by Mike Shevdon
Behind me, the door was wrenched open. I turned and she stood there, hands on her hips, colour in her cheeks.
"How dare you!" she shouted. "How dare you presume to tell me what I think and how I feel. What gives you the right?"
"Don't make it worse than it has to be."
"Worse? You stupid, stupid man! You idiot! What do you think you're doing?"
I shrugged. "It's over isn't it? What else is there to say?"
"Idiot!" she repeated. She grabbed my jacket and wrenched me back into the room, slamming the door behind me. She pushed me back against the door and pressed her lips to mine, hard. She kissed me hungrily, pressing her body against mine. It was such a change of tack that it took a moment for my head to catch up with my body.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
She kissed me again. "Shut up and undress me."
"You'll wake the baby…"
"He's downstairs with Lesley." She tugged my jacket off my arms and pulled my shirt out of my trousers, I could feel her nipples hardening under her blouse. I started fumbling with her buttons. She grabbed the blouse and ripped it open, exposing her breasts and shrugged it from her shoulders, then tugged at the belt of my trousers.
"But I thought…"
"Stop it! Stop thinking. You think too much. You pull things apart until there's nothing left. You analyse everything until it's torn apart. Don't think. Feel."
She tugged me by the belt towards the bed, pulling my shirt over my head and kissing me again. We fell on to the bed and kicked off our remaining clothes, wrapping our bodies together.
She bit my shoulder, making me squeal, "Ow! That hurts"
"That's for being stupid." She nibbled my ear, making me squirm, "and that's for thinking too much." She had her hands on my naked rear, wriggled beneath me. She kissed me long and languid, lifting her hips, and my body took over from my brain and I finally stopped trying to think.
A little while later I was staring at the ceiling, stroking her hair while she lay on top of me, resting her head on my chest. The length of her naked warmth was laid down my body, so that her legs rested between mine. I sighed.
"A pigeon for your thoughts," she said.
"It's a penny," I reminded her.
"You always say that, but it doesn't make it right."
"I hate pigeons."
"I don't suppose they're that keen on you," she said.
We lapsed into silence again; I could feel the rise and fall of her chest where she lay on me.
"You're not leaving me then?" I asked, tentatively.
She leaned over and sank her teeth into my side.
"Ow! Ow! That hurts! Let go!" I rubbed where her teeth had nipped the skin. I rubbed it with the palm of my hand. "I'm going to have a mark there."
"You shouldn't ask such stupid questions."
"Teeth are off limits. No teeth. OK?"
"That's not what you said earlier," she purred.
"That was different."
"You have to make your mind up then. Teeth or no teeth?" Her hand stroked across my chest, circling where my chest hair surrounded my nipple.
"Why is everything so complicated?" I asked her.
"It's not complicated. You simply have to decide what you want and what you're prepared to do to get it."
"Is that what you did?"
There was a long pause. I carried on stroking her hair.
"I admit, when I first met you I was thinking that you already had a daughter, so maybe another baby wasn't impossible for you. But you have to remember that you were marked by the Untainted. I'd never heard of anyone surviving to the next dawn in those circumstances. It was unlikely at best, and I offered what I could, partly from selfishness, it's true, but I would have made sure you enjoyed it."
"What changed your mind?"
"About you? I don't remember a specific moment. Between threatening to skewer you with a knife and losing you on the Way, something changed. I found I cared about losing you."
"Do you still care?"
She pressed her nails into the soft skin at each side with increasing pressure.
"OK, OK, I give in." The pressure relaxed
Lifting her head, she rose up on her arms to face me, studying my face intently.
"What?" I asked.
She shuffled upwards so that she could straddle my hips and sit across me, taking both my hands in hers and intertwining the fingers, pressing them down so that her hands were over my shoulders. I leaned up to kiss a nipple, but she evaded me, looking serious.
There was a hint of green fire somewhere in the darkness of her eyes.
"Know this, Niall Petersen. I have loved you almost since the day I met you. I cannot promise to love you for ever, because I do not know what the future will bring, for either of us, but right here, right now, I love you."
"I love you too."
She lifted her hand, mine still entwined, and pressed it against my lips. "Don't say that unless you mean it. I do not demand it of you. I do not even ask it."
"I do. When I thought you were leaving I was… I don't know what I would have done."
"Someone…" She stopped, and sighed, and tried again. "Before I met you, someone hurt you. Maybe it was Katherine, and maybe it was someone else, I don't know and I'm not blaming anyone for it. But you hold yourself closed, like any moment you expect the floor to drop out from under you."
I didn't say anything. The knot had reappeared in my throat and I didn't think I could speak.
"I just want you to know," she said quietly, "that I won't do that to you."
She leaned down and gently kissed my lips.
She added, "I might stick a knife in your ribs, or bash your head in with a rolling pin, but I won't do that to you."
I smiled, and she smiled too.
"Which might be sooner rather than later if you don't get me out of here. Seriously, if I have to change another nappy today I am going to go stark-raving mad. I love our son dearly, but he's a little shit-bottom."
"All part of the joys of parenthood," I said.
"Well if you don't want to find him skewered to a door post, you're going to have to do something."
"Far be it from me to tell Blackbird of the Fey'ree when she can come and go. The world is your oyster, Mistress." I hadn't forgotten her earlier words, despite our current rapprochement.
"That smart mouth will get you into trouble." She kissed it for emphasis. "I can feel my brain going to mush. I haven't had a decent conversation that doesn't involve nappy-rash for weeks. Don't look hurt, I don't mean you. It's just that I've always been active and enquiring; I spent the last thirty years as an academic. The lack of any kind of mental stimulus is driving me to distraction. I need something to get my teeth into."
"I'll see if I can come up with something."
"Maybe I could come with you on one of your Warder missions?"
"I don't think Garvin would approve," I pointed out.
"Stuff Garvin. I don't need his permission."
"Woah, I was just pointing out that Warder business possibly wasn't the best way to get some fresh air."
"You don't need to protect me, Niall."
"It's not that. I'm already feeling out of my depth. I meant it when I told you I messed up this morning. We could have caught them if I had been quicker on my feet."
"And then what happens to them?" she asked.
"Whatever. They join the courts? We all live happily ever after?"
"Something tells me that's not what Garvin has planned."
"I know you don't see eye to eye with him, but you don't have to see a conspiracy in everything he does."
"Where is Angela?" she asked, innocently.
"The seer? She's staying in the house, isn't she? Garvin said he'd ask Mullbrook to find her somewhere."
"Have you seen her since then?" she asked.
"Well no, since you come to mention it."
"So where is she?"
"It's a big house. There are plenty of empty
rooms."
"It makes you wonder, doesn't it? What are they all for?"
"Now you really are going off track. I promise I will find something for you to do." She squeezed my hand, "For us to do together, then. Just don't rattle Garvin's cage any more than you have to, OK? He's already on my case."
"He probably wouldn't approve of you having sex when you're supposed to be on duty," she said, releasing my hand and stroking across my chest so it brushed my nipple.
"We won't tell him then, eh?"
She released my other hand and leaned down for a long slow kiss. She whispered warm in my ear, "He's probably listening at the keyhole." She lifted my hands to her breasts so I could caress my thumbs over her nipples while she stroked down my arms. She wriggled on top of me in response.
"I don't think so," I said.
"He knows far too much of what goes on in this house," she said, sitting upright and reaching round behind her to stroke her nails up the inside of my thigh.
"You're not serious," I asked.
She stared at me wide eyed, while her hands did something far from innocent behind her.
"We'd better give him something to listen to then, I suppose?" she said.
The West End got more crowded as the light faded – party goers, mates out for a drink, people choosing from menus outside brightly lit restaurants. Alex floated past them. At the end of the evening they would all go home. Late buses and lastditch taxis would carry them back to their houses and they could crawl into their beds and dream of happy families.
"You all right, love?" A bloke with his mate in tow staggered towards her. She caught a whiff of the alcohol on his breath.
"Go away," she said. "Leave me alone."
There must have been more in her words than a simple request, because he veered away, dragging his friend behind him. She changed direction and walked into Leicester Square, weaving between couples arm-in-arm, avoiding the crowds of lads out for a good time, staying clear of the girls who were less than subtly touting for business at the edge of the crowd. The cinemas were emptying out after the late showing, the uniformed staff guiding the stragglers out into the square.
"It's your lucky night." The man approached her smiling, offering his card. "We're recruiting models and you have the look of tomorrow, you know that? Of course you do, a beautiful girl like you has her career ahead of her. Just take this card to the address on the back and they'll look after you." He proffered the card.
She smiled, "You really think so?" She took the card and turned it over. The address was in minute print.
He grinned at her. "Sure, you're a natural. You're gonna look great in pictures, Baby." He stepped in close, too close for her liking.
She reached up and tapped him lightly on the forehead. He stepped back, unnerved by her odd reaction. "I don't think it's your lucky night," she said. "I fact, I think your night's going to take a turn downhill." She turned away.
"Don't say that, Baby. You'll jinx me. I'm just doing my job."
She called back, "And don't call me Baby." Walking on, she wondered how long it would take him to realise that the word "pervert" was now tattooed across his forehead. She changed course and headed into Soho in case it was sooner rather than later.
As soon as she left the bright lights of the square she wrapped herself in glamour. These were streets she would be cautious around in daytime, even more so after midnight. Taxis rumbled down the streets and a garbage collection giant was grinding and squealing its way down the street, tipping containers of commercial waste out into its dark maw with mechanical efficiency while its minions ran around trying to keep the beast fed. She turned aside, heading vaguely towards Oxford Street and the lighted pillars of Centrepoint and the BT Tower.
The streets grew quieter, punctuated by the chinking rattle of bottles as the pubs cleared out the empties and the occasional roar of a motorcycle taking a short cut down the back streets.
The people out now were drunk, lost or lonely, and she didn't include herself in any of those groups. She walked down the edge of a square, a large patch of brown grass fenced off in the middle with park benches occupied by huddled shapes with draped newspaper, plastic bags and tins of cider. She'd a fair idea of how harsh that life could be and had no wish to join them.
The sudden whiff of a foul drain caught her off guard.
The tumbling rush of turning water, the gut-turning stench of shit, the gulped-off scream as one of them was dragged under….
She shook her head, lifting her hand to push away the mental images that crowded into her brain as she stumbled off the pavement into a doorway. Not now.
Leaning against the door to a swanky advertising boutique, pressing her forehead to the cool glass, she fought to control her breathing. The cold on her skin helped to calm her. She smoothed her hair back from her face, pushing down the memories, concentrating on the moment. She was OK. All that was past, and she had come through it. She could deal with it.
Even so, she couldn't stay the night in a doorway. She had to keep moving.
Despite the summer day, the night was chilling fast and she'd only the skimpy cardie to keep her warm. There was the momentary regret that she could have acquired something warmer, but then she pulled it close about her. She liked her new clothes. They made her feel better. She started walking again.
A movement across the square caught her eye. Something large had just bounded across the grass. She scanned the open space for movement, but there was nothing there. A dog? No, too big, and where was the owner? Something else? In her time at Porton Down she had seen things that she did not want to encounter in the dark London streets. She wrapped her glamour tighter and cut down an alley away from the square, heading back towards the bright lights.
She crossed over Shaftsbury Avenue, wondering whether to head up towards Tottenham Court Road or back down to Leicester Square. She'd been here in the day, shopping for a guitar when she'd discovered a boy she liked was into music and wanted to form a band. Her mum had suggested she sing, but she had balked at that. The kind of music he liked wasn't the sort of music you sang, and her enthusiasm for the guitar had evaporated when she'd discovered that you had to cut your nails and it made your fingers sore. They'd sold it on eBay for half what they paid for it.
Turning away from the music stores, she headed back to Cambridge Circus towards Neal Street. There were some nice boutiques that way and even though they would be closed she could still window-shop. She paused as she crossed Seven Dials. There were a couple getting out of a taxi outside a hotel, the man making a big show of tipping the driver, and it occurred to her that there were places in London full of empty beds that were there for the taking.
She ghosted past the reception where the couple were booking in and went to the lift. The buttons operated with a key-card, but that didn't stop her. She went to the top floor, opening out on a blank corridor with doors spaced along it.
The ones with trays outside were obviously occupied. The problem was figuring out which ones were empty. The receptionist would have it all on the computer, but there was no way to access it without attracting attention. She went to a door and listened. Was that the faint sound of snoring? She moved on.
Four doors down she found a room that was quiet. She put her hand on the door handle and the light blinked to green. The door opened easily. She opened the door and let herself in.
"Who's there?" A voice came from the darkness inside.
"Sorry Madame, it's… room service." The lie twisted on her tongue. "I've got the wrong room. My apologies." She slipped out again and pulled the door shut behind her, sliding sideways away from the viewport in the door. After a second she heard the lock behind her click shut and the rattle as the chain was put across. She slipped away down the corridor.
The doors all looked the same. If only she could figure out which ones were empty.
At the end of the corridor was a door with a brass plaque mounted beside it. The plaque said, The Seven Dials Suite. "In for
a penny…" she whispered. She put her hand on the door control and it blinked green.
Pushing through she found a hallway with low-level LEDs leading like runway lights into the room. She let the door almost close and then rested it against the latch so she could escape quickly if she needed to.
