Page 46 of Never Too Late

“Answer it,” Cillian said.

“I’m not you. I can ignore calls.”

“If you don’t answer it, you’ll spend the rest of the night wondering who it was.”

“It’s probably a wrong number.”

“Answer it and find out.”

Curiosity warred with the need to prove something to Cillian. As that wouldn’t achieve a damn thing in the end, I snatched it up before it went to voicemail. “Hello?”

“Monsieur Prescott?”

“Oui.”

A torrent of French followed from the woman on the other end. “Wait, wait,” I interrupted before she could really get into the flow and there was no stopping her. “I don’t understand. Do you speak English?”

“Oui, désolée. You are friend of Laurent Dupont, yes? You are the last number he called on his phone.”

“We met for dinner tonight. Is he there? Did he lose his phone? If so, I can get it back to him.”

“I am…” A long pause followed. “I do not know English word, sorry. I am une infirmière.”

“Infirmière?” I looked to Cillian, his French far stronger than mine.

“Nurse,” he supplied.

“Nurse,” I echoed, cold fear seeping into my chest.

“Ah, yes. Thank you. We wish to contact his family.”

“Why?”

“Are you a friend?”

“Yes.”

“I’m afraid Monsieur Dupont was involved in an accident?”

“What sort of accident?” My palms were clammy, and I was finding it difficult to breathe. I’d known it wasn’t a good idea for him to go home on his own after everything that had happened, especially given the amount of alcohol he’d imbibed, but I’d let him do it, anyway. I’d let him convince me he’d be fine, and obviously he hadn’t been.

“He was hit by a bus.”

“A bus! Jesus!” Cillian might only be getting one side of the conversation, but the look on his face said it was enough for him to add two and two together and come up with the right number.

“Is he…?” The words dried up in my throat and I didn’t want to give the thought hammering away at my brain, life, in case it somehow made it true. Laurent had been my rock since I’d moved to Paris. His presence had made everything easier than it might otherwise have been.

“His condition is serious,” the nurse said. I forced myself to take a deep breath. ‘Serious’ wasn’t dead, and that was important. “We found a number for his father, but there was no answer. We will keep trying.”

“Right,” I said. He was probably somewhere sleeping off the worst effects of the alcohol binge. Either that or he’d started on his next one.

The rest of the conversation passed in something of a blur as I extracted the name of the hospital and attempted to gain more information on Laurent’s condition. The latter proved impossible, the language barrier too great for the nurse to describe his physical state in English. The thought kept niggling that Laurent could translate, but of course he couldn’t, because he was lying unconscious in a hospital bed—I’d been able to glean that much—and if he could translate, then the conversation wouldn’t be necessary. When the call ended, I stared into space, trying to sift through my thoughts.

“Finn,” Cillian said softly.

I jumped at his voice breaking into my thoughts. “It’s my fault.”

Cillian frowned. “It’s not your fault.”

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