‘Claire. Claire Tremaine. I’m the island caretaker.’
‘I’m Raoul,’ he told her. ‘Raoul de Castelaise.’ Now surely wasn’t the time for titles and formalities. ‘Soldier. I’m pleased to meet you, Claire. In fact I can’t begin to tell you how pleased. Tell me about your arm.’
‘I guess...it’s broken.’
‘Can I see? I’ll need to lift your windcheater.’
‘I don’t have a bra on.’
‘So you don’t. You want me to find you a bra?’
‘I don’t care,’ she muttered. ‘Look at my arm. Don’t look at anything else.’
‘No, ma’am.’ He sat on the edge of the settee and helped her sit up, then carefully tugged off her windcheater. She only had her good arm in it, so it came off easily.
She’d ordered him not to look at anything else. That was a big ask.
Too big.
She was beautiful, he thought. She looked almost like an athlete, taut and lean. Her chestnut curls were wisping onto her naked shoulders.
She looked vulnerable and scared.
He headed back to the bathroom and brought out a towel, wrapping the fluffy whiteness around her so she was almost respectable but her arm was still exposed.
She hugged the towel to her as if she needed its comfort. The bravado she’d shown since the moment he’d met her in the water seemed to have disappeared.
She was scared?
Yeah. He was a big guy. Apart from the dog, she seemed to be in this house alone. She was semi-naked and injured.
Why wouldn’t she be scared?
‘Can I tell you that my grandmother thinks I’m trustworthy?’ he told her, tucking in the edges of the towel so it made an almost secure sarong. ‘She tells the world what a good boy I am, and I’m not about to mess with her beliefs. I am trustworthy, Claire. I promise. If only because my grandmother’s presence seems to spend a lot of time sitting on my shoulder. You’re safe with me.’
And she managed a smile that was almost genuine.
‘Scary Granny, huh.’
‘You’d better believe it. But I can handle her.’
‘And you love her?’
‘You can believe that, too.’
And her smile softened, as if she really did believe him. As if somehow his words really had made her feel safe.
‘Are you French?’ she asked.
‘I’m from Marétal. It’s a small land-locked country near...’
‘I know it,’ she said, in an exclamation of surprise. ‘Your army’s taking part in the international army exercises in Tasmania. I looked it up.’
‘You looked it up?’
‘I get bored,’ she admitted. Her voice was still tight, but she was making a huge effort to sound normal. ‘I was listening to the Tasmanian news on the radio. They listed the countries taking part. I didn’t know where Marétal was. So you’re part of that exercise.’ And then her voice grew tighter. ‘Are there...are there any other soldiers lost overboard?’
‘Only me—and it wasn’t an army exercise,’ he said ruefully. ‘Despite the camouflage, I’m off duty. I took a friend’s boat out from Hobart and got caught in the storm. I had two days being flung about Bass Strait, finally made it to the lee of your island and you know the rest. But my friend—the guy who owns Rosebud—is in Nepal. He doesn’t know I took his boat and I didn’t tell anyone I was going. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision. I broke all the rules and the army would agree that I’ve been an idiot.’
‘You’ve paid the price.
‘It could have been a whole lot higher.’
He was watching her arm while they talked. She was supporting it with her good hand, holding it slightly away from her body. Her shoulder looked odd. Squared off.
‘Idiot or not, you might need to trust me with your arm,’ he suggested. ‘Can I touch it?’
‘If you don’t mind me screaming.’
‘I’ll be gentle,’ he told her, and lightly ran his fingers down the front of her shoulder joint, thinking back to his first-aid courses. Thinking of anatomy.
‘It feels dislocated,’ he told her.
‘It feels broken.’
‘It probably feels worse than if it was broken.’
He put his fingers on her wrist and checked her pulse, then did it again at the elbow.
‘You look like you know what you’re doing,’ she managed.
‘I’ve been in the army for years. I’m a first-aider for my unit.
‘You put on sticking plasters?’
‘Sometimes it’s more than that. When we’re out of range of medical help this is what I do.’
‘Like now?’
‘I hope we’re not out of range. You said you have a radio. Two-way? We must be within an hour’s journey for a chopper coming from the mainland. Tell me where it is and I’ll radio now.’
‘Or not,’ she said.
‘Not?’
‘No.’ She winced. ‘I know this sounds appalling... We have a radio—a big one. We also have back-up—a decent hand-held thing that’s capable of sending signals to Hobart. But last time he was here Don—the owner—was messing around with it and dropped his beer into its workings. And the main radio seems to have been wiped out in the storm.’
‘He dropped his beer...?’
‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘If it had been Marigold it would have been a martini.’ She closed her eyes. ‘There’s a first-aid kit in the kitchen,’ she told him. ‘I think I need it.’
‘I doubt aspirin will help.’
‘Marigold is allergic to pain. Very allergic. She’s been known to demand morphine and a helicopter transfer to the mainland for a torn toenail. I’m thinking there’ll be something decent in there.’
There was. He found enough painkillers to knock out an elephant. Also muscle relaxant, and a dosage list that seemed to be made out for the Flying Doctor—Australia’s remote medical service. The list didn’t actually say This much for a dislocated shoulder, but he had enough experience to figure the dose. He made her hot, sweet tea—plus one for himself—then watched her take the pills he gave her.
‘Stay still until that works,’ he told her.
He found a blanket and covered her, and watched her curl into an almost foetal position on the settee. Rocky nestled on the floor by her side.
He tried to think of a plan.
Plans were thin on the ground and he was still having trouble thinking straight.
The drugs would ease her pain, he thought, but he also knew that the longer the shoulder stayed dislocated, the higher the chance of long-term damage.
In the Middle East he’d had a mate who had...
Um, no. He wasn’t going there.
He did a further tour and found the radio in a truly impressive study. Claire had been right: there was no transmission. He headed outside and saw a wooden building blasted to splinters. A huge radio antenna lay smashed among