A Gift to Remember by Melissa Hill

revoked.’
    She smiled. ‘I know – you’re not a dog person, I get it. I suppose I’ll just have to take him round the Emergency Room with me.’
    ‘The good workers in the ER aren’t exactly dog people either, sweetie – they’ve got the humans to think about. Tell you what though, instead of trying to strike it lucky
with the hospitals, let me make a call. I know a guy who still works at Roosevelt.’
    Darcy brightened a little. ‘Do you think your friend would be able to tell me if the man I hit has come round and is OK?’
    ‘I can’t promise anything. It’s been a while since we’ve talked, and he could well have moved on since, but I can certainly try.’
    ‘I’d really appreciate anything you can do, Joshua, thanks.’
    ‘Like I said, go and sit down somewhere for the moment – preferably out of this cold. I’ll call my friend and see what I can wheedle out of him, if anything.’
    Grateful for her workmate’s help, Darcy said goodbye to Joshua, while he promised he would call her back as soon as he knew anything.
    Feeling a powerful headache coming on, she tugged on Bailey’s leash and wandered back towards her bike. As she did so, she again noticed the deli bag and wondered if she should just leave
it there beside the lamp post in case the lady came back for it.
    But now, lifting it up, Darcy realised it didn’t contain deli or bakery products, but something much, much heavier. And looking inside, she saw a package, a gift box that had been
beautifully wrapped in thick green paper, and tied with a wide red grosgrain ribbon.
    The bag itself, although a little wrinkled, also had an expensive look to it.
    But where had it come from? Darcy wondered. Alongside her, Bailey panted and wagged his tail with such enthusiasm it was causing her to wonder if his owner might have been carrying it before he
got hit. And thinking about it now, she recalled – a snapshot of the man and his dog right before they connected flashing into her mind – there was indeed something on the end of his
arm – the same one in which he held the leash.
    Darcy looked from the gift box back to Bailey, quickly understanding that she had more than one thing to return to Aidan Harris.

Chapter 5
    What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us
. Ralph Waldo Emerson
    Still shaken in the aftermath of the accident, Darcy adjusted her bike and manoeuvred Bailey’s lead in such a way that she would be able to walk alongside him and the
bike, while at the same time keeping a hold on her belongings and Aidan Harris’s gift.
    Taking Joshua’s advice, and with her bones aching and clothes still a little damp from the fall, she decided to take temporary refuge in a nearby café – one that hopefully
allowed dogs inside. Most of the places directly on West Fifty-Ninth were pretty swanky, so she made her way a block over to one of the more casual chains on Seventh, where she guessed she should
have no problems finding a table.
    Locking her bike outside, she took Bailey’s leash in her still-trembling hand and entered hesitantly, breathing a sigh of relief when a smiling cashier called out in greeting.
    ‘Nice dog,’ the woman commented, as Darcy ordered a strong cup of English breakfast tea and a cranberry muffin for the sugar hit. The immortal words of C.S. Lewis: ‘
You
can’t get a cup of tea big enough or a book long enough to suit me
’ automatically popped into her brain. Never a truer saying, as far as Darcy was concerned, remembering how
curling up with a book and a mug of tea had always been a comforting ritual for her mother, and a tradition that Darcy had tried to hold onto from their time together. She only wished she had one
of her beloved books to help soothe her right now, but in her haste to leave the apartment this morning, she’d forgotten to put the copy of
Pride and Prejudice
back into her bag.
    The café was full of Christmas shoppers as Darcy led Bailey