18
The redhead stared at the last dregs of countryside as it flashed by. In the seat behind her she could hear a couple of guys arranging a game of golf. Someone had ordered a late lunch and the chink, chink of cutlery on china was beginning to annoy her. She’d never understood why people ate on trains: in half an hour or so they’d be nearing the outskirts of London with hundreds of brilliant cafés and restaurants at their disposal.
She flinched as a train whooshed by, going in the opposite direction, vibrating the carriage as it sped past. She wondered what lay ahead and wished it were over. Should she take a cab from King’s Cross or walk? Yes, definitely walk. She needed fresh air in her lungs, needed to oxygenate her brain and concentrate. Everything depended on her memorizing her script by heart. She opened the browser on her phone, then closed it again, remembering she had an app to guide her to her destination. Pressing the menu key, she scrolled to it in readiness to type in a postcode. The device wasn’t playing.
‘Bloody technology!’ She rolled her eyes as her prosperous admirer looked up. ‘Of all the times to go walkabout . . .’ Sighing, she put the phone back in her bag. ‘The mapping system appears to be down. I can’t live without it now. How about you?’
‘Same here . . .’ The man took off his Prada glasses and smiled at her. That sexual tension again. ‘I was considering a glass of wine. Would you like to join me?’
She was all set to decline – she needed her wits about her today – but then a frosty woman sitting diagonally opposite who’d boarded the train at York gave them a filthy look. The redhead had been watching her too. She’d been reading The Stock Trader by Tony Oz. Its strap line: How I Make a Living Trading Stocks. Obviously thought she was a player. Didn’t the silly cow know she was in the company of the best in the business?
‘I’d like that very much.’ The redhead grinned.
Picking up the menu, the man held it out to her.
‘Anything but Sauvignon,’ she said, ignoring the menu. ‘Do you fuck too?’
She didn’t bat an eyelid when a number of passengers turned to look at her. Appalled, the woman across the aisle hid behind her book.
The man stuck out his hand. ‘I’m Ben . . . Foster.’
But the redhead already knew his name, his date of birth, his home address. That he was a professor at Newcastle University. She’d read the passport application he’d been fiddling with since the train pulled out of the Central Station of her home city. She also knew that he was on his way to the University of California, Berkeley, in the not too distant future and that the trip involved an international conference.
It never ceased to amaze her how many people laid themselves open to identity theft. She could read upside down almost as well as the right way up after years of practice. If she were so minded, her interesting stranger would be begging for his life back in a matter of weeks. She was a class act.
He had no fucking idea who he was dealing with.
‘I’m Liv, short for Olivia . . .’ Taking his hand, she looked deep into his eyes. ‘Delighted to make your acquaintance.’
Ben held her gaze. ‘You always this direct on a first date?’
‘Only when I see something or someone I really like.’ She glanced briefly at the Stock Trader book cover being held in front of a stranger’s face. ‘Then it’s no holds barred and I don’t stop until I get what I want. You?’
‘Same, pretty much.’
Yeah right. Who was he trying to kid?
‘Where you from?’ he asked. ‘No, let me guess. South of the river, certainly. Low Fell? Springwell? Am I at least warm?’
The redhead wasn’t happy. She’d spent time and money trying to lose her accent – trying to have no discernible accent at all – and this joker had nailed her good and proper. Her elocution coach was toast. Must try harder, she thought.
‘I’m a linguist . . .’ Ben said, filling in the silence. ‘Accents are my business.’
‘Is there a Mrs Ben?’
‘Indeed.’
‘Of course there is. But what she doesn’t know, right?’
‘That about sums it up . . .’ He blushed like a schoolboy. ‘My father told me if you play with fire you’ll eventually get burnt. You think I should listen to him?’
The redhead swallowed down the bile that rose in her throat, shivering as a ghost crept over her skin. She was somewhere else entirely, back in that dark, dark box room. She knew all about being burnt: she still bore the scars under her very expensive clothes. She could feel them now – tight where the skin had healed itself – puckered pockets of ugliness.
Hideous.
She forced a smile.
As the train rattled on she rubbed her shoeless foot up and down Ben’s inside leg. She loved playing games with men she didn’t know. Loved fucking with their heads, seeing how far she could push them. Over the years she’d found that even the most devoted of husbands came round to her way of thinking. Eventually. Of course, she’d wait until they were absolutely besotted before making her play. A lucrative play it had been up to now.
Shame.
There would still be men like Ben.
But she was going to miss the rest of it.