Body and Soul by Roberta Latow

were bound together as one and no one could break them asunder. That she would understand his and Dante’s devious philosophy on how to live. Garfield had believed he could corrupt her into accepting their methods of winning and reaping their just rewards. She had, after all, managed her own path to fame and fortune.
    He had always assumed she had done it by using every trick in the book as they had. Eden had fooled them both. Because of Garfield’s years with her he nearly lost Dante as his ally and only true partner in life while the women he hustled resented his being with the beautiful cellist and he nearly lost their support too.
    Garfield studied the photograph for several minutes, absorbed in it. Eden could still do that to him, even in newsprint, and he hated her for it. Bile rose in his mouth and he gagged on it, hating her the more as he remembered how she had fooled him. He had had a grand passion for her and she had cheated him. Had seduced him to believing she would lay down her life for him. And though she did in one sense, she had not in another; had failed to make him the star attraction she already was herself.
    He closed his eyes to block her from his sight but that was even worse as his mind tantalised him with memories. The excitement of orgasm with Eden charged his body. Memories of sexual ecstasy, the power he’d had to make her come in floods of sweet excess, made him gasp.
    Once more he snapped his fingers for the attention of the waiter and ordered a Pernod. He found his hand trembling as headded a long splash of water to the lime green liquid. As soon as it turned milky he drank from the glass. The bite of aniseed awakened his taste buds. He imagined the taste of Eden Sidd, so sweet and salty on his tongue. After reading the large print under the photograph Garfield tore the page from the newspaper, scrunched it into a messy ball and dropped it under the table where he kicked it sharply away from him with the toe of his shoe.
    Garfield often thought of those great years when he had been with Eden – they were some of the best of his life. It had been Hydra, Paris, New York, a constant social whirl where all doors in the art world were held ajar for him and the woman on his arm. He never, however, thought about Eden as a human being in her own right, an artist with her own agenda, but rather blocked her out, pretended she had no real substance as Eden Sidd but only as a sensual, exciting, faceless woman who’d adored but ultimately cheated him, used him when he was so certain he was using her and could leave any time he chose.
    A scene flashed through his mind: that fatal phone call, Dante calling from Venice. ‘You must leave her today or all will be lost for us. The Contessa will make over her palace to her niece unless you come home and stay with her here. She longs for your love – and the sex, of course – but she is growing impatient. Don’t be stupid! You have allowed your cock to rule your head long enough. Eden Sidd may be a sexual delight but that’s all she’s been or will ever be. She’s not one of us, just pretending to be. When it comes down to it, she hasn’t the money or the courage to live as we do. She wants you all to herself. She’s ruining you. You have forty-eight hours more left to play with her then, I warn you, it had better be over.’
    Dante had of course been right about Eden. Garfield had owed her no explanation and when he walked out on her never gave her one. She’d had her problems: the tragic death of her mother and father had been an enormous loss to her, plus financial worries and a career she had been distracted from when love had moved in on her. Yes, he had had the best of Eden and now there was nothing left. The well had run dry. It wasover. Time to move on. He never gave it a second thought and was gone within twenty-four hours of Dante’s phone call.
    Garfield paid his bill. After turning his collar up against the wind and the rain, he walked