She drops her hand from her mouth. ‘Is it true?’ she asks. ‘Are you a cop?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh fuck fuck fuck.’ Her voice is so soft and thin, so devastated. ‘Are you wired up now?’ she asks. ‘Or bugged or … or whatever the terminology is?’
‘No, I’m clean. It’s just me and you. Always has been.’
She shakes her head. ‘I don’t believe you.’
‘I don’t blame you,’ I reply. ‘Listen, sit down. Let’s talk this through.’ I pat the bed and immediately regret it. That must have looked pretty skeevy.
Wisely, she ignores my suggestion. ‘Sol Miller?’ she says. ‘Is that even your name?’
I shake my head. ‘I’m Sol Revivo. Solomon Revivo.’ And in my mind, my wisecracking alter ego pipes up, ‘Hey, good to meet you!’
She covers her mouth again, arms wrapped across her front, and goes back to doing the stare thing.
‘Lana—’
She lowers her hand from her mouth. ‘Who are you working for?’
I breathe as quietly as I can. I feel like a stabbed coffee bag, life whistling out of me. ‘London Met.’ I try a smile. ‘So I can get you all the police-issue handcuffs you want, Cha Cha. Upgrade those old Hiatts.’ The joke falls flat. That’s understandable.
‘I don’t know who you are,’ she says, voice shaking. ‘You are made of lies.’
‘No,’ I say. ‘Not made of, I swear. I’ve lied to you, yes, and from the very bottom of my heart, I am sorry for that.’
Hell, I can’t say anything that doesn’t make me sound like an asshole. I decide to shut up. Almost. ‘Ask me anything you want,’ I say, and a voice in my head goes, ‘Gee, that’s big of you, Revivo.’
‘How did you get into my house?’ she asks.
Straight for the jugular. ‘I made a duplicate of your key.’ I have never felt shame as bone-deep as this.
‘You bastard,’ she breathes. ‘How? When?’
I clear my throat. ‘I took a clay impression.’
These sordid truths of my profession feel like a tawdry gift. I can’t offer much to excuse my behaviour but at least I can expose how we work. Keep on giving her one hundred per cent truths. Not that I can ask her to believe them. But she’s not exactly Mary Poppins herself. Lord knows what her story is. I have to remind myself that, much as I want to hurl myself at her feet and beg forgiveness for my deception, I need to be on my guard. Because Lana Greenwood probably ought to be begging for forgiveness too. Unless, oh fuck. Unless this relationship means jack shit to her and I’m a bigger fool than I thought. My self-loathing reaches new heights. What world do I inhabit?
‘What are you doing here?’ she asks. ‘Are you back from Birmingham for good?’
My heart breaks a little. ‘Lana, there was no Birmingham. The new job doesn’t exist. It’s part of my exit strategy.’
She shakes her head as if trying to clear her thoughts. ‘Your what?’
‘I’m being pulled from the operation,’ I say. ‘I have to withdraw from you without arousing your suspicions. I’m meant to dick you about a bit, make you mistrust me. Then I vanish.’
‘Withdraw?’ The word is pure contempt.
‘I’m too involved with you, Lana. And my superior officers know it. We’re not meant to get romantically attached to people we’re—’
‘Romantically attached?’ She’s sneering at my choice of words again.
‘It’s the Met, Lana.’ I’m trying not to raise my voice but I’m so fucking frustrated. ‘We don’t use the phrase “fall in love”.’
I want to show her the truth, to unpeel my outer self and say, here, take a look, this is me. But I can’t. We can’t. None of us can ever completely know another person but this is a different ball game altogether. My line of work amplifies the basic tenet of human existence, the unknowability that leaves us locked in our own meat, clawing to get out in search of another’s unreachable soul. Trying to stave off the isolation. Not that they mention that on any training course.
‘This fake IT job was going to land me a contract in Spain,’ I continue. ‘I’d make out you could come and visit. I’d send you a postcard from Europe. Just one. Then you’d never hear from me again. That’s the plan. I’m meant to be executing it now.’ I crimp my lips together, trying to stay tough on the outside. ‘But I can’t do it, Lana.’
My voice thins to a squeak. It’s pitiful.
I cough and draw a breath. ‘If it helps any,’ I say, ‘you could get me hauled over the coals. Sue the ass off the Met.’
‘Every cloud,’ she says bitterly.
‘I’m sorry.’ The word will never suffice but what else do I have right now?
She takes a step into the room, arms curled around herself as if it’s cold in here. ‘So is my life in danger?’ she asks. ‘From Ilya Travis?’
‘We can get you police protection.’
She looks at me, aghast. I feel bad that it’s about to get worse.
‘Why did you kill Misha, Lana?’
A sob erupts from her, a snatch of a wail that chills me to the marrow. She tries to swallow it, clamps a hand to her mouth again, and staggers back against the bedroom door. Bump. Her noise falls to whimpers and sniffles. I know I’ve guessed correctly. It’s some time before she has the composure to speak. But that’s OK. I can wait.
Eventually she says, ‘Are you spying on me? Is this why we were together? Have you known all along?’
And that breaks me, that totally fucking breaks me. I’m half off the bed, about to run to her, to scoop her up in my arms and squeeze the pain away. And the words are there, formed, ready to leap from my mouth: No, Lana, no! I love you, you crazy fucking bitch. I love you, and this isn’t about that.
But I freeze and I don’t speak because sanity kicks in. I realise those aren’t appropriate declarations to make to a suspected murderer, especially not when you’re a cop. Besides, she’s kinda in the ballpark with those questions of hers.
‘I smelled chlorine in your hair,’ I say. ‘At Dravendene. When we were fucking in the forest.’
She nods heavily. Comprehension’s dawning, for one of us at least.
‘The way you cried out,’ she says. ‘When you came, you howled like…’
‘Like I was in pain,’ I offer. ‘Like I was shattering into pieces. Like I’d just realised this woman I was fucking, who I was really getting to like, realised she was my enemy. And I should back off if I knew what was good for me.’
‘I’m not your enemy.’ Her voice is soft as velvet.
There’s a lump in my throat. ‘Why did you kill him, Lana? That’s the part I can’t figure out.’
‘It was an accident,’ she says, quiet as a mouse.
‘Care to tell me about it?’
Maybe my tone is off. She’s suddenly angry. ‘Why the fuck should I tell you anything?’
I have to concede she has a point.
‘For a long time,’ I say, ‘I had you pegged as working with Misha. Thought maybe the bar was a business front. But I’m pretty sure I’m wrong on that score. If I’m not, then you’re damn good, Lana. And I take my hat off to you.’
‘I didn’t know him,’ she says. ‘Just a customer. It was an accident.’
‘So you keep saying,’ I reply. ‘You wanted me to read this journal, right?’
She’s silent, just looks embarrassed.
‘Because you’re always leaving it lying around the place. Hell, Lana. One night you left it open on the coffee table.’
‘Why are you in my home?’ she asks.
I sigh. We’re back to me being the one in the wrong. I figure I have to take it. This isn’t the time to discuss who has the moral advantage here, who’s committed the worst sin.
‘I came back to continue reading your … story,’ I say. Man, I didn’t meant that to sound quite so sarcastic. ‘I started reading before I made out I was leaving for Birmingham,’ I explain. ‘Couldn’t leave it hanging. Thought the truth might start to emerge if I wasn’t
on the scene.’ I check my wristwatch. ‘I thought you’d be at the bar till late.’
‘I’m in no mood for it tonight,’ she says. ‘Raf’s with Bruno. They’re going to lock up. I’m exhausted. I came back to sleep. I saw you through the blinds so I crept in.’
Ah, yeah. Those blinds I’d left open so I could spot her if she came back early. Hoist by my own petard.
‘So what are you trying to convince me of with this?’ I say, gesturing to the journal. ‘Your innocence?’
She nods.
‘But you’re not innocent,’ I say.
‘And neither are you,’ she replies crisply. Her shoulders stiffen and her chin tips up. ‘So tell me, Mr Revivo. Why did we have a relationship? What did I mean to you?’
I note that she keeps using the past tense. ‘Sit down, Lana. Please.’
She shakes her head. ‘Tell me.’
I draw a deep breath. I can’t sugar-coat any of this. But I wish she’d sit down with me. The way she’s standing in the doorway like that makes me edgy. As if she’s on the verge of walking out. I’m on her bed with her diary. She’s looking in at me, and I’m looking in at her life. It’s not good, really not good. I am the lowest of the low. Even if she meant for this to happen, I should have been a bigger guy. Infiltrating a bunch of crooks to get intel on them is one thing; reading the heart of your lover is another. If this is her heart. God, but I hope it is.
‘As part of an ongoing investigation,’ I say, ‘we had to gain access to the social circle of a number of people. We had Morozov and others under surveillance. We knew Morozov went to fetish clubs in his personal life so I tried to get involved in the scene. Met Lou via a kinky dating site, Brighton-based like him. And then I was in. Or on the outskirts. Turns out she didn’t know him that well. No one seems to have done. Kept himself to himself. Then I got an invite to Dravendene with Lou’s crowd. And he was there. And you were all over me and you knew him and it was a gift, a total gift dropped right in my lap.’
She nods. Her face is tense. She’s remarkably calm, considering. It bothers me.
‘That night,’ she says, ‘you kept saying you thought you knew him from somewhere.’
‘An act. A way to forge a connection. Make him think we moved in the same circles.’
‘You used me to get close to him.’
And here comes the wrecking ball, smashing into my dreams.
‘It’s not that clear cut,’ I say. ‘Sure, this was a covert, intelligence-gathering operation but—’
‘Bullshit.’
‘I swear, Cha Cha, I didn’t—’
‘Don’t Cha Cha me, you treacherous, fucking cunt. You used me!’
‘Lana, please! Let me explain. Give me a chance here.’ God, I sound like such a cliché. I wouldn’t blame her if she tried to punch me in the nuts.
She glares at me, lips pressed tight, shoulders rising and falling. ‘I need a drink.’
It sounds like an accusation. She leaves the bedroom. I listen to her moving in the other room, bottles, glasses and ice clinking. Will she fix me a drink? Do I deserve one? Should I ask? Should I join her? I could kill for a smoke but I’m holding off a while longer. It’s self-indulgent and rude. I’m walking a tightrope here. I need to not fuck up any more than I already have done.
Minutes later she returns, a balloon glass in one hand, a tumbler in the other. Brandy for her, bourbon for me. Over ice. Two cubes, the way I like it. It’s the little kindnesses that kill you. Bourbon on the rocks and I want to weep with gratitude. She passes me my drink and stands by the bed.
‘So why don’t you tell me who you are,’ she asks, ‘and I’ll tell you what I’ve done.’
I raise my glass to the air. ‘Quid pro quo.’
She sits on the edge of the bed with me, not too close, and she takes a sip of brandy. Then she lies back on the duvet, feet still on the ground, and gazes up at the ceiling. One hand clasps the balloon glass to her stomach, the other is tucked behind her head. Lamplight from the courtyard shines through the window, throwing stripes across the lower half of her body. She’s wearing this sky-blue dress, an ordinary, straight-up-and-down number which probably cost a whack because she always looks so damn good in it. Her knees peek out the bottom. She has great knees. Her posture is open, as if she’s lying on a river-bank and dragonflies are dancing around her, but there’s a stiffness in her body. Everything about her says, ‘Don’t you dare fucking touch me.’ So I don’t. I value my balls.
‘I’m listening,’ she says.
I inhale deep and hard. I figure it’s best to start at the end because that’s of most relevance to us. ‘Like I say, you seemed a useful link to Morozov,’ I reply. ‘That was the start of it. Plus, you know, you were cute, so that helped.’ She doesn’t smile. Failed again. ‘Then suddenly he’s dead,’ I continue, ‘and when I smelled your hair, I knew there was something you weren’t telling me. So, forgive my language, I decided to cultivate the connection and monitor you off the record.’
‘And they say romance is dead.’
I ignore the barb. She has every right to fire them.
‘You know, we ought to have been at his inquest the other week,’ I say. ‘But my unit had words with the right people and we were let off the hook because it could’ve gotten complicated. What else? Hell, so much to fess up to. I faked the building site job. Used it as an excuse to be in Saltbourne. With you. I’ve been briefed on the building trade. I’d work from home, writing up reports, checking in with HQ. Then I’d go for a run, stick on these dirty clothes and smear a little grime and plaster here and there. Then I’d drive over to the bar for … for Happy Hour. And I was happy, Lana. You made me happy, so fucking happy.’ My throat tightens. I wait for it to pass. ‘Can’t fake happiness, Lana.’
‘No,’ she says sternly, still lying there, eyes fixed on the ceiling. ‘Tell me who you are, Sol Revivo. What makes you tick?’
The pause that follows seems to go on forever. Tumbleweed practically rolls across the silence. And I’m thinking I am a man who, right now, would peel off his own skin and dive into salt if it would take away your pain. But, instead, I tone it down, stay matter-of-fact, and I say, ‘I’m a regular, middle-class Jewish guy from New Jersey. Been living in London these last twenty years. I have dual nationality. That part was true. Joined the police force in my twenties and gradually moved up the ranks.’
‘Why did you leave the States?’
I give a hollow laugh. I can’t help it. This stuff’s so petty. ‘Quiet, toxic family dramas. The usual. Wanted to get away from my mother. Ironically, my mom swapped continents for the same reason. It’s a family tradition.’
She sits up next to me, frowning.
‘So your parents weren’t killed in a car crash when you were a child?’
Ah, hell. It’s hard to keep track of what matters when you fabricate a life. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Alive and well.’
‘There was no Little Orphan Sol?’
I wince. ‘No.’
‘And your grandmother with the inheritance?’
I shake my head. Man, this is harrowing, and it’s all my fucking fault. I want to reach out and hold her hand as she sits there, stunned, but I don’t think the gesture will be helpful.
‘It’s useful to have money and no job when you’re undercover,’ I explain. ‘Wins you friends, keeps you free to roam. I played up my Jewishness. Claustrophobic relatives with cash. That kind of thing. Easy to convince people of your credibility when you tap into their … their preconceptions.’
‘So your tattoo?’ she says. ‘Those seed heads? One for every loss.’
I shake my head. ‘Just a tattoo, Lana.’
Her face flushes, a darkening rose. She takes a large, steady sip of brandy. She stares at the wall opposite us.
‘You made me care about you,’ she says. Her voice is so tiny, as if she’s having to eke out every word. ‘With your tales of loss. Your talk of fear. Guilt. I thought – stupid, stupid me – I thought it meant we were clo
se.’ Then she turns to me and, with a vicious little jerk, hurls the remaining contents of her glass in my face.
It’s cold, it’s wet, it’s a shock. For an instant, I can’t see. Alcohol stings my eyes. She’s on her feet and so am I. She’s running from me. The room is blurred, but I follow. I hook her around the waist and pull her back. She shouts but she lets me restrain her. I’m damn certain she lets me.
‘Lana, forgive me, please. Please! I’ll do anything, I swear to God, I’ll…’
Tears well in my vision. A reaction to brandy in the eyeballs. I’m holding her against the open door of the bedroom. No, not holding. Let’s face it, I’ve trapped her. My arms are either side of hers, my hands are flat to the door. She’s motionless apart from the faint pump of her shoulders. I blink and the tears spill. I expect her to knee me in the cojones. She doesn’t. Another wave of tears rises. I’ll admit it, that’s not the brandy weeping anymore.
She reaches up, face moving close to mine. She presses a sucking sort of kiss to my cheek. Ye gods, but it’s impossible to second-guess this woman. Her lips pulse. It’s like a sea anemone’s got suction on my face, and it’s beautiful. Fucking beautiful. She’s slurping on her brandy and on my tears. I can taste the mixture when it dribbles to my lips, salt and sweet and warm. Part of me’s wondering if she’s about to bite a vengeful chunk out of my face, and part of me’s getting hard. I hope to hell she doesn’t notice.
Well, she notices. Too late. Her hand is on my dick, rubbing me through my pants. Immediately, I’m a good deal harder.
‘Make me forget,’ she whispers.
Oh God, Lana, Lana! I’m right back in the forest at Dravendene. ‘I can make you forget,’ I’d said, and I had meant it. Or I’d wanted to. I’d wanted us to get lost together, lost in each other, to forget everything for a while before facing the fray. Because we were both reeling from the death of Morozov. But, yeah, for different reasons. I get that now.
She raises her arms, inviting me to take off her dress. So I do, and she’s there against the door in her bra and panties. I’m not sure if this is good medicine for either of us but, right now, I’m risking it.
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