‘Dave, Chris?’ Outside, the rotors of the second rescue helicopter began slowing down. Ruby got out more mugs for the other crew. ‘Where’s Slats?’

‘Right here.’ A short, wiry man sauntered in and handed Dave some paperwork.

Chris sat down and introduced Jack to his offsider before returning to the previous conversation. ‘Ruby’s got everything under control with the house, Jack. We made sure of that the moment we learned what she was up to. She’s one very organised lady. And damned determined when she sets her mind to something.’

‘Here you go.’ Ruby slid the filled mugs across the table towards the men.

Jack’s eyebrows were on the move again. ‘Ruby? Organised?’ His eyes widened and he turned to her. ‘Have you had a total mind make-over since I saw you last?’ He certainly didn’t have any hang-ups about everyone knowing they used to know each other.

‘Sort of.’ She shrugged off his criticism. ‘I definitely don’t rush things like a sprinter out of the starter’s block any more.’

Jack told Chris, ‘Three years ago, if she’d wanted a wall taken out, she’d have taken it out, regardless of load bearing or any other constraints.’

Chris laughed. ‘Sometimes it’s hard to slow Ruby down once she gets going with that mallet, but she’s very conscious of making the best out of this house. It’s going to be well worth all her efforts.’

Jack pressed his lips together. Holding back a retort? Then he headed to the sink, poured the coffee away and began making another one. Without milk.

‘Oh, sorry.’ She’d made it the way he used to drink it. Silly girl. She should’ve asked, not presumed, she knew.

‘Not a problem.’

Leaning back against the small bench, Ruby folded her arms over her abdomen, holding her mug in one hand. Her pie was heating in the microwave. She put distance between her and Jack, all too aware of the sparks that would fly if they touched. Trying not to watch as he stirred the bottom out of his coffee mug was hard after all those years of wondering about him; yearning for his touch, his kisses, even his understanding. She remembered how those long fingers now holding the teaspoon used to trip lightly over her feverish skin, sensitising her from head to toe.

He glanced over. ‘What?’

‘Nothing.’ Thoughtlessly she laid a hand on his upper arm then snatched it back as his eyebrows rose. Dropping onto a chair, she surreptitiously continued to study him over the rim of her mug. There were a few more crinkles at the corners of his eyes, an occasional grey strand on his head. His tall frame still didn’t carry any excess weight, but when he’d held her he’d felt more muscular than before. Had he started working out? In a gym? Not likely. But, then, how was she to know?

On her belt the pager squawked out a message, as it did on Dave’s. He said, ‘I’ll get the details.’

‘Damn it, when do I get to eat?’ She spun around to empty her coffee into the sink and bumped into Jack. As she snatched the microwave open, she clamped down on the sweet shivers dancing over her skin. ‘Lukewarm’s better than no pie at all,’ she muttered, before sinking her teeth into the gluggy pastry and racing for the helicopter behind Chris and Slats. Would lukewarm Jack be better than no Jack at all? At least she was getting away from him, and he’d have gone by the time they got back.

As Ruby clambered up into the ‘copter Dave called out, ‘You’re picking up a cardiac arrest patient from the interisland ferry.’ He came closer, Jack on his heels. ‘Ruby, I’m sending Jack in my place. Show him the ropes, will you?’

‘Sure,’ she spluttered. Didn’t anyone around here listen to her? Couldn’t they hear her silent pleas? She did not want to be confined inside the ‘copter with Jack until she’d had a few days to get her mixed-up emotions under control. Her heart thudded against her ribs. Would that even be possible?

Toughen up and deal with it. Deal with Jack. He was here. That was all there was to it. Her chin jutted out and her spine clicked as she straightened unnaturally tight and upright. She’d do the job, show him the ropes, and then she was due two days’ leave.

Out over Cook Strait, Chris hovered the helicopter above the rolling deck of the inter-islander. The sky was clear and cold, the sea running fast with a big swell. Not ideal but it could’ve been a whole lot worse.

‘Send the stretcher after me,’ Ruby instructed Jack as she prepared to be lowered to the deck with a pack and the oxygen bottle on her back.

‘Right,’ Jack snapped.

So he thought he should go first. Tough. It was her job today. At least he hadn’t argued and wasted valuable time. That was the Jack she remembered.

The ship lurched upwards as her feet reached for the deck, jarring her whole body and giving her knee some grief. Mindful of the ship’s crew, she swore silently and tried hard not to limp as she crossed to her patient, checking the area for any obstacles that might get in the way of the stretcher being lowered. She waved the crowd of onlookers further back.

A woman looked up as Ruby crouched uncomfortably beside her. ‘I’m a GP. This is Ron Jefferies, fifty years old. Lucky for him I was close by when he fell. I started CPR within sixty seconds. The ferry crew supplied a defibrillator, which I used at maximum joules. We now have a thready heart rhythm.’

Ruby introduced herself as she unzipped the pack and removed an LMA kit. ‘Ron, I’m going to insert a tube in your throat and place a mask over your face to give you oxygen.’

‘I’ll put an IV in.’ Jack was down already and knelt opposite.

‘Please.’ Ruby was already pushing up Ron’s sleeve and passing the bag of saline to the GP now standing behind her. Holding the bag aloft helped the fluid flow more easily until they were ready to winch their patient on board the helicopter. She and Jack worked quickly and efficiently together, unfolding the stretcher and snapping the locks into place at the hinges.

She directed Jack and the GP to grip Ron’s legs and upper arm, while opposite them she clutched handfuls of his trousers and shirt, ready to pull. ‘On the count of three. One. Two. Three.’ And their patient was on the stretcher, being belted securely.

‘We’re ready to transfer.’ Ruby spoke to Slats through her mouthpiece as she checked Jack had attached the winch to the stretcher. Within minutes they were all aboard and Chris had headed the machine for Wellington and the hospital.

Jack checked their patient’s vitals while Ruby wrote up the patient report form.

‘He’s one lucky man,’ she murmured. ‘How often does a GP witness an arrest? Getting the compressions that quickly definitely saved him.’

‘He owes her his life for sure.’ Jack glanced up at her. ‘Did you get her name?’

‘No time for that.’

‘We didn’t learn anything about our man here either, apart from who he is. I wonder if he was travelling with family? Friends?’

She shook her head. ‘According to the steward I spoke to while you were being winched up, he’d put it over the loudspeaker for anyone travelling with Ron Jefferies to come forward, but no one appeared. It will be up to the hospital to track down relatives.’

‘They’ll be able to talk to him when they remove the LMA.’

‘Maybe.’ The man didn’t look very alert. Ruby watched as Jack rechecked all his vitals.

In her headphone Slats said, ‘We’re here, folks. The team’s waiting for your patient.’

Jack glanced up. ‘Thank goodness. Ron needs a cardiologist urgently.’

It didn’t take long to hand Ron over to the hospital emergency staff, and then the pilots were skimming across the harbour to the airport and back to base.

Usually Ruby would gaze out the window during this short flight, looking at all the city landmarks, enjoying the moods of the harbour, unwinding after an operation. But now her eyes were drawn to Jack as he sat, hunched in the bucket seat, reading the clinical-procedures notebook they all carried.