‘But she still hasn’t given you any information about the boyfriend?’ he asked hopefully.
Emily shook her head. ‘She’ll have to if the police need to know, though, won’t she?’ She desperately didn’t want Millie dragged into any of this, but she was beginning to think it might be a blessing in disguise if she was forced to disclose more information about the man, such as who he was and where he lived. Emily needed to know. She needed to protect her daughter. The cold foreboding in the pit of her stomach told her she did.
Jake nodded. ‘She won’t have much choice,’ he said, searching her eyes, a kaleidoscope of emotion in his own: confusion, despair, frustration.
‘I’d better get on and make sure Tom’s office is available for Sally to use.’ Emily moved towards the door. She couldn’t stand here, so close to the man she loved, with this vast space between them. The man who once would have soothed away her worries with soft kisses, whose comforting embrace around her would have made her feel safe. She’d thought he was her rock, that he would catch her if ever she fell. And now … Did he realise she was clinging on by her fingernails? Would he be there if she let go?
‘Emily, wait.’ He stepped towards her. ‘There’s something else,’ he said, a flicker of hesitation in his eyes.
She looked at him cautiously.
‘I tried to talk to you about it last night. Clumsily, stupidly. I wasn’t thinking straight. I was tired, overwrought after what happened with Jennifer Wheeler. And then when we argued, I …’ He faltered, kneaded his forehead and looked back at her. ‘I need you to take another blood test,’ he announced.
She stared at him, stunned. ‘You’re not serious?’ She struggled to get the words past the constriction in her throat.
Jake locked his gaze on hers. ‘Deadly.’
‘A drugs test?’ She felt every sinew in her body tighten. ‘You actually think that I’m self-medicating? Writing out my own prescriptions? Or am I stealing drugs from the safe, Jake, is that it?’
‘Emily …’ He glanced over his shoulder. ‘Please just hear me out.’
Clearly he was worried the police might overhear. Let them. He was insane. Or else he really was trying to driveherinsane. Emily had heard enough.
‘Let me past, Jake,’ she said, sure that the contempt in her eyes must be obvious. She didn’t care. What was it he wanted? Forherto attempt suicide? Tears welling up so fast they almost choked her, she tried to step round him.
‘Emily,don’t.’ He caught hold of her arms. ‘Just listen to me, will you?’
He was keeping his voice low. So she would be seen as the volatile, drugged-up, aggressive one? ‘Let mego.’ She tried to pull away. Whatever she’d done, she wouldn’t stay here to be tortured by him.
‘Jesus!Listento me.’ Jake only held her tighter. ‘If you’re not self-medicating, someone is feeding you these drugs, do you understand?’
Emily stopped struggling, blinked uncomprehendingly at him.
‘Amphetamines.’ His face was pale, his eyes fearful. ‘You’re being poisoned, Emily. Youhaveto take another blood test.’
Twenty-Nine
‘There’s no way I’m letting Sally take my blood,’ Emily said, looking shakily at Jake over the glass of water he’d fetched her. She half expected him to sayWhy?orIt’s not Sally, such was his propensity to jump to the woman’s defence.
But he didn’t. Nodding instead, he reached to relieve her of the glass, placed it on the table and went to collect the appropriate equipment to take the specimen himself.
‘Who would do such a thing?’ she asked him as he helped bare her arm and attached the tourniquet, all of which he did calmly and efficiently.
You?she wondered, icy fingers tugging at her heart as she noticed the taut set of his jaw, the small tic playing agitatedly at his cheek. Might he be capable of it? The notion was absurd – she must truly be going mad. He would hardly have told her about it if it was him. Then who? She couldn’t believe anyone would do something so terrifyingly wicked.
Jake met her gaze as she studied him, her mind ticking frantically in tandem with her heartbeat. He would be desperate to hold onto all that he’d worked so hard for here. Was it possible that there really was a whole other side to him she’d been too blind to see before? Some part of him that had been so badly damaged by the trauma of his mother’s death and the role his father had played in it that he couldn’t bear the thought that in the end he had turned out to be a chip off the old block?
‘You’re wrong about me, Emily,’ he said quietly after a second, his look intense, his ocean-coloured eyes growing a shade darker.
It was as if he was reading her mind. Emily looked away while he searched for a suitable vein. Shewasgoing mad. Her thoughts were firing scattergun through her mind – because of the drugs? Someone was trying to poison her. He was trying to help her, not kill her. He’d never been anything but caring and gentle and kind. This was the man who’d cried openly, tears of wonderment, when he’d first cradled his newborn baby daughter in his arms. What was thematterwith her?
She squeezed her eyes closed as he inserted the needle. He wasn’t going to hurt her. She knew he wasn’t. But still she couldn’t look.
‘All done,’ he said, pressing a gauze gently to her arm.
Emily looked up at him, a tight lump rising in her throat that she couldn’t seem to swallow.
Jake gave her a small, reassuring smile and turned to fill an empty vial with the sample he’d taken. ‘In answer to your question, I have no idea who would do such a thing,’ he said. ‘Excluding anyone at home,’ he glanced pointedly back at her, as if he really had heard the ridiculous ramblings of her mind, ‘my thinking is that it has to be someone here.’
