Tia stood in the doorway, her eyes wide. They stared at each other as Cora dropped back on her heels, her hand swiping her mouth. But then Tia wasn’t looking at Cora. She was staring at Frazer, who still lay against the desk, tensed and frozen in place.

The door shut with a slam.

“Fuck!” Cora’s heart was racing as Frazer stood up and yanked on her pants. “Frazer! Fuck!”

She looked up. Frazer was wide-eyed.

Her lip trembled.

“Fuck.” Frazer said.

* * *

Cool air had hit Frazer’s legs. That was her first warning.

Cool air during sex was never fun.

And then Tia was staring at her upside down and Frazer felt like she’d been caught by her mum. This could not be happening.

It couldn’t.

They’d managed not to be caught for three months.

Three months of rendezvous around the hospital, of careful door locking. Of Cora only being in her house on days Alec was away.

Of sex with zero feeling and of friendship with probably too much.

Of avoiding her friends and family as much as possible because she didn’t want to see the judgement in their eyes when she shared what she was doing.

And now Tia had caught them. The worst person to catch them second only to Alec himself.

God, would she tell Alec?

She wouldn’t, would she?

“Is she going to tell Alec?” Cora asked. She’d not even bothered to stand up but was sitting on the floor next to the chair Frazer now sat in. She looked miserable, and the urge to hold her hand overtook Frazer, a moment’s insanity.

“I don’t know.” Frazer shook her head. “No. She won’t. We’re friends.”

“You are?”

Frazer looked down at Cora, who was terribly pale. Wide-eyed. She looked ready to run away, and Frazer couldn’t blame her.

“Yeah. We are.” Frazer stood up. “I need to go and speak with her.”

Cora scrambled to her feet. “You?”

Blinking at her, Frazer asked, “Well, do you want to?”

That was all it took for Cora to go even paler. “No.”

That’s what Frazer had thought. “Okay. I’ll go.”

She reached her hand out to squeeze Cora’s arm. For reassurance only.

But Cora took a step back, wrapped her arms around herself. Gave a terribly fake smile. “Okay. You go.”

It was easy to walk away from that office. From Cora’s silent panic. When she walked into the hallway, Frazer expected everything out there to have stopped. For people to be standing about, judgemental looks on their faces. But the other rooms that were in this area were mostly empty; no one was milling in the hallway.

It was almost as if the world hadn’t stopped spinning on its axis.

Someone else knew. This thing they were doing was real. It was out there, beyond their reach or control.