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She swallowed and looked him in the eye. ‘How can I help you, Alex?’ The words were automatic. It was all she could manage right now.
He looked around. ‘Is there somewhere we can talk?’
She nodded and gestured with her arm for him to walk down the corridor, stopped at a door, pulled a key from her pocket and unlocked the door.
Her office. It even had her name on the door: ‘Ruby Wetherspoon, Head of Speech and Language’. She’d done well. Most days she was proud. Today she had no idea how she felt.
The office was small, but neat and tidy. She pointed to a chair and invited him to sit. It was almost a relief to sit at the other side of the desk and have the heavy wooden structure between them.
‘How exactly do you think I can be of assistance to you, Alex?’
Her words were formal, her professional façade slipping back into place. The juggling of the cards on the table-top was the only sign of her nerves. She hoped he wouldn’t notice.
‘It’s not me. It’s my daughter Annabelle. She’s three years old now and she isn’t speaking.’
Ruby nodded automatically. His daughter. Of course. Why else would be come to her?
She had this sort of conversation every day. This one wouldn’t be much different.
‘Three years old is still an acceptable age for speech development. All children develop at a different rate. Some children have a delay in their speech and language development. Have you had her hearing checked?’
He sighed. She was going back to basics—which was the correct thing for a health professional. But she could tell from his expression he’d heard it all before.
‘I’ve had ten different professional opinions on Annabelle. The latest of which is selective mutism. Her hearing is fine. Her comprehension is fine. She doesn’t seem to want to speak.’
She could feel herself bristle. Ten assessments on a child? Talk about overkill. Why not just let her develop at her own pace? She tried to be pragmatic.
‘How does she communicate with those around her?’
‘She signs.’
Ruby was surprised. ‘Proper signing?’
He nodded. ‘We have a member of staff who’s deaf. She’s been able to sign since she was young.’
It wasn’t particularly unusual in children who were deaf, or in children who had deaf siblings. But it was unusual in a child who could apparently hear and speak.
She lifted her hands. ‘Then maybe she thinks that’s normal?’
He shook his head.
It was time to ask some more questions.
‘Has Annabelle ever spoken? Ever said a few words?’
‘Only on a few select occasions.’
Strange... Ruby couldn’t help but be a little curious. Selective mutism was certainly unusual but she’d dealt with a few cases before. She’d even published some professional papers on it.
Ruby lowered her voice. ‘Does she speak to you, Alex?’
The question was straight to the heart of the matter. It was a natural question for any health professional, but she saw him recoil. She’d seen this before. He felt this was his fault. She’d dealt with lots of parents who felt guilty about whatever issue their child had. Most of the time it was just hard luck. Genetics. A developmental delay. A head injury or similar accident.
She asked the most practical question. ‘Does Annabelle have anything significant in her medical history?’
‘No. Nothing.’
They sat in silence for a few seconds. She couldn’t take it. She couldn’t take it a second longer. Her professional façade was slipping. After all this time—just to turn up like this and expect her to help him—just because he asked? Did she have mug stamped across her forehead?
She couldn’t even acknowledge the flutters in her stomach. She couldn’t even explain her feeling when she’d heard his voice and turned to see him again after all this time. It had been like a sucker punch.
It was time to stop being so polite.
Ruby leaned back in her chair. ‘I don’t get it, Alex. After all this time, why come to me? Why come here? You must have plenty of people in Euronia willing to help with your daughter.’
His brow was lined with deep furrows that marred his handsome face. It made her feel self-conscious. She only had the lightest dusting of make-up on, to emphasise her brown eyes and pink lips. How much had she changed in the last ten years? Would he be disappointed by what he saw?
Why was he here? Why, after all this time, had he been convinced that this was the right thing to do?
‘I want to feel as if I’ve tried everything possible for Annabelle. I haven’t had faith in any of the people who have seen her and assessed her. And, whilst the latest diagnosis seems reasonable, I’m not happy at the treatment plan for Annabelle.’
Maybe that’s because you should have left her alone to be a normal toddler. Ruby was still imagining what ten assessments had done to that poor child. But she couldn’t say those words out loud.
It was difficult. This was Alex, her mysterious Frenchman—who wasn’t a Frenchman after all. She’d never thought she’d come into contact with him for work. She never thought she’d come into contact with him again.
‘What is the treatment plan for Annabelle?’
He pushed a folder he’d been carrying across the desk towards her. She opened it and scanned it quickly. Whilst the assessment might have been thorough, she didn’t agree at all with what was in the plan, or with the conclusions it had already surmised.
Ever the professional, she raised her head and selected her words carefully. ‘Every professional will have a different idea of the correct plan for your daughter. It’s not really my place to disagree.’
He pointed to the file. ‘What would you do?’
She opened her mouth automatically to speak, then closed it again. ‘What does it matter?’
‘Because I’d like you to come to Euronia and assess Annabelle for yourself. I’d like you to be the one to plan her care and treat her.’
He might as well have dumped a bucket of ice-cold water over her head. She was stunned. ‘That’s impossible.’
‘No. It’s not. I know you have a job here, and patients, but I’ve offered your Director of Services a generous annual bequest if you’ll agree to come and work for me—for Annabelle,’ he added quickly.
‘What?’ She stood up, the chair behind her flying backwards. ‘You’ve done what?’
She couldn’t believe her ears. The tiny glimmer of hope that he’d searched her out for any reason other than his daughter died in an instant. He might be a prince in another country, but he didn’t seem much like a prince to her now.
‘And you did that without speaking to me first?’ She walked around the desk, reached down, and grabbed hold of his jacket, pulling him to his feet. ‘How dare you, Alex? How dare you? Ten years later you think you can just walk into my life and buy me?’
Anger and the untold resentment that had festered for ten years came spilling out. This wasn’t her. She never acted like this. But she just couldn’t help it.
She shook her head fiercely, blazing with fury. ‘You can’t buy me, Alex. I’m not for sale.’ She held out one hand. ‘I have a job. Responsibilities. I have staff to take care of—patients to take care of.’
She stared at her other hand, still gripping tightly to the lapel of his jacket. What on earth was she doing? Her knuckles were white and she quickly loosened her grip and took a step backwards. Her heart was thudding in her chest. Her head was thumping.
‘And you could do it better if you had two more permanent members of staff.’ He cut her off before she had more time to think about it.
Her mouth fell open. ‘What?’
‘That’s what I promised your director. Permanent funding for two more members of
staff if they’ll release you to work with Annabelle. Plus filling your post while you’re gone.’
Her brain was whizzing. Two more members of staff could make a world of difference to this place. Time. It would give her staff time. The one thing she couldn’t conjure up for them.
She hated rushing assessments. She hated not having enough time to allocate to the children who needed her. She hated having to turn children away because there just wasn’t enough space for any more patients. Two more members of staff was a luxury she couldn’t afford to ignore.
‘Why on earth would you do this?’
He sat back down in his seat and put his head in his hands.
She’d read about everything that had happened to him in the last ten years. Now here he was, right in front of her, and she actually felt sorry for him.
She started shaking her head. ‘It feels like blackmail, Alex. I haven’t seen you in ten years. Ten years! Not a word from you—nothing. And now this.’ She started pacing around the small office. ‘I know what happened to your father. The whole world knows. But you never contacted me. You never said anything. I was left sitting in that hotel for two days, wondering if I’d imagined everything. Thank goodness Polly dragged me out and about.’
His head shot up. ‘I did contact you. I sent a message.’
‘I never got any message!’ She was still angry.
