Endless Feeling

dangerous affair

You pace a lot when your world is slowly falling apart. You are always waiting for something, your mind is always turning, and nothing can distract you from the incoming news that might shatter your world as you know it.

Harry hadn't stopped pacing since he announced they had a break in the case, and delivered confirmation that John Abbotsford was only the tip of the iceberg. There wasn't much else to do—there was no real information to discuss since Rachel had called Sullivan in to look at whatever it is that she had found. Harry didn't know anything more than that; Sullivan had refused to divulge much over the phone.

"What is taking them so long," Harry grumbled. He checked his phone for the millionth time and growled when it didn't show anything different other than the passing of time.

"Did Sullivan say where he went to meet Rachel?" That was still unclear to me. It wasn't unlike Rachel to be in the office outside of normal operating hours, but it was half nine at night, on a Saturday. Even Harry wasn't that much of a workaholic, let alone Rachel.

"No."

The length of time it was taking them to arrive at Fairway Park, suggested Rachel and Sullivan were coming from Rachel's flat on the other side of town, and not the SI offices as Harry assumed. I didn't voice the thought. It made no sense. Saturday night traffic was a logical explanation, and the one Harry was moaning about.

It was just over an hour before our phones, and home system, alerted us to someone entering the property via the front gate. Harry hadn't sat down the entire time, instead pacing and fiddling and shouting things down the phone at unsuspecting people, while I lay on the sofa and mindlessly read the latest edition of an interior design magazine I subscribed to.

"Rachel?"

The break in Harry's voice as he said Rachel's name was a knife to my heart. He wasn't a man who showed weakness to many, who let his emotional mask slip. I could count on both hands the people Harry felt safe enough to be vulnerable with. Rachel was one of those people, and from the look in her face, the feeling was mutual. To outsiders, she was Harry's executive assistant.

To those in the know, Rachel had been Harry's friend long before she worked for him. They'd been close through university and Harry counted her as another sister. She was part of the family we had created and it pained Harry to see her hurting. It hurt me too, but they had a history that made them close in a different way.

Sullivan stood on the fringes of the room, arms crossed over his chest and his brow furrowed. Rachel sniffed and wiped her nose on her sleeve. She stepped past Sullivan and ran across the room into Harry's outstretched arms. He held her close to him and whispered something to her. Rachel squeezed him tightly then let go, taking a seat on the sofa opposite me. Harry sat beside me and pulled me onto his lap.

"Things with Nate have been... strained for a while. I thought it was that I was working so much—" she cringed "—but that never really made sense because I've worked worse hours before. So has he. But I brushed it off. I think I was in denial? I didn't want to face that there might be something more to the unsettled feeling I got whenever I was around him."

Rachel kicked off her shoes and brought her knees up to her chest. I shifted to get up but she shook her head, almost imperceptibly, keeping me where I was. There was more to tell, and I got the feeling Rachel needed space to be able to get all the words out.

"There was so much going on with work and worrying about you two that it was easy to push the feelings aside and pretend everything was fine. Then I started catching Nate out in lies. He'd say he was going one place then would forget where he said he was going and would say another place when he got home or the next time we talked. Silly little things. Things that were easy to brush off.