Flight to Coorah Creek Read Online Free PDF Page B

quickly as possible,’ he said, his voice rough. ‘I imagine there are things you need to do to the plane.’
    â€˜Yes. There are.’ Her voice was little more than a whisper.
    â€˜If you’re looking for breakfast …’
    â€˜I can find the kitchen. I’ll send word when we are ready to leave.’
    Adam didn’t so much hear her go as feel her absence. He dropped the drip line, and tentatively rubbed his shoulder, feeling the roughness of the skin beneath his shirt. There was no new wound there. No burn. Why then did it hurt?
    Because it always did. When people got too close they hurt. They laughed, or they left or they just hurt. The only way to avoid the hurt was to keep people away. He was very good at that. Oh, people liked him. He was friendly. He cared about his patients. There were times he knew he touched their lives. But that was different. No one touched his life. No one touched him.
    Adam took a deep breath and regained his equilibrium as the only person who had never deliberately hurt him walked into the room.
    â€˜I’ll look after him if you want to get some breakfast,’ Sister Luke said.
    â€˜Thanks. I’ll go in a minute. I just want to check the wound.’ Adam busied himself with his patient for a few minutes. Sister Luke was, as always, the perfect nurse – assisting him without being told what he needed.
    â€˜It’s probably safe to go into the kitchen now,’ Sister Luke said, as they finished.
    â€˜I don’t know what you mean?’ Adam fiddled with the drip in his patient’s arm again rather than look into the nun’s too-knowing grey eyes.
    â€˜I heard Jess asking for someone to drive her to the airstrip. My guess is she’s finished her breakfast and gone.’
    â€˜That’s good. We need to get this kid to hospital,’ Adam said, firmly ignoring Sister Luke’s tone. ‘Can you stay with him while I get something to eat? I don’t want to disturb him any more than we have to, so I won’t shift him until Jess sends word that the plane is ready.’
    â€˜Of course.’
    Sister Luke was smiling in that annoyingly satisfied way she had. Adam almost snorted as he left the room.
    Sure enough, there was no sign of Jess in the homestead’s big kitchen. The station owner and his wife were effusive in their thanks as they served him a huge breakfast of steak and eggs, with more coffee on the side than he would drink in a week.
    Just as he was finishing, the loud clump of boots on the wooden veranda heralded the return of one of the stockmen. Removing his hat, the man put his head inside the door.
    â€˜Doc, the plane is ready to go,’ he said.
    â€˜Great.’ Adam got to his feet.
    â€˜Jess said you’d probably need the stretcher from the plane,’ the stockman continued. ‘It’s in the ute.’
    The stretcher. How had he not thought of that? That was unlike him. He put it down to tiredness.
    With the assistance of another stockman, they carefully carried the jackaroo out of the house, and laid him in the back of the ute. Adam rode with his patient, wincing every time the slow-moving vehicle hit a pothole in the red dirt track. There were far more than Adam would have liked, but thanks to the drugs, the injured boy was oblivious to the harsh bumps.
    At the airstrip, the plane was waiting, the steps lowered. As the driver pulled the ute up close to the aircraft doors, Adam could see Jess in the pilot’s seat making her pre-flight checks.
    â€˜Gently now,’ Adam cautioned, as together the driver and the stockman lifted the stretcher from the back of the vehicle. They carried it to the plane and manoeuvred it through the door. Adam followed them on board to make sure his patient was safely strapped in for the flight. The straps secured across his chest and legs would keep him safe through any turbulence they encountered. Making sure the saline drip was still