'What time is it?' Connie rubbed her face wearily as she came round from her fitful and all too brief sleep to find Ric lying beside her, propped up on one elbow, picking strands of hair from her forehead and pushing them gently to the side, his eyes glazed over with concentration on his mediocre task.

'Just gone nine. We arrived at three-ish but you were out for the count by the time we got here. I didn't like to wake you…' he yawned slightly, the grey pallor of his skin betraying the fact that he hadn't had a wink of sleep himself, his mind constantly running on overdrive, trying and ultimately failing to make sense of what Leah had told him.

'Thanks' she sat up, stretching her arms before curling them back close to her body and shivering slightly 'bloody woman always was stingy with the central heating' she muttered, getting up and rooting through the wardrobe on the far side of the room, eventually removing a bathrobe that looked like it hadn't seen daylight since the seventies and pulling it around her, still trembling slightly in the cold.

'I met your stepmother last night' he remarked neutrally as she came and sat beside him, pulling him so he was lying beside her, her limbs entangled with his as she held onto him tightly, needing his comfort although she would never admit it 'she's…'

'Nice' Connie finished with defeat in her voice 'believe me, she's mellowed with age. Dad was the same'

'She said something…' he eyed her with a curious smile and watched as the colour drained from her face with terror at what it was that her stepmother had told him. Not that Leah knew the worst of it – the things that she was really terrified of Ric knowing were secrets kept by only two people in the world– but she knew enough to leave Connie with some serious explaining to do.

'What?' Connie asked quickly; too quickly – it was obvious that she was concealing something and even more obvious that her mothers death was only the tip of a very deep iceberg.

'She said that you shouldn't be drinking…' he frowned slightly 'Apparently you're on the wagon'

'Oh God, that' Connie emitted a laugh filled with relief and flapped her arm dismissively 'I used to drink a bit when I was a teenager – probably a reaction to what my mother did as much as anything – and my father convinced himself that I had an alcohol problem. It was a complete overreaction but once I knew how much it upset him, I made a point of not drinking in front of him and Leah or coming home hungover. It just wasn't worth the hassle. It would seem that my dear stepmother has taken that as proof positive that I had an alcohol problem. I wouldn't pay any attention…'

'Really' Ric stated doubtfully, wondering how no matter how much overtime his imagination might be doing, Connie could always explain away even the strangest occurrences with a credible story and a flap of her wrist. Wondering why, despite the plausibility of her tale, he didn't quite believe her.

'Honestly Ric, do I look like a raging alcoholic?' she emitted a contemptuous laugh and gave him a gentle kiss on the cheek 'you're worrying about nothing and I bet you haven't had a wink of sleep, have you' she stated accusingly and he shook his head guiltily, resulting in an impatient roll of her eyes 'you must be exhausted – you wait here and I'll bring you up a cup of tea' she instructed, bending down and planting a kiss on his forehead before sweeping out of the room.

'Leah, a word' Connie strode into the kitchen with as much authority as one could while wearing a battered, moth eaten, pink bathrobe and matching pink frilly nightdress.

'Good morning dear' Leah ignored Connie's command and continued frying bacon and eggs on the stove, not even looking round to see her stepdaughter 'sleep well?'

'Very well' Connie snapped 'Leah, what precisely have you said to Ric?'

'Nothing. Well, only that you shouldn't be drinking, which is true' she gave Connie a stern look 'you were doing so well'

'I'm not on the meths Leah; I had one glass of wine. It's allowable in normal society' Connie retorted irately, taking two mugs from the cupboard and slamming them on the side, pointedly not offering to make her stepmother a cup of tea.

'He doesn't know' Leah stated with a smile of realisation crossing her face 'I thought he looked shocked. You should tell him; I'm rather surprised you haven't already'

'Oh of course' Connie snorted contemptuously 'because that's absolutely the first thing I should tell everyone I meet after my name. "Hi, I'm Connie and if you leave me alone for five minutes with a bottle of gin, it probably won't still be there when you get back"'

'How long have you known Ric?' Leah enquired, ignoring the sarcasm

'Almost two years' Connie stated sheepishly, her eyes downcast as Leah surveyed her with displeasure.

'So it would hardly have been your opening gambit. Am I right in thinking that you spend rather a lot of time with him?' Connie nodded guiltily 'You should tell him' Leah repeated, slamming three plates of congealed bacon and eggs on the table in front of them 'He looks like the sort of man who'd understand'

'Oh, he'd understand' she rolled her eyes slightly 'he would be so understanding, I might have to kill him. And he'd want to know why'

'Connie sweetheart, we all want to know why' Leah reminded her with a kindly smile that wasn't bourn out in her voice 'your father went to his grave wanting to know what it was that made you act the way you do. But if you haven't told us in twenty odd years, you probably aren't likely to tell anyone, ever'

'I don't need to tell him, Leah. I haven't drunk to excess since I was in my twenties and I certainly don't intent to start now. If I choose not to share that aspect of my current…' she struggled for a word to describe Ric for a moment but found that there was none '…Ric, then that is my decision. You certainly aren't going to take it out of my hands by telling him yourself; do I make myself clear'

'Abundantly' Leah's tones were clipped as she sat down at the table and started to push a piece of bacon listlessly around the plate in pursuit of the egg 'go and call Ric, tell him that breakfast is ready. We'll need all the fortification we can get for today'

Outside the door, Ric froze, fearing that his vantage point was about to be discovered. His rumbling stomach had driven him downstairs at the smell of bacon but he had stopped as the voices of two irate women came into earshot, his appetite leaving him as he took in the content of the conversation that passed between them. As he suspected, Connie hadn't been entirely honest with him, but he wasn't remotely surprised by what he was hearing – from what Leah had said and her reaction to Ric's new-found knowledge, he had suspected that she probably drunk more heavily than she was willing to admit, and it was reassuring to note that he had never seen her drink more than one or two glasses of wine in the time that he'd known her, nor had he ever known her to be drunk or hungover in his company, but he wasn't so naïve as to think that the fact that she rarely drank, or at least drank with an audience, was the beginning and end of the story. He too had an addiction and saying that Connie was no longer an alcoholic was like saying that he was no longer an addict; she may not choose to drink to excess – and the jury was out over whether she was being entirely truthful with either him or herself – and he may choose not to go out and place a months rent on a horse in the three thirty but that didn't mean that he didn't want to. Every time he was in close proximity to a situation in which he could place a bet, he would feel his heart racing and an almost irresistible draw pulling him and his debit card towards the betting shop or roulette wheel. If he thought about it, he'd seen the same behaviour in Connie at times. At charity balls, he'd seen her looking longingly at a bottle of vodka mounted on the wall before ordering an orange juice, professing to want to keep a clear head for surgery the following morning. If he was honest, it always made him feel rather guilty as he sipped his whiskey, watching her, a paragon of virtue with her mind always on her job, knowing that she would be far more use than he in theatre the following morning. It had never occurred to him that there was a more sinister reason behind her abstinence. Even in her office, he'd seen her hand hover for longer than it normally would over the decanter of whiskey that Michael used to keep in her office, an item that made her wonder what sort of man Michael was to leave such temptation in his wife's way when he doubtless knew that she had a problem. It had never occurred to him that she was simply attempting to overcome her desire to drain the bottle and start on the gin, but with hindsight, perhaps it should have. After all, he was sure he'd never told Connie that he had a gambling problem, and unless Jess, Diane or Zubin had told her, an unlikely scenario because she was pretty near the bottom of the list of people whom any of them would confide in, it seemed that she had worked it out for herself. Perhaps she had seen the look of hunger in his eyes when a patient would be wheeled in, wielding a copy of the Racing Post or perhaps she had seen the guilt in his face when he would be implored by a naïve student nurse to enter the ward sweepstake, regardless of how many times Jess or Donna begged them not to. Whatever it was, it seemed that Connie had drawn her own conclusions, yet he had completely missed the signs of her addiction, signs that when he knew were blindingly obvious. Connie had been right when she said that he'd want to know why she drunk, but she was wrong to think that he'd force her to tell him. He knew how much he'd hate being pushed to explain what it was that drove him to gamble and he'd never put her in that position. What bothered him more than the truth of the matter, he mused as he retreated quickly back up the stairs, not wanting her to know that he had been listening in doorways, was the fact that once again, she had lied to him.