Page 109

Tension fills the air, and the nurse looks to me to make the next move. I shake my head at her, my eyes pleading, which she reads fluently.

Turning to Austin, the doctor shuffles awkwardly. “It’sfamily only in the room, I’m afraid.”

“She’s my fiancée,” he says weakly.

He must have thought of the excuse before. Maybe Luca warned him outside that they wouldn’t let anyone who wasn’t family stay. But his voice is limp, like he’s begging me. But I can’t look at him right now.

“I don’t know that man,” I finally say.

“Olivia . . .” he pleads.

“Leave. I don’t know who you are,” I spit out.

“Come on, honey. Time to go,” the nurse says calmly as she guides him from the room by the elbow. Despite her barely coming to his shoulder, he doesn’t put up a fight.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Austin

“Ineed an update.”

“Sir, I’ve told you already. You’re not family; we can’t give you any information.”

The warm tone of the southern blonde nurse who led me out of Danny’s room is long gone. In her place is an old timer, a black woman who must be in her late fifties and is already sick of my shit. Like I’m not too. I fucking hate myself.

Luca left a few hours ago, returning to the office to attend to the fallout, something I should be doing instead. But I can’t leave Olivia here. If I leave, it would be over, and it’s not fucking over. Not a chance.

I don’t know that man.

It’s nothing less than I deserve. But she’s the only one who knows me. I’ve told her things that even Luca doesn’t know, that Alfie doesn’t know...Okay, Alfie might know them. But that’s not the point. The point is I’ve trusted her with everything. And she trusts me, too. She’s trusted me to look after her brother. I could have just fired him; I could have let him go, and none of this would have happened. Not that we know what actually happened. Luca is interviewing,to put it politely.He’s using my dad’s old-school tactics on this one. I’m fucking furious, but my usual instinct to fight isn’t surfacing. I’m not even running. I’m frozen, like a fucking opossum. This is what I’ve been reduced to.

Luca is right. I’ve lost my edge and become soft. And forwhat? She wants nothing to do with me. I’ve lost her just as I almost had her.

Austin, I . . .

I’ll never know what she was going to say. Was she going to tell me she loved me, too? I was nervous as hell she wouldn’t, but I felt it right? I know she felt the same, the looks, the love that radiated from her; she was happy with me. We were happy together. Despite being from different worlds, we were working it out together.

I hear a door open along the corridor where Danny’s room is. I’ve been removed from the seats outside the room, so I’ve been in the general waiting area for the last twelve hours. I glance up the bright corridor as Olivia shuffles out. Her shoulders are slumped forward, her skin sallow. My beautiful, perfect girl, beaten down by the fluorescent lights and anguish I’ve caused her. She heads to the counter, where the older nurse is still scowling every time she looks at me. Olivia hasn’t seen me yet.

“I need to know what needs to be paid,” she says.

Jesus, I don’t think she’s slept at all. She’ll need new clothes, her things. No way I can convince her to go home to rest, but I can bring things here for her.

I send a quick text to Luca with a list of items to pick up from her house. She’s already furious with me. What’s one more invasion of privacy?

“It’s been taken care of, darling. The bill is settled,” the nurse says softly.

So she can be nice. Brilliant.

“I don’t understand.” She shakes her head. Has she eaten anything? Surely the nurses would have brought her some food?

Her head flicks toward me, and I try to hide my face behind my hand like a fucking chump. As if I could look away from her. As if I could hide my six-foot-four-inch body in a waiting room the size of a small café with only four other people in it.

She stares me down. Her tears have gone now. It seems the last twelve hours have hardened Olivia. Now she’s all fury.

“How is Danny? They won’t tell me anything,” I try.

“Why are you here?” Her voice is clipped, uninviting.