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She crossed the road behind him, bewilderment beginning to mute the excitement of the chase. Careful to stay far enough outside the double doors not to trigger the opening mechanism, she watched as a male nurse in a blue uniform arrived to greet Trey in the lobby. The older man touched Trey’s arm, the gesture consoling.
Trey followed the nurse through another set of sliding doors to the right of the reception desk.
The last of Lizzie’s exhilaration collapsed as she read the sign above the frosted glass door that slid closed behind him.
St John’s Hospice.
She could have gone home. She could have pretended not to know what she now did. But she sat in the corner café by the tube station instead, nursing one cappuccino for over an hour—and getting increasingly pissed-off looks from the guy behind the counter—while waiting for Trey to reappear.
When he finally did, instead of heading into the tube station he walked past the café and carried on going down the main road. Tuning out the angry shout from the counter guy when he realised she’d left only a ten-pence tip, Lizzie sped out of the café, intending to catch up with Trey—and say … what?
How did you explain you’d followed someone for close to an hour, then hung around waiting for them to come out of a hospice? Without sounding like a psychopath? Somehow she didn’t think saying she’d been a massive fan of Kim Possible when she was twelve was going to cut it.
She was out of breath, and still hadn’t come up with a believable excuse, fifteen minutes later as she followed Trey through Hanover Gate into Regent’s Park. The manicured grassland, leafy trees and elegant pathways opened up like an oasis in the midst of the city’s traffic-choked streets. Not too busy on a weekday at noon, the boating lake at the north end of the park had only a few aimless pedaloes on it manned by easily amused tourists.
Trey wound his way through the empty rows of deck chairs that faced the lake. And sat down in one. She watched him pay the required fee to the hovering deck-chair attendant.
She hesitated several rows behind him. Now he was static, there could be no more excuses.
Still, she approached slowly, noticing the defeated stoop of his shoulders. He thrust shaking fingers through his cropped hair and spent a long moment holding his head in his hands.
She stopped, feeling like an interloper. Intruding on his despair, his personal secrets. Who had he been visiting in the hospice?
Whoever they were, they must be really important to him.
The peacefulness of the park made the bump-bump-bump of her pulse seem deafening.
Whatever he was going through, and from the hunched posture, the weary body language, she could see it was a lot. She didn’t want to add to it, but she couldn’t just walk away, either. Because that would make her a coward, and a liar, as well as a stalker.
‘Trey,’ she murmured, not wanting to startle him. His head jerked round anyway.
‘Lizzie?’ He sounded unsure, as if she might be an apparition.
I wish.
‘Hi, can I join you?’
‘Yes.’ He indicated the deck chair next to his, still frowning, but then his lips lifted in a quizzical smile. ‘I didn’t know you came to Regent’s Park to jog.’ His eyebrows popped up. ‘You didn’t jog all the way here, did you?’
She pushed out an unconvincing laugh. ‘Not exactly.’ She took the seat next to his, brutally aware of the strain in his expression and the puzzled half-smile. A smile that was about to disappear when he discovered what she’d done.
She perched gingerly on the deck chair’s crossbar.
Not all about you, remember.
He glanced past her, as if expecting to find a reason for her sudden appearance. ‘Then how come you’re …?’
‘I followed you here.’
His gaze snapped back, the half-smile disappearing on cue. ‘You … I don’t get it.’
‘If it’s any consolation, neither do I.’
‘Where did you follow me from?’
The tone was still bemused rather than annoyed. But she didn’t kid herself it would stay that way.
‘From outside Aldo’s school, when you dropped him off. I’ve been following you all morning.’
