Chapter 37 Now

I press against the door, barely breathing. What the hell is going on out there? My grip tightens on the knob, but I don't dare twist it. Not yet.

After a long moment, Gabriel adds, "Answer me, goddamn it! Why are you following me again?"

Rebecca is silent.

I'm so lost. Following… again? Why would my patient be following him? I feel like I might jump out of my skin as I wait for more, but there's nothing. Long seconds tick by. The anxiety inside me builds and builds. What if she's not saying anything because his hands are around her throat? What if he's snapped? After all, it's clear I don't know the real Gabriel. But this is my office, Rebecca is my patient, and I need to protect her.

I can't wait any longer. I swing the door wide. "What's going on out here?" I try to summon all my doctorly authority, but it falls flat. The two of them don't even look my way. Gabriel and Rebecca are standing four or five feet apart, glaring at one another, almost like they didn't notice my arrival.

"Don't you get it?" Rebecca says. Her hands go wild, gesturing. "We can be together now. You're finally free. You can tell me everything you couldn't tell anyone else, the way you used to. I've missed you. I keep trying to get ahold of you, but…" Her chin wobbles.

Gabriel growls. Actually growls. "Get the fuck out of my life! It's your fault they're dead!"

Silence fills the space again. Without warning, Rebecca sobs and runs out of the office. I watch her go, my mind spinning, trying to make sense of the situation playing out before me.

Before I can say anything—or ask Gabriel to leave—he turns and locks eyes with me. My stomach swims, seeing the fury behind his gaze.

"What kind of sick game are you playing?" he demands.

"What?"

"You won't answer my calls, you won't answer my messages. I come to see you, and she's here?"

I hesitate, because I don't want to violate doctor-patient privacy. It's not my place to say Rebecca is a patient. Except she said so, didn't she?

"I don't understand what's happening." I swallow. I'm still shaking. I want him to leave, but I'm also curious. "How do you know Rebecca?"

"She's the woman who ruined my life. Who destroyed it. We were… together." He hangs his head. "It wasn't my wife who was the cheater. It was me. But it was a mistake, and I tried to fix it. I ended things with her." He gestures to the door. "Rebecca. She refused to accept it was over. I wouldn't see her. I refused to talk to her. Then one night, she came to the house and told my wife everything. Ellen left. She took my daughter and ran out, and"—he exhales, a shuddering breath—"the next thing I knew, they'd been hit, killed instantly by a drunk driver."

The aggression on his face fades to desperation. Grief drips from each word, from the beaten-down positioning of his body. He extends one arm to press against the doorframe, almost as though he can't keep himself upright.

The reality of it all leaves me stunned. I drop into Sarah's chair.

"She was your girlfriend…" I trail off.

At his nod, I think back to Rebecca talking about her ex-boyfriend. The one she wanted back, the one she compared every other man to. Was that Gabriel?

"I had no idea." I shake my head. "She came in one day and made an appointment, and I had no reason to believe she was anything but a patient. She never asked about you or anything." I stop talking, because I'm dangerously close to breaching patient confidentiality. "I'm sorry," I add.

"When did you start seeing her?" he asks.

I think back, gulp when I realize the timing. "Not long after you first came in."

I expect him to go. To take himself and his grief outside. I certainly can't be the one to help him, not after everything. But he just keeps talking, like we're in session.

"She destroyed my life. One thing at a time. When I ended it—she had been my student, but not when we were dating, before." He slides down the wall to sit on the floor, knees up, hands hanging helplessly over them. "When I ended it, she went to the other professors. My peers, my boss. She told them everything. I nearly lost my job. But she's of age, and I wasn't her professor at the time. Everything was always consensual. Then she started following me." He shakes his head. "I'd thought she stopped, but she must've followed me here."

Following him. Like I had.

My throat clenches, and I want to tell him to stop—to leave, because I don't want to know. I don't want it made any clearer to me how wrong I was all this time. But he just keeps talking.

"It got out of control. I threatened to go to the police. And for a little while I thought she finally understood things were over. But then she came to me at work, sobbing in my office about how much she missed me. She started to undress, and I said no. And that's…" He pauses to take a deep breath. "That's the night they died. The night she ruined my life. My wife would have never been out walking around that night if Rebecca hadn't told her what we did."

"I'm so sorry." Useless words. I say them anyway, because I don't know what else to offer.

Gabriel looks up, meets my eyes from across the room. "And that's how it happened. That's how my family ended up being killed by your husband."

I gasp. He knows. He's known all along, and now I know it for certain.

Gabriel lowers his gaze to the floor, shakes his head, and climbs to his feet like it takes great effort.

"Goodbye, Meredith." He walks out the door, leaving it open behind him.