confiscating her phone, making her sleep on the hard floor, and having to shampoo the blood and brains of a dead man out of her hair after she’d been covered in gore during a gunfight on the banks of the Seine. It was shared experiences like that which had cemented their budding relationship.
‘You want a drink?’ he asked her.
‘I could use a shower first,’ she said.
‘You know where it is,’ he said, motioning down the narrow hall towards the bathroom. ‘There should be some clean towels.’
‘Nothing I should know about? No rats or roaches?’
‘Take the gun in with you, if it makes you feel any safer.’
‘I’ll risk it.’
While Roberta was in the bathroom and he could hear the water pittering and splashing, Ben went into the bedroom, shut the door, sat on the edge of the bed and took out his phone. He turned it on and ran a web search using just the name ‘Tesla’. Within moments he was swamped in a welter of scientific and technical hoo-hah that seemed as grandiose as it did improbable.
He switched from text search results to images, and a few seconds later he found himself staring at the face of the man himself. A pinched, lean, chalky-white face with something of Edgar Allan Poe about him, something perhaps a little bit mad. The hair was oiled and parted in the fashion of the 1920s, the little brush moustache trim and neat. The eyes were sharp and foxy and seemed to bore right out of the screen and into Ben’s.
‘If this is really all about you,’ Ben muttered, ‘you’ve got a lot to answer for, pal.’
He gazed at the image a moment longer, knowing he was only procrastinating. This wasn’t what he’d taken his phone out for.
He swallowed and quickly keyed in Brooke’s number. As he waited for her to reply, he anxiously tried to think of how to express what he wanted to say. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. Can’t we just stop? Can’t we just go back to the way things were? Or just I love you. I need you. Let me come home, as soon as this is over.
But there was no simple formula. No backspace key, no erase button. The damage that had been done couldn’t be healed with just a few facile words.
Brooke didn’t even reply. He aborted the call, strangely relieved but dreading when he’d have to try again.
The pain in his body reminded him of the other damage that needed healing, too. Standing up, he painfully unpeeled his jeans far enough down to inspect the large red weal across his left thigh where the Beretta magazine had absorbed the force of the bullet strike earlier that day. Its oblong shape was almost perfectly imprinted on his skin. He touched it and winced. In a day or two it would blossom into a spectacular bruise and a rainbow of colours.
His right side was pretty tender, too, where he’d taken that particularly solid blow from the man now encased several feet deep in concrete. I’m getting too old for this bollocks , he thought as he peeled off his T-shirt to examine his ribs. Another florid, multicolour bruise was on its way there, too, but at least nothing was cracked internally that he could feel.
The bedroom door suddenly opened and he turned to see Roberta standing there.
Chapter Fourteen
She was wrapped in a towel that covered her from chest to mid-thigh and her hair was wet. ‘Sorry,’ she blurted. ‘I was looking for a hairbrush. Forgot to pack mine.’
‘I don’t have one,’ Ben said. It was impossible not to notice the gleam of her well-toned flesh, or the way her hair lay across her bare shoulder.
Her eyes flicked downwards for an instant. ‘You’ve got scars that weren’t there before,’ she said.
‘I suppose I do,’ he said, glancing down. His torso read like a map of his exploits over twenty years.
‘Jesus. I thought you said you were lucky with bullets.’
‘That one wasn’t a bullet,’ he said. ‘It was a knife. Those ones are bullets.’
‘Oh.’
‘The drugstore on the corner will have a hairbrush we can
‘You want a drink?’ he asked her.
‘I could use a shower first,’ she said.
‘You know where it is,’ he said, motioning down the narrow hall towards the bathroom. ‘There should be some clean towels.’
‘Nothing I should know about? No rats or roaches?’
‘Take the gun in with you, if it makes you feel any safer.’
‘I’ll risk it.’
While Roberta was in the bathroom and he could hear the water pittering and splashing, Ben went into the bedroom, shut the door, sat on the edge of the bed and took out his phone. He turned it on and ran a web search using just the name ‘Tesla’. Within moments he was swamped in a welter of scientific and technical hoo-hah that seemed as grandiose as it did improbable.
He switched from text search results to images, and a few seconds later he found himself staring at the face of the man himself. A pinched, lean, chalky-white face with something of Edgar Allan Poe about him, something perhaps a little bit mad. The hair was oiled and parted in the fashion of the 1920s, the little brush moustache trim and neat. The eyes were sharp and foxy and seemed to bore right out of the screen and into Ben’s.
‘If this is really all about you,’ Ben muttered, ‘you’ve got a lot to answer for, pal.’
He gazed at the image a moment longer, knowing he was only procrastinating. This wasn’t what he’d taken his phone out for.
He swallowed and quickly keyed in Brooke’s number. As he waited for her to reply, he anxiously tried to think of how to express what he wanted to say. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. Can’t we just stop? Can’t we just go back to the way things were? Or just I love you. I need you. Let me come home, as soon as this is over.
But there was no simple formula. No backspace key, no erase button. The damage that had been done couldn’t be healed with just a few facile words.
Brooke didn’t even reply. He aborted the call, strangely relieved but dreading when he’d have to try again.
The pain in his body reminded him of the other damage that needed healing, too. Standing up, he painfully unpeeled his jeans far enough down to inspect the large red weal across his left thigh where the Beretta magazine had absorbed the force of the bullet strike earlier that day. Its oblong shape was almost perfectly imprinted on his skin. He touched it and winced. In a day or two it would blossom into a spectacular bruise and a rainbow of colours.
His right side was pretty tender, too, where he’d taken that particularly solid blow from the man now encased several feet deep in concrete. I’m getting too old for this bollocks , he thought as he peeled off his T-shirt to examine his ribs. Another florid, multicolour bruise was on its way there, too, but at least nothing was cracked internally that he could feel.
The bedroom door suddenly opened and he turned to see Roberta standing there.
Chapter Fourteen
She was wrapped in a towel that covered her from chest to mid-thigh and her hair was wet. ‘Sorry,’ she blurted. ‘I was looking for a hairbrush. Forgot to pack mine.’
‘I don’t have one,’ Ben said. It was impossible not to notice the gleam of her well-toned flesh, or the way her hair lay across her bare shoulder.
Her eyes flicked downwards for an instant. ‘You’ve got scars that weren’t there before,’ she said.
‘I suppose I do,’ he said, glancing down. His torso read like a map of his exploits over twenty years.
‘Jesus. I thought you said you were lucky with bullets.’
‘That one wasn’t a bullet,’ he said. ‘It was a knife. Those ones are bullets.’
‘Oh.’
‘The drugstore on the corner will have a hairbrush we can
Similar Books
