Page 53 of The London Girls
He pressed his lips to her forehead. ‘I’ll be gone less than a week, and then I have another two days with you before I ship out. And what’s a few more months away when we have the rest of our lives together?’ he whispered back. ‘One day when we’re old and grey, we’ll laugh about how we couldn’t stand the thought of being parted for just a little bit longer.’
Olivia hugged him tightly, her cheek to his chest.
She certainly hoped he was right.
CHAPTER TWELVE
FLORENCE
‘So, tell me all about this wedding.’
Florence smiled, seeing that Jack was clearly trying to make an effort and strike up a conversation with her as they sat together at the start of their shift. ‘It was beautiful,’ she said. ‘Sad at times because of her brother, but we had a wonderful time.’ She sighed, thinking about the way Leo had looked at Olivia and wondering if anyone would ever look at her like that. It had been a few days since the wedding; Jack had taken some leave so she’d been on her own the past few nights, and she was grateful to have him back.
The silence that stretched between her and Jack wasn’t unwelcome; the night was quiet, there hadn’t been a bomb for a few days now, and she’d become so used to being near him without talking that it seemed to come easily. Even if the Luftwaffe did decide to resume their nightly bombing routine, they had at least an hour before the sirens would go off. It was only nine o’clock, and they’d never had an air raid before ten.
‘Jack, I hope you don’t mind me asking ...’ she started.
‘I’m sure I will,’ he said. ‘Mind, I mean.’
Florence laughed, shaking her head as she stared at him. ‘Honestly, sometimes I don’t know whether you’re just beingsarcastic or you’re actually just a grump.’ His voice was so deadpan itwasimpossible to tell.
His eyes crinkled at the sides, softening in a way she hadn’t seen before. ‘Look, I wasn’t always like this. Before the war, I was ...’ He looked down at his hands, seeming to study them before slowly looking up. ‘Things were different then. Sometimes I barely recognise the man I am these days.’
‘Your medical training,’ she said softly. ‘I’m just curious. You seem so capable and I was wondering—’
The words had barely left her mouth when the wailing sound of a siren coincided with a boom that made the ground shake beneath their feet, reverberating through them, plaster dust falling from the ceiling above.
‘Here we go again,’ he muttered, rising and holding out a hand to her.
She clasped it and stood, almost knocked off her feet when another explosion rocked the room. She shut her eyes, willing the thoughts to go away, hating the way her mind took her straight back to that night.
‘You all right?’ Jack asked. It was then that she realised she was still holding his hand.
She let it go, smoothing her palms down her trousers. ‘We’d better go,’ she said, folding her arms to hide the shake of her hands. ‘It sounded close.’
‘And far too early,’ he muttered. ‘If they’ve started already, I hate to think what the night holds.’
As they started to hurry out of the room, which was tucked away at the back of the large building where the ambulances were kept, one of the volunteer firefighters she’d gotten to know came running towards them.
‘It’s bad out there,’ he said. ‘Really bad.’
‘How close?’ Jack asked.
‘Can’t be more than a street or two away. How many drivers do you have tonight?’
‘Not enough,’ Jack said, grimly. ‘I’ll go and get everyone moving. We need to get out there as soon as possible.’
A tremor ran through Florence as she walked quickly over to Petal, the ceiling shaking above her again and sending more plaster dust falling around her. She’d already checked Petal over, knew that she had a full tank of fuel and that she was running well, but as she waited for Jack she still went over everything again, running through the checklist in her mind.
A thudding of uneven footsteps made her turn and she saw Jack lumbering faster than she’d ever seen across the concrete floor, the look on his face showing his agony.
‘What is—’
‘One of the bombs has hit the theatre,’ he said, and she felt her face drain of all colour as she stared back at him. ‘It will have been full of people at this time of night.’
‘Oh Lord,’ she whispered, knowing what that meant – how many lives could have been lost. It also explained why they’d felt the explosion so strongly; they were only a few streets away.
There was another boom that made the floor reverberate beneath her feet, and suddenly there was more noise around them as other ambulance drivers made their way in. The fire engines were already moving, and she caught Jack’s eye one last time before she found her way to the driver’s seat and carefully turned Petal around, hating to think what they were about to encounter as she tucked into the convoy of fire engines heading to the theatre. It was a route she knew like the back of her hand, and one that was only minutes long, but as they edged closer, it felt like the longest drive of her life.
