‘Meg, wait a moment!’
She paused when she heard Jack calling her name, although she didn’t turn round because she wasn’t sure that she had her emotions in check sufficiently to face him. She kept her back towards him, staring at the inky blackness of the trees that surrounded the village, yet she knew to the second when he stopped behind her.
That inner radar again, working overtime, she thought with a surge of black humour. Maybe she should use it as an early warning system for whenever he was in the vicinity. She certainly could do with avoiding him from the look of it!
‘I didn’t mean that as it sounded.’ He got straight to the point without any preamble, surprising her enough so that she half turned. She saw the regret in his grey eyes and somehow that undid all her good work, setting free her carefully shored-up emotions. It had been a long, tiring day and Jack’s intransigent attitude hadn’t helped one bit!
She felt her lower lip quiver before she could stop it and quickly turned away, hating herself for letting him see that he had the power to upset her.
‘Oh, hell!’ He reached out, as though he was going to touch her, then let his hand fall to his side without actually making contact. ‘Look, Meg, I wasn’t trying to make you feel that I wanted Yvonne here instead of you,’ he ground out, as though the words had cost him an awful lot of effort.
Maybe they had, Meg thought with unaccustomed cynicism. It certainly couldn’t have been easy for Jack to lie for the sake of harmony within the team!
‘Don’t worry about it,’ she said with an insouciance which cost her even more. ‘I certainly shan’t!’
He didn’t actually grind his teeth but the effect was much the same. Her blue eyes widened when she saw myriad emotions cross his face at that moment. It was a measure of his strength of mind that he managed to control himself, but she was shaking in her boots.
Why in the name of all that was holy did she know that he’d been tempted…sorely tempted…to kiss her? She had no idea but the thought was enough to make her head spin.
‘I apologise, anyway. Goodnight.’
He strode away, leaving her standing there, staring after him. Meg took a tiny breath and let it trickle into her lungs. A bigger one might have helped but she didn’t seem capable of that. Breathing was an effort, thinking even more of one, but feeling…well, feeling was easy-peasy!
She shivered as a hot trickle worked its way up her spine, shuddered as a cold one flowed the other way. Hot and cold chills were suddenly racing through her body however they chose and she couldn’t stop them!
She closed her eyes and tried to subdue the little devils but that was a mistake of gigantic proportions. Jack’s face suddenly filled her mind—lean cheeks, moody grey eyes, enticingly kissable lips…
‘Oh!’ Her eyes shot open before her wayward mind could go any further. Stills she could just about deal with, but if that picture had become animated and moved to the next frame—a close-up of the kiss Jack had so very nearly bestowed on her…
She groaned then clapped a hand over her mouth in case anyone heard her. She had to get a grip! So what if Jack had been tempted to kiss her just now? It didn’t mean that she would have let him or responded. It took two to tango, as her mother was so fond of saying, only that didn’t sound nearly as reassuring as it should have done. While she had absolutely no desire to tango with Jack…
She cut the rest of that thought dead!
Meg wasn’t sure what had woken her. She was so tired that it was a wonder anything had. Yet suddenly she found herself wide awake and staring round at the darkness. Lesley was snoring softly in the adjoining campbed so obviously whatever had woken Meg hadn’t disturbed her.
For a moment she debated rolling over and going back to sleep, but the nagging feeling that something was wrong wouldn’t go away. Pushing back the mosquito net, she took her shoes from the end of the bed and shook them to dislodge any creepy-crawly visitors before slipping them on her feet.
Leah had left them a candle to light the hut with while they’d got undressed but they’d blown it out and now there was only the pale shimmer from a sickle moon to see by as Meg made her way to the door. She peered out across the clearing in the centre of the village and felt her skin prickle with alarm when she saw shadowy figures moving about in front of one of the huts. What was going on? Who was out there? And, more importantly, should she go and find out?
Meg hesitated but the feeling that something was wrong wouldn’t go away. Her legs felt like lead as she stepped from the relative safety of the hut and began to cross the clearing. It was a relief when she spotted Moses among the crowd of people gathered by the hut.
‘Is something wrong?’ she asked, going straight over to speak to him.
He turned to her and his face looked grey and drawn in the moonlight. ‘It is Leah, Dr Meg. The baby is coming but there is something wrong and he cannot be born.’
He gave an expressive shrug which said more than any words could have done. Meg felt her heart sink as she wondered what the problem might be. There were so many things that could go wrong during a birth, although thankfully most could be dealt with in the safety of a hospital. However, this was the middle of the African bush and she had no idea what she was letting herself in for as Moses eagerly accepted her offer of help. At that moment, it seemed a very long time since she’d done her stint on the maternity unit.
The hut was lit by candles, and as Meg went inside she could see several women gathered around the low pallet that Leah was lying on. It was obvious that they were the local midwives and she was conscious that she might offend them if she offered her help. However, they made no objection when she knelt beside Leah, simply moved aside to make room for her. She had a feeling that they believed they’d done all they could and her heart sank even further at that thought, although she tried not to show any trace of concern.
‘Hello, Leah. It’s Dr Meg,’ she said softly, noting the lines of pain that bracketed the girl’s mouth. ‘Can I just check how your baby is doing?’
Leah nodded mutely. She was obviously too exhausted to speak. She arched upwards as another contraction began, a keening wail coming from her as the pain tore through her body. Meg was shocked by how strong her contractions were because there had been no sign that she’d been in labour when she’d served their meal a few hours earlier.
She placed her hand on the young woman’s abdomen and gently palpated it, feeling the hard form of the baby beneath her palm. She couldn’t be certain but she suspected that it was lying in the breech position and that was what was causing the problem. Turning the baby was beyond her because she simply didn’t have that kind of expertise. However, it was obvious that something had to be done—and quickly—otherwise both mother and child could die.
She patted Leah’s hand, trying to sound a lot more confident than she actually felt. ‘Don’t worry, Leah. I’ll go and get another of the doctors and we’ll help you deliver your baby. All right?’
She wasn’t sure that the girl had even heard her as Leah stared at her with pain-glazed eyes. Meg hurried from the hut and ran across the clearing. Whether it was professional courtesy or pure instinct which made her go straight to Jack’s hut, she wasn’t sure, but she didn’t stop to debate it as she ducked under the low lintel. Leah needed help and, in her view, Jack was the best qualified to give it.
‘Jack, wake up!’ Pushing aside the mosquito netting, she put her hand on his bare shoulder, ignoring the frisson which shot up her arm as she felt the heat of his skin. He was naked from the waist up, a thin white sheet covering the lower half of his body and outlining the narrowness of his hips and muscular power of his long legs.
Meg quickly averted her eyes and focused on the task of waking him rather than letting her mind go wandering off. All right, so Jack was superbly fit but now certainly wasn’t the time to be thinking about it. She tightened her grip on his shoulder and shook