entered. The black sweater showed off her blondeness and she’d covered the courtroom pallor with more make-up than she normally wore and Jordan thought the lipstick was too bright, almost as bright as Leanne Jefferies’ has been in court. She was drinking mineral water. She seemed to sense his presence before he reached the discreet side booth, shadowed even more than the already deeply shadowed restaurant, and looked up, smiling. ‘Hi!’
Jordan lowered himself opposite her and said ‘hi’ back. She hadn’t completely managed to hide the dark rings beneath her eyes.
‘I know I look a mess,’ she said, as if reading his thoughts.
‘You don’t look a mess and you know it.’
‘I feel a mess.’
‘You’ve no reason to feel a mess, either.’
She smiled again, shaking her head. ‘I don’t believe you. But thanks anyway. The hotel in Raleigh told me you’d gone away until Sunday, so I guessed you’d come back here.’
Jordan said, ‘I’m glad you got me. I want to thank you for everything you said in court.’
‘It was the truth. That’s what you’re supposed to do, isn’t it? Tell the truth. Why didn’t you?’
‘What!’
‘About having once been married?’
Jordan shook his head. ‘All part of the venture capitalist nonsense, too busy for a normal life.’
‘How did it go wrong for you?
‘Rebecca found another guy she liked better.’ She had, but not until he’d tried to drown himself at the bottom of a bottle.
Alyce humped her shoulders, dismissively.
Jordan ordered a gin martini from an enquiring waiter. ‘It still can’t have been easy for you, standing there in front of your husband, saying what you did.’
‘I’m sorry about the ring.’
‘Turned out to be a pretty bad joke, didn’t it?’
‘It was nice at the time. Everything was nice at the time.’
Jordan hesitated, curious at the remark. ‘I thought so, too. I really didn’t notice that you went on wearing it.’
‘I know you didn’t.’
‘Why did you?’
‘I wanted to. I wouldn’t have done it, though, if I’d known everything we did, everywhere we went, was being watched as it was. Alfred’s a bastard; a one-hundred-and-ten-percent bastard.’
‘But we fucked him with the chlamydia lie. Him and Leanne.’ Jordan suddenly remembered that Reid hadn’t made his promised application to the judge for the medical records, if any still existed, of the dead Sharon Borowski. He supposed that it wasn’t so important now.
‘I hope we can catch him out in all the others.’
‘What others?’ demanded Jordan, alertly.
‘I wish I could guess. There’ll be a lot more, believe me.’
Jordan did and wondered if he’d get any leads from the following day’s phishing trips through the computers. ‘We’ve agreed to have daily, after-court conferences, Dan, Bob and me. There’s a lot of us on your side.’
‘I’m glad you are,’Alyce said, smiling at him across the table.
From her study of the menu before he’d arrived Alyce immediately asked for spaghetti with clams when their waiter returned. Jordan, who hadn’t bothered with the menu, said he’d have the same, as well as a bottle of Chianti, eager to get rid of the man.
‘What happened to the ring?’ he asked.
I took it off on the plane. Left it there when I got off. We’d agreed it was over, remember?’
Jordan hesitated. ‘Didn’t you want it to be?’
Alyce shrugged, awkwardly. ‘It was best that it was. Except that it wasn’t over, was it?’
‘Isn’t,’ insisted Jordan, correcting her tense.
Alyce shook her head, positively. ‘Let’s not walk this route any further. You’re still a defendant, possibly going to lose a lot of money.’
‘After showing up their medical reports as we did, Dan doesn’t think it’s going to be anything like as bad as it might have been.’ He was shortening the man’s name, he realized.
‘I don’t see the connection, but that isn’t what I want to talk to you about. I… I mean the family will pay back whatever’s awarded against you. As well as your costs. What’s happened to you is my fault
… nothing to do with you…’
The offer silenced Jordan for several moments, his reactions colliding between anger and gratitude and settling somewhere in between. ‘I don’t want that. Thank you, but no.’
‘It could be a lot of money.’
‘I know. I can afford it.’ How much he wished he could tell her that it would be her husband who paid and in a lot more ways than just money.
‘You’re offended,’ she accused.
‘I told you no. And mean it.’
They were both glad of the arrival of their food. The wine was better than Jordan had expected but Alyce limited herself to half a glass. Seizing the abstinence as a weak excuse to break the embarrassment that had come between them Jordan said, ‘Aren’t you supposed to drink with whatever medication the doctor’s given you?’
Alyce didn’t reply at once. ‘It was just a tranquillizer yesterday. And it’s not regular medication.’
‘You’re going to be under a lot of stress, a lot of pressure, next week.’
‘I know.’
‘Have you talked to the doctor about it?’
‘He says there are things but I don’t want to slow myself down, certainly not when I’m giving evidence. I don’t want to give the bastard the slightest advantage.’
‘Surely…’ started Jordan, his mind on the previous day’s after-court discussion. ‘I’ve forgotten his name…?’
‘Walter,’ she provided. ‘Walter Harding.’
‘Is there a guarantee that Walter will be able to be in court every day?’ persisted Jordan, not trusting Reid to be as thorough as he should be.
‘Bob says he’s going to try to get me excused some of the time.’
Jordan decided against referring to the conversation with the two lawyers. Instead he said, ‘What if Pullinger refuses?’
‘Maybe then I’ll have to take something.’
‘Dan seems to want me there most of the time.’
Alyce gave a half smile. That’ll be something, having you there.’
‘When are you going back down to Raleigh?’
‘Sunday, I guess. It’s not something I particularly want to think about.’
‘We could spend some time together here at the weekend.’
‘Maybe,’ Alyce said, doubtfully.
‘Why don’t I call? We could drive up into the Catskills.’
‘I don’t want to pick up where we left off in France, Harvey. Not
…’ She stopped. ‘I just don’t, OK?’
‘I’ll call,’ insisted Jordan.
Jordan went several times through virtually every word of their conversation, eagerly analyzing every inference and meaning, sure of his final conclusion. The most important of which was that Alyce hadn’t wanted their affair to end in France, which he’d been too stupid then not to realize. But now he did realize it. And decided it wasn’t too late for him to recover. She’d clearly reconciled herself to it being over, her only consideration now the impending turmoil of the coming weeks. But that’s all it would be, just weeks: days and weeks when he’d be with her, doing everything he could to help and support and protect her. And when it was all over… What about when it was all over? he demanded, halting the fantasy. All it could ever be, a fantasy. How could it be anything else, doing what he did, existing every day of his life as he did? Darling, there’s something I’ve got to tell you. I’m not a
