Constantinou's Mistress (19 page)

And he…he would simply move on.

He almost laughed with relief at the logical clarity of his thoughts. He picked up his address book and flicked through, but the blur of pages promised nothing. In time, he thought. Everything would return to normal.

T
HE
choice of pub was not to Nick's liking. It was dark, smoky and packed to capacity. The bar was thick with an after-work crowd and the noise was reverberating. But it was appropriate.

He cradled his beer with both hands and then took a long swig before addressing the man sitting opposite him.

‘Well? What have you got for me?'

‘Same as I had for you last week, guv, and the week before and the week before that. Nothing.' The short, balding man flicked through the pages of his notebook. ‘At least, nothing of any interest. Visit to the doctor. Once. Visits to the supermarket, several. Trips to the cinema. Three. All with other women. She's had two temp jobs, both in the Marble Arch area.'

‘I am not interested in all of that.' Nick waved his hand dismissively. ‘What about men? One in particular. Average height, medium colouring, average build.'

‘No men of the average variety, guv. In fact, no men at all.' He shut his notebook, sat back and waited.

‘Are you sure you are doing your job properly?'

‘Look, I'm not about to complain at the dosh you're throwing my way to keep an eye on this lady of yours, but you're wasting your time. I've got a lot of experience in this field and I would have found out by now if there was anything going on. Nothing's going on.'

‘Does she…look well?' He glowered at the private detective, daring him to show the slightest sign of
amusement at the question, but Norman White maintained a perfectly straight face.

‘Looks as well as is to be expected.'

‘What is that supposed to mean?'

‘Doesn't seem to eat much, least not on the occasions I've sat behind her at the restaurants she goes to with her girlfriends. Should be eating more, in her condition.'

Nick drummed his fingers impatiently on the small circular table and stared away into the distance. He had been a fool thinking that he could let this thing go. He had been confident that a few weeks would see him back to his usual routine, getting on with work and his social life. In fact, he was doing neither. He was pretty sure that, as far as outward appearances went, he was still running a tight ship, but his heart was no longer in his job. He went in to his office every morning, determined not to let her invade his head, and he returned home every night knowing that he had failed yet again.

‘Think she might be planning on leaving London, though,' Norman said thoughtfully, and Nick's steady drumming on the table stilled.

‘What did you say?'

‘She's thinking of leaving London, going to stay with her parents. Overheard the conversation last Friday. Apparently thinks that London won't work for her and the kiddie when it comes along, and I tend to agree with her. Too fast, this place. My own daughter has a nice little place in Reading. Bit of countryside for the kids, no scrambling on the tube if you want to get anywhere.' He shook his head. ‘Sooner she clears out, the better.'

‘I do not recall asking you for your opinions, Mr White.' Leaving London. When? Tomorrow? Next week? Next month? Maybe she was already packing her
bags and climbing into the taxi right now, on her way to God knew where. Somewhere far away from him.

A surge of panic rushed over him and he could feel himself perspiring slightly. ‘Are you sure about this?'

‘'Less she changes her mind, but don't think that's going to happen, somehow.'

‘When? When is this going to happen?'

‘No date set. Least, not that I've been able to find out.'

‘
Not that you've been able to find out?
Isn't that why I pay you, Mr White? To find out things I would not be able to find out for myself?'

‘Look—' he drained his glass and declined the offer of another ‘—there's nothing more I can do. I'll take my week's pay and if you don't mind I'll call it a day on this.' He stood up and waited while Nick riffled through his wallet and extracted a wad of notes. ‘My advice to you is that you sort out whatever problems you and this lady are having.' He inclined his head and stuck the wad of money into his pocket, keeping it all together with a thick rubber band. ‘Good luck, and if you ever need me again, well, you have my card.'

Nick watched him weave his way towards the exit, then he sat back in the chair, frowning.

So Robert was no longer around. Even the most suspicious part of him could not foresee her concealing a partner in crime with enough cunning to fool an experienced private detective, especially considering that she would not have had the slightest idea that she was being followed.

She was on her own and she was leaving London, probably for good.

And it was time to make some decisions. He had wasted weeks having her spied on, which had proved
what? It certainly hadn't sorted out
his
problem. He was still obsessed with her. Dammit. And what was going to happen when she left? Would she still be in his system?

He sighed and rubbed his eyes with his thumbs. She would always be in his system. Who had he been kidding when he had confidently assumed that out of sight was going to be out of mind? He still wanted to see her, hear her, talk to her, make love to her, even if she
had
betrayed him.

And that was the bitterest pill. The fact that he still wanted her with every ounce of his being, even though she had exploited him.

He wanted her and he had to speak with her. Before she left.

He thought of her flinging her few possessions in a bag, looking around the poky flat to make sure that she hadn't forgotten anything, while outside the taxi waited with its meter running. He pictured her locking the door behind her, sticking the key in an envelope and shoving the envelope under the door for the landlord to find. Lugging her cases down the stairs, panting and resting on every other stair because the pregnancy would make her tire quickly. Then driving away, to the station to catch a train that would take her out of his life for good.

He swallowed down the last of his beer, stood up, and then his feet were taking him outside, making him wait for a taxi, and every shred of pride that he had possessed disappeared as he heard himself giving her address, then sitting back and impatiently waiting for the car to take him to his destination.

He might have guessed that she wasn't going to be in when he arrived outside the converted Victorian house twenty-five minutes later, but now that he was finally here he had no intention of going. In fact, he hadn't felt
so good since the whole mess had taken place weeks ago and he had slung her out of his office.

There was a coffee shop attached to the supermarket just by the underground. Nick bought himself a cappuccino, positioned himself on the most convenient stool at a long counter that faced the side-street, and waited.

He would wait until the cows came home.

He watched the ebb and flow of people hurrying into the tube station, and scurrying out of it. He had managed to make his way through three cappuccinos and was considering a fourth when he saw her emerge. She was carrying three bags and shifting them from one hand to the other, and she looked tired.

He left the coffee shop, hurrying outside and only slowing up when she was in front of him, then he began to gain speed from behind her. She wasn't even aware of him.

‘You should not be carrying those bags in your condition.'

Lucy froze. Literally. To find the bags removed from her as her startled eyes took in Nick's broad, tall body as he stepped in front of her.

‘What are you doing here?'

‘These things weigh a ton. What the hell have you got in here?'

‘Vegetables,' she babbled, barely blinking in case the vision in front of her vanished. ‘It's cheaper to buy them at the market than…
What are you doing here?
'

‘I need to talk to you.'

Memories of their last little
talk
sprang into her mind with disabling clarity and she flinched back.

‘Haven't we done that already, Nick? May I have those bags back, please? I'm quite capable of making it to my flat with them in one piece.'

He ignored the request, instead falling into step with her until they were at the house, at which point she turned to him again.

‘Look, Nick, you said everything you had to say the last time…the last time we were together. Now, just please go. Go and leave me alone. I'm getting on with my life and I don't want you coming here so that you can shout at me again.'
Getting on with her life! Getting on with existing would be closer to the truth.

‘I won't shout at you. I just want to talk.'

‘What about?' Lucy asked antagonistically. She had stretched out her hand for her bags and he had ignored the gesture, until she clicked her tongue in irritation and stuck her key in the lock, letting him follow her up the stairs to her flat.

He could feel the hostility rippling off her in waves as he ascended the staircase in her wake. A month ago he would have been enraged at the thought that she could be hostile towards him when he had every reason to be the one dishing it out. Now things were different.

‘So. You're here. Now, do you mind explaining what you want?' Lucy turned towards him with her hands on her hips and her lips drawn into a thin, straight line. The cold night breeze had ruffled her hair, giving her that tomboyish, elfin appearance that he loved with such maddening desperation.

‘How are you?'

‘I just told you, I'm fine.'

‘And aren't you going to ask me how
I
am?'

‘I don't
care
how you are.' She removed her hands from her hips and folded them mutinously across her chest. The man had a nerve. The last time they had been together he had battered every emotional defence she possessed and, not content with that little performance,
here he was again, larger than life, prepared to dole out more of the same.

‘Well, I am bloody awful, just in case you were a little bit curious.' His black eyes clashed with hers and he stood where he was, not moving an inch.

‘Good. I have no doubt you deserve it.'

‘You are not making this any easier for me.'

‘In which case you're tasting some of your own medicine.' She gave a bitter little laugh that stuck in her throat and threatened to turn into a sob. A stupid, self-pitying sob. And there was no way she was going to give him the satisfaction of seeing that sort of response.

‘You look too thin. You haven't been eating properly.'

‘And since when is my health any of your business?' She couldn't face him. It was too much. She headed towards the kitchen, regretting the impulse the minute she was there because he had followed her in and dwarfed the small room with his presence. ‘I'm nothing but a conniving gold-digger, after all, in cahoots with my lover.'

‘I know you have not seen him since you returned to England.'

‘What?'

‘You heard me.' Nick sat down on one of the small wooden chairs and rested his elbows on the table.

‘And how do you know that?' She tried to inject an element of scorn and indifference into her laugh, but it emerged as a bewildered croak.

‘Because,' Nick said calmly, ‘I have had you followed.'

‘You
what
?'

‘Why do you keep asking me to repeat what I have
said, when we both know that you heard perfectly well the first time around?'

‘You
had me followed
? How
dare
you?'

Nick looked down at his long brown fingers. ‘I needed to find out…'

‘You needed to find out.' The tenor of her voice had dropped into the Arctic sphere. ‘And would you mind telling me exactly what you needed to find out?'

‘Whether you were still seeing that man.' Discomfort made his face darken.

‘By
that
man I take it you mean Robert? My fellow con-man? And why would it have made a difference whether I had been seeing him or not? Surely it wouldn't have mattered to you, since you had managed to expose our evil little plan.'

‘Have you any idea what it took for me to come here?' Nick demanded as self-righteous anger crashed into place. ‘You used me and, believe me, you deserved every accusation I flung at you!'

‘I knew you couldn't just come up here and talk! I knew sooner or later you would start again on the tired old gold-digger road!'

‘You're having another man's baby! How do you think I feel? Do you think it's easy for me to sit here and tell you that I just don't give a damn
whose
baby you are carrying just so long as I am in the picture? Do you think I feel happy at finding myself in the position of needing to employ a private detective because I could not bear the thought of not knowing what was going on in your life?'

Lucy's mouth dropped open and she struggled to make sense of what he was telling her. What
was
he telling her? Surely not that
he loved her
? She could barely breathe.

‘It's
your
baby,' was all she could find to say.

‘That is impossible.' Nick's jaw hardened. Lord, but he wanted to move, except the kitchen was so restricting that his only option was to remain where he was, pinned into the chair by the woman staring at him and lying through her teeth.

‘
How?
How is it
impossible
? We had sex. We weren't using protection at the time. Tell me why it's so impossible for me to get pregnant. Did your mother never tell you about the birds and the bees?'

Nick gritted his teeth together and inhaled deeply. ‘It is impossible because I cannot father children.'

Lucy opened her mouth to speak but nothing emerged, while he continued to stare at her, his body absolutely still.

‘You've had…had a vasectomy?'

Nick laughed harshly. ‘A vasectomy? Me? I would never have a vasectomy. I have always wanted a family of my own!' He'd never thought that he would confess to anyone this secret that he had carried around with him for such a long time, and the feeling of being utterly and completely at someone else's mercy was so alien to him that he literally didn't know where to look or what next to say. But, lord, he adored this woman, and he would adore her child, even if it wasn't his, even if it had been conceived with all the wrong intentions. And she would love him back; he would teach her how.