‘I’m just going now,’ he murmured, between slow, gentle kisses.
‘Don’t go. Stay. Come back to bed. Stuff the world, it can do without you today,’ she said, already knowing what his answer would be.
‘Yep, but the station can’t. I’m on grub duty,’ he answered, as expected. ‘There would be an uproar if I didn’t show today and the lads went hungry.’
Grub duty. It basically meant he was in charge of preparing the lunches for the shift. Actually, dinner too, given that he’d somehow agreed to cover for a mate and that meant he’d be doing a double shift, and would be at the station for twenty-four hours, sleeping between call-outs in the bunk room. A double shift on New Year’s Eve. That was about as unlucky as it got for a firefighter on one of the busiest days of the year. Yet, he hadn’t complained once, because he truly cared about his job, something she’d realised the first time she’d met him.
Cormac Sweeney had walked into her ward in his firefighter uniform almost a year ago, and by the time he’d reached the nursing station, Emmy was in lust. When he’d asked if he could sneak in to say hello to an elderly man he’d pulled out of a fire caused by a smoking chip pan, her heart was paying attention. When she took him through to the man’s bedside and Cormac treated the gent with such care and respect, bits of her were already in love. Especially the bits that, despite her fears, were responding to his kiss right now.
He must have felt the heat rise between them because he broke off the snogging session and gave her one last smile as he stood up from the bed. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow morning, but I’ll try to call you later. Sorry we’re not going to be together at midnight, babe. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.’
‘No worries, but call me if you can. I’ll be in all night. Or if I get bored, I might head over to Mum’s and go wild with a bottle of wine and the box of Quality Street that’s still under the tree. And I’ll drop in on Gran at some point too.’
‘Yeah, I’ll try, but you know how it is. It’ll be chaos.’
He brushed her off so easily and there was something shifty in the way he didn’t make eye contact. She wracked her brain to remember the psychological tells they discussed on all those episodes ofCriminal Mindsthat she used to binge on. Did the suspects look down to their left or their right when they werelying? Or did they just, like Cormac, back out before you could spot where their gaze was going? Not that she had any serial killer concerns, but there had definitely been something off with him lately.
‘No worries,’ she answered, trying to play it cool. ‘I do know how it is. Have a good shift. And please stay safe.’ He was already at the door.
‘You too,’ he retorted distractedly, obviously checked out of the conversation. Her shift at the hospital definitely didn’t require a safety warning. The most physically hazardous thing that ever happened on her ward was an octogenarian going rogue with a Zimmer frame.
‘I love you,’ she said, as he went out the door. It was superstitious, an ever-present anxiety that the one time that wasn’t the last thing she said to him would be the time he got injured at work. Or worse…
If he said it back, it was drowned out by the thud of his steps on the stairs.
Emmy slumped back on the bed, deflated. There it was again, the niggling feeling. He wasn’t being unkind or rude or abrasive, just… distant. As if he wanted to be anywhere else but here. And it was a demeanour she recognised only too well. Her dad had perfected it when things started to go wrong with him and Mum. He’d stopped paying attention when she spoke. Stopped laughing at her jokes. Started staring into space as if he had something on his mind. Turned out it was a thirty-two-year-old called Donna. The man she’d adored above all others her whole life was now someone she barely recognised, and even two years later, there was still a lingering fracture in their closeness, one that was papered over with cordial tolerance.
After she polished off the bagel and coffee, she drifted back to sleep for a while, still knackered after her double shift yesterday. It had been midnight when she’d crawled in the door and she’dbeen too wired to sleep, so she’d worked her way through two episodes ofSelling Sunsetbefore climbing in beside a sleeping Cormac at 2a.m., and drifting off to dream about a palatial estate in the Hollywood Hills.
Her second alarm of the morning woke her at ten minutes to ten. She had her morning routine down to perfection. One hour and ten minutes to get showered, dressed, and over to Glasgow Central Hospital in time for her shift to start at eleven.
Before she got up, she did a quick internal check and, yes, her worries over Cormac’s behaviour were still there. Emmy knew she had to confront it, but even the thought of that twisted her stomach into knots. Tomorrow. The first day of the New Year. May as well get the year off with a bang and…
Bang. Bang. Bang.
It took a second to register that the noise was coming from her own front door. Someone had just thudded it with the kind of force that suggested urgency. Maybe a delivery driver, keen to get his last shift of the year over with.
She slid out of bed and trotted down the stairs, spotting the outline of a man in the opaque glass side panel next to the door. He wasn’t holding any kind of parcel, so not a delivery guy. No post-person’s red jacket either.
Shit. This was one of those moments when she really needed to have one of those personal safety alarms. And a bra on. Whoever it was, they were about to get greeted by a wild-haired, red-eyed woman in her pyjamas.
Cormac had already undone the overnight locks and security chain, so she only had to open the Yale at the top of the door. Trying to keep as much of herself hidden as possible, she slowly pulled open the heavy oak door and peered round it.
‘Dad!’ she exclaimed, confused. There was absolutely no reason for her father to be at her door at this time of the morning. Or for him to have bloodshot eyes and hair that lookedlike it had just come out of a tumble dryer. He was always so impeccably groomed, this sight in front of her was hard to take in. The dishevelled suit, the tie pulled loose, the unshaven face. None of this fitted on Eric Ryan. They used to joke with him that he was like one of those middle-aged silver foxes that featured in travel promos for Saga Tours and adverts for life insurance. Right now, he would be more suited to an NHS warning about the dangerous after-effects of binge drinking.
‘What’s happened? Is something wrong? Is it Mum?’ That came out automatically, before she remembered that he would have no clue how Mum was, on account of the fact that he’d had some kind of midlife crisis, destroyed Mum’s life and wrecked their family.
‘Yes, love, it’s Mum,’ he replied, and she was surprised there was no slur to his words. Given his appearance, she’d half expected him to have got here fuelled by tequila.
‘What is it?’ Her blood ran cold. ‘Is she hurt? Has she been in an accident?’
He immediately put his hands up as if he was surrendering. ‘No, no. Nothing like that. She’s fine.’ He ran his fingers through his hair, exasperated.
‘It’s me who’s not okay, Em. I need help.’
‘With what, Dad?’ she asked, confused and aware that this whole scene was playing out on the front doorstep and Mrs McFadden from next door was walking up her path and craning her neck so much to see what was going on that she was almost walking backwards.
Her dad’s voice escalated with uncharacteristic drama. ‘I’ve been a total idiot and I need to fix my mistake. Emmy, I need you to help me get your mum back.’
