had sympathy in their eyes as they listened to my story.
But that’s what it was. A story. That’s all they could take from it. One person’s opinion which would certainly clash against another’s. And there were no witnesses. No evidence. Nothing but a couple who’d gone home together where one of them was accusing the other of a terrible crime with no proof. Still, I told them it all as honestly as I could do, and they left there with a sympathetic smile and the promise they’d be looking into it as thoroughly as they could.
I went into the station with them, and Mum, Dad, Vicky and Nicola waited in the reception area. I was assigned a dedicated officer who recorded my account and sent me to a medical team to check me over, but I knew it there and then. That same little voice of intuition I should have listened to for so long about Sebastian.
They’d never be able to prosecute a monster like him. He’d be too slick for anyone to convict him of anything with no real evidence.
Mum and Dad tried to get me to stay over in my old bedroom to wrap me up tight for the night when we were done, and part of me wanted that. Part of me wanted to be looked after like a little girl safe at home. But I’d been that little girl wrapped up in cotton wool for far too long, and I’d been without things I needed in my life for far too long, too.
I didn’t want another night without Lucas for as long as I lived.
“We’re right here for you, Anna,” Dad said, and pulled me close before I left with Nicola and Vicky. “You’ll never see Sebastian again, or I swear I’ll kill the vile piece of shit myself.”
I didn’t doubt it.
I didn’t doubt it when Mum held me tight and told me that Sebastian Maitland was gone from my life, and he’d pay the price for what he’d done.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t so sure the police would be able to deliver on that.
I was quiet on the way back home with the girls, all of us exhausted and heavy with the upset, but it sure felt good to be there with them. For once in months, it felt so good to have them on my side.
Lucas was in the hallway as soon as we pushed our way in through the front door. He folded me in his arms, and I breathed deep and collapsed in the release.
He asked about the police and about my parents, and I told him everything I could do through the fog of tiredness. But it was blurred. Blurred and fading.
“Let’s get you to bed,” Vicky said, and reached for my hand. “Don’t worry, Lucas. We’ll make sure she’s alright.”
It was such a relief when he pulled me closer. “I won’t be leaving her anywhere,” he said. “Not ever again.”
I expected them to argue with him, but they didn’t. They didn’t say a word as Lucas came through to my bedroom with me and helped me pack a suitcase with my things. They watched from the hallway as he helped me gather my toiletries together and fastened the case ready for my leaving, but didn’t they make a sound in protest.
They hugged me tight as I left, and watched me leave. No complaints. No arguments. No objections.
I was grateful – truly grateful – that I didn’t need to justify Lucas’s place in my life all over again.
I was silent for most of the way back to his place, facing him with my legs pulled up high in my seat, staring at his profile as he kept his eyes on the road ahead. The strength in his jaw, and his eyes, and the firmness of his shoulders as he drove me home. I remembered how he’d pulled up at the train station to pick me up for one crazy day, and how I’d known from that first single moment that it would be trouble, because he was him. He was Lucas. The man I’d always been in love with. The man I’d never really moved on from, not even with Sebastian the evil prince Maitland at my side.
“Penny for your thoughts?” he said, and I managed a smile.
“Penny for my thoughts is that I love you.”
“Well, that’s a good thing,” he said. “Because a penny for my thoughts is that I love you too.”
I was desperate for bed when we got in, but