New Year’s Day 2016
BREAKFAST ARRIVED, ANOTHER pre-packed airplane meal. Anna choked down as much of it as she could, because even though her stomach attempted to climb out of her throat, she felt weak and dizzy and knew that she needed to eat.
She was relieved beyond words when she was told that her Brief had arrived and was waiting for her in an interview room.
She felt grubby, soiled and defiled when she met her solicitor, an older man wearing a navy three-piece suit and an avuncular smile.
“Miss Scott, I’m Damian Harris. I’ve been retained on your behalf by Brendan Massey.”
“Oh? But you work for the Finchley Phoenixes?”
“No, I’m from the law firm of Weston, Harris and Dempsey.” He cleared his throat. “As I understand it, the rugby club’s legal cover doesn’t stretch to those classed as self-employed.”
A cold shudder went through Anna. The Phoenixes had cut her loose. She should have expected that.
The interview began, and Anna was hyper-aware that it was being digitally recorded. Two police officers interviewed her. There was no good cop/bad cop, just two people who looked like they’d had a long night.
The questions went on, going over and over the same ground:
“How long have you known Nick Renshaw? When did you become intimate? Could anybody else vouch for that? Do you have an alibi?”
An alibi for love? What did that look like? Anna had no idea.
After ninety minutes of question and answer, Anna was left alone with her solicitor.
“What will happen now?”
“You’ll be released on bail with conditions. They’ll be deciding what those conditions are now. If there’s no evidence to find . . .” and he gave her a hard look, “there’ll be no case to answer and the charges will be dropped.”
“They won’t find anything because there’s nothing to find.” Anna sighed. “How long will it all take?”
“I would imagine two to three months?”
Anna gasped.
“That long?”
“That’s quite fast for the justice system. With a high profile case like this, they’ll want to get it done and dusted.”
“My business will be ruined by then,” she cried softly.
“You’ll be permitted to go about your business although there’ll be restrictions on any travel abroad, I’d imagine.”
Anna shook her head.
“I’m finished. I know it.”
He patted her hand kindly.
“What if they find me guilty?” she gulped.
“As you’ve said, there’s no evidence to find.”
“But what if . . . I mean, we had private sessions when he was with the Minotaurs. I didn’t record all of them!”
“They need evidence,” he said, his voice gentle. “A custodial sentence is highly unlikely.”
Anna felt faint.
“What happens next, with the investigation, I mean?”
“They’ll interview witnesses, neighbours in London, your neighbours in Manchester, and ask whether Mr. Renshaw ever visited you there; they’ll speak to your work colleagues and his; they’ll analyse your electronic devices as the police explained. Right now, we’ll concentrate on getting you out of here, Miss Scott.”
“Did they say who told them that I’d committed perjury?”
He shook his head.
“They wouldn’t disclose who the informant was, but given what you’ve told me, I would suggest your partner’s ex-girlfriend is a likely candidate. Looking at the reports in the gutter press, I’d say she also seems as if she believes what she’s saying.”
“How can she?!”
“Hard to say. Delusional? Simply jealous?”
Or just a bitter, scheming bitch.
“Is Nick in any trouble?”
“Unlikely. There’s no suggestion that he committed perjury as he wasn’t asked during the court case about his relationship with you. You say you had no communication with him prior to the trial and that it was his lawyer who asked you to appear as a character witness. Correct?”
“Yes,” Anna whispered.
She’d been caught in a horrendous nightmare, but she couldn’t wake up and shake it off. It had ensnared her, dragging her down, down, down, until she couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe.
The police officers returned thirty minutes later with a sheaf of paperwork.
“You’re being released on bail with conditions not to contact Mr. Renshaw.”
Anna’s mouth dropped open as the police officer continued. All pride gone, she began to sob quietly, hopelessly.
“Should you breach those conditions, you may be liable for further arrest. You’re being bailed for two months. If you need to travel abroad, you must notify the police through your solicitor.”
Anna stood on shaky feet as Damian Harris escorted her from the room.
“I can’t see him at all? I can’t see Nick?” she pleaded.
Her solicitor’s gaze was severe.
“You’re to have no contact with him. If you do, you’d be in clear breach of your bail conditions and could be re-interviewed or even re-arrested.”
A pit of darkness opened at Anna’s feet and she wanted to howl.
“There are photographers outside,” he said, more gently. “I have a taxi waiting.”
The nightmare continued as Anna stepped from the police station. The shouting and yelling started immediately.
“Did you lie, Anna?”
“How long have you and Nick been seeing each other?”
“Did you do it for the publicity, Anna?”
“Do you feel bad about breaking up Nick’s wedding to Molly, Anna?”
“Prefer married men, do you, Anna?”
She ignored them all, keeping her eyes fixed on the ground as Damian moved her toward the taxi as quickly as possible.
Once inside, she sank into the leather seat, exhausted, her body aching, her brain numb.
She knew that she’d have to run the gauntlet again at her apartment, with Damian reminding her not to talk to any journalists.
“Why would I do that?” she muttered.
He gave her a pitying look.
“In my experience, some clients think that giving their side of the story will help. It won’t.”
Anna’s lips turned down.
She longed to see Nick but she couldn’t.
She had nothing and no one.
When she walked through her front door, her apartment would be as dark and empty as her heart.
Nick was fuming. He paced his small kitchen, fury radiating off him, a murderous look on his face that had Brendan stepping away and putting a table between them.
“What do you mean I can’t see her?! This is bloody ridiculous!”
“It’s the conditions of bail,” Brendan repeated nervously.
“How can they say that I can’t see my own girlfriend? Who the fuck do they think they are?!”
“Um, the police?”
“I can’t believe this is happening!”
Nick fisted his hair and screwed his eyes shut.
He wanted to hit something, break something, destroy something the way he was feeling destroyed inside.
Despair was mixing with rage. There was no one to fight. There was no way to win.
“It won’t be forever,” Brendan offered tentatively.
“I need to be there for her!” Nick yelled, making Brendan cringe. Then more quietly, “She was there for me when I needed someone. Fuck! What do I do?”
Brendan chewed his lip anxiously.
“Right now, the only way to help her is to leave her alone.”
Nick turned wrathful eyes on Brendan.
“She needs me!”
“Actually, Nick, you’re the last thing she needs right now.”
“I have to see her!”
Brendan lost his temper.
“This is your fault!” he shouted, stabbing Nick in the chest with his finger. “I’d bet anything that it’s your ex-bimbo who leaked all these lies to the newspapers. It’s because of your court case that this whole fiasco has ended up with Annie being accused of perjury! It’s all because of you! And now you want to be a macho man and ignore her bail conditions. Isn’t her having to spend one night in the cells enough for you? Do you want to see her end up in prison, too?”
Nick felt as if he’d been kicked in the chest, and he couldn’t breathe.
“You have to leave her alone,” Brendan said firmly.
Nick was defeated. Brendan was right—it was all Nick’s fault.
“Tell her . . . tell her I’m sorry. Tell her I love her, that I’ll wait for her. And we’ll get through this.”
“I will, I’ll tell her.”
Nick rubbed his forehead as he slumped into a hard wooden chair, resting his elbows on the kitchen table.
“This can’t be happening!”
But it was.
Stony faced, Anna ignored the reporters who clamoured outside her apartment. She wanted to yell at them, scream at them, You’ve already had your pound of flesh! Go away! Go away! Leave me alone! But she couldn’t. Silence was her only defence.
She hurried inside, slamming the door behind her.
But she wasn’t by herself after all—there was someone waiting for her.
“Brendan!”
“Oh, Annie!”
She fell into his arms and sobbed, letting out the tears that she’d tried so hard to hold inside.
He led her to the sofa where she and Nick had sat together so many times.
“He wanted to be here, Annie, but he’s not allowed to, you know that. He told me to tell you that he’s sorry, that he loves you and that he’ll wait for you. I’m not allowed to take or receive any further messages, but he means it, Annie, I know he does. He was beside himself. We waited at his flat all night for news.” He paused. “And there’s something else you should know . . .”
“Oh God! What now?”
“Uh, well, they’ve started printing stories about your ex . . . some professor guy named Jonathan Frankle.”
“Oh my God! What are they saying?”
Brendan grimaced.
“That it’s your M.O.—find a married man, well, an unavailable guy and . . . you know . . .”
His words trailed off.
“I can’t believe this! When will it end?”
“I’ll make you a cup of tea before I tell you the rest,” he said, patting her arm soothingly.
Anna blanched. “There’s more.”
Brendan closed his eyes as if in pain.
“Tell me!”
“Your . . . um . . . phones have been hacked.”
“Oh no! The police warned me . . . I can’t believe it’s happened already?”
“’Fraid so.”
“The private photographs?”
“Yes.”
Anna looked away, hurt and ashamed. Now she was a victim as well as a suspect. What else would the world throw at her?
Brendan stayed for an hour, but there was nothing for him to do and Anna was craving the sanctuary of her bedroom.
Brendan unplugged her landline and gave her a cheap pay-as-you-go for emergencies. He really was the best P.A. a woman could want, the best friend.
Once he’d gone, the apartment was eerily silent. No phones ringing, no Nick laughing or singing in the shower, no emails to check, no work to do. No one to help her through the agonising misery.
She took a long, hot bath, collapsed into bed and cried herself to sleep.
But Anna didn’t sleep well. She tossed and turned, chased by nightmares and nameless, faceless threats. When she finally gave up trying to rest, she plodded into the kitchen to make coffee, feeling tired and stripped raw. Peering out of the window, she saw that there was a different reporter’s car parked outside. Surely they had something better to do on a public holiday? Apparently not.
Wondering if it was a good idea, she plugged the landline back in and jumped when it rang immediately, sighing with relief when she saw her mother’s name pop up; she longed to hear her voice.
“Mom! It’s so good to hear from you. How are you? How’s Dad?
“Oh, Anna, sweetheart!”
“I’m so sorry about the photographs. I don’t know how they hacked them, but, oh God, I’m so sorry! Has Dad seen them?”
Her mother’s voice soft and broken, the words interrupted by muffled sobs.
“Mom! Are you okay? Where’s Dad?”
Her words jarred to a halt as her mother continued to cry quietly.
“Mom, please!”
Her mother took a gasping breath.
“Your father . . . he’s had a stroke.”
“What? Oh my God!”
Guilt clamped a cold hand around Anna’s heart. Because of the photographs? Because of me?
“All that red meat, and butter on everything. I kept telling him, but he wouldn’t listen. You know your father.”
“Mom?” Anna’s voice cracked. “Is he . . . ? Is he . . . ?”
“We’re at Phelps Memorial Hospital. I don’t know, Anna. It was a major stroke. I don’t know . . .”
Tears streaked Anna’s face as she fought to stay calm for her mother’s sake, but the shock was too great, and she took great gulps of air before she tried to speak again.
“I’ll get the first flight home.”
Her mother didn’t even try to argue with her.
She didn’t care that she wasn’t allowed to leave the country. She didn’t care that she might be committing another crime. All she cared about was getting to her dad as quickly as she could.
While she waited impatiently for the first available flight, she emailed her plans to her lawyer. If the British police wanted her, they could damn well come and find her.
It was fifteen hours before Anna arrived at the 236-bed hospital of Tarrytown, an hour north of New York City.
By then, the nude photographs of her had gone viral, but she didn’t have it in her to care.
“Can I stop more of the photographs being published?” Nick asked the Club’s solicitor.
The man sighed.
“Once the images are out there, it’s very hard to get them taken down for good. You can try, but they tend to pop up on other websites. You’ll be chasing your tail . . . and it’s expensive to pursue.”
“I don’t care about that! Just do it!”
Both Nick and Anna’s phones had been hacked. Even though they’d had security passwords, it hadn’t slowed the hackers for even a minute. It was a wakeup call to realise how easily an expert hacker could gain access without even having to touch the devices. It had all been done remotely.
Giovanni’s ‘dick pic’ that he’d taken with Nick’s phone did the rounds of some of the gossip sites but with all of them attributing the shot to Nick. That pissed him for another reason—Giovanni’s dick was nowhere as impressive as his own.
But it was the photographs of Anna posing for him that made him slam his locker door and swear loudly as the other players tried to calm him down.
“At least she looks hot, mate,” Jason grinned, which was not the best thing to say.
Nick grabbed him by his shirt.
“Don’t! Just . . . don’t!”
Jason raised his hands in the air, looking about him worriedly.
“I’m just saying . . .”
“Shut up!”
“I would listen to him, amico mio,” Giovanni said quietly.
The team supported him and the Club stood by him, but none of that helped Anna.
Molly was loving the publicity. As much as possible, she was trying to keep it focussed on her and not Anna. There were photographs of her in skimpy outfits, doing Page Three ‘glamour’ shots, and she appeared on a couple of cheap online talk shows. She was enjoying her fifteen minutes of fame, and eking out every additional second she could.
Jonathan was also basking in the attention, describing himself in several articles as a “committed family man”, making Anna sound like a stalker who’d blackmailed him into a relationship. He also managed to phrase it to seem as if he’d taken pity on her because she was “unstable”.
In the same way that possession is nine-tenths of the law, getting out your version of events first played best in social media.
Nick vented his fury in the gym, beating the shit out of a punch bag.
Late one evening, he called Molly.
“Nicky, this is a surprise—not a particularly pleasant one.”
“Why did you do it, Mol?”
Her tone was wary.
“Are you recording this?”
Nick laughed unhappily.
“No, just you and me. Unless you’re recording it. Going to make a few more bob, are you, Mol?”
“Fuck off!”
“I will, when I’ve said what I want to say. I never cheated on you. Never. Not once. Not even when chances were right in front of me and I knew you wouldn’t find out. Not with Anna, not with anyone. You and me were long over when I started seeing Anna. And you know me well enough—you know I’m telling the truth. So I’m asking you again, why did you do it?”
He listened to her breathing, wondering if he’d ever get an answer.
“You deserved it.”
“Hitting you was an accident, you know that.”
“You broke my fucking nose!”
Nick hung his head.
“I am sorry about that. But did I deserve you cheating on me with Kenny? I was good to you. I treated you well.”
“You never loved me.”
“What?! I did everything for you! Everything! I was going to marry you!”
“I was an afterthought. You only cared about rugby. You were so moody and miserable when you were injured. I was sick of you feeling sorry for yourself.”
Nick was shocked.
“I thought I’d never play again! Yeah, you could say I wasn’t exactly happy about that! It was supposed to be for better or worse.”
“It seemed like worse to me,” she snapped back.
“You didn’t care what harm it would do?”
“You’ve got to look out for yourself, because no one else will.”
Her voice was hard and cold.
“That’s where you’re wrong, Mol.”
“Don’t be so fucking holier than thou! You’re just the same as me, only you won’t admit it! You’ve got your fancy car and your fancy woman, and what have I got? Nothing! It isn’t fair!”
Nick didn’t bother to reply. He simply ended the call. It hadn’t made him feel any better; it hadn’t really answered any questions. Molly was a jealous bitch, and she’d never admit she did anything wrong. But it did make him wonder: how the hell could he have ever wanted to marry her? When he thought about how Anna made him feel, he knew that Molly was right—he’d never really loved her.
Great. Something else to feel guilty about.
Anna peeled off some bills and thrust them at the cab driver, yelling, “Keep the change!” as she ran toward the hospital entrance.
The driver had stared at her like he couldn’t figure out why he knew her face. Anna had ignored all his attempts at conversation during the drive from the airport.
It was almost ridiculous to run now, but she had to. For her own sanity, she needed the momentum, she needed her father to know that she’d gotten to him as fast as she could.
Her new cell phone had been turned on since she stepped off the plane at JFK, but her mother hadn’t replied to her texts and Anna had been too scared to call her.
Adrenaline made her shake as she waited breathlessly for the hospital’s receptionist to tell her where they were keeping her father, and then she ran up two flights of stairs and down a long corridor until she skidded to a halt outside his room.
Unable to stop her hands from trembling, she peered through the window and saw her mother sitting next to a hospital bed.
Anna pushed open the door gently.
“Mom?”
Her mother spoke without turning her head.
“Anna’s here, Gary. Open your eyes for her, please, baby.”
Anna stared down at her father’s grey face, sagging on the right side, his right hand curled into a claw.
“Oh, Daddy!”
She knelt on the hard floor and put one arm around her mother’s waist, resting her free hand on top of her father’s.
“I’m here, Daddy. Please wake up now. I love you so much. Please, Daddy!”
His left eye twitched and Anna’s mother took it for a sign, squeezing her daughter’s hand.
“He knows you’re here! Talk to him again, sweetheart.”
“I’ve missed you so much, Daddy. If I’d known you’d be laying around in bed . . .” but she couldn’t finish the joke and tears came again. “I’m so sorry, Daddy. I’m so sorry I disappointed you.” Her sobs came faster now. “All I’ve ever wanted to do is to make you proud. Please wake up, Daddy.”
“He can hear you, honey. I’m sure he can hear you,” and her mother turned to Anna, wiping the tears on her cheeks. “He’s always been proud of you. Always. We both have. He missed you so much while you were away, but he was proud of everything you achieved.” Then her eyes turned back to her husband. “Gary, Anna’s here. Time to wake up now.”
Gary Scott was a big man, an ex-pro footballer, tall and broad with a tendency to gain weight once he’d passed fifty. But he was a fine-looking man; everyone said so. Seeing him in that hospital bed, pale and diminished, it was the worst feeling in the world.
Anna pulled up a chair and sat on the opposite side of the bed from her mother, each of them holding one of his hands. They spoke quietly through the still of the night, and each hour they watched the man who was their rock slip away from them.
Dawn came quietly, a whisper of light on the horizon, and Anna rubbed her eyes. She gazed down at her father and stroked his hand.
“I love you, Daddy. So much. Please wake up. Please wake up, Daddy.”
But there would be no more waking up for Gary Scott, and an hour later, on January 4th, he slipped away.
Anna and her mother clung to each other with the stunned faces of shipwreck survivors. And when they couldn’t cry anymore, a kindly nurse led them to a quiet room and took them through the paperwork, telling them what to expect now, who to contact and what to do about the funeral.
Anna could barely take it in. Neither she nor her mother had slept more than a handful of hours in the last two days. The nurse understood that and calmly, gently told them to take their time.
All that they had left was time. And each other.
After a while, there was no point staying at the hospital. Gary Scott’s body might still be there, but his spirit was gone; the beautiful soul that made him the energetic vital man he’d always been was gone.
Anna’s mother stared at the watery sun struggling to climb in the sky.
“He would have hated it, you know,” she said. “He wouldn’t have wanted to survive that. He hated any sort of illness. He never stopped complaining about the ache in his knees on damp days, or the cold in his bones in the winter. He was talking about moving to Florida, but he’d never would have done it.” She turned to face Anna. “He didn’t want to grow old. Now he never will.”
Anna wrapped her arms around her mother, and they held each other as the grey clouds hung dark and ominous above them. But what are clouds when the worst has already happened?
Anna took her mother’s car keys and drove them both home. During that short, twenty minute drive, their roles reversed, and Anna became the parent.
She guided her mother through the house, knelt to take off her shoes, quietly bringing her hot tea, then undressing her and putting her to bed.
She sat alone in the kitchen, staring out at the trees stripped bare in the back yard. Their skeletal arms, dark and black, waved at her in the bitter wind.
She sipped her tea, clasping the mug until it grew cold.
The radiators ticked softly, the pipes humming and rumbling. Her dad never had gotten around to draining the air out of them.
Her head dropped into her hands and her hopeless tears came again.
14th January 2016
There’s so much to do to organise a funeral. So many things to think about. And the last thing you want to do is discuss catering or flowers or any of those thousand things you have to decide on. And when the person who has passed has been well known in his time, there’s double the work.
The Health and Care Professions Council didn’t let this get in the way of the wheels of their justice. The investigation must have been unusually rapid, because on the day before her father’s funeral, Anna woke up to read an email from them.
She should care what they said, knowing they had the power to end her career, but she didn’t.
She read the words slowly, misery dragging her down.
Dear Dr. Scott,
As you were unable to attend a ruling on your relationship with a former client, we have taken the unusual step of informing you of our decision by electronic mail.
You have admitted breaching professional boundaries by engaging in a personal and sexual relationship with the service user. You have further acknowledged that your actions constituted misconduct and as such, we conclude that your fitness to practise was impaired as a result.
Dating former patients is flawed and risks undermining the public’s trust in the profession. Further, you have breached the HCPC’s ethical guidelines and we are therefore withdrawing your licence to practise forthwith.
Yours sincerely,
More than once Anna wished she’d never met Nick Renshaw. But Fate wasn’t paying much attention to what she wished or what she wanted. She didn’t believe that ‘things happen for a reason’. That’s just what people told themselves to feel better.
But I did meet him and I made a lot of wrong decisions.
Her life had changed for good, for bad—changed permanently and irrevocably.
Damn his beautiful face. Damn his beautiful body. Been there, done that, got the scars to prove it.
Anna read the email twice more, then quietly deleted it.
She had work to do.
She put a notice in the local newspaper and sent emails to news desks and city sports desks, announcing her father’s passing. The florist had to be contacted, a menu finalized with the caterer for the gathering after the funeral, the minister briefed, the guest list updated.
Anna took charge of the paperwork, notifying her father’s insurers, pension, bank, clients and clubs—so many people, all sad, all sorry, all moving on with their lives. And then there was Anna, with no clue how to do that. Just another day to get through. Another day to fall asleep at the kitchen table because half a bottle of vodka was the only peace you could find in your life.
The day of the funeral was bitterly cold, an icy wind feathering the ground with flurries of snow that hung on trees and branches, and drifted into soft, silent mounds.
The small church was packed, people standing at the back, and even a local TV crew attended because her father had been somebody. The minister talked about the impact he had as an NFL player, the years as a coach, and his charity work with young athletes from disadvantaged backgrounds. If anyone knew of the scandal surrounding Anna, it wasn’t obvious.
Her father’s drinking buddies arrived, awkward in out-of-date suits and sober ties, and his football friends filled the aisle with their broad shoulders and broader bellies. Her mother’s friends wore navy or black, and whispered that they’d bring food later.
Her father had been loved and admired, and that was something. But it felt as if her hands were empty even as she wrapped them around her mother, who was graceful in her grief, offering brave smiles to friends and distant cousins that Anna didn’t recognise.
There was one other person there, and Anna felt him before she saw him.
She felt a prickle on her skin, and turned. From the corner of her eye, she saw Nick watching her, his expression troubled. He nodded, but didn’t move towards her, and for that she was grateful. She didn’t have the strength to talk to him, even if she’d had anything to say, but something about his silent presence soothed her.
The service ran over time because so many people wanted to share their memories of the great Gary Scott. Anna smiled through her tears, knowing it was exactly what her dad would have wanted—laughter and slightly off-colour locker room jokes. Her mom smiled sometimes but seemed absent, except for the moments when tears slid down her rouged cheeks.
When they finally faced the interment, the ground was iron hard and the weather deteriorating. The minister rushed through the words as the mourners turned blue with cold and stamped their feet.
Anna’s mother placed a bouquet of black-eyed-Susie’s on the coffin, because those had been his favourites—bright yellow and full of sunshine, just like her, he used to say. Anna laid a single sunflower on top and held her mother as their tears froze and their teeth chattered.
When the coffin was lowered into the ground, it didn’t seem possible that such a large presence had left the world, and Anna felt her father’s absence bitterly.
Everyone else was grateful to leave the grim and grey churchyard for the warmth of Anna’s mother’s house. They drank toasts to Gary Scott’s memory and ate the sandwiches and quiches, and forked pie into their mouths that opened and closed like hungry birds.
Nick had disappeared into the crowds of people without speaking, but Anna knew that he’d be back. He wasn’t a man who gave in without a fight. She hadn’t spoken to him since that terrible day—the thought of starting now was too much. Too much. And her throat closed with horror.
As the last stragglers left, a town car pulled up outside the house, and Anna’s heart began to beat wildly. She stood with her back pressed against the door as if her thin, stick-like arms could keep him out. When he knocked, it reverberated through her fragile frame. She didn’t want to answer, but knew her mother would hear and ask questions that Anna would rather not answer.
Slowly, reluctantly, she opened the door and stared.
“Anna.”
He wore a heavy overcoat, but his hands were bare. Those long fingers with the blunt nails that had touched her so many times, seemed vulnerable in the icy grip of winter.
She hardened her heart, her breath misting in front of her.
“I’m sorry for your loss. He sounded like a great guy. I wish I’d known him.”
“Thank you.”
“Can we talk?” his eyes pleaded with her.
“You know we can’t. You shouldn’t even be here.”
His head drooped.
“I had to. I couldn’t let you go through this alone,” he said softly. “I miss you.”
She’d missed him, too. Missed his soft Yorkshire accent, those flattened, drawn-out vowels. Missed his warmth. Missed his kindness. Missed his body wrapped around hers, pressing down on her, inside her. Above all, she missed his love. And here he was, offering it to her again. But it was too late to heal the wounds.
“Please, Anna. We need to talk.”
She lifted her chin and forced herself to meet his gaze.
“I’m not allowed to have any contact with you. Those are the conditions of my bail. You know this.”
“That won’t be forever. They’ll see from the phone records that we weren’t lying. It’s just a matter of time. I’ll wait for you.”
“Don’t.”
“Of course I’m going to wait for you!” he cried out in frustration.
“I don’t even know if I’ll go back to London. It’s not like I have a career left. I’ve lost every client. Brendan did his best, but they all cited broken contracts because of the morality clause.” She laughed bitterly.
Nick took a shocked breath and his eyes filled with sympathy.
“They didn’t even wait for the police to finish investigating. I’m guilty—judged by the public and the Press.”
“It’s all my fault. Let me make it better!”
“You’re going to make it better?” her voice was as cold as the wind that whipped Nick’s coat around him and cut through Anna’s thin black dress.
He saw a delicate gold chain around her neck and hoped that she was wearing the gold rugby pendant that he’d given her. Hoped, but couldn’t be sure.
“How exactly are you going to make it better?”
Ice in her heart, ice in her words. Nick blanched.
“Well, I . . .”
“No, let me guess,” she folded her arms and glanced over his shoulder, staring at the scudding clouds with a ferocity that chilled him. “Did you know that the Health and Care Professions Council revoked my licence to practise?”
Nick sucked in a breath and closed his eyes.
“But if we tell them the truth . . .”
“Really? I only broke the morality/no-fraternization clause a little? You’ll go to them and tell them we’re sorry and we won’t do it again, then ask them nicely if they’ll give me back my licence to practise. Is that what you were going to do? No?”
She knew she was being a bitch but she couldn’t stop the juggernaut of emotions. She felt overwhelmed one minute, empty and lost the next. Seeing Nick was too much, just too much.
“Anna . . .”
He saw the moment that she started shutting down, closing him out. Her eyes drifted across the familiar planes and angles of his beautiful face with the blankness of a stranger, then she met his eyes.
She knew exactly what to say.
“There’s nothing for me in London now.”
Nick’s gaze turned fierce, and Anna could see the determination in his eyes. He wanted her to fight, not give up.
And she couldn’t do that to him.
She lifted her chin and met his heated gaze.
“I wish I’d never met you.”
And then she closed the door, a soft click as she locked it.
Disbelieving, Nick leaned his head against the door, then turned on his heel, a curse dropping from his lips as he strode back to the waiting car.