500 Miles from You (Scottish Bookshop #3)(74)

No, no, she kept telling herself. No. She stumbled toward the door, opened it wide, and drew in as many deep breaths as she could. The fresh, bright air stung her lungs as she told herself, Calm down. Calm down. The road was empty, and she walked across it to the copse on the opposite side.

Oddly—and she felt faintly ridiculous—holding on to one of the trees seemed to sooth her. The deep heavy scent of the bark and the sap, the bright overwhelming neon greenness of the new leaves, filled her senses; the shade and the height of the great oak made her feel strangely safe. She leaned against it, hands on her knees, and took great deep breaths; gradually, her back against the trunk, she felt her heart rate steadily return to normal. She had known this was coming, of course she had. She always did. Anita had told her about it, over and over again, but she had been too resistant. Classic health professional: terrible patient.

But she had been stupid, and arrogant, and frustrated at having to pay attention, to think about the thing she didn’t want to think about—and now she couldn’t cope with this, not at all. And she had thought she was getting better, had genuinely truly believed it. And now she felt back at square one.

Cormac?

Yes?

I got the letter from court. I have to testify.

Cormac couldn’t help it; his heart started to beat a little faster.

You’re coming to London?

I have to go to court.

When?

Next week.

What’s going to happen?

I have to stand up and . . . go through it again.

That will be okay, won’t it? Help put it to rest? Isn’t that what we’re meant to be doing?

I’ll have to see his mother. I’ll have to see the boy who did it.

He’s not going to get off. He’s not going to come after you.

His friends might.

She felt her heartbeat rise again, felt the panic rise.

I think you’ll feel sorry for him more than anything else.

I don’t know what I’ll feel.

There’ll be a lawyer with you.

Oh God.

Honestly, don’t panic. I promise. You got this.

How do you know? You haven’t met me. I might be completely useless.

Not according to my sources.

She half smiled at that.

Have you been in a court case?

There was a long pause.

Yes.

What was it?

Friendly fire.

Lissa blinked.

Did you shoot someone??

No. It was a friend of mine. A translator, working with us. Out with his friends. Some of the squaddies got a little . . . well.

He got shot.

Everyone got shot.

He deleted that last message, but it was somehow worse now that he’d deleted it; it made it clear that it had had a big impact on him. Which it had.

Lissa looked at it for a long time.

What are we like? she typed finally, adding a row of screwy-face emojis.

Cormac looked up at the gray river and smiled to himself. Suddenly in the midst of eight million people he felt incredibly close to someone very, very far away.

Eejits, he typed.

Lissa smiled to herself.

Eediats, she typed back.

And that was the moment Cormac nearly called her. He almost pressed the button. But what if he called her and she didn’t pick up? What would he do then? What if he broke the connection, ruined everything. He thought of Jake telling him he didn’t behave well with women. He thought too of Jake, who, he thought, was dating her. Oh Lord. Well. He put his phone back in his pocket so he wasn’t tempted.

He was so tempted.

Lissa stared at the screen. Maybe he would just call? Throw caution to the wind? Call and talk and tell her everything? She wondered if he sounded like Jake, with that melodious Highland accent. Maybe deeper; Jake said he was taller than him. She sighed. This was ridiculous. She was building it into something it absolutely wasn’t. The wind rustled through the trees.

But just connecting had worked somehow. He had calmed her down, made her feel better. She straightened up again, looked around her. The birds were calling, high up in the fresh bright air. Their days, she supposed, were all the same. The world was awake around her.

And it wasn’t going anywhere. The trees had been here for hundreds of years. The wood had stood through wars and great changes, but had never been uprooted. The foxes and rabbits lived their lives; the deer ran; the trout still jumped in the stream; the seals still flapped along the lochside.

For the first time Lissa started to wonder: Could she build a life here? Not with Cormac of course, that was ridiculous, they hadn’t even met, she didn’t even know what he looked like. Of course he wasn’t going to like her—how could he? It was a silly crush, that was all, a good distraction from the anxiety and the pain. Plus, she had his job.

But even without that . . . might this be a place for her? She thought of Nina’s friendly face behind the piles of books she organized so beautifully. She had found a home here. And Zoe too, even if she was trailed by what looked like six or seven children at all times and, if Lissa’s professional opinion was not mistaken, what looked like another one on the way.

They had found a place here. Could she?

She would read the letter. She would read it, and she would face up to it, and then, when the secondment was over—then she would see.

She glanced, sadly, once more at the phone. She missed him already.