‘Thanks. We might wait in the car.’
‘Yeah.’ The firefighter looked up at the falling rain. ‘Don’t blame you.’
They walked back to the car in silence. Mimi got in, sitting quietly in the passenger seat.
‘All right. I’ll go.’ Rafe decided to make his position clear, right from the start.
Mimi turned to him, no trace of the anger that he’d seen in her face more times than he could count today. ‘This is my job, Rafe.’
He didn’t care. Mimi was not going into a dark house which was in the process of being burgled. He didn’t care if it was just kids, or that there was going to be backup. She wasn’t going.
‘Look, Mimi...’ He heard the exasperation in his own tone and took a breath. ‘In a situation like this, I’m handier with my fists than you are.’
‘You’re thinking of hitting the patient?’ She was annoyingly calm.
‘Don’t be smart.’
She pressed her lips together, as if she was trying not to rise to the bait. ‘Teamwork, right? You’re a gifted doctor, Rafe, but I’m a first responder. I’ve been trained to work with the fire services and the police and I know exactly what to expect of them and what they’re going to expect of me.’
Rafe grabbed the last and only argument he had. ‘And, professionally speaking, a paramedic usually defers to a doctor in any medical situation.’
‘Okay.’ She sat back in her seat, folding her arms. ‘Make the decision, then. From a professional standpoint.’
She’d pulled the last plank out from under him. Rafe had made some tough decisions in his life, but that didn’t make this one any easier.
‘All right. You should go. You’re the one best qualified to do the job.’
‘Thanks.’ Her face suddenly softened. ‘Don’t worry.’
She went to get out of the car and Rafe caught her arm. ‘If you don’t take care out there, so help me I’m reporting you...’
She grinned at him, irrepressible as ever. If this was all he could have, the camaraderie of working together in a potentially volatile situation, then he’d take it.
‘You need to have a word with Jack. He usually threatens to string me up and flay me to within an
inch of my life.’
‘What you and Jack do on your own time is your own business.’
Mimi chuckled. ‘I’d like to see him try.’
‘Just go, before I change my mind. And be careful.’
‘Yeah. I will.’
Rafe let go of her arm and she got out of the car, walking over to where the dinghy was being pushed out into the water. One of the firefighters helped her in and she sat down. Someone must have cracked a joke because Rafe saw a couple of the men laugh, and Mimi joined in.
He got out of the car and went to stand next to the senior fire officer, who was watching as the boat steered a path across the water. It drew up alongside a small balcony on the upper floor of the house, and two figures climbed up onto it. The crack of breaking glass sounded above the rush of the water and then the figures disappeared inside.
CHAPTER SIX
MIMI WATCHED FROM the boat as the two police officers gained entry into the house and were followed in by one of the firefighters. Glancing across the expanse of water, she could see Rafe, standing by the fire truck. Suddenly, she was glad that he was there.
The firefighter appeared and beckoned her inside. She knew that the place would have been searched and that it was now deemed secure. A hand reached down and she grasped it, struggling to find a foothold on the balcony, before an undignified shove from the firefighter in the boat behind her boosted her upwards.
‘Through there. If we give the order to evacuate the house, you don’t wait. We’ll be getting everyone out.’
‘Understood.’ Mimi waited for her bag to be passed up and hurried through to the bedroom on the other side of the house.