~~~
Gloria rang him while he was waiting for his plane. She was worrying about him, but he had no time to feel grateful for her concern. The bloody woman had enabled this situation. However, he was calmer now, and realised he had left without finding out where Fee and Max were staying. This, at least, Gloria could help him with.
The departure gate was besieged by families, baggage, and coats. Paul’s knee beat up and down as he sat among them, thinking back to his time working with Max to calm his anger and open up his life again. Months of talking. And all the time, the man had been pumping him for information about Fee.
Hunched in his seat on the aeroplane, Paul stared with blind eyes at the in-flight magazine, his resentment building, trying to ignore the sounds of restless children, and the irritating attention of the trolley dollies. He did not care how high the bloody aeroplane was flying; he wanted to be left alone to stoke up his rage.
When the flight landed, he stepped from the plane, grubby and tired. Heat shimmered from the tarmac and smacked him in the face. The clothes he wore were unsuitable for this trip; and those he had thrown into his gym bag - not that he ever attended a gym, but those bags were useful – were no better. Now, sweat prickled his armpits and dripped down his back as he marched through passport control, uninterrupted.
A taxi driver outside the airport knew the hotel, and Paul climbed into his cab, relieved to find it air-conditioned. He rebuffed the man’s attempts at conversation and stared out of the window, barely noticing the charcoal coloured cliffs and the lively shops and bars. When they arrived at the expensive looking hotel, Paul shoved some notes at the fellow and strode off without his change.
The manager of the hotel was a stuck-up prick, who refused to tell Paul anything about Fee and Max. Paul’s language almost got him thrown out, but he managed to propel himself from the gleaming building without physical assistance, driven by the man’s cold courtesy.
Storming along the white pavement in his jacket and pullover with sweat bathing his body, discomfort soon distracted him from his fury, and he began a quest for cooler clothing. Half an hour later he stepped from a souvenir shop sporting flip-flops, a tee-shirt, and knee-length shorts. He flapped past jewellery shops, bars, and restaurants to a cheap little pension about a mile from Fee’s hotel, and after checking in with the refreshingly pleasant female proprietor, Paul set about finding a bar.
Soon he was seated at a pavement table behind a potted palm tree - the perfect spot, right opposite Fee’s hotel. He watched the entrance between the fringes of the plant’s leaves and was so preoccupied that when a girl approached to take his order, he hardly noticed the clarity of her skin and trimness of her waist. He ordered breakfast - a beer - then lit a cigarette and settled back in his chair to wait.
After twenty minutes, his patience was repaid when his ex-wife clopped up the hotel steps in a strappy dress, the outline of her slender legs visible through its diaphanous fabric. A dainty handbag swung from one rosy shoulder as she vanished inside. Paul ordered another beer.
When she reappeared, she had changed her shoes to a pair of sensible pumps. Paul threw down the last of his beer and more of his cash and hurried after her. Their route took them along the road and up a broad, gritty path. Loose volcanic chippings collected inside Paul’s flip-flops, and he dodged behind some bushes to flap them out. Ahead, Fee took a right, and when Paul reached the same spot, she was crossing a wide area of scrubby grass, walking towards a cliff edge where it was bordered by a low chain-link fence. Paul paused, wary of stepping into the open. Some distance ahead a restaurant with a long, deserted veranda looked cool and inviting. A path snaked close to the building and into the distance along the cliff top beyond. To his right, between Fee and the restaurant, a dramatic mass of volcanic rock climbed into the sky and jutted into the sea forming a steep promontory that interrupted the smooth line of the cliff edge. Paul expected Fee to head for the restaurant, but instead, she scrambled up the rugged mound. Max was nowhere in sight, and Paul glanced over his shoulder, but there was no sign of the fucker behind him, and he blew out a breath.
When she reached the towering peak, Fee smoothed her skirt and sat down, dangling her legs over the edge. She leant on her arms and threw back her head, letting the sun warm her face.
Paul’s furious blood pumped in his ears, and he became deaf to the screaming gulls and roar of the sea. How dare she be so content? Without a plan in his head, he discarded his flip-flops under a tree and charged across the open space towards Fee. He pumped up the rocky hill, scree tumbling behind and sharp projections stabbing his feet. When he reached her, Fee opened her eyes. They widened when she realised who he was. ‘Paul, what…’ but those were the last words she ever spoke. With one hard kick, Paul shoved her off her perch with his bare foot. Her scream echoed from the wall of rock and ceased abruptly. Paul turned, panting.
Then he saw him - Max Rutherford - emerging from the restaurant with two wine glasses. When Max spotted Paul, he dropped the glasses and with a look of pure
