Chapter 32
Dan rubbed one hand over his eyes and yawned; it had seemed such a good idea to have an impromptu celebration the night before that none of them had considered how they would feel twenty-four hours later, at the end of an extended day. It had seemed the very least he could do, to volunteer to cover Holly’s evening surgery.
He was thrilled for his friends, of course he was, but he couldn’t help wondering how their new arrivals – and of course they had to be in the plural – would affect the delicate balance they had worked so hard for at The Practice. If these cuts really were the harbinger of things to come, then surely they needed more hands on deck, not fewer.
He read through the oncology report for Edward Everett, his suspicions about prostate cancer all too sadly accurate. How his wonderful wife, Jane, would cope was anyone’s guess, but it did rather put things in perspective. Their marriage was one of equals and it endured; he could only wish the same for his two best friends. Happily-ever-after apparently wasn’t an open-ended state of affairs, and that alone made all his concerns seem shallow and superficial.
Taffy poked his head around the door, looking almost as rough as Dan felt. ‘Are you sure you’re happy to stay? You don’t want me to stick around for some company? Try out some fancy coffees from the new machine?’
Dan shook his head. ‘Nah, I think you’d better get home to Holly and rub her feet or something. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?’
Taffy grinned, pushing open the door and sitting on the edge of Dan’s desk. ‘Nah, she’s too ticklish for that. Not to mention your daft cousin has filled her head with nonsense about feet being the new erogenous zone.’
They both gave a theatrical shudder.
‘So,’ Taffy said after a moment’s pause. ‘Are we going to talk about the parrot?’
Dan looked up in surprise; he’d only been joking when he suggested it. ‘We can’t really have a parrot at work, Taffs, you know that. I was just winding Gracie up.’
Taffy looked at him sceptically. ‘You do seem to spend an awful lot of time winding her up these days. Had you considered just asking her out?’
It wasn’t often that they were so frank with one another, preferring the ease of their long-established bantery relationship, but obviously impending parenthood had trimmed away another layer of familiarity.
Dan frowned, but responded with honesty: ‘I think we have to accept that I missed the boat there, Taffs. We don’t all get our happy-ever-afters on the doorstep, you know.’
Taffy grinned. ‘Are you likening my wife-to-be to a takeaway pizza?’ He stood up. ‘Pop round when you’re done – we can have a few beers in the garden and plot the downfall of Chris Virtue if you like.’ He paused. ‘Failing that, you could be the sexy doctor with the pet parrot – it could be your USP for online dating.’
‘My Utterly Sexist Parrot?’ Dan clarified with a grin, punching Taffy on the arm by way of affection. ‘That might work. If in doubt, be eccentric, right?’ Eccentric sounded so much better in his head than just ‘single’.
Ten patients, three hours and a demanding heap of admin later, Dan clicked ‘print’ on his last referral letter of the day and sighed. He really didn’t want to intrude on Holly and Taffy two nights in a row – no matter what Taffy said, they needed some couple-time to adapt to their big news – but he had to confess he’d do anything to just talk about cricket and nonsense with his mate for a bit.
He couldn’t even bring himself to go for a run, even if running with the Larkford Harriers always gave his self-esteem a little boost. He did try to ignore the obvious flirtations and increasingly skimpy Lycra that some of the female triathletes had adopted, but he was only human after all. The pity was that he could no longer even see the attraction in a pointless one-night hookup; Lindy Grey had cured him of that.
He picked up the notebook that Grace had bought for him last week, the light bulb on the front cover hinting at the genius fundraising ideas he was supposed to be drafting inside.
So far, he had a list of the Air Ambulance crew and a few doodles of helicopters with faces. The name Chris Virtue seemed to leap off the page and Dan barely suppressed a shudder of irritation. Grace had been annoyingly chipper for the last few days, full of chit-chat about the poncy dinner, all the little nuggets of information she’d gleaned, and now this new suggestion of an auction. By the sound of it, any contribution he personally could make would only be a drop in the ocean of funding required. It was enough to make a man feel a little irrelevant – on every level.
Dan closed down his computer. It had almost been worth staying late to clear up his overflowing inbox, but even that accomplishment seemed hollow and unsatisfying tonight.
A loud crash from Reception startled him; he was out of the door and running down the corridor even before his logical brain could kick in. There was another clang as something hard and metallic fell to the floor and the skin at the back of his neck prickled a warning as he took in how eerily deserted the building was.
He slammed open the door to Reception, hoping to take the intruder by surprise, only to freeze in the doorway for a split-second, as his brain struggled to compute what he was seeing.
Old man Jarley was puce in the face and shouting at Grace, as he held her pinned against the wall. An angry bruise was already erupting over her eyelid and she was begging him to stop. With one hand he held her wrists above her head and with the other he was waving a knife in front of her face. ‘Just give me the fucking key!’ he hissed, his eyes glazed and pupils dilated. There was no doubt that he was high as a kite.
The remains of a smashed lamp and computer were scattered all over the room; it was clear that Grace had been fighting him off with whatever she could find to hand.
With just two steps Dan was across to them, barely giving Jarley a chance to react. In a bizarre turn of the tables, Jarley was just as hobbled as Grace, with both his hands otherwise engaged. Dan didn’t hold back; he brought his fist forward with such force that Jarley flew across the room and slammed into the wall, crumpling like a rag doll, blood oozing from his nose and the corner of his mouth.
Convinced that Jarley wasn’t going anywhere any time soon, Dan stepped forward just as Grace fell mutely into his arms. It wasn’t that he expected her to be sobbing, but there was something about her utter silence that frightened him more. As though she had somehow logged out of the situation.
He bent forward and caught one arm under her knees, swinging her fragile frame up into his arms. He walked through to the waiting room in search of water and a chair, pressing his lips into her hair and murmuring reassuring words that made no real sense. The salty taste on his lips confused him for a second, as tears ran down his own face in shock and horror at what might have been, if he himself hadn’t been such a lazy bastard in letting his paperwork pile up. The image of that knife glinting so close to Grace’s face was imbedded in his mind’s eye.
‘Grace?’ he said gently, as he sat down and she automatically settled in his lap. She made no sound, other than a tremulous keening that was barely audible, as though her scream had been caught unspoken in the atmosphere. With one hand he slipped his phone from his pocket and dialled. ‘Chief Inspector? I need you at The Practice. Now. There’s been an assault.’
Whether it was the thought of the police, or the word ‘assault’, he couldn’t tell, but Grace bent double in his arms, her cries no longer frozen, as she moaned in pain and disbelief. ‘I was just locking up—’ she managed, raising her head to look at Dan. ‘And he wouldn’t believe me. I told him I didn’t have the pharmacy keys, but he wouldn’t believe me.’
He tried so hard not to look shocked at her appearance, but perhaps she saw herself reflected in his eyes, as she dropped her face instantly into his shoulder and sobbed. ‘I’m so stupid. Why did I even let him in? But he said he needed to drop off a letter—’
He kissed her hair once more, and then her forehead – lovingly, gently, with completely honest adoration. ‘Oh Grace,’ he murmured, ‘my poor Grace. You’re so trusting, that’s all. And so brave.’
She shook her head. ‘It still wasn’t enough though. He didn’t believe me. And he was so strong.’
Dan sniffed back the tears he seemed incapable of controlling, the tears that sprang unbidden to his eyes at the very thought of anything ever happening to the woman in his arms. The woman, he could now clearly see, for whom he would give up anything and everything. And not a scrap of Lycra in sight! He tried to smile at the thought, but it only set him off again.
Grace slipped off his lap and onto a different chair, holding Dan’s hand the whole time, as though she would never let it go. ‘What would I have done if you hadn’t been here? We all dismissed him as just some old perv, the local stoner, but Dan, he meant it when he threatened me—’ She sobbed and her words became strangled. ‘He really meant it.’
Time became elastic after that and Dan had no idea how long he and Grace had sat entwined, waiting for the police to arrive.
Even after Mr Jarley had been handcuffed, groggy and abusive, and driven away. Even after both their statements had been taken, there was still a feeling of time being suspended. Of an alternative path for how this evening might have ended, but for a few different choices. Grace kept rubbing at her neck, where the knife had grazed the skin as she struggled, stroking it almost hypnotically.
‘Let me take you home, Gracie,’ said Dan quietly. ‘We can clean up those bruises, get you a drink. A brandy might help with the shock.’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t want to go home.’ She looked at him plaintively, the tears welling unshed in her eyes, the swelling unhalted by the ice pack they’d applied as Chief Inspector Grant had sensitively quizzed her about the evening’s events. Dan could only be grateful that his own witness statement would be enough to avoid any semblance of doubt about Jarley’s drug-seeking intentions.
If Dan had anything to do with it, old man Jarley wouldn’t be free to walk the streets of Larkford again for a very long time. Rehab at this point was actually too good for him. But right now, none of that mattered. ‘Come home with me. I’ll sleep on the sofa. But you’ll have company nearby if you need me? Or,’ he said, kicking himself for not thinking of it sooner, ‘we could call Alice or Holly? In case you’d rather—’
Grace shook her head. ‘Maybe Alice could pop by, but, Dan, please don’t go. I don’t want to be – I can’t be – on my own.’ She offered him a feeble smile, so feeble in fact that it almost achieved the impossible and made her smile for real. ‘I guess there’s no point using puppy-dog eyes when I look like a hammered steak, is there?’
Dan held both her hands and looked her squarely in the eye. ‘You look beautiful, Gracie, you always do. And to be honest, just knowing that you’re okay and—’ He choked at the memory that had assailed him in those few brief seconds, the very thought of anything happening to her.
‘Hey,’ interrupted Grace, ‘I thought it was my turn to fall apart here. You’re bogarting the emotional breakdown.’
He stood up and held out a hand. ‘Well, maybe we could just skip over that bit when we tell the others; focus on your Ninja lamp-throwing skills and my sensational rescue instead?’ He was teasing her and she knew it; right now, neither of them gave two hoots what anybody else thought. They’d been there. They knew the truth of what had happened. And what were a few tears between friends anyway?
‘Do you want to call the counsellor the police recommended?’ Dan carefully avoided using the phrase ‘victim support’; he had no desire to play into any scenario where Grace considered herself a victim of anything.
‘No,’ she said simply. ‘I would like a shower though.’ She looked vaguely around Dan’s bedroom.
On the walk over, he’d almost lost his nerve. There was no way on earth that he wanted Grace to associate his home, his bedroom, his bed – goddammit – with what had happened to her today, but it seemed that Grace was craving comfort and support. He supposed he should be honoured that she considered his pokey flat met those criteria.
So, instead of all the ways he’d ever imagined Grace in his home, Dan found himself sitting on the floor outside the bathroom door while Grace took a shower with as much peace of mind as he could provide right now.
He picked up his phone again and pressed redial. ‘Chief Inspector?’ His voice was low enough to be drowned out by the running water. ‘Is he okay?’ He hadn’t dared voice his fears in front of Grace – after all, what could he possibly say? But an Army-trained punch was a punch with power and as much as he’d personally like to kill old Jarley, he’d much rather see him stand trial. Let’s see how much he enjoyed spending his twilight years in prison, rather than tormenting the population of Larkford.
Chief Inspector Grant cleared his throat before answering. ‘I won’t lie to you, Dan, and it seems to be a clear case of aggravated assault with intent to obtain prescription drugs, but—’ He hesitated. ‘Look, we’ve taken him for some X-rays, under police guard of course, but now he’s awake, he’s angry. There’s been talk of having you up for assault. Just, try not to worry, okay?’
Easier said than done, thought Dan, as he hung up the phone. Assault charges and medical licences didn’t tend to go hand in hand. He hung his head despondently and ran the scenario yet again in his mind. Had he used excessive force? Did he really care?
To save the woman he loved from being held at knifepoint, wouldn’t he do the same thing all over again?
The sound of Grace’s tears pulled him back into the moment. What’s done is done, he thought, as he tentatively tapped on the bathroom door. ‘Grace?’ he called gently. ‘Gracie?’
She pulled open the door, her hair swaddled in a towel-turban and his sweatshirt and pyjama trousers dwarfing her. She looked tiny and lost and utterly beautiful.
She stepped forward into his arms and rested her cheek against the flannel of his shirt. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I forgot to say thank you.’
‘You’re welcome,’ he replied seriously. ‘Let’s order some pizza and take a look at that black eye, shall we?’
He stopped in the hallway, trying to feel his way through this situation – to focus more on Grace’s needs than his own. God knows, a bit of tactless Taffy therapy would be welcome at this point.
‘Do you want me to call anyone?’ he offered. ‘Holly? Alice?’ He paused and took a deep breath, trying to be the bigger person. ‘Chris Virtue?’
‘No,’ she said, with the tiniest shake of her head. She pushed the sleeves of his sweatshirt up over her tiny wrists and leaned back against the doorframe, watching him intently. ‘I only want you.’