‘Well, that’s all I know.’ Dora gave a worried sigh. ‘Poor Galen. From the sound of things, I don’t think it will be very long.’
Oh, no...
Vividly she recalled him standing at the door, smiling, pleased to see that his grandmother had eaten, and then...
And then it had become all aboutRoula, Roula, Roula. Dealing with her stuff when there should surely have been a moment for his.
He’d asked her to go for a drink.
He had actually been asking to speak with her...
Damn!
‘Galen?’ She knocked on the open glass door. He didn’t look up. ‘I just heard about Yaya.’
‘It’s fine.’
‘Clearly it’s not. Galen, it never entered my head that you’d been through a difficult meeting. It should have...she’s so frail. I just wasn’t thinking straight.’
‘Of course not.’ He let out a breath. ‘Nor was I.’
‘They’d just told you?’
‘No,’ Galen said.
‘I’m not with you...’
He relented a touch. ‘I kind of told them.’
‘Oh.’ She waited for details, but none were forthcoming. ‘What did you say?’
‘Roula...’ he was very direct ‘...we can’t talk about you, correct?’
She nodded.
‘Yet you feel we can talk about me?’
‘I’m your PA.’
‘Till Friday.’
‘Galen—’ she started.
‘Save it for the sympathy card, Roula...’ He glanced up. ‘Airmail, I presume?’
The bite to his tone had her breath catching.
‘When do you fly?’ he asked.
‘Monday.’
His phone buzzed then. ‘If you’ll excuse me? I need to take this.’
It wasn’t a great week.
There was just a pall of sadness in the gleaming space—and him saying, no, he did not need more fava soup, nor any of her endless offers to bring in food.
Her last day was as flat as Kristina’s had been.