The French Girl(53)
Seb speaks into the void she’s created. “Anyone know a good lawyer?” He aims for a joking tone and directs the question toward Caro and me, but he looks anything but playful. It seems to me I can see straight through to the skeleton beneath his surface; the muscle and skin and tissue are just window dressing draped on the bones of him. He might unravel at any moment.
“Criminal law’s not really my area,” I reply. I try to inject some humor myself: “Though if you’re looking for a good corporate lawyer I’m absolutely the person to talk to.” Nobody bothers to honor my effort with even a smile.
Caro is already back on her BlackBerry. She speaks without looking up. “I’m sure my dad will be able to come up with someone. Or your dad,” she adds as an afterthought.
Seb grimaces. “Yeah, really looking forward to that conversation.” Tom glances across with a sympathetic twist of his mouth. Seb’s father’s influence has clearly not waned over the years.
Caro’s head lifts at that. “Come on, Seb, don’t let Modan rattle you. I mean, he has nothing. Nothing! No physical evidence at all and just a load of conjecture.” She looks round the group impatiently. “None of us have anything to worry about. This is all going to go away.”
“Or linger on forever,” says Lara darkly. She glances back at the entrance to the building for the third or fourth time, and I realize she’s expecting Modan to follow her out.
“What do you mean?” asks Seb uneasily.
She shrugs. “The best outcome is that they find who did it and put them away. Then it’s all neatly wrapped up. Otherwise . . .” She shrugs again. “It’s never really over. Even if they consign it to the cold case pile, it could still come alive again. New evidence, new political pressure to take another look.”
Her words cause another blanket of silence to fall heavily on the group. She’s probably quoting Modan, I think uneasily. How many cases has he worked on that end up like that, never resolved but never entirely forgotten, either?
“Well, I have to get back to the office,” says Caro abruptly. “Can I drop anyone at Westminster tube on the way past?” It’s presented as a general offer, but she’s looking directly at Seb when she says it.
“Sounds good,” he says after a pause.
“Best head that way to get a cab,” Tom says, pointing. “I’ll call you later, Seb, okay?”
Normally we would all accompany our good-byes with some kind of physical display, but today Seb simply lifts a tired hand in salute, and Caro takes his other arm, calling over her shoulder, “See you all soon—in fact, see you tomorrow, Kate.”
Oh joy. “See you then,” I say sweetly.
Tom watches them go, a frown between his eyebrows. Is he worried about Seb’s behavior, or Caro’s? And for whose welfare is he concerned, his own or someone else’s? A movement in my peripheral vision pulls my head round, and I see Modan making his way across to Lara, who has moved a couple of paces away from Tom and me. Her gaze is fixed on Modan, but her expression is unexpectedly conflicted.
“I’ll call you later, Lara,” I offer, presuming she will leave with him.
She glances at me swiftly, shaking her head. “No, wait for me. Please, wait.”
“I . . . Okay.” I’m slightly nonplussed. Tom takes my arm and pulls me aside so we are partially hidden by a tree, his eyes fixed on the pair. “What—” I start to say, but he shushes me. I realize I am as close to Tom as I was in the corridor that night, close enough to smell his aftershave. It makes me absurdly self-conscious; I turn my head quickly and focus on Modan and Lara. The detective must have seen us on his route to Lara, but the tree cover does give the illusion that they have some privacy, and in truth I can only pick out the odd syllable from what they are saying. Lara is doing the bulk of the talking, in a low, earnest tone, spots of color visible in her cheeks. She’s trying not to cry, I realize. Something she says cuts at Modan: he flinches and interrupts urgently, reaching a long arm out to her, but she shakes her head resolutely and takes a step back. It finally dawns on me what I’m watching, and I instantly feel grubby, but it’s impossible to look away. Modan tries to make his point again, frustration clear in every line of his long frame, but Lara is resolute. She must be resolute to hold firm in the face of the heartrending misery that slowly steals over Modan’s face. I don’t look at Tom. If he were to display any pleasure at all at this outcome I might actually punch him.
Then Lara is walking toward us in short, quick steps, the color still high in her cheeks. Her eyes are remarkably dry. “Oh, honey.” I step out from the tree as I speak and move to hug her, but she gives a quick shake of her head and I realize she will fall apart if I do. “Come back to mine. Let’s find a cab.”
She nods. Tom reaches out a hand and touches her cheek briefly. “I’m sorry,” he says, with what seems like genuine empathy. He looks like he has more to add, but he checks himself; her face crumples briefly at that, but she catches herself. I link an arm through hers just as Tom spots a taxi and hails it for us. Lara climbs in first. I glance down the street and see that Modan is still standing there, his long face indescribably bleak. I look away hurriedly and move to follow Lara, but Tom stops me, gesturing me toward the front of the cab, out of earshot of Lara.
“We need to talk,” he says, decisively, looking me straight in the eye for possibly the first time today.