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A day of chasing a false lead had left Ellie feeling drained. As much as she tried to rise above the hopelessness growing within her, every fruitless day of investigating was another step closer to her letting it swallow her.
She turned the corner and the station came into view. There were the usual familiar faces milling around, but also a couple of strangers. Protecting this community was what she joined law enforcement to do. Everyone from the old man taking the stairs one at a time to the teenage girl on her phone in the middle of them needed her. She couldn’t let a few bad days get the better of her.
With a new sense of purpose, she headed up the steps, only to pause after passing the young girl she’d noticed earlier. She’d seen it before, people lingering outside the station. Despite all the community outreach programmes, people were sometimes uncertain about how to approach the police and how they would be treated. Maybe it was the case, or maybe it was her maternal instincts, but something made her stop besides the girl.
After all, if there was one thing she was good at, it was being friendly.
“You okay there?” she asked brightly.
The girl didn’t look up from her phone. “Fine.”
“Are you waiting for someone?”
“Yeah.”
“You can wait inside if you want. It’s Russell on the desk today. He makes the best tea. I'll see if he can find you a choccie biccie as well.”
Ellie waited for the girl to respond as her smile became gradually more frozen in place. She nearly sagged with relief when the girl made eye contact with her even if she looked annoyed.
“What?”
“You don’t have to wait out in the wind if you don’t want to,” Ellie reiterated.
The girl was giving her a blank look as though she wasn’t used to strangers showing her kindness. Judging by her accent she wasn’t local. Or maybe this was a typical teenage reaction to someone over thirty trying to engage them in conversation.
“Look,” Ellie said, climbing down a few steps so she was more on the girl’s level, “I know police stations can be intimidating but we’re not all bad. Promise.”
Something about the disbelieving smirk on the girl’s face made Ellie think she’d missed a joke. It was unsettling, not quite knowing if she was on the same page.
“Really?” the girl replied with barely contained laughter.
Ellie searched the girl’s eyes for any indication that her belligerence was covering any hurt, but she couldn’t find any. She had half a mind to tell her not to be so bloody rude, but she’d learnt over the last few years that sometimes even the most damaged of people could be the best actors when they needed to be.
The cold eyes of Ricky Gillespie swam to the forefront of her mind. Years later, she wasn’t sure if she’d remembered them being much worse than they actually were. Either way, they still haunted her.
At least she’d never truly trusted Claire.
“I’m just saying you don’t have to sit out here on your own.”
The phone in the girl’s hand beeped, and she turned her attention back to it. “I like being on my own.”
Knowing from Tom that she had no hope of winning her back now, Ellie flashed the girl a quick smile that she didn’t see and headed back to the station. “Suit yourself,” she grumbled. When she reached the glass doors of the entrance, she glanced back and saw the girl hadn’t looked up from her phone.
Just as she was thinking how the girl was possibly the rudest person she had encountered all week - which was saying something given her profession - she nearly walked straight into the person that usually held the title.
“Miller, where have you been?” Hardy didn’t notice her shock at nearly being barrelled over by him or stop for a reply. “Have you spoken to SOCO yet?”
“No, I’ve been talking to-”
“Seriously?” He pulled out his phone and stormed towards the doors. “Some DI you’re shaping up to be.”
“Oi!” Ellie yelled after him but he was already out in the wind, his voice still audible through the glass and gale. “Wanker.”
“You gonna let him get away with that, ma’am?” asked Russell on the desk. By the looks of things he’d stopped writing mid-sentence to watch their altercation.
“Course not,” she scoffed. “Next time I see him I’ll kick him in the balls.”
Russell blinked and went back to his paperwork, clearly unsure whether she was joking or not.
Ellie wasn’t sure if she was either. Although later she was definitely going to give him a bollocking in front of as many of the team as she could gather without it seeming suspicious.
Still tempted to yell at him even if he was on the phone to SOCO, she peered out to see if he was still in the courtyard and was surprised to see he’d stopped to talk to the rude girl outside. Although, it looked as though the girl had learnt some manners in the minute since Ellie had spoken to her and was stood next to Hardy, smiling as she spoke with him.
Her jaw nearly hit the floor when she saw her stand up on tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek.
Suddenly the lack of social niceties and even that maddening smirk made a lot more sense.
“Daisy,” she breathed.
“Sorry?” Russell said, but Ellie didn’t reply. Hardy was smiling down at his daughter and something twisted in her stomach. She hurriedly punched in the code to let her through the door into the main station, hoping to put distance between herself, Hardy and whatever her reaction to him smiling was.