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‘It’s not ideal, but we’ll get her to the hospital as soon as the weather lifts. In the meantime, you’ve done your job and you can rely on me to do mine.’
A small curl of warmth quieted some of the fear. ‘Thanks. This baby is...’ Important. All babies were important, but this one was important to her.
‘I know. And he’s going to be fine.’ His eyes made her believe it. ‘Is the father on the scene?’
‘Very much so. He’s not here, though; Lynette’s husband is in the Royal Navy and he’s away at the moment. My father works abroad too; Mum was going to come home next week to help out.’
‘So it’s just you and me then.’ He contrived to make that sound like a good thing. ‘You’re her birth partner?’
‘Yep.’ Cass pressed her lips together. Going to classes with Lynette had seemed like the most natural thing in the world. The most beautiful form of sharing between sisters. Now it was all terrifying.
‘Good.’ His gaze chipped away at yet another piece of the fear that had been laying heavy on her chest for days, and suddenly Cass wondered if she might not make a half decent job of it after all.
‘I’d rather be...’ Anything. ‘I’d rather be doing something practical.’
He laughed. ‘This is the most practical thing in the world, Cass. The one thing that never changes, and hopefully never will. You’ll both be fine.’
She knew that he was trying to reassure her, and that his You’ll both be fine wasn’t a certainty, but somehow it seemed to be working. She walked over to the coil of ropes and pulleys that had been dumped here while she’d taken the bags through to the vicarage.
‘I’ll get these out of your way.’
‘Let me help you.’ Before she could stop him, he’d picked up the rope, leaving Cass to collect the remaining pulleys and carabiners up and put them into a rucksack. ‘You used this to get the bags across?’
‘Yeah.’ Hopefully he was too busy thinking about childbirth to take much notice of what he was carrying. The cut end was clearly visible, hanging from the coil of rope. ‘I borrowed the gear from one of the guys in the village who goes mountaineering.’ She slung the rucksack over her shoulder and led the way through to the storeroom, indicating an empty patch of floor, but Jack shook his head.
‘Not there; it’s too close to the radiator and rope degrades if it dries out too fast. Help me move these boxes and we’ll lay it flat over here.’
Cass dumped the rucksack and started to lift the boxes out of the way. ‘You know something about rope?’
‘Enough to know that this one’s been cut recently, while it was under stress. Mountaineering ropes don’t just break.’ He bent to finger the cut end and then turned his gaze on to her.
The security services had missed a trick in not recruiting Jack and putting him to work as an interrogator. Those quiet eyes made it impossible not to admit to her greatest follies. ‘I...cut the rope.’
Somehow that wasn’t enough. He didn’t even need to ask; Cass found herself needing to tell him the rest.
‘Mimi shouted across, asking if we had a harness. They both seemed determined to try and get across, and medical bags are one thing...’
‘But lives are another?’ he prompted her gently.
‘Yeah. I was worried that they’d just go ahead and do it, and as soon as one of them put their weight on the ropes I wouldn’t be able to stop them. So, when we got hold of the second bag, I cut the rope.’
He grinned. ‘I couldn’t see Mimi letting you haul a bag over and staying put herself on the other side. Nice job.’
Cass supposed she might as well tell him everything; he’d hear it soon enough. ‘Not such a nice job. I miscalculated and the rope snapped back in their direction. Another few feet and it would have taken Mimi’s head off.’
‘It was...what, thirty feet across the river?’
‘About that.’
‘Weight of the bags...’ He was obviously doing some kind of calculation in his head. ‘Wouldn’t have taken her head off. Maybe given her a bit of a sting.’
‘Well, it frightened the life out of me. And what’s-his-name...’
‘Rafe...’
‘Yeah, Rafe tackled her to the ground.’
