Staying Power

by Judith Cutler

  As she’d expected, Cassie made a noise somewhere between amusement and outrage.

  So why had she chosen a really slinky outfit, very short, very flattering now she was so thin? Sometime between Florence and now she’d lost nearly a stone. She looked down at her legs: how would Patrick react to seeing this much. She’d come to a decision: if something didn’t tweak the chemistry between them – act as a catalyst, that was it! – she’d let the relationship go, such as it was. The champagne she was taking, her sexiest outfit – if they didn’t work, finito!

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  So what sort of man cherished his motorcycles – some six or seven collectors’ items and a modern couple he said he used regularly – not in a garage but in a living room, complete with thick, heavy curtains? She was presumably about to find out, as he steered her – both still clutching champagne flutes – to what he called his snug. It was the size of a family living room, and furnished with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, a huge desk, and deep chairs, thickly upholstered in maroon leather. She subsided into one of these.

  ‘Now,’ he said. ‘Eyes shut. Tightly shut? Good. Just keep them shut while I get your little present!’

  If he was pissed enough to ask, she was pissed enough to obey.

  Leather! The smell took her straight back to Florence – pre-flu Florence, when she’d located the leather market by its smell. Poor Alan. She’d have given her teeth to have been able to nail Sanderson for that. He’d certainly driven him to it, as surely as if he’d tied the rope and pushed him. Deliberately bleeding his business dry. But suicide it seemed to have been. The ultimate expression of anger. Anger at whom? Kate, whose card was in his pocket? Kate, who’d never returned his call? Yes, those long slashes in the cashmere he’d hoped would make his fortune – they were angry. The slashes that had cut into his flesh. Poor bastard. The man who’d taken the photo of her as a stranger and been kind to her on the plane. All that talk about leather and lining. He’d been right about her shoes, come to think of it, the ones she was wearing tonight. Yes, they were stretching: soon they’d need inner soles to hold them on.

  ‘You can open your eyes now.’

  She pulled herself together. She’d need a different sort of shoe to go with the outfit Patrick was holding out to her.

  ‘Here: it’s yours. Take it. Go on. For you.’

  A set of leathers. Lovely soft, though presumably tough, leathers. The panels of red and white – how long would they stay white, for goodness’ sake? – would highlight hips and breasts, the red give lustre to her hair. He’d chosen well.

  ‘Go and put them on,’ he said, his eyes at last showing something like interest. ‘Please. And Kate, don’t leave anything on underneath.’ Presumably under his black set, he was naked too.

  Hmm. Well, she’d never done leather before, but why not? And why this business about going to put them on. Why not strip here and don them? Still, at least if she changed in the downstairs cloakroom, she’d see what she looked like.

  The answer was, very good.

  God, what would an outfit like this do to Graham’s blood pressure?

  She gripped the washbasin. This could be a big mistake. They were already outside her bottle of champagne and were making inroads into one he’d had on ice. There was no way she would take to his pillion, no way, come to think of it, she could let him drive. Still, she’d seen no sign of helmets, and there was no harm in humouring him. And then, then it dawned on her: he was probably thinking not riding but – riding.

  Better get in the mood. If that was what she still wanted.

  When she emerged, he was back in his bike room. There was no doubt about the expression in his eyes. Except he hid them behind a camera.

  ‘Just sit astride it: that’s fine! Lovely. Hold it there! Lovely.’

  Alan’s photo. The photo with Cary. Oh, enough of this. She dismounted.

  She shook herself. It was all past tense now. Had to be, or you couldn’t do your job.

  She framed another photogenic smile on her face, as she leaned against the bike. But her heart wasn’t in it.

  Patrick wasn’t smiling either. Not socially, at least. He was gathering up a length of heavy plastic coated chain – the sort people used to fasten their machines to lamp posts. And he was lying backwards on the saddle, head towards the bars.

  Oh, God.

  His voice thick, he said, ‘Chain me to the bike. Chain me to the bike. And then—’ He saw her hesitate. ‘It’ll be such fun. When you unzip me …’

  She shook her head dumbly.

  ‘Please, Kate. Please. And then sit astride me. No. Chain me first …’ he whispered desperately.

  Poor bastard: was that the only way he could manage?

  It might be a bit of fun, something to giggle over. And there was no reason why she shouldn’t acquiesce in his fantasies. Except—

  No, fun though it might be – and he was certainly consenting – she couldn’t do it. There’d been too much control in her life recently. Her life, and others’.

  ‘Hmm,’ she said. ‘Tell you what, you just lie back there and close your eyes. And wait. No, no peeping.’

  She blew him a kiss as she slipped out.

  Leaving the leathers hanging in the bathroom, she closed Patrick’s front door softly behind her and strode off into the cold of the night.