Second Shot

“Thank you,” I said.

For a moment he was silent as he folded his stethoscope neatly into his bag, his movements very deliberate and precise, as always. “This cannot continue,” he said, without looking at me directly. “You can barely stand. I fail to see what purpose is served by your continued presence here, other than to lay yourself open to further attack, or as a burden to your colleagues.”

Neither can I. “I’m staying,” I said.

He closed the bag, snapping it shut with a briskness that could almost have been mistaken for temper in someone more human. “Well, I regret that I am not,” he said.

There was a slight tap on the door and Neagley stuck her head round without waiting for an invitation. “Can I offer you coffee, Dr. Fox?” she asked.

My father stiffened. “Thank you, but no,” he said with icy politeness. “And my name is Foxcroft-Mr., not Dr.”

He ignored her puzzled frown. At the doorway, he turned to fire one last salvo. “I shall be taking a flight out of Boston tomorrow, and if you had any sense you would do the same,” he said. “I cannot keep doing this, Charlotte. I’ve done my best to help you, but if you won’t heed my advice.. well, there has to come a time when one calls a halt, don’t you agree?”

“Yes,” I said, and he paused, surprised. “But I’d call it making a stand.”

Something tightened in the side of his jaw He strode out past Nea-gley and I heard Sean intercept him in the hallway to get him to check Matt’s head wound.

There was a long pause and something that sounded suspiciously like a sigh. Then my father’s voice said, brusque, “Show me.”

Neagley came farther into the room and shut the door behind her.

“He really is a doctor, right?” she said.

I raised a smile. “He’s a consultant orthopedic surgeon-they look down on mere doctors from a very exalted height.”

“Ah,” she said, understanding. “I thought for a moment he meant he was an ex-doctor-like he might have had his license revoked or something.”

My smile fleshed out. “Oh, how I wish you’d asked him that. …”

She smiled with me for a moment before her face sobered. “So, does he think you’re OK?”

“Oh, just peachy,” I said. Of course, he s probably disowned me, but what else is new?

“What really happened this afternoon?” she said. “Matt was being kind of vague.”

“I’m not surprised. He got quite a belt round the head.”

Neagley came forwards and sat on the foot of the bed, regarding me with that serious cop’s face.

“When I gave you the rundown on Oliver Reynolds the other day at the hospital, I didn’t go into a lot of detail,” she said. “I told you he was good at putting the frighteners on women, but I didn’t tell you how.”

She flicked her eyes in my direction, but I was concentrating on straightening out the bedclothes, smoothing the rumpled sheet.

“He threatens to rape them,” she said flatly. “And if they have young daughters, so much the better.”

“He threatened the kids?” I said sharply, remembering Reynolds’s mention of Ella.

Neagley grimaced. “Only that he’d make them watch.”

I looked her straight in the eye. “Good job we were able to get the better of him before that thought crossed his mind, then,” I said levelly “Have you said anything about this to Sean?”

“No,I-”

“Well, don’t,” I said. “Please.” And when she still looked dubious, I added, “Believe me, you don’t want to be responsible for what he’ll do if he finds out.”

Surprise crossed her face first, followed by a grim understanding. She nodded, got to her feet. “You know where I am when you want to talk,” she said gravely

“Yes — and thank you,” I said, but I knew I’d never take her up on the offer.

If the look she gave me as she went out was anything to go by, she knew it, too.

You’re very quiet,” Sean said. “Penny for your thoughts?” “We’re in the U.S.,” I said. “Shouldn’t that be a cent?” “No, it still works with a penny, I think,” he said. “And you’re hedging.”

It was four days after my father’s final visit and we were sitting in the Explorer in the car park at the Shaw’s supermarket in North Conway. Inside the store itself, Lucas and Rosalind had taken Ella with them to do their weekly grocery shop.

It was the first time I’d laid eyes on her since the night I was shot, and I was shocked by how clearly I remembered every little nuance of behavior or movement. I could almost tell what she was thinking, feeling- even saying-just from watching her at that distance. As she trotted away from us towards the entrance, a tiny figure between the two adults, I was aware of having something vital stripped from me.