Gil went straight to the bed, to Bianca. He winced and went white as he looked at her bruised, swollen face, the blood trickling from her nose. Lifting her head with great care and tenderness, he untied the knot in the silk scarf, unwound it from around her neck, tossed the scarf to the floor.
‘What did that bastard do to you? My God, I wish I’d got to him before the men did—I’d have torn him limb from limb, the sadistic little swine...’
She heard his voice and tried to lift her lids; it hurt but she managed it and looked at him dazedly. She had never in her life been so glad to see anyone; tears welled into her eyes.
‘Gil.’ Her voice broke. ‘Oh... Gil...’
‘I’m here,’ he said, gently stroking the torn, tangled hair back from her face. ‘I’m here, Bianca; you’re safe now.’
She shuddered helplessly. ‘He...’ Her voice sounded thick and strange; blood was trickling from the corner of her mouth.
‘Don’t try to talk. Your mouth must hurt badly. You should be resting, Bianca.’
‘He was going to rape me!’
‘Shh...’ Gil soothed her as if she were a child, patting her hair, her shoulder.
She was trembling violently, her teeth chattering like castanets. ‘I’m so cold. So cold.’
‘Shock,’ Gil said from somewhere a long way off, and lifted her up off the bed, into his arms.
‘Don’t...’ she cried out, panic surging back, fighting him off.
‘OK, OK,’ he said, and then she felt warmth surrounding her as he wrapped a quilt around her whole body, then lowered her to the bed again. ‘Better?’
She shut her eyes, still shivering. ‘Better,’ she whispered.
‘I’m going to get a doctor for you,’ he said quietly. He moved away from the bed, picked up the telephone from her bedside table, and a few seconds later spoke curtly in Spanish.
After a while he put the phone down and she felt him come towards her again, sit down on the edge of her bed, feather a few strands of hair back from her temples.
‘The doctor will be here soon. Bianca...’ He paused; she felt him watching her, but didn’t open her eyes. The shivering was slowing, warmth was percolating into her, her mind was operating again, but she couldn’t face Gil. He had seen her like that... her hair dishevelled, her dress ripped apart, her body almost naked, her face marked, bruised and bloody.
Gil was the last man in the world she would have wanted to see her in that state. Shame and sickness filled her.
She shouldn’t have opened the door without checking who was outside. There was a security window in the door, a tiny glass circle which gave you a strange view of whoever stood outside, like looking out of a goldfish bowl. If she had looked before she’d opened the door she would have seen him and none of it would have happened.
If only I had... If only...
‘Bianca, can you hear me? You haven’t fainted, have you?’
Reluctantly, her lids stirred.
‘Bianca, the police are here; they want to see you. Do you feel up to talking to them, telling them what happened? They want to make sure they can keep him locked up this time, so if you could make a statement at once it would help. But if you can’t face it I’ll keep them away. I don’t want you to feel you must, if it bothers you.’
She forced her eyes open; Gil was bending over her; she felt his physical presence and shrank back, chill perspiration breaking out on her skin.
‘Don’t...’
He frowned. ‘You’re not scared of me, Bianca, are you? I’d rather cut off my right arm than hurt you— don’t you know that?’
She half sobbed, half laughed. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t help it. Of course I know you wouldn’t hurt me—of course you wouldn’t.’ But she didn’t want him touching her or coming too close. She didn’t want anyone coming too close; she needed to distance herself, to cut herself off from everyone for a while.
He sat down on the bed further away, his face pale, his brows heavy above his grey eyes. ‘Do you feel up to seeing the police?’
She sighed. ‘I suppose I have to?’
‘Not if you don’t feel you can bear it. It’s up to you. When the doctor gets here he’ll probably sedate you; I think maybe you should go to hospital.’
‘No! I’m not seriously hurt. Just bruised.’
‘You’re in shock; it might be wiser if you spent a night in hospital where they can keep an eye on you.’
‘I don’t want to go to hospital,’ she said obstinately, and then suddenly wailed, ‘I want to go home!’ as she was overwhelmed by a desperate yearning to be safely back in her own house, with her children.
If she had never come here this wouldn’t have happened. It was a pity she had ever seen that poster in the travel agency window. She shut her eyes and remembered that day, when she’d first got the idea of a holiday in Spain—it seemed so long ago, another lifetime. So much had happened to her since she got here. It was incredible how much difference a few days could make. Time had rushed past, yet looking back she felt she had been here for months, not days. Her memories of this place were going to be crowded with incident. At home time had slowly dragged past, each day more or less the same, a gentle, tranquil, unthreatening routine of life. Why had she ever grown tired of it? Why had she wanted to get away? She didn’t know when she was well off, did she?
You stupid woman! she told herself. Once you get back home there won’t be any more foreign holidays, any more adventures, any more risks taken.
‘How did he get in here?’ she asked Gil hoarsely. ‘I thought your security was supposed to be foolproof?’
‘We don’t know yet. The security man I warned to be extra vigilant around your apartment noticed someone vanishing into this block and knew it was not a guest, or a member of staff, so he got on the mobile phone to me to let me know, and I shot over here with a couple of other guys. I knew you should be leaving now to meet Freddie and Karl in the piano bar—I had an immediate sixth sense that something was wrong. So we came up here, and thank God we were in time.’
She felt ice trickle down her spine. ‘Yes,’ she whispered.
There was a tap on the door of the apartment; Gil slid off the bed and walked away, returning a moment later with a short, middle-aged man in a dark suit.
‘This is Dr Perez, Bianca. I’m afraid his English isn’t very good, so would you like me to stay, to translate for you?’
She shook her head. She did not want him in the room whilethe doctor examined her.
‘Well, if you want me, I’ll be in the sitting-room,’ Gil said without comment, and left, closing the door behind him.
The doctor smiled at Bianca soothingly, then began a brief examination, clicking his tongue over the bruises on her face and throat. He asked her a few gentle questions; she managed to understand his limping English and he seemed to grasp her replies. She wished again that she had learnt some Spanish, and decided that before she visited any country in future she would learn at least some of their language.
He showed her a hypodermic. ‘Please, sorry, I try not to hurt.’
Warily, she eyed the thing he held. ‘What’s in there?’
He frowned, shrugged. ‘Drugs.’
‘What sort of drugs?’ Bianca did not much like the idea of that long needle going into her and pumping her full of unknown drugs.
The doctor sighed, making a face, then walked away, opened the door and called Gil, who came hurrying. The doctor talked fast in Spanish; Gil talked fast back to him, then came over to the bed and looked down at her, his eyes searching her bruised face.
‘Well, you’ll be glad to hear that the doctor doesn’t think you need to be hospitalised. He agrees you’re in shock but he proposes to sedate you to calm you down, reduce the effect of the shock—you’ll still be able to talk to the police, if you wish, but if you prefer not to we only have to tell them that you’re under sedation and they’ll go away.’
‘Sedatives? That’s what’s in the hypodermic?’
H
e nodded.
She sighed. ‘Oh, well, then, I suppose I’d better let him inject me.’
‘I think you should. If the needle scares you, shut your eyes.’
‘I’m not a child, Gil!’ she snapped, and saw his lids flicker in reaction to her sharp tone.
He went out again and the doctor came back to the bed, prepared her; she tensed, waiting, and then she felt the sting of the needle going in and the doctor’s soft murmur.
‘Good, very good.’ He put a piece of cotton wool over the site of the injection. ‘Hold, please.’ He moved away and Bianca sat with closed eyes, one finger on the cotton wool, feeling her body slow down, her breathing slacken, her heartbeat calm.
‘OK,’ said the doctor, taking away the cotton wool. He studied the faint red spot on her skin where the needle had entered. ‘Good, OK,’ he said, smiling, well pleased with himself. ‘Now rest, please. Stay quiet. OK?’
‘OK,’ she said. ‘Thank you, Doctor.’
‘Goodnight,’ he said in English, and vanished.
Gil stood in the doorway, staring at her across the room as she lay back against her pillows, staring back at him blankly.
‘Will you see the police now or tomorrow?’
‘Now.’
‘Sure?’
‘I want to get it over with. At the moment I feel so calm that if a bomb dropped I think I’d hardly blink. Tomorrow I might feel worse than I do now.’
‘Do you want to put a nightdress on before you see them? They’ll want that dress for evidence.’
She tried to sit up but her energy was so low it was a struggle; Gil slid an arm under her and lifted her, then lowered her feet to the floor. ‘Tell me where to find your nightdress and I’ll help you.’
‘No!’
The cry made him jerk. ‘No,’ he said quickly. ‘Of course not—sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I’ll find the nightie for you and go out while you change.’
‘There’s a clean one in that drawer,’ she said, pointing, and he walked over there, opened the drawer, found a simple blue and white cotton Victorian-style nightdress.
‘Will this do?’
‘Yes, thank you.’ She held out her hand and he gave her the nightdress. ‘Now I’d like to go to the bathroom, please.’ She stood up and swayed, and Gil put an arm out. ‘No, I can manage!’ she said, but felt sufficiently off balance to clutch at his sleeve.
She leaned on him while she slowly walked to the bathroom, which seemed a long way off.
‘Don’t lock the door,’ Gil said. ‘In case you faint.’
She didn’t answer, but she didn’t lock the door because she had to admit that fainting was definitely on the cards. The room was coming and going in a most disconcerting fashion, as though her vision was disturbed, but she knew it was her brain which was not operating at full strength. The injection must have been pretty strong stuff, whatever it was.
In the bathroom she pulled off the red dress, dropped it on the floor, in a tumbled heap, then turned on the shower and stood under it, washing herself from head to foot, feeling unclean. A few minutes later she towelled herself roughly and then slid into her nightdress.
Barefoot and damp-haired, she went back and found Gil in the last stages of making the bed with fresh linen. The used bedclothes lay in a pile on the floor, crumpled and untidy. She gave them a distasteful glance then looked away.
‘Thank you, that was very thoughtful. Why didn’t you call a maid to come and do it?’ she said as he straightened to look round at her, his dark hair tumbling over his forehead, a lock half covering one eye.
‘I thought you would rather not have anyone else around just now.’
His sensitivity touched her. ‘No, I wouldn’t,’ she admitted huskily. ‘You’re very kind, Gil, taking all this trouble.’
‘It’s no trouble; you forget I was working in hotels when I was still a boy. It’s my family trade. I can make a bed faster than the speed of light!’ He grinned at her. ‘There isn’t a job in a hotel that I can’t do efficiently. Anything I ask my staff to do I can do better!’ He paused, then added more soberly, ‘And also the police want your bedclothes, to take away for forensic examination.’
Shivering, she grimaced. ‘Of course. Stupid of me not to think of that.’
She climbed back into bed and Gil tidied the covers with deft, practised hands. ‘Can the police come in now to talk to you?’ he asked her quietly. ‘They’re waiting in a car outside.’
She took a deep breath and nodded, and he brushed a few damp strands back from her bruised face, his fingertips cool and soothing on her hot skin.
‘Do you want me to stay with you this time, to translate for you?’
She couldn’t meet his eyes. ‘Do they speak English?’
‘A little, but not too well,’ he told her regretfully. ‘If you don’t want me here, would you like me to find Freddie and get her here to help with the language barrier?’
She looked at him then, eyes stricken. ‘She knows?’
Gil stared back at her, his face tight, his mouth a white line. ‘I had to explain why you wouldn’t be at dinner tonight. Don’t look like that! Freddie isn’t going to think any the worse of you because you’ve been attacked by that vicious little swine! You’re hardly to blame for what happened! Why should you feel guilty?’
‘Because I’m stupid and I’m a woman,’ Bianca burst out, her voice shaky. ‘Women have an in-built guilt programme—it starts when they’re just little girls; whatever happens to them they are the ones who are made to feel guilty. It’s always their fault. They’re in the wrong place, at the wrong time, they’re too attractive, they were wilfully wearing make-up, or pretty clothes—there are a hundred excuses for blaming them.’
‘Freddie’s a woman—she isn’t going to blame you.’ He paused and added roughly, ‘And neither am I! It was bad luck that you ran into this nasty piece of work right at the start of your holiday. Maybe I shouldn’t have insisted on calling the police, getting you involved in this investigation—you’d never have seen that little bastard again if I hadn’t interfered.’
She lay back, calming again, and gave him a wry little smile. ‘No, Gil, it isn’t your fault either. You were right— I had to tell the police. Sooner or later he was bound to move on to more violent crimes than snatching handbags—he was going to use that knife, and I think he’d have killed someone, not merely raped them. He’s dangerous; he had to be stopped.’
He nodded. ‘I know. But I wish it hadn’t been you who had to face that ordeal.’
‘I’m tougher than I look. I can cope. I’ve had plenty of practice in coping with tough situations.’ She thought of the long, hard birth of her first child; she had been very young then and very scared, but she had come through that, and through all the problems since; she had somehow even managed to survive Rob’s death and the loneliness she had felt ever since. ‘I’m pretty tough,’ she added with a touch of self-congratulation, and Gil looked at her with sardonic amusement.
‘You don’t look so tough to me!’ He ran a hand down her loose, silky black hair, lightly touched her bruised cheekbones with one fingertip. ‘I wish to God I could have stopped this happening to you, Bianca.’
She inwardly flinched at the contact. If only he would stop touching her. In some ways he was so sensitive. Why couldn’t he work out how she felt at this moment—as if she would never want another man within feet of her?
‘Ready for the police now?’ Gil moved away and she relaxed again, with a smothered sigh of relief.
He went out of the room; she heard him opening the front door of her apartment, then the sound of other voices, a heavy tread of feet, and the room seemed to fill up with policemen.
In fact there were only two and they were clearly trying to be quiet and sympathetic—but she found their presence so disturbing that she felt as if there were half a dozen of them.
Gil stayed throughout the interview, translating for her. Although she was very nervous, it turned out to be less of an ordeal
than Bianca had been afraid it was going to be. The police were very down-to-earth and practical with their questions, and gradually Bianca relaxed.
While she was being interviewed one of the police team moved silently about the room taking fingerprints from door-handles and other places which the suspect might have touched, and another man wearing transparent plastic gloves gathered up the bedclothes from the floor and her torn dress and underclothes from the bathroom, stuffing them all into large plastic bags. As he carried them out Bianca watched him, her throat closing in revulsion.
Another man with a camera was waiting to take pictures of her face, showing the bruises which were rapidly darkening, the skin shiny and stretched around her eyes, on her jawline, around her mouth.
She jumped as the flashbulbs popped, and knew she was going to look like a scared rabbit, her eyes red and very big.
At last they went, and Gil got up too. ‘You ought to eat—no, don’t shake your head at me. You’ll feel better if you have a light supper. How about an omelette? And some fruit? I’ll have them send it over at once. What would you like to drink? A hot, milky drink would help you sleep. There will be a security man outside the block all night so if you need help you only have to yell out the window, remember.’
‘I’ll be OK. With that boy in police custody I shall feel a lot safer.’
He nodded. ‘I’m sure you will. Goodnight, Bianca. I hope the rest of your holiday with us is going to be good deal less dramatic and far more pleasant.’
When he had gone she lay there staring at nothing. She couldn’t stay on here; she had to get away. She had to go home. She would have to come back for the trial in due course, but that would not happen for a long time.
Her meal arrived quickly; the middle-aged waitress who brought it did not look at her face, keeping her eyes lowered as she murmured a greeting which told Bianca that Gil had warned the woman not to stare at her. No doubt the whole hotel was gossiping about what had happened—even the other guests would have noticed the arrival of police cars, the departure of the suspect, rough-handled into a car and driven away. Bianca hated the idea of being talked about by a lot of strangers.
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