‘We keep in touch. Sort of. Christmas and birthdays. And I take note of where she’s registered to work. In case …’ He hesitated. ‘Hell, I don’t know. In case of nothing.’

Beth’s face softened. She clipped her bag closed, then touched his shoulder as she straightened. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I’ve been married twice, remember. Once your ex, always your ex. Unless it’s nasty there’s always a little bit of them under your skin. But, hey, there’s a sizeable med centre on Wildfire. The trapped doctor doesn’t have to be Maddie.’

‘Right.’ But suddenly he was staring into middle distance. He knew … Somehow he knew.

‘Earth to Josh,’ Beth said, not so gently now. ‘The plane’s waiting. Let’s go.’

The crash had come from nowhere. One minute Maddie was working efficiently in the dim light, worried but not terrified.

Now she was terrified.

She needed to block out the dust and dark and fear.

Where was her patient?

She’d lost her torch. She’d fallen, stumbling in terror as the rock wall had crashed around her. She was okay, she decided, pushing her way cautiously to her knees. There was still breathable air if she covered her mouth and breathed through a slit in her fingers. But she couldn’t see.

Somewhere in here was a guy with a life-threatening bleed.

Where was the torch?

Phone app. She practically sobbed with relief as she remembered an afternoon a few weeks ago, sitting on the hospital terrace with Wildfire’s charge nurse, Hettie, while Caroline had shown them apps they could put on their cell phones.

Most she had no use for, but the torch app had looked useful for things such as checking it was a gecko on her nose and not a spider in the middle of the night. The disadvantages of living in the tropics. But now … Yes! Her phone was in her jacket pocket. She grabbed it and flicked it on.

One push and a surprising amount of light fought through the dust.

She could now see the big torch, lying at her feet. She grabbed it. The switch had flicked off when it had fallen. Not broken. She had light.

Next …

The guy she’d come in for.

She’d met them halfway in. Blood had been streaming from Malu’s thigh and he’d been barely conscious. The miners with him had tied a tourniquet but it wasn’t enough.

‘He needs more pressure,’ she’d snapped. ‘Put him down.’

And then she’d felt the rumbles. She’d felt the earth tremble.

‘Run!’ she’d screamed at the two guys who’d been carrying him, and she still seemed to hear the echoes of that yell.

They’d run.

She hoped they’d made it. Fallen rock was blocking the way she’d come. Please, let them have made it to the other side.

It was no use hoping. First things first. She was raking the rubble-strewn floor with her torch beam, searching for Malu. The combined beam of torch and phone only reached about three feet before the dust killed it.

He must have pulled himself back.

‘Malu?’

‘H-here.’

A pile of stone lay between them. She was over it in seconds. It hurt, she thought vaguely. She was eight months pregnant. Climbing over loose rock, knocking rock in the process, was maybe not the wisest …

She didn’t have time for wise.

He was right by the pile. He was very lucky the rocks hadn’t fallen on him.

Define luck, she thought grimly, but at least he was still alive. And still conscious.

Dust and blood. A lot of it.

He had a deep gash on his thigh where his pants were ripped away. The guys had tried to tie a tourniquet but it had slipped. Blood was oozing …

But not pumping, she thought with relief. If it’d been pumping he’d be dead by now.

She was wearing a light jacket. She hauled it off, bundled it into a tight pad, placed it against the wound and pushed.

Malu screamed.

‘I’m so, so sorry,’ she told him, but there was no time to do anything about the pain. She had to keep pushing. ‘Malu, I have drugs but I need to stop the bleeding before I do anything else. I need to press hard.’

‘S-sorry. Just the shock …’

‘I should have warned you.’

Go back to basics, she reminded herself, desperately fighting the need to cough, and the need to breathe through the grit. Desperately trying to sound in control. Don’t start a procedure before explaining it to the patient, she reminded herself, even if she was trapped in a place that scared her witless.

Malu had relapsed into silence. She knew Malu. He was a large, tough islander from the outermost island of the M’Langi group.

He had a wife and two small children.

She pushed harder.

She had morphine in her bag. If she had another pair of hands …

She didn’t.

His pants were ripped. Yes! Still pressing with one hand, she used the other and tugged the jagged cloth. The cloth ripped almost to the ankle.

Now she was fumbling one-handed in her bag for scissors. Thank heaven she was neat. There was so much dust … Despite the torchlight she could hardly see, but the scissors were right where she always stored them.

One snip and she had the tough fabric cut at the cuff, and that gave her a length of fabric to wind. The miners had tried to use a belt as their tourniquet but it was too stiff. The torn trouser leg was a thousand times better.

She twisted and wound, tying the pad—her ex-jacket—into place. She twisted and twisted until Malu cried out again.

‘Malu, the worst’s over,’ she told him as she somehow managed to knot it. ‘The bleeding’s stopped and my hands are now free. I’ll make us masks to make breathing easier. Then I’ll organise something to dull the pain.’

And get some fluids into you, she added to herself, saying silent prayers of thanks that she had her bag with her, that she’d had it beside her when the collapse had happened, that she’d picked it up almost automatically and that she hadn’t dropped it. She had saline. She could set up a drip. But in this dust, to try and keep things sterile …

Concentrate on keeping Malu alive first, she told herself. After so much blood loss she had to replace fluids. She’d worry about bugs later.

Malu was barely responding. His pulse … His pulse …

Get the fluids in. Move!

Five minutes later Malu had morphine on board and she had a makeshift drip feeding fluids into his arm. She’d ripped her shirt and created makeshift masks to keep the worst of the dust from their lungs. She sat back and held the saline bag up, and for the first time she thought she might have time to breathe herself.

She still felt like she was choking. Her eyes were filled with grit.

They were both alive.

‘Doc?’ Malu’s voice was a whisper but she was onto it.

‘Mmm?’

‘Macca and Reuben … They were carrying me.’

‘I know.’

‘Reuben’s my uncle. You reckon they’ve made it?’

‘I don’t know.’ There was no point lying; Malu would know the risks better than she did. She grasped his hand and held. There was nothing else she could do or say.

The thought of trying to find them, trying to struggle out through the mass of rubble … Even if she could leave Malu, the thing was impossible. The rubble around them was unyielding.

Malu’s hand gripped hers, hard. ‘Don’t even think about trying to dig out,’ he muttered, and she thought that even though his words were meant as protection to her, there was more than a hint of fear for himself. To be left alone in the dark … ‘It’s up to them outside to do the rescuing now. Meanwhile, turn off the lights.’

‘Sorry?’

‘The lights. We don’t need ‘em. Conserve …’

‘Good thinking,’ she said warmly, and flicked off her torch. Then she flicked off the torch app on her phone. But as the beam died, a message appeared on the screen. When had that come in?

She wouldn’t have heard.

The message was simple.

Maddie? Tell me you’re not down the mine. On way with Cairns Air Sea Rescue. Josh.

Josh.

Josh was coming.

Her phone was working. Help was on its way.

It was amazing that the signal had reached down here, but this was a shallow tunnel, with ventilation shafts rising at regular intervals. The simple knowledge that she had phone reception made her feel better. And Josh was coming … All of a sudden she felt a thousand per cent lighter. She told Malu and felt the faint relaxation of the grip on her hand. Cairns Air Sea Rescue would be the forerunners, she knew. The cavalry was heading this way.

She gripped her phone hard, as if it alone was a link to the outside world. Help. Heavy machinery. Skill, technology, care. All the things needed to get them out of here.

Josh was coming.

It shouldn’t make one scrap of difference that Josh would be one of the rescue crew. Their marriage had been over for years. They talked occasionally as casual acquaintances. Friends? Probably not even that.

But still … Josh was coming.

‘So you still got reception?’ Malu whispered, sounding incredulous, and she looked at the one bar out of five signalling a really weak link to the outside world.

‘Just.’

‘Tell ‘em to hurry,’ Malu muttered. ‘And tell them if there’s one single camera at the mine mouth then I need a new pair of trousers before they bring me out.’

She even managed a chuckle. He was so brave.

His pulse was so weak …

‘I’ll tell them,’ she said and ventured a text back.

Yeah, we’re underground. There’s a bit of rock between us and the entrance. We’re not very respectable. If you’re coming in we’d appreciate a change of clothes. There’s a distinct lack of laundry facilities down here.

She read it to Malu and he managed a chuckle. She should say more, she thought. She should give a complete medical update but for now it was enough that she was breathing and Malu was breathing.

She just had to keep it that way until Josh …

Until the cavalry arrived.

The plane was taxiing out onto the runway. ‘Phones off now,’ the pilot snapped, and Josh went to flick off his phone—and then paused as a message appeared.

If you’re coming in we’d appreciate a change of clothes. There’s a distinct lack of laundry facilities down here.

He swore. Then he swore again.

‘Josh?’ Beth was watching, all concern.

‘She’s down there,’ he said grimly. ‘Maddie’s trapped.’

‘Then all the more reason to turn your phone off so we can take off.’ But she took the phone from his hands and stared at the screen, and her face tightened. This team were used to horror, but when it affected one of their own …

‘Wait thirty seconds,’ she told the pilot, and she started texting.

‘What?’ He tried to grab his phone back, but she turned her back on him and kept typing. Then the text sent, and she handed it back.

He looked down at what she’d written.

We’re on our way. With Josh in the lead. He’ll be in there with you, even if he has to dig in with his bare hands.

‘Beth …’ He could hardly speak.

‘Truth?’ she queried, and he tried to swallow panic. And failed.

‘Truth,’ he muttered, and he flicked his phone off and they were on their way.