Mr. Right All Along

by Jennifer Taylor

  ‘You’re obviously a glutton for punishment.’

  ‘Or desperate.’ He laughed, a soft rumble emerging from his powerful chest. ‘Can you imagine how mortifying it will be if I have to drop out after I’ve persuaded everyone else to take part in this challenge?’

  He rolled his eyes and Eve laughed more naturally this time. ‘It wouldn’t look very good.’

  ‘Too right it wouldn’t.’ He chuckled. ‘Marie, for one, would never let me live it down,’ he said, referring Marie Thomas, the paediatric unit’s redoubtable ward sister.

  Eve’s brows rose. ‘Is Marie taking part?’

  ‘Yep. She’s raised almost three hundred pounds in sponsorship pledges too.’

  ‘That’s fabulous!’ she exclaimed, genuinely impressed.

  ‘It is. We’re on course to raise almost ten thousand pounds all told, which is a lot of money.’

  ‘It certainly is. You’ll have to put me down as a sponsor. Will fifty pounds be enough? I’ve no idea what the going rate is.’

  ‘That would be brilliant. Thank you.’

  He touched her hand in a spontaneous gesture of thanks and Eve did her best not to react, but it was like trying to turn back the tide. A rush of panic engulfed her and she gasped. Ryan bent and looked into her face, looked deep into her eyes, into her soul even, and she could see the anger burning inside him.

  ‘I don’t know who’s responsible for the way you’ve changed, Eve, but whoever it was, he did a real number on you. I don’t know if there’s anything I can do but if there is, you only have to ask.’ He stepped back and his face was set. ‘I want to help you, Eve. If you’ll let me.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  WHAT WAS SHE doing here?

  Eve’s head spun as she stared around the kitchen. There was so much colour in the room that her eyes were dazzled. Deep yellow walls, bright blue cupboards, multicoloured china stacked on the shelves. The kettle was red, the toaster purple, the washing-up bowl an eye-watering green. It was like finding herself slap-bang in the middle of a rainbow and she felt disorientated, confused. Her life was all shades of grey, from washed-out silver to deep, dark charcoal. Colour was something she couldn’t handle. Colour hinted at extremes, at passion, at desire, at all the things she didn’t want to experience.

  Colour scared her too because it reflected her feelings for Ryan. She couldn’t see him in terms of black and white or even charcoal and silver. He was imprinted in her head in glorious Technicolor exactly like this room.

  ‘Sorry about that. It was my mother. She seems to have a knack of phoning when it’s least convenient.’

  Ryan came back into the room and Eve forced herself to concentrate. He’d put on a track suit over his running clothes, plain black, unadorned and mercifully lacking in colour. She watched as he headed to the gleaming red kettle and flicked the switch. She could hear the water hissing as it came to the boil, hear it getting louder and louder, and her senses were assaulted once more, only by noise this time. If she didn’t do colour then she didn’t do noise either!

  She shot to her feet, almost overturning the chair in her haste to escape. Ryan glanced round, his expression as bland as a baby’s. She knew he could tell how panicstricken she felt but he didn’t ask her what was wrong or offer suggestions to calm her down. He simply accepted her turmoil and for some reason she felt better because of it.

  ‘At least have a cup of coffee before you go. It’ll only take a couple of seconds to make it.’

  He took a pair of mugs off a shelf and spooned instant coffee granules into them then topped them up with boiling water. The milk was in the fridge—the jug was orange—the sugar in a bowl that had multicoloured spots on it. He dumped everything on the table and sat down, leaving her to decide what she intended to do.

  She could go or she could stay and it was all the same to him, he was trying to imply, only she knew it wasn’t how he really felt. Not inside. Ryan wanted her to stay. And he wanted her to stay because he cared. That was why he had insisted she should come home with him, but did she want him to care? That was the big question, the one she couldn’t answer now and maybe not ever.

  ‘Fancy a biscuit? Or how about some toast?’

  He half rose but Eve shook her head and he subsided back onto his chair. Picking up his mug, he drank a little coffee, blowing on the glassy black surface first to cool it. Eve averted her eyes, not wanting to watch how his lips puckered as he sucked in air then blew it out in a soft little sigh that seemed ridiculously loud to her hypersensitive ears. She didn’t want her senses to stir from their slumbers again, didn’t want to feel attraction or anything else. She just wanted to be, with all that did and didn’t entail.

  Silence fell as she sat down and unconsciously she started counting the minutes. How long would it last, this silence? One minute? Ten? She’d come to dread the silences when she’d been with Damien. When he wasn’t talking, he was thinking and she had learned to fear his thoughts as much as his actions. Damien could turn peace and quiet into terror in the blink of an eye so she had chattered on, inane comments aimed at soothing him, even though they had rarely worked.

  Tears started to her eyes as the memories came flooding back and she stared into her coffee, wishing she could sink into its dark heart and disappear. She couldn’t do this. She wasn’t brave enough to gather up the threads and learn how to be herself again.

  ‘Tell me, Eve. I can’t promise it will help but it might and that has to be better than this.’

  Ryan’s voice was so calm, so patient, so free of threat that Eve felt a little of the fear trickle out of her. She shrugged, her hands cradling the mug because it was something to hold onto.

  ‘What’s to tell? I think you’ve guessed already, haven’t you?’

  ‘Guessing is one thing. Hearing about what you’ve been through is something else.’

  He half reached towards her then stopped and pain rippled under her skin. He wouldn’t touch her again. He knew how she felt about being touched because she had made it clear. Maybe she should be relieved yet it was more proof of how much she had changed. Ryan had often put his arm around her in the past, often hugged her in a friendly fashion, and all of a sudden she missed being on the receiving end of his warmth and kindness, missed being normal. If she could learn to give and receive the odd hug, it would mean she was on her way to finding the person she had been.

  ‘I was in an abusive relationship. It took me almost two years to pluck up the courage to leave and I’m still getting over what happened.’

  ‘You did well to get out when you did. A lot of women never find the strength to cut the ties.’

  His tone was level. There was no hint of censure for her or for her abuser but Eve wasn’t fooled. Ryan hated the thought of her being treated so badly and a little more fear trickled away and a tiny bit of warmth took its place.

  ‘I didn’t think I’d have the strength either, which is funny, really, because I always thought that I would never put up with being abused. We used to see women like that when we were doing our rotations, didn’t we?’ She carried on when he nodded, suddenly eager to explain why she had allowed it to happen to her. ‘I could never understand why they let their husbands or boyfriends treat them the way they did, but it’s different when it happens to you.’

  ‘I remember one woman telling me that she hated what was happening and hated herself even more for allowing it to happen, but she didn’t know how to stop it.’

  His voice was still calm, uncritical, relaxed. They could have been discussing the price of fish for all the emotion he betrayed but Eve knew it was an act. Ryan cared. He really cared. She clung to that thought. ‘She loved her partner and couldn’t imagine a life without him, I expect.’

  ‘It’s all part of it, isn’t it?’ He shrugged. ‘The abuser makes his victim so dependent on him that she finds it impossible to imagine not being with him.’

  ‘Or her. There are men who are victims of abuse too.’

  ‘True, although
not as many men suffer abuse as women do.’

  ‘No.’ Eve swallowed, feeling sick. It always happened whenever she had to admit that she was a victim of abuse. Oh, she might know that she was, but knowing it and admitting it were two very different things.

  ‘How did it start?’ Ryan prompted, and she forced the nausea down. Now that she had got this far, she wanted to carry on to the end, surprisingly enough.

  ‘Exactly as you read about it in all the textbooks.’ She gave a little laugh and he laughed too and it made her feel better, as though they were in this together. It was such a crazy idea that she immediately dismissed it. Ryan wasn’t part of this and he never would be. She was the one who had to learn to cope, to live, to forgive herself.

  ‘Damien was so charming, so funny, so sexy, and I was completely smitten. I never realised how controlling he was until it was too late.’ She shrugged. ‘I found it touching that he wanted to see me every night, that he hated me going out with friends, that he loathed us being apart. I thought it showed his vulnerable side and that’s something a lot of women find attractive. I certainly did.’

  ‘So when did you realise that it wasn’t vulnerability that was making him behave that way?’

  Ryan’s voice sounded deeper and she shivered. Was her story getting to him? Was he really thinking how stupid she’d been to be taken in? She tried not to let the idea take hold but it was hard when it was what she herself believed.

  ‘It was a gradual process. Damien started to object whenever I said I was going out so, to keep the peace, I stopped making arrangements to see my friends. Then, because I always refused to go out with them, they stopped asking me.’

  ‘So he got what he wanted? He isolated you. Classic behaviour, as you said.’

  ‘Exactly.’ She managed a little smile. ‘I should write a paper on this, shouldn’t I? Only I doubt it would make any difference. Far too many women are as gullible as me.’

  ‘It’s not gullible to believe that someone loves you. It’s what everyone wants, to love and be loved.’

  ‘Is that what you want?’ she asked before she could think better of it.

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘But you never went out with anyone for more than a couple of months, did you? You had quite a reputation for playing the field.’

  ‘Did I?’ He shrugged but she knew that he had taken her comment to heart and wished she hadn’t said anything. She had enough to do with sorting out her own life without trying to find out what made Ryan tick.

  The thought that there was something behind his behaviour was intriguing. She had to make a determined effort to dismiss it. ‘Anyway, once Damien had control of my social life, he set about controlling my working life too.’

  Eve stopped and took a deep breath as the full impact of that statement assailed her. Losing her friends had been bad enough, but losing her career had been so much worse. She had thrown everything away, given in to the threats and the coercion because she’d been afraid of upsetting Damien. All those years of study, of hard work and determination had been reduced to nothing because she had been a coward.

  ‘In what way did he take over your working life?’

  Ryan’s voice grated and Eve steered her thoughts away from herself. Although she wanted him to know the truth, she didn’t want it to have a detrimental effect on him too. It was enough that her life had been blighted by her stupidity.

  ‘Oh, it was pure textbook stuff once again,’ she said with an insouciance she didn’t feel. ‘You know, the odd comment that made me doubt my judgement or a look that implied I was mistaken. Damien often conducted ward rounds, if you remember. The consultant was rarely there so there were dozens of opportunities when he could belittle me. And he made the most of them, believe me.’

  ‘I never realised.’ Ryan frowned. ‘I can remember him being rather sharp with you a few times but I thought he was trying to make it appear that he didn’t favour you. Everyone knew you two were an item and I assumed he didn’t want anyone complaining that you had an unfair advantage.’

  ‘No chance of that.’ She smiled bitterly. ‘I was never going to get a boost up the career ladder if Damien had anything to do with it.’

  ‘It must have been a nightmare for you, Eve. Did you never think of telling anyone?’

  ‘No. By the time I realised what was happening, it was too late. I was too ashamed of letting myself be sucked in and too afraid of Damien to speak out.’

  Ryan stared at his coffee. He was gripping the mug so hard that the bones in his hands gleamed white through his skin. He forced himself to relax his grip, afraid that he would crush the china, not that it mattered. What did a broken cup matter? Eve had been put through the wringer and spat out the other side and he’d been so intent on making sure that he didn’t get involved that he’d allowed it to happen. Even though he’d had no idea what had been going on, he would never get over the guilt he felt for letting her down.

  ‘I’m sorry, Eve. I know it’s too late, but I’m really and truly sorry I wasn’t there for you.’ He looked up, met her eyes, and felt worse than ever. She had needed him and he had failed her; what sort of a person did that make him?

  ‘You weren’t to know, Ryan. I made sure you didn’t know, in fact.’ She gave a hoarse little laugh. ‘I became extremely adept at concealing the evidence.’

  ‘You mean the bruises?’ Ryan heard the disgust in his voice, not at what she had done by hiding the evidence but at what had been done to her, although he realised too late that it was what she thought.

  ‘Yes, although Damien was careful not to hit me where it showed most of the time.’

  Ryan couldn’t bear it. He simply couldn’t bear to hear her sounding so apologetic. She was the victim. And she was the one who should be reaping all the apologies.

  ‘Obviously a man of many talents,’ he said roughly, pushing back his chair. He went over to the kettle, although he doubted if he could drink any more coffee without it choking him. Still, he had to do something, had to take the edge off the moment and make it more bearable for her.

  She had been so brave to tell him what she had. He had dealt with other victims of abuse and he knew how hard they found it to speak about their experiences. There was all the shame as well as the misplaced guilt, the thought that somehow they had brought it upon themselves. He couldn’t bear to think that Eve believed she was responsible for what had happened to her, although he wouldn’t be surprised if she did.

  He swung round. ‘What happened wasn’t your fault, Eve. You do understand that?’

  ‘Yes and no.’ She shrugged, avoiding his eyes as she stared at point above his left shoulder. ‘Intellectually I understand it but emotionally…well, it’s a different story.’

  Ryan swore under his breath as he sat down. He leant across the table, his frustration rising because he didn’t dare touch her. Would they ever reach a point where he could? he wondered. A point where she wouldn’t shrink away and would welcome his touch? He had no idea yet all of a sudden it seemed incredibly important that it should happen. He needed to touch Eve, for his sake as well as for hers. She may have been absent from his life for several years but he wanted her to be part of it from now on.

  The thought barely had a chance to filter through the receptors in his brain when there was a loud hammering on the cottage door. Ryan stood up, frowning as he glanced along the hall.

  ‘I wonder who that is,’ he said, his voice sounding rough thanks to all the emotions he’d had to contend with in the past half hour. He had slipped into a comfortable routine over the years. Although he dated frequently, he never gave one hundred per cent of himself to a relationship. There was always a couple of per cent held in reserve, a bit of himself going spare.

  It was safer that way. If he held something back, he could remain focused on his objectives, i.e. keeping Scott’s name alive and raising money to prevent other families going through what his family had gone through. However, he knew that if he involved himself in Eve’s
affairs, he wouldn’t be able to do that. He would have to give her one hundred per cent of himself and he wasn’t sure if it would be wise. Something warned him that every little bit he gave to Eve would make him want to give even more and where would that leave him? In over his head, in so deep that he’d never surface?

  He had avoided love and avoided it for one very important reason: he didn’t want to be responsible for ruining some woman’s life. What if he fell in love, got married, had a child and, like Scott, it died? Although he wasn’t affected by the genetic abnormality that had caused his brother’s death, he could pass it on to his own children. That was why he was never going to have children and why he was never going to marry either. It wouldn’t be fair to enter into marriage on that basis. Maybe the woman would accept it at first, but what if she changed her mind? What if she decided that she wanted a family and he refused? How could any marriage survive that kind of pressure?

  As he made his way to the door, Ryan realised that no matter how he felt about Eve, it wasn’t enough. Was that why he had stuck to friendship in the past? Why he had deliberately distanced himself after that kiss? Had he known, subconsciously, that Eve was the woman who could make him reconsider his decision to remain single?

  With a sudden rush of insight, he knew it was true and it made him even more determined not to get involved with her on anything more than a friendly basis. Eve had been through enough, without him ruining her life as well.

  Ryan’s heart was heavy as he opened the door. He frowned when he found his neighbour, Maureen Roberts, on the step. She was soaking wet, dripping water and river slime all over the doormat.

  ‘We need your help, Ryan,’ she said before he could speak. ‘A boy’s fallen into the river and he’s not breathing. My Frank pulled him out but he’s not sure what to do.’

  ‘Right. Have you phoned for an ambulance?’ Ryan asked immediately.