Читать книгу Mine - J.L. Butler - Страница 14

I wasn’t the one who suggested meeting in Islington. Martin texted me from Switzerland asking me to dinner and when I said yes, he had a table booked at Ottolenghi within minutes.

I took this as a good sign. Ottolenghi was not in Soho or Chelsea. It was on Upper Street, a stone’s throw away from my flat, a short stagger back and I knew I had to – wanted to – prepare for that eventuality. Years of self-imposed singledom don’t make for the highest levels of grooming, and slinky underwear had been replaced by over-washed comfort across the board: something had to give. Most Saturday mornings I’d be at the Toynbee Hall free legal advice centre in Stepney, where I’ve done volunteer work for years, but that week I decided to skip it and instead spend the morning at a little Korean beauty spa on Holloway Road so that I would at least be waxed and smooth. I then went to my favourite deli, La Fromagerie, and bought creamy brie and fragolino grapes to stock the fridge and I put fresh linen on the bed, even spraying them with lavender scent in a bid to make them smell like those starchy sheets you find in expensive hotels. I wanted to make my flat a delicious haven he would never want to leave. Which, I was starting to realize, was exactly what I wanted.

I chose a black dress and hot pink heels and deliberately left five minutes late. I was useless at playing games, always had been, but it was my one concession at ‘playing hard to get’.

As I walked along Upper Street, passing the early evening crowds, groups of four or five, loud, laughing, I breathed in hard, wanted to feel some of that energy, some of that abandon, the sense that anything could happen tonight. A smile crept on to my mouth. Anything.

I crossed the road, my heels clacking on the tarmac, my coat flying. Would he be there already, waiting for me? Or would I find an empty bar and a message on my phone, some excuse about work or delayed flights? I had never been convinced Martin Joy would contact me again after the First Directions hearing, but once we had arranged a date, I had naively assumed that he would turn up. Now I wasn’t so sure. Should I call him to ask if he was on his way? Think positively, I told myself. Good things can happen. Even to you.

And there he was: my heart skipped as I saw him through the glass. Facing away from the street, lounging against the bar, his broad back moving, his strong hands carving through the air. He was talking to someone. The smile on my face slipped; no, he was with someone. A couple. I paused for a step, my hand hovering above the door handle, fighting disappointment. Had I misread the situation? Wasn’t this a date-date? But I couldn’t stand there wavering: the door was glass and anyway, Martin had turned and seen me.

‘Fran,’ he said warmly, as I pushed inside. He reached for my hand, guiding me towards him. A crackle of static passed between us as our skin touched, but he didn’t flinch, just smiled and whispered one word into my ear, low enough that only I could hear it: ‘Sexy.’

‘Francine,’ he said, turning to the others, ‘this is Alex, my business partner, and this is Sophie, his wife.’

‘Just his wife,’ she said with a conspiratorial wink, stepping across to shake my hand. ‘No one important.’

But she was impressive: blonde, tall, a little bit horsey, like the captain of a lacrosse team. When she stood up off her stool, she was at least six inches taller than me. Even in my heels I was barely five feet five, but I had never felt smaller than I did right then.

Though Alex laughed along, I sensed more reserve in him. Thin, upright, not a wrinkle in his grey suit. Maybe I wasn’t the first woman Martin had introduced to his friends since the divorce, or perhaps Alex was still loyal to Donna – friends did that, didn’t they? They took sides.

There was a brief, awkward pause and then Martin filled the space.

‘You did get my text?’

‘Which text?’

‘About Alex and Sophie joining us for dinner.’

I shook my head.

‘We won’t be staying long and I promise that Alex will be on his best behaviour,’ said Sophie, flashing me a conciliatory look.

Martin inspected his phone as his friends went ahead to the table.

‘It didn’t send. Text failed.’

He touched my fingers, a gesture of apology, and I felt his heat against my skin.

‘It’s fine. I want to meet your friends,’ I said, wondering how convincing that sounded.

We were shown to our table and Martin ordered two bottles of orange wine and a selection of starters. Everything was so well chosen, I knew he had been here many times before.

‘So you were skiing?’ I said, aware that I should chip in with some small talk from the get-go. I had no idea what Sophie and Alex knew about our relationship, such as it was, but until I had some sort of signal from Martin that this was a date, that Sophie and Alex knew it was a date, I decided to proceed with caution, keeping conversation to the vague and unrevealing.

‘Heli-skiing.’ Martin nodded.

‘Spitalfields’ very own Milk Tray Man,’ joked Alex.

‘It’s great. Have you tried it?’ asked Sophie, with the confidence of someone who had spent her life on skis.

‘I’m happier with a hot chocolate and viennoiserie down at the bottom,’ I said, not wanting to admit that the only time I’d spent rushing down snowy slopes was tobogganing in the park as a child. It took a strength of will not to grill him further, desperate to know who he had been in Switzerland with – no one went heli-skiing alone, surely? – but knowing it looked needy to ask.

‘So you work alongside Martin?’ I asked as we sat down at a table tucked away at the back of the restaurant.

Alex nodded, but Sophie pursed her lips and gave a tight shake of the head. ‘Not me. Not any more. I’m sure you know better than most people that working together does not always make for a happy home life. We tried it in the early days, but ended up wanting to strangle each other, so I’ve stepped aside and taken on a more’ – she sucked her teeth – ‘advisory role.’

‘Meaning she tells us both what to do,’ smiled Martin.

‘He likes to make it sound like I’m some sort of nag,’ said Sophie. ‘But without a woman’s eye for detail, I dare say the lights would have been turned off years ago.’

Alex took her hand and kissed it.

‘There – your reward, darling.’

She tapped his cheek playfully and I felt a pang of jealousy. They’d probably been married, what?… at least a decade, and she obviously still adored her husband.

I slowly began to relax and enjoy myself as the three joked and teased each other the way only old friends can do. Martin held forth about his recent trip, ‘coming out of the powder looking like Frosty the Snowman’, while Sophie told me about a disastrous skiing holiday she and Alex had been on to Courcheval, where a complete lack of snowfall had turned the resort into ‘the seventh ring of hell’ where there was nothing to do for the Russian tourists but show off. ‘The only place I’ve seen more fur was in San Diego Zoo!’ she laughed.

‘So where did you all meet?’ I asked, envious of their tight bond.

‘University,’ said Alex.

‘Economics Society.’

‘It was that trip to New York, wasn’t it? To Wall Street. We were room-mates in that crappy hotel in the East Village.’

‘I like to think of myself as a matchmaker,’ said Sophie. ‘I knew they’d get on, so I fixed it.’

‘I thought she became president of Econ Soc to get on, but really she just liked playing Cilla Black.’

‘Guilty as charged,’ she said, raising a hand.

Conversation flowed on with the wine, some delicious orange-scented white that filled my head, and I began to feel glad that Martin had invited his friends along on our date. The modern, chichi restaurant, Alex’s easy intelligence, Sophie’s knowing asides: it was a heady mix of the chic and metropolitan, and I ached to be part of this. I could see the admiring glances we were getting from couples at other tables; we were the beautiful people, sophisticated and urbane, and for once I was one of them, right at the beating heart of London.

‘So you haven’t really told us about you,’ said Sophie, when she’d finished telling the waitress what she wanted for dessert. ‘In another life, I’d like to have been a divorce lawyer. I got wooed by a few commercial firms on the milk round, but it seemed way too dull. Family law, on the other hand, must be fascinating.’

‘Fascinating sometimes,’ I said honestly. ‘Often difficult and emotional. We tend to find that, when it comes to divorce, feelings take over. People waste huge amounts of billable hours arguing over the smallest things because they don’t want the other side to win. I recently had a couple at loggerheads for six months over the ownership of a teapot.’

‘A teapot?’ said Alex.

I nodded. ‘Quite a nice teapot, but probably only worth a hundred pounds, tops. They’d bought it on their honeymoon and they’d each have given up the entire contents of their Kensington house to get it away from the other one.’

They all laughed, but it was an awkward moment, like breaking the spell, reminding everyone who I was and how Martin and I had met.

‘Actually, Fran, I wanted to ask you something. A professional query …’

‘Is there something I should know about, darling?’ said Alex, his eyes comically wide, but she ignored him.

‘Obviously, Martin’s getting divorced, and we’ve all been wondering …’

‘Crapping ourselves, more like,’ said Alex.

‘… how it’s going to affect the business,’ said Sophie. ‘Could Donna come after us? I mean, we’ve always been friends, but as you say, people do funny things when they get in a courtroom.’

I looked around, feeling horribly exposed and duped. I’d thought this was a date, but it was looking as if I had been brought here as part of a fact-finding mission.

‘We were worried that Donna might go after Martin for future earnings.’

I glanced at Martin. ‘We’d fight that, of course,’ I said, gripping the stem of my glass.

‘So?’ pressed Sophie.

‘It’s true that divorce can have some corporate ramifications. But the Gassler Partnership doesn’t trade on the stock exchange so I expect that any impact will be limited. To be on the safe side, I can recommend a PR who specializes in deflecting negative attention – but, honestly, I don’t think it will be necessary.’

I looked at Martin, who smiled back at me reassuringly. I could tell my assessment was largely what Sophie and Alex had wanted to hear.

‘Speaking of divorce, did you hear about Mungo Davis?’ said Alex. ‘Caught his wife in bed with their driver – and do you know what she said?’

I never did hear what Mungo Davis’s wife said, because I excused myself and headed for the loos.

When I reached the sanctuary of the bathroom, I put both hands on the side of the basin and inhaled deeply. As I gazed back at my reflection I wondered what I needed to do to be happy. I liked Martin Joy. I’d thought he liked me, but clearly I had misread the situation.

I took my lip gloss out of my handbag and applied it carefully in the mirror. The overhead lights made me look paler than usual and I raised my hand to touch my cheek.

You can do this, I told myself as I prepared myself to go back into the restaurant. Keep your dignity.

Martin was paying the bill when I got back and Sophie was slipping on her coat.

‘The gatecrashers are going,’ she smiled.

‘We’ll see you out,’ said Martin.

I stood awkwardly on the pavement as we said our goodbyes. When Sophie and Alex disappeared into a taxi, I pulled my coat further around my body, ready to start walking home.

‘That was great,’ I said tightly. ‘They’re really good fun.’

‘I’m still sorry,’ he said, shuffling from one foot to the other.

I felt my shoulders relax.

‘Alex called me in Switzerland. He was feeling jumpy about my divorce and was talking about getting his own legal representation. When I mentioned I was seeing you, he asked if they could come along. I didn’t think they’d stay for three courses.’

I shrugged and smiled. I didn’t want to make myself vulnerable and suggest what we do next.

‘The night’s still young,’ he said, gazing at me from under his dark lashes.

My heart gave a little leap, although I tried to stay cool.

‘What did you have in mind?’ I shrugged.

‘Don’t you live around here?’ he said, taking a step closer.

‘Just down there, if you want to walk me home,’ I said.

As he threaded his arm through mine, my whole body relaxed.

‘Was that true?’ I said after a moment. ‘The story about Sophie fixing you and Alex up.’

‘She organized the trip, allocated the rooms, so I guess so. I owe Sophie a lot. She even sorted out a bursary for me to go to New York. I wouldn’t have been able to afford it otherwise.’

I looked at him in surprise. He’d hinted that we had similar backgrounds, but I’d assumed it was just talk.

‘My parents died when I was five. I was brought up by my grandparents. They valued education, did everything they could to support me through school, university. But there wasn’t much money to go round.’

He looked straight ahead as if he didn’t want to talk about it any more.

‘So tell me about Switzerland,’ I said as we walked, enjoying his heat through the sleeve of my coat.

‘We were in Verbier.’

I vaguely remembered Tom Briscoe mentioning Verbier once in chambers; it sounded like a Sloaney hotbed of black-runs and après-ski and I couldn’t help but think of Martin with a bevy of blonde chalet girls in some outdoor Jacuzzi. After all, I didn’t like the use of the word we.

‘I had some meetings in Geneva first, but I managed a couple of days on the slopes. It was good to get away from all this.’

‘Thanks,’ I laughed.

Martin stopped and turned me towards him. ‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ he said, with such intensity it made me tingle.

‘So tell me, what’ve you been up to?’

‘Working. Writing.’ I shrugged.

‘A female John Grisham, eh?’

‘Not exactly.’ I smiled. ‘A paper: “External relocation mediation involving non-Hague convention countries”.’

‘Perfect sun-lounger reading,’ he laughed.

‘I know, I know.’ I held up my hands, ‘It’s for my silk application. It looks better if you’ve had something published.’

‘I think you can do anything if you put your mind to it. In fact I’m sure you can. Perhaps I can read it later.’

There was heat in his words. I liked the assumption that he would not just be walking me to my door. And yet, the mention of the silk application had slipped in a sliver of doubt, a thin, distant voice reminding me he was a client. So I slowed my pace, tried to keep the conversation on neutral ground.

‘I wanted to be a writer,’ I said. ‘When I was younger, when our house felt too small, I’d take myself off to the local library and lose myself there. I’ve always loved words, the way they can make you laugh or cry, hurt you, help you – the way they can transport you somewhere entirely different. I’ve always thought that words held magic.’

I glanced up and he was looking at me as if I was the most interesting person in the world.

‘So what made you do law?’

I shrugged. ‘I grew up in a terraced house in Accrington, went to a failing comp. No one I knew was particularly successful, let alone someone who could make a living being a writer. Instead I saw crime, and broken marriages and home repossessions and I realized that the only people who seemed to benefit were the lawyers. Win or lose, the lawyers always won.’

‘So now you use words to win and make money.’

‘I suppose so, yes. Does that sound selfish?’

Martin laughed. ‘You’re asking the wrong guy. I have “capitalist” tattooed across my chest.’

He looked at me, serious now. ‘But making money’s easy. I’m in awe of people like you who can find a tiny chink in the other guy’s armour to win a battle. I’m not sure I’d be mentally agile enough.’

‘I doubt that,’ I said.

I didn’t want to mention that I’d read almost everything I could get my hands on about Martin Joy. The general consensus in the dry trade papers that I had trawled was that he was a genius, one of the smartest financial minds of his generation. I loved the fact that he was so modest.

As we walked, we traded secrets about our lives. We discussed the box-sets we both wanted to watch but were too busy for, disclosed our favourite corners of the city – Postman’s Park in the City, the Roosevelt and Churchill bronze on Bond Street, the Bleeding Heart restaurant in Clerkenwell for its excellent red wine. I liked how easy it was to talk to him. I liked how much we had in common. He had once lived in Islington, just streets away from me in Highbury Fields, and although he had left for Spitalfields before I had even arrived, it gave me a secret thrill that our lives had once shared the same routine and rhythm.

‘Come on,’ I said, taking his hand and leading him down a side street, ‘I’m this way.’

He squeezed my fingers tighter and I lost all sense of everything going on around me, shrink-wrapped in our own little bubble.

For a moment I was reminded of my younger self, on the odd occasions I had met someone new and exciting. I was no different from the other young people looking for sex, love, leaving pubs and clubs with a boy, girl, suggesting dive bars or parties, wanting to stretch the night out longer, not wanting the spell to break.

But tonight I was very much an adult. Tonight we were heading straight home, and we both knew how the night would end.

‘Donna wants to meet me,’ said Martin suddenly. ‘Tuesday.’

My heart sank again, and I realized, right then, how much I liked this man. I didn’t want to feel needy, but I did – and it was Martin I needed.

‘Does she want to apologize for missing the First Directions?’ I said, glancing across.

‘I think she just wants to talk.’

‘Are you asking my opinion, or have you made up your mind to go?’

‘What do you think?’

My heart was beating fast now. I could feel the sword of Damocles hanging over me in the dark sky, like the black clouds that sometimes descended.

‘I think you should go,’ I said, knowing there was no other way to respond.

‘I thought so too,’ he said, gripping my hand tighter. ‘You said it’s better to try and stay out of the courts, right? It’s best to try and settle.’

‘Talk, yes, but don’t agree to anything.’

‘It’s only a conversation, Fran. I want to hear what she has to say. Without the lawyers around us. I just want to know what she’s thinking …’

He said it with a smile, but it felt like a reprimand. Without the lawyers around us. Without me.

‘How did it end, Martin?’ I asked, the words out of my mouth before I could stop them. ‘I mean, what actually happened?’

He looked at me, clearly weighing up whether it would be a good idea to tell me.

‘I went to Hong Kong,’ he said finally. ‘Business. I came back two days early and Donna wasn’t there. She’d just disappeared. That’s why I wasn’t surprised when she vanished this time. It’s Donna’s modus operandi. I finally tracked her down in New York, courtesy of the $47,000 credit-card bill. Hadn’t thought to tell me. She never thought about me. I wasn’t a person, a partner. I was just the provider,’ he said, his tone hard.

‘And you resented that?’

He shook his head. ‘Not then. By that time, I just didn’t miss her. I remember sitting in the house, in the dark, listening to the silence, and thinking how good it felt to be on my own, thinking this is how I want it to be.’

‘I’m on a date with a hermit,’ I laughed nervously.

He stopped, looked at me. ‘I’m just someone that wanted to get out of a marriage that had long passed its sell-by date. When she got back from New York, I told her I wanted a divorce.’

‘But she filed first,’ I noted. I knew the case file backwards. Knew that she had filed the divorce petition first.

‘She made sure she did that,’ he replied as if he was silently cursing himself for being slow off the mark.

‘And here we are,’ I said.

‘And here we are,’ he repeated.

The number 19 bus, my bus, stopped a few feet ahead of us, a flash of red, like a warning sign. A handful of people got off, buttoning their coats against the cold, and it hit me with a jolt that I recognized one of them. Pete.

Shit.

Instinctively, I let go of Martin’s hand.

‘Hello.’ Pete looked at Martin and then me.

‘Hi, Pete,’ I said politely, trying not to think of the last time I had seen him, when his lips had brushed against my neck. ‘Been out?’

‘Just popped to Ottolenghi.’

‘Popped, eh?’ he repeated, looking at Martin quizzically.

‘Oh, Martin – this is Pete Carroll, my neighbour.’

‘Martin Joy,’ he said, extending his hand. Pete kept his hand firmly in the warmth of his pocket.

‘Pete’s at Imperial. Doing a PhD,’ I said, trying to break the awkward mood.

‘Impressive,’ said Martin. ‘What in?’

‘Machine Intelligence.’

‘Oh, I work in fin-tech. We should talk when you finish.’

Martin hesitated for a moment. I thought he was going to produce a business card and was relieved when he didn’t. Perhaps Pete would forget his name, although I knew deep down I was fooling myself.

‘Well, I need some milk,’ said Pete, turning towards our local shop.

‘See you in the week,’ I said, as casually as I could.

‘I think he likes you,’ whispered Martin, as Pete disappeared inside.

‘Are you jealous?’

‘A little. Because I like you too.’

We were at my front door now. I knew this was my chance to tell him how I was feeling about Donna. That I was jealous and upset about them meeting. But we were on my front doorstep, close, so close, and I didn’t want to do anything that could jeopardize the evening, and I knew that meant keeping quiet.

‘I had a good night,’ I said finally.

‘It’s not over yet,’ he smiled, pushing the door as I turned the key.