Saved by the Single Dad (13 page)

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

T
HE
WEEK
HAD
seen them slip back into their easy routine. Jack had been looking forward to the weekend, wondering if perhaps Cass might be persuaded to take some time off from her work at the house, for an outing with him and Ellie. And then, suddenly, nothing else existed. The phone call on Friday afternoon, from a parent of one of the kids from Ellie's class, drove everything else from his head. Just the need to drive, to be there.

He could hear sirens in the distance, and he willed them on. Jack knew they were probably going in the same direction as he was, and if he couldn't reach Ellie then someone had to. Anyone.

He took the turn into the small side road that led to the school and slammed on the brakes, narrowly avoiding a fire engine that was parked up ahead. Getting out of the car, he ran, not stopping to even close the driver's door, let alone lock it.

‘Jack...Jack!' He heard a woman's voice and scanned the crowd. ‘Jack!' The mother of a little boy in Ellie's reception class ran towards him.

‘Hannah.' He caught her hand, then put his arm around her. ‘What's happening?'

‘All the other kids are out. But the annexe...' Hannah's chest started to heave and Jack willed her to stay calm.

‘Sarah told me that part of the building had collapsed.' Ethan had stayed home today with a bad cold, but Jack had dropped Ellie off at school this morning.

‘Yes. The ground's so wet... The kids' classroom looks okay from the outside, but they're still in there.'

‘Okay. Hannah, they'll get to them. The firefighters are trained for this; they know exactly what to do...' Jack wasn't sure whether he was trying to reassure Hannah or himself.

Stop. Look around. Assess the situation, then act.
His own training came to the fore and Jack swallowed down his panic, the overwhelming need to have Ellie safe in his arms.

A pattern emerged from the chaos. A line of older children were leaving the main entrance of the school, shepherded by their teachers towards the sports field, which was some way from the building. There, children were being counted and checked, while a small group of parents waited anxiously.

He took Hannah's hand, walking swiftly around the back of the building, trying to control the feeling that he just needed to sweep everything in front of him away and find Ellie. What had once been the school hall was now a pile of rubble and the two-storey annexe beyond it, which housed the reception classroom, was completely cut off.

‘They got the class on the ground floor out through the windows.' Hannah was hiccupping the words out through her tears. ‘But Jamie and Ellie were upstairs. I saw her in the window, Jack.'

Jack looked up at the window, his heart leaping as he saw a small figure, climbing up on to the low, wide sill.
Ellie.
She was waving her hands above her head and seemed to be shouting.

‘Ellie...' He roared her name, but in the general activity she didn't hear. ‘Ellie!'

Someone held him back and he struggled free. The firefighters already had ladders up at the windows, and one of them climbed up. Jack saw Ellie walk along the windowsill towards him, reaching through the safety bars to press her hands against the glass.

They seemed to be talking. The firefighter called for quiet and a hush fell on the people below.

‘Good girl. We saw you. Get down from the window now, sweetie, and stand over there.' The firefighter pointed into the classroom and Ellie obeyed him.

‘Good girl. That's my good girl.' Jack sent the whispered words up into the air, wondering if Ellie knew he was here for her. Praying that she did.

‘Why don't they just break the windows?' Hannah had her eyes fixed on the huge picture windows, which looked out on to the rolling countryside beyond.

‘Windows that size...if they break them they might hurt the kids.' Jack shivered as he thought of shards of glass raining down on Ellie's head.

‘Where's the teacher...?'

Good question. The thought of fifteen four-and five-year-olds alone up there made his blood run cold.

He wrapped his arm around Hannah, hurrying to the cordon of police and teachers which surrounded the scene. ‘Let me through. Paramedic.' At the sight of his uniform he was waved through and, taking Hannah with him, he made for the two ambulances, parked next to a fire engine.

‘Josie—' he recognised the paramedic who was waiting by one of the ambulances ‘—what's happening?'

‘There's a class of fifteen kids and a teacher, trapped in there. No sign of the teacher, but there's a little girl who keeps coming to the window. There's a fire crew gone in.' Josie pointed towards a pile of rubble which almost filled a gaping hole in the wall. Above it, clean plasterwork with a line of pictures still pinned to it in a parody of normality amongst the destruction.

As he watched, one of the pictures fluttered from the wall on to the ground. A groaning sound, and a chunk of plasterwork flattened it as it detached itself from the wall and crashed down. Hannah let out a little scream of terror.

‘Okay, Hannah. It's just a piece of paper...' He tightened his arm around Hannah's shaking shoulders. The image of frailty, crushed and broken, had torn at his heart too.

Josie was shaking her head, her eyes fixed on the classroom windows. ‘She didn't hesitate. That woman deserves a medal...'

‘What?'

‘The firefighter. She saw the little girl and she was the first in, even though there have been great chunks of stuff coming down. Three of the men followed her.'

‘Red hair?' A trickle of hope found its way into Jack's heart.

‘Dunno, she had a helmet on. I didn't know it was a woman but I heard her call out to someone.'

Cass. It must be Cass.
‘I'm going in...' Jack let go of Hannah and started to walk, and Josie pulled him back.

‘Don't be an idiot.'

‘Ellie's in there.'

Josie paled suddenly. ‘All the same, Jack. If you get hit on the head by a lump of concrete then that's just another thing they'll have to deal with.'

He didn't care. ‘Stay here, Hannah. I'll find them.'

‘Jack...' Both Hannah and Josie were pulling at him now, and Jack shook them off. Then he looked up. Two figures had appeared in the window, with dark jackets and yellow helmets. Firefighters.

Cass. She and the other firefighter were making short work of the safety bars across one of the windows, and they opened it wide. Jack wondered where the other two men who had gone in were, and hoped that their absence didn't mean that there were casualties to attend to.

‘Jamie...' The children were being lifted out one by one, into the arms of the men on the two ladders which had been raised to the window, and passed down to the ground. Hannah sprinted forward, pushing a policeman who tried to block her path out of the way in a surprising show of strength. She reached her son and fell to her knees, hugging him close.

Ellie. Where was she? Why wasn't she the first?
Jack looked up at the window and saw Cass, with Ellie in her arms. She was talking to her, waiting for the firefighter on the ladder to be ready to take her, and Ellie was nodding.

Then a kiss. Jack almost choked with emotion as he saw Ellie handed safely from the window and into the arms of the man on the ladder.

Cass's attention was now on the next child, lifting him up and talking to him. But all Jack could see was Ellie. He ran forward and heard her voice as she was carried down the ladder.

‘I shouted for help...'

‘That's right, sweetie. Well done.' The firefighter was smiling as he climbed down.

‘Daddeee! Cassandra rescued me.' Ellie held out her arms to Jack and then he felt her small body against him. He stammered his thanks to the firefighter, who nodded, climbing back up the ladder to fetch the next child.

‘Are you all right, honey?' His first instinct was just to hold her, but he forced himself to check Ellie's small body for any signs of blood or injury.

‘Cassandra came to find me. I got rescued...' There was clearly nothing wrong with Ellie's lungs.

‘That's right, darling.' He looked up and saw Cass pass the next child out of the window. When she'd done so, her gaze scanned the people below her and found Ellie, who waved at her excitedly. Cass's grin told Jack that she'd seen what she had been looking for, and that she knew Ellie was safe.

The children were being marshalled into a group around the ambulances by parents and teachers so that each could be checked over. Jack walked across, holding Ellie tightly against his heart.

He saw Sarah running towards them and Ellie waved to her.

‘I was rescued!' Clearly Ellie wanted everyone to know. Sarah flung her arms around them both and Ellie struggled to get out from between their bodies so that she could see what was going on.

The last child was being brought down the ladder and Jack did a swift headcount. Fourteen. He made only fourteen. And where was their teacher? He heard Cass's shout behind him.

‘Paramedic...'

Josie looked up and grabbed her bag, making for one of the ladders. Jack reluctantly passed Ellie into Sarah's arms.

‘Will you take her?' The words tore at his heart but he knew what he had to do.

‘Of course. As soon as she's been checked over, I'll take her back home. I left Ethan with my neighbour so I don't want to be any longer than I can help.' Sarah turned to Ellie. ‘Daddy's got to go and help Cassandra. We'll wait for him at home, eh?'

Ellie nodded. ‘Are you going to rescue Miss Elliott?'

‘Yes, sweetie. I'll be back as soon as I can.' Jack turned and made for the ladders.

* * *

It was no surprise that after the first paramedic was helped through the window, Jack appeared right behind her. Both of them had been provided with helmets and jackets.

‘Just couldn't stay away, could you?' Cass grimaced at him.

‘Nope.' Jack looked around the empty classroom.

Cass nodded. ‘Good. Keep the helmet on.'

She led the way across the empty classroom, holding her arm out in front of him to keep him back from the door as she opened it. She heard Jack let out a quiet curse as he looked along the corridor, at the gaping hole in the floor that separated the classroom door from the far end of the corridor. ‘How did you get through here?'

‘We made it.' It hadn't been easy, and they'd been showered with lumps of loose plaster falling from the ceiling. But when she'd seen Ellie up at the window, Cass had remembered the promise she'd made to the little girl.
‘If you go to the window and call for help, the firefighters will rescue you.'
That wasn't the kind of promise you made lightly.

‘What's the situation?'

‘The teacher's at the bottom of the hole, with the boy. He's lying underneath her and we don't know how badly either of them are hurt yet. There's a team trying to get to her from the back, on ground floor level, but the doorways are blocked with rubble and at the moment the only way is through here. So a second team has been working to get a ladder down to her.'

‘Can you get me down there?'

‘It's not safe.' The roof was still intact but cables and lumps of ceiling plaster dangled precariously over the hole. The other paramedic had already backed away into the safety of the classroom, and if he was going to stick to protocol then Jack should as well.

‘Tell me something I don't know. Get me down there, Cass.'

She nodded. ‘Okay. It'll be a minute before we're ready to go down.'

‘Is she conscious?'

‘We think so. When we came along the corridor we heard her groaning, and when we called down she replied. There was stuff coming down from the ceiling and she was covering the child with her body.'

‘What happened?' Jack's face had formed into a mask of determination.

‘I think the boy must have run out of the classroom and the teacher followed him. We found the door locked, and she must have thought to lock it behind her to keep the rest of the kids inside. Somehow, she and the boy both fell.'

He nodded. ‘Can we get her up to this level?'

‘We could, but it would be better to wait for the team coming in via the ground floor. We'll have to make a decision on that when you've assessed her injuries.' Cass looked up as someone called her name. ‘They're ready.'

Jack followed her over to the mouth of the hole and Cass climbed carefully down, flattening herself against the ladder as a shower of dust and debris fell from the ceiling. Picking her way across the rubble, and what looked like the remains of a photocopier, she headed towards the woman.

‘Annabel... Annabel, I'm Cass.'

Annabel's eyelids flickered and she moaned. ‘Cass...'

‘Lie still. Not too long now before we get you out of here.'

‘Take him...' Annabel cried out in pain as she shifted slightly and a boy's dirty, frightened face peered out at Cass.

‘Okay. Okay, we're going to take you both. Just hang in there.'

The boy started to crawl out from the crevice below Annabel's body. Somehow, even though she was clearly badly injured, she'd managed to get him into the safest place she could, protecting him in the only way that was available to her. Dust and plaster was floating down from above them and Cass crouched over Annabel, sheltering her and the child as best she could.

Jack was making his way towards her with the medical bag, which had been lowered down after them. As soon as he reached them, Cass let go of the boy, who wriggled free of his hidey-hole and straight into Jack's arms.

The boy was handed back to the firefighter who had followed Jack down, ready to be carried back up to the classroom where the other paramedic was waiting. Cass held her position, sheltering Annabel, while Jack started to check her over, talking quietly to reassure her.