SI-10 offices
She stands in the police station with a woman beside her. Joyce, yes that's her name. It's a strange experience, being photographed like this, whilst the dark haired officer writes down her injuries and records her words. In another life, she'd be friends with his woman, there's an easy rapport about her and she, and the uniformed female PC have been nothing but patient with her.
"Would you like a cup of tea?" Joyce asks her softly. "We're almost finished, I promise. You're doing really well."
Harriet shakes her head, feeling her bravery ebb away as she looks around the spartan room, "I should speak to my father first, did anyone call him?"
"He's on the way, " Joyce confirms with a gentle smile.
Then Harriet thinks of the man who kept her calm, and seemed to know why she was doing and what she did. "The American officer, he.. can I speak to him?"
"James Dempsey? Yes, of course, I'll find him for you." Joyce smiles and gets to her feet. "This is the statement you've given, do you want to read through it? If there's anything you're not happy with, we can change it. If it's okay, then you should sign it here. I'll give you a bit of space for a moment."
Harriet picks up the paper and nods, watching Joyce leave. With a deep breath, she begins to read the words, finding them blurring as she gets to the end. Her marriage written in black and white. If a friend had told her this, she'd have driven through the night to save them. She puts it down and feels her body shake with the force of her tears in this anonymous police room, at last free to cry for the woman she had left behind.
It's still a little warm from the July day. He'd found her in tears and quietly suggested that they get some air. And so she's sat on the wall of the police station, brushing away his apologies for the 'godamm awful' coffee'. She doesn't say that she can't remember the last time someone made one for her. He's too nice and she's damaged goods.
She shivers beside him and he quickly shrugs off his denim jacket and wraps it around her. "Take this."
She runs her hands over the soft fabric and then looks at him properly. He's changed into jeans and shirt, his gun holstered by his shoulder, his hair all kinds of brown and copper hung over his collar. He is a curious mix of lithe and strength; "You're not like anyone I met at the academy."
"You're a copper?" he asks. She's grateful he doesn't look shocked by this.
"Robert stopped me, didn't want me to work. I wanted to work in intelligence." She looks at his cigar, there's a desire inside her to test her limits. She'll later put down to this strange electricity she felt which made her feel unchained for a moment. He looked like a man she could rebel with; "Can I have smoke, please?"
Dempsey looks surprised and goes to get a cigar from his pocket but she tentatively, and with a hand that shakes, reaches for the one in his lips. He looks quizzically at her and then, after a moment of hesitation when she was certain that she saw a flash of something heated in his eyes, he handed it over to her.
He stands, tall and reassuring next to her in the evening light, smiling as she tries to blow a smoke ring until a black Daimler appears and she hands it back and his denim jacket.
Wordlessly her father holds her tight in his arms and she sees the eyes of a man who has known too much for too long. Briefly letting her go, he holds out a hand to Dempsey and shakes it, "Thank you."
Dempsey nods. He wants to ask the elderly man where their home is. Can he visit and stay guard over his daughter and never let her go? Instead, he offers a card and quietly says, "If you need anything, either of you…"
He watches the car pull away and fancies that he saw her face turn to look at him. When he pulls on the cigar, he feels something pull inside at him, his DNA meets hers, smells the echo of her perfume on his coat.
Then he goes home, calls off the date with a woman called Kathy from a bar and wonders if this is what it's like to be infatuated. If it is, then its crap timing. He's flying back to New York next week.