Ghostheart by R.J. Ellory Page A

while.’
    Breathing space
, she thought, but didn’t say a thing. The atmosphere had changed, and Annie felt that she’d walked along the edges of something deceptively simple, and yet somehow profoundly complex. Later, thinking back, her single most enduring thought, resonating like a bell in the cool crisp air of a still Sunday morning, was that she did not know a thing – not one thing – about her father. Such a simple question –
What did your father do?
– and she had been lost in a host of half-formed imaginings that had no connection to reality.
    And then David said, ‘I should go,’ and rose from the chair. A while back he had released her hand and she hadn’t even noticed. The lifeline was disappearing.
    ‘Are you busy later?’ he asked.
    She nodded. ‘I have someone coming to see me,’ she said.
    ‘A date?’ he asked, but there was nothing suggestive in his tone.
    ‘No,’ she said, and smiled. ‘No such thing. Tonight I have my reading club.’
    ‘A reading club?’
    ‘Yes, a reading club, first meeting tonight.’
    ‘And anyone can come?’
    ‘No, not anyone … a very select group of initiates, only the very best people – you know?’
    David nodded, seemed distracted. ‘Then another time,’ he said.
    ‘Yes … another time. You know where I am.’
    ‘I do,’ he said, ‘and I’m sorry about what I said.’
    Annie smiled. ‘I’m not … not anymore.’
    He seemed to relax a little. ‘So another time it is then?’
    Annie hesitated for a second. ‘Yes, another time.’
    David smiled, seemed pleased. ‘I’ll see you then,’ he said, and started towards the door.
    She went after him, slowly at first, and even as he reached the sidewalk she was there at the window watching his back as he walked away. He didn’t turn, and for some reason she was glad of that. She wouldn’t have wanted to appear desperate or lonely – or hopeful. Hope was an over-rated commodity, too over-rated by far.
    She thought of the possibility that something might happen here, and for a moment she was caught in a brief question-and-answer with herself.
    Should I?
Perhaps, perhaps not
.
    Could I?
I think I could
.
    Will I?
I … I hope
…
    And then there was Sullivan’s voice:
Coincidence my dear, isbullshit … Your thoughts are almost exclusively responsible for the situations you get yourself into
.
    David Quinn disappeared at the end of the block, and Annie turned to survey the store. For the first time the walls seemed to be closing in upon her: the place seemed so small; so many shadows, so little space.
    She shook her head and went to the counter, and there on the surface sat the sheaf of papers that Forrester had left with her five days before. She reached for the telephone and called Jack Sullivan, shared the time of day with him and then reminded him to come down at six before Forrester arrived. He said he would,
promised
he wouldn’t drink too much and forget, and she hung up the receiver.
    The store was filled to bursting with silence. The rain had stopped and, but for the sound of her own gentle breathing, there was nothing. Nothing at all.

SEVEN
    Forrester arrived punctually. Sullivan was already in the kitchen, out of sight. He wasn’t drunk, he hadn’t forgotten, and if anything he’d been early. Annie was grateful for that, more grateful than he could tell from the nonchalance of her greeting when he appeared at the front door.
    ‘Good day?’ he’d asked.
    ‘Quiet,’ she’d said, deciding before he’d even arrived to say nothing of David Quinn. Irrespective of whatever doubts she herself may have had about David, Annie O’Neill was considerate enough to take Sullivan’s feelings into account. Though there could never be any possibility of a relationship between herself and Sullivan she knew that he held her close in his thoughts. His feelings were avuncular, paternal almost, and if she started to change her patterns too rapidly he would become concerned. His presence at the