Well this is up slightly earlier than anticipated. I would like to say thank you to all those who are following and reviewing this fic, it is making me very happy to have so much support. Extra special thanks to Anny and Meggi - love you!

I hope this update helps make up for chapter 9 and I would like to thank you all for not hating what I did to Sam and Dylan in that part!

Here is chapter 10.

To look out for you

The definition of regret

Regret: verb; feel sad, repentant or disappointed over something that one has done or failed to do

Sam Nicholls

Sam stood with her hands submerged in warm, soapy water at the kitchen sink washing the plates, cups, cutlery and various cooking implements that recently been used for breakfast. She put the first dinner plate down on the side to dry and reached back into the bowl, momentarily confused as she pulled out a second plate. She reminisced that it had been an incredibly long time since she had done two people's washing up, the last occasion being that very difficult morning before her preceding tour of duty when she had spent the night sharing Dylan's bed despite the fact that she no longer occupied his heart.

Sam rolled her shoulders back and stretched out her aching muscles as she continued to rinse the dishes. Her wounded body still felt stiff and she had a niggling hangover induced headache, but she felt in surprisingly good shape given her alcohol consumption the previous night, the unexpected fry up managing to settle her stomach enough to prevent nausea from making an unwelcome reappearance. Her waking thought on stirring from an unbelievably good night's sleep had been that she felt safe for the first time since her assault, in fact she had slept more in that one night that she had done any day since her injuries had been sustained, remarkably without a single nightmare. She had been able to hear Tom clattering about in her kitchen for a short time, but it had eventually gone quiet and she had assumed he had departed for work.

She recalled feeling assured that she could finally brave the kitchen and make herself a much needed coffee, so had pulled her big fluffy dressing gown on and yanked it tightly around her for comfort before heading out of her bedroom and down the hall. She brought to mind that mortifying moment where she had entered the living room and had come face to face with her house guest, instantaneously looking directly at the floor, face reddening in embarrassment and wishing the ground would swallow her whole. It wasn't as if she hadn't considered that she would actually see Tom again, given that they worked in the same department it would be unavoidable, but she had hoped it wouldn't be whilst she still looked incredibly rough and hadn't downed her morning caffeine fix.

Memories of the night before still burned fresh in her mind and she found herself thinking, not for the first time, how grateful she was that Tom was such a lovely guy and that he wasn't holding it against her that she had made such an exceedingly clumsy pass at him the night before. She had been distinctly out of practice in passionate encounters, her last such foray being over a year previous and had been responsible for the devastation that had been caused to her marriage. Dylan had never been one for such recklessly amorous behaviour himself either but the connection between them been so incredibly deep that despite the lack of romance in their day to day lives, the intensity of their time alone together had more than made up for that. Even just the slightest reminder of those days caused her to yet again regret how badly her marriage had ended and exactly how much she had lost along the way.

In fact the only occasion Sam recalled ever making out with someone in such a fashion it had been her twenty first birthday and she had been so drunk she barely recalled her crazy actions the following day. That had been the last time she had been with anyone before Dylan, which she realised with a sense of despondency meant she had only actually kissed four people in the past five years, and had barely managed to sustain one relationship from any of that. If she had ever wanted to move on from Dylan, which she doubted would ever be the case, she was well aware her poor track record with men made it highly unlikely she would ever settle down with anyone else in the future.

She had been desperately trying not to think about that awful moment in the small hours of the night when Tom had pulled away from her and called a halt to the rapidly escalating proceedings that had been occurring on her sofa. They had been all over each other and a sense of hazy desperation had descended over her mind as she continued to pull her companion closer in towards her. She had managed to squash her feelings for Dylan down deeply inside her, despite him apparently trying to fill her every conscious thought, but it had been the aggravating discomfort of her injured muscles that had caused her to tense up in spite of the moment. Tom had lifted his head from hers and looked at her questioningly as they both lay there barely clothed and breathing heavily, before drawing himself up into a seated position and pulling her into a hug.

His bare skin had felt alien against hers and in spite of the comfort he had obviously intended to provide her, the rejection she had felt had hurt enough to bring tears to her eyes and caused her to hastily grab her clothes and flee the room, slamming her bedroom door behind her. Tom had knocked on her door a few moments later and tried to extend the hand of friendship, but through the rapidly strengthening sobs she had dismissed him outright and instead her guest had retreated back to the relative safety of the sofa, informing her as he did so that he would spend the night there in case she wanted to talk.

Sam recalled that she had paced back and forth across her small bedroom repeatedly for about half an hour, trying to calm herself down and quell the erratic thoughts that were spinning through her confused mind. Several times her fingers had instinctively travelled to the slowly healing stitches on her arm, but on each occasion she had been just strong enough to pull her hand away before she caused herself any further harm, Nick's earlier words echoing inside her head the entire time. She hadn't been able to believe that she had just all but pounced on Tom, purely as an act of drunken retaliation at her husband's dinner date with Zoe. She knew herself well enough to know it wasn't Dr Kent she actually wanted to be with, more that she had needed to feel something for someone once again and that she had wanted to feel wanted, in a way no one bar Dylan had ever truly demonstrated to her. The fact that in order to make herself feel better she had used her colleague and come extremely close to manipulating him into her bed just added a sad sense of guilt to the long list of awful feelings that had been dominating her brain in recent weeks, an emotion she was well versed in given her own previous fling back in a time where Dylan would still have referred to her as his wife.

Just seeing Tom standing there in her living room in the same clothes she had quickly removed from him the night before had both filled her with regret and caused her to feel incredibly mortified. She had never been used to laying herself open in front of other people, but Tom had seen her at her worst and most vulnerable moment the previous night, never mind the fact that the last time they had locked eyes on each other she had been practically naked and the memory of his hands on her body still filled every corner of her brain.

Sam recalled that they had sat there in an awkward semi-silence for what had felt like forever, making brief small talk about the antics of their colleagues the night before, until her companion had apologised for taking advantage of her drunken state and questioned whether she was okay given that she had fled so rapidly from the room last time he had seen her. She had been horrified that he had felt the need to apologise, given that it had been Sam herself who had initiated the whole disaster in the first place, but when he carefully referenced the obvious injuries he had seen underneath her clothes as a cause for concern she hadn't been sure whether it hurt more that he had rejected her in the first place or that she had been so incredibly stupid as to jeopardise such a potentially good friendship with her actions.

She had listened with interest as Tom had informed her that he hadn't put a stop to their liaison because he hadn't wanted it, but rather that he had known she still had feelings for Dylan and wasn't prepared to be second best nor get caught in the crossfire between her and her husband. She remembered making it clear to him that she had known she had used him to make herself feel better and had asked for his forgiveness, but he had pointed out that he was actually quite flattered and joked that things like that didn't happen to him every day. She recalled teasing him about how the young nurses swooned over him every time he walked through the E.D. and he had remarked that he was more interested in the yummy mummies who brought their little darlings into paediatrics if he was honest, sending them both into fits of giggles at his reasoning for choosing his medical specialism.

It had been as he rummaged through her fridge and she had unpacked a box of kitchen implements she had barely used just so that they could make a fry up that she had finally relented and informed him she was divorcing her husband and on seeing the pity cross his face, she had finally articulated the thought that had been stuck in her mind since their earlier conversation, that she wasn't prepared to be second best to anyone either. She knew it wasn't fair on her or Dylan for them to continue like this, especially as she had so completely made an idiot of herself with her breakfast guest purely to punish her ex-husband for moving on.

Tom appeared back in the kitchen as she finished the remaining washing up and dried her hands on the towel and he threw her the jacket she had dumped on the armchair when they had returned to her flat some hours beforehand.

"You ready to go?" he asked, his voice uncertain and she nodded, still not quite able to look him in the eye. "You do realise," he continued, "that if we arrive together people might talk?"

Sam considered the implication of that statement for a moment and reflected on what the gossip mongers of the E.D. would make of her walking into the department with Dr Kent, still dressed in the clothes he had been wearing the night before and both of them looking slightly dishevelled and less than their best given the state they had gotten themselves into at the pub. She didn't like being the centre of attention any more than Dylan did but in truth the only person whose opinion she ever worried about had no reason to be bothered by idle chit chat about her any longer.

"It doesn't bother me," she answered, shrugging her shoulders dismissively. "Let them think what they like."

Tom met her gaze with a grin. "I won't tell if you won't," he responded. "It will do wonders for my credibility if they think I managed to somehow end up with you."

Sam laughed at the thought of Dr Lyons and alike interrogating Tom about their night together and she carefully pulled on her jacket, wincing slightly as she forced her still sore and swollen arms into the coat.

"Just don't go making up any stories eh?" Tom added to his earlier comment. "I'd quite like to keep my air of mystery if you don't mind."

Sam batted his arm light-heartedly and shook her head in mock annoyance, before grabbing her bag and leading him down the stairs to her front door. As they reached the bottom she noticed an envelope on the door mat, which given the still early hour she assumed would have been delivered the day before and therefore she must have walked straight over it when she had come in last night. Post had been a rarity for her since her arrival in Holby as with the exception of the utility bills that arrived like clockwork each month no one else had ever had just cause to want to write to her.

Tom paused in the doorway as she bent down to pick up the letter, which was adorned with an instantly recognisable post mark. She ripped it open without thinking and studied the contents, inadvertently gasping as she realised the significance of the subject matter and tightly screwing her eyes up to shut out the world around her.

"Bad news?" Tom asked, pulling her from her trance like state.

Sam opened her eyes and passed him over the letter, studying his face as he took in the substance of the document.

"I have to report back to base in three weeks," she spoke, her tone hushed and serious. "Three weeks and I'm out of here." She noticed Tom's stunned expression and how tightly he was clutching the piece of paper, almost as if he was scared that if he let go of it he might actually have to respond to the words it contained.

"Tom, this is a good thing," she said, this time with a more determined edge to her voice. "I want to go back, I need to go back. This is what I'm trained to do."

"Will we ever see you again?" he asked, staring at her intently and she met his gaze for a moment, as a look of horror inexplicably fell across her colleague's face. "I didn't mean like that," he quickly added. "I know you'll be fine out there, I just meant will you be coming back to Holby when you get back?"

"No," Sam responded quickly, adamant that she would never be returning to Dylan's part of the world ever again. "I'll probably get seconded somewhere else, which given that I'll be divorced by then will be for the best. It's awkward enough now; can you imagine how hard it would be then?"

She made sure to give Tom a half smile, trying to reassure him that she was genuinely alright with the circumstances she found herself in despite the looming date of her departure coming as an incredible shock to her. She had always known the army was capable of moving fast when it was required to, but even she hadn't anticipated that when she made herself available for a new posting they would take her up on the offer quite so quickly. She had a matter of weeks to sort things out with Dylan and get their divorce moving on enough that by the time she returned he would be completely free of any ties to her.

"You do realise we will have to do drinks again?" Tom's voice came from beside her and she realised he had been speaking to her the entire time she had been lost in thoughts of her husband. "If you're leaving I mean?" he added and she nodded in response.

"I guess we could do that," she said smiling. "But don't mention it to anyone yet, there are a few people I need to tell myself first."

"Of course," Tom replied, a slightly joking manner to his voice. "But next time, I'm not coming in for coffee you know; no matter how much you try to persuade me." Sam raised her eyebrows at him, unsure of where that statement was leading. "Well if I'm never going to see you again and you are really divorcing this husband of yours, I might not be able to resist your advances next time round."

Sam rolled her eyes at him, "You're something else, you really are! Come on, we're going to be late." She bundled Tom out the front door and pulled it shut behind her, before the two of them started the short walk to work together.

As they walked along and she listened to Tom's extraordinarily bad jokes, trying to stifle the merest hint of a smile that appeared on her face at the worst of them, Sam couldn't help but let her thoughts drift to what she was going to say to people at work about her posting. She knew that if she had been initially wounded by Tom's rejection of her the previous night, it would be nothing to how bad she was going to feel when her husband didn't react to hearing of her upcoming departure. There was no other feeling she knew that was quite as bad as the rejection she had felt from Dylan in the past. It was a good job she had slept well that night because there was no doubt today was going to be an exceptionally long shift.

Dylan Keogh

Dylan sat on the sofa in the unusually empty staffroom sipping at the boiling mug of coffee that was warming his hands and enjoying the silence of having his own space for a while. Since his arrival he had only seen staff from the nearly concluded shift and had been working on the assumption that he had the place to himself because of the staff drinks the previous night, causing him to dread what a terrible state his colleagues would be in when they finally sauntered into work.

The door opened and he looked up to see Zoe briskly walk in, failing to acknowledge his existence and heading straight for her locker. He went to speak but he was unable to find any suitable words and from her demeanour, he gathered that she was having similar difficulties which he was well aware from his knowledge of this particular woman was not a usual occurrence for her. The awkward tension that had descended on the room since her entrance was all encompassing and Dylan couldn't help but wonder whether it would be as apparent to their colleagues as it was to him that he and Zoe were no longer on the best of terms. He had always found it difficult to read or understand people, women especially, with the exclusion of Samantha for the duration of their marriage at any rate. Yet it was beyond obvious that Dr Hanna was having some degree of difficulty in facing him that morning and he knew without doubt that it was his behaviour that was responsible for her stubborn refusal to meet his gaze.

He stifled a yawn as it dawned on him quite how tired he was, the stress of the past week finally taking its toll on his body and mind. Dylan recalled returning to his boat in the small hours of the morning and taking Dervla for a much needed walk through the darkness, stretching her legs and clearing his mind simultaneously. When he had gotten back to the boat he had crashed out on the sofa and managed to grab a maximum of a couple of hours of fitful sleep for the remainder of the night, thoughts of both the women in his life dominating his mind and disturbing his usually peaceful slumber.

Dylan was very confused by the previous night's events, not least the part whereby he had initiated an encounter with Zoe. He knew that it was highly unusual for him to be the one that did the running in any relationship, mainly because he had always been baffled by the conventions of liaisons with the opposite gender, something he was sure his wife would testify to if asked. He could count on one hand the number of occasions he had instigated anything romantic with Samantha, especially if he discounted their engagement and wedding night.

He still wasn't actually sure why he had followed Zoe into the kitchen and kissed her, especially considering it had been her who had put thoughts of his wife into this mind but he was certain that his companion had responded to his advances, despite the fact that just hours earlier she had been the one telling him he still had feelings for her younger colleague. Dr Hanna had thrown him completely when she had interrupted her tirade in the restaurant about his supposed feelings for Dr Nicholls to inform him that he was the object of her own affections, but whilst he had not wanted to admit to her that he was muddled by the turn of events he had been stunned by her declaration. Dylan knew he was barely able to manage friendship, never mind anything more emotionally intense than that and he had actually found himself vaguely disappointed that Zoe had complicated their own relationship by adding a romantic dimension. Although he never would have admitted it to her, Samantha or anyone else for that matter, he had truly been looking forward to having the support of simple companionship with someone who accepted him and his grumpy nature without judgement.

He brought to mind the moment he had kissed Zoe and whilst it had been her he had been looking at, it was his wife's responsive touch that had been on his mind. Samantha had always had this annoying habit of filling his head and refusing to leave his thoughts at the most inappropriate moments and with her very presence dominating the room, kissing Zoe had felt incredibly wrong, like they were two puzzle pieces that didn't fit together but somehow had become connected regardless. Dylan knew he never felt like that when he was with his wife and wondered whether when Sam had told him all those months before that she had not gotten anything from her fling with a fellow soldier, she had felt something similar to the strange emotion that he had at that moment.

He recalled that it had most definitely been Zoe who had taken their liaison to the next level, but he knew he had been just as willing a participant in proceedings as he struggled to push coherent thoughts from his mind. Their intimate association had been over almost as quickly as it had started and it had been in the moments immediately afterwards that Dylan had felt the gulf between them opening. He realised with a significant degree of regret that he had managed to compromise any remaining semblance of friendship that had remained between him and the woman lying beside him, which had led very quickly to his departure from the bed and her flat.

He remembered that neither of them had even tried to make eye contact as he left and that lack of inclination to engage definitely appeared to have carried forward to this morning if Zoe's positioning of herself, back towards him as she made herself a coffee, was any indication of where they now stood with each other. Her behaviour the night before still shocked him, as he could not understand why she had allowed things to escalate so far knowing full well he had feelings for Samantha, but he was aware enough to be sure that he had been the one who should have called a halt to proceedings the moment his thoughts had drifted away from the woman he had actually been personally involved with at that moment.

If he was honest with himself the entire evening had been a disaster and if he could have gone back to change how events had panned out he would do without hesitation. Dylan knew he had refused point blank to listen to any of Zoe's thoughts on the subject of where he stood with his wife, despite knowing that what she was saying was incredibly sensible. He felt a sense of shame at how he had embarrassed them both with his swift and abrupt exit from the restaurant, but the statement his dinner companion had made about the separation from his wife being triggered by his treatment of Samantha had angered him so greatly he had curiously been unable to control his emotions. He considered that everyone would assume she had been the one to leave him, rather than the actual occurrence of him walking out on her, as given that the general perception of him appeared to be gruff and unreasonable most people probably assumed Dr Nicholls had reached the end of her tether with both him and their marriage. Whilst he knew that this was not the entire story, he definitely felt responsible for the breakdown of their union as from the little enlightenment he had garnered from his wife over the past year he was aware he had been at fault for failing to offer her enough understanding and support, leading her to seek solace elsewhere.

On leaving the restaurant he had roamed the street deep in thought, neither wanting to go back to his house boat nor willing to seek out Samantha to argue out their current status with her. He recalled instinctively heading to Zoe's with the sole intention of apologising to her for his unacceptable level of rudeness, in spite of the fact it was rare for him to seek forgiveness for such behaviour in any circumstances. However upon entering her flat and being confronted with her questioning glare his desire to open up to her about the situation they all found themselves in had rapidly ebbed away.

The woman currently still ignoring him as they both drank from their coffee mugs had understood him better than he had previously given her credit for. He might have been able to issue an abject dismissal of her when she had confronted him over his feelings for his wife, but he was mindful that despite Samantha's destruction of their marriage he had never lost the automatic reaction the beautiful woman had generated in him every time she walked into a room. He had perceived Zoe's open challenge to him to deny his interest in his wife as an ill-advised ambush, but the moment the words had escaped his dinner date's lips Dylan had known they were indeed correct and he had been forced to face up to the deeply buried knowledge that he was still in love with Samantha. That truth was something he knew he was far from being ready to admit to anyone, the incredibly determined and feisty object of those feelings included, but even admitting it to himself had been a significant step forward for him given his lack of experience in emotional declarations.

He watched Zoe finish the last dregs of her coffee and start rinsing her mug in the washbowl, reminding him of when he had entered the kitchen and found her draining the remaining wine down her sink late the previous night. Dylan had been incredibly grateful to her for that act, as the sweet smell of the wine combined with his jumbled thoughts had caused him for the first time since his separation to consider drinking once again. He had managed to maintain his composure in the face of that temptation, knowing that alcohol would only have added to the confusing situation he had found himself in, but the simple act of considering a drink had forced him to reflect back on his past.

Dylan's mind had been thrown back to the one time Samantha had really needed him and it had been the drink that had initially prevented him from being the support she had so desperately required. Nonetheless his memories prompted the recollection that it had been the consequences of that experience that had compelled him to renounce alcohol completely so that he was able to protect the woman from further harm. It was a great source of horror for him that yet again Dr Nicholls had been put at risk and wounded in his presence, but the fact that it wasn't him that she had turned to in this instance had hurt him more than he cared to mention.

He had never been the jealous type in the past, mainly because he had never been emotionally invested enough in anyone or anything to care enough, but on every occasion that he allowed his wife's relationship with Dr Kent to enter his head he found himself unable to manage his own attitude towards the man.

"I think we should just forget last night ever happened," the female voice from across the room interrupted his thinking and he glanced up at her.

"Yes," he responded tersely. "That would be best."

He saw Zoe raise her eyebrows at his curt answer, but he had very little else to add to the statement and was content to allow the awkward silence to fall back on the room.

"You do know Sam and Tom aren't together don't you?" Zoe spoke again, apparently now able to read his mind and answer a question he had actually not finished forming in his head. "Just forget about that and for the sake of my sanity if nothing else, talk to her Dylan. If you two don't clear the air this whole situation is just going to get worse and it won't just be you and her that suffer."

He considered her comments and unexpectedly found that there was a lot of truth in her words, but before he could respond to acknowledge her words they were interrupted by the door opening and the two subjects of their conversation entered the staffroom. He instantaneously recognised that his wife looked much more relaxed than she had done in recent days and also that her male counterpart was wearing exact same clothes he had been dressed in the previous day, therefore obviously having yet to make it back to his own home overnight.

The two entrants stopped dead in the doorway and all four of them remained stationary for a second, with Dylan noticing an exchange of glances between Dr's Hanna and Kent as Samantha busied herself staring at the carpet.

"Awkward," Tom said aloud, provoking his wife to look up and meet the gaze of all those in the room, himself included, who were now staring at her intently.

"Indeed," Dylan heard her respond, her gaze fixed firmly on him before making fleeting eye contact with her companion and then heading straight to her locker, focused exclusively on that and not giving him a second glance.

He studied her momentarily as she intently rootled through the belongings strewn in her locker, before her apparent lack of interest in the remaining parties in the room felt incredibly dismissive towards him and he felt an overwhelming need to exit the room. He hurriedly exited through the very door she had just entered, almost knocking Dr Kent over in his haste and without even acknowledging the half-finished conversation with Zoe that had been invalidated by the arrival of Samantha and her confidante.

Dylan headed straight for the relative safety of CDU with the sole intention of occupying his mind with a case that would test his deductive skills to the limit. He had found the last months working with his wife incredibly difficult to bear, not only with her invading his professional working space but also that her presence had forced him to reconsider their history together. However the demands of that challenge were nothing in comparison to the crushing rejection he felt at knowing that as he was finally ready to accept he was still in love with Samantha, the woman herself had been moving on with a younger colleague who was obviously far more suited to her than he had ever been.

Thank you so much for reading and I would very welcome reviews. Feedback makes me happy :)

I'm hoping to have the next part up in a couple of days. Callie x