out of himself and into the community had both backfired so far and she felt guilty. It must have been a very bad accident to have such an effect on him.
At five o’ clock, Marina still hadn’t heard from him, and the two volunteers who had left a family birthday early, especially to help her, arrived to take over. She was drained and left the hut with mixed feelings. On the one hand, she was relieved that the kite surfers had been rescued, but she was also trying not to think what might have happened if Lachlan hadn’t spotted them. Even though it was his visit that had distracted her, she had to focus on the positives: if the station hadn’t been there at all, if she hadn’t stuck out the watch, if Lachlan hadn’t brought it to her attention – things could have been very different.
Chapter Thirteen
‘Whoa, steady. Let me give you a hand.’
Tiff grasped Dirk’s arm as he and one of the other crew members helped her off the lifeboat as it moored alongside the quay.
‘You OK?’ He didn’t let go of her arm and she didn’t push him away until she was safely on the quayside.
‘I’m fine. Absolutely fine.’ Finally, and unwisely, brushing off his hand, she tottered up the quayside and back towards the station, feeling as if the ground was a giant marshmallow.
‘You’ll soon have your land legs back,’ he said.
‘What legs?’ Tiff mumbled. ‘They don’t appear to be working.’
She’d changed – or been helped to change – out of the dry suit by one of the other female members of the crew after her ‘dip’.
She convinced herself that would have been OK – just about – if the lifeboat had headed straight back to Porthmellow station as scheduled. Except it hadn’t – it had been re-directed to a real ‘shout’ a few miles out to sea where a yacht’s engine had failed and was drifting towards a notorious reef.
Rachel had taken the decision to race immediately to the yacht, with Tiff still on board. Tiff had been briefed and understood the urgent need and had tried not to show how seasick she felt. But by the time they’d reached the yacht and towed it back to port, it was mid-afternoon and she’d thrown up twice.
The crew had been amazing, checking on her and bringing her cups of water, sweets and some seasickness pills which, although a little late, had helped a bit. She hadn’t wanted to make life difficult for them, or to take them away from their main task of recovering the yacht, so she’d done her utmost to look cheerful even though she felt like death.
She’d uttered another of many silent prayers as the lifeboat puttered gently into the calm waters of the outer harbour and only now, back on the safety of dry land, did she finally allow herself a small smile that the experience, though horrendous, would make a hell of a good feature – in fact she might even be able to sell it to a national magazine, let alone Cream of Cornish, if she could find a strong enough topical slant to it. There was one added angle she could use, of course, but she didn’t think Dirk would be happy about it.
‘You were awesome!’ Rachel trilled. ‘The perfect casualty. No matter how many times the crew try to act like a real casualty, they never get it right.’
‘Thanks. I aim to please,’ Tiff muttered, grateful that a chair was within collapsing distance. ‘I can’t believe you do this for the love of it.’
‘Dirk gets paid. Most full-time mechanics do because we need a trained expert on site at all times.’
‘I’d volunteer anyway, even if I wasn’t paid,’ Dirk said.
‘You have to eat, Dirk!’ Rachel laughed. ‘And you do come out on shouts at all hours as well as your regular duties.’
‘What else would I do with myself?’ he muttered.
‘I can’t imagine spending a moment longer than I had to on that … thing.’ Tiff shuddered, glancing back at the lifeboat. Two of the crew were preparing to take it back to the station where it would be winched onto the launch slipway.
Rachel patted her on the shoulder. ‘There’s a brew on,’ she said. ‘Why don’t we all have a cuppa and a debrief. You can ask your questions for the feature at the same time? Or if you’d prefer, you can head home and call me when you’ve recovered?’
Although the dry suit had, as promised, kept her