Disclamer:- ok I know I thought to but this on the last chapter so I'm doing it now. Mickey, Mia do not belong to me I just use them for my fics.

Authors notes:- Words in Bold type are Mia reading Mickey's letter and words in Italics are Mia's thoughts.

Chapter 2

The sound of the letter box clanking shut awoke Mia early one Saturday morning.

Great, she groaned to herself, just when I hoping to get a lie-in I get rudely awoken by the postman. She clambered out of bed and put on her dressing gown and made her way downstairs to collect the post.

Bills, bills and more bills lay upon the mat under the letter box. Mia picked them up despondently. It seemed to her as if she did nothing but pay bills these days. Mia took the bills into the living-room and began to open them. Most of them were bills for the house but there was a credit card bill amongst them.

When she was half-way through the pile Mia spotted an envelope that didn't look like it contained a bill at all. For one it was just an ordinary envelope, not one with the plastic bit over the name and address like the ones for the bills were, and the address had been hand written on the envelope with black biro. Mia studied the hand-writing and realised it was Mickey's.

Mickey Webb was the last person Mia wanted to hear from after the way he had treated her other the past few weeks and she certainly didn't want to read a letter from him that was full of lame excuses for what had happened between him and that Steph woman. The guy was even more pathetic than Mia thought he was if he couldn't even apologise to her face to face and had to write it in a letter.

Mia flung the letter on the table and then grabbed her coat, bag and car keys and went off to the supermarket.

Mia found herself unable to concentrate on her shopping as her mind wondered to the letter that Mickey had written. What if there is more to it then just him apologising for the Steph incident? Mia had found it hard to accept what Mickey had done with Steph as she had thought he was different from all her other ex-boyfriends.

Ha! she thought contemptuously, All men are the same their all cheats, liars and scumbags. They say they love me and they would never do anything to hurt me and then they sleep around behind my back and Mickey Webb is no different! Well I suppose he was honest enough to tell me about Steph well eventually anyway. None of the other cheaters had done that I had to find out about their infidelity from friends or even worse through idle gossip that I had unintentionally heard… perhaps I should at least take a look at Mickey's letter.

When Mia returned home she just dumped her shopping upon the kitchen floor and opened Mickey's letter with great enthusiasm. It was written on a folded up lined and margined A4 sheet of paper and had the same hand-writing in the same black biro as the envelope. She began to read:

I know you don't really want to talk to me after that night in the Seven Bells pub when I told you about what happened between me and Steph…

Too right I don't want to talk to you after that night you upset me, Mickey, I thought you and me had something special but obviously I'm just another women for you to have sex with.

…but I felt I had to tell you why I've been shutting you out and why I did what I did that night with Steph and that is why I have written you this letter…

I think you told enough that night in the pub.

…What I am going to tell you about is something that is so hard for me to talk about to anyone, ever, that is why I couldn't tell you even though I tried both in the pub and in your car the day before...

That sounds quite serious perhaps there is more to this than just him making feeble excuses for sleeping with Steph. I'd better read on.

…It's been nearly three years since the incident happened but to me it still feels like it was only yesterday. I was working on a case in which a very dangerous and violent criminal was stealing from prostitutes that he was seeing. His name was Martin Delaney, even just writing his name feels me with such a petrifying fear to point that my fingers are trembling as I write this I got one of the prostitutes to act as bait in a trap to catch Delaney this succeeded and we managed arrest him. Unfortunately there was a mix-up in custody and Delaney escaped and beat up the prostitute who had assisted us. Jack was not pleased and so I decided to make amends by going after Delaney myself without back-up which was a stupid, foolish thing to do. Eventually I tracked Delaney to an abandoned warehouse near Larkmead Station. Unfortunately Delaney managed to knock me unconscious with a spade he had found in the warehouse...

Nice story, Mickey, even if in some parts you're not making sense: "even just writing his name feels me with such a petrifying fear to point that my fingers are trembling as I write this." What has that got to do with anything? This guy must have affected you somehow but what has that got to do with you and me or you sleeping with Steph?

…When I came to I found I was tied face down to a table with Delaney standing over me, taunting me. I'll never forget what happened next no matter how long I live. Delaney pulled down my trousers and then removed his own and then he raped me...

Oh my God, Mickey! This is what you were trying to tell me! No wonder you bottled out this would be practically unspeakable for anyone let alone a bloke and all this time I've been hounding you to share your past with me and then getting frustrated when you haven't. I'm sorry Mickey if I'd known or even suspected that the reason you were so secretive was because you'd been a victim of something as brutal as this then I wouldn't have kept on at you but I thought it was because of what happened with Liz.

..I've never felt so humiliated as I did then; the pain, the blood and the fact that as a trained police officer I wasn't man enough to stop another man over-powering me and taking my body without my consent; running his hands over my chest and trickling them through my hair. That's why I want us to take things slow, why I flinch ever so slightly when you try to caress me...

Too be raped most be an awful experience for anyone but, given your job position, more so for you. You're used to dealing with dangerous criminals like rapists practically every day no wonder you feel humiliated and didn't want to tell me. This Delaney took from you something which wasn't his to take; he didn't have that right. He must have been one sick man to do something like this to someone especially to a trained police officer. Yeah I can understand you wanting to take things slowly and now I know why I'll go as slowly as you need to you needn't worry about that.

…I know the journalist reporting on the spoiled meat case was only doing his job but he dragged every back up for me when he asked those questions. My worse day in court was the day I had to give evidence for my rape. I'm sorry I walked out of the interview that day but those questions although intended to be innocent just dragged everything back up. That is why I snapped at you to leave it…

I remember that day. I remember you reading too much into the journalists questions and acting all suspicious and defensive and me thinking you were over-reacting when you walked off after he asked the "worse day in court" question and the "is there a criminal that's affected you more than the others" question but I understand now why you walked out because like you say those questions would have dragged everything back up.

…I understand if after reading this and discovering the truth you're ashamed and disgusted by me and never want to have anything to do with me again after all who wants to be with someone who's body has been used.

Oh Mickey I could never be ashamed or disgusted by you because of this. Now that you've told me I feel more in the loop and your behaviour the last few weeks makes more sense because of the rape you can't handle being intimate with another person. I must have seemed so over-bearing these last few weeks. I'm sorry, Mickey.

I don't think you body has been used – you've just had you innocence taken – and this isn't going to stop me from wanting to be with you, ever, because I know we can deal with the outcome of this revelation together. I love you Mickey Webb and nothing, not even this is going to stop that. I don't know why I'm just thinking all this to a piece of paper, though, when I should be saying it aloud to you, face to face.

As soon as Mia had that thought she knew it was true and so she made a pact to herself to confront Mickey the next morning at work and let him know that she was here to support him.