Finding Katie

Chapter 21

Katie

The staff meeting every Friday was my favourite time of the week at the centre. Especially the item on the agenda where all the good news of the past week were shared; who had managed another week clean and who had been released to go back home to their families.

Today though, I'd barely remembered to head to the common room when the meeting started, and if anyone was to ask for the minutes of the meeting, I'd be hard pressed to give it.

I couldn't keep my attention on Vincent and what my colleagues were saying, and I only looked up when he called my name for the third time.

My boss – and everyone else around the table – was looking expectantly at me.

"Sorry," I said, my cheeks heating. "I was wool-gathering. Could you please repeat the question?"

Vincent grinned. "What's next on the agenda?"

I looked down at the paper before me. "The last item for today. The schedule for the autumn months. Lauren's asked to cut back her hours a little, and Kenneth would like a few weeks off in September."

Nodding, Vincent turned to the other side of the table, but I gave up listening to the discussion when I'd tried – and failed – for the fifth time to keep my mind from circling back to Ben.

The last three days I had done little but berate myself for the near disaster when he'd come to my flat after his trip away. What had happened had been my own fault. I had grown careless. I'd become so comfortable with him that I'd stopped being on guard, and it had made me relax more than was safe. To the point of recklessness.

How hard would it have been to return to the table and close my laptop before I'd jumped him? At the very least, I could have closed the webpage so my online bank and the status of my accounts weren't displayed so prominently on the screen for anyone to see.

It was one of those small, stupid mistakes I knew would be my downfall. I'd always been so careful to avoid them. Until Ben.

Of course, the major mistake of rushing to slam the laptop closed when he'd asked about it hadn't helped in the slightest. The man was no fool. If not seeing the balance of my bank accounts, then that sort of behaviour would make him suspicious. Of course, it would. It had.

The whole farce, all of Ben's questions, had rattled me so much that I'd kept making mistake after mistake. In the taxi, in the lift, in Ben's flat.

I still wanted to knock my head against the wall.

Which would only give me a headache and not in the slightest help me focus.

It was just that after all those years of always looking over my shoulder, always guarding my every single word, being with Ben was a liberating experience that I relished every single day I was with him. So much so that there were hours, whole days even, where I forgot all else that was happening. Everything but Ben and me.

I had never before been someone's girlfriend. Being Ben's made me want to giggle like a sixteen-year-old girl with my first crush. And then kiss him senseless.

These last three weeks were as close to a normal life as I'd had since I'd been eleven years old.

"Have a nice weekend. See you on Monday."

My head jerked up, and I belatedly replied to my colleagues as they left the common room waving. But I didn't rise. I was in no hurry to return to the reception where I would have to keep a smile on my face for all those passing by the desk.

Instead, I slowly gathered my papers, and when I was alone, fell back in the chair.

I covered my eyes with my hand. I was tired. Tired of having to once again watch my every word around Ben. Tired of being determinedly cheerful when I was anything but. Tired of knowing I was running out of time.