Huh? He was definitely out of it. Oh, she hoped there wasn’t brain damage.
“It is me. I’m really here.” She allowed herself a gentle caress of his strong jaw while he was too out of it to stop her, and shoved the fact she was taking advantage of an injured man to the back of her mind. “Someone shot at us. The truck went out of control. You hit your head. You’ve been unconscious.” She hated how her voice trembled.
“Aye, now I remember.” He groaned as he tried to move.
“No, not yet. I need to check for concussion and a broken neck.”
“What?”
She did the only thing she could think of and flicked the beam from the flashlight into his eyes.
“What the hell?” Alastair scrunched them shut.
“I’m assessing you. Follow the light with your eyes.”
“Get the light out of my face, Rainne.”
“But I need to see if you have brain damage. How am I going to do it without the light?”
“I don’t have brain damage, but I am being blinded. Turn the light off.”
She flicked the flashlight off, leaving them with only the faint glow from the door lights. Alastair seemed relieved. Rainne cast around for other ways to assess his injuries. She held up two fingers.
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
“It’s dark in here, Rainbow. I can barely see your face.”
“Oh, yeah. Okay, that won’t work. You need to answer some questions. What’s your full name and today’s date?”
“My name is Alastair Stewart and it’s the twenty-eighth of February. Want to give me a clue why we’re playing twenty questions while I’m trapped in a broken truck with my face in the snow?”
“They always ask questions on TV when someone has a brain injury. Who’s the current president?”
He opened one eye to stare at her. “Of which country?”
“I need to watch less American TV,” she mumbled. “Who’s the prime minister of Britain?”
“I really don’t care.”
That made her back snap straight. “How can you not care? Please tell me you voted in the last election. People fought and died for your right to have a say in how this country is run. To waste a vote is to spit in the face of their sacrifice. You shouldn’t just care who’s running the country, you should be interested in what they’re doing. They’re making decisions on your behalf. How can you not care about that?”
His lips twitched as though he was fighting a smile. “And there’s the Rainbow I used to know. I wondered if you were still in there under your dull, generic clothes and plain brown hair.”
“There’s nothing wrong with my hair. You can’t work in an office with multi-coloured hair. I like it brown. I don’t think it’s plain.” She teased her bottom lip with her teeth. “Is it plain? Really?”
“Okay, are you sure you aren’t the one with brain damage? Because if you think I’m going to lie here in an upturned truck, in the snow, and discuss your hair, you’re seriously deluded.”
He had a point. She was being inconsiderate. She should be thinking about him, not her hair. “I’m sorry, but there’s a lot of blood on the snow under your head and I was worried.”
“Head wounds bleed.” He sounded as though he knew that for sure. Which was either really worrying or reassuring, depending on how you looked at it.
“Do you have pain anywhere?” she said.
For a minute she didn’t think he would answer, and when he did his voice was tight. “Head. Neck. Right wrist. Ribs.” He sounded like he was reciting a shopping list rather than injuries.
“Oh.” Her hands began to shake. She wasn’t cut out for this. She was the least capable person she knew. She was useless. No good to anyone...
No. Those were old thoughts. She wasn’t that person anymore. Now she had skills. She was able. She could think for herself. She was useful.