‘I don’t care,’ she said as she got to her feet. ‘If I so much as look at a man with a view to dating him, I’m going to donate a thousand dollars to the hospital research foundation … no, make that five thousand dollars. That should make me think twice before I fall into the same trap again.’
‘Wow, that’s a lot of money,’ Rhiannon said.
Georgie set her shoulders determinedly. ‘I know, but it’ll be worth it to prove to myself that I can do it. I’m also going to pay my father back for the apartment.’
‘But why? I mean, it was a present, wasn’t it?’ Rhiannon asked.
‘That’s not the point,’ Georgie said. ‘It’s time I stood on my own two feet. It won’t hurt me to pay my own way for once.’
Irene Clark, the head nurse on the unit, pulled Georgie to one side when she came to the ward the next morning. ‘Ben asked me to tell you to meet him in his office,’ she said. ‘I think it’s about you being transferred to another unit.’
Georgie had been expecting it so it didn’t really come as much of a shock. She had considered asking for it herself but didn’t want him to think she had any qualms about working with him. ‘I’ll go down now,’ she said.
Ben picked up the thick wad of faxed results he had received and subsequently copied and sent to the police working on the investigation into Marianne Tander’s accident. He’d not long finished speaking to the investigating officer who had filled him in on the background.
As much as Ben didn’t want to see Georgie face to face, he thought she should be the first to know her suspicions had been correct after all.
Her heard her knock and called for her to come in, getting to his feet as she entered the room.
‘You wanted to see me?’ she said, nervously shifting from one foot to the other.
He frowned and noticed for the first time how red and bloodshot her eyes were. ‘Have you been crying?’ he asked.
‘No,’ she answered as her eyes moved away from his.
‘I thought you should know you were right about Marianne Tander’s injury,’ he said into the tight silence.
Her eyes came back to his. ‘Oh?’
‘I researched her medical history,’ he informed her. ‘She has metastastic disease. She’s been having chemotherapy for ovarian cancer. I confronted the husband this morning. It appears she and Jonathon made a pact. She made him promise that if she lived past Christmas, he was to help her die.’
Georgie put her hand to her throat. ‘What?’
He gave her a grim look. ‘The plan was for her to take a dose of Valium and he would place a pillow over her face, but at the last minute he couldn’t go through with it. I suspect the only reason he agreed to do it in the first place was that he didn’t think she would last past Christmas, but she did and her suffering intensified to the point where she took matters into her own hands.’
Georgie’s brow furrowed even further. ‘So what happened?’
‘Marianne Tander couldn’t walk without assistance but the morning of the accident she somehow dragged herself to the staircase in their house and threw herself down just as Mr Tander was coming out of the bathroom. He couldn’t get to her in time to stop her.’
‘Oh, my God … the head wound was from the fall, right?’
He nodded. ‘Mr Tander carried her out to his car and was on his way to the nearest hospital when due to his distraught state and the slippery conditions he briefly lost concentration and ran into the tree. When the police and ambulance arrived he panicked, wondering if they would accuse him of pushing her down the stairs, so on the spur of the moment made up the story about the other car. And, of course, luck was on his side as the roads were wet that morning and the police had been inundated with callouts to other accidents. There were no skid marks to verify his version of events. Apparently single-vehicle accidents are not always investigated unless there are concerns over injuries or death.’
Georgie sank to the chair opposite his desk. ‘So what will happen to him? Mr Tander, I mean. Will he be charged?’
He let out a sigh as he pushed the results to one side. ‘I’m not sure what charges if any will be laid,’ he said. ‘Marianne is going downhill fast. I don’t think she’ll see the week out. The cancer is so widespread I’m surprised she hasn’t already gone into organ failure.’
Georgie chewed at her bottom lip for a moment. ‘He really loves her.’
‘Yes, he really does.’
‘I was thinking about what he said when he cornered me that day,’ she said. ‘He said she’d suffered enough. Do you remember?’
He nodded. ‘That’s why I thought I’d run a check through the labs.’
Another silence tightened the air.
Georgie ran her tongue across her lips. ‘Ben, I think I should tell you I overheard you and Leila discussing your relationship the other morning. I know I shouldn’t have been eavesdropping at such a private moment but—’