Jo examined the X-rays for a while longer, then moved across, behind the head of the bed to stand near the emergency button, just in case Gregor should start flatlining while the medics were otherwise engaged. She watched the machines closely for any sign of alarm, but nothing happened. Heart kept beating. Lungs kept inflating. The patient just lay there, eyes closed, splayed feet pointing to the corners of the ceiling. She moved to the other side of the bed and glanced at the man’s fingernails, at the white skin like wax, bloated and wrinkled from being so long in the water.

He was alive. But for how long? Despite what the doctor had said, she didn’t want to believe there was no hope of recovery. Someone, somewhere, cared about this man and would be willing him to live if they knew what was happening. Until those people were found, all he had was Joanna.

“Hold on, Gregor,” she said to him. “If you can hear me, we’re going to find the person who did this to you. So just hold on, okay?”

CHAPTER

17

THEN

Ruby

September

“CLOSE YOUR EYES and open your hands.”

Ruby did as he asked. Gregor placed something flat on her palm.

She opened her eyes. “That’s not my phone.”

“It is now.”

The model in her hand was top of the range. It probably cost several hundred pounds, maybe more.

“Do you like it?”

“I can’t accept this.”

His face fell. “Whyever not?”

“I mean, thank you so much for thinking of me, but honestly, you really shouldn’t have.”

“But it’s your birthday, isn’t it?”

Ruby was shocked; how could he have possibly known it was her birthday? “Well, actually it was yesterday.”

Gregor burst out laughing at her surprised expression. “I didn’t know! That’s so funny—I was just going to say that as a joke. Was it really your birthday yesterday? How perfect! Oh, brilliant. What a coincidence. Well, you’ll have to accept it now, won’t you?”

It had been a little over a week since the phone had been lost, and for those few days Ruby’s life seemed stripped back, simple in a clean, uncomplicated way. She’d been to the library to find some Scottish folk tunes for Constance, and what time she hadn’t spent practicing, she’d been using to develop her own piece. On her birthday, apart from playing her violin and working on her composition, she’d had a bath that lasted for two hours while she listened to Tosca on the secondhand record player she’d treated herself to. Perfection, added to by the fact that she didn’t even need to actively ignore any annoying calls from Joanna and Marianne.