Michael was concerned; his wife was late for their agreed meeting. This in itself was not an unusual occurrence – under normal circumstances if she was on time then he had done something to upset her. What made this different, aside from the fact that it was the small hours of the morning, was that he had been waiting far longer than the fifteen minutes that she believed was her prerogative. A full hour had elapsed since their arranged meeting time and even Connie would always call should she be running that late, especially in the small hours of the morning. She knew how he worried. After waiting for 45 minutes he had called her mobile but got through to voice mail. After 50 minutes he had called her office but received no answer. This meant one of two things; either his wife was too drunk to successfully hear, locate and answer the phone or something had happened to her on the short walk to meet him. Praying to all the existing deities that it was the former he punched in the number of Darwin ward, waiting for one of the nurses to answer, hoping he got through to someone amenable. Eventually Tricia's gentle voice floated down the line and he felt a surge of relief; she was the one nurse in the hospital who would do just as he requested, no questions asked.
'I need you to tell me if Connie's still in her office' he asked once the niceties were out of the way, expecting to be put on hold while she looked.
'Mrs Beauchamp left about an hour ago' Tricia replied without hesitation or doubt and his heart dropped.
'Will you go and double check for me?' he asked and she agreed, returning moments later to report that the office was indeed empty and locked.
'Thanks Tricia' he sighed as he put the phone down and glanced around him, half expecting his wife to appear from the shadows, apologising profusely for her lack of punctuality. Quickly he resigned himself to the fact that it was not going to happen and realised that he needed to go and look for her.
Shivering slightly against the chill in the air, wondering why the world seemed twice as cold and twice as lonely in the small hours of the morning, he reached into the car and pulled out his long, dark, Mac. Thrusting his hands into the deep pockets he began the trudge up the path to the hospital, trying to overcome the sense of fear and dread that fluttered around his chest.
At first he didn't see her; didn't register her presence at his feet until he stumbled across her. As he turned to berate whoever was stupid enough to sit down in this narrow alley his expression chanced from outrage to shock and horror.
'What on earth has happened?' he asked softly, although seeing her huddled in a trembling heap, her skirt hitched up around her waist, he had a terrible sense that he knew. When she failed to reply he placed a tentative hand on her arm but she flinched away from his touch, emitting a high pitched yelp of terror as she struggled to get away from him. It was almost as if she didn't recognise him. As if she thought that he too was going to attack her. This terrified him more than the state she was in.
'Connie, will you let me take you back to the car?' he tried and her head snapped up with surprise. It was almost as if she had only just registered his presence or only just realised that it was him and not some other man who was desperately trying to calm her down. She stared at him for a moment, her eyes glazed over with shock and then she shook her head, as if she was dragging herself back to the land of the living. Slowly, painfully, she dragged herself to her feet and started to hobble towards the floodlit car park at the end of the alley way, brushing away his hand as he tried to help her, fearful that without his assistance she would not be able to stay upright for long. They walked painstakingly towards the car park, the silence only punctuated by her occasional whimpers that could have been down to fear, shock or pain.
Eventually they stepped out into the car park and he took in the full horror of his wife's appearance. Her wrists were ringed with dark bruises, clearly where she had been held down. Her clothes were filthy and her skirt was torn, a frantic rip made by a man impatient to get to what was beneath. Through the tear in the skirt he caught a glimpse of her upper thigh and saw that it was mottled with bruises. The more he saw, the more convinced he became that his initial assessment had been correct and one look in her haunted and fearful eyes removed any doubt there may have been.
'Who?' he asked quietly, not knowing what else to say. She just shook her head in utter hopelessness 'We should call the police and get you checked out' he added, knowing it was unlikely that she would agree to his suggestion. If she did he would be even more worried about her.
'Just take me home' she whispered eventually and there was desperation in her voice. He knew that she was right – if there was one thing guaranteed to make the whole ordeal worse for her it would be having people talking about it. It didn't matter whether it was her friends, her staff or some police men she had never met before, she would feel laughed at. The more people knew the worse she would feel and he knew that he couldn't allow that to happen; she had been through enough. Wordlessly he unlocked the car and opened the door for her, watching as she slid painfully onto the soft leather upholstery and stared, unseeing, out of the windscreen, too traumatised to even speak. Logically he knew that he should be trying to convince her to talk to the police but he couldn't bring himself to push her so instead he did as she asked. He turned the key in the ignition and took her home.
