His Very Special Bride

‘That’s true. The estate agent must have had a momentary lapse.’ Carol hesitated, sending her a thoughtful glance. ‘So, are you still set on taking on the cottage?’

Sarah nodded. ‘It isn’t in the best of shape, but I don’t see that I have any choice. It’s about all that I can afford until my job prospects improve—my freelance writing is beginning to bring in a modest income, but it isn’t enough to provide a terrific standard of living. At least the effort I’ll have to put in to make the cottage into a home will be good therapy for me.’ She frowned. ‘I just hope that Social Services won’t decide that it’s not a fit place for Emily.’

‘I doubt they’ll object. After all, from the sound of it, there isn’t anything too untoward about the property, apart from some damp in the kitchen. Besides, having a doctor living next door might turn out to be an advantage.’

Sarah made a face. ‘I don’t think he’ll see it quite that way. The impression I had was that he would much prefer to be left to himself and, to be honest, that actually suits me right down to the ground. I need some space so that I can clear my head.’

‘Not too much space, I hope?’ Carol was frowning. ‘I know you want to take on more work, and that you’re determined to go it alone, but you have to think of Emily in all this. She’s been through a lot, with you being away in hospital for a time, and the last thing she needs is for you to suffer a relapse. That’s why you have to remember that I’m here for you, for both of you.’

Sarah clasped her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. ‘I will. Like I said, I’m not going to be far away, and we’ll be back to pester you on a regular basis.’

‘That will be fine by me.’ Carol’s face creased into a smile. ‘Did the neighbour say where it was that he worked? Perhaps he’s a GP, with a practice nearby. That would be handy for you and Emily, wouldn’t it?’

Sarah felt a rush of heat ripple through her at the mere thought. Ben Brinkley as her GP? Heaven forbid. Even now she could remember with startling clarity the feel of his long body brushing against hers as he had helped her. Her whole system had gone into overdrive.

‘I don’t think I would be in any hurry to sign up on his list,’ she said on a husky note. She could well imagine that her blood pressure would soar sky high just as soon as she stepped into any surgery run by him. ‘I’d much rather settle for a more genial, fatherly type.’ She frowned. ‘Anyway, he was at home in the middle of a weekday afternoon, so I doubt he’s in general practice. Maybe he works shifts at the local hospital.’

That would make living near to him easier to handle, from her point of view. After all, it meant that he would probably be working some weekends, and that would narrow down the risk of her running into him, wouldn’t it?

A short time later, after she had dropped Emily off at nursery school, Sarah drove into the local town. Parking her car, she walked across the cobbled square, and headed for the estate agent’s office.

‘I’m so sorry about the trouble you had,’ the young man said, getting up from behind his desk and coming towards her. ‘I must have put the wrong label on the key. It was lucky for you that the neighbour happened to be around yesterday when you visited the property.’

Sarah stared at him. ‘I remember ringing you to tell you about the mix-up,’ she said, ‘but how did you know about the neighbour? I don’t recall telling you about him.’

‘No…no, he rang me.’ His expression was something between apologetic and awkward. ‘I think he wanted to check that you were who you said you were. The property wasn’t meant to have been put on the market for another day or so and he wasn’t expecting anybody to be viewing it.’

Sarah winced. Dr Brinkley was certainly thorough in his way of getting to the bottom of things. He’d obviously had doubts about her version of events and somehow that didn’t seem to bode well for their forthcoming relationship as neighbours.

‘But the cottage is still up for rent, isn’t it?’

‘Oh, yes, it is.’ His face brightened. ‘Are you interested in taking up the tenancy, then?’

‘I am. Do you have some papers for me to sign?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, yes…I’ll sort them out right away.’ Clearly, he was eager to finalise things before she had the opportunity to change her mind, and just a few minutes later Sarah left the office. In her bag, she had the correct set of keys, and all the necessary documentation for her new tenancy.

Was this the beginning of a new life? The thought was a little daunting, but at least she had made a start. Straightening her shoulders, she began to walk along the street, heading in the direction of the offices of the local newspaper.

‘Oh, no… Stop…stop… Slow down…’ A woman’s voice rang out, shrill with desperation, and she put up a hand as though to indicate that someone should stop. The woman was walking towards her, looking beyond Sarah to a point behind her. Sarah’s purposeful stride slowed to a halt and she glanced behind her to see what was happening.

A motorcyclist was slowing down, indicating that he wanted to turn right at a junction, and he had positioned himself in the centre of the road. All appeared to be well, except that in the background there was the aggressive, speeding drone of an oncoming car.

Sarah turned round fully to take a better look. On the brow of the hill, she saw that a driver of a black saloon was overtaking on a bend in the road, and he was heading straight for the motorcyclist. The woman who had been shouting was gesticulating now, miming a frantic warning, but Sarah was very much afraid that it had come too late.

At the last moment the man behind the wheel of the car seemed to realise what was about to happen. He wrenched the steering-wheel, swerving to the left as he tried to avoid the motorbike, but he was going too fast and it was clear to Sarah that his actions were too late.

She watched in horror as he hit the bike with the front wing of his car and then smashed into another driver who was innocently heading straight on in the left-hand lane of the road. The front of the black saloon crumpled like a concertina and the car that had been hit swung round violently.

Sarah ran towards the mangled cars and the bike, anxious to do what she could to help.

To her dismay, she saw that the motorcyclist was lying on his side, his leg trapped beneath the bulk of his motorcycle. He appeared to be unconscious, but after a swift check she discovered that his airway was clear and he was still breathing, albeit faintly.

Instinctively, she reached for her phone. ‘Emergency services—I need an ambulance,’ she said, her breath coming in short gasps as she realised the enormity of the situation.

‘Will you help me to lift the bike off him?’ Sarah flung the question at a man who had come to stare at the devastation all around.

‘Of course.’ Together they freed the young man from the weight of the vehicle that was trapping him, and Sarah knelt down to check him over more thoroughly.

The woman who had been shouting earlier appeared to be in a panic, flapping her arms wildly and running about as though she was unsure what to do next.

‘Do you think you could try to stop the oncoming traffic?’ Sarah suggested briefly. She could see that the biker had a thigh wound, with blood seeping through his jeans, and now she laid the heel of her hand on to his thigh and applied pressure. ‘Perhaps you could position yourself over the brow of the hill to stop anyone from coming any closer,’ she told the woman, ‘but make sure that you stay on the pavement.’

The woman nodded, and Sarah guessed she was glad to be able to do something useful. The man who had assisted her must have decided that was the best option, too, because he went with the woman, saying, ‘You take the near side to the brow of the hill, and I’ll go further along, to slow them down.’

Another man was already heading across the far side of the road to halt the traffic there.

Sarah took off her light cotton jacket and folded it up, making it into a tight wad. Then she whipped the leather belt from the waistband of her jeans and used it to strap the wad in place over the man’s thigh, close to the source of bleeding.

After that, she hurried over to the other two vehicles and she quickly checked the condition of the drivers. The man who had caused the accident was still sitting upright in the driver’s seat, looking dazed, and when she spoke to him he said in a thready voice, ‘What have I done? I didn’t realise…’

‘Don’t worry about that for the moment,’ Sarah said. It seemed that his air bag had failed to deploy fully, and his leg was trapped by crumpled metal. ‘Are you hurt? I’ve called for an ambulance. Is there anywhere in particular that’s causing you pain?’

‘My leg,’ he said, and then added in a shaky tone, ‘I’ll be all right. Will you go and see to the others?’

Sarah nodded. ‘I’ll be back in a minute. Don’t try to move.’

The driver of the other car was clutching his chest and his breathing was rapid and gasping. He was complaining of back pain, but his whole body was trembling, and Sarah guessed that he had gone into a state of shock. She stayed with him for a moment or two, trying to calm him and reassure him that he would receive medical attention soon.

It worried her that she had to leave the drivers, but her main concern had to be the young man who was lying in the road. He had been bleeding profusely from his leg wound, and she didn’t know whether her attempt to stem the flow would be sufficient. She went back to him and saw that the pressure pad she had put in place was soaked with blood. The only comfort she could take was that at least he was still breathing.

It was a relief, some time later, to hear the sound of the ambulance siren in the distance, and to know that help was on its way at last. She felt out of her depth, but she knew that these people needed to be taken to hospital at the earliest opportunity. She got to her feet.

The woman who had been stopping the traffic came to stand beside her. ‘The police have arrived,’ she said. ‘They’re setting up cones to keep the area clear.’

‘That’s good.’ The woman was much calmer now, and Sarah guessed that she would be able to give a good account to the police of what had happened.

She waited beside the motorcyclist as a paramedic walked towards him and knelt down. He tried to talk to him, but there was no response, and so he looked up at Sarah. ‘Do you know if he has been unconscious the whole time?’

‘Yes, he has.’ She hesitated, then added, ‘The two drivers were both conscious when I went to look at them. One seems to have a chest injury and is struggling to breathe, and the other is complaining of leg pain.’

‘Thanks. Perhaps you’d like to show my colleague the one with the chest pain.’ He nodded towards a second paramedic who was emerging from the ambulance.

Sarah did as he’d asked, and when she was satisfied that both drivers had been assessed and the man with chest pain was being attended to she went back to the driver who had caused the pile-up and tried to reassure him that help was on the way.

By this time a second ambulance had arrived, along with a fast-response car, and more emergency practitioners began to come forward.

Feeling a trifle redundant by now, Sarah went to see how the motorcyclist was doing. The paramedic she had spoken to earlier was working side by side with someone else now, a dark- haired man who was wearing the outfit of an emergency doctor.