Chapter Text
He climbed down the stairs to the office before nine every day. Probably for a mixture of habits acquired while in the army, and some unconfessed self-consciousness whenever Pat would shake her head at something he'd done that she might disapprove. He'd have thought Robin knew this, but then again, there was so much she knew, it sometimes surprised him when she didn't know something about him. Something like this.
Is it ok if I come up?
There was her text. No good morning, no hello, just that, out of the blue.
Sure.
It was 8:30, of course he was ready, and of course it was ok for her to come up. Any time, if he was to be honest. Which he needed to be, at least with her. He had promised himself as much just three days ago.
Now, he took a deep breath, trying to imagine it was smoke and trying to pretend his anticipation was disappearing in it, but it wasn't and it didn't, and there wasn't much to do than to glare at the kettle as he waited for the water to boil.
And for her steps to sound on the stairs, as they were now. Firm. No hesitation.
She had been early, and feeling like a fool walking up and down Denmark Street, waiting for it to be nine or at least any hour that wasn’t so damn early, so that she could slip into the office and pretend she was just giving the cricketer case an early start. But she had waited just too long. Friday had been aeons ago. And, she tried to convince herself, it would be much better to say all the things she had wanted to say during the weekend before their workday started. Before they could go back to be colleagues.
He opened the door to his flat before she knocked, and it startled her for a fraction of a second, but then she smiled, tight-lipped, and he told her to come in.
Strike took pride on being able to read Robin's smallest gestures. A small intake of breath, the lightest flicker of the corner of her mouth, a slower blink, but all of that failed this morning as she took a seat on his small table and looked at him, wordless.
"Good morning," he said, trying for his voice to sound just as emotionless as her expression. Just as if he hadn't spent most of his weekend trying to think about anything other than her and failing miserably.
"'Morning."
He was starting to notice the faintest purple shadows under her eyes when the kettle announced the water was boiling, and he had to turn around to make some instant coffee. His back to her, he dared to ask, "how was your weekend?"
Was he being masochistic? Just as he had been on Saturday morning when he’d pictured her and Ryan, walking hand in hand somewhere nice and romantic? Or just mean, aiming for her to tell him that it had been so boring she couldn't wait to go back to work on Monday? She was here early, after all.
"A bloody mess, if you must know," she said, just as he turned around, in time to see a small crease form between her eyes.
"Was it bor-?"
"I didn't go, alright?"
Strike blinked, and slowly sat on the chair in front of her. Last Friday, after convincing himself she was not coming back to the office, it would never had occurred to him that she wouldn't left with Murphy for that long-planned weekend away.
"You didn't," he said, trying to anticipate the implications of that. Had he known she had been in London all that time he would’ve- he had no idea what he would’ve done, really, but something. Something other than just thinking about her.
"No, I didn't. How could I? I mean… you said…" she took a deep breath. "I could do with one of those coffees, you know?" she pointed at the steaming kettle at Strike’s back.
He stood up at once, "yeah, sorry about that-" and noticed his hands were a little shaky.
In silence he poured some coffee on the second mug and placed it in front of her. A moment later she was hugging it with her hands, and he couldn’t help but notice there was no ring on her finger. So his most catastrophic fears from the early hours of Sunday had not become a reality and he felt a sigh of relief threatening to escape him.
Robin couldn’t remember how she had managed to climb down the stairs following Ryan, or how she had entered his car. Almost as waking up from a dream she found herself in his passenger seat, listening to him rant about the traffic in the city on a Friday afternoon.
He wasn’t in a bad temper, she knew, only eager to get away.
But something was off. Something that was coming from inside her, making her feel as if there was not enough air inside his car.
“... she knew I was in love with you.”
Strike’s words seemed to reverberate in her mind. And not just that, but the way he had said them, his eyes fixed on hers, his expression serene. There hadn’t been any “buts” or “howevers” or any way to disguise the statement into something else. He had been deliberate in saying it, precise in his timing, knowing perfectly well where she was heading and with whom.
Had it been anybody else, she could’ve thought it had been cruel. Sadistic even, to mention such enormous feelings when she was finally happy and about to go away with a nice guy. But it had been him, and he wouldn't do that to her out of cruelty.
Breathing was becoming more difficult by the minute, as it was trying to keep up with Ryan's small talk. Robin lowered the window and a gush of welcomed chilly air hit her.
"Are you all right?" Ryan asked.
"Fine," she said, her eyes fixed on the window, without really seeing what was outside.
When they finally reached her flat, he asked if she'd need help bringing her stuff. She just shook her head, wordlessly. It was just a holdall. Some clothes she would need for the weekend, and he could wait in the car for her.
She walked quickly, climbed the stairs instead of using the lift, and only once she was inside the apartment she managed to take a deep breath.
"Ryan is a good man," Robin said after being quiet for what felt like an eternity. She had repeated those words so many times during her lonely weekend, both inside her head and aloud, that now they felt meaningless and empty.
Strike just nodded, and he felt it would've been just too hypocritical to say he agreed, even though he did.
"He's good to me," she added, her eyes fixed on her mug.
He took a sip of his coffee, wondering if he was supposed to say something.
"And I knew... I knew I needed to fall out of love with you," she finally said after a long pause.
For Strike, the words seemed to take a long time to make sense. He had suspected, at some point. He had thought he had seen something in her eyes, once or twice. Heard something in her voice on occasion. He had hoped… but this. The way she was saying it, it felt as if this, her going out with Murphy, had been part of something bigger. A strategy, not unlike the ones she would devise to cleverly extract information from reluctant witnesses.
"When?" he managed to say hoarsely.
She shrugged, "I don't really know. I just… knew I was… I was in love with you," this time her eyes met his and she held her gaze for a moment before continuing. His heart was beating fast and it was taking all his willpower not to tell her to keep on speaking. "But you were not there… you were not interested-"
"When?" he repeated, and he saw her blushing slightly.
"You know… during the Ink Black Heart case."
"That's when you started seeing Ryan," he stated, confirming his craziest suppositions.
She nodded. "I learned you were seeing Madeleine," she decided not to remind him it had been Charlotte the one breaking the news, instead of him, and how that had been painful too. The conversation was too scary as it was. "And I needed to fall out of love with you," Robin repeated, feeling a mixture of bravado and anger. She was risking a lot, everything, maybe, saying all of this. But it had been him the one taking risks first when he had looked at her in the eyes to say something she had fantasised with but never really thought he would say. As if she'd just noticed the mug in her hands, Robin took a sip of coffee. "And Ryan... he is a good man. But you…" She took a deep breath. Now or never. “You said you loved me.” It was not a question, she was just stating the facts.
"I did," he said, holding her gaze and wondering if he'd dare to touch her hand.
"Do you, though? In the present tense?"
"Yeah." He sighed. He needed to just jump into the void again, scary as it seemed. Her eyes were fixed on his and he focused on that blue-grey before speaking. "I'm in love with you… in the present tense."
Robin felt her eyes fill with unshed tears and she hated it. Even though she had dreamed about this, expected even, with the smallest amount of hope, the revelation still came as a surprise.
"I thought I heard that."
The words were still there, and the meaning seemed to shift everything around her. The holdall was different, but it reminded her of Strike asking her if she was all packed, the day before she left for Chapman Farm. The plant on the pot, ironically the only one Ryan hadn't killed when she was undercover. The way almost everything inside her apartment made her think not of her boyfriend, but of her partner.
She took her phone out of her pocket. Was she expecting to find a text from him? Some explanation or elaboration about what he has so casually said in his office? There was nothing.
Almost as if her fingers belonged to somebody else, she started calling Strike's number. She stopped two numbers short and cleared it all. What could she say? For a long moment she stared at her phone.
The sudden buzz and Ryan's name on the screen made her drop it on the carpet and it took her three attempts to answer it.
"Are you sure you don't need help?" He sounded happy. He was happy.
And she should be as well.
But she couldn't. Not like this.
"No… Ryan… I can't. I mean, I'm sorry." Robin took a deep breath. "I won't go with you."
"What?"
"Give me a moment, I'll go down."
She didn't know when she had made up her mind but now that she had, she could feel her lungs properly filling, her head finally stopping spinning.
Ryan had managed to park not far from her building's door and he was standing next to his car, his hands deep inside his pockets.
"What do you mean you won't come?" His voice was harsh and he was frowning.
"I'm sorry, really, but I… I can't." she took a deep breath. Breaking up for no reason was something she had never done before. "The thing is… we shouldn't keep on seeing each other."
His frown grew deeper. "Why?"
She sighed. "Because I don't think I'm in love with you."
"You don't think…"
"I know I'm not."
It was his turn to take a deep breath. "It's Strike, isn't it?"
For a wild moment Robin considered telling him that yes, it had been him, or, more precisely, what he had said, that had turned her world upside down. And it would've been true. But there were other truths that she could say that were much less hurtful.
"This is not about him. It's me, not loving you the way you say you love me," she said as honestly as possible. "That's not fair to either of us."
Again, they remained silent for a moment. Robin took another sip of her coffee and Strike mirrored her.
At last she put her mug back on the table.
"It took me a while to convince him I was sure I didn't want to be with him. And then he said I should think about it over the weekend." Robin gave a dry chuckle. "There was nothing to think about, once the decision had been made."
Finally, taking a deep breath, he reached forward and placed his fingers on hers, slowly, almost as if he were afraid they would break. She looked at him, blinking, and then slowly, she turned her hand so her fingertips were touching his. His heart was beating madly and he wondered if hers was, too.
"Weekend was a mess," she spoke again, her voice steady even though she could feel a tinge where Strike’s skin was touching hers. "First I thought about calling you… just because… because talking to you is what I do when I'm distressed. But I couldn't, not before I was ready to have this conversation. And I don't think I am but these last days have been the longest ever."
"I was sure you'd left with him."
Now that she was laying it out at the open, it was just fair for him to do the same. And yet he couldn’t tell her about his inner monologues, and how difficult it had been to stop at the third pint on Saturday, when he had been sure she would come back engaged and he just wanted to forget all about how stupid he had been all those past years.
She sighed. "I didn't. I couldn't."
"I'm so relieved," he admitted.
Robin looked at their hands on the table for a long moment.
"But what does this mean, Strike?" She looked at him again. "How are we…? What if we ruin it all?"
He sighed. "We won't." And he couldn’t say why, but he was sure they wouldn’t.
"How do you know?"
Downstairs the door of the office opened and closed, and startled both Strike and Robin moved their hands to check their watches.
"Pat," she said.
"She's ten minutes early," he commented with a hint of grumpiness.
"We’d better go down…" she stood up and drained the rest of her coffee.
He stood up as well. He needed to say something. Do something. But he had no idea of what.
"Robin," he said, before she opened the door to the landing.
She turned around, and now he could finally read it all. There was fear, but also something that might very well be happiness. A bright glow in her eyes and the promise of a smile in the corner of her lips.
Again, he took her hand and felt warm when she squeezed his fingers.
"We'll figure it out," he said with a grin, and he gently touched her cheek with his knuckles. "We'll figure it out," he repeated.
He took a step back in time to see her slowly smile. "We will," she said.
"We always do."
She gave his fingers another squeeze and then left, to silently climb down the stairs to their office.