Dempsey spend the rest of the morning with reading the file and doing some research himself. He even went to the archive to pick up some other, older, files of cases related to this case.

Chas set on one of the other desks behind the computer. From time to time he glanced at Dempsey, opened his mouth to say something but didn't. He was wondering if Dempsey had read the brochures he had given him yesterday or not. But asking him about it, would like if he was nursing him and he knew already the answer that Dempsey should give. If he would answer at all.

Around one o'clock, Dempsey pushed all the files together on his desk, slipped into his jacket and wanted to go away.

"Are you going to the hospital now?" Chas couldn't refuse to ask.

"Yes. If the boss needs me, he can reach me there. Will be back at 5"

"Take your RT with you!" he heard Chas yelling after him. But Dempsey just ignored it.

Downstairs at the parking, he opened the door of his car and slipped on the drivers seat. On the passengers seat still laid the box with chocolates he had bought that morning. In his rush to get inside the SI10 building earlier and not used to the fact of buying chocolates, he had the box totally forgotten. The car had stand in the sun during the whole morning and when Dempsey picked the box up to give it a better look, he realised that all the chocolate inside was melt.

'Very clever James' he said to himself, stepping out of the car again and throwing the box in the garbage bucket.

Just as he wanted to step inside his car again, he heard someone calling out his name.

"Dempsey!" It was Chas. Holding a RT in his hand.

"I told you to take the RT with you!" he said with a warning in his voice.

Dempsey throw the RT on the passengers seat and answered: "Can you guys here not live without it?"

"We can, but you can't"

"What's that suppose to mean?"

Chas tried to be patient: "We must have a way to reach you when you are in the hospital"

"I don't think RT's are permitted to use in the hospital Chas!" he pattered the man on his shoulder, slipped inside the car for a second time and drove away. Chas saw him leaving. To astound to react.

When Dempsey entered the bakery for a second time that day, the woman behind the counter couldn't believe her eyes.

"Was there something wrong with that first box? Or didn't she liked them?" the woman asked a little worried.

"No. It was my fault. I put the box in the sun" he explained.

"Hmm, that's not so clever Sir"

"Tell me. I don't have to tell you how the box looked like now but not as a chocolate box anymore. So I hope you can give me another one?" Dempsey asked with the sweetest smile on his face he could come up with.

The woman after the counter didn't know where to look at. She knew the man in front of her was flirting heavily with her, but she couldn't help it as she felt her cheeks becoming red. Trying to keep her composure, she turned around, taking an empty box from one of the shelves and with nodding her head she said: "You want the same as before?"

"That would be nice"

When she handed him the full box minutes later, Dempsey gave her a big smile again.

"Thanks. I'm sure my girlfriend would never forget this" and when he walked out of the shop, he heard the woman whispering against a colleague of hers: "What a pity he has a girlfriend already. That girl probably didn't realise, how lucky she is to have such a hunk as her boyfriend"

He had hardly done two steps outside the shop or he felt a hand on his arm and a voice saying: "I don't believe this. What the hell are you doing here again? You suppose to be in the hospital by now!"

Dempsey almost jumped and dropped the box with chocolates to the ground when he realised from whom the voice came from. Angela!

A little sheepish he turned around to look at her.

"I had a little accident"

Not knowing what to think about that but still wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt she added: "Accident? What kind of accident?"

"I accidentally put the box in the sun"

"Is that all? And it took you more then 3 hours to replace it? Sorry, but I don't believe you anymore"

"I had to go somewhere else as well"

"Oh. Do you know something: I guess I was right"

"About what?"

"That you're trying to come up with every available excuse so that you don't have to go to the hospital"

"That's not true!" Dempsey started to feel helpless. He knew how it looked like and deep down inside he couldn't blame her. He probably had done the same if he was her.

"Well, are you going now or what?"

"I'm going. Really!" he added: "You can come with me, if you want some proof"

He knew how it would look like when he shows up at Harry's bed with Angela by his side and especially when he had to explain to her what happened. But if there was no other way, he had to take the consequences.

"I'll give you one more chance. But if I discover tomorrow that you didn't show up, I'll come personally after you. Doesn't matter where you are. London, New York or even the moon...I'll find you and your days will be count by then!" she warned him.

One look on Angela's face and he knew that she meant every word of it.

When she saw him driving away, at least in the direction of the hospital, she started to pray: "Please don't put any obstacles in his way again so that he'll be able to change his mind!"

*****

The parking for the hospital was filled with cars and it took Dempsey more then 15 minutes to find a parking place 3 blocks away. He jumped out the car, put the box with chocolate in one hand and looked at his watch. Two o'clock. Then he would have more then 2 hours to spend together with Harry.

When he opened the door to Harry's room, he found the room empty. No sign of Harry. Where was she? He put the chocolate box on her bedside cabinet, avoiding the sun this time, and walked to the nursery post at the end of the corridor.

"Excuse me, can someone tells me where Mrs. Makepeace is?"

"She's in her room" one of the nurses answered him slipping through a file and didn't even look at him.

"No, she isn't"

"She must be. Maybe you have the wrong room"

"Yesterday she was there. Room 13"

"Oh that one. Oh we just cleaned it. Someone died in there this morning"

"What?" Dempsey exasperated, started to shake leaning against the doorpost and felt sick.

"It didn't go so well with the lady....." finally the nurse looked up from her file.

"Are you a relative of hers?" she said standing up and walking up to him with more concern in her voice now.

Dempsey had no problems with interrogate the biggest criminals of the world but now he went speechless, he couldn't say a word. The last memory he and Harry shared was that strong, and now that he looked back, stupid misunderstanding that developed 2 years ago when he had phoned her, but couldn't reach her. That's where it all had started yesterday. Why had he waited so long to go back to London? Why hadn't he just bite the bullet and went back and to see what would happen earlier? But he knew why he hadn't done it. He hadn't done it out of fear. Fear of her reaction that she had moved on with her life that there wasn't a place for him anymore in it. How would he ever faced Angela again? If he had been driven straight to the hospital this morning, maybe he had been just on time to tell her that he loved her, that she had been the love of his life and that he would never forget her. He would have been there when she needed him the most. But he wasn't. And now it was all too late......