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The homeward journey from Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons on Sunday afternoon was doing nothing to dissipate the tension that had overwhelmed Robin’s body since almost the moment they’d left London on Friday night.
She rested her head back against the passenger seat of the ancient Land Rover and tried to tune out the sound of Matthew crunching the gears as he sang under his breath. He’d made a playlist of songs from the year they’d started dating on his new iPhone, and ‘If You Come Back’ was filling the car.
Come back…
Robin had never imagined two short words could trigger so many emotions.
I watched you go
takin' my heart with you, oh yes you did
and every time I try to reach you on the phone…
Well okay, she admitted to herself, imagining that Strike felt she’d taken his heart with her was probably a bit unrealistic, but all the times he’d tried to reach her on the phone and hadn’t…because of Matthew. And that one time she'd tried to reach him.
She swallowed hard. She couldn't cry. She must not cry. Matthew would demand explanations and he'd just...know.
Would she be sitting here now if they'd managed to get in contact? Enduring Matthew’s chirpy demeanour that was a regular feature on mornings after they’d had sex, and that was surely all it was these days. Robin could no longer remember a time when she’d felt they’d been making love, and the moment she’d said those three words the night before, she’d realised finally and categorically that she didn’t mean it.
How the hell had Matthew not noticed?
She sighed louder than she’d intended as the thought occurred to her that maybe he had. Maybe he didn’t want to acknowledge it, or worse, didn’t care so long as she was willing to keep trying at a marriage that they both knew was ultimately destined to fail, thus protecting the image he so carefully cultivated for his friends and colleagues. How much longer could she keep pretending?
“You alright Robs?”
“Hmm? Yeah, I’m fine, just tired.”
She noticed the smirk that crossed his face. Twat.
“Takeaway this evening?”
“Great, I’ll pick it up on my way back from the office.”
“The office? For fuck’s sake Rob, it’s our anniversary weekend and you want to go in to work?”
She couldn’t face another row about her job.
“I’ve left a couple of things there I need for work tomorrow, don’t want to have to get up and leave you in bed too early in the morning…”
She delivered the words in a seductive tone, with a smile full of promise, even as a wave of nausea rolled in her stomach.
“Oh,” said Matthew, and she noticed the smirk was back, “Right, well, I’ll drop you off on the way then. Shall I wait while you pop in?”
“Don’t worry, I’ve emails and stuff to check, you get home and relax and I’ll see you later.”
Matthew nodded happily and began singing again.
* * *
Lorelei Bevan couldn’t suppress the smile on her face as she let herself into Strike’s flat and surveyed the tiny space for his kit bag.
The two rooms were as immaculate as she has ever seen them, not that she had seen them often. There had been a handful of lunchtime liaisons during the course of their relationship, but she had never stayed over. She had tried not to let it bother her, knowing he was protective of his space, and after all, her flat was much more welcoming.
Still she felt a sense of satisfaction at being allowed access to Strike’s domain as she packed the packed the holdall with clothes, toiletries and a couple of books he’d mentioned, and began to hunt for his mobile phone charger.
Perhaps, she thought, it would be worth taking the risk. The following week would be the first anniversary of them meeting in The Cambridge. She’d had no intention of taking anyone home that night, much less the somewhat inebriated and dishevelled hairy giant she’d spilt her drink on as she made her way back to her friends. But he’d had a twinkle in his eye and possibly the sexiest voice she’d ever heard. Resistance had been futile.
As they’d travelled in a cab back to Camden, hands and mouths as uncontrolled as being in a public taxi would allow, she reflected her friend April’s words after the break up of her previous relationship, “The best way to get over a man is to get under another one”. Like Strike, she had not been looking for anything more than fun.
But she’d fallen, hard and fast, and had been fighting an increasingly losing battle against her feelings for months, wondering if the time would ever be right to attempt to move things on. She had been mulling over the issue when he’d called her, asking for her help, wanting to stay, giving her access to his space. Perhaps, she thought as she made her way down to the office, he would give her access to his heart after all. Perhaps, next week, she would tell him how she really felt.
“Did you get my message?” Robin’s voice disturbed Lorelei’s musings, if not her mood.
“Hi Robin, how was your weekend?”
There was an infinitesimal pause as Robin, realising it wasn't Strike in the office, gathered herself. “It was fine, yeah.”
“Cormoran’s hurt his leg, he’s just staying for a few days…Do you know where he keeps his phone charger?”
“Um, bottom drawer…”
Lorelei didn’t notice the huff as Robin finished her reply, or the tense look on her face.
“Check you out…” she grinned, holding the plug and cable triumphantly aloft, “…right first time.”
Robin responded with a weak smile, as she tried to convince herself that what was she was feeling was surprise, rather than a vague sensation that a neighbouring cat had pissed on her territory.
* * *
Strike manoeuvred himself precariously back to Lorelei’s sofa, crutch in one hand, bowl of cereal in the other. Lorelei was planning to cook when she got back from Denmark Street, but a combination of hunger and boredom had got the better of him. He never had been good at enforced inactivity.
He only just managed to place the bowl on the side table before he overbalanced onto the sofa, cursing under his breath. Picking it up he surveyed the flat as he munched crunchy nut cornflakes. Strike missed his little attic in Denmark Street already, it’s miniscule square footage was easier to navigate, and there at least he would not feel beholden, or that he needed to be constantly battling with the thoughts and feelings that had been raging in his head since the moment he’d woken in Lorelei’s bed that morning.
He closed his eyes and sighed at the wave of guilt that washed over him as he recalled Lorelei’s face when he’d asked her if he could stay, and again when he’d handed the keys to his flat and office. She’d tried to hide it but he’d seen the pride, the proprietorial manner in which she’d bustled off to collect his belongings. He was increasingly beginning to realise that it was only a matter of time before she said something. Something that could not be taken back or forgotten, and he knew he should try to head such a conversation off at the pass, but he didn’t want to hurt her anymore than he wanted to be single at the present moment.
Lorelei was a wonderful woman. Tall, attractive, fun, intelligent. She was a great cook and a willing and giving partner in the bedroom. There was just one thing - one person - she wasn’t…
It was Robin’s anniversary, and therefore the anniversary of the one and only time he’d held her in his arms. The only time he’d come dangerously, perilously close to telling her how he really felt.
“Come away with me…”
But the words had remained unspoken and instead she’d gone away with Matthew and continued in the marriage that Strike had believed then (and still believed now) was a horrible mistake.
Strike had spent much of the day pretending to be distracted by the case whenever Lorelei spoke to him and he didn’t immediately register her voice. The truth was his head had been filled almost entirely with the imaginary scent of roses, the way Robin had looked at him when she’d said ‘I do’, the sound of her calling his name after abandoning her first dance with her husband.
Did he regret his choice now, twelve months later? He’d always told himself ‘this far and no further’, believing that to be the best thing for their working relationship. But it seemed their relationship had been irrevocably damaged anyway. There had been a slight defrosting since they’d begun to work the Chiswell case, their first together since her marriage, but it only made him long even more for their former easy camaraderie and banter.
His melancholy thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the front door opening.
“Brought a guest with me…” called Lorelei, “…found her lurking in your office.”
Seeing Robin behind her, Strike sat up hastily and pulled on his trousers, whilst Robin did her best to avert her eyes and look unflustered, accepting the offer of a drink from Lorelei.
“So um, did you find him?”
“Briefly, but Suki’s not the girl he saw, and now…he’s running,” he lifted his holdall off the sofa, clearing space for his partner. “Take a seat.”