by Susan Lewis
‘God damn you!’ he thundered. ‘This isn’t about ego, it’s about you, and caring what happens to you …’
‘But not about loving me, and that’s what I want.’
‘I do love you, for Christ’s sake. I don’t understand why you think I don’t.’
‘Because you never tell me!’ she shouted. ‘In the eighteen months we’ve been together you’ve only ever said it when you think I’m about to go, or because I almost got killed. The rest of the time we just have great sex and talk about work.’
He sighed in exasperation, started to turn away, then turned back again. ‘Look, you know I’m not good at that kind of thing,’ he said, ‘but it doesn’t mean I don’t feel it.’
‘No, Elliot, you don’t have the same feelings for me as I have for you, because I really do love you, and frankly this is hurting me more than I can bear, but I’d rather live without you than be here as some kind of salve to your conscience.’
‘Jesus Christ! What do I have to do to convince you?’ he yelled. ‘I love you, I want you here, and I know you wouldn’t kill yourself if we finished. So what more can I say?’
‘It’s what you do that matters.’
‘So what do I have to do?’
Her blue eyes were heavy with pain as she looked at him. Then shaking her head, she said, ‘The fact that you need to ask that question proves how far apart we are.’ Pulling the door open, she struggled with her heavy bags into the corridor, then closed the door quietly behind her.
As she walked to the lift, everything in her was straining to go back, almost as though she was still physically joined to something inside. She longed to hear the sound of the door opening, and him finally saying the words that would make it all right to give in, but each step was taking her further and further away, and the door simply stayed closed. It was hurting so much that the only way she could deal with it was to force herself to think solely of the practical movements of the next few minutes, and hours. There should be plenty of taxis downstairs; her mobile was charged so she could call Rachel on the way to Rhona’s. The thought caused her heart to contract again, for she hardly wanted to think about how Rachel was going to take this latest news. Was she, Laurie, even in a good enough emotional state to deliver it right now?
Her throat was so tight and her eyes so full that it took a superhuman effort not to scream with anger and despair as she heaved her bag into the lift and pressed the button to go down. He really wasn’t going to come after her; he’d know that at this point she’d still be outside, but he really was just letting her go, and though she’d more or less known he would, she so desperately hadn’t wanted to be proved right. But she had, and knowing him as well as she did, she guessed that by now he’d already be back at his desk.
‘Narrow Street, Limehouse,’ she told the cabbie, throwing her holdall in the back. Climbing in after it, she fastened the seat belt and took out her phone. At least calling Rachel would stop her calling Elliot, or telling the driver to turn back.
‘Rachel? Hi, it’s me,’ she said, when Rachel answered. ‘Is everything all right your end?’
‘It seems to be,’ Rachel replied. ‘I’ve been on the Internet this afternoon, getting more information on the African professor George Monheit at the LSE told you about. Patrice Bombola? Apparently he’s Congolese by birth, but grew up mainly in Nigeria, went to the University of Benin there, then did his postgraduate work at the African Studies Centre at Boston University. He lectures all over the world now, on trade and finance in developing countries …’
‘Rachel, there’s something I need to tell you,’ Laurie interrupted.
Rachel fell silent.
Laurie turned to gaze out at the grey slumbering walls of the Tower of London, and almost wished she could be one of the late, great, or even not so great, beheaded. ‘Elliot gave me some information on Professor Bombola today,’ she said. ‘He’s … There’s a very good chance he’s an integral part of a Phraxos special project that helps raise finance for rebel or guerrilla forces, mainly in Africa, who then use the money to buy their weapons from Phraxos-owned companies.’ She took a breath. ‘Tim had a meeting with him, at the Kensington Palace Hotel, about four weeks before he died.’
There was no response from the other end, but Laurie could easily picture Rachel there in the cottage, all alone, afraid and confused, and trying desperately to deal with the shock of this, her worst nightmare, coming true. The seconds ticked on, until at last her voice came down the line, sounding slightly firmer than Laurie might have expected, though nonetheless strained,
‘How do you know Tim met him?’ she asked.
Realizing she’d have to explain fully, Laurie said, ‘When I saw George Monheit and he told me about Bombola, he said he’d met him personally, in London, about a month before the election, at the Kensington Palace Hotel. They’ve known each other for years, so it wasn’t unusual for them to meet, and Monheit only brought his name up because he was someone he knew who had a personal relationship with Franz Koehler. I don’t think he knows the exact nature of the relationship – Elliot only told me that later, when I mentioned Bombola to him. It was after I spoke to Elliot that I called the Kensington Palace. They wouldn’t give me the information over the phone, so I went round there, earlier today, and by the time I left I knew that Patrice Bombola had stayed for two nights in mid-May, and that amongst his many visitors were Tim, Katherine Sumner and Franz Koehler.’
Rachel’s intake of breath was barely audible, but Laurie heard it, and gave her a moment to recover before continuing.
‘So essentially,’ she said, ‘what we appear to be looking at is not just a link to Phraxos, but to this highly secret special project they’ve got going, which is to supply arms for both sides of any given conflict, i.e. the US-backed regime, and the opposition forces. It doesn’t get much more corrupt or lucrative than that.’ She sat forward to direct the cabbie to Rhona’s apartment block, which backed on to the river side of Narrow Street. ‘And if we put this meeting together with the four million dollars,’ she continued, knowing that Rachel would already be bitterly aware of what she was about to say, ‘the most likely scenario we come up with is that the four million dollars was an incentive to direct at least some of the extremely lucrative orders from the British Defence Department to Phraxos-owned companies. It’s easy enough to check, so I did, and there are three orders in the pipeline.’
Rachel’s voice was still strained as she said, ‘They would be legal, though. Unethical on Tim’s part, obviously, but legal.’
‘Of course. But the fact that Bombola was at that meeting …’ Laurie didn’t want to rub it in any more than that, so asking her to hang on while she paid the driver, she then picked up her bags and started into the building. ‘OK, back with you,’ she said.
‘Has this person at the Kensington Palace spoken to the police?’ Rachel asked.
‘Yes,’ Laurie confirmed. ‘And wait for this, he was made to sign the Official Secrets Act and reminded he would be under penalty of prosecution if he spoke to the press, or anyone else about his interview.’
‘Oh my God,’ Rachel murmured. ‘So how did you get him to talk?’
‘He didn’t tell me anything about the interview. I just asked the right questions about Bombola’s guests during his stay, he’d either nod, or shake his head, and I swore I’d never reveal where I got my information.’ Pushing open the door, she propped it open with one bag, then turned to haul the other inside. ‘I’m really sorry about the way all this seems to be going,’ she said when Rachel stayed silent. ‘But I suppose what can be said for it is that we’re making some headway. We’ve also got more confirmation that Haynes and his Special Ops team are not being very forthcoming with what they know.’
Rachel’s voice sounded distant, and distracted as she simply said, ‘No.’
‘Is anyone there with you?’ Laurie asked.
‘No. Uh, Beanie and I are going to the Caves for dinner. Chris said he might join us.’<
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‘Any more phone calls about the money?’
‘No. They must have it by now.’
‘OK. I’m sorry, but I have to go. There is one last thing, though. I heard today that we should be getting some news on the DNA by Friday at the latest.’
There was another long pause and once again Laurie could feel her own heart responding to what must be going on in Rachel’s now. ‘The stains on the sheet,’ Rachel mumbled, sounding as though she was hardly connecting with the words. ‘Frankly I could almost live without knowing any more about them.’
‘I know,’ Laurie said quietly. Then after promising she’d call again in the morning, she rang off and dropped the phone into her bag.
For a moment she stood staring back across the street to the neat terrace of town houses that made up Ropemaker’s Fields. She was recalling Elliot’s words as she’d left tonight, and felt a shudder of fear run through her, for the prospect of taking on a syndicate of arms dealers was so much more daunting than anything she’d ever done before that were it not for the loyalty she felt to Rachel, she might actually consider backing out.
Chapter 15
STACEY’S LAUGHTER RANG out around the set as Bryn, who was playing the husband and poet, minced out from behind a camera, wearing one of her dresses and an outrageous red wig.
Catching Robert’s eye Bryn threw back his head and trilled, ‘Darling, am I looking beautiful for you today?’
Though he could feel himself colouring, Robert went gamely along with the tease, and recited the next line of the script. ‘Too ravishing for words,’ he declared, with a delivery that made it fortunate he hadn’t chosen acting as a career.
‘Am I too capricious or gay?’ Bryn sang, in a ludicrous falsetto.
‘You are simply perfection,’ Robert responded.
Aghast, Bryn clapped his hands to his heavily rouged cheeks. ‘Simple? I?’ he cried. ‘How can you say such a thing? I am the Venus of Arles.’ And dropping the front of the dress to bare his chest, he threw out his right hand to show an apple. ‘Do you not understand my complexity, my likeness to Aphrodite?’ he demanded. Then with a mischievous twinkle, ‘Or do you only see my little tootie fruitie?’
At that a roar of laughter went up, for the twist of the nipple was, without a doubt, a reference to the visibility of Stacey’s, no matter what she was wearing.
Deciding not to let it go any further Robert clapped his hands, shouting, ‘OK. That’s a wrap. Rushes at … seven?’ He looked to the first assistant, who gave the thumbs up, then watching Stacey wander off into the shadows with the ghastly Petey, he went to put an arm round Bryn’s shoulders to walk him to the dressing rooms.
It was a transparent ruse to get him where he wanted to be, for though they discussed Bryn’s role and performance the whole way, as soon as they reached Bryn’s door, Robert said, ‘It’s working even better than I hoped, so keep it up,’ and after playfully cuffing the wig from Bryn’s head, he continued on to Stacey’s small suite of rooms.
His mouth was dry, his body already trembling with excitement, for they were about to spend the next hour alone, before attending rushes. He just hoped she’d already got rid of Petey, as she’d promised when they’d spoken earlier to confirm this now regular end of the day tryst. All too often Petey hung around, brushing her hair or cleansing her face, while she read Robert’s poems, casting him sultry, tantalizing smiles in the mirror. He wondered what she’d made of the one he’d slipped her earlier, which was longer and even more graphic than the others, and had been written only last night, while Anna was asleep.
The thought of Anna caused a brief hesitance in his step, for he’d noticed again this morning how tense she was looking. She’d been impatient with the girls too, and with him, and when she’d burned her hand on the kettle she’d sworn in a way she never did in front of the children. But though he knew he was the cause of her stress, and though he loved her with all his heart, he just couldn’t turn back from this now. He was utterly compelled to go on, for it wasn’t just a mad and dangerous game that was inspiring him to the greatest heights of creation, nor was it simply a slavish following of his own rampant bodily urges; it didn’t even stop at a connoisseur’s delight in the perfect female form, because it was all of those things – and more. So very much more that even he couldn’t describe it, for nothing so consuming, or controlling, or so intrinsically powerful had ever happened to him in his life before.
By the time he reached Stacey’s door a thin film of sweat had broken out on his face. To his dismay Petey answered his knock, but Stacey’s smile as she greeted him all but dazzled the acolyte from Robert’s tunnel vision.
‘Darling,’ she purred, turning from the brightly lit mirror and holding out her hands. ‘Wasn’t Bryn just too funny? And you, the way you played along,’ she crossed a hand over her chest, ‘you are my hero.’
‘And you are my destruction,’ he responded, on script.
Laughing, she got to her feet and planted a kiss full on his mouth. ‘Now tell me, because I’ve been dying to know,’ she said, waving him towards a red velvet chaise-longue, while she untied the belt of her robe. ‘What did the producers think of the rough cut scenes they saw at lunchtime?’
Watching, tensely, breathlessly, as Petey peeled the robe from her shoulders and dropped it on a chair, he sat on the end of the chaise-longue, saying, ‘Hardly any notes. They loved it.’ He swallowed hard as she stretched out her arms while Petey sprayed her naked back and buttocks with a lemon scented cologne.
‘Were they all there?’ she asked, turning to face him.
‘Yes,’ he murmured, gazing rapturously at the flawless beauty of her skin, the small, upturned mounds of her breasts with their big, tightly puckered nipples; the golden triangle of hair nesting in a landscape of soft white flesh. And then there was the most thrilling part of all, her most intimate part, protruding from her lower lips like a small pink tongue.
‘Even Anna?’ she asked, rotating back towards Petey who was now holding up a dress to slide over her head.
‘Yes,’ he murmured again, and almost groaned as the dress fell like a curtain, cutting him off from a performance that was surely far from over. Then realizing she had spoken Anna’s name, he lifted his eyes to look at her face.
‘What did Anna say?’ she asked, sitting down at the mirror to allow Petey to brush out her hair.
He cast his mind back, and realized that his wife had said very little. ‘She thought your performance was outstanding,’ he lied, and his eyes closed as Anna’s pain seemed to move through his chest. What was he doing? How could he have hurried away from the viewing like a frightened, anxious lover whose mistress might not wait? He had all but ignored her, not wanting to get into any kind of discussion about the film, because it was eating into precious time he might spend with Stacey – and because he knew that Anna would tell him what he already knew, that the film was starting to show signs of his distraction.
‘Are you all right?’ Stacey asked.
He met her gaze in the mirror. ‘Yes,’ he answered, but his voice was cracked with anguish.
Glancing up at Petey, she took the hairbrush and nodded for him to go. After the door had closed behind him, she went to join Robert on the chaise-longue, arranging herself so that she was propped up by cushions, with her feet crossed behind him, her thin, crêpe dress falling decorously around her knees.
Turning to face her he smoothed a hand along her bare freckled calf. ‘You’re a cruel and wanton witch,’ he told her. ‘To tease me the way you do heightens my pain and drives me mad with desire.’
‘Of course,’ she smiled. ‘It’s why I do it.’
He smiled too, and as her head fell back against the cushions, displaying her gracefully long neck, he lifted her feet on to his lap.
‘Your latest poem tells me,’ she said, ‘that you must be glad I shared the experience of what I did with my husband last Saturday night.’
‘Glad, because I know you were thinking of me,’
he responded, gently massaging her toes. ‘Otherwise tormented by jealousy.’
‘You seemed to like the special panties,’ she commented silkily.
‘Of course, I want to see you in them.’
Opening her eyes to look at him, she said, ‘You can see me any way you choose,’ she reminded him.
His smile was small, and full of despair, as his hands circled slowly towards her ankles. ‘Sometimes I feel that I never see anything but you,’ he replied.
She murmured sleepily as his fingers moved round to stroke the backs of her knees. ‘Tell me what we’re doing in your mind right now,’ she challenged softly.
Looking down at his hands as they tenderly massaged her flesh, he said, ‘We’re in the position you and your husband were on Saturday night. And your mouth is full of me.’
‘Mmm,’ she moaned, lifting her arms up over her head. ‘But did you beat me first?’
‘Of course. Just because he won’t punish your wickedness, doesn’t mean I won’t.’
‘And did I beat you?’
‘Savagely.’
She sighed, ecstatically, as his hands travelled under the hem of her dress, up to her thighs. Then, as though not wanting to break the erotic tension of the tease, they stayed silent, as his fingers crept closer and closer to their goal.
‘Very soon,’ he said softly, as he lightly touched her pubic hair, ‘this will be full of me.’
A small gasp escaped her lips as the sensation shot through her like an arrow.
‘But you know that isn’t allowed,’ she reminded him.
‘Can you resist it?’ he challenged.
She didn’t answer at first, so he dared to brush a finger over the moist flesh of her labia.
‘You’ve already gone too far,’ she warned, though she made no attempt to stop him.
