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“Um, I met Eric a little over four years ago. I was a second-year resident at that time.”
“Second year?” Ronan interjected. “Most people your age would have still been in medical school at that time.”
“Yeah, um, I skipped a couple of grades when I was a kid. I graduated high school when I was sixteen.”
Ronan nodded.
“Eric came into the ER with a broken wrist. He’d been chasing a suspect. When he tackled the guy, he fell wrong…”
“Your ex is a cop?” I asked.
Ethan nodded. “For Metro PD…Metropolitan Police Department in D.C.” Ethan dropped his eyes again and said, “He started flirting with me, though I didn’t really realize it at the time. I was…I was kind of clueless when it came to that kind of stuff,” he said softly. “When he asked me out, I was so surprised. I told him no because I didn’t think I was allowed to date a patient. He came back the next day and asked me out again…said I wasn’t his doctor anymore.” Ethan paused before softly whispering, “He was so charming.”
Silence fell across the room and I had no doubt Ethan was remembering that day because a wistful expression fell over his face. It took him several long moments to continue.
“Things were good at first. He was patient and sweet. I wasn’t very experienced so I wanted to move slow. He did too. He said I was worth waiting for. It was three months before we even…you know,” Ethan murmured as more color flooded his face.
“Things started to go bad about a month after that. He hit me for the first time after he accused me of cheating on him. Another doctor had given me a ride home from work when I was having car trouble. I didn’t even know how Eric knew and when I asked, he hit me and told me not to try and change the subject. I was so stunned that I didn’t know what to do. He apologized the next day…told me it was just because he loved me so much and the idea of me with someone else drove him crazy. He swore he would never do it again and I believed him. I needed to believe him,” he added, his voice low.
“About six months into our relationship, Eric was involved in something pretty big. He and some other officers were providing support to the Secret Service for this rally for one of the presidential candidates running for office that year.”
I knew instantly what Ethan was talking about and what would come next because it had been big news at the time.
“Eric intercepted a guy who’d managed to get past security and was running towards the stage. He…he had a bomb strapped to his chest. Eric tackled him and kept him from detonating the bomb. It was…it was a big deal.”
“I remember that,” Ronan said softly. “It was all over the news.”
Ethan nodded. “Everybody called him a hero. And he was,” Ethan murmured. “He saved a lot of lives that day. No one…no one knew what he was really like.” I saw Ethan dash at his eyes. Even though he’d only mentioned the one violent episode, I knew he’d left countless more out.
“The press was how I found out he was married…to a woman,” Ethan said softly. “I’d had no idea. But things started to make sense after that. Why he never wanted to go out in public with me, why he rarely spent the night. I confronted him about it and told him I didn’t want to see him anymore. It…it didn’t go well for me.” Ethan fell silent for a moment before continuing.
“I found out his wife was actually his second wife. His first had died about a year after Eric married her – some kind of drowning, I guess. His second wife was named Patricia Fields and I guess she was a pretty big deal. A lawyer for the White House or something. They’d been married for three years. Patricia had a daughter from a previous marriage.”
“Lucy,” Ronan murmured.
Ethan nodded. “She told me later that Eric adopted her about a year after the marriage. Lucy’s dad died of a heart attack when she was nine. I guess Patricia was well-off – family money or something. After I found out about Patricia, Eric would talk a lot about how she never let him forget it was her money and not his. The things he said about her…” Ethan shook his head.
“Do you think he was abusing her too?” I asked.
Ethan glanced at me and shook his head. “I don’t think so. Lucy said he never laid a hand on her. They fought a lot, but for some reason, Eric never went after her like he did me.”
Yeah, because Eric had had Ethan to use as a punching bag. I had no doubt the fucker had taken every violent thought he’d had about his powerful wife and vented it on Ethan instead. A glance at Ronan told me he was thinking the same thing.
