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He couldn’t look again, his full attention needed to get Pop to safety. Then Dave was there to haul them up onto the skids, checking Marty was okay before dragging Pop into the chopper.
Marty crawled in himself, unhooking from the winch wire, fingers trembling now he realised just how close run it had been, his body shaking from the strain of the lift.
Below them they could see the cattle being unloaded, then hear, above the engine noise, the roar as the land beneath the road plunged into the gully.
He strapped in and sat there, trying hard to quell his tremors, while Dave settled Pop on the stretcher, the old man now awake and complaining that he was perfectly well and didn’t need Dave’s fussing.
But Marty was trying to remember what he’d seen. It couldn’t have been Emma.
Could it?
Or had he conjured her up because he’d been thinking of her—thinking of Pop, of fatherhood, and right along that train of thought to Emma and the boys.
* * *
With relief battling rage within her, Emma drove back to town as fast as she dared on the winding mountain road.
Hospital or base?
Surely they’d take Pop to the hospital to have him checked over, although she knew Marty would prefer the base, where he could see to the old man himself.
The chopper was so far in front of her when she cleared the trees she couldn’t see it, but decided to go straight to the base.
And there he was, helping Pop down out of the side door, steadying him as they walked across to the hut, talking, talking—probably questioning him about how he felt.
Emma stayed in the car and waited, aware she didn’t belong here—shouldn’t be here—should be anywhere but here, really…
But she had to see him, touch him, make sure he was all right, so there she stayed.
He must have seen the car for eventually he walked towards it. She got out as he drew nearer, knowing the metal walls around her weren’t enough to contain her rage.
‘Emma, what are you—?’
‘What in heaven’s name did you think you were doing?’ she yelled at him, before he had time to complete his question. ‘You could have been killed! Eventually they’d have got a wire attached to the back of the truck and hauled it backwards, there was no need for you to put your life in danger like that. You frightened me to death.’
‘Or the road could have given way first,’ he said quietly, touching her shoulder.
One touch and the rage abated, leaving her feeling so weak she wanted—no, needed—to lean against him, to feel him against her, to be one with him as surely they were meant to be.
And perhaps he felt the same as he folded his arms around her, held her close, dropping kisses on the top of her head.
‘I’m sorry you were frightened,’ he murmured, ‘but…’
He paused and moved a little away from her, one finger tilting her chin so he could look into her face.
‘But how could I expect you to accept me as a father to your children if I could not save my own father?’
She pulled away from him, anger rising again within her.
Anger and something else.
Hope?
‘What did you say?’ she demanded, looking into the blue eyes she knew so well.
Smiling now, though warily…
‘I’m asking you to marry me—if you’ll have me. Asking because I love you—I think I’ve loved you from the day we met. But I was so hung up on the past, on my birth father, I resisted it with all my strength, but I can’t resist it now. You were right, Pop’s my real father, and a better role model no man could ever have. I realised that today when I thought I might lose him. And if I lost him, would I lose you? Or would you marry me out of pity? So many thoughts, Em, but all of them of love.’
He paused, then added, fairly tentatively for someone who’d been talking non-stop, ‘Will you marry me?’
Emma stared at him, trying desperately to assimilate all she’d heard, but the only words that meant something were the early ones, the ‘I love you’ ones. Words she’d never expected, hardly even dared hope she’d hear on Marty’s lips.
She smiled and shook her head, and had moved closer to kiss him when her head shake obviously bothered him.
‘You’re saying no?’
‘That was disbelief,’ she said, smiling as she put her arms around him. ‘Disbelief that you’d love me when I’ve only recently realised just how much I love you. I was so afraid, you see. Afraid of love—of loving again. I thought if I made it all about the boys…’
‘It wouldn’t hurt?’ he whispered.
And he held her close again, so they only broke apart at heavy footsteps approaching, and Pop’s gruff voice saying, ‘If it’s all the same to you two, I’d like to get home sometime today. Hallie will be worrying.’
