Page 346 of The Doctors Will See You Now

My heart shattered. Try as I might, I couldn’t come up with another option. My problems were tangible. Her explanation wasn’t.

“Miss, you need to leave,” the officer said to me. “We have to lock up Mr. Shepard’s apartment.”

I looked up from my defeated spot on the floor, following the lines of his black shoes to his black pants to his badge until I met his neutral gaze and just stared at him or through him or at nothing at all. I wasn’t even sure.

My world focus had tunneled to misery. In the blink of an eye, I felt like my entire life had changed. I’d gone from on top of the world—in a loving and happy relationship with everything to look forward to—to the scary, darkened depths of hell.

And that was just me. Not Scott. No. He was in a worse place than hell. He’d been accused of some of the most horrendous things inside of an article with my fucking name on it, and subsequently, taken into custody for questioning. To an outsider, it looked like I’d accused my boyfriend of charges that spanned the gamut—some of the worst being sexual misconduct and insurance fraud.

What a fucking mess.

Everything had fallen apart, and the cruelest part of all was that I didn’t understand the why or the how. Why would someone do something like this to Scott? And more importantly, who would do something like this?

Whomever it was, I hated them. They’d ruined his career, his fucking life—under the guise of my name—and because of that, they’d ruined us. I’d tried to tell him that I hadn’t written that column, but the uncertainty in his eyes said more than his words could. He was torn, and from the looks of it, he didn’t know what or whom to believe—including me.

Even though it hurt like a motherfucker, I couldn’t blame him. I mean, my name was on that column. I’d told him I was writing a column about him. And the column had even come from my goddamn email! It all looked really fucking bad, and everything pointed directly to me.

It looked like I’d ruined his life, and that I’d done it consciously and without any regard for him or his feelings. Like I’d put my joke of a career as a gossip columnist before him.

Fuck.

A quiet sob wracked my body and when visions of Scott being escorted out by the police filled my head, what should have been fresh tears dripping from my eyes came out as nothing. I’d cried more in the past two hours than I’d probably cried my whole life, and it showed. I’d literally run out of tears.

“Miss?” the officer addressed me again. “Is there anyone you can call to come get you?”

There was probably someone I could call, but I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to see anyone or talk to anyone. I just wanted to go to bed and make this day disappear.

“Miss?” he urged again, and I shook my head.

“No. There’s no one,” I said and slowly got to my feet. “I’ll be fine. I’m leaving.”

“Are you sure?” he asked and I nodded.

With my head down and my shoulders sagging forward, I walked toward the elevator. I didn’t know where I was going, but I knew I needed to get the fuck out of Scott’s apartment or else the police were going to end up escorting me out, too.

Plus, I was probably the last person he wanted to see greeting him at the door when he got home.

If he even gets to come back home…

Fuck. What if they kept him in custody? What if he got charged for those false accusations?

Another sob wracked my body, and it took all of my strength to move on to the elevator and hit the button for the lobby. Once the doors shut, I let my head fall back against the wall with a quiet thud and sighed.

I had to focus on something else besides breaking down. Now was not the time to lose myself to my emotions. I owed at least that much to Scott.

As the elevator doors opened, my eyes were assaulted with the flashes of cameras. Outside of the lobby doors of Scott’s apartment stood what felt like a hundred paparazzi snapping pictures and ready to pounce on anyone who left his building.

God, this was bad.

I took a deep breath, and with a hand covering my eyes, I walked outside and faced the media music. Immediately, voices called my name from every direction while the flash and click of cameras filled the air.

“Harlow! It’s Harlow Paige!”

“Harlow, over here!”

“Why did you write the article?”

“Did you fake your relationship with Scott?”