And gradually the chaos became order. The onlookers melted into the night. Two of the fire engines left. One would stay.

‘I know you wish us to the devil,’ the fire-chief told Dom as they carried the kids back into the almost-normal living room. ‘But the fire spread to part of the ceiling and there’s no guarantee we haven’t miss spots. There’ll be two men staying upstairs all night, and there’ll be more outside. Yes, you can stay in the house but you’ll do so with our presence. Like it or leave it.’

Dom could see the sense. He smiled, rueful. ‘Fine by me, Graham. We’ll sleep round you.’ He looked across at Erin. ‘How about you? Can I accept any of these offers of help on your behalf?’

The locals were leaving, but he only had to call one back, say, ‘Do you mind looking after Erin?’ and she’d be away.

‘No,’ she said fiercely, involuntarily.

‘No?’

She coloured. ‘I…If it’s okay with you. I might be able to help…with Marilyn.’

‘That’s right, we still have Marilyn,’ he said, and he smiled, and she was reminded of that chuckle all over again.

‘She’s having the world’s worst birth experience in dog history,’ she said, and tried to make her voice not wobble. ‘I’ll settle her back by the fire.’

‘If the very word doesn’t make us all blench.’

‘Fires are good,’ she said, stoutly, aware that Martin’s eyes had widened in alarm. ‘Fires are lovely. This was an aberration.’

‘What’s an aberration?’ Nathan said. He sounded exhausted. It was time he was tucked up into bed, wherever they could find a bed. But Erin knew that farming the kids out to strange beds tonight would be asking for trouble. Dom knew it and she knew it.

‘An aberration’s a mistake,’ she said, meeting Dom’s gaze full on. ‘This was a little, smoky fire lit by mistake that made us all feel a bit sick. But there’s a lovely fire in the kitchen stove and another in the living room. That’s what we all want now. A lovely warm fire so I can get my cold toes warm.’

It was the right thing to say. They were wearing their nightwear plus blankets. Even though Erin had shoved on Dom’s wellingtons over the dressings on her foot, her toes were freezing. So, it seemed, were everyone else’s.

‘Brilliant,’ Dom, said and his eyes were giving her a message that said her approach had been right on all sorts of levels. ‘It’s what we all want. An ordinary fire to warm our toes. Let’s get ourselves organised.’

It would take days before the stink cleared from the upstairs rooms, but downstairs the smoke had been sucked out before it had permeated enough to cause any damage. The windows were open, fresh air had blown through and it felt almost normal.

‘So we’re all sleeping downstairs,’ Dom decided, and before they knew it burly firefighters had hefted mattresses and bedding downstairs and set up a row of beds in front of the sitting-room fire.

What had seemed a big room when Erin had had it to herself was now cramped. Three mattresses. Erin’s divan.

Marilyn’s mat.

‘For she’s not going to be the only one in the kitchen,’ Erin decreed. ‘One in, all in.’

‘Fine by me,’ Dom said.

The fire was still a pile of glowing embers in the grate. Dom added wood, building it up so it crackled and flared.

‘Fire’s great,’ he said as Martin looked at it nervously. ‘This is what fire’s meant to do. Martin, I’ve been thinking. You’ve had a terrible experience-it should be useful for something. Tomorrow I’ll teach you how to set and light a fire properly.’

Whatever Martin had been expecting it wasn’t this. He even managed a sleepy smile.

Dom had set the beds so his was the closest to the fire, Martin’s was next, then Nathan’s and finally Erin’s settee. So they were in a protective sandwich, two little boys with an adult on either side and Marilyn at their feet.

The kids were asleep in seconds. Erin knew she should sleep, too-but she could see Dom in the firelight. He was propped up on one elbow, looking over his charges. By the firelight she saw raw emotion playing on his face.

‘I don’t regret that kiss,’ she said suddenly into the dark, and she saw him stiffen.

‘Why aren’t you asleep?’

‘I’m watching you.’

‘Don’t.’

‘Someone has to look out for you,’ she said gently. ‘You watch out for the whole world and no one watches out for you. Well, that’s about to change. I don’t regret that kiss one bit. It was a truly fabulous kiss. A kiss to dream about. You go to sleep now, Dominic Spencer, and know that tonight you’re off duty. Responsibility’s mine.’

‘Right.’

‘Believe it,’ she whispered.

‘You’re shaking,’ he said into the dark.

‘I’m not.’

‘I can hear it in your voice.’

Well, maybe she was. Somehow the events of the night had caught up with her.

‘I’m okay.’

‘You need a hug?’

‘I might,’ she said, cautiously.

‘Why didn’t you say so?’ he said, and suddenly he was upright, stepping carefully across the sleeping boys, stooping to touch her face. And then, because there was no room to kneel by her bed in the crowded room-that surely must be the reason-he tugged back her blankets and slipped in beside her.

His arms came round her and held.

If she’d not been shaking before she was now. Or maybe…maybe not. It was a different sort of shaking.

‘I needed to hold you,’ he said.

‘I…I know. I kinda need to be held,’ she admitted.

‘I know that, too. You were brilliant tonight.’

‘You were, too.’ She relaxed against him. Or sort of relaxed. Her back was curved into his chest. He was wearing pyjama bottoms but no top. She could feel his body through her silk pyjamas.

It certainly took a girl’s mind off fire.

‘I’m not seducing you,’ he said, apropos of nothing in particular.

‘No?’ Her voice wasn’t working properly. It sort of…squeaked.

‘No,’ he said, and she could feel his smile.

‘Rats,’ she whispered.

He chuckled-and held her closer. ‘Hey, if I could I would, but how Mom and Pop Brady ever managed procreation with that lot…’

‘I can’t remember any combined Bradys,’ she said cautiously, savouring the warmth of him against her. Loving the warmth of him against her. ‘There was a His Bunch and Her Bunch and then no more.’

‘Kids,’ he said darkly. ‘They’re a contraceptive device second only to a brick wall.’

Right. Or not right. She wasn’t sure. The feeling of his body against her was doing all sorts of strange things. Wonderful things. ‘You…you want to tell me why you’re in my bed, then?’

‘To stop you shivering.’

‘I think I’ve stopped shivering.’

‘I’ll be the judge of that. Besides, I need to thank you. You saved our lives tonight.’

‘You saved yourselves.’

‘I never would have got Martin downstairs without your help.’ His voice was still hoarse from smoke inhalation. He sounded serious suddenly, and husky, and so damned sexy he was making her toes curl. ‘I couldn’t say it in front of the boys but I know how close we came to losing him,’ he whispered into her ear. ‘Thank you.’

‘Hey, any time,’ she whispered-and then she thought Dom must have been even more terrified than she’d been. Just because he was a man, did that make him less needful of comfort? Instinctively she twisted to face him and her arms came round to hold him, tight.

‘It’s okay, Dom,’ she said, trying-not altogether successfully-to focus on him as a person and not as the body he came with. ‘We’re all okay. And I’m sure Martin won’t do such a thing again.’

‘He might.’

‘Then you’ll be there to help him,’ she said stoutly. And then, because it was what was in her heart, she said what she most wanted to say. ‘Dom, I want to help you.’

‘You already did.’

‘No, long term.’ She swallowed. ‘I could help here. If you let me.’

‘You mean medically?’

‘Of course.’ The medical bit was only part of it, she thought, but instinct told her to start with the medical offer and move on. ‘I could take so much off your shoulders. Here. In this community. There’s so much work!’

‘Here? Are you nuts?’ They were lying entwined like long-term lovers. It felt right, though, she thought. It felt entirely, wonderfully natural. ‘You’ve just got a new job,’ he said.

A new job. She forced herself to focus. That’s right, she had, too. Head of Emergency Medicine. In another world.

But she’d shifted worlds. This was her world now and there was no going back.

‘I’ve just had another epiphany,’ she retorted. ‘In fact, I’ve had a week of epiphanies. The work you’re doing here…I can’t imagine how you cope. I can’t imagine any greater honour than being permitted to help you.’

‘Tansy helps me.’

It was like a slap. She closed her eyes. She felt ill.

She was still holding him. She didn’t know how to stop holding him.

‘Erin?’ He shifted away from her and she felt like weeping. Okay, she was being overemotional here but it had been some night and he was making her feel…

‘Erin?’

She opened her eyes again, cautiously. He’d pushed himself up on his elbows and was gazing down at her in the firelight. Rueful.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to sound so blunt. Tansy does help with the boys. Medically, though…yes, I am stretched. But you and I…No.’

‘No?’

‘No.’

‘Because?’

She put her hands up to touch his face. This was the most important moment in her life. She knew it.

Did he know it, too?

‘Because of this,’ he said.

And he kissed her.

It was a different kiss this time. Their last kiss had been born of fear and exhaustion and relief, but those emotions had passed. The warmth of the room, the knowledge of two little boys sleeping safe and warm beside them, the peace of the drama past-and the warmth and comfort they were taking from each other-combined into one lovely whole. Suddenly it seemed so right, so inevitable, so…true.