Thirty-Two

Laura Aubrete lay on her back and looked at the ceiling.

The drawn curtains in the hotel room afforded very little light—certainly none of the afternoon sunlight which, when she had first arrived, had been pouring into the room. The fact that she could see very little, however, meant nothing to her. She was seeing far more in her mind’s eye, its pictures projected on to the greyish surface above her. Most of all, she saw Anna Miles’s face, and that assumed expression of innocence.

She got herself up on to one elbow, and took a drink from the glass on the bedside table. ‘A pound of flesh,’ she muttered.

‘What?’ asked a male voice from the adjoining bathroom.

‘A pound of bloody flesh,’ she repeated, then laughed grimly at the pun. ‘I wish I could rip it out now.’

He put his head around the door. ‘Flesh, or heart?’

She emptied the glass. ‘Heart. Guts. Everything.’

He looked at her, his eye running the length of her. ‘I warned you.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And forewarned is … but I never thought she’d actually manage it.’

He came out of the bathroom, throwing the towel down on the floor.

‘Husband and father-in-law in less than a year,’ he said. ‘You have to admit, it’s a neat trick.’

She returned her attention to the ceiling. ‘And she looks so bloody innocuous.’

‘Trembling little woman,’ he said. ‘I told you.’

‘All right,’ she said.

He smiled to himself. None of her fury had abated. It had lent a certain pleasure to the afternoon, that uncontrolled temper. But, despite the long hour in bed, her mood hadn’t altered. If anything, it was blacker than ever. But he liked that. Even encouraged it. After all, he had no use for her otherwise.

‘Where are you going?’ she demanded.

‘I’ve things to do,’ he said.

‘No,’ she told him.

He looked at her, half-dressed, his eyebrows raised. ‘I beg your pardon?’

She swung her legs off the edge of the bed. ‘I want you here.’

‘That’s very nice,’ he said. ‘But I have to go.’

She got up, and put her arms around him. ‘I haven’t finished,’ she said.

‘I have.’

She took a piece of his flesh, on his back, between finger and thumb, and twisted it. He barely reacted. He took his trousers from the chair and started to put them on.

‘I want to know what to do,’ she said.

‘You’ve got your Board.’

‘I’ve talked to them.’

‘Well then.’

‘It’s going to take weeks. Months!’ she exclaimed.

‘You’ll have to be patient, won’t you?’ he said.

She regarded him, hands on her hips. Almost dressed now, he considered her. She had put a little weight on in the last few months, since he had first known her. It looked good on her, rounding out the shoulders and hips. She would progress, of course, getting heavier as she approached middle age, becoming overweight as she hit fifty. Nothing to do with genes, nothing to do with gender. She would get heavier because, at heart, Laura Aubrete was a greedy girl, and the greed would outstrip the grinding mobility of her twenties and thirties. She was lovely now, in her prime. A flower in bloom. One of her own roses.

‘Aren’t you pretty,’ he murmured.

‘Oh, for Christ’s sake,’ she retorted.

He pulled the sweater over his head. ‘You have to go through the channels,’ he said. ‘You have to be seen to be doing the right thing.’

‘She’s defrauded me!’ she cried.

‘I know that,’ he said mildly.

‘She brought pressure to bear on him,’ she said. ‘That’s what I have to prove.’

‘And can you?’

She turned away, crossing her arms.

‘Well … can you?’

‘I will.’

‘How?’

She said nothing.

‘Difficult thing to prove,’ he said.

She whirled back to him. ‘Don’t you think I know that!’ she shouted.

‘Unless Matthew will back you up.’

Her hands clenched. He picked up his keys from the table.

‘He won’t do anything,’ she said.

‘He’ll do something, eventually.’

‘He’s retreated into his own little world. He’s locked himself in!’

‘Perhaps he’s shocked, too.’

She laughed. ‘Yes, I should think he fucking well is,’ she said.

‘And when he isn’t shocked, when he recovers from his father’s death, and the betrayal from the woman he loves, he’ll see that he has to retain the estate.’

‘He’ll give it to her.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘His father’s already done that.’

She slumped in the bed, kicking at the coverlet that lay in a pile next to it. ‘I’ll think of something, with or without your help,’ she said.

He walked over to her. ‘Did I say that I wouldn’t help?’

Laura looked up at him.

‘I didn’t say that I wouldn’t help,’ he told her.

He reached down and ran a finger down her neck, until it rested on the point between her breasts.

‘I don’t know what to do,’ she said.

‘We’ll do what I always planned to do,’ he replied quietly. His finger ran on downwards, his eyes on hers. ‘Lie down,’ he said.

‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

‘We’re going to help her fall,’ he said. ‘Lie down.’

She fell back on the bed. Ben McGovern unfastened his belt. Her eyes flickered to it as he measured the length of the leather in his hands.

‘Fall?’ she repeated.

He wound the belt around his fist. ‘You see Laura,’ he murmured, gently, ‘you do fall a very long way when you’re thrown out of heaven.’