Page 44 of Dead to Me

‘The way you talk about her… about this Tanya…’ She looked at me, searchingly.‘She’s not just another student, is she?She’s Reid’s sister.’And then she leaned back in her chair and gave a harsh, bitter laugh.‘You are a piece of fucking work.’

I genuinely didn’t know what to say for a moment.I hadn’t expected her to work it out, but then I’d been too open withher, hadn’t I?I could only blame myself.Why had I told her so much, when all I should have done was my goddamn job?

‘I’m not– I’m so sorry,’ I told her.‘Thisisabout Holly.I’m not just interested in Tanya.’

‘I need to go,’ Cordelia said, and she rose, quickly, but with a strangely impressive dignity in her anger.‘Can you show yourself out, please?’

‘Cordelia–’

‘No,’ she said, firmly.‘I need you to leave me to think about this.’

Fuck.

That was the main thing I thought as she left.

There was so much that was bad about this.My career was under serious threat, for one.Cordelia could make a complaint to Gael and theEnsign,and that would land me in serious shit.She could also tell the group who I really was and put an end to all this.

Why did you do that, you idiot?

Over and over I thought about what I should have said and berated myself for getting carried away.I must have sat in that chair for a full quarter-hour, on a self-lacerating loop, and I was only kicked out of it by a loud shout of laughter from the bar.

As I peered over the glass screen I realised with horror that one of the two men standing there was Philip Sedgewick.And as I drew in a quick breath he turned and looked right at me.

18.Reid

Thiswas what he’d been avoiding for eighteen months.This roiling mass of frustration, confusion, doubt and worry.

Reid had walked away from Cordelia Wynn.He’d had to.

As a detective, as a professional, fleeing had obviously been ridiculous.He’d come to her with questions, and got answers.Just because they were answers he hadn’t expected, that was no reason to go to pieces.He should have been able to adjust.

But somehow hearing everything had been about Tanya had knocked the breath out of him.He’d felt like he might suffocate in that little room.

Cordelia’s face had been drawn with surprise as he’d mumbled something indistinct and run for the door.

He’d relived, on the way down those stairs, that last conversation he’d had with Anna.The one where he’d begged her to stop arguing with him about Tanya’s overdose and accept that she’d done it to herself.

Anna hadn’t listened.She’d kept on and on telling him that it made no sense.

He still remembered how he’d tried to reiterate the facts.

‘You know how much her degree and her hockey career meant to her,’ he’d said.‘She was already on sertraline for anxiety; we know that.It’s not hard to believe that she would have turned to other drugs, too, when she felt like she had no other option.’

‘But why so much, Reid?’she’d asked him.‘Why take four times the amount of Ritalin the average person her size wouldneed?And why take enough modafinil to keep her awake for a week when all she was trying to do was finish an essay?’

‘Because it wasn’t working,’ Reid said.‘Because she’d been taking more and more for months and she still couldn’t focus!’he’d snapped, hating Anna for making him say this.‘Look, the coroner sought a doctor’s opinion, and he said the problem with these drugs is that people self-medicate on higher and higher doses, not understanding the damage they’re doing to– to their heart.’He’d had to swallow and move away from her to go on.‘One of the dangers of an overdose involving modafinil is also that it can bring on delusions and hallucinations which stop someone from recognising what’s happening to them.’He’d felt his mouth trembling as he’d tried not to give in to tears.‘She wouldn’t have known to save herself.’

‘She wasn’t stupid, Reid,’ she’d snapped back.

‘Neither am I!’he’d ended up shouting at her.‘What right have you got to think you know better than fucking everyone?It’s so– arrogant!’

‘Oh, I’m so sorry for not immediately bowing to your superior intellect,’ she’d said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

Had that been it?The moment when he’d realised he’d been wrong about her all along?

He shook his head.He was sure it hadn’t.He’d felt hurt, but not… not like his whole world had twisted.

And then it came to him, suddenly, as he stepped out into the courtyard.He knew what had made him look at everything differently.

---