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‘Take your time. I’ve nowhere to be.’

Liv hesitated again.

‘He broke your wrist. Badly. But there’s more to the story than that, isn’t there?’

‘Yes.’ Liv nodded sadly and tried to answer as if she was relaying the details of a patient in a case conference. If she spoke dispassionately and as though talking about an event that happened to someone else, then maybe it would be easier. Maybe. ‘I managed to get away, but he followed me out of the room. That was when I saw he’d grabbed the scalpel out of my kit. He was in a paranoid dissociative state.’ Her professional approach failed her as her memories transported her back to those horrible few moments. ‘You know what A&E can be like at weekends.’

‘Busy.’

Liv nodded. ‘We were really full. There were so many people there. Sick, hurting and scared. We’d called security, but their office wasn’t in A&E. It took them time to get to us. There were children there, Callum. I couldn’t let him hurt them.’ Her voice cracked. ‘I couldn’t let him hurt anyone. I was the nearest person to him, and I don’t think anyone else had realised what was going on. It was all so fast. I tried to get the blade away from him, to protect my patients. I couldn’t let them get hurt.’ Tears streamed freely down Liv’s face, and she stared up at the ceiling, trying to compose herself.

Callum replaced her cup with a tissue, but didn’t interrupt her.

Liv wiped away the worst of her tears, and squashed the tissues in her fist, wishing she could crush all the pain, and damage, as easily as damp tissue. She forced herself to continue. ‘So I put myself between him and my patients. I didn’t have any choice. I couldn’t let him hurt anyone else. He . . .’ She took a few deep breaths as she paused to remind herself that she was safe in her living room with Callum by her side, and that the man who’d hurt her was just a sick patient, not a bogeyman who would reappear by some nightmare magic if she spoke his name. ‘He stabbed me with my own scalpel. More than once. The first few hits were minor flesh wounds — painful but not life threatening. But the last one . . .’

‘It was worse?’ Callum’s face was impassive, his voice flat with enforced calm.

Liv nodded as she shifted in her seat to lift the hem of her hoody and tug down the waistband of her trousers to reveal the puckered skin beneath. Callum sucked in a gasp through his teeth, the breath whistling in sympathy.

‘As you can see, he caught me in the lower abdomen. The scalpel went in deep, and the bleeding and damage was profuse. The surgeons did their best — of course they did — they were working on one of their own, but they had to remove the ovary on that side, and the scarring internally is worse than externally. They saved my life, and I’m incredibly grateful for that, but they couldn’t save the future I’d planned.’

‘It compromised your fertility.’

Liv nodded, although it wasn’t really a question. ‘Hormonal shock. I’ve not had a menstrual cycle since.’ She held up her hand when Callum went to interrupt. ‘I know, I’ve still got one ovary left, and it’s only been a few months, but the scarring is extensive, and like I said, my cycles seem to have stopped completely. Even if I were in a position to want to conceive anymore, I probably couldn’t, and my chances of carrying a baby to term are low because of uterine scarring.’ Her voice broke as the truth poured out of her, and the tears rampaged down her cheeks again. ‘He took it all. My life, my home, my relationship, my future family. My sense of safety and sanity. He stole it all.’

* * *

Callum stared at Liv in horrified wonder — injured and scared for her own safety, she had still put the wellbeing of total strangers above her own, and had paid a terrible price. Yet still, every day she came into the surgery with a smile, cared for his patients and his community as if they were her own, and was one of the most kind and positive people he knew. She looked after Sarah without appearing to hold back, despite how difficult it must have been to care for someone else’s child so soon after learning she might never be able to have any of her own.

Though Sarah’s entry to the world had hardly been ideal, Callum couldn’t imagine a life without being a father, and his heart broke for Liv.

‘I wish you wouldn’t look at me like that,’ she mumbled from behind a curtain of hair.

‘Like what?’

‘Like I’m broken.’

Callum reached out to her in desperation to make her understand, brushed her hair from her face and tilted her chin to make her look at him. ‘Look again, Liv. I’m not thinking that at all. I’m thinking you’re one of the most amazing people I know.’

She snorted in response, shaking her head and breaking his hold and gaze. ‘I’m nothing special.’

‘The fact you don’t see how special you are, makes you even more special, Liv.’ He told her honestly, amazed that she thought any different.

‘I’m not special at all.’ She shoved away his concern and his touch as she leapt to her feet. ‘I’m a screwed-up, damaged, unlovable mess. You’re an idiot if you can’t see that, and if you’re not an idiot, then you’re a liar!’

Callum gasped in shock, completely taken aback by her anger.

‘Liv, I don’t understand.’

‘What is there to understand?’ Liv whirled on him angrily. ‘I’m ruined, Callum! Broken and unworthy of love. I suspected it my whole life, and now I know it’s true.’ She hung her head and wrapped her arms tightly around her own waist, as if trying to comfort herself as sobs wracked her body.

He didn’t even think before he seized hold of her shoulders. ‘Why would you say that, Liv?’

‘Because it’s true.’ She sniffed. ‘Everyone leaves me.’

He pulled her into a rough hug. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’

‘No, but I am. Your parents will come back, they won’t need me anymore, and I’ll just be cast to the wind. Again.’ She shook her head, overwhelmed by tears.