Deception on His Mind (Inspector Lynley, #9)(124)

“Sure,” she said, although the growing warmth of her chest and neck told her that she was going crimson.

“You remember what time we split, don't you? We went up to the huts round nine. We had that booze—bloody awful, it was—what was it called?”

“Calvados,” she said, and added uselessly, “It's made from apples. It's for after dinner.”

“Well, we sort of had it before dinner, huh?” He grinned.

She didn't like it when he grinned. She didn't like his teeth. She didn't like to be reminded that he never saw a dentist. Nor did she like to be faced with the fact that he didn't bathe daily, that he never used a brush on his fingernails, and most of all that he was always careful that their meetings were private, beginning beneath the pier on the seaside of whatever pile was nearest the water and ending in that beach hut that smelled of mildew, where the rattan mats on the floor made a red lattice on her knees as she knelt before him.

Love me, love me. Her actions had begged. See how good I can make you feel?

But that was before she knew that Sahlah needed her help. That was before she'd seen the expression on Theo Shaw's face that told he intended to abandon Sahlah.

“Anyways,” Trevor said when she didn't chuckle at his lewd remark, “we were still there at half-eleven, remember? I even had to make a dash for it to get to work on time.”

She shook her head, slowly. “No, we weren't, Trev. I got home round ten.”

He grinned, still focused on the handlebars. When he raised his head with a nervous laugh, he still didn't look at her. “Hey, Rache, that's not the way it was. Course, I don't expect you to get the time exactly straight cause we was sort of involved.”

“I was involved,” Rachel corrected him. “I don't remember you doing much of anything after you pulled your prong from your trousers.”

He finally looked at her. For the first time ever in her recollection, his face was scared. “Rachel,” he said miserably. “Come on, Rache. You remember how it was.”

“I remember it being dark,” she said. “I remember you telling me to wait ten minutes while you went up to the hut—third from the end in the top row, it was—to … What was it, Trev? To ‘air it out,’ you said. I was to wait underneath the pier and when ten minutes were up, I was supposed to follow.”

“You wouldn't've wanted to go inside when it was all smelly,” he protested.

“And you wouldn't've wanted to be seen with me.”

“That is not the case,” he said, and for a moment he sounded so stiff with outrage that Rachel truly wanted to believe him. She wanted to believe that it really meant nothing that the single time they'd been in public together had been dinner at a Chinese restaurant conveniently located some fifteen miles from Balford-le-Nez. She wanted to believe that the fact that he'd never kissed her mouth meant he was only shy and working up his courage. And most of all, she wanted to believe that his letting her service him fifteen times without ever once wondering what she was getting out of the activity aside from the humiliation of yearning so openly for anything remotely resembling hope of a normal future only meant that he'd not yet learned from her example how to give. But she couldn't believe. So she was stuck with the truth.

“I got home round ten, Trev. I know cause I felt all hollow inside, so I turned on the telly. And I even know what I watched, Trev. The middle and end of that old movie with Sandra Dee and Troy Donahue. I bet you know the one: They're kids and it's summer and they fall in love and mess around. And they sort of finally realise that love's more important than being scared and hiding who you really are.”

“Can't you just tell them?” he asked. “Can't you say it was half past eleven? Rache, the cops're going to ask you cause I said I was with you that night. And I was. If you tell them you got home round ten, don't you see what that means?”

“I expect it means you had time to give Haytham Querashi the business,” she answered.

“I didn't do it,” he said. “Rache, I never saw the bloke that night. I swear. I swear. But if you don't back me up in what I said, then they'll know I'm lying. And if they know I'm lying about that, they'll think I'm lying about not having killed him. Can't you help me out? What's another hour?”

“Hour and a half,” she corrected him. “You said half-eleven.”

“Okay. Hour and a half. What's another hour and a half?”

Plenty of time for you to show you had at least one thought in your mind about me, she told him silently. But she said, “I won't lie for you, Trev. I might've once. But I won't do it now.”

“Why?” The word was a plea. He reached for her arm and ran his fingers up her bare skin. “Rachel, I thought we had something special, you and me. Didn't you feel it? When we ‘as together, it was like … Hey, it was like magic, didn't you think?” His fingers reached the sleeve of her blouse and insinuated themselves inside, up her shoulder, along the strap of her bra.

She wanted touch so bad that she felt the damp answer to his question. It was between her legs, on the backs of her knees, and in the hollow of her throat, where her heart was lodged.

“Rache …?” The fingers grazed the front of her bra.