Calling Lucy, speaking to Miles, would have to wait.

5

For the next few days, I followed the same pattern. If I’m honest, by the Monday I was physically much improved. The stiffness and ache in my limbs and neck were easing, the bruises fading into tie-dyed green and yellow splashes decorating my head and chest. Realistically, if I took it slow, I could probably manage to drive the 180 miles or so to Windermere.

But as the physical pain retreated, it seemed to increasingly expose the deeper pain that lay beneath my bumps and scrapes. My chest squeezed with anguish whenever I thought about Charlie, my emotions wading through denial, shock, bitter regret and deep, deep sorrow.

My phone lay abandoned and out of charge where I’d dropped it somewhere under the bed. Lucy would have been dealing with the emails coming through, sorting any posts or invitations that needed responding to. Vaguely, somewhere in the back of my mind I knew that the longer it took me to tell her that I was letting her go, the longer I’d have to pay her for. I ignored the faint buzz of guilt about not calling her back. We were usually in contact at least once a day, sometimes ten times that many, and my ambiguous message was hardly sufficient to explain what was going on. I knew she’d be worried. But petty issues like my employee, my money, my preposterous job, my life in London, seemed like a hazy hallucination caused by the strong painkillers I was still scarfing in some vain effort at dulling my heartbreak.

Even the threat that had driven me to bolt in the middle of the night seemed unimportant, a thousand miles away.

And surely they’d never find me here, anyway?

Finding it impossible to care, or worry about any of it, instead I lay in bed, crying, sleeping, staring at the stains on the ceiling, picking at the meals Daniel brought me and sinking further and further down into a pit of self-loathing and shame.

I needed to snap out of it. Or at the very least find the gumption and the grit to begin to slowly heave myself out.

Fortunately, Daniel and Dr Ziva agreed.

On Thursday, nearly a week after I skidded into a ditch, Daniel woke me with a mug of tea and a chipped bowl of porridge. A while later he came and retrieved the empty mug and still full bowl but this time he was carrying Hope, and before he took the tray away he plonked her on the bed and left her there.

It was a single bed, probably as wide as it was high. Hope looked as surprised as I was as she sat up and goggled at me, automatically cramming one hand into her mouth.

‘Hi,’ I managed, sounding like some sort of child-eating troll before I cleared my throat and tried again. She tucked in her chin, eyeing me warily. I tried to think of something else to say.