FOUR

Boyd is asleep. A predictable sort of anti-climax if Grace had really thought about it instead of spending most of her journey to the hospital trying to untangle her contradictory thoughts and feelings. Boyd is asleep and she can't voice any of the half-dozen possible opening lines buzzing through her head. At least he is in a quiet side room off the busy ward itself so she can gaze down at him without feeling any more self-conscious than usual about doing so. He's propped up on thick pillows, his eyes are closed, he is very pale, and there are all the expected tubes and wires to accompany the utilitarian hospital gown, but he is most definitely alive. It suddenly strikes her how seldom she's seen him so very still. Usually even if he's not on his feet and prowling, he's fidgeting restlessly, as if his body is always trying to keep up with his sharp mind. And he is sharp. Part of the attraction.

Attraction. It's a dangerous word and an even more dangerous concept. One that still frightens her after years of distant acceptance and fierce denial. Oh, yes, there's a reason Grace is a past master at deliberately not examining – at not even naming – all the worrying things that skulk in the infinite hinterland beyond the acceptable limits of friendship and professional respect. Sometimes she's certain that Boyd feels it too, whatever alchemy it is that draws them together and often all-but totally excludes everyone else… and then he will say or do something that convinces her that he really is utterly oblivious, that he simply isn't aware of the disruptive feelings for him that she does her best to ignore, and most certainly doesn't reciprocate them. And that would almost be bearable if things were always that way, but they aren't. Just as Boyd always appears to be in movement, so it seems that his thoughts and feelings are constantly in a state of flux. It's been difficult, but over time Grace has learnt to accept that he just can't be relied upon to think, say and feel the same things for more than two days in a row. Sometimes not even for more than two hours in a row.

He is an inconsistent creature, one of extremes, and as she looks down at him she wishes – more than anything – that he wasn't quite so adept at unintentionally upsetting the equilibrium she continually tries so hard to establish. It's ironic, she thinks, that she found life significantly easier while Boyd's attention was firmly elsewhere. Stray pangs of inconvenient jealousy might have nagged at her, but least she knew exactly where she was when he was… seeing… the American woman, Sarah. At least she was able to calmly dismiss all her wishful and only half-acknowledged dreams as foolish flights of fancy and –

Maybe Boyd is more aware of his surroundings than Grace thinks, because his eyes don't begin to flicker sleepily, they suddenly snap wide open, pupils contracting fast beneath the harsh artificial lights over the bed. He stares up at her, and it isn't confusion Grace sees dawn in his expression but a wary sort of acceptance, as if he knows that his survival means that there are going to be some extremely difficult questions to answer. Finding her voice, she says, "We decided someone really should make sure you were behaving yourself. I drew the short straw."

"Funny." His voice lacks its usual power, but the dry edge is comfortingly familiar.

She continues to stare down at him. "How do you feel?"

Boyd shifts slightly against the banked pillows and winces. "Like shit."

"Good."

His features settle into stubborn surliness. "Thanks, Grace."

All thoughts of cautious subtlety have disappeared. He has that effect on her. "Well?" she demands. "What the hell did you think you were doing?"

Boyd ignores the question. "Fenton…?"

"Dead," she informs him. "Stella shot him. Twice, actually."

"And his gun…?"

Grace is quite prepared to answer his questions if it will make it far more difficult for him to avoid hers. "A relic of the Cold War, according to Eve. Something called a Zastava. Yugoslavian."

"Grace." A restrained but pointed warning. He is not a patient man.

She shrugs. "CO19 took it from the scene. No official word yet, but Eve's confident it's the same weapon that was used to kill Lucy Bowers and the other three women."

Boyd visibly relaxes, his eyes closing again for a moment. When they open some of the tired wariness seems to have vanished. "Tell Spence to – "

"Boyd," she interrupts, "Spence isn't in a position to do anything. The IPCC appointed an investigating officer first thing this morning. Nothing else can happen until the whole incident's been thoroughly investigated and rubber-stamped, you know that. They've already taken preliminary statements from the three of us. They'll be coming in to talk to you as soon as the doctors allow it."

A shadow seems to pass over his face. There's no doubt he understands the possible ramifications of the mandatory investigation into the shooting. He mutters, "What did you tell them?"

"The only thing I could, that I was downstairs in the hall and didn't see any of it."

Boyd glowers at her. "Don't be obtuse, Grace."

It's the only confirmation of what happened beyond her sight that Grace needs. "So Stella was right," she says, knowing he will hear the over-controlled note in her voice, "you did deliberately walk into Fenton's line of fire."

"Grace…"

"It's a damn good thing for you that she still thinks she owes you something for that all business with Drake," Grace says, each reproving word calm and clear, "otherwise you'd already be suspended, and they'd be asking you the kind of questions that you and I both know you don't want to have to answer."

They stare at each other in antagonistic silence, all sorts of complicated things deliberately left unspoken between them. Hard questions with complex answers; things that they aren't prepared to voice. Grace shakes her head at Boyd's refusal to explain, to reassure, and she turns away. She's not sure if she wants to walk right out of the room or not. Behind her, his tired voice says, "It just happened."

Strangely, Grace doesn't disbelieve him. Mendacious though Boyd can frequently be, it's not in his nature to lie simply to make things easy for himself, and his words do make an absurd sort of sense. She goes to stand by the window, finds herself looking down into a small unkempt inner courtyard that seems to function mainly as a large light well for the hospital's inner wards. Litter, straggly plants and weeds predominate. Not an inspiring sight. It looks as if it's going to rain soon. Cold, depressing autumn rain.

"Grace," he says. When she doesn't turn her head, he continues, "Grace, look at me."

Boyd is not the only one who can be stubborn. Not looking round, she says, "Spencer had to break the news to your brother. He's flying back to England as soon as he can. It's only by accident that he's not flying home to arrange your funeral."

"I realise that."

Now, she does turn. "Do you?" Boyd does not answer. Instead, he closes his eyes again. Angered by his obstinate avoidance, Grace takes a step back towards the bed. "What you did, Boyd… it wasn't just stupid, it was incredibly selfish. What do you think it would have done to Robert? Or his kids? To everyone who cares about you?"

She thinks the hollow noise he makes in response is probably supposed to be a wry laugh. "Yeah, because there are so many of those around, aren't there?"

The anger that flares inside her is hot and real. "Oh, grow up."

Boyd opens his eyes. "I'm serious. My damned ex won't answer my calls, the only family I've got left live abroad, my son's dead and my bloody wife ran off with another bloke years ago. Oh, and my superiors would dearly love to see the back of me. You'd hardly have been jostling for space at my graveside."

"Don't," Grace says, her voice hard and sharp.

The look in his eyes is something like the thousand yard stare she's seen too often from traumatised victims. People who have seen and suffered too much. His voice is very quiet. "What have I got left, Grace? Tell me that."

At least one answer burns through her in immediate response, but she finds herself shaking her head and saying, "If you keep talking like this, Boyd, I won't have a choice – I'll have to share my concerns about your state of mind with the DAC."

His expression hardens. "I don't respond well to emotional blackmail."

"And I wouldn't stoop so low. It's not blackmail, it's a simple statement of fact."

"It would end my career."

"So?" Grace mocks, letting him hear at least an edge of her fury. "Yesterday you almost ended your own life, Boyd. If you think I wouldn't do everything I could to stop that happening, well, you don't know me at all."

Boyd's voice is quiet and deliberate. "Oh? I thought you didn't care?"

She almost flinches at the implicit accusation. Almost. A furious mixture of irritation and guilt makes her instantly counter, "And I thought you had the hide of a rhinoceros. Since when has anything I've had to say actually bothered you?"

"Since always." Boyd is glaring at her, his hostile expression only emphasising how pale he is, how exhausted he looks. "What the hell did you expect me to do, Grace? Burst into tears and pour my damn heart out? Get down on my fucking knees and beg you to help me? Because I warn you, that could be something of a problem just at the moment."

Stunned by the sheer audacity of his attack, Grace stares at him for a moment, and then she turns on her heel and stalks from the room. The increased surge of anger and adrenaline driving her doesn't ebb until long after she's reached her parked car.

-oOo-

It's a ridiculous overreaction, of course. That's the embarrassing irony that weighs an angry Grace down as she gathers her thoughts in Christchurch Gardens, not too far from New Scotland Yard. She ignores the Suffragette Monument and tries to find the composure she needs to think clearly. Conflicting instincts are pulling her in opposite directions, one half-made decision after another gaining ascendency and then losing it again as the internal battle continues. Duty requires one thing, friendship another. A choice has to be made. Head for Scotland Yard and the Deputy Assistant Commissioner's office, or risk going back to the hospital on the off chance that Boyd can be made to listen to her?

'Boyd needs you,' that's what Eve said. 'You know it, I know it – everyone knows it.'

Is that the crux of the whole matter? That somehow she's always sensed that need in him, even if Boyd's never admitted to it – and what Grace needs, more than anything else, is to be needed. Symbiosis.

If it's that simple then nothing's ever going to change between them. He is always going to be difficult and contradictory, always testing the boundaries like an insecure child, and she is always going to prioritise his emotional needs over hers because that's always been the easiest and most successful route to a halfway harmonious relationship. When things go wrong between them, Grace realises, they do so because one or other of them has stepped well outside the expected roles that they have learnt to play for each other. Complex, damaged man; patient, compassionate woman.

Awareness is depressing and unpalatable.

Surely they are both more, much more, than the predictable, world-weary caricatures they seem to have chosen to inhabit. Aren't they?

She could end his entire career at a single stroke. A depressed senior officer taking prescribed medication in the wake of a family tragedy is one thing, but a depressed senior officer with a demonstrable lack of regard for his own personal safety is patently unfit for command. That's what Boyd's superiors will say, and no-one will disagree with them.

Grace isn't aware of it, but her pace has quickened as she approaches the eastern edge of the park. The one nearest New Scotland Yard.

-oOo-

Boyd doesn't apologise and somehow that pleases her. It is, after all, highly characteristic of the man she knows. He just watches her as she approaches and finally says, "So, you came back, then. Should I be preparing myself for a visit from the DAC?"

"No," Grace tells him, towing the room's only chair to the side of the bed and then sitting down, "but we need to talk."

He looks momentarily relieved, but his answer is resolute. "We really don't, Grace. It was just a moment of stupidity, that's all."

She nods. "Against my better judgement I'm prepared to accept that. What frightens me is the thought that something like it might happen again."

"It won't."

"Convince me."

Boyd sighs, a heavy, weary sound that is magnified in the small room. "I just… let things get on top of me. I don't think I even really knew what I was doing. I kicked the door open and there he was, ready to fire. It all happened in an instant. Maybe I thought it was a quick and easy answer to everything, I don't know."

"And if you'd ended up paralysed, or worse?" Grace challenges.

"Didn't give it a thought," Boyd admits, and she knows he's telling the truth. "Not a pleasant idea, in hindsight."

Grace looks at him in silence, watching him watching her. There are so many… much easier… men in the world, but sometimes it feels as if she can only see him. As if he's the only reality in a world of insubstantial shadows. Blazing Technicolor in a sea of monochrome uniformity. She wants to seize hold of him and not let go, but whether to protect him, or simply to reassure herself she doesn't know. Both, maybe. She knows he'd never allow it. Too stubborn, too independent. No, she can't force any kind of hold on him, physical or emotional. Not breaking eye-contact, she says, "What you said was unfair. I can't be your therapist, Boyd. More, I won't be."

He doesn't sigh, but it's heavily implied. "I know."

She waits for a second before asking, "What did your GP say? When she gave you the anti-depressants. Be honest with me."

Boyd looks away. "That I was suffering from depression and would benefit from grief counselling, or some such bollocks. I don't know, I wasn't really listening."

Grace believes that, too. Whether he wants to hear it or not, she says, "Depression is an illness, Boyd, not a sign of weakness. Anti-depressants help some people and not others. The most effective treatment – "

The interruption is predictable, but not as brusque as she expects. "I thought you weren't doing the therapist thing?"

Grace holds her hands up, palms towards him. A placatory gesture. "I'm just trying to be a friend, that's all."

Most of the fight seems to go out of him, and suddenly he looks incredibly tired and vulnerable. "That's all I need, Grace."

"I know you think I talk far too much," she says carefully after several moments, fighting the temptation to reach out and take his hand, "but believe it or not, I'm pretty damn good at listening, too."

-oOo-

continued...