Untouchable

by Ava Marsh

‘You interest me, Grace. Not many women do that.’

  ‘I’ll take it as a compliment,’ I say, forcing myself to speak.

  ‘You should.’

  I turn my face to meet his. It’s still dark outside, but my eyes are growing accustomed to the gloom and I find I can gaze right into those inscrutable iron-blue eyes. He’s more attractive than I remember. And compelling, in that understated way. His effect is unnerving, exerting a kind of force field that somehow saps my remaining energy.

  ‘Amanda was beautiful,’ he says, his voice softer. ‘But your face is more interesting.’ He lifts a hand and touches my cheek. I steel myself not to flinch.

  ‘So, Grace, what are we going to do about our little problem? Or rather, what are you going to do?’

  He’s playing with me, I think. Relishing every moment.

  I stare out the front window. Maybe I should tell him the truth. Maybe I should tell him that I have no idea. No plan. Nothing up my sleeve.

  He’s going to suss it soon anyway.

  Because everything he’s said to me since I got in this car is true. I can’t blackmail him. I can’t threaten or embarrass him. I have no leverage over him whatsoever.

  But that’s not the worst of it. Not by a long way. The worst I daren’t admit even to myself.

  ‘You can’t help yourself, can you?’ he says suddenly. ‘Like a moth to the flame.’

  I jerk my face back towards his. ‘What do you mean?’

  His gaze is casual, even clinical. ‘Don’t disappoint me, Grace. I think you know exactly what I mean.’

  An ancient feeling stirs within me, half-forgotten, now resurrected. A creeping lassitude weighing me down as he lifts his hand again and trails it from my chin to my chest. A warmth between my legs, an ache, dull but insistent.

  The mind forgets, but the body always remembers.

  I take a deep breath, confronted now with what I’ve so far managed to avoid – the terrible recognition that some part of me is drawn to this man. Desires him. Despite everything he is, and everything I know he has done.

  ‘Grace,’ he whispers, slipping his hand through my shirt buttons and cupping my breast in his hand.

  Oh God, not again. I close my eyes and find myself standing in that terrible little flat, facing Michael.

  ‘Grace.’

  Lennart releases his seatbelt and mine. Leans across the console between our seats and moves his hand to my thighs, pressing it against my jeans. I force myself to look at him, his features blurring as he moves closer.

  ‘Keep your eyes shut,’ he commands. I obey as he pulls me towards him, covering my mouth with his. I kiss him back, wanting to devour him, to be devoured. Craving the oblivion that only sex can bring.

  But Michael’s face hovers in my head, that indifferent, almost triumphant expression in his eyes.

  Lennart slides his tongue into my mouth. I push him away and sit upright.

  ‘No.’

  I start to cough. Try to draw breath but my throat has seized up. Tears sting my eyes as I grab my handbag and grope for my inhaler. Grasp it and raise it to my mouth, pressing down hard on the canister.

  Nothing.

  Oh fuck, I think, as I remember it’s run out. I forgot to get a new one. I fucking forgot.

  I shake it and try again. Not even a hiss. I drop it and attempt to breathe in. I’m gasping, choking. Stars begin to implode in my head.

  Oh God. I can’t fucking breathe. Panic surges up inside me. My hands grip the seat as I try desperately to rake in some oxygen.

  Lennart leans across me and takes something out of the glove compartment. A small tin. As another paroxysm of coughing engulfs me I see him remove a neatly rolled joint and light it, pulling on it deeply before holding it to my lips.

  ‘Inhale,’ he orders. ‘As much as you can.’

  I try, but the coughing becomes more violent.

  ‘Grace!’ He grips my arm, his voice insistent. ‘You’re hyperventilating. Calm down and try again.’ He raises the spliff to my mouth and I suck on it as hard as I can. Manage to pull some of the smoke into my lungs. A few seconds later the pain begins to ease.

  ‘Again,’ Lennart insists.

  I inhale more deeply this time, and the ache in my chest slowly subsides to a memory. I draw away, clearing my throat.

  ‘Thanks,’ I choke, barely able to form the words.

  He grinds the spliff out on the ashtray in the console. Chucks it back into the tin. ‘You should be more careful. Keep more than one inhaler. And get yourself on a decent preventative.’

  ‘I never had you down for a stoner,’ I say, my voice still croaky.

  He laughs. ‘Purely medicinal. I find it helps with the headaches.’ He studies me for a minute while my internal chaos subsides. The pot has taken the edge off the fear; not much, but a little.

  ‘Why did you just do that? I ask. ‘Why not leave me? It would have been cleaner, wouldn’t it?’

  Lennart looks at me with the expression of a parent whose child just said something humorous. ‘What, and miss the best part? You haven’t told me what I want to know yet.’

  ‘I thought you already knew it all.’

  ‘Not this. Not now. I mean what happened before,’ Lennart says, his eyes never leaving my face. ‘With Michael Farrish.’

  I swallow. He knows. Of course he does.

  ‘Convicted for raping his girlfriend, right?’

  I avoid his gaze. But don’t bother to deny it.

  ‘You worked with him for how long?’ he asks, though I’m sure he already knows that too.

  I squeeze my eyes shut. Let my head sink back into the headrest. ‘Two years.’ My lips are numb and it’s an effort to speak.

  Lennart thinks for a moment, his right hand rubbing his chin. ‘So, your job was to rehabilitate him, guide him through the sex offenders programme. Get him to acknowledge the pain he caused his victim, and so on.’

  I nod, eyes still closed, wondering why he needs to do this.

  ‘I’ll bet Farrish did a very convincing job of compliance. Talked about his feelings, his difficult childhood, yadda yadda. You were convinced you were really getting somewhere, right?’

  I cough. ‘Do we have to do this?’ I lift my hand and wipe my eyes. I’m suddenly exhausted, wondering how this is all going to end. Almost ready for it to be over.

  ‘Yes, Grace, I think we do,’ Lennart says, turning to me. ‘You know why? I think I’m the only person you can do this with.’

  I snort. But my heart’s not in it.

  ‘Oh, I’m sure there was plenty of talk afterwards, in hospital,’ he continues, undeterred. ‘All that counselling and psychotherapy – after you tried the easy way out.’ The derision in his tone is mild, but unmistakable. I’m not sure if it’s aimed at the therapists, or my botched attempt at an overdose.

  ‘But your depression, what was at the heart of it, Grace? That’s what interests me – and what should interest you.’ I feel his hand again on my cheek. It barely touches my skin, but the tiny hairs register its presence like an electric charge.

  Don’t open your eyes, I tell myself, as if I really am a child. Don’t look.

  Silence for a while. Long minutes with just the rhythmic sigh of our breathing. It’s the only sound in the whole vehicle, beside the patter of the rain on the car. Softer now, less insistent.

  ‘What you forgot, Grace, wallowing in all that guilt, that remorse, was the nature of the beast.’ Lennart inhales, releasing the breath slowly. ‘By all accounts, Farrish is a very plausible man. Charming even.’

  I open my eyes finally. Meet his. ‘You’ve certainly been doing your homework.’

  He shrugs. ‘Like I said, you intrigue me.’ He leans back into his seat, stares out of the windscreen at the landscape ahead. No trees, only an expanse of indistinct countryside stretching off towards faint lights in the distance.

  ‘How do you know all this?’

  Lennart’s top lip curls. ‘I’ve read the reports. The stuff you wrote u
p on him, the original parole hearing.’

  ‘When?’ I ask indignantly.

  ‘Way back. Before the party. It was my job to check you all out.’

  I flash back to our first meeting, his look of recognition in the lobby. The teasing in the hotel room.

  You’ve led such a dull life, have you?

  This man will always be ten steps ahead of me.

  ‘Tell me about Michael,’ he insists. ‘It was going so well, wasn’t it? You built up a rapport. Farrish opened up to you, talked about his girlfriend. He cried.’

  The ridicule in his voice is unmistakable, and I feel the stir of something. Anger. Irritation. ‘How on earth did you get your hands on—’

  He holds a palm up to interrupt me. ‘Details, Grace. How does anybody get anything done? You call in a few favours, that’s all.’ He leans his head back on the headrest. I see a faint line of stubble around his cheeks. Part of me wonders when he last got to shave.

  ‘So you were pleased with his progress. Argued in favour of his release?’

  I nod miserably.

  ‘And two days afterwards he called, on the mobile number you gave him – even though that broke every rule in your book.’

  ‘I wanted to …’

  ‘I know. You wanted to help, to be there for him.’ He looks at me. I can’t tell if his expression is sympathy or scorn. ‘Was that what you told yourself when he asked you to go round to his flat?’

  I stare down at my hands. See they’re trembling. I feel suddenly hot, undo my coat, slip my arms free.

  ‘I’ve seen pictures, Grace. Farrish. He’s a disarmingly attractive man.’

  I swallow again. Wish I had something to drink. ‘Where exactly are you going with this?’

  He moves his face closer to mine, his voice low and quiet. ‘Do you want me to stop? Do you really?’

  I look outside at the drizzle, at the distant shimmering lights. Consider getting out of the car and making a bolt for it, but I’m too tired to even attempt it.

  Time to stop running, Grace.

  Lennart puts his hand in his pocket. ‘Some things are simply very hard to resist, aren’t they?’ He pulls out a packet of cigarettes, flips open the lid and holds it out to me. I stare at the neat crowns of the filters. The urge to take one surges inside me. I haven’t smoked in five years and yet I’ve never wanted one more.

  I shake my head.

  ‘It’s a bit late for self-denial, isn’t it?’ Lennart removes a cigarette and lights it from the car lighter. The tip glows in the gloom as he sucks it into life. He helps himself to a single puff then hands it to me. ‘Just one, Grace. It won’t kill you.’

  My resistance crumbles. Like the condemned man, I think as I take it from his hand and put it to my lips. Take a long deep drag. And start choking again.

  Lennart grabs the cigarette from me and waits for the coughing to abate. I feel sick and dizzy and slightly high as the nicotine swarms into my bloodstream, stirs up all those dormant receptors in my brain.

  ‘Better?’ he asks, and I nod.

  ‘So let’s see.’ Lennart sucks on the cigarette, releasing a plume of smoke into the car. ‘You go round there, telling yourself you’re there to help. Hiding the real reason from yourself for as long as you can. Only once you’re in that room the self-delusion evaporates and you’re helpless. Unprepared.’

  ‘Alex,’ I say weakly. ‘What is this for? Please, can we just let it go?’

  He looks over. ‘Why? Have you got something you’d rather be doing?’ The hint of a smirk around his mouth.

  I blink hard, remembering where all this has to be leading. ‘No.’

  Lennart spins round and leans sideways into the leather of his seat, eyeing me directly. ‘There you were,’ his voice low, almost mocking. ‘Educated, married, successful. Fully trained in the inner workings of the mind. And none of it counted for anything when it came to it, did it?’

  I lean forward, open the window and rest my head on the side of the car, letting the fresh air blow into my face. A few drops of rain land on my skin.

  ‘Did you resist, Grace, when he came on to you? Did you show him your wedding ring? Slap his face?’

  I shake my head again. Tears run down my cheeks, merging with the rain. I turn and grab the cigarette from his fingers, take another drag and throw it out the window.

  Then I face Lennart. ‘I fucked him, OK? You know that. Everyone knows that. The whole fucking world knows it. I let Michael screw me and I did it knowing I was destroying everything – my marriage, my career, my self-respect, everything.’

  ‘Grace.’

  Just that. My name.

  ‘What?’ I sob, running my hand across my cheek. I feel I’ve been treading water for the last five years. That now I’m sinking, no strength left to resist. ‘What’s this all about? Humiliate me, before you …’ I can’t bring myself to voice it.

  ‘I’m not trying to humiliate you,’ Lennart touches the base of my throat with the back of his forefinger. ‘Far from it.’

  ‘So what then? Why all this?’

  He withdraws his hand but ignores my question. ‘Did it never occur to you, Grace, that you were always too big for all that – the semi-detached house and the semi-detached life? That there was too much in you to ever fit into such a small space?’ He exhales. ‘You didn’t know it then and you still don’t. You’re still punishing yourself for not being small enough, ordinary enough.’

  I stare out the windscreen. Try to stop crying.

  ‘Tell me,’ whispers Lennart, leaning in again. His voice nearly a hiss. ‘Tell me what happened in that flat.’

  A noise in my throat. Like gagging. ‘You already know.’

  ‘Only the facts,’ he says. ‘Not the details.’

  I listen to the rain. It’s picking up again, the faint echo of wind speeding across the landscape. I’ve lost all track of time. How long have we been here? One hour? Two?

  It feels like for ever.

  I give in. Close my eyes and let the memories overwhelm me. ‘I honestly didn’t believe …’ I stop. That’s not true. The real, ugly, painful truth is that I went there, knowing what would happen, yet denying it was even possible. Still denying it as he kissed me, moments after walking through the door. Still denying it as he undressed me and lay me down on that grubby mattress and fucked me entirely senseless.

  I never wanted anyone less – or anyone more.

  Lifting my hand, I pinch my top lip until it hurts. Blink back the tears and force myself to carry on. ‘He … Michael … Afterwards, we … afterwards, he got up and walked over to the window. He said …’

  You really shouldn’t have done that, Grace.

  The terrible weight of those words. The contempt in his eyes.

  ‘What, Grace?’ Lennart’s voice close to my ear, his breath on my skin. ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He said: “You’re all the same, you fucking bitches.”’

  Michael wasn’t even looking at me when he spoke. He was staring out across the town, towards … towards where she lived.

  ‘And then I knew,’ I say hoarsely. ‘That he’d made it up – the remorse, the confessions, the tears, all of it.’

  Lennart makes a small noise. Something between a tut and sucking his teeth. He doesn’t say a word for a minute or two. Nothing but the sound of my sobbing, ragged and tired, in the stillness of the Mercedes.

  ‘Forbidden fruit, Grace – always the sweetest. You accept that in others, yet condemn it in yourself.’ He sighs again, a deep heavy sound like disappointment. ‘Farrish knew you better than you knew yourself. All that time you were analysing him, peering into his mind, you were simply handing him the keys to yours.’

  He turns to examine me again. ‘He exploited you, Grace. Manipulated you.’

  I shake my head miserably. ‘I misjudged him. If I’d been any good, if I’d done my job properly … if I’d had more integrity, I’d have seen through him, I’d have …’

  ‘That’s a little naï
ve,’ Lennart snorts. ‘You know he’d have been released anyway. He’d completed the programme. The risk assessments showed he was unlikely to reoffend. Besides, the world’s full of ex-cons who played the rehabilitation game, only to end up back inside.’

  ‘Social and financial pressure, criminal culture, there’s many different reasons for recidivism …’

  ‘Spare me the psychobabble,’ Lennart cuts in. ‘I like you better in your new career.’

  I shut up.

  ‘So what did you do?’ he asks, after another minute or two have passed. ‘When you realized the truth?’

  ‘Don’t you know?’ I don’t bother to conceal the bitterness I feel.

  ‘I’d like to hear it from you.’

  I breathe in to a count of five. Breathe out to the same. ‘I went to the prison governor. Told him what had happened, what I feared about Michael. He brought in the police.’

  ‘You told them all you’d slept with him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  I snap my eyes open before I recall the expression on their faces. The frown of surprise, then disgust. ‘But they said they didn’t have enough to go on. To arrest him.’

  ‘So you confessed for nothing.’

  Lennart’s words echo round my skull. I raise my hand to my forehead, squeeze the skin between my eyes as if I can pinch out the past. ‘I was put on immediate suspension. And twelve hours later, when she went to the police, I was sacked.’

  ‘Alison Tennant,’ Lennart says thoughtfully. Even the sound of her name makes my chest contract painfully. ‘Only twenty-six years old, wasn’t she?’

  I nod.

  ‘So …’ He waits for me to go on.

  I inhale slowly. ‘After I left, he went straight round to her parents’ house, broke in when she wouldn’t open the door. Raped her twice.’

  Lennart shifts his weight in his seat. ‘Only this time he covered it up. Used a condom both times, then dragged her in the shower to wash off any trace of his DNA, right?’

  I nod again, aware of the pain building in my head.

  ‘So without any hard physical evidence, it was her word against his. Her crying rape, and him claiming he only went round there to talk. So you had to testify, try to convince the jury that he was lying. I can’t imagine that was much fun, Grace. Especially when it came out, your part in it.’