So why was he polishing off a glass of Chardonnay in the middle of the afternoon? And looking at Khalim with a kind of jealous incredulity.
But then, Rose decided with more than a little satisfaction, Giles rarely met men who transcended his good looks so completely!
She looked around at the plates and cups and wineglasses littered around the sitting room and saw Khalim’s lips curve with undisguised displeasure. Well, let him judge her, she thought proudly as she bent to pick up an empty wine bottle which was in danger of tripping someone up!
‘Lara, you’ve already met Khalim,’ she said shortly. ‘Khalim, I don’t believe you’ve met Giles, who is Lara’s—’
‘Lover,’ drawled Giles arrogantly.
Khalim’s facial muscles didn’t move an inch. ‘It is my pleasure,’ he said smoothly and looked at Rose with a question in his eyes.
Now what? thought Rose helplessly. Did she take him to her room? No, she couldn’t—she just couldn’t. Not with Giles smirking like that and Lara affecting that puppy-dog expression whenever she looked at Khalim.
‘Would you like some coffee?’ she asked weakly.
‘Thank you,’ he replied, without enthusiasm.
The kitchen looked as though someone had tried to start World War Three in there—with every surface covered in used crockery and glasses.
And Lara had used up all the real coffee, thought Rose in disbelief as she picked up a nearly-empty jar and held it up to him.
‘Is instant okay?’ she questioned.
‘Instant?’ he echoed, as though she had just started speaking in Marabanese.
‘Coffee,’ she elaborated.
‘Do you have any tea?’
‘Yes. Yes, I do.’ She made them two cups of herb tea and then cleared the table so that they could sit down and drink it.
They sat facing one another warily across the rising steam from their cups.
Now what? thought Rose again, before getting back some of her customary spirit.
‘You don’t have to stay, you know,’ she bristled.
‘No, I don’t,’ he agreed calmly, thinking that Rose—his Rose—should not have to live amidst such outrageous chaos. ‘But you will not come back with me to the Granchester either, will you?’
‘No.’
‘Do you mind telling me why?’
How to explain that his costly surroundings only emphasised their inequality, and that if she was to spend the tenure of their fragile relationship always on his territory, then it would always seem a little tainted.
‘Can’t we just be like a normal couple?’ she demanded. ‘I don’t always want to be surrounded by your bodyguards and the awe in which people hold you. Everyone always defers to your status—it’s always there. A barrier.’ She nearly said, A barrier towards getting to know you, and then stopped herself. Maybe he didn’t want to get to know her on the level she craved to discover him.
He stared across the table at her. ‘Then we seem to have reached some kind of stalemate, don’t we, Rose? What do you suggest?’
The idea hit her like a thunderclap. If only they could be an ‘ordinary’ couple. The idea grew. ‘Why don’t you rent a flat of your own?’ she suggested. ‘A flat where we can meet as equals?’
‘A flat?’ he repeated.
‘Why, yes.’ Of course, they would never be quite the same as a normal couple. Khalim would never have to go begging to the bank manager for a loan, for example. But neutral territory would give them some kind of equality, surely?
‘There are loads of—’ she forced herself to say the hateful word ‘—short-let flats on the market in London. Furnished or unfurnished—suit yourself. Wouldn’t it be…nice…’ she gave him a kind of feline smile ‘…to have a place where we were free to be ourselves? Within reason, of course,’ she added hastily. ‘Obviously there would have to be some provision for your bodyguard.’
He raised his eyebrows. Good of her! And then he thought about it. And thought some more. Didn’t her words have more than a kernel of truth in them? Wouldn’t a rented flat give him a fleeting kind of freedom? The kind of freedom which most men of his age took for granted? The freedom…and he swallowed as he imagined a whole place of their own. Where Rose could wander around wearing what she wanted.