For the briefest of moments, I wondered if my recent thoughts about Paul and our wedding had summoned him like an unwanted apparition. “You knew I’d be here?” I asked when I’d recovered my wits.
“I knew Pippa was having her wedding dinner here, so I took a chance you’d come for it. I found myself a comfortable seat and waited.” He slipped a tattered, yellowing paperback of Raymond Chandler’s classic novel Farewell, My Lovely into his jacket pocket. Paul had always had a weakness for the golden age of American fictional P.I.s.
“And how, precisely, did you know that?” I asked.
“My father’s still a senior clerk in the chambers adjoining Anne’s. Mothers talk about their daughter’s weddings, and word got around. You know how tight clerks are in those law offices. Dad always hoped you and I’d get back together, so he pays attention to what he hears about your family.”
That was how Paul and I met originally, a chance encounter in the lift when I dropped into my mother’s office.
“I hear you moved to America. That came as a surprise; I always thought of you as a London girl. One hundred percent.”
His eyes dropped to my left hand. Checking for a wedding ring. I’d already noticed he was not wearing one. Either he hadn’t got one on his second marriage or the couple were divorced already. Likely the latter. I hadn’t seen Paul for seven years. Those years had not been good to him. Stubble was thick on his jaw but not in a nicely trimmed, fashionable way, more as though he hadn’t bothered to shave recently. His reddish-brown hair, now heavily streaked with gray even though he was only in his midthirties, badly needed a cut. The whites of his eyes were tinged red, and the skin beneath those eyes was as dark as fresh bruises. His fingernails were bitten to the quick. He’d made an attempt to look respectable, not wanting to be asked to leave this hotel, but his leather jacket was badly worn, his shoes tattered, and his trousers too tight. He’d put on weight recently and hadn’t had the money, or the inclination, to buy new clothes. Paul was thirty-five, the same age as Ryan. He looked ten years older. Paul was the same age as me. I hoped he looked ten years older than me too.
Rain dripped on the floor around his feet. Either he hadn’t been waiting a long time or he’d been in and out of the hotel, trying to avoid the stern gaze of the doorman and the concierge. Maybe simply restless as he waited. I’d never known Paul to have an ounce of patience.
“I left my sister’s wedding early because I’m dead beat,” I said. “My flight here wasn’t exactly a short or easy one. I’m sorry,” not really, “but I don’t have time to chat. Good night, Paul.”
His hand shot out, and he grabbed my arm. I froze in place and simply stared at it until he released me. “Sorry, Gemma.”
“Good night, Paul.”
“Everything all right here, madam?” the doorman asked me with a side glance at Paul.
I smiled at him. “I’ll be fine, thank you.”
“Yup. Thanks, we’re fine,” Paul said to the doorman, who didn’t look all that reassured. “What’s the hurry? Bar’s still open. Can I buy you a drink? They have a great gin menu here.”
“You most definitely cannot.”
A few of the elderly wedding guests were beginning to leave the party, along with younger people likely to have small children at home, meaning they couldn’t sleep off a night of indulgence. They nodded briefly to me in recognition but were more intent on pulling on raincoats and preparing umbrellas to be unfurled. The doorman slipped out to hail cabs.
“Okay, I get it,” Paul said. “Not a good idea tonight. I’d like to catch up while you’re in London. Just as … old friends. We were close once, right?” He gave me that crooked grin I’d once found so charming. Now I found it full of nothing but loneliness and regret. “I have something that might be of interest to you.”
“What sort of something?” I have to admit, my curiously was aroused. Paul and I hadn’t parted on good terms. I’d been away from England for seven years. He could have found me easily and written if he wanted to. But I hadn’t heard a word since the divorce was finalized and our mutual business affairs settled. Entirely to my satisfaction, I must add.
Paul talked quickly, the words spilling all over themselves in his haste to get them out. “I know you live in America now. You own a bookshop with Arthur Doyle. One bookshop. You had plans to own several shops, as I recall.”
“Plans change. One is fine for me now. Something about my original start-up store failing because of, let me think, what was it now? Oh, yes, ineptitude and mismanagement on the part of one of the partners.” And blind stupidity on the part of the other. The latter had been me. “I also own one quarter of a restaurant and tearoom.”
“For what it’s worth, Gemma, I am sorry about how things worked out between us. Truly sorry.”
“So you keep saying, but it’s worth absolutely nothing, Paul. Shall I assume Sophie is out of the picture?”
“She is. We … uh … decided it wasn’t working out.”
“What a surprise.” Paul and I had jointly owned that mystery bookstore. Sophie, young and pretty, worked for us. People say I have good powers of observation, but those powers sadly deserted me on that one occasion. Perhaps I didn’t see what I didn’t want to see. When I finally had seen—because Sophie shoved it in my face—I dumped the cheating man. I had no trouble getting him to buy my share of the store, and I walked away with a nice profit. The shop had, to no one’s surprise, least of all mine, immediately gone into a precipitous decline. Which might have had something to do with the fact that the part-owner who did almost all of the work had left.
“I know it’s a lot to ask, Gemma, but—”
“Not interested.” I took a step toward the door.
“I’d give anything in the world for that foolishness not to have happened.” Paul lowered his voice. “For us to get back together. For you to love me again. The way I love you. The way I still love you. The way I’ve always loved you.”
“Give it a rest, Paul.”
“Okay, that’s not going to happen. Forget I said it. I need your advice, Gemma. That’s why I sought you out. I have this book. It might be the real deal. I’d like you to have a look at it.”
“A book? You mean a collector’s item? I sell new books, Paul, not anything rare or valuable.”
“You never know what riches can be found between the pages of old books, do you, Gemma? Come to the shop tomorrow. Have a look. That’s all I ask. Please, Gemma. You remember where the shop is?”
I’d heard he sold the store for a bargain basement price. Perhaps my information had been wrong. Perhaps he still worked there, although he didn’t own it any longer. I hesitated.
“Please, Gemma? Come to the shop. I ask nothing else.”
Despite my better instincts, my curiosity had been aroused. I knew I’d regret it, but I said, “Tomorrow then.”
“Great. Sundays we open at noon.”
“I’m not coming as a customer, Paul. But noon should do.”
“Let me give you my number.”
“Don’t want it.” I walked out of the hotel.