Stumbling into Mischief

Fourteen

"I want the case you're working on now done by tomorrow. Understand?" Douglas asked.

"T- t- tomorrow?" Richard repeated, glancing up. "That... That isn't long enough. We need more time."

"Well, you better get to work." Douglas said with a grin, before turning and walking away.

Richard watched him go, and then looked down again. His heart was thudding hard against his chest and his ears were ringing. He didn't feel good. There was no way he'd be able to finish the case by tomorrow - it was impossible.

* * * *

Once he made it to his and Clare's office, Richard opened the door and quickly went in. He had to tell Clare what happened - he needed her to make everything okay.

"Clare?"

Clare was sitting at her desk with a laptop.

"Good morning, Mr Steel!" She chirped, looking up at him. "You'll never guess what I've just seen."

Richard looked at her for a moment. She was excited about something - his personal problems would have to wait.

"What?" He asked, wiping the sweat from his forehead.

"Well, I was having a quick look at Jessica Bailey's Facebook page, and I noticed Randle Philips is her friend."

Richard frowned. His understanding of social networking was embarrassingly little.

"What does that mean?"

"They must have known each other more than Randle said." Clare replied, glancing back down at her laptop. "Look, come here."

Richard nodded and walked over to her, looking down at the laptop.

Clare pointed to the screen. "You don't just randomly add your patients on Facebook, do you?"

"I suppose not."

"And he's on Sara's friends list, too."

Richard looked at her and frowned. "I thought he didn't like Sara?"

"That's what he said... but maybe he was lying. And, if so, we need to find out why." She paused as she looked up at him. "You look like you've seen a ghost. Are you okay?"

Richard nodded. "Mm. Yes."

Clare looked at him for a moment, and then nodded. "Well, I was thinking. We could get Randle's address from the hospital and, if you're not busy, pay him a visit after work? And then I thought we could visit Aiden together to search the house?"

Richard began to feel lightheaded again.

"A- a- after work?" Richard stuttered. He had planned to stay late and try to get the other case done - to prove to Douglas that he was still working hard. He wouldn't have time for anything else.

He couldn't handle it all.

Clare nodded. "Yes. I think we should search the house as soon as possible. We might find something useful that'll help with the investigation, and..."

Richard's ears started to ring again, muffling Clare's voice, and his head began to spin.

"Richard?"

And then everything went black.

* * * *

"Richard? Are you awake?"

He opened his eyes.

It took a moment for his vision to focus, but once it had, he saw Clare. She was standing over him, waving in his face like a lunatic.