CHAPTER TEN
ROULAWASSTILLin her pyjamas as Galen drove beneath some vast building and pressed a lot of buttons to get them into an ancient elevator. And then they were going up, to a world that was so blacked out it was like walking in the dark.
‘Here...’
He put on some lights and dimmed them, and she saw there were couches, and no doubt beautiful artwork and such things, but her eyes were fixed on a huge globe.
‘Come on.’ He took her arm. ‘I’ll show you around.’
‘I don’t need a tour.’
‘Then nor do I.’
It was so dark she had to feel her way to find the sofa. It was vast, and just so nice to half sit, half lie in a silence broken only by their buzzing phones, which Galen checked now and then.
So dark that when she reached for her soda and drank it she pulled a face. ‘What the hell...?’
‘Antacid,’ Galen said. ‘Mia poisoned me.’
He’d made her smile, but then her face changed. ‘Has she messaged?’
‘Not yet,’ Galen said. ‘But Yolanda called, and Costa, Leo...’
‘Can we please not talk about it?’
‘Of course.’
He suggested a movie.
‘You watch on a computer?’ Roula frowned as he set up his laptop. ‘I thought you’d be a bit more high-tech than that.’
‘The screen’s in my bedroom.’
‘Galen!’ She half laughed as she stood up. ‘I’m not exactly dressed to kill...’
It was the biggest bed. They could have lain there like separate stars if they chose. But they sat propped up, and he rang out for food, and they watched the most dreadful movie, and she drank iced soda and Galen drank iced tea.
It was so nicenotto talk about it—but of course the world was waiting for her, and despite the blacked-out room she knew it was getting late.
‘I should have brought a toothbrush and things.’
‘I have all that.’ He wandered into his bathroom and came back to hand her a lovely little bag. ‘I sometimes choose the lady’s one when I fly. For guests...’
He must fly first class, because it was a gorgeous bag, crammed with beautiful things. But she was so tense she just grabbed the toothbrush, and as she brushed her teeth she made up her mind.
‘I’m going to call my mother,’ Roula said when she returned to the bedroom. ‘She’s surely finished giving her statement now?’
‘Why don’t I check your messages first?’
Roula nodded.
‘I’m going to shower,’ Galen said as he retrieved their phones. ‘The guest rooms are down the hall, if you want. The second or third door.’
But as he went to the bathroom, rather than heading off, she sat on the bed.
She didn’t want to be alone this night.
Yet she didn’t want sex.