“I’ll take them in for Destiny. She loves that kind of thing.” And she did. Destiny loved flowers and surprises and being spoilt rotten. If a guy pampered her and made her feel like a princess, she was hooked on them. I just hoped that she would wake up while they were still in bloom to see them. At least one of us would be able to appreciate them.
Harper didn’t make any kind of comment as I took them out of his arms and dumped them unceremoniously by the door. I grabbed my bag and my jacket, checking that I had my purse and my phone with me. “I’ll drop them off for her when I call in to see her on my way home from work.”
Harper said nothing about it as he scooped up his car keys, “Let’s head off, then.”
The day was pretty much as I had expected it to be. Steve, my boss, was in a major bitch-fit mood. Nothing I said or did was right and he rode my back all day. It didn’t help matters when the florist came to the reception, dropping off another over-the-top bunch of flowers for me. Steve ranted and raved that this must be the reason why I was screwing up my work. He thought that it was because I was too preoccupied by my social life. I nearly snapped when he said that. I was worried about Dee. That was where my mind was. Milligan didn’t even come into the equation. But, my point was, I never let anything affect my work like that, and Steve knew that. I didn’t know what was up with him, but he made my day thoroughly miserable. I couldn’t wait to get out of the office at the end of the day. I could only hope that he would chill out and that we would have a better day tomorrow. This wasn’t like him at all.
I grabbed both of the huge bunches of flowers and skulked out of the office. I called out goodbye to Steve, but all I got in response was a filthy look. What the hell was his problem? I wasn’t used to him behaving like such a little bitch.
Pushing through the revolving doors, I couldn’t see where I was going thanks to these ridiculously large bouquets, and I suddenly collided with a very solid chest.
I knew the smell of that aftershave. Milligan. I didn’t need to look up through the foliage to see that it was him.
“I see you got the flowers.” He said in a gentle, soft voice.
I refused to meet his eyes. I juggled with the two bunches of flowers in my arms so that I could get a better view of where I was going, which was a nearly impossible task.
“Looks like it, doesn’t it?” I tried to make my tone ice cold. “You shouldn’t have.”
“I wanted to.”
“You always do what you want, don’t you?” I muttered.
“Don’t I get a thank you?” I could see in my peripheral vision that he cocked his head at me but I still refused to look at him.
“I never asked you to send me flowers.” I know that I sounded really ungrateful, but that was the plan. I wanted him to know that nothing he did was going to change my mind. Nothing he did was going to be enough. Flowers sure as heck wouldn’t change my mind or soften me. It hadn’t even really started between us and it certainly wasn’t going to go anywhere from here. It was over before it started.
“Carrie, wait, please.”
I carried on walking.
“Please. Don’t walk off. I just want to talk to you.”
“What are you going to do if I don’t? Hit me?” I knew that that was a pretty childish shot, but it kind of slipped out. I didn’t really care, either. I was done talking to him.
“You know that I would never hurt you.” He said, sounding sincere. He didn’t make a move to follow me any further.
“Whatever.” I carried on walking away.
“I just want you to talk to me.”
“Well, ‘I want, never gets’ is what my mother used to tell me.”
“Don’t be so childish, Carrie.”
“You know what, Milligan? I can be whatever the fuck I want to be. You don’t have to hang around here and listen to my childishness. This isn’t going to happen. I don’t care how many bunches of flowers you send me or whatever you have to say to me, I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to see you again.” I paused to take a step toward him, looking him directly in the eye so that he knew I meant exactly what I was saying to him. “I don’t want to see you ever again.”
“You don’t mean that.”
I laughed and rolled my eyes, “Yeah. I really do.”
He stepped forward to bridge the gap between us. Now that I had decided to be brave and look him in the eye, I couldn’t look away. I had temporarily forgotten quite how devastatingly handsome he was and how mesmerising his eyes were. Just looking up into that masculine face made me want to drop the flowers and reach up to touch him. I instantly hated myself for having that thought.
“Are you sure about that?” He reached up to run his finger slowly along my jaw line. That single touch reminded me of everything that I had felt with him in the shower. I wanted it again. I wanted more. I wanted him so badly. “Come to me, Carrie.”
Blinking, I tried to shake off that power that he seemed to hold over me. It was strange and disconcerting. My will had been so strong. I’d resolved never to see him again. Was I really this weak? Was I just putty in his hands? Could I really forget what he had done so easily?
“Come to me, Carrie.”
No. No, I couldn’t. I didn’t want this. I didn’t want him.
“Milligan.” I had to clear my throat and tear my eyes away from him to continue. “Don’t send me any more flowers. Don’t come here again. Don’t come near me again.” I blinked as I dragged my eyes away from him, and it was almost painful. I turned to walk away while I still had the strength to do so. I wanted to run from him, but I didn’t. I walked away, hopefully looking confident and sure.
I glanced back at him just once as I crossed over the road. He was still stood stuck still outside the entrance to my office. I couldn’t see him too clearly from over here, I was too far away, but there was something about the way that he was standing there and watching me as I walked away gave me chills.
In a way, I was glad that I’d had the strength to walk away, but that look still scared me. I turned away from him and walked a little faster.
Walking into the hospital, all eyes were on me as I carried the two humungous bunches of flowers. I’d even had to walk sideways like a crab through the main double doors and I still struggled with them.
“My, my! Look at those! Someone’s been a very lucky little lady.” Sylvie said to me as she watched me approached. I smiled at her. I was getting used to see her in here and she was a welcome sight.
I wasn’t too sure that ‘lucky’ would have been the word that I would have used, but she wasn’t to know that. Most women loved the thought of receiving flowers. Not me, though. And, not after what I’d seen. It just wasn’t enough. Nothing would make up for that.
“How’s Nathaniel?” I asked her. Her grandson had been involved in a horrific motorbike accident and he had been brought in the same day as Dee. I didn’t ever see Sylvie leave the hospital, but the twinsets she wore daily changed in colour.
She shook her head sadly at me. “No news yet. He’s in surgery at the moment.” She pulled at the tissue she was holding in her hands, the only outwardly sign of her emotions. “How is your friend?” She knew all about Dee. We’d spent so much time over the last couple of days sitting side by side in the waiting room that the only thing we had to pass the time was to talk.
“No change here, either.”
“I’m very sorry to hear that, dear.”
I sat down next to her for a moment. I knew that if anything happened in the next few moments with Destiny that the nurses would come and find me. I had the feeling that Sylvie needed someone with her just now. Her son and daughter-in-law always sat in with their son, but Sylvie kept up her vigil in the waiting room. We didn’t say anything to one another. We didn’t need to. We were both going through the hell of not knowing. Just being there for one another was enough.
It was a strange thing. Before Saturday night, I hadn’t even known Sylvie. Yet, she was here and she was a co
nstant comfort to me. She was like a favourite Aunt, someone I could talk to about anything without being judged.
Eventually, Sylvie dabbed at her eyes with the shredded tissue and sat up a little straighter in her chair. She was a tough old bird and I hoped that I would be half as strong as she was when I got older. “So, who are the flowers for?”
“I thought that Destiny would appreciate them.”
Sylvie looked at me, smiling knowingly, “Someone must have gone to a lot of effort and expense to choose them. They’re beautiful.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I knew that she was fishing, but I wasn’t in the mood to talk about Milligan. I didn’t want to hear all over again what a ‘charming young man’ he was.
“You don’t want to talk about it.” Sylvie said, perceptively.
I smiled at her sadly. “No. Not really.”
“So, it didn’t work out between the two of you, then?” She asked. So much for not talking about it.
“Not really. He just wasn’t the kind of man that I thought he was.” I didn’t bother to say any more than that. I didn’t want to get into the whole story with her.
“Well, I can’t say that I am too disappointed to hear that, I’m afraid.”
I turned around to look at her sharply. “What do you mean?” I thought that she seemed to be quite taken by Milligan when he had been sat with her.
“I’m not too sure myself, if I am being honest with you. There was just something about him that I couldn’t put my finger on. He was very smooth and very charming, but there was something about him that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.” She nodded, as if thinking it through in her mind. She glanced at me like I would think that she was just a batty old woman. The bad thing about it, after that little display last night, I could totally understand what she meant by that.
“So, I take it that we won’t be seeing him here at the hospital any longer?”
“Not if I can help it.”
“Just his flowers as he tries to win back your affections, eh?” She chuckled. I smiled at her weakly. I hoped that after seeing him on my way here tonight that he finally might have got the message and that I wouldn’t be seeing him again anytime soon.
“I had better take these into her.” I said as I got up slowly from the chair, reaching for the flowers that filled the air with their sickly sweet overpowering scent. “I hope you hear some good news about Nathaniel soon.”
She stood up to help me juggle the flowers in my arms and patted my hand. “Bless you, Carrie.” I nodded and moved over to the direction of Dee’s room.
I paused when I got to the door. Looking around back over my shoulder, I couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. But, you know the feeling that you get when you are being watched? I felt like there were eyes boring into me and it made my skin crawl. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck standing to attention. That made me think back to what Sylvie had said to me only moments ago. Looking around again, there was no sign of him anywhere. The people that were sitting in the waiting room were absorbed in their own problems and in their own little worlds and were paying no attention to me. The hospital staff were going about their business. No one was even looking in my direction. So, why was I suddenly feeling so on edge? It was the most unsettling feeling.
I quickly walked into Dee’s room and kicked the door firmly shut behind me. Dumping the flowers down on the table at the end of the bed, closed my eyes and I breathed in a big breath of fresh air, followed by a quick sneeze. I didn’t suffer from any allergies like that, but the smell of the flowers had been over-whelming.
Opening my eyes, I couldn’t believe it. I just couldn’t fucking believe it.
There was another huge bouquet of flowers artfully arranged in a vase in the far corner of the room. What was he playing at? I stormed over and saw that the envelope to the card was still sealed. I ripped it open, not caring if I destroyed the message inside.
‘Carrie. Come to me. XOXO’
What was his problem? Why couldn’t he just leave me alone?
I turned my back on the flowers and concentrated on Dee in front of me. She looked just the same as she had when I had left her. If it hadn’t been for all the needle, wires and machines, she would have looked like she was sleeping. I hated to see her looking like this. She was always so energetic and full of life. I brushed her hair back from her face. I knew that if she woke up this very minute that she would throw a complete hissy fit. Dee was the sort of girl that would do her hair and make-up on a Sunday when the only place she had to go to was the shop down the road for some milk. That’s just how she was. She hated to look like anything less than perfect. That was one of the things that was making her look quite so ill at the moment. She didn’t have any make-up on and her hair hung limply. I knew that there was no point in even trying to do her make-up. The nurses would only come in and scrub it off. And, I knew that I wouldn’t be able to do it to her standards. The least I could do was run a brush through her hair, though.
I jumped out of my skin when the door suddenly opened and I was confronted by yet another bunch of those infuriating roses. The bristles on the brush tangled in Dee’s hair and I tried not to jerk the brush out. As soon as he stepped through the door, Harper poked his head around the flowers. “Express delivery” He called out with a smile on his face, until he saw the rest of the flowers and his face froze. “What’s all this?”
My own face fell. “Milligan.”
Harper stormed over and dumped the flowers on the floor. There wasn’t really anywhere else that they could go. The surfaces were already taken up by the three other bouquets. “I was told at the nurse’s station to bring these in here. I thought that they were for Destiny. I can’t believe it.”
“Because he’s a total nut case.”
Harper looked over at Dee and smiled again when he noticed that I had tried to make an effort with her hair. “How’s she doing?” He planted a soft kiss on her sleeping cheek.
“No change.”
Harper smoothed out her hair in a fan on the side of the pillow. “Looks good.” He commented. As he put his sports bag on the floor, he glanced at all the flowers. I followed his gaze. He didn’t say anything else about them. I knew he wouldn’t. He got the message when I told him this morning that I hadn’t wanted anything else to do with Milligan. I didn’t bother mentioning to him about running into him after work today. It didn’t matter. I’d told Milligan exactly what I thought of him and I didn’t think that it was going to happen again.
Harper and I spent a bit more time chatting with one another and talking to Dee, filling her in on all the inane crap that she was missing. It was something that we were both starting to get used to, glossing over the awkward silences.
It was starting to get late and we decided that it was time to get off home. There was no point in staying there all night. The nurse’s and the doctors had all assured us both that they would ring us the very second that anything happened with Destiny.
I still felt so bad about leaving her here all alone, but there was only so much that we could do. With no other family to look out for her, it was all down to me and Harper. But, we did both need to try and get a good night’s sleep. I didn’t need another crappy day at work like I had had today. And, I hoped that Steve would be in a better mood and give me less hassle.
All I wanted to do when we got home was collapse in my bed and close my eyes.
Unlocking the front door, the first thing I saw was a single red rose that had been pushed through the letter box. I could tell that not too long ago, it would have been perfect, but now? The petals were dropping off of it and it looked sickly. Harper said nothing as he bent down to pick it up and passed it over to me, walking away to head off to watch a bit of TV.
I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t want the goddamn rose. Why wasn’t he getting the message? I only hoped that this rose had been sent before I had my little chat with Milligan earlier. I hoped that he had finally got the message and t
hat he would stop all of this nonsense.
I walked through to the kitchen. I didn’t want this rose. I opened up the lid of the bin and dropped the flower in with the trash. As I let it go, my skin snagged on one of the spikey thorns, drawing a small drop of blood. I stood there staring at my finger for a moment. Spilled blood. That seemed like a rather ominous omen.
Shaking my head to rid myself of such silly thoughts. I knew that it didn’t help to think like that. I ran my finger under the cold water until the blood finally stopped flowing. I refused to think that this was anything but what it was. They were flowers. They were just flowers. There was no menacing message behind them.
I could have gone in and watching some TV with Harper, but I wasn’t in the mood for it. I couldn’t even be bothered to pick up a book, which just about summed up my state of mind. Sleep was the only thing that was going to help me tonight.
Chapter Nine
The next few days were relatively quiet, thank goodness for that.
I finally felt like I could relax a little bit. There had been no change with Destiny’s condition, but the other aspects of my life were becoming a little less stressful. Steve hadn’t been giving me such as hard time at work. I had been sleeping better and I hadn’t seen or heard anything from Milligan. I hoped that meant that he had finally got the message and that he was now going to leave me alone.
That was until the following Wednesday morning. I was at work and Steve came into my office to sit on the edge of my desk. He look was a mixture of concern and anger. It wasn’t an easy look for him to pull off. I wondered what the hell I had done wrong this time. It was a worry to see him looking like that. The last week, things had gone back to normal and we had had our easy working relationship back. Now, it all looked like it was going to go belly up again.
“What’s wrong, Steve?” I asked him.
He was watching me so quietly that I thought I may as well get the ball rolling. He hadn’t had a bad word to say about my work. I didn’t know what I had done wrong. Everything had been completed and put on his desk way ahead of schedule. I had worked my ass off to get that last assignment right. I couldn’t see how he was going to be able to pick fault with it.
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