Stockholm Syndrome [01] - Stockholm Syndrome (40 page)

Five minutes later they're back in the bedroom. Lindsay gets a sick sort of thrill out of ruining the fresh sheets.

v. Friday afternoon. Champ de Mars.

There are far too many couples wandering around the Eiffel Tower.

Lindsay's starting to feel a bit claustrophobic again, even with the breeze and sunshine. It's even worse halfway up, getting jostled on every side by people 5 Never be jealous, never. It's
you
I love.

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taking up far more than their fair share of space because they refuse to stop holding hands, and when one of them gets down on one knee to stick a diamond ring on his weeping girlfriend's finger Lindsay kind of wants to throw the bloke down the stairs. It's either that or throw
himself
.

"Let's go," he says tersely, but Valentine doesn't give any indication that he's heard.

"Look at him. Smartarse. He's getting the best blowjob of his
life
tonight, you can see in her eyes."

"I said let's go."

Now the kid just looks at him impatiently, like Lindsay's a pet dog who drags his feet and won't walk where he's told. "Be fair. You've been here before, I'm still looking."

"You're not, you're watching those idiots."

"I'm looking!" He looks out across the city for a few seconds to prove his point, then says, "Okay, I'm done, we can go."

"Why are you so difficult?"

"Cos you'd be bored otherwise." He tries to slip his hand into Lindsay's but Lindsay shakes him off so he starts playing with his own hair instead, like he always does when he's got nothing else to fidget with, twisting a bit around his finger. "Where now?"

"Don't know. Anywhere. We can find a place for lunch if you want.
Not
McCrapburgers," he adds, before Valentine can suggest it. "Real food."

"You mean posh twats' food. Like yesterday. I don't like posh twats'

food. I just want steak and chips. Proper steak. I mean, actually
cooked
."

"You're so English. You'll get guillotined if people hear you. Why are we still here? Let's go."

Valentine's still lingering, and he drops his bit of hair now so he can have another go at Lindsay's hand. Lindsay sighs and lets him, because he's not

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really trying to hold it, he's just gripping his wrist and running the fingers of the other hand lightly across Lindsay's palm like he's playing the nursery rhyme. He sounds sulky when he says, "I can do a
bit
of French."

"Dirty words you learned from Google, yeah."

"I'd pick it up quick if you taught me properly. I'm good at picking stuff up, if people say it first so I know what the squiggly bits over the letters are meant to sound like." The stroking slows and stops, and Lindsay holds his breath and raises an eyebrow and watches the kid lift his hand and press a snuffly sort of kiss into his palm, just at the base of his third finger. When he talks again it's very quiet and his breath tickles Lindsay's skin. "Like, I know how to say veux-tu m'épouser6, now."

Then Valentine punches him in the stomach because he bursts out laughing and they glare furiously at each other all the way to ground level, but it's too sunny to fight for long.

vi. Friday night. Paris hotel.

He thinks he's reached the pinnacle of frustration and fury, but then he goes to slam the door and realises it won't because it's got that slow-close mechanism on it. Valentine laughs, which only makes it worse. Lindsay's never wanted to kill him so badly before. He grabs the kid by the throat and shoves him up against the closing door until it clicks shut, putting enough pressure on his windpipe he can feel the rattle and movement when the kid tries to breathe and swallow. He's not trying to get away, he's got sense enough for that at least, he's just standing there watching Lindsay with his eyes wide and his face starting to flush. Lindsay holds him there with one hand and reaches for his coat pocket with the other. It's hanging up on the pegs beside the door; he has to fight through the fake-fur trim on the kid's favourite green coat to get to his own and he wrenches it off the peg with an infuriated snarl, snapping the loop in the 6 Will you marry me?

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collar. Valentine whines like he's been hit. Lindsay squeezes his throat to make him stop. He finally finds what he's been trying to get at, and half a second later Valentine's breathing in ragged wet gasps because Lindsay's taken his hand off his throat and replaced it with the silencer fixed on the barrel of a black pistol.

"Can't believe you brought a fucking
gun
on a romantic Paris holiday,"

Valentine says. His voice sounds choked and raspy. Lindsay jabs the silencer into the hollow at the bottom of his neck, and Valentine makes a funny little sound and squeezes his eyes shut. "We playing roulette again?"

"I don't fancy your chances much with a semi-automatic."

"Is

it

loaded?"

"Why the fuck would I have an unloaded gun?" He racks the slide to load the chamber, and Valentine's eyes fly back open at the sound. "I told you not to..." What? Talk to anyone else? Smile, dance, smoke? Sit there at the table in the corner of the dark noisy bar with his chair shoved back and turned away from Lindsay so he can rest his hands on that chambermaid's thighs, just where her slutty miniskirt ends, and let her breathe the last of the blunt into his mouth?

"I don't want you doing drugs," he says. It sounds lame. "Not even that."

"You're gonna shoot me cos I had a
smoke
?"

"You kissed that girl."

"No I never!"

"I

saw
you, do you think I'm blind? You were sitting right there next to me, I saw you."

"I never kissed her, it was just a shotgun, everybody was doing it." He almost smiles at that, even as he's trying to edge away from the barrel jammed against the underside of his chin. "Heh. Shotgun." Lindsay slaps him over the cheek as hard as he can, and Valentine stays there where he ends up, with his head turned to the side from the force of it and resting against the door. He's got his eyes closed again. He's breathing quietly, like he's trying to keep calm, and Lindsay hates him for it; he wants him to break. He can see the pulse beating in

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the kid's neck, and nudges the barrel up against the beat.

"I'll do it. I will. Don't you believe me?"

"I

believe

you."

"Why aren't you scared?"

"I

am."

"Why aren't you trying to get away?"

"Cos you'll shoot me."

"Why..." This is what he wanted, the kid motionless and scared and doing what he's told but it's not helping, everything's just making him want to burst out crying. He won't, not over this stupid whoreish little shit and his utter lack of understanding about what's acceptable behaviour. He just needs to get a hold on himself, swallow hard to clear his throat, try to concentrate past the alcohol buzzing round his brain. Very slowly and deliberately, he moves the gun up to press hard against Valentine's temple. "You cried last time. Why aren't you crying?"

"Thought you were gonna kill yourself before."

"I'm going to kill
you
. Why aren't you crying?"

"Will it help? I can, if you want."

"Shut up. Shut up."

"Sorry." He doesn't move his head but he's looking at Lindsay now, sideways. He's clearly frightened but he's calm, he looks much more in control than Lindsay feels, and that makes it so much worse. "Shoot me cos you want me gone, not cos of something you think I did when I never."

"
Shut up
." The kid nods his head, just slightly, and goes silent again, except for another pained little noise when the gun digs in a bit more. "You have to do what I say."

"I do. I will."

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"Don't... you can't... I don't want you to..."

"What?" Valentine says, quietly. "Tell me. So I won't."

"I

don't know
." He swings the gun around and shoots the wall, up in the corner near the ceiling. It's still noisy, even with the suppressor, and it makes Valentine flinch, but there's nobody else staying on their floor to hear. "Loaded, see?"

"I said I believe you."

"Why aren't you scared?" he demands, but the noise and recoil seem to have snapped him sane again and he suddenly feels tired and stupid. Slowly, very slowly, Valentine reaches out for his hand, stroking gently over his clutching fingers until he relaxes them and lets the kid slip the gun out of his grasp and put it on the table next to the door.

"You

are
gonna shoot me," he says. "One day." He's still holding Lindsay's hand, he's looking down at where their fingers are wound together and not at Lindsay's face, but his voice is clear. "I ain't thick. I know you'll get sick of me. You can't just let me go, I know too much, you'd be freaked out forever in case I snitched. You'll get proper sick of me one day, not just annoyed, and then you'll shoot me. It's okay."

"I won't get sick of you," Lindsay says. He feels numb and far away, as if it's somebody else talking, and almost like he's going to throw up, a sort of lurch in his stomach like when you're at the top of the Angel tube station escalator and somebody a bit too eager to get on the train shoves you from behind.

"Yeah you will. I'm gonna be with you til I die, though. Least I can say that and
know
it's true, how many people can do that? Bit romantic, really. If you squint, and look at it sideways."

"I don't like you talking to people," he blurts out, and Valentine finally looks up at him. His eyes are bright and his slapped cheek is dark, but he's smiling just a little.

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"Tell me I'm yours."

"You're

mine."

"Tell me all the time, every day."

"You'll get sick of
me
."

"
Jamais
," he says, emphatically, and drops Lindsay's hand so he can put his arms up round his neck and hug him so tightly it's more like being choked.

vii. Saturday morning. Paris hotel.

The

plan

was
that they'd actually leave the hotel at some ungodly early hour today, to cram in as much sightseeing as possible, but twenty minutes after Valentine slipped onto Lindsay's lap for a good-morning kiss, warm and drowsy from only just waking up, they're still in the armchair going at it like teenagers.

Lindsay keeps thinking he's going to get bored of all this kissing that doesn't go anywhere, but somehow he never does. It's so stupid and juvenile, he thinks, even as he's letting a gentle moan out through his nose and winding his fingers in the kid's hair to tell him without words
don't move and don't stop, ever, unless I
say
.

The phone ringing is like an electric shock. They both jump and crack their noses together, then Valentine starts laughing with his hand clamped over his face.

"Fucking hell, watch it, my nose is big enough anyway."

"Accident. Pass me my phone, will you?"

"No I will not. Don't answer it."

"Might be important. Pass it here."

He's grumbling but he does it. Lindsay hits the button to answer and puts his hand over Valentine's mouth to get a bit of peace. "Lindsay Brown."

"I

know
it's Lindsay Brown. I wouldn't ring my 'Lindsay Brown' number and expect Shirley Temple, would I?" It's Ty, as characteristically cheerful as 329

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ever for this time of the morning. "You wanna pick your phone up when you hear that ringy noise. Usually means somebody's trying to get hold of you, like I've been doing the last two days."

"I'm on holiday."

"You're on a permanent holiday, you lazy fuck."

"Do you want a postcard and a stick of rock?"

"No."

Valentine's licking his palm now. Lindsay tries not to smile, and squeezes his hand tighter on the kid's face. "So what
do
you want?"

"Tell me you've not forgotten your goddaughter's birthday."

"...Course I've not forgotten."

"Because the post's just come and I don't see a French postmark."

"Of

course
I've not forgotten!" he insists, taking his hand off Valentine's mouth and running it through his own hair instead, distracted and slightly panicky. Fortunately, he's good at thinking quickly. "We're flying over later to surprise her, deliver a present in person. Sorry, I should've let you know, have you got plans?"

"Party at the house. All the family. About seventeen billion small people from school. You fucking better be there. Help me with the crowd-control when the E-numbers get working."

Fuck
, he mouths at Valentine. The kid obediently puts his hand between Lindsay's legs and leans in to lick his neck. Lindsay grabs his hand and glares at him.

"Talk to her, tell her you're coming. She thinks you forgot."

Lindsay always feels awkward talking to Melissa, still. He can't connect with children, they're like a completely different species, and ten-year-old girls are the worst of all. It's getting more bearable as she gets older. He's got her listening to jazz and some early Tom Waits. They bonded over Jimmy Stewart

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one Christmas. He bought her a little blue acoustic guitar and he teaches her chords every time he goes over. He misses her more than he ever imagined he would, living so far away now, but he still feels clumsy around her – it's even worse now Valentine's around in jarring contrast, his easy rapport with children and his willingness to sit on the floor with her and her little sister and play with Barbies.

"Let me talk to her."

"Don't

interrupt."

"Let me talk to her!"

"There's a performing monkey here wants to say hello. Shall I tell him to get lost?"

"Just gimme the phone, you wanker. Oops," he adds, when he's holding the phone to his ear. "Sorry. Don't tell your dad I said that, he'll have me."