A Father Beyond Compare

Tom felt the instant that Emma went completely limp in his arms and something akin to anger took hold.

Had he just gone through the most dangerous rescue mission of his career only to fail? There had been no time to even assess the degree of trauma Emma had suffered to her lower leg. What if that piece of twisted metal had been tamponading an arterial bleed and he hadn’t had the opportunity to prevent her bleeding to death in the tense minutes of getting her out of the van and winched up to the helicopter?

Time slowed and it seemed to take for ever to get her on board the aircraft and then to get himself inside. In less than a minute Terry had the chopper on safe ground but Tom was barely aware of landing. He was crouched over Emma, tilting her head back to ensure her airway was open. Trying to assess whether or not she was still breathing.

Josh was filling the rest of the space in the cabin.

‘Carotid pulse,’ he said, ‘but no radial. What’s your estimation of blood loss?’

‘Too much.’ Tom could see fresh blood loss on the shredded denim of Emma’s jeans. He didn’t need to remind Josh of the urgency of controlling the haemorrhage. His partner was already ripping open dressing and bandage packages.

Tom pulled down an oxygen mask and flicked the flow to full bore. He put the mask on Emma’s face and eased the elastic behind her head.

‘It’s OK,’he told her. ‘We’re safe now, Emma. You’re going to be fine.’

Her face was deathly pale, framed by the long, wet tresses of dark hair.

‘She’s hypothermic,’ Tom warned Josh. ‘I’ll get a cardiac monitor on.’

‘Can’t feel any broken bones here.’ Josh was taping the pressure bandage in place on Emma’s leg. ‘Could be just soft-tissue injury. How’s her breathing?’

‘Shallow,’ Tom responded. ‘But chest wall movement looks equal.’ He had been waiting for the rotors of the helicopter to slow enough to make using a stethoscope useful. ‘Sounds clear enough,’he reported moments later.

‘Could be some abdominal trauma.’ Josh had cut the top of Emma’s jeans with shears and pulled the rest of her shirt clear. Tom felt his heart sink as he saw the ugly purple mark marring an expanse of perfect pale skin. If Emma had ruptured her spleen on top of losing blood from the injury to her leg, they may well be too late in starting a fight to prevent her slide into irreversible shock.

Fluids were needed, stat. Wide-bore lines—one in each arm. Pressure cuffs to get the fluid where it was urgently needed—to pump up blood volume and keep enough oxygen circulating to prevent cellular death.

She also needed rapid transport to hospital. The rotors of their aircraft were still turning as Terry kept the helicopter idling. As soon as he and Josh were happy that Emma was stable, they would take off again. With fluids running and the cardiac monitor revealing an overly rapid but normal pattern, take-off was only seconds away.

There had been another reason for landing near the collection of emergency vehicles dotting the lip of the river canyon, however.

‘We need to get the kid,’ Tom reminded Josh.

‘But he’s fine,’ Josh responded. ‘Not a scratch on him apparently. He could go by road.’

‘No.’ Tom shook his head. ‘Mickey needs to come with Emma.’

What if she regained consciousness en route and the distress at having been separated from her child worsened the situation? If Tom had needed any persuasion to stick to his preferred option, it came when Emma’s head rolled to one side and then back again. Her eyelids fluttered open and an arm trailing an IV line was raised as her hand reached towards Tom.

‘Mickey…’

It was the only word Emma uttered but it was more than enough for Josh to nod agreement. He climbed out the rear door and was back in a very short time with a tiny boy clutched in his arms.

‘Mickey’s here,’ Tom told Emma. ‘He’s coming with us.’

‘Mummy!’

The word was lost in engine noise but it was easy to lip-read. Even easier to read the joy of reunion on that small face. Mickey was actually grinning as he caught sight of his mother. Way too small to match those huge, dark eyes and with a now nearly dry mop of tousled, black curls, Mickey had to be the cutest kid Tom had ever seen.

‘Mummy’s asleep just now,’ he shouted carefully. ‘She’s not feeling too well and we’re going to have another ride in the helicopter so that we can take her to the hospital.’

Fear clouded the dark eyes now and Mickey’s bottom lip trembled. How much did the boy understand? With his disability, it was possible that the boy had had quite a lot of experience of hospitals. Maybe enough to know that some people who went into one never came out again?

‘Mummy’s going to be fine,’ he added firmly. ‘This is just another part of your adventure, OK?’

That earned him a suspicious stare and the reminder that Mickey had already declared his dislike of Tom. Still, the child made no protest as Josh strapped him into the seat. The extra passenger made it more awkward to work around Emma but it was a short trip of less than thirty minutes and Emma remained stable.

Better than stable, in fact. With at least the external bleeding controlled and rapid infusion of fluids, Emma’s level of consciousness improved steadily. By the time she was lifted from the stretcher to the bed in the resuscitation area of the emergency department under the watchful gaze of the assembled trauma team, Emma was awake.

‘Mickey,’ she said anxiously. ‘Where’s my son?’

‘He’s being taken care of.’ The doctor in charge of Emma’s airway leaned over her reassuringly. ‘Don’t worry. We need to focus on you for a little while.’

There had been no chance to complete any of the paperwork a job like this generated but, having given all the information he could during the patient handover, Tom was only to happy to use the task as an excuse to stay in Resus, taking over an out-of-the-way corner of a bench.

He had to move a couple of times, to go behind the reinforced glass as X-rays were taken. He was still there when the ultrasound technician arrived with the equipment needed to examine Emma’s abdomen.

Josh appeared right behind the bulky machine.

‘I’ve got a date tonight, mate. If I’m late again, I’m going to be in big trouble. You’re finishing the paperwork, aren’t you?’

‘Yeah. I just wanted to find out what the verdict is on Emma’s leg. There’s a surgical consult that should-n’t be too far away.’

‘That’ll take hours. You know what it’s like around here. They haven’t even started that ultrasound.’ Josh gave Tom a curious glance. ‘If you’re that keen on following up, why don’t you drop back in on your way home? After we’ve signed off.’

Tom could understand his partner’s eagerness. They were at the end of four days of active duty and about to start their four days off. He was looking forward to the time off himself but he hadn’t had a chance to talk to Emma again yet because of the level of activity around her bed. And he hadn’t even been to check up on how young Mickey was doing.

Neither reason was any excuse to stay in the emergency department, of course, and if they’d been scrambled for another callout Tom would have gone instantly, without a backward glance.

Well, maybe he would have looked over his shoulder but that was perfectly understandable, wasn’t it? This rescue had been a major incident. The thought of what could have happened if they’d failed could well come back to haunt him. It was no wonder Tom felt he needed a little more closure than normal.

His partner’s curious glance had been slightly disturbing, however. Was Tom already involved on an emotional level? Emma was certainly a very attractive young woman and she had certainly impressed Tom with her courage but it wasn’t as though he had any intention of getting more involved with a patient. She had a kid, for goodness’ sake, and Tom found them an alien species as far as his social life was concerned. Not only that, she had come to New Zealand to find the kid’s father and that hesitation she’d displayed in answering questions about friendship made Tom think that there was a lot more going on than Emma was revealing.

She must have ended the relationship if the guy still didn’t know he had a son but it was pretty obvious things were far from over on Emma’s side. Why else would she have come halfway across the world?

Tom shrugged off his reluctance to leave. He picked up the folder of paperwork and nodded at Josh.

‘You’re absolutely right, mate. It’s time to go home.’

‘You came back.’

‘It was kind of on my way home and I wanted to see how you were doing.’

‘Much better.’ It wasn’t hard to find a smile for Tom but Emma felt strangely shy. He looked very different without his uniform and helmet. Had she really registered what he’d looked like at all in the crisis during which they’d met? It was his voice she had recognised just now when she’d overheard him asking a nurse where she was.

Emma would remember that voice and its capacity to sound reassuring for the rest of her life. She would also remember the wonderful strength of his arms but everything else was a haze. Emma couldn’t remember anything after the point they’d escaped the van. She’d looked for Tom when she had woken up enough in the emergency department only to be told that he’d gone and that he’d finished his shift so was unlikely to be back in the department that day. There’d been too much else going on to register disappointment but the pleasure Emma felt now on seeing him come through the curtain of the private area she was now occupying was well up the positive emotional scale.

‘Anything still hurting?’