Sam slowly and quietly picked herself up and headed upstairs to the bathroom. She stood infront of the mirror and examined her face. She was definately going to get a bruise where Stuart had hit her. Her face already looked a funny colour from the amount of makeup she was forced to wear to hide the bruises. She lifted her top up and her eyes filled with tears as she looked at her body. It was black and blue and very sore to touch. she rubbed cream into one of her many cuts and noticed her ribs sticking out. Each one could be seen quite clearly. She had lost the weight for Stuart. He had called her fat even though she was already underweight, and had forced her to loose weight. She knew she was making herself ill but was too scared of the repercussions if she protested. Stuart was slowly but surely draining her of her confidence but she was too scared to do anything about it.

She was ashamed to think that of herself. She, Samantha Nixon, had never been scared of a bloke in her life...until now.

The thing is, she knew she didn't have to be scared of him. If she told Phil, or anyone for that matter, they would put a stop to it. It was just having the courage to tell someone...

She was scared noone would believe her, Stuart was liked...not well liked, like Phil or Zain...but still liked. He was a gentleman, a hard worker, and a good bloke to everyone else. To Sam...he was a monster.

A single tear ran down her cheek as she examined her body. How could she let him do this to her? She jumped as he thumped on the door.

"Samantha you've been in there for ages. Get out now!"

slowly Sam opened the door.

"At last!" he grabbed her wrist and hauled her out, not caring if he hurt her. It was all she could do to stop herself from tumbling down the stairs.

Phil looked up the following morning when she walked through the doors into CID. She looked downright miserable as she headed for her desk. Phil noticed she was limping slightly too. She looked so thin and weak, he was sure she had lost weight. He looked over at her and noticed Jo doing the same thing. She also looked worried.Seeing Phil looking at her, Jo walked over to his desk.

"What do you reckons wrong with Sam?"

"I don't know, did you see her when she walked in? She looked awful."

"Yeah I saw her. I also saw her yesterday, in the toilets, she had definately been crying, her eyes were really red but when I asked if she was ok she couldn't get out of there quick enough!"

"It must be Turner. He must be upsetting her" Phil said feeling anger bubbling at the pit of his stomach.

"Stuart? No way! Stuart would never hurt her intentionally!"

"Maybe he would. We don't know much about the bloke after all."

"No, I suppose not. He always seems so nice though"

"I've never liked him. I always thought he was too smug and very slimy"

"Well theres only one way to find out whats going on" Jo told him

"Whats that?"

"Go over there and ask her"