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He was a big fan of hugs.

Chapter 8

Piper sat in the bunk room a full twenty minutes after Emmett left, straining to hold apart the conflicting emotions within her. Humiliation and resentment gripped her atria, the upper chambers of her heart, and warmth and love had a firm hold of her ventricles, the lower chambers. Heath on one side and Emmett on the other, in the ultimate tug of war. It wasn’t a battle of which way she wanted to sway, but of the guilt from being unable to understand which emotion she should be feeling.

She was sure she should be sinking into the humiliation of the phone call and rehashing every embarrassing morsel of her reason for being in Rush Creek to Emmett. Instead, the comfort of his hug, the thrill of her body held against his, the smell of cedarwood and gingerbread washing over her, had her forgetting why she was upset in the first place. She was so pathetic.

Piper shut the door to her locker and hoisted the strap of her shoulder bag higher. She was really looking forward to that bubble bath. Peeking out the door, she sighed with relief when the main waiting area was clear of people and rushed out the front doors. It was well into evening and the nurses on shift would be settling the people from the emergency department into the main ward. Or they could be attending to anyone Emmett and Stef could be bringing back in from the callout.

‘About time you came out.’

Piper jumped like an Olympic pole vaulter as Maddie pushed off the wall, her bag over her shoulder. ‘Why haven’t you gone home?’

‘Because I heard my choir buddy wig out at an ex-boyfriend on the phone and my superpower just happens to be waiting until she’s finished burying her head in the sand to talk to me about it.’

Piper gave a small laugh. ‘That’s some superpower. Do you want the shortened version, which I’m sure Emmett would’ve preferred?’

‘Hit me with it.’

Maddie fell into step beside her as Piper walked towards the car park. ‘My ex-partner is a surgeon at the Sydney hospital I used to work at, and I left him to run all the way up here because he’s been stood down from the hospital, under investigation for stealing medication to feed an opioid addiction, which I embarrassingly didn’t find out about until after it had happened.’

To Maddie’s credit, the only reaction was the bounce of her head that Piper caught out the corner of her eye. ‘Makes sense why you don’t want to talk to him.’

Piper wanted to sigh at the lack of judgement in her friend’s voice, reinforcing her move to Rush Creek as the right one. ‘He said on the phone that he wants to fight for us. There’s no us left to fight for.’

‘But his phone call still upset you?’

‘I’m trying to shut the door on that part of my life but it’s like he keeps sticking his foot out. I guess I feel a lot of guilt for not standing by him. I fell out of love with him a long time ago.’

Maddie remained silent as they reached the car park. Piper’s breath came a little easier at the sight of Connie. She stuck the key in the passenger door to unlock it and threw her bag on the seat. Maddie leaned against the sliding door.

‘Look, I might regret saying this, but maybe you should talk to him? On your own terms. To give yourself some closure from the guilt. I can be with you when you do, if you want.’

‘Maybe.’ Piper’s shoulder jerked up in a shrug, letting the idea marinate for a few seconds. ‘Maybe I should hear him out, so he’ll stop calling.’

‘It can’t hurt. And if it does start hurting, I’ll help you hang up on him, then we’ll block his number. There’s obviously a reason you haven’t blocked him yet.’

It hadn’t ever occurred to her. What did that say about her and her choices? ‘Okay,’ she said before she could overthink it. ‘If you’re really happy to be there with me.’

‘Let’s do it.’ She nodded at Connie. ‘Wanna open her up and we’ll call from inside?’

‘You want me to speak to him here? In a car park?’

‘You got anywhere better to speak to your ex-boyfriend?’ Well, when she put it that way.

Piper opened Connie up, flicking the fan on with the fairy lights. The van was more than a little stuffy from being locked up in the hot afternoon sun but bearable with the breeze coming through the open door. Maddie bounced up onto the bed with a proclamation of ‘cool’ and Piper perched on the edge as if ready to leg it out of the Kombi and throw her phone down the hill.

‘Just do it,’ Maddie said, wriggling around and making herself right at home. ‘The more you put it off, the harder it’ll be.’

With a deep breath, Piper pressed the call icon next to Heath’s name and placed it on speaker, holding the phone out between her and Maddie.

‘Piper?’ The desperation in his voice made her cringe. ‘Is it you?’

‘Yes, it’s me,’ she snapped. ‘You wanted to talk, Heath, so talk. I’m giving you five minutes then you’re going to listen to me.’

Maddie’s raised eyebrows and nod said she was impressed with the firm boundaries Piper was putting in place. She wished she knew where they’d come from.

‘Five minutes? After nearly three years together, that’s all you’re going to give me?’